– Mr Sahnazaryan, do you agree with Levon Ter-Petrosyan’s recent announcement according to which Karabakh has already been given out? According to your opinion, what is the status of the process of Karabakh conflict negotiation?
– It is clear that the process of Karabakh negotiation has entered an active phase. Even there are signs showing that there is international pressure on the parties to make peace. According to the information I have the new principles of Madrid consist of 14 points, 6 out of which have already been published. Generally I would say that this is not a conflict settlement but a process when Azerbaijan wants to get rid of the results of the war and return to the situation before the war. I don’t see compromises here; this is done by one party only. Even the fact that there will not be international peacekeepers in the region but monitors shows that Armenia is losing. We have always said that in order to provide security of Karabakh there should be two types of guarantees: political and military. Since 98 this policy was changed and due to the efforts of Oskanyan and Kocharyan this issue turned from being an issue of self-determination to an issue of lands. And now we see the results of this policy. Since 98 Armenia has not been able to resist a number of decisions and resolutions against the country in different international institutions. The best example is the resolution adopted by the UN in March of the previous year. Now due to the efforts of Azerbaijan there are two more draft resolutions in the UN General Assembly and we should not expect anything good from them. In this active phase of negotiations Azerbaijan is actively lobbying for the adoption of these resolutions in the UN because it has the goal to strengthen its positions in the OSCE MG and show that the MG is not the last instance for it and it will continue to use the other international institutions for its purposes. It also shows the role and position in the international community. The support they have in the UN proves one more time that they have stronger positions. However in 90s the Armenian party was trying to develop the issue in such institutions and Azerbaijan was trying to prevent. The situation has changed and maximum what our delegates could do is to prevent them from developing issues in such institutions. In the recent period Azerbaijan could prove that it has become a factor and should be taken into account in the Armenian-Turkish and Russian-Turkish relations, as well as all regional projects. Azerbaijan is implementing a very active foreign policy. It has harshly said “no” both to Moscow, Brussels and Washington. Even it was very critical to Turkey and it did not like the football diplomacy and made Turkey to take into account its interests as well. Now they also want to show that the Armenian-Turkish relations depend on them too. Now the most balanced and active foreign policy in the region is Azerbaijan’s foreign policy. Such a factor was Armenia in the beginning of 90s.
– Do you mean that there was no improvement in the Armenian-Turkish relations due to the fact that Azerbaijan did not want it?
– Certainly, Azerbaijan could show that Turkey is not independent with its policy related to the relations with Armenia. Currently there is a serious tension in the relations between Ankara and Baku. Now Ankara wants to attract Baku. It would be naïve to think that Turkey may open the border without any significant improvement in the issue of Karabakh conflict. Serzh Sargsyan’s football diplomacy brought poor results for Armenia. I was in Turkey recently and after a number of meetings with politicians I had the impression that they had got all what they had been dreaming of – the roadmap, a commission of historians at a governmental level, and now they are keeping these agreements in their shelves and are waiting for new things to be done related to the issue of Karabakh, in order to discuss the agreed roadmap after all these things are done. The Armenian government must discover these documents. I think that by setting a deadline on the day of the soccer match Serzh Sargsyan made a mistake again. He should have developed another precondition too, according to which if those preconditions are not done till a certain date, all the agreements before should not be valid any more.
– If the situation with the conflict of Karabakh is so serious, why does not the ANC organize public events, demonstrations to inform people about it?
– The ANC has published its approach clearly, we have published our research and ideas. The ANC does not want to organize public events now because the issue of Karabakh has always been an issue of self-determination for us. This means that all what is acceptable for Karabakh is acceptable for Armenia as well.
– Don’t you think that by doing so the ANC is escaping from responsibility? Are the rumors saying that Ter-Petrosyan’s and Serzh Sargsyan’s opinions concerning the issue of Karabakh are the same?
– These are wrong rumors because the version of settlement that was on the table in 97 is not connected with the existing one. This is the cheap propaganda of the authorities. That is the reason why the authorities escape from any direct debates with the opposition. They are saying two things, first they say that this version of settlement is good, and second, they say if they don’t do this there will be a war. I don’t exclude the possibility of a war, but if this is a good version, why don’t they discover it? It is a pity that today Armenia is not a subject in international relations but it is an object. A government that lacks legitimacy cannot protect its state interests in international relations. The only thing they protect is their power.
– The rumors concerning extraordinary elections are getting more active from time to time. Do you think it is realistic to hold extraordinary elections?
– The authorities will organize extraordinary elections and will release the political prisoners only under pressure. We should not expect a good attitude and will from them. They released the political prisoners under inner pressure and some pressure from outside as well. We will continue our struggle in order not to leave any political prisoners in Armenia.
– In the beginning of the year the opposition leaders believed that there would be a massive discontent as a result of the crisis resulting in change of the power. And now it seems that the possible change of power is connected with the issue of Karabah conflict settlement.
– We have never relied on the social and economic situation. It is the vice versa, despite the government which does not have a specific project, we have developed projects for the purpose of resisting the impact of the international crisis for the purpose of helping the bad situation of our people. In October we took a long break and announced that it was a crucial phase in the Karabakh conflict settlement process and we did it for the purpose of letting the authorities be free and not to make extra compromises. If we wanted we could use that issue. The ANC has been relying on the people only.
– There are opinions, according to which Russia is not interested in the settlement of Karabakh conflict and development of the Armenian-Turkish relations because in that case its military presence in our country will not be necessary any more. Thus, the positions of Russia in the region will be weakened as well.
– This is self-delusion. Do they want us to rely on Russia, give up and not to solve the problem? Firstly, since 98 the status-quo has been changing every hour and it was not in our interests. What if Russia’s policy changes one day, of course if it has not been changed already? I am personally concerned of the recent development of Russian-Turkish ties and some agreements particularly. Let’s not forget that Armenia is just an outpost for Russia, which will be sacrificed for political purposes whenever they need. Russia is unpredictable in its foreign policy. In any conflict the frozen status of the conflict if beneficial to one of the parties, which is developing faster than the other one.