When last week the PACE’s two c0-rapporteurs on Armenia, John Prescott and Georges Colombier didn’t present their report on the report of the parliamentary committee on the investigation of the March 1 tragic events because of “strictly justified reasons” the governmental elite of Armenia got very encouraged and felt well complimented. The committee was due to specifically look into an Armenian parliamentary report that largely justified the use of deadly force against opposition protests that followed the disputed presidential election of February 2008. And it reached to the level when the RPA member Edward Sharmazanov qualified the absence of the Europeans as an evidence of “closing the page of March 1.” “Even if the issue was discussed by the Monitoring Committee, I am sure it would hardly be included on the agenda of the PACE’s plenary session,” Sharmazanov said. He accused the opposition of continuing to “exploit” the 2008 post-election unrest for political purposes. It turns out that in the report of the PACE, which was to be publicized, the co- rapporteurs are expressing no confidence to the report of the parliamentary committee headed by Samvel Nikoyan. However it is more worrisome that the PACE doesn’t publicize the report than the fact that they are expressing a vote of no confidence to the ad hoc. It is also worrisome that the government of Armenia doesn’t understand or pretends that doesn’t understand what’s hidden behind this behavior. But in fact everything is more than clear. The PACE has made the government of Armenia understand (with clear text) that their evaluation may be very strict regarding the events of March 1 if Armenia doesn’t abide with the obligations of normalizing relations with Turkey or refuses to follow the “right” track of resolving the NKR conflict. It means that by the absence of the co-rapporteurs the PACE has only given time to Armenia. And prior to that probably the RPA members will come back to the mode of “cursing the Europeans.”
