According to Gegham Baghdasaryan, former MP of the parliament of Karabakh, expert and the editor-in-chief of the Analiticon journal, says that the evaluations and opinions of the Freedom House and other international organizations saying that Karabakh is not a free country are unacceptable for the Karabakhi authorities and government.
“Frankly said I think that the current situation in Karabakh is more close to being partly free than not free. But I have said that both of these statuses are shameful. Why should Karabakh be free? What does stop the authorities of Karabakh from letting be free? Nobody thinks about this question in Karabakh. We could be and had to be a free country and we had the necessary preconditions there. After the war there were great and fantastic conditions for us to be a free country. One must be a looser not to use this opportunity,” said G. Baghdasaryan. Meanwhile he says that democracy has been degrading in Karabakh since 2007. He says he does not understand why one joint candidate was nominated in 2007 and why a process was started to collect all political powers under one umbrella. “Personally I do not understand why the opposition of those times, the ARF and the Movement 88 joined the authorities. Today an environment has been created under the notion of unity, which excludes the possibility of debates and competition. There is no opposition in Karabakh,” said G.Baghdasaryan who claims not to be pro-government. In answer to the question what the people of Karabakh think about the opinions that there is no opposition in Karabakh and if there are not any people that claim to be opposition G.Baghdasaryan said, “There is a big group of people in Karabakh who do not like the policy and the work of the authorities. But people think that it is better to solve the problem of external threats first and then solve the problem of democracy.” He believes the governments of both Armenia and Karabakh should change. “The authorities in Karabakh are passed from hands to hands, while they had to be passed from heads to heads. It is time for new heads and we must do our best to give a place to the bright heads,” said Baghdasaryan.
Concerning the ongoing negotiations over the conflict of Karabakh the former MP said that he did not see any new tendencies in the negotiations. He believes the efforts of the mediators are aimed at keeping stability because they are afraid that one of the parties, namely Azerbaijan may give up on the negotiations and try to solve the problem with other methods. But on the other hand he believes there are no serious reasons to insist on it. According to him, Azerbaijan is making more militaristic statements whenever there are any opportunities in the negotiations to find a solution. “With this strategy Azerbaijan is trying to show that its participation in the negotiations is a compromise already. But the principle of non-application of force should not be a condition or compromise but obligatory responsibility,” said G.Baghdasaryan. He thinks there will not be any improvements in the negotiations in the near future, which is proven by the announcement of the EU representative Peter Semnebi concerning the importance of maintaining the ceasefire regime after his meeting with the Azeri president in Baku. “In a word, I do not think there may be improvements in the negotiations this year. All efforts will be mostly targeted at the continuation of the negotiation process.”
Concerning the opinions that the case of Sudan to organize a referendum for freedom may be a precedent for Karabakh he ay that it cannot be a precedent because in Sudan they had the agreement of all parties for a referendum. According to him, it is a precedent only from the prospective of having a new independent country on the world map. “At the time when the issue of Karabakh was raised the UN had 150 members. Now this number is 200. It means that new countries are originating in the world,” said G.Baghdasaryan.
Baghadasaryan believes before the recognition of Karabakh the Armenians should help the recognition of the Karabakhi factor. “Karabakh must have its word concerning all the issues connected with it. Karabakh cannot make independent decisions as long as the Armenian authorities are participating in the process of the formation of the government of Karabakh,” said Baghdasaryan.
He also commented on the bill on recognizing Karabakh developed by Heritage party and said that it is a positive initiative. “As the two Armenian states are not doing anything for the purpose of recognizing Karabakh, I highly appreciate that initiative which is aimed at the recognition of Karabakh. From this prospective I have a positive opinion about this initiative developed by the Heritage party. On the other hand I think it is very important to recognize the factor of Karabakh. I think it is more important than the recognition of Karabakh itself. In the past ten years this factor has been lost. Unfortunately Karabakh is not a factor not only in the negotiations but the Armenian format as well, even in the inner relations. Unfortunately Karabakh has stopped being a subject and has turned to being an object. This is explained with the fact that the authorities of Karabakh do not have much resource and wish to implement an independent policy. This will continue as far as the Armenian authorities take part in the process of formation of the government of Karabakh,” said G.Baghdasaryan.