Pashinyan weighs in on Armenia’s ties to Russia in AFP interview

PanARMENIAN.Net - Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has weighed in on Armenia’s close ties or trust towards Russia in an interview with AFP, given that Russia did not meet Armenia's expectations during and after the war.

“That same question could be asked about any country, “how do you justify your good relationship with any country when in Nagorno Karabakh human rights are violated, there is a humanitarian crisis, ethnic cleansing is being prepared and those countries are not reacting properly?”, even the countries that consider human rights and the UN Charter, democracy and ethnic tolerance to be priorities for them,” Pashinyan said.

“So now you want to say that all those countries with which we have good relationship are doing their maximum to overcome the humanitarian crisis in Nagorno Karabakh? My direct answer to you will be no for a variety of reasons: some of them are buying gas, some are buying oil, some are thinking about their banking systems, and others have other concerns. But it would not be correct to say that they doing nothing.

“We are not speaking about political or inter-ethnic conflict, we are talking about ongoing process of genocide, and not just its preparation. Any genocide you know wasn’t like that they woke up one day and started killing people, slaughtering people. Let’s go back to the Holocaust, the one that the world knows the best. Did Hitler come to power and the next morning pulled out the sword and started chasing the Jews in the streets? It lasted years, it was a process, which could have been well predicted. It was expressed in rhetoric, it was expressed in policy.

“Now in Nagorno Karabakh they have created a Ghetto, in the most literal meaning of the word. I say again, sometimes we do not deliver the terms understandably, we just give people headlines, “humanitarian crisis”. Some percentage of our audience well understands all the details of what’s going on, but the majority does not understand, that’s not their business, that’s not their activity.

“But Azerbaijan is creating a Ghetto in Nagorno Karabakh today. What’s the international community’s reaction? Russia asks us how we justify our good relationships with the West, is that what you expect of them to make a semi-statement that the Lachin Corridor should be opened? Yes, the Lachin Corridor has to be opened. The International Court of Justice rendered a decision back on February 22. That is a decision of the highest international court. By the way, Russia really doesn’t well recognize the jurisdiction of that court, but the international community, with the exception of Russia, recognizes it as the highest court. And now Russia asks us “Is this what you expected of the West, when establishing such close relations with the EU and other partners, your expectation was that they would say, for example once a week that the Lachin Corridor should be opened?” In the same way as we justify our relations with the West, in the same way we justify our relations with Russia. Like according to the logic of some western circles our relationship with Russia is not justified, because Russia is not fulfilling all its obligations, and is not meeting all of our expectations, similarly, Russia tells us the same about the West.”