WHY SHOULD WE ALWAYS ACT AS CONTRADICTORS?

We continue the interview with Republican MP ARTAK DAVTYAN who presents his views on the unused potentials of the Armenian diplomacy and the “mechanisms” of running the Turkish-Azerbaijani blockade

“You insist that Armenia’s encirclement by Azerbaijan and Turkey impedes the development of democracy in our country. Some people may contradict you by saying that the encirclement has nothing to do with democracy; it is just a pretext for justifying the anti-democratic manifestations of the ‘authoritarian’ regime.”
“How come? You are aware that one of the strategic trends of the Government’s activity is the poverty eradication program. I don’t think there will be any divergence of opinions with regard to the fact that we would have greater achievements and solve much more problems in case the blockade was raised.
A significant part of our population, more than 860 thousand citizens currently live below the line of poverty. In such conditions it is, mildly speaking, unrealistic to discuss the principles of democracy and certain European values.
It is also very important for the people to believe in the same European and Western values. And how can they believe in them when Armenia has been blockaded for 20 years, i.e. since the country’s gaining independence? But, strange though it is, the European community won’t touch upon the issue. Moreover, considering its own interests, it provides direct or indirect assistance to all the programs circumventing Armenia.
In such conditions the following question comes up: does the international community promote the peaceful settlement of the conflict by assisting and hence – contributing to the process of strengthening Azerbaijan, at the same time refusing to respond to the bellicose statements of the latter? And if Azerbaijan has decided to unleash a war against us once again, what other task is left to us apart from eliminating the threat to our security? That’s to say, we have a task to extend the security zone with the purpose of preventing any attempt by the neighboring country to extend its ‘vital’ territory at the expense of our state.
We must speak about this all the time and present our viewpoints, so as the international community will be held accountable and explain why its own system of values is being ignored and why a country like Azerbaijan which, with its bellicose ambitions, endangers both the regional energy and communication programs and the sums of its tax-payers, should become powerful at the expense of Armenia.
So, we should view all this as some integrity, as an action plan and introduce all these issues to our Western partners in succession, depending on the urgency of the problem and, being in constant and systematic cooperation with the international organizations, make our attitudes accessible to them. It is also in consideration of this factor that we insist on Karabakh’s having a land border with Armenia because we have seen and are aware of the consequences of a 100 percent blockade.”
“The Armenian organizations of the Diapsora are working diligently for achieving the international recognition of the Armenian Genocide, but they don’t seem to make equivalent efforts for voicing those issues in the international tribunals.”
“Naturally, the Diaspora should be involved in this process as well and create relevant resources and provide an information field for making our views clear and perceivable. Let’s also bear in mind that being somehow detached from Armenia, the Diaspora anticipates our Foreign Ministry to give it some impulses. And if such impulses are missing, the Diaspora does not make sepcific efforts that direction.
Perhaps, it was also due to the fact that we once assumed a ‘childish’ posture by saying that ‘there’s nothing wrong with us, and if we have lived without roads for so long, we’ll go on living like this for 100 years to come.’ I don’t think this approach is justified. Especially considering that the closed roads pose a danger both to our economy and the democratization of our country. If the West and all the organizations advocating democracy, as well as the democratic countries raise their voice and adopt a resolution condemning our country’s encirclement, they will thus stimulate our people’s belief in the western values, democracy and the same international organizations.
This is a powerful impulse that the Foreign Ministry prompts in which direction to work. In this respect I attach importance to our President's recent statement with regard to the importance of raising the country’s blockade.
Our most important argument which we, for some reason, remember only from time to time is the following: the Karabakh war was forced by Azerbaijan, and each war has its consequences. In this particular case, the consequence is what we have now.
As regards the “occupied territories, everybody realizes well that if we really had such problem, we might have occupied 80 or 100 percent of Azerbaijan and not 20 percent as claimed by the country. And this is something that didn’t happen.
Summing up what I said, I have to state once again that we must make the problem of the blockade one of our pivotal issues – one of the priorities of Armenia’s foreign policy.
LILIT POGHOSYAN

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