According to “Haykakan Zhamanak,” analysts are pessimistic about a fresh meeting of the Armenian and Azerbaijani foreign ministers scheduled for December 6 because “there is nothing new about the resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.” “Everyone is sticking to their guns and nothing suggests that the parties could reach a common denominator in the foreseeable future,” writes the paper.
“Hayots Ashkhar” says, for its part, that the weekend military exercises in Nagorno-Karabakh testify to “positive changes in not only the international community’s attitudes towards the negotiation process but also Armenian perceptions of their essence.” The paper says that the official scenario of the drills, which involved defensive and counteroffensive operations, “mirrored our latest successes on the diplomatic front.” All international mediators and major foreign powers, it claims, came up with initiatives in November aimed at keeping the Karabakh conflict “frozen.” It says that Turkey’s efforts to reverse this trend by getting Russia to put pressure on Armenia have ended in failure.
“Zhoghovurd” shrugs off recent government pledges to seriously clamp down on corruption in Armenia. The paper says that in making such statements government officials try to look so serious that “they almost start believing what they say.” “They started those shows long ago but those have intensified of late,” it speculates, seeing a connection between the government’s anti-corruption rhetoric and the signing of Armenia’s landmark agreement with the EU. “It is laughable to see the authorities fight against a vice which is the reason why they came into existence in the first place,” it says.
“Past” says that the Armenia-EU Comprehensive and Enhanced Partnership Agreement (CEPA) is first and foremost a “political document.” “For Serzh Sarkisian, this is the only diplomatic victory of his ten-year tenure,” writes the paper. “In the existing situation, it is also a huge carte blanche for his legitimacy. And it’s a carte blanche from both Russia and Europe.”
(Tigran Avetisian)
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