The activists who picketed the Government building simultaneously with the weekly cabinet session did not elaborate as to how the authorities should achieve these goals, but stressed that Armenia must not recognize Nagorno-Karabakh as part of Azerbaijan or make other “unilateral concessions” at negotiations with Baku.
At the cabinet session Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian spoke about the August 16 discussions at the UN Security Council of the deepening humanitarian crisis in Nagorno-Karabakh brought on by Azerbaijan’s de facto blockade of the Lachin corridor, the only road connecting Armenia with the region. He said that they highlighted the fact of the closure of the Lachin corridor by Azerbaijan.
Pashinian again urged Azerbaijan to end “the illegal closure” of the Lachin corridor and allow the passage of two dozen Armenian trucks with humanitarian aid currently stranded near the entrance to the corridor on the Armenian side.
“Azerbaijan, on the one hand, has closed access to Nagorno-Karabakh for 100 tons of flour sent by the Armenian government, on the other hand, it does not allow the people of Nagorno-Karabakh to harvest the sown wheat [by shooting at farmers]. This is yet another fact that substantiates the thesis put forward by international experts that Azerbaijan is carrying out a genocide through hunger and, therefore, the opening of the Lachin corridor should be considered as a step to prevent genocide,” the Armenian prime minister said.
Pashinian reiterated that as the best way of ending the situation Yerevan sees a dialogue between Stepanakert and Baku, reaffirming Armenia’s commitment to peace.
Government critics see the kind of position coupled with Pashinian’s repeated public statements that Armenia is ready to recognize Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity as a blow to the right of Nagorno-Karabakh Armenians to self-determination. They also claim that Pashinian and his political team thereby renege on their election pledge.
Lilit Kocharian, one of the activists who initiated today’s picket, told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service that one of their goals was to remind the prime minister about his 2021 election pledge of seeking “remedial secession” for Nagorno-Karabakh.
“It is under this slogan that he went to the elections, and now he stands up and says that he has a mandate and can do whatever he wants. But it is not so. We just want to make it clear that he does not have a mandate to hand over Artsakh [Nagorno-Karabakh – ed.], he does not have a mandate from Armenia to make unilateral concessions at the expense of Armenia and Artsakh, something that has been happening for the last three years,” Kocharian said.
She said that before demanding anything from international bodies, they need to raise problems in front of local politicians and statesmen, insisting that Armenia should be the guarantor of the security of Karabakh Armenians instead of handing over the responsibility to Russian peacekeepers.
“These people [Karabakh Armenians] bear passports of citizens of the Republic of Armenia, and it is written there who the guarantor of the holders of those passports is. It is the Republic of Armenia,” Kocharian said.
Another civil initiative called “Batsum” (Opening) has been collecting dry food near the United Nations office in Yerevan for a month, demanding that the international organization deliver it to the “besieged Artsakh people facing the threat of hunger.”
According to Narek Ayvazian, a member of the initiative group, they monitor the stock 24 hours a day, believing that it will eventually reach its destination.
“In any case, we hope that what we have done by raising our voice in support of our compatriots in front of international institutions is having some effect, including on decision-makers,” Ayvazian said.
The Batsum initiative announced a simultaneous rally in Yerevan, Stepanakert, Los Angeles and New York later this week demanding the opening of the vital corridor between Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh.