Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan participated in the Armenian Democracy Forum today. The event is being held for the second time with the joint efforts of “Freedom House,” an international human rights organization, and “Union of Informed Citizens” NGO.
The President of the Republic, Vahagn Khachaturyan, Deputy Speaker of the National Assembly, Ruben Rubinyan, Deputy Prime Minister Tigran Khachatryan, members of the Government, MPs, representatives of diplomatic corps accredited in Armenia, civil society, and expert circles were present at the Armenian Democracy Forum.
Prime Minister Pashinyan made a speech in which he stated:
“Honorable President of the Republic of Armenia,
Dear representatives of the diplomatic corps,
Dear Chairman of the “Freedom House” organization,
Dear attendees,
I welcome holding the “Armenian Forum of Democracy” for the second year in a row, and I hope this critical event will continue every year and become annual.
I want to record that in the Republic of Armenia, the Internet is free, the press is free, and elections are free. But I don’t want to highlight this as an achievement or an achievement; I want to highlight this as a routine that results from all of us working together.
When the non-violent, velvet, people’s revolution took place in 2018, and we said that democracy is the leading brand of Armenia, many people were suspicious because they said that in the conditions of post-revolutionary euphoria, the government does not particularly need and need to restrict freedoms. But the fact that the “Armenian Forum of Democracy” was held in our country for the first time in 2022 and not in 2019, I think, is quite a telling fact because when we emphasized the freedom of the extraordinary parliamentary elections in 2018, it was also somewhat emphasized the question is, what will the elections be like under other conditions? Unfortunately, those other conditions occurred, and we noted that the polls in those other conditions are not at all less free and democratic, and that is the assessment of the international community, which does not mean that the elections in both 2018 and 2019 were flawless. Of course, the political climate and culture are issues that still need to be addressed.
In this regard, yes, I must emphasize that democracy is the leading brand of Armenia, and this is our belief and our strategy. It is not at all the result of accidents due to circumstances. This is a conscious political course that the government and people of the Republic of Armenia are pursuing.
In this sense, very serious institutional reforms are still underway, which should bring with them a higher level of human rights protection, a higher level of the rule of law, and a higher level of anti-corruption policy. But the Republic of Armenia also enjoys the results of these freedoms. And I believe that the high economic growth we have today is also the result of financial freedom because if the economy was manageable and managed by the state, I think that, especially in the post-war period, we would have very serious and profound problems. But since these freedoms have also reached the level of the economy, this freedom came to our aid at the most challenging and decisive moment.
I also want to record that there is no internal threat to democracy in the Republic of Armenia. I am sure of this. All possible threats to the democracy of the Republic of Armenia are external, and these threats are, of course, well-known and visible to everyone. But it is also important that we prove together and answer perhaps the densest and most challenging question among the public in Armenia today. And the question is: can democracy also provide security? The answer is yes to this question, but it remains to be proven. I hope that we will be able and somewhere we will be able to respond positively to this question.
In this regard, I want to emphasize that democracy will continue to be the critical leading brand of Armenia. Still, it will also continuously have related and supporting brands, one of which will be high economic growth and the second – peace. It is this trinity that will serve the very purpose. Because, after all, we are talking about freedoms, but freedom is not the ultimate goal in itself, freedom is a means to ensure human well-being and happiness.
This is the highest goal that we set before ourselves because our task is that in the conditions of freedom and democracy, a person in the Republic of Armenia should be prosperous, protected, happy, and able to do what he loves and ensure the results of his favorite work own well-being and also the well-being of the country. Of course, democracy, in our understanding, is a necessary but not sufficient condition for this, and we must provide the rest of the institutional prerequisites so that this vision becomes a reality.
Thank you”:
Next, Nikol Pashinyan participated in the panel discussion under the title “Democratic development in the presence of national security challenges” held within the framework of the forum and answered a number of questions.
Referring to the ideology of the “Civil Agreement” party and also to the question of how the security situation created after 2020 has changed the understanding of the governance system, the Prime Minister noted. “We have said that the ideology of the “Civil Contract” party is beyond “isms”. They are somewhat different things. And honestly, during this period and before that, and after that, I have thought a lot about that topic, and there are also those debates within our party. Our ideology has been democracy itself. I said today that democracy is a strategy for us, but democracy was the ideology that pushed us toward the revolution. And that is the reason why democracy became, was, and continues to be the brand of Armenia.
In this regard, there was a provision in the speech of the President of the Republic, which gives rise to a very interesting parallel and is related to your question. The President spoke about the relationship between democracy and the Nagorno-Karabakh problem. This is a serious topic, and for me, one of the most critical problems of this topic is that the lack of democracy in the Republic of Armenia or the attitude towards democracy has served as a tool so that we all do not know the whole truth about the Karabakh issue. This is a critical nuance. Of course, I don’t want to start a political debate to create a political discussion. Still, the model that only a few people are aware of the Karabakh issue at the level of an expert is the most evident proof of that, and the biggest problem we have faced is precisely that. : And this is the reason that now we are in democratic conditions about the Karabakh issue, that we learn new information, bring up new meanings and contexts of famous words, and this is an important detail.”
Speaking about Government-civil society cooperation, Nikol Pashinyan noted. “Recently, we had a discussion in the Government in a closed working mode, and during the debate, it came to the point that indeed we constantly see that in terms of the involvement of civil society, efficiency is not always at the proper or desired level. We tried to investigate the issue and understand what the problem was quickly. And when I looked at the hall, officials were present; I understood the problem: all those present were from civil society. This is where the conflict is that no one often notices this absence of civil society in the discussions or looks at it from the side view because wherever you look, everyone is from civil society. Our government today, the parliamentary majority, the civil society today, has a majority, an important detail. But I’m not saying this because you don’t need to change anything. On the contrary, one must first understand the problem in order to solve it, and I agree that we need to involve more in our policy-making and ensure the involvement of civil society.
There is one more reason, however, for this I want to mention that after the war, when very serious dividing lines appeared, very often tendencies of politicization appeared in the civil society, which also creates an additional problem. But I agree that it’s one of our biggest systemic problems today, that civil society needs to be appropriately involved in policy making. How do you make it truly engaging and productive and not constantly conflicting? It is another problem that we will discuss and solve.”
The Prime Minister referred to the observation made during the panel discussion that free elections are still not enough to have democracy. “I agree with that wording and also mentioned it in my speech. Democratic elections and democracy, in turn, must lead to the establishment of democratic institutions. Without it, it is not possible to make democracy institutional. And in this sense, of course, we have considerable challenges in terms of the independence of the judicial system. I consider the formation of a democratic, political culture critical. I talked about the 2021 elections, and after that, a wording came to me: hammer and sickle elections, which, of course, is an expression of a very difficult political situation. of the law
supremacy is, of course, an essential condition for the establishment of democracy and the rule of law, which is expressed by the rule of law. Democracy and institutions exist in the states when a person is aware of his rights and the mechanisms to protect his rights. Today we see many problems that reach the president, the prime minister, and the government for one simple reason: a person does not know about his rights and does not know how to protect
According to Nikol Pashinyan, it is dangerous to say that they are attacking those countries where democratic reforms are taking place. “That, in my opinion, is not a correct perception of the situation because we all forget the war of 2016. The 2020 war is a continuation of the 2016 war in every way. It’s different if you say democracy couldn’t prevent that war from happening. I keep reminding this: after all, let’s not forget, in April 2018, Serzh Sargsyan, as a prime minister candidate, declared war. At that time, there was no revolution in Armenia yet. And this is a fundamental understanding: why the democratic government could not avoid the war? Precisely because of the circumstance mentioned by the president, the government faced a volume of truth related to the Karabakh issue, which was indigestible for the government coming from the square and even more indigestible for the public. This is the fundamental reason, because when you see under the slogans, what is there, and it is indigestible in reality.”
The head of the government emphasized the importance of protecting the rights and identity of national minorities, saying: “There is criticism against Armenia that Armenia is a mono-ethnic country. Although it is difficult to understand what kind of accusation it is, on the other hand, we should happily record that in our country, national minorities are represented in the parliament. I think that this is an essential institutional feature. I am also thrilled that in Armenia, there are not only Christian temples, but also Muslim mosques and temples of the Yezidi faith, and this is extremely important. Moreover, there is an Armenian Catholic community, an evangelical community, and an Armenian apostolic community in Armenia. I don’t think that today, in any direction, any community can say that its religious freedoms are violated in any way.”
In response to the question regarding the external threats to democracy and the membership of the security integration associations, the Prime Minister stated: “I said in my speech that, yes, I consider democracy in Armenia to be irreversible internally. And what are the external threats? I want to talk about our recent past.
You see, on May 10, 2021, my resignation comes into effect, and the parliament is dissolved, that is, there is practically no government or parliament in the country, and on May 12, the invasion of Azerbaijan in the Sotk-Khoznavar sector takes place—zero reaction from the Collective Security Treaty Organization. Now there are high-ranking military officers detained in a criminal case. Why are they detained because it turns out they did not take any action to protect the sovereign territory of Armenia? Do you understand? And they have no explanation because everything can have an answer. Now let’s imagine if our reactions were linear in May 2021, we would lose democracy and the state, and there is no exaggeration in what is said. Of course, we have challenges. When the events in Ukraine started, Armenia tried, so to speak, to have certain balanced positions with its votes and so on. Under those circumstances, there was a situation where it created some satisfaction, essentially, among all the partners. But, of course, I also said publicly it is evident that over time, Armenia’s and everyone else’s field of maneuver is narrowing. Considering its vulnerability, this is a severe challenge and problem for all of us and even more so for the Republic of Armenia.”
When asked whether the authorities have the will to institutionalize democracy in Armenia, Nikol Pashinyan said: “The President of the Republic of Armenia is sitting here, I am here, the members of the Government are here, why did we come here if we have no will? In other words, this is also the expression of that will, but the question was about something else: how to make the hope not someone’s choice but the institutions. That is already the second question, the reform agenda that we have. Moreover, here we have the answer to that question, regardless of the source, because the Republic of Armenia is considered a leading state in at least five directions within the framework of the Eastern Partnership program. One of them is establishing an independent judicial system, anti-corruption policy, freedom of elections, assemblies, and so on. : You are right: if, for example, there is no freedom of assembly, freedom of speech, freedom of the Internet,
freedom of choice is not just about voting, right, that won’t change that. Thank God we could provide all that under the most challenging conditions. But I still want to return to deeper institutional reforms, and that is education, because I believe that democracy is directly related to the quality and access to education. After all, the lack of proper conditions for education in hundreds of our villages is the biggest challenge to democracy. Is “.
Summarizing the speech, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan again emphasized the importance of institutionalizing democracy. “However, in terms of the institutionalization of democracy, I also want to emphasize the well-being of the citizen, which is very important. I did not mention high economic growth by chance because peace and democracy should be associated with well-being and happiness; otherwise, if the country is poor and people are in extreme poverty, by and large, what difference does it make from the point of view of a person, an individual, whether it is democratic or Is it not democratic, or how institutionally democratic is it? That is, democracy, freedom, the rule of law, and institutions are ultimately a means to the ultimate end, which is human happiness. If we don’t put that goal at the heart of our strategy, there’s something wrong with the system. When democracy was not there, it seemed far away, it could be a goal, but if democracy is here, then what is the following goal: peace, economic growth, human well-being, and happiness?
