In 2002, a closed-door, face-to-face meeting between Robert Kocharyan and Heydar Aliyev took place near Sadarak, without a third person, which lasted 4 hours and 15 minutes. After its end, the parties refused to provide any information about the content of the negotiations.
At today’s session of the NA Investigative Committee, Kristine Poghosyan, MP of the NA “Civil Contract” faction, mentioning the incident, asked Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan whether there is a protocol for the negotiations, whether Robert Kocharyan submitted a written report about the official documents of the talks at the National Security Service and the Foreign Ministry. Do you know if the meeting was documented in any way? The deputy reminded me that there are two high-ranking officials of the National Security Service who, due to their status, were informed and, most likely, possessed important information. According to Poghosyan, one of them is Hrachya Harutyunyan, the former head of the National Security Service, who died suddenly in 2021 at 65.
Nikol Pashinyan responded that he worked with two heads of the State Security Service and has been under the protection of that service for five years. “I can assure you that the PPS does not have any function to be aware of the negotiation process. His function is something completely different,” said Pashinyan and told an episode of how it happened entirely by chance in Dushanbe when the 3rd person in the elevator with him and Aliyev was Grigory Hayrapetov because there was no place for the 4th person in that elevator, “The opponents tried to present that some conspiratorial conversation took place in the elevator. At that time, I had already dismissed Grigori Hayrapetov from his job. I told them that Hayrapetov was present in that conversation. He was the main bodyguard of Robert Kocharyan and Serzh Sargsyan during his tenure. I said: invite him. I mean, he is no longer under orders. What could have happened in that elevator? Do you understand what we are talking about? PPS can be aware when you talk or hear something while walking. But from the negotiation process in a closed room, it’s content… I would suggest not to rely on the PPS.”
Referring to the Kocharyan-Aliev above meeting, Nikol Pashinyan said that Minister of Defense Vagharshak Harutyunyan was present, who said in a public interview that Meghri’s version was discussed in his presence between Kocharyan and Aliyev in July 1999 in Sadarak, “According to Harutyunyan, Kocharyan told him that Meghri’s is a good option for solving the Karabakh conflict.”
