“Today I also want to answer a question that is perhaps the most important for understanding the history of the last seven years,” Pashinian said in a weekend statement on the 35th anniversary of a declaration of independence adopted by Armenia’s first post-Communist parliament. “After all, why did Armenia, our government and I personally not make concessions before September 2020, which was the only theoretical opportunity to avoid a 44-day war?
“The key reason for this was that as a result of those concessions, all the threats and dependencies we had would have increased disproportionately, leading to the loss of Armenia’s independence and statehood. We adopted a strategy to preserve Armenia’s independence and make that independence real.”
Pashinian clearly referred to peace plans jointly drafted by the United States, Russia and France and based on their so-called Madrid Principles of a Karabakh settlement. The three co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group presented the conflicting sides with an updated version of the draft peace deal in 2019, one year after Pashinian came to power. The latter reluctantly acknowledged this fact in February after repeated denials.
Armenian opposition leaders maintain that Pashinian’s failure to accept that plan paved the way for the disastrous 2020 war and Azerbaijan’s subsequent recapture of Karabakh. Some of them seized upon his latest statement to accuse him of deliberately provoking the six-week war that left at least 3,800 Armenian soldiers dead.
“So he knowingly did not prevent the war as a result of which we suffered thousands of casualties, lost the Republic of Artsakh and a part of Armenia’s territory, and promised Azerbaijan a land corridor,” charged Artur Khachatrian, a lawmaker from the main opposition Hayastan alliance.
Levon Zurabian, a deputy chairman of former President Levon Ter-Petrosian’s Armenian National Congress (HAK), said Pashinian’s “bombshell” admission will “forever change” political debate in Armenia regarding the causes of and responsibility for the 2020 war.
“He finally admitted that in 2020, it was possible to make concessions and avoid the war,” Zurabian wrote on Facebook.
“It means that Pashinian had rejected the peace plan proposed by the U.S., Russia, and France, under which we would have kept all of Nagorno-Karabakh, Lachin, and Kelbajar under Armenian control for generations without having to give [Azerbaijan] any Zangezur corridor,” he said.
Originally put forward in 2007, the Madrid Principles upheld the Karabakh Armenians’ right to self-determination while calling for their withdrawal from Azerbaijani districts around Karabakh occupied in the early 1990s. Karabakh’s internationally recognized status would be determined through a future referendum.
Pashinian said until now that he did not accept this peace formula proposed by the U.S., Russia and France because it was all about “returning Nagorno-Karabakh to Azerbaijan.” Armenian opposition leaders dismissed his claims as a hapless attempt to dodge responsibility for the loss of Karabakh.
Last December, Ter-Petrosian challenged Pashinian to publicize all peace plans drafted by the three mediating powers along with Yerevan’s official responses to them. Pashinian claimed that he is ready to do that but that his administration has not managed to find those documents.
