There Are Sacred Things That Must Never Be Touched
The discerning reader has likely already guessed whom we are referring to, and why no one can be accused of committing such an act of sacrilege more than Armenia’s current authorities.
As a result of their defeatist policies, they have not only placed our national values—our sacred symbols—on the auction block before the enemy, but have also demonstrated both the intent and the willingness to amend our Constitution to satisfy the latter’s demands.
Every time we watch, with revulsion, our Prime Minister warmly shaking the bloodstained hands of Ilham Aliyev beneath the patronizing, self-satisfied smile of U.S. President Donald Trump, one cannot help but ask in utter disbelief: how can a political leader so casually embrace a man whose regime forcibly displaced 120,000 Armenians from their homeland and continues to imprison their leaders unjustly to this day?
Yes, we must ask: how can anyone, with a clear conscience, shake the bloodstained hands of such a man without first demanding, as a precondition, a just resolution to the Artsakh conflict?
Yet, in the interest of fairness, let us refrain from condemning the Prime Minister and his entourage outright. Let us instead attribute this disgraceful conduct to incurable naivety. Even so, one cannot help but wonder whether these fortunate gentlemen have ever truly studied or absorbed the lessons of modern Armenian history.
As if that were not enough, having knelt before the neighboring despot, the Armenian people are now expected to submit to His Majesty’s conditions and dictates. Had our Prime Minister possessed the resolve and maturity expected of a seasoned statesman, he would never have endorsed Trump’s initiative without first insisting on the unconditional release of Armenian political prisoners and the mass return of Artsakh’s indigenous population to their ancestral homeland.
The other glaring act of sacrilege is equally outrageous. After seizing Mount Ararat—a mountain revered by all humanity, where according to Holy Scripture Noah’s Ark came to rest, and which visitors standing on the heights of Yerevan can almost touch with their fingertips—Turkey now has the audacity to demand that Armenia erase Ararat from its national coat of arms and, ultimately, from its collective memory.
Following that absurd logic, by what right does the Turkish state display the crescent moon on its own flag? The moon certainly did not become an exclusively Turkish national symbol either before or after the Ottoman conquest of Byzantium, as far as history records.
And what we have witnessed so far is only the beginning. One shudders to imagine what further concessions our esteemed, music-loving Prime Minister may yet impose upon the Armenian people in pursuit of his illusory peace with the enemy. We leave that for the reader to judge.
Allow us, however, to repeat an undeniable truth: the surest path to peaceful coexistence with neighboring countries is not found in making endless unilateral concessions. Peace acquires meaning and legitimacy only when concessions are reciprocal—when tangible and lasting gains are secured in return. Sadly, such elementary political wisdom appears to remain far beyond the comprehension of Armenia’s current leadership.
As though all these transgressions were not enough, the ruling party, imitating the practices of our adversary, now keeps two prominent Armenian philanthropists imprisoned on disputed charges, thereby pouring water onto the enemy’s mill.
