PACE 'fails to take proper steps' to ensure democracy strengthening of Artsakh, Nikol Pashinyan says in top European body

The unresolved Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh) conflict continues to remain an urgent priority for Armenia and our region, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said in Strasbourg today, accusing the top parliamentary body of a failure to take the necessary steps to ensure the strengthening of democratic institutions and the development of civil society in Artsakh.

Addressing the Plenary Session of the Council of Europe's Parliamentary Assembly (PACE), the prime minister stressed the vital importance of European partners' support to the recently initiated dialogue with the Azerbaijani leader. ''The rather constructive and positive dialogue, which we have initiated with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, is extremely important, of course. Yet, I do not think that a dialogue between [state] leaders alone is absolutely enough for reaching a [final] settlement. It is very important to also start a dialogue between our societies to enable us to prepare our populations for peace instead of a war,'' he added.  

As an effective platform of communication, the premier highlighted the role of the social media, regreting at the same time that many Armenian and Azerbaijani users commonly use them to hurl curses and insults. ''Over the past thirty years of the conflict, we could logically have exhausted the language of hatred and curses and moved instead to help each other to understand mutual positions, seeking the causes that prevented us from making our point clear. I myself initiated such a discourse repeatedly from the parliament podium by stating that any proposed settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict must be acceptable to the people in Armenia, in Nagorno-Kasrabakh and Azerbaijan, '' he added.  

Considering his statement unprecedented, the prime minister said he also expects it to pave the way to the peaceful settlement of the conflict. ''Unfortunately, we do not for now hear similar remarks by Azerbaijan, so I am hopeful that the appeal for peace – directed from this platform – will meet an adequate reaction by the Azerbaijani public.''

Pashinyan said he firmly believes that the Assembly's peace podium is the proper place to allow for replacing bad language and provocation with dialogue and constructive work, respectively. ''Yet, unfortunately the podium of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe is used at times for purposes of triggering wars. In that connection, I cannot leave unnoticed the PACE debates held in January 2016 - marking the prelude of the Four-Day War which erupted in April the same year, creating a breeding ground for Azerbaijan's armed forces to launch heavy offensives,'' he added.

Emphasizing his unwillingness to insist on any intentionality, the premier said he nonetheless believes that the authors of those very debates and documents willy-nilly became the instigators of a war that claimed hundreds of lives. ''And today too, we unfortunately still see attempts – on both other international platforms and the PACE – to entangle those institutions into geopolitical maneuvers and conflicts, which absolutely run counter to those organizations' essence and mission. It is worth to also bear in mind that conflicts have to be considered separately in their essence and substance. Making judgements about a conflict - without understanding of its root causes, essence and peculiarities - is tnatamount to playing with human lives and destinies,'' the prime minister noted.

For that very reason, he said, Armenia keeps treating the OSCE Minsk Group as the only appropriate format to tackle the issue (with the three co-chairs of the mission being thoroughly familiar with the heart of the problem). ''The OSCE Minsk Group was launched as a platform to build a dialogue among Nagorno-Karabakh, Azerbaijan and Armenia, so we are undertaking the necessary measures to re-establish the dialogue between Nagorno-Karabakh and Azerbaijan in that format,'' Pashinyan added.

Meantime, he stressed also the Council of Europe's paramount role in the process. ''This organization, which demonstrates jealousy when it comes to human rights and the development of democratic institutions in Europe, pays zero attention to the need of offering support to the NGO's in Nagorno-Karabakh. The PACE fails to take any measure at all towards the strengthening of democratic institutions and the development of civil society in Artsakh. That's commonly attributed to the controversies and misinterpretations over the status of Karabakh – which isn't virtually a recognized state. But the state status is not the issue at all when it comes to the PACE's mission. If Nagorno-Karabakh is not yet internationally recognized as an independent state, can there be any international polemic at all over the human nature of the population residing in that country? Is a piece of document what really matters first for the Council of Europe - a leading international human rights body – instead of a real human being?'' the prime minister asked.  

Pashinyan made his strong call upon the human rights organizations in Europe (dealing with democracy building and freedom of speech) to extend their support to the Artsakh authorities in enhancing the country's laws and institutions to strengthen human rights and rule of law and to ensure the independence of the judiciary. ''[The target should be] the citizen of Artsakh, the human being, who is expected to benefit from all that. A human being matters more than any document in essence, any political or group interest, so I do believe that the Council of Europe and its Parliamentary Assembly will guide themselves by those very interests,'' he added.