Armenian
News Network / Groong
Guests
Hosts
Introduction
Hello,
and welcome to the Armenian News Network, Groong,
Week in Review. This show was recorded on Monday, May 16, 2022. This week we’re
going to talk about the following major topics:
● Continuing Opposition Protests in Yerevan
● 5 + 6: Armenia’s “Response” to Azerbaijan
● Lebanon Elections 2022
To talk about
these issues, we have with us:
Dr. Ohannes
Geukjian who is the chair of the department of Political Science and Public
Administration (PSPA) at the American University of Beirut, Lebanon. He is also
assistant professor of comparative politics and conflict resolution.
And
Arthur G. Martirosyan, who is a Senior Consultant with CM Partners. In
1994, after graduating from Yale University, he joined Conflict Management
Group and Harvard Negotiation Project, and has since worked on conflicts in the
former Soviet Union, the Middle East, the Balkans, Africa
and Latin America.
Topics This Week
Continuing Opposition Protests in Yerevan
This past week
the opposition continued demonstrating and protesting throughout Yerevan. At
Groong, we have been covering the protests almost daily, with our Twitter Space
broadcasts from France Square most evenings. Hovik, you and Alison Tahmizian Meuse have been interviewing various opposition
leaders and also relatives of soldiers we lost in the 44-day war in 2020.
What’s the state
of the protests, as things stand right now?
5 + 6: Armenia’s “Response” to Azerbaijan
Just over this
weekend, Edmon Marukyan revealed
the 6 points with which the Pashinyan government responded to Azerbaijan’s
5-point March document
which laid out their conditions for peace with Armenia.
Generally, here’s
what the response looks like:
- This is a response to your March letter
- Armenia has never had territorial claims on
Azerbaijan.
- Security and guarantees and final status
for Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh is fundamental for the Armenian side.
- Commitment to the November 2020 Agreement.
- Armenian side ready to start negotiations
for settlement of relations between Armenia and Azerbaijan, “based on the UN Charter, the
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and the Helsinki
Final Act. “These are the basic principles that have existed from the
beginning. In other words, the nations’ right to self-determination and
other important rights and freedoms.””
- States
that Armenia applied to the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs for help in the
negotiations.
Needless to say, the opposition is not happy.
● Is this an adequate response?
● Why has it taken almost a month to inform the
Armenian public?
● Why doesn’t the opposition like this response?
FM Mirzoyan was
in Dushanbe and explained
Armenia’s approach to achieving peace with Azerbaijan; basically the points
above. Also, FM Mirzoyan met with Azerbaijani FM Bayramov. The clear difference
in the post-meeting public statements of the two countries was the issue of the
POW release, essentially indicating that Azerbaijan has no intention of
releasing Armenian POWs, of whom there are between 1 and 200, a year and a half
after the 44-Day war.
Also, because of
the war in Ukraine, Russia and the West are unable to cooperate on such
platforms as the OSCE MG, so it’s not clear who is going to “manage” the
negotiations process.
● What is the outcome of this past week’s
continued negotiations on the Armenian-Azerbaijani so called “peace agreement”?
Lebanon Elections 2022
On Sunday May
15th Lebanon held its first elections since the Beirut blast in 2020, and the country
plunged into economic freefall. The government is bankrupt, the financial
sector has melted, and banks are insolvent and cannot honor the debt to their
depositors. So peoples’ money is trapped, if not
evaporated in the deep devaluation of the Lebanese pound, and almost three
quarters of the country is living below estimated poverty levels.
So in the middle of this chaos, nearly 4 million
people are eligible to vote in a country of 6.8 million. The major alignments
are:
- Hezbollah & allies
- Lebanese Forces & allies.
- October 17 Movement
● What is the state of affairs after the
elections, and what are the major alignments in the country at present?
● Since the election took place yesterday, how are things taking shape?
The Armenian
community has been active in the elections, perhaps seeing an opportunity for
change, but divisions within the Armenians doesn’t help.
● How are Armenians involved in these elections?
● Is the Armenian community united in its
involvement in Lebanese elections? What are the division lines within the
community?
It’s always hard
to predict what lies ahead.
● What can we expect as a result of these
elections? Will they provide an opportunity for Lebanon to implement economic
and financial reforms?
● Are you optimistic that the elections may open
up the path for positive changes and reforms?
Wrap-up
That
was our Week in Review show, and we hope it helped you catch up with
some of the issues in and around Armenia from this past week. As always, we
invite your feedback and your suggestions. You can find us on most social media
and podcast platforms, or our website Groong.org.
Thanks
to Laura Osborn for the music on our podcasts. Don’t forget to subscribe to our
channel on YouTube, Like
our pages and follow us on social media. On behalf of everyone in this episode,
we wish you a good week, thanks for listening and we’ll talk to you next week.
Groong
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Keywords
Ohannes Geukjian, Arthur
Martirosyan, Katia Peltekian, Armenia, Artsakh,
Nagorno Karabakh, Azerbaijan, Lebanon, Peace Agenda, Agenda of Peace, Nikol Pashinyan, Lebanon Elections,