YEREVAN, APRIL 13, ARMENPRESS. During his speech in the Parliament today, Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan talked about also the failures made by the government in 2021, mentioning as such the incursion of the Azerbaijani units to Armenia’s sovereign territory in Sotk-Khoznavar section in May 12, 2021. Pashinyan called this incident the failure of the Armenian government and armed forces, but added that the way the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) responded to this is also the failure of that Organization.

“Why did that failure happen? In order to get the answer to this question, perhaps what had happened should be viewed in the context of several important events preceding it. On May 10, 2021, the National Assembly of Armenia was dissolved by virtue of law, and our country entered into the stage of snap parliamentary elections, and it’s obvious that one of the motives of the incursion that happened two days after that was to paralyze Armenia’s state institutions and statehood,  create a pre-election and post-election chaos and have a concrete impact on the election results. But the context of the May incursion will be incomplete if we do not take into account the events that happened in February when the General Staff of the Armenian Armed Forces openly was engaged into politics, by spreading a statement urging the government to resign. It should be noted that the opposition, whose former leader admitted that back during the war he was calling on generals to direct their rifles at the government building, not at the adversary, eventually achieved its goal and it was revealed that there are forces in the Army, who are more interested in what is happening in the Republic Square, the Baghramyan Avenue, the Melik-Adamyan street, rather than in what is happening on the border”, the PM said.

According to him, the politicization of the Armed Forces, their engagement into political intrigues once again showed its catastrophe. “And when we look back and analyze many events, it’s an impression that the military failures are simply necessary for some people to form a motive for a power change in Armenia. Of course, this may seem a conspiracy theory, which is not proved by any concrete fact, but the analysis leads to such thoughts. The apparent appearance of several high-ranking military officials in the opposition field after their dismissal come to prove the hypotheses I have talked about before the famous events. Most of them today are delivering opposition speeches, while they have been personally responsible for a number of failures blamed on the government.  

In any case, the long-term politicization of the Army, its full engagement into corruption chains became one of the systematic wounds that brought us to the brink of disaster. And I mean not only the direct, but also the related effects. It is in the background of the aforementioned irresponsibility, politicization and opposition that, as it was recently revealed, spy networks formed by Azerbaijan have operated in the Armenian Armed Forces. We can say this based on the discoveries made so far by the National Security Service, which are already creating serious problems”, the PM said.

He says it’s obvious that the paralyzed situation of the Army for nearly one and a half month as a result of politicization had a direct consequence in the form of an incursion in the Sotk-Khoznavar section, and these events made more urgent the agenda of the Army reforms, one of the main goals of which must be the professionalism of the army, the transition of the conscription system to regular trainings of reservists, similarly to what we do now, meaning the three-month military trainings.

“What had happened in the Sotk-Khoznavar section, is, of course, the failure of the Armed Forces and the government. But how the Collective Security Treaty Organization reacted to what had happened, I think, was also a failure for that Organization. Despite the existing procedures, the CSTO has not made a decision to conduct the monitoring of the issue yet, justifying the long-held fears among the Armenian public that that Organization, which is of key importance for Armenia’s security system, will do nothing at the necessary moment, and will remain in the status of an observer. The fact is that the CSTO has not addressed this situation in any way even in the status of an observer.

The Azerbaijani armed forces continue to be located in the Sotk-Khoznavar section, creating real threats to the security of Armenia. But I also want to note that the 45 square kilometer territories, that came under occupation as a result of these incidents, unfortunately, are not the only ones in Armenia. Since the early 90s, around 70 square kilometer territories are in the same status and as I said, our policy is to view the solution of the issue in the context of the activity of the delimitation and demarcation commission”, the PM said.