“I want to say that the agenda of peace is not an agenda of defeat,” he told Arayik Harutiunian, the Karabakh president, and other senior Karabakh officials. “The agenda of peace is an agenda of overcoming the horrors of war and the difficulties that followed the war and guaranteeing the security, rights and future of the people.”
It was Pashinian’s first face-to-face meeting with the Karabakh leaders since his April 13 speech in the Armenian parliament which caused an outcry in Armenia and Karabakh.
Addressing the parliament, Pashinian said that the international community is pressing Armenia to “lower a bit the bar on the question of Nagorno-Karabakh’s status” and recognize Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity. He signaled Yerevan’s intention to make such concessions to Baku.
Armenian opposition leaders portrayed the speech as further proof that Pashinian has agreed to Azerbaijani control over Karabakh.
The authorities in Stepanakert also deplored it. In a resolution, the Karabakh parliament demanded that the Armenian authorities “abandon their current disastrous position.”
Earlier this week, Harutiunian claimed to have received assurances from Pashinian that Yerevan will not back any agreements on the territory’s status unacceptable to the Karabakh Armenians.
Pashinian said in this regard on Thursday that he will not cut any peace deals with Azerbaijan without consulting with the Karabakh leadership.
Harutiunian confirmed his support for the “agenda of peace.” But he also stressed: “On the other hand, I want to make clear that we see no way of deviating from our right to self-determination.”
Pashinian made no mention of that right in his opening remarks publicized by his press office. He again did not specify Karabakh’s future status acceptable to Yerevan. He reiterated instead that the people of Karabakh must be able to continue to live in the disputed territory and “consider themselves Armenians.”
“This is the agenda which we must jointly advance. I am convinced that we are moving in the right direction, and I am happy when the Artsakh authorities share that conviction,” added the Armenian premier.
The meeting with Harutiunian and other Karabakh officials came amid intensifying opposition demonstrations in Yerevan sparked by Pashinian’s Karabakh discourse. Armenia’s leading opposition groups are trying to force Pashinian to resign.
