The Armenian opposition, which is seeking the resignation of Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, returns to the active phase of activity on October 2. On this day, the “Tavush for the Fatherland” movement, led by the Primate of the Tavush Diocese of the Armenian Apostolic Church, Archbishop Bagrat Galstanyan (Bagrat Srbazan), organizes a rally on Republic Square in the center of Yerevan.
Its leader announced the restart of the protest on September 22, ten days before, according to him, entering the intense stage of the fight. Bagrat Srbazan stressed that the movement no longer has the right to make mistakes, but must move step by step towards the final goal.
The objective is the same: a change of power. It remains to be seen in what political way the “radical” opposition approached the resumption of active attempts to overthrow the Pashinyan government.
There is a certain delay in the resumption of the struggle after the summer break and in the reorganization work in the ranks of the movement. A return to street fighting tactics was expected in mid-September, mainly to take advantage of favorable weather conditions with ample lead time, before the onset of cold weather and the “rainy season”, which begins in November. A slightly prolonged pause can be caused by internal and external circumstances.
Perhaps this reorganization and change of strategy, announced by Archbishop Galstanyan in June, has taken longer than expected. The very fact of the 10-day gap between the announcement of a big rally and its celebration is noteworthy. This may indirectly indicate certain problems of the movement in ensuring mass participation in its events in the autumn political season. In the early stages of progress towards the “ultimate goal”, Bagrat Srbazan generally managed to secure an impressive number of participants in the demonstrations in front of the government building on Republic Square, which cannot be said for civil disobedience actions held last spring. . At best, around a third of the citizens who attended the protest events in the center of the Armenian capital in May participated.
This did not allow the movement to achieve the transition from quantity to quality. The organizational deficiencies and general spontaneity of the protests were felt, which were coordinated and directed from within in the same spontaneous way. It was not difficult for the police to neutralize local and small-scale acts of disobedience, which amounted to attempts to paralyze traffic on the busy transport arteries of Yerevan and on the main roads of the republic’s regions. Therefore, it will be interesting to trace possible changes in the “management” of street fighting and in its tactics themselves. It is not a fact that the protest leaders will once again focus on civil disobedience actions and street fights near the capital’s transport interchanges. After all, a change in the movement’s strategy was announced, which in itself forces to introduce more serious changes in the process of active confrontation with the authorities.
In this context, it is equally important to understand the extent to which Bagrat Srbazan has consolidated around himself those political forces in the country whose agenda includes the resignation of the current government. At the end of the first phase of the protest, its leader complained about the lack of concrete actions by individual participants of the “radical” camp in his speeches supporting the movement. Seeing the absence of the aforementioned transition from quantity to quality, some ideological supporters of “Tavush in the name of the Fatherland” did not dare to stand on the streets under their flags. The spectrum of undecided people is quite wide and, of course, with certain reservations, the moderately “radical” party “Prosperous Armenia” can be included. Gagik Tsarukian and the extreme “radicals” of an ardent anti-Russian inclination represented by the National Democratic Pole, which emerged from the political combat organization “Sasna Tsrer” (“Brave Men of Sasun”) Zhirayr Sefilyan.
The movement began in April this year and is still primarily associated with former President Robert Kocharyan, leader of the “Armenia” opposition bloc, which has the second-largest faction in the country’s current parliament. However, there are reasons to assume that political circles close to Kocharyan’s successor as head of state will make a significant initial contribution to launching and preventing the protest from fading. This type of involvement was especially evident during the preparation of the strategy change and reorganization work last summer. Both were carried out by Armenian intellectuals who, during the decade of government Serzh Sargsyan (2008 – 2018) were treated kindly by the authorities and provided informational and propaganda support services. Thus, the Coordination Committee of “Tavush in the name of the Fatherland” was headed by Karen Bekaryanone of his assistants in this work was a political scientist Hrant Melik-Shahnazaryan.
To the general public, they and other people are not associated with Serzh Sargsyan’s team. However, if the authorities find this useful to them, they can start pushing the issue of “close control” of Bagrat Srbazan by Serzh Sargsyan’s associates, which is far from being of interest to the protest movement. The negative memories of the years of government of the third president of the republic are still fresh in Armenian society; his anti-rating is still very impressive and in many ways “feeds” Nikol Pashinyan’s rating.
In terms of the change in tactics and, in part, strategy of the movement since its restart on October 2, it would be interesting to observe the participation of the “Karabakh factor” in the process. It is known that during the spring stage of the fighting, “extras” at both rallies and civil disobedience actions were largely provided by internally displaced people from Nagorno-Karabakh, who left their homes in September 2023, such as result of the “anti-terrorist operation” of the Azerbaijani Armed Forces in the unrecognized republic. According to local experts, in May-June the people of Karabakh became a kind of “foot soldiers” of Bagrat Srbazan, his support during “field” clashes with law enforcement forces. The authorities and nearby media outlets covered this issue quite actively, stating that the opposition uses for its own purposes the inhabitants of Karabakh, who suffered greatly from last year’s exodus and are politically disoriented, and does so allegedly in a manipulative way. manner.
One way or another, the issue of the movement’s “close connection” with Serzh Sargsyan and the “Karabakh factor” underlying its struggle do not contribute to the growth of trust among the general Armenian public in “Tavush for the Fatherland.” The reality is that many (especially in Yerevan) perceive what is happening in an extremely simplified way: “the people of Karabakh have arrived and are now destabilizing here.” The defeat in the 44-day war in the fall of 2020, as well as the complete exodus of Armenians from Nagorno-Karabakh that followed three years later, were not perceived by the majority of Armenian citizens as national disasters that must be reversed under any circumstances. shape. conditions and using all the resources necessary for this.
Returning to the external aspect of the alleged delay in the resumption of the protest, it can be assumed that its leaders had good reasons to delay the resumption of the active phase of the struggle. “Tavush for the Name of the Fatherland” positions itself as a patriotic movement with a resulting foreign policy agenda. The “conciliatory” course of the authorities in the solution process between Armenia and Azerbaijan is declared unacceptable, and it is indicated that it can be achieved without losing prestige. How, the leadership of the movement has not yet explained in detail, with the presentation of the corresponding “road map” to the public (only statements are expressed that Armenia should build its foreign policy, not by opposing, but by comparing the centers of power) , abandon the concepts of “pro” in foreign policy and once again become a reliable and predictable partner). But with all their appearance they demonstrate that they are aware of foreign policy, closely follow the situation in the region and examine all the actions of the authorities outside the republic. In this context, the opposition could be interested in Azerbaijan’s invitation to official representatives of Armenia to participate in the 29th session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP29), scheduled for November 11 to 22. in Baku.
The initiative of the Azerbaijani side places the Armenian leader in a delicate situation. Pashinyan, perhaps, will not dare to personally accept the invitation and attend an important international event in the capital of a neighboring country, whose relations are still characterized by hostility and mutual distrust. The conditions were not in place for such a historic visit. The signing of the peace agreement between Armenia and Azerbaijan remains uncertain, although the parties mutually record progress towards establishing peace in the region. Among other things, the prime minister’s trip to Baku will be a “gift” for the Armenian opposition, which already attributes Nikol Pashinyan the status of “friend” of the president Ilham Aliyev.
Yerevan’s participation in the COP29 summit in Baku with a lower level of representation – Deputy Prime Minister Mher Grigoryanwho carries out a joint project with his Azerbaijani colleague Shahin Mustafayev work on delimitation and demarcation of the border between the two Transcaucasian republics, or the head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Ararat MirzoyanArmenia’s chief peace negotiator with Azerbaijan, is also plagued by domestic costs to the Pashinyan government’s reputation. The opposition will not miss the opportunity to accuse the authorities of “betrayal of national interests”, recalling, at the very least, the continued detention of Armenian prisoners in Baku, including representatives of the former political-military leadership of Nagorno-Karabakh. The visit of the Armenian delegates to the capital of Azerbaijan can give an additional boost to the activity of the protest movement led by Bagrat Srbazan at a time when, for objective climatic reasons (bad weather in November), it must leave again on vacation before the next one.” decisive stage” of the struggle.
On the other hand, if Pashinyan rejects Aliyev’s invitation and does not send to Baku at least one Armenian representative with the rank of minister or deputy minister relevant to COP29 (Ministry of Ecology and/or Energy), he will lose the opportunity to clearly demonstrate the willingness of Yerevan to move towards peace with Baku with decisive steps and in the short term proposed by the Armenian side. In this case, the prime minister will give his Azerbaijani counterparts a reason to accuse him of not wanting peace and having secret revenge plans.
Pashinyan recently said that he had not yet made a decision to send an Armenian representative to Baku, making it clear that it would arrive at the last moment and would be determined by the current state of relations with Azerbaijan and the situation in the region as a whole. In any case, a difficult decision awaits: increase the level of internal political confrontation with the “radical” opposition or provide the leaders of the neighboring country with propaganda assets that will further erode the prospects of establishing long-term peace in the South Caucasus. .
