ARMENIAN PIRATE OF THE CARIBBEAN

Had Armenian President Armen Sarkisian resigned a little earlier, he would repeat Boris Yeltsin's famous move, when the latter left the office with the words I'm tired, I'm leaving said in his New Year's address. But Armen Sarkisian is not tired. His explanation of resignation was as paradoxical as expected: he believes he did not have enough authority. As stated in a statement posted on the website of the now former president of Armenia, he lacked the constitutional tools to help his country and there is a "situation in Armenia when the president has to be the guarantor of statehood without actually having any real tools to be so". He is allegedly unable to influence "matters of war or peace", cannot veto legislation which he deems inappropriate. Also, the president's capabilities are regarded not as an advantage, but as a threat from various political forces.

Soon after the resignation of the Armenian president Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan gave an online conference on Facebook, where he confirmed that Armen Sarkisian had discussed his resignation with him: "I found out about it a few hours before the statement was made public. He called me 3.5 hours before the statement was released and we talked about it. I asked Mr. President if he was discussing the issue with me or just notifying me about his decision. I was trying to understand whether the decision was negotiable or not? After that, he said he had made a decision."

Speaking about a possible presidential candidate, Pashinyan said that it was imperative to find solutions that would ensure political harmony between the president, government and the parliamentary majority. "My understanding is that … it is especially important now when we are facing serious challenges. I think there should be a situation where the parliament, the government and president feel bound by a common responsibility," Pashinyan said.

The Armenian prime minister did not comment on his statement further. By the way, not everyone in Armenia believed the official version of President Sarkisian's resignation.

Four years to "study the powers"?

Armen Sarkisian became the President of Armenia in 2018. Constitutional reforms in Armenia were already over by that time. The second term of the third president of Armenia, Serzh Sargsyan, was expiring in 2018 and he wanted to do in Armenia what Mikhail Saakashvili tried to do in Georgia. Sarkisian wanted to transform the country from a presidential to a parliamentary republic, transfer the main administrative powers to prime minister, and then change the president’s office to that of prime minister. It was Serzh Sargsyan that invited Armen Sarkisian to the post of president. And it is unlikely that it took the latter four years to understand that in today's Armenia the president is more of a decorative and representative figure, but not the real ruler of the country.

When Serzh Sargsyan's constitutional games turned into Pashinian's "kebab revolution", Armen Sarkisian did not resign. He even tried to keep a low profile, trying to stay out of the headlines. Nor did he resign after Armenia's capitulation on November 10, 2020.

But what happened now?

Attack of Soros minions: Episode 2.0

Meanwhile, it is interesting that Armen Sarkisian's resignation coincided with a remarkable shift in Armenia's domestic politics, as Nikol Pashinyan began the second stage of his initiative to expand the staff. Today, almost all significant posts in the government are held by Pashinyan's associates and Soros boys. Moreover, while the Ministry of Defence was headed by Vagharshak Harutyunyan, a professional soldier (and the man behind missile attacks on Ganja, Barda, and Terter of Azerbaijan), now this post is taken by Suren Papikyan, a purely civilian, a Soros grantee and a close associate of Nikol Pashinyan. The Armenian Foreign Ministry is now headed by Ararat Mirzoyan. He too is a member of Soros’s team, unlike his predecessors, the career diplomats Ara Ayvazyan and Zohrab Mnatsakanyan, not to mention Edvard Nalbandian.

Armen Sarkisian was the so-called last man standing in the Armenian political elite — Pashinian inherited him, in fact, from Serzh Sargsyan. And he tolerated him in silence, at best.

It was during and immediately after the 44-day war that Sarkisian became very active. While he would previously tell journalists that he was not aware of the latest developments in the Garabagh negotiations, now President Sarkisian was actively giving interviews to the Russian media.

Finally, there is another aspect in this case too. Armen Sarkisian could well become a key figure in case of an anti-Pashinian coup and the subsequent transfer of power. After all, he was still the head of state even with limited powers. And today, with the Garabagh Clan getting increasingly active (Robert Kocharian held a press conference, while Serzh Sargsyan organised the congress of his Republican Party), Pashinyan has reasons to be nervous. He has already launched sort of a counter-offensive, criticising on his Facebook account the Armenian diplomacy for the blows it had suffered from before he came to power. And when Armen Sarkisian ‘suddenly’ resigns and another close associate of Nikol Pashinyan, former Minister of Culture, Science, Education and Sports Araik Harutyunyan, is supposed to replace him, it looks like a continuation of the staffing trend. The fact that the now former Armenian president was the holder of passport of a tiny island state in the Caribbean Sea only made the shift easier.

But are domestic politics and inter-clan warfare the only reasons behind the incident?

"Capitulation schedule"

Perhaps it is worth considering one phrase from Armen Sarkisian’s statement to understand the real reasons for his resignation—the one where he complains about his inability to influence the "issues of war and peace".

This is not just a catchphrase. Mr. Sarkisian resigned amid highly demonstrative developments in the post-conflict settlement in Garabagh.

For the uninitiated, Baku and Yerevan have only ‘to break the ice’ after the end of the 44-day war, the liberation of the Araz Valley and the city of Shusha followed by the withdrawal of Armenian troops from the districts of Aghdam, Kalbajar, and Lachin.

But it is not that simple. Armenia has yet to comply with difficult and unpleasant terms of its surrender. It concerns not only the opening of the Zangezur Corridor, which Yerevan does not want to hear about. Another issue on the agenda is the delimitation and demarcation of state borders. Armenian leadership knows very well that when the districts of Zangilan, Gubadli, Lachin, and Kalbajar of Azerbaijan were under the Armenian occupation, their fellow compatriots have shamelessly moved the borderline between Armenia and the unrecognided Nagorno-Karabakh Republic toward the Azerbaijani territory. Certainly, Baku does not want these lands controlled by Yerevan. This means that the processes of demarcation and delimitation will be accompanied by territorial losses for Armenia, as was the case in the village of Shurnukh. Nikol Pashinyan may, of course, try to delay the process and propose a "mirror withdrawal of troops". But Azerbaijan does not simply reject such cosmetic measures. As events on the border show, Baku is perfectly capable of demarcating the borders unilaterally.

Under such a situation, it is possible that Armen Sarkisian did not want to be part of the ongoing surrender, or was just afraid. Especially after a threatening and rather dangerous statement by the Armenian terrorist group ASALA that appeared in the media.

Yet all these games will unlikely make it possible for Yerevan to avoid the terms of surrender.