Gagik Ginosyan Sends Open Letter to the Prime Minister

Ethnographic dance expert and president of the "Karin" cultural educational NGO, Gagik Ginosyan, has sent an open letter to Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan. In the letter, it is particularly noted:

Open Letter to Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan
Copy to: President of Armenia Armen Sarkissian, Speaker of the National Assembly Ararat Mirzoyan

Who sets new laws and regulations is declared outside the law. The words of Sevan are brilliantly resonating in this context. Leonid created the standard of a modern hero with his behavior, which is why he was stripped of the title of hero, as the palace, holding the monopoly on the title, understood that awarding Leonid the title would inadvertently validate the standards of our modern heroes, many of whom deserving the title in our modern state would be condemned to having that title revoked, or the people would perceive these titles as a farce.

However, the title of hero is not given through palace decisions. The title of hero has always been granted by the people, and time seals that decision. The vivid proof of this is that nearly 27 years after the day of his suspicious death, the people not only uphold his image but also demand that their hero, the national hero, be restored to the title from which he was unjustly stripped by previous authorities, likely realizing their guilt in his martyrdom.

Leonid Azgaldyan's character continues to educate generations even from the fragmented videos we have, and certainly many of the heroes from the April 2016 war were inspired by his character, spirit, and ideas. From the very first day of the petition campaign, those ready to raise their voices and restore decades of justice with their signatures demonstrated that just as he had united his squadron around the idea of the homeland, signatures flowed from Artsakh, the diaspora, and different corners of Armenia towards Yerevan.

Leonid Ruben Azgaldyan, during the very first rallies dedicated to the Artsakh issue, foresaw the imminent war and realized that the liberation of the homeland was impossible without military engagement, especially considering the savagery and inhumanity of the mob attempting to forge a nation. Contrary to leaders who beat their chests from stages at rallies and later disintegrated the country, he gathered his supporters and silently withdrew to create weapons and train youth, preparing for the liberating war he anticipated, becoming the first Armenian scientist to create weapons in our contemporary history.

He was the first to call his military unit an army, rather than a detachment or some other name, understanding and elevating the issue of establishing a regular army. Many would later be credited for army building, but not him who laid its foundations and not for the factional fighting that could not bring combat success, especially not for the liberation of Artsakh.

With the detachment he founded and led, until his tragic martyrdom, navigating for four years, participating in numerous battles and liberating around 27 Armenian settlements, organizing the self-defense of all Martakert, training and imparting tactical knowledge to hundreds of young people, he provided a completely new value system for global military strategy, where the crucial value, according to his words, was the volunteer soldier committed to the self-defense and liberation of his own country, which is why his liberating army had only six fatalities: the seventh was himself.

Every contemporary army around the globe would envy the strategic and tactical expertise as well as the discipline he instilled. Those who knew Leonid are acutely aware that in the Artsakh hero war he was the ideological heir of Nzhdeh, who did not fight solely with weapons but with spirit and then with ideas. Hence, like Nzhdeh, his battle has not ended; today, standing in the trenches of the Armenian army, he continues to fight daily alongside every soldier, winning today, crafting the characters of Armenian history.

It is time to recognize that not only the moment for economic, political, and other amendments in our state has come, but also first and foremost the time for the character correction of national heroes. Tomorrow we will have a generation and a nation as we will proclaim heroes today. Let us understand that if we do not rectify the falsifications of our predecessors today, future generations will have to rectify us too. Let us have the will to pass on to the new generation heroes representing a purity free from falsifications that symbolize Armenian heroism and spirit, and not unworthy characters who have unjustly been awarded the title of hero due to the arbitrary decisions and interests of their predecessors.

Mr. Prime Minister, this is my letter addressed to you, which I handed to you in person last April. To reiterate, I will say that titles of hero are not given by palace decisions. The title of hero, at all times, is granted by the people, and time seals that decision. The palace must earn the honor of bestowing the title of hero upon a hero.

The necessity for the palace to purify itself is evident. The palace, which reverently preserves not only the “heroes” of the previous palace but also does not affirm the standards of heroism, as understood in its notion, thus accepts the criteria of heroism of the previous palace and its “heroes.” However, undoubtedly, the revolution in our country is primarily a revolution of values, then new governmental, economic, and other types of revolutions must stem from this very revolution of values.

As long as the revolution of values has not taken place, the remaining revolutions will simply remain a temporary illusion, makeup, behind which, sooner or later, will crawl out the former, false, and foul “values.” Following the traces of the letter handed to you six months ago, certain institutions responded through your mediation to clarify the issue, and surprisingly, they all unanimously tried to convince me to be satisfied with bestowing Leonid Azgaldyan with the title of Artsakh Hero. As justification, it was argued that Azgaldyan’s combat activities were conducted in Artsakh.

Without diminishing any individual awarded the title of national hero of the Republic of Armenia, I must state that among the fallen Heroes of the freedom struggle during military operations, only Leonid Azgaldyan's ideologically united and comrade-in-arms, Movses Gorgisyan, was killed on the territory of the Republic of Armenia. All other heroes conducted their activities exclusively in the territory of the Republic of Artsakh. However, they were awarded the title of Hero of the Republic of Armenia. I have also submitted along with my letter the path of Leonid Azgaldyan’s combat activities, which clearly shows that there is no other military figure in the territory of the Republic of Armenia who contributed as much to the military events occurring in the 1990s, starting as early as 1989, when Soviet troops attempted to invade Yerevan from their base in Nubarashen following the murder of seven young Armenians at the Yerevan railway station, punishing the Armenian liberation struggle and the Armenian people for their national aspirations, to the military clashes in the Noyemberyan and Meghri regions, and the complete organization of the self-defense of the entire Vardenis region, literally training an entire generation in military art and preparing for military operations, which later served as the foundation for the liberation of the Karvachar region, ultimately securing the safety of Artsakh and its reunification with Armenia.

In all these enumerations, Leonid Azgaldyan plays an exceptional role as the ideological, scientific, and organizational leader and direct participant and motivator of the first modern Armenian weapons creation. I found it strange that in response to my arguments from various institutions, an ostensibly astonished yet more condemning sentiment emerged, oddly articulated with the same words: