Liparitarian Suggests Concessions for Resolution; Not so Welcomed in RPA

The newspaper ‘Hraparak’ reports: “Under the initiative of Eduard Aghajanyan, the ruling faction held a closed meeting yesterday with Levon Ter-Petrosyan's adviser, Jirair Liparitarian. The idea originated from Nikol Pashinyan, who 'assigned' Liparitarian to the National Assembly to propagate the theses of his book 'White Paper' — promoting friendship with Turkey without preconditions, that is, renouncing claims of genocide restitution to establish relations, and signing a peace treaty without clarifying the status of Artsakh.

Before demarcation, Pashinyan needs to prepare his team since this document must be ratified by the National Assembly. He is concerned that there will be patriots among the members of the RPA who would obstruct his plans. Liparitarian attempted to convince the RPA members that we, Armenians, especially after a defeat, cannot assume any role or set demands; the only condition for our survival is to yield to the Turkish-Azerbaijani tandem and establish relations.

He stated that it is currently important to maintain Nagorno-Karabakh in territorial terms and that raising the status issue is inappropriate. We must concede to the Turkish-Azerbaijani demands and find a solution between the road and the corridor, but he did not elaborate on what that might entail. He made a historical excursion, arguing that the surrender of land was inevitable, since, dating back to the 1990s, the international community has regarded it as occupied.

When asked why the first president did not resolve the issue from a position of strength, he answered that his team did not allow it, hinting at Vazgen Sargsyan. He also mentioned that today, in essence, we have no foreign policy. About 20-25 deputies were present at the meeting, and they emphasized that his approaches are not particularly welcomed in the ruling faction.”