Ex-head of Armenian-EU Parliamentary Cooperation Committee describes EP's statement one-sided and irresponsible

Former Head of Armenian delegation at Armenia-EU Parliamentary Cooperation Committee Samvel Farmanyan has sent a letter today to the authors of yesterday’s unacceptable statement by the Members of European Parliament, he reported about it on Facebook.

Farmanyan said he has copied it to Ambassador Andrea Victorin, Head of EU delegation to Armenia.

The letter runs as follows:

MEP, Marina Kaljurand, Chair of EU-Armenia Parliamentary Partnership Committee

MEP, Trian Basescu, European Parliament’s Standing Rapporteur on Armenia

MEP, Zeljana Zovko, European Parliament’s Standing Rapporteur on Azerbaijan

Ambassador Andrea Victorin, Head of Delegation of the European Union to Armenia

Dear Colleagues,

Your yesterday’s joint statement deeply shocked people in Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh. I feel obliged to share that public concern as a former head of the Armenian delegation to the EU-Armenia Parliamentary Cooperation Committee (PCC). I believe it may make useful clarification in addition to those concerns and arguments that might have been already provided by Armenian diplomatic missions and parliamentary channels.

EU has been one of the key partners of Armenia despite any political change in my country. Significant results have been coined in many fields. CEPA signed in 2017 has opened a quite new perspective to that cooperation still waiting for its full implementation.

Parliamentary dimension of Armenia-EU cooperation remains to be essential. Hundreds of MPs of the European Parliament and the National Assembly of Armenia have contributed to our common agenda throughout time. Parliamentary cooperation has been backed by mutual respect and understanding as well as our joint commitment to the principle of restraint while dealing with sensitive issues. No doubt that this principle has firmly dominated in our discussions over the conflict of Nagorno-Karabakh reflected in the previously adopted joint documents and statements.

It will not be an exaggeration to state that your joint statement breaks that model tradition developed throughout the last decades. It does not embody our commitment to the mutually beneficial perspective of Armenia-EU partnership and sheds doubt on the impartiality of the European Parliament towards this sensitive issue. And most importantly it misrepresents the nature of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and has the potential to damage and undermine the efforts of the Minsk group of OSCE to find a peaceful settlement to the conflict.

The wording used in your joint statement goes against the meaningful official stance of EU institutions on Nagorno-Karabakh conflict reflected in different documents and high level statements including CEPA. It also breaks the philosophy of over 15 previous joint statements by the EP’s delegation tensing up the environment over the ongoing peace process on the ground.

COVID 19 has pushed the governments to focus on the most important mission they have - to save lives. Different international organizations and opinion leaders have called on national governments to commit themselves to peace and restraint from further escalation in conflict zones while people are fighting against this pandemic. Political and military leadership of Azerbaijan continues to ignore these calls and threatens Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh with a new war meanwhile continuously violating the trilateral ceasefire regime on the line of contact.

Any biased or one-sided statement in the nature of your joint statement adds extra fuel to the fire and intensifies the explosiveness of the situation on the ground. It sends deplorable supportive message to Azerbaijan regarding its plans of a new military aggression against the people of Nagorno-Karabakh. It is due to recall the caviar efforts of Azerbaijan to get such supportive parliamentary resolutions before the planned military aggression in April 2016 as internationally legitimizing smokescreen for its military adventure – a proved fact echoed in the findings of different international parliamentary and journalistic investigative bodies.

The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict does not have a military solution. Any military provocation by Azerbaijan will be undoubtedly and effectively stopped again by the military of Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh. The people of Armenia are united when it comes to Nagorno-Karabakh and the security of its people despite any political mapping of my country. This should be remembered well by all those who wish to see the opposite. In this context any meaningful stance of the European Parliament should be adherent to CEPA wording to avoid damaging the peace process.

It is worth mentioning that any one-sided and irresponsible statement that does not reflect the truth and the peace process puts the European Parliament’s and EU’s impartiality under doubt in the eyes of the Armenian society while increasing the voice of all those who are doubtful about the perspectives of Armenia-EU partnership and our joint commitment to shared values.

It is out of discussion that a due relevance should be explored to correct the biased and unacceptable statement that you made yesterday.

Obviously, diplomatic missions and the respective parliamentary bodies of Armenia will convey you the same message.

Armenia-EU cooperation including its parliamentary dimension has a strong tradition and should have the same perspective which I bring my commitment to.”