No foreign country should interfere in the internal affairs of independent and sovereign Armenia. Only the Armenian people have the right to elect their leaders and decide their policies.
It is ironic that those Armenians who have been screaming day and night about Russian interference remain completely silent when Western countries (the European Union and the United States) are openly interfering in Armenia’s internal affairs. Those who believe that Western intervention, unlike Russia, is harmless and acceptable are either ignorant or naïve in matters of international relations.
Foreign leaders (whether from the East, West, North or South) do not offer anything to Armenia out of their goodwill. They are just pursuing their own interests.
The problem is that the leaders of Armenia have never stood out for their knowledge of international relations throughout history. Armenians, to their detriment, ignore the developments taking place in the world, which may affect their lives or their survival. When you are a small and weak country, you cannot afford to be indifferent to the events happening around you. Otherwise, you become vulnerable to external threats. What needs to be done is to become as powerful as possible, and then try to reduce these threats to a minimum through flexible diplomacy.
Armenians, quite justifiably, have a very negative attitude towards Turkey and its leaders. However, it must be admitted that Turkish leaders, like their Ottoman predecessors, are very adept at international politics. For centuries, the Ottoman sultans were able to pit the great powers against each other and regularly changed their positions to protect the interests of the empire. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s actions are a continuation of that traditional tightrope walk. Erdogan is exceptionally skillful in maneuvering in the murky international waters. Armenia currently does not have, and rarely had a leader with such skills in the past.
The second problem is the emotional approach of Armenians to foreign relations, based on whether they love or not. International relations cannot be compared with personal relations. you can communicate even with your enemies if you can secure a benefit for your country.
The third problem is that throughout their entire history, Armenians have always waited for some foreign power to come and save them from their enemies. Armenians might have had such unrealistic expectations at the beginning of their history, but after millennia of invasions, massacres and even genocide, one would think that they would finally wake up and, seeing that no foreign power had ever come to their rescue, would conclude that no one would help them.
Unfortunately, Armenians never learned the necessary lessons from their tragic history. Even today they expect some foreign country to protect them. In recent decades, Armenians hoped in vain that Russia would protect them, as if it was obliged to do so. All countries protect only their own interests, not those of others. Completely disillusioned with Russia’s inaction during the 2020 Artsakh War, and even more so after Azerbaijan’s invasion and occupation of part of the territory of the Republic of Armenia in 2021 and 2022, most Armenians began to look elsewhere for their country’s protection in vain. Their frustration was based on the fact that Armenia and Russia, along with several other former Soviet republics, had signed a mutual defense treaty, the CSTO (Collective Security Treaty Organization). That agreement was supposed to protect the Republic of Armenia. However, Armenians forget that contracts are often considered just pieces of paper. All countries put their national interests above any contractual obligations they may have.
After being disillusioned with Russia for completely understandable reasons, one would think that Armenians would conclude that no one will come to Armenia’s aid and stop looking for a new savior. Alas, they continued their eternal quest. Now they hope that France, the European Union or the United States will be their new saviors. However, if Armenia is attacked, neither the European Union nor the United States will come to its aid. It is naive to expect that these foreign countries will risk the lives of their soldiers to protect the borders of Armenia. It is the responsibility of the leadership of Armenia.
Instead of oscillating between East and West, it is in Armenia’s interest to establish mutually beneficial relations with all the countries of the world without expecting any of them to come to its rescue. However, to implement such an important task, Armenia needs a skilled leadership.
I suggest Armenians to ignore President Donald Trump’s, Vice President JD Vance’s and Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s useless declarations of support for Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, which are a clear example of foreign interference in Armenia’s internal elections. I hope their support meets the same fate as Vance’s personal visit to the Hungarian capital, Budapest, on the eve of the April election to support Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, who suffered a crushing defeat.
Today, the Armenian people need practical steps, not empty words. Trump, Vance and Rubio did not lift a finger to release Artsakh leaders who have been illegally held in Baku prisons since 2023. They also did not condemn Pashinyan’s persecution of the Armenian Apostolic Church. This shows that their many statements about protecting Christians around the world are nothing more than empty words.
Harut Sassounyan
Translation: Ruzanna Avagyan
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