Armenia’s post-war Political Crisis

Armenia’s Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan is facing protests and requests to resign after Armenia lost the war with Azerbaijan for Nagorno Karabakh. Richard Giragosian, Director of the independent Think­tanks Regional Studies Center (RSC) in Yerevan, Armenia, explains what had happened and how the world should react. (Deutsche Version hier.)

A lingering domestic political crisis in Armenia has only further deepened in recent weeks. Although Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan was swept into power on the popularity of his leadership and courage in forcing the ouster of the previ­ously corrupt government in 2018, that initial euphoria has seriously eroded. Moreover, ever since that impressive victory of non-violent “people power” in the country’s “Velvet Revolution,” the Armenian government has seen a steady decline in support while it struggled to sustain the momentum of reform and democratization.

Although buttressed by a rare degree of legit­imacy from its overwhelming victory in a free and fair parlia­mentary election in December 2018, the government has floun­dered more recently, however, with a series of serious political missteps and policy mistakes that has contributed to a simmering political crisis. Against that backdrop, it was the unexpected defeat in the 44-day war with Azerbaijan for Nagorno Karabakh in November 2020 that triggered a sharp escalation of the pre-existing political crisis. Given the Armenian government’s lack of prepa­ration of society for the scale and severity of unexpected losses from the war, Pashinyan faced an immediate and emotional series of protests, leading to calls for the prime minister to resign and demands for accountability.

Unprece­dented Post-War Vulnerability

The depth of this post-war crisis in Armenia stems from the unexpected degree of vulner­a­bility and insecurity. Most signif­i­cantly, Prime Minister Pashinyan is both vulnerable and exposed by his solitary position as the only Armenian leader to have suffered a military defeat over Nagorno Karabakh. This is especially serious as it repre­sents an unprece­dented period of vulner­a­bility, given the fact that the Karabakh conflict has long served as the priority element of Armenian security, defense and foreign policy. Having emerged in well within the waning years of the Soviet period, the Karabakh issue actually predates modern Armenian indepen­dence and statehood. Within this context, the Armenian government faces a daunting challenge to adapt to a substan­tially new geopo­litical reality.

The demands of weath­ering the unchar­tered waters of this post-war reality have also forced the Armenia leader to accept a Russian-imposed ceasefire agreement that effec­tively ended the six-week war for Karabakh, but which is also dependent on the presence of Russian peace­keepers for security. Faced with little choice and no alter­native, the Armenian accep­tance of the terms of the Russian agreement saved lives and salvaged the remaining territory of Nagorno Karabakh. But the agreement was based on a consol­i­dation of signif­icant terri­torial gains by Azerbaijan and only affirmed Armenia’s stunning defeat. At the same time, the limited scope of the ceasefire agreement does little to resolve the conflict and raises an outstanding question over the status of Karabakh, neces­si­tating a return to diplo­matic negoti­a­tions to ensure lasting security and stability.

The crisis escalated signif­i­cantly in February 2021, however, with an unprece­dented and unexpected inter­vention of the armed forces into the political arena. Sparked by an act of open defiance of the government, a group of some forty senior Army officers called on Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan to resign. The act was signif­icant as both a serious move to undermine the tradi­tionally stable civil-military relations and as an unusual display of the politi­zation of the normally neutral armed forces. The motivation and meaning of such an unprece­dented devel­opment stems from three factors driving a broader context of political conflict.

A Prolonged “State of War.” Armenian society has been unable to overcome the shock from the unexpected military defeat in the war for Karabakh that ended in November 2020. While this is partially driven by the Armenian government’s failure to prepare public opinion for the scale and severity of the military defeat in the 44-day war, it is also due to the continued “state of war” that has only been prolonged by Azerbaijan’s continued failure to return a sizable number of Armenian military prisoners of war and civilian hostages.

Post-War Uncer­tainty & Insecurity. A second factor contributing to the escalation of the post-war crisis has been the uncer­tainty and insecurity in the new post-war reality. With a delay in the resumption of diplo­matic negoti­a­tions, this uncer­tainty stems from the vague and incom­plete terms of the Russian-imposed agreement that ended the war on 9 November. Although that agreement repre­sented an important cessation of hostil­ities that allowed for the deployment of a Russian peace­keeping force to Nagorno Karabakh, it was far short of either a peace deal or a resolution to the Karabakh conflict. Moreover, the agreement deferred the status of Nagorno Karabakh to a later stage of diplo­matic negoti­a­tions and left several additionally important issues unanswered, such as military withdrawal of demobi­lization. At the same time, this uncer­tainty was compounded by insecurity, which also impacts Armenia proper as post-war border demar­cation has only exacer­bated local insecurity given the close proximity of Azerbaijani military units along the southern border areas of Armenia.

Lack of Account­ability & State Paralysis. The general perception of a lack of account­ability for the military losses and political decisions through the war is a third factor in the lingering domestic political crisis. From a broader perspective, this lack of account­ability is rooted in the fact that the Karabakh conflict actually predates Armenian indepen­dence, which places the Pashinyan government in polit­i­cally uncharted territory, as the only Armenian leadership to have “lost” Karabakh. But more specif­i­cally, the response of the government to the unexpected loss in the war has been both inade­quate and insuf­fi­cient. With no adjustment to the new post-war reality, marked by an absence of any modified or new diplo­matic strategy and a failure to alter military posture or reform, the Armenian government appears impotent in its “state of denial.” And with little luxury of time, the failure to accept the need for seeking “lessons learned” from the war has greatly under­mined confi­dence in the government. And despite democ­ratic gains since coming to power, the meager political response and the marginal role of parliament have only fostered a perception of state paralysis.

Dangerous Prece­dents

Against that backdrop, Armenian democracy is further beset by two broader trends, each of which is directly related to the recent losses in the war for Karabakh and that continues to exert destructive pressure threat­ening the resilience of Armenian democracy. The first of these trends is the dangerous precedent from the perception that the recent war for Karabakh vindi­cates the use of force as an acceptable means to resolve essen­tially political conflicts. This risk of rewarding aggression and military force as credible options to settle diplo­matic disputes raises serious concerns over the impli­ca­tions for other conflicts, ranging from Cyprus to Crimea. And by failing to challenge this precedent of allowing military means to force a resolution of conflicts, the danger is rooted in legit­imizing the concept that “might makes right” in inter­na­tional relations.

A second dangerous trend is rooted in a related precedent involving the apparent accep­tance of the military victory of two much larger, more powerful author­i­tarian countries (Azerbaijan and Turkey) over a small democracy. And in the case of any consol­i­dation of the victory of these aggressive author­i­tarian states, such consent repre­sents a degree of complicity and culpa­bility. From this perspective, the inter­na­tional community must be cautious in allowing such a precedent to stand, especially as the wave of author­i­tarian repression in Azerbaijan and Turkey will only be encouraged or endorsed, to the detriment of strug­gling democ­racies like Armenia.

What should the inter­na­tional community do now?

Given the combi­nation of these pre-existing challenges and the impact of a dramat­i­cally new post-war environment, democracy in Armenia is now under assault. The dramatic gains of Armenia garnered from its peaceful revolution of 2018, which was driven by an activist population no longer defined by apathy but committed to defending democracy, were widely embraced as a welcome exception. But stability and security in Armenia are now imperiled. While much of the burden of adapting and adopting Armenian national interests to meet this new post-war reality lies with the government, the inter­na­tional community also has a respon­si­bility to recommit to democ­ra­ti­zation and reinvest in reform in Armenia. The risk of regress and retreat from reform and democracy not only stands out is as a danger for Armenia, but also stands apart as a threat to the inter­na­tional community. And for the future of Armenia, democracy protection is now as important as democracy promotion.