Civil Contract faction not to support opposition-proposed draft statement on Shushi Declaration

ArmInfo. The ruling party Civil  Contract has not supported the proposal by the Armenia opposition  faction to express concern over the adoption of the so-called Shushi  Declaration for fear of, among other things, causing harm to the  authorities-declared policy of long-lasting peace and stability in  the region, stated Gurgen Arsenyan of the dominant parliamentary  faction Civil Contract after the opposition MP Andranik Tevanyan  presented a draft statement. 

Armenia's Parliament will hold a special meeting on Wednesday to  discuss the Shushi Declaration ratified by the Azerbaijani and  Turkish Parliament. The meeting will be convened on the initiative of  the Armenia opposition faction, which proposes that the RA National  Assembly issue a statement condemning the ratification of the Shushi  Declaration and "expressing deep concern over the ratification by the  Azerbaijani and Turkish Parliaments of the declaration the  Azerbaijani and Turkish presidents signed in the Azerbaijan-occupied  Shushi on June 15, 2021." 

Back on June 15 and 17, 2021, Armenia's foreign office issued  relevant statements. According to Mr Arsenyan, the statements  contained all the key points incorporated in the opposition-proposed  draft. He believes the Parliament's position must be identical to  that of the foreign office.  In their 2021-2026 programme of action  Armenia's authorities declared a policy of long-lasting peace and  stability and are implementing their foreign policy in line with the  programme, with a view of causing no harm to the declared policy. 

The Armenian Parliament's foreign policy tools are not restricted to  mere statements. In this context, Mr Arsenyan welcomed a recent  statement by the Armenia bloc on resuming its participation in the  international activities of Armenian parliamentary delegations. 

The opposition-proposed document reads that despite the assurances  that the Shushi Declaration is not aimed at a third party, its  content is obviously against the Armenian people.  "It sets the  strategic goals of the two nations that carried out a 44-day  aggression against the Republic of Artsakh, against Artsakh's  self-determination, sovereignty and territorial integrity of the  Republic of Armenia, and the rights of the Armenian people, which  survived a genocide and was scattered throughout the world," Mr  Tevanyan said. 

The wordings concerning the "Zangezur corridor" contained in the  declaration are evidence that Turkey and Azerbaijan are reaching  public agreements on implementation of joint expansionist programmes.  The authors of the statement also condemn the Azerbaijani-Turkish  agreement on struggling against international recognition of the  Armenian Genocide by distorting the essence of the problem and  turning it into a subject of historical research. 

"The Shushi Declaration is not based on the UN Charter or the  OSCE-approved security principles. Rather, it is based on the 'ethnic  security' approach, which is in conflict with the fundamental  international legal norms. According to the Vienna Convention on the  Law of Treaties of 1969, all the international treaties that are in  conflict with the imperative international legal norms are not  legitimate. The provocative and destructive Shushi Declaration is  unacceptable to the Republic of Armenia. It is a serious challenge to  regional and global security, which does not contribute to our  region's peaceful development, is in conflict with normalization of  Armenian-Turkish relations without preconditions and arouses serious  doubts about official Ankara's real intentions," the draft statement  reads.