Blankspot is on the ground in the Armenian border areas to Azerbaijan, where a political battle is being fought between the desires of a resurgent opposition movement and the geopolitical reality. A struggle that appears to have significant consequences for Armenia.
Av Rasmus Canbäck 5 maj, 2024
The reporting work, including translation and arranging contacts on site, was done in collaboration with Nvard Melkonyan. Without her, the reporting would not have been possible. This is the seventh part in the series on Armenia’s new reality. Text and photos: Rasmus Canbäck.
Karen Melyan carefully places single-use packages of coffee and canned goods into one of the newly dug trenches.
”You can take photos as long as you don’t reveal our position. It could jeopardize our safety,” Karen Melyan says, then walks back past car tires and sandbags stacked on top of each other.
From the trench, trenches snake in various directions along the border between Armenia and Azerbaijan. Considering the recent years’ wars between the countries and over 300 cross-border shootings, few probably think the fear is unwarranted.
”You can’t claim to love your homeland without doing something,” Karen Melyan continues.
He is one of several volunteers who have come here from all over Armenia. His group does not belong to any political organization but consists of local residents and ”patriots” who have traveled to border areas to help strengthen the military capability.
”We don’t have weapons, not right now. We’re trying to have a dialogue with the military. If something happens, we’ll make sure we can help,” Karen Melyan says.
The newly dug defense trenches stand a hundred meters from the formal border between Armenia and Azerbaijan, in what can be considered a no-man’s-land. The reason the military isn’t building them is as complicated as the area’s history.
During the Soviet era, these ”administrative borders” were used to indicate whether it was the Armenian or Azerbaijani Soviet state that had control. When the states became independent in 1991, the administrative borders remained formal, and in large parts of the former Soviet Union, there were never any immediate border negotiations because of wars. This has caused prolonged border disputes between Azerbaijan and Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan, as well as between Estonia and Russia.
In practice, this means that during the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan from 1988 to 1994 over Nagorno-Karabakh, the strategic positions were also moved forward along the border areas between the states. Today, Armenia controls parts of border areas formally belonging to Azerbaijan, and vice versa (and some parts of Armenia being occupied by Azerbaijan since 2021 and 2022).
The lack of agreed borders applies even today. In a historic agreement from mid-April, hailed by the international community, Armenia and Azerbaijan agreed on a smaller stretch of border. But both the prelude and aftermath have sparked considerable debate, criticism, and sometimes anger in Armenia.
”The negotiations between Niko (Nikol Pashinyan) and Azerbaijan haven’t been conducted properly,” Karen Melyan says. ”We can’t continue to give away pieces of our homeland. I want to be clear that I’m not pro-Russian. That might be one of the reasons why some media outlets here have cut out my interviews. I believe Armenia should approach Europe, and we should have democracy. But this is about our security and future.”
Karen Melyan’s canned goods and powdered coffee are a small part of a much larger geopolitical game that extends beyond negotiations about a border. Since Nagorno-Karabakh was emptied of its ethnic Armenian population in September 2023, the conflict has escalated, with shootings occurring daily along the border.
Azerbaijan has also issued an ultimatum: either Armenia voluntarily vacates four more villages, or it may happen by force. Armenia’s Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan visited one of the villages, Voskepar, in March and indicated then that border areas would transition to Azerbaijan in connection with the negotiations of demarcation and delimitation of borders.
Even though it was said at the time that the transition would happen within a week, it wasn’t until mid-April that all the details were presented. According to the agreement reached between Armenia and Azerbaijan, Armenia has until May 15 to clear mines from them for handover.
What the Armenian government wasn’t prepared for was that the agreement with Azerbaijan would be what unified a critical movement whose discontent has slowly grown in recent years.
When the singer Artur Khachents takes the stage in Voskepar, he is dressed in a black t-shirt with the triangular symbol of Nagorno-Karabakh over his shoulders. He sings about traveling to Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) and drinking its water to ease the pain.
”Who needs pain when there’s no friend? We need to bear the pain alone when we have no friend.”
Speaker after speaker takes the stage to explain how wrong it is for the government to agree to hand over areas outside Voskepar to Azerbaijan. The village church is only a few meters from the border, and the road risks being blocked. Residents are also worried that Azerbaijani soldiers will look into the village, creating a sense of insecurity.
It has been barely half a year since Azerbaijan launched the final military offensive against Nagorno-Karabakh, which prompted the mass exodus of Armenians in what many consider an ethnic cleansing. They fled in fear of what the Azerbaijani army would do if they stayed. Only eight Armenians are said to remain.
The symbols that have long been central in the struggle for Nagorno-Karabakh are now visible everywhere in Voskepar. Participants in the demonstration wear t-shirts with the classic statue ”Tatik-Papik,” and the flag of Nagorno-Karabakh is displayed alongside the Armenian flag. Tatik-Papik symbolizes for many ”the connection to the motherland.”
Today’s demonstration has attracted groups from across the country, including representatives of opposition parties.
Several participants call Nikol Pashinyan a ”traitor” or ”Armenia’s greatest threat” because he has agreed to the new deal.
Today’s demonstration has been organized by Archbishop Bagrat, Head of the Tavush Diocese. In an interview for the openly oppositional news channel Newday, he explains that their demands are aimed at Nikol Pashinyan’s negotiations.
”This is not about politics; this is about survival,” says Father Bagrat.
Analyst Tigran Grigorian from the think tank Regional Center for Security and Democracy in Yerevan has highlighted this spring that the so-called negotiations between the countries are not ”peaceful” because they take place against the backdrop of the ethnic cleansing of Nagorno-Karabakh.
”By ethnically cleansing Nagorno-Karabakh in September, Azerbaijan has managed to pressure Armenia into unilateral concessions,” he recently told the BBC.
According to Grigorian, this has happened, among other things, by the negotiations now being conducted bilaterally between the countries rather than under EU auspices.
”The effect of the wars between Armenia and Azerbaijan is that Azerbaijan has forced a peace negotiation format without external mediators.”
There are many issues to resolve, partly concerning Armenia’s occupied territories. In the southern part of the country, Azerbaijan attacked Armenia in 2021 and 2022, occupying significant parts of the territory.
”I’m not sure Baku is willing to withdraw its forces from Armenian territory,” Tigran Grigorian told the BBC.
Tigran Grigorian is also critical of international actors, including EU representatives, praising the agreements between Armenia and Azerbaijan as he does not share the optimism.
Reactions to the agreement have also differed between Armenia and Azerbaijan. While the agreement is largely hailed as a success in Azerbaijan, it has been criticized in Armenia, plunging the country into a deep political crisis where the critical mass is growing.
Although the handover of the four villages outside Voskepar and the neighboring village of Kirants was the most tangible news from the negotiations, others point out that the truly historic aspect is that the further negotiations are taking place according to the Alma Ata protocol from 1991.
Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan have also done so, having completed around 90 percent of their decidedly conflict-ridden borders. Like between Armenia and Azerbaijan, the issue between Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan has revolved around which areas are de jure (formal) versus de facto (in practice) borders. The borders that existed during the Soviet era are often not practical in terms of either infrastructure or communities. However, this is not something the Alma Ata protocol considers, which sets the stage for conflict when villages and infrastructure suddenly end up on the ”wrong” side of the border.
It is precisely this dilemma that, under the threat of Azerbaijani aggression, is affecting Voskepar and the village of Kirants right now. Previously, it affected Shurnukh in the Syunik province when the main road between Yerevan and Iran was suddenly closed off when Azerbaijani soldiers blocked it.
The response from the residents of Voskepar was to block the important main road passing through the village. Similar actions then spread across the country where civilians in solidarity did the same.
The main road between the capitals of Armenia and Georgia, Yerevan, and Tbilisi, which was built during the more peaceful Soviet era, sometimes meanders across borders. In other words, according to some assessments, smaller passages are formally on the Azerbaijani side of the border but are controlled by the Armenian side.
The Armenian government argues that it will eventually need to build new roads past the affected areas. It is clear that the government’s decision seems to have opened a Pandora’s box among government critics.
Oppositional Armenian media report that political figures from the old opposition are trying to exploit the movement for their own agendas, even though the emerging protest movement seems to have little to do with party politics. On the contrary, many participants in the protests, like Karen Melyan, are critical of both the political opposition and the government.
The latest opinion poll from the American International Republican Institute in March of this year (conducted in December) in Armenia showed that only a few percent believe that the political opposition, historically associated with Russia, is a good alternative. However, it also showed that support for Nikol Pashinyan is only 17 percent, and it has steadily declined in recent years. Sixty percent of respondents say they do not have any political affiliation at all.
Another central issue is whether the movement takes a positive or negative stance towards Russia. This stems from the fact that the old political opposition is considered to be close to Russia. Accusations of oligarchic rule, corruption, and ties to the Kremlin were driving forces against it when Nikol Pashinyan led a popular revolution in 2018. Since then, Armenia’s path away from Russia has been rather difficult.
As Russia is criticized by Armenia for not following the commitments it has made under the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) in connection with Azerbaijan’s war against Armenia in recent years, dissatisfaction has grown.
According to the aforementioned opinion poll, almost two-thirds of respondents said that the relationship with Russia is either bad or very bad, which is a remarkable shift from previous years when the relationship was perceived as good. However, trade with Russia has increased in recent years as Armenia has become one of many former Soviet states that can be used to bypass Western sanctions.
Russia has also taken an active role in the ongoing protests in Armenia, probably because the country’s position benefits from instability in the region. The Armenian part of the Russian state media Sputnik has been particularly active in reporting on the protests.
The combination of Russian media’s disinformation and the opposition politicians’ attempts to take leadership may have contributed to creating an image of the protest movement’s connections to Russia – despite individuals like Karen rejecting it.
Another aspect is the polarized media climate. In Reporters Without Borders’ press freedom index for 2024, Armenia did indeed increase as the only country in the region in ranking, but media polarization was identified as the biggest threat. Media considered independent rarely report on the same things, or in the same way, as those considered oppositional.
Reporters Without Borders points out that there are many media outlets driven by political or commercial interests, and that these are used for underlying agendas. It is primarily the oppositional non-independent media, along with semi-professional ones that are prominent on social media, that have reported on the protests. The Government funded media outlets have generally been sparse in its reporting.
The challenge is to interpret the grassroots movement’s motives without attributing them to incorrect opinions based on agenda-driven media reporting.
In the films, you can see how the police roll into the villages and arrest individuals who are considered to obstruct the work of the deminers. This, in turn, has led to large groups of people traveling to the villages to protest. There are also allegations from people on the ground that the police have used violence against them.
In the media, Archbishop Bagrat increasingly emerges as an informal leader of the protests. In interviews, he continues to emphasize that it is an existential, not political, issue.
On May 1st, he, like others, was prevented from entering the villages on the grounds that it disrupts the mine clearance work, which became big news among the opposition. Over thirty people are said to have been arrested.
Since then Archbishop Bagrat has organized a marsch from Kirants to Yerevan, which after a few days seem to have gathered big amounts of people.
One of those who has followed the emergence of an autonomous opposition movement, which does not necessarily have connections to party politics, is the Swedish-Armenian historian and peace and conflict researcher Vahagn Avedian.
”The emergence of today’s critical movements is a direct result of the war against Azerbaijan from 2020 onwards. Many of them blame the current government for the war loss in 2020, and also, ultimately, for the subsequent handling that resulted in the de facto ethnic cleansing of Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh).”
Vahagn Avedian believes that criticism of Pashinyan’s government will grow following recent announcements about border delimitation and demarcation where additional Armenian villages in Tavush are to be handed over to Azerbaijan.
”It feels like yet another blow in the aftermath of the closure of Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) where the government in Yerevan eventually relinquishes even parts of areas from Armenia’s recognized territory. Moreover, many fear that similar concessions will only encourage Azerbaijan to continue with the same aggression for even more territorial takeovers,” said Vahagn Avedian.
However, he does not believe that the protests will be as extensive as they were in 2018.
”I don’t think so even though the volatile situation can change quickly. The situation in Armenia was completely different in 2018 with relative stability in the conflict with Azerbaijan and the people tired of corruption and oligarchy consisting of the old guard. In many cases, any administration would fall after the way the Artsakh conflict was handled in 2020, not to mention what followed,” says Vahagn Avedian.
He concludes by reasoning that the lack of other leaders is the primary reason why the current government continues to govern Armenia.
”What keeps Pashinyan in power is partly the unstable situation that now prevails towards Azerbaijan but also to a large extent because there is no clear replacement for today’s regime. Simply put, the people do not want any of the old leaders back, and there is no new face yet that can challenge Pashinyan in the same way he did in 2018,” concludes Vahagn Avedian.
Back in the border areas, Karen Melyan and his volunteers continue to prepare for the border to be moved.
”In the end, we’re doing this for our safety and our homeland. I don’t see myself as radical or serving anyone else’s interests. We’re just tired of there never being peace,” says Karen Melyan.
Behind him stands one of the older volunteers, Levon Kostandian, agreeing. His Soviet-era four-wheel-drive Lada has been valuable for transporting heavy tires and bags of cement.
”I fought in the war in the 1990s, went to Artsakh, and have been helping with everything in recent years. I believe it is the destiny of Armenians to never be at peace,” says Levon Kostandian.
Header image: Karen Melyan and his friends preparing the trenches.
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About the author: Rasmus Canbäck has covered the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh for Blankspot for three years. His book “Varje dag dör jag långsamt” (Every day I die slowly) is about being the last foreign journalist to enter the region in March 2021. Soon, it will be translated into English.
Read the previous parts of the report series about Armenia’s new reality here.
Part 1: Armenia’s new reality – report from the borderland between war and peace
Part 2: Meet the women who clear mines in Nagorno-Karabakh (by Siranush Sargsyan)
Part 3: Nu avgörs framtiden för Nagorno-Karabach (only in Swedish)
Part 4: When nobody is watching – the borders slowly move closer
Part 5: The Invisible War Crimes
Part 6: Testimonies from Nagorno-Karabakh that the world ignored
