Pashinyan: “Western Azerbaijan” Narrative Poses Serious Threat to Armenia’s Security

YEREVAN — Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has described the so-called “Western Azerbaijan” narrative promoted by Baku as a serious threat to Armenia’s security, regional security, and the established peace. He made the remarks at the international conference titled “Comprehensive Security and Resilience.”

According to Pashinyan, the simultaneous existence of differing public and private narratives creates new challenges in the security environment.

“We see manifestations of these challenges from time to time and on a wide variety of occasions,” the prime minister said.

Pashinyan emphasized that security problems often begin with patterns of thinking in which narratives detached from reality are promoted domestically, while entirely different issues and approaches are discussed at the negotiating table.

“Since the emergence of social media, the boundaries between internal and external discourse have disappeared,” Pashinyan said.

Turning to the peace process between Yerevan and Baku, Pashinyan said progress was achieved after moving away from what he described as a policy of mechanical reciprocity, when the Armenian side decided to abandon an endless “ping-pong” approach.

“If we imagine that, under these circumstances, the peace agreement had been signed and ratified in the form agreed upon at that time, would this create problems for Armenia or solve them?” Pashinyan said.

The prime minister also said the events of September 2022 demonstrated that Armenia’s previous single-component security system was ineffective and had placed the country at risk of losing its sovereignty.

“The security formula that existed until 2022 was, forgive me, primitive in its essence, because it consisted of a single sentence: ‘The Collective Security Treaty Organization will ensure our security.’ That sentence had no continuation,” he said.

Pashinyan stressed that Armenia’s new security architecture is based on international legitimacy and the protection of the country’s internationally recognized territory of 29,743 square kilometers. He warned that pursuing territorial claims beyond those borders would create dangerous grounds for actions against Armenia.

“If we step even 10 square kilometers outside international legitimacy, at whose expense are we doing so? At someone else’s. That means we are giving someone else legitimacy to take action against us,” Pashinyan said.