Levon Ter Petrosian, Opposition Rally, Liberty Square, Yerevan, Republic of Armenia
Without a doubt, the most significant event this winter has been the return of the first president, Levon Ter Petrosian, to the political scene in Armenia. Resigning in 1998 and living virtually as a recluse, Ter Petrosian came out of self-imposed retirement on 21 September — the 16th anniversary of Armenia's independence — to launch a blistering attack on the government and his successor as president, Robert Kocharian. Most observers took the criticism as indication that Ter Petrosian intended to again run for office.
On 26 October, at his first public rally, he confirmed such speculation by declaring that he would indeed run, but not everybody was happy. While considered an educated and formidable politician and statesman, many Armenians still hold Ter Petrosian responsible for the dire economic situation they found themselves in during the early to mid-90s when electricity shortages were commonplace, and corruption and cases of political persecution sky-rocketed.
In 1996, it is widely believed that the presidential election which secured his second term in office, was falsified.
In the wake of opposition protests following the ‘96 election, Ter Petrosian sent the tanks out onto the streets of Yerevan and opposition activists were persecuted and harassed. No wonder then, that not only did many expect the first president to account for his time in power, but they also demanded it. A rally staged Friday in the capital's Liberty Square was billed with that intent. Unzipped sets the scene.
Friends report from Yerevan that there are leaflets all over the capital inviting people for a (second) mass rally by ex-President and presidential hopeful Levon Ter-Petrosyan on 16 November. The main expectation of people who plan to go to the rally is that Levon at last will answer to the criticism over his period of presidency. They hope to hear his reflection over such issues as corruption, 1996 presidential elections (which many consider was a green light to all subsequent election frauds), Karabakh and so on. People expect and hope. Will Ter-Petrosyan deliver? We have to wait and see.
Even those opposed to Ter Petrosian's return such as Raffi K at Life in Armenia were intrigued.
Today is the 2nd Ter-Petrossian speech at the Opera (tonight). I don’t know if I’ll go - most the people I know who have gone have been rubberneckers, not supporters, and I am not sure I want to contribute to the swelling of his supposed ranks with rubberneckers. However, he is supposed to provide an explanation for his shortcomings today, which would be quite interesting - though I’m not sure I’d understand all the academic Armenian.
Opposition Rally, Liberty Square, Yerevan, Republic of Armenia
Setting the scene for the event, and inadvertently adding to the intrigue, the government did all they could to disrupt the meeting. An open-air pop concert scheduled for the next day in the same location, even though such events are unheard of in the winter, meant a huge stage erected would take up a significant amount of space. The concert was sponsored by the Yerevan municipality and the ruling Republican party of the main government candidate for next year's election, prime minister Serzh Sarkisian, as Unzipped explained.
Election period is the best for Armenian pop music loving crowd, more specifically youth, and it is officially started. We've seen it during parliamentary elections. We've already seen an introduction for presidential elections on 26 October.
This Saturday, just a day after ex-President Ter-Petrosyan 2nd rally, there will be an open-air free concert in Opera square (Freedom sq) with invited pop stars from Russia, including Dima Belan. Formally, concert is organised “for students”. However, it is sponsored by Yerevan mayor and Republican party.
“You go do your rallies, we will do concerts. Now see who will have more numbers.” […]
As it was, however, the stage was used by Ter Petrosian and his political allies as The Armenian Patchwork explains.
Once again opposition parties supporting the candidacy of Levon Ter-Petrosyan for president organized a rally on 16 November.
Ter-Petrosyan spoke from the stage on Freedom Square, from which Russian singer Dima Bilan and Armenian singers would perform the next day, a concert sponsored by the ruling Republican Party of Armenia.The crowd reached more than 10,000 […]
Khachatur Sukiasian, Opposition Rally, Liberty Square, Yerevan, Republic of Armenia
Local multi-millionaire businessman Khatchatur Sukiasian, also known as Grzo, was subject to tax inspections due to his support for the former president. Ironically, it has been frequently alleged that Sukiasian has evaded taxes during his time at the top of the pile under Ter Petrosian. His family is also reportedly related by marriage to former Minister of the Interior Vano Siradeghian still wanted by Interpol for masterminding several political assassinations in the 1990s.
A few days before the event, a youth activist from a minor political party, — the Democrat Hnchakian Party (SDHK) — was beaten by masked men while distributing anti-Sarkisian leaflets in a district of Yerevan. The Armenian Observer decried both the beating and the nature of the leaflets. Pro-Ter Petrosian and opposition activist Aramazd even reported that some leaflets advertising the rally were being systematically removed or defaced by government supporters, but despite the added publicity such tactics offered to the opposition, turnout at Friday's rally was little more than the previous one.
Even if the organizers put the number at 85,000, a figure impossible to achieve in Yerevan's Liberty Square, Reuters reported 12,000 while Radio Free Europe said 20,000. Bloggers, however, put the number at 10-15,000, but nonetheless said the gathering was impressive even if far smaller than the 50,000 recently reported in neighbouring Georgia. Even bloggers, such as The Armenian Observer, who have been highly critical of Ter Petrosian said that the speech by the first president was inspirational.
The crowd [responded] to the speech very enthusiastically, at least in the tight center where I was standing, and for a moment I felt inspired and elated. I felt, that it’s great after all, that Ter-Petrossian decided to come back - the political struggle has become so much more interesting by that. LTP is definitely much more charismatic and a better speaker then any of the politicians in the opposing camp - and today I felt for the first time ever, that he might actually have a chance of winning, because compared to him, Serge Sargsyan seems dull and weak to say the least.
Although not present at the rally, Unzipped was also pleased that Ter Petrosian finally addressed some outstanding accusations and criticisms of his time in power. Ironically, however, his greatest regret was bringing the current president and prime minister to Armenia from their native Nagorno Karabakh, the mainly Armenian-populated self-declared but unrecognized Republic in neighbouring Azerbaijan. The current favorite to take over from the current president is the prime minister, Serzh Sarkisian.
“Seeing the latest steps by Robert Kocharian and Serzh Sarkisian, I am increasingly convinced that I need to repent and ask for absolution,” he told about 20,000 people who gathered in the city’s Liberty Square. “Therefore, I belatedly but sincerely apologize to you for bringing Robert Kocharian and Serzh Sarkisian to Armenia and foisting them upon you.”
“If I made mistakes in my staffing policy - and I really did - this is the biggest one. In fact, this is not a mistake but a disaster which I inflicted on our people. So help me rid you of that disaster,” he added, drawing cheers from the crowd.
[…]
My initial impression is that the speech […] “contained a long-awaited critical analysis of his track record in government”. People may agree or disagree with what he said. But importantly, for the first time, he faced up his past in public and, overall, delivered expectations of the rally. His speech contained other important statements too which may be crucial in shaping up further developments in pre-election Armenia. Once more Levon proved that he is the one who is setting the ‘theme' for the election campaign.
With three months left before the 19 February 2008 presidential election in Armenia, The Armenian Observer rightly concludes that Levon Ter Petrosian is now shaping up to be the main opposition candidate aiming to contest the vote against the prime minister. Given the dynamics of Armenian politics, the race is now likely to get very heated and potentially volatile. Moreover, with the objectivity of the media in Armenia questionable, bloggers are taking on a very crucial and important role.
And while there might not be many posts on the election for now, what is lacking in terms of numbers is more than made up in terms of quality. Photographs of the 2008 presidential election in Armenia to date are here.
All photographs © Onnik Krikorian / Oneworld Multimedia 2007.
Hovannes Hovannisian, Opposition Rally, Liberty Square, Yerevan, Republic of Armenia
Stepan Demirchian, Opposition Rally, Liberty Square, Yerevan, Republic of Armenia
Levon Ter Petrosian, Opposition Rally, Liberty Square, Yerevan, Republic of Armenia
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Armenia has better politicans than Levon Ter Petrosian. Levon Ter Petrosian´s theam and governmont was not lese corrupt than the current one. presidential election which secured Ter Petrosians second term in office, was falsified. So he should quite the politics for ever and once !
[…] The full post is available on Global Voices Online. […]
[…] full post is available on Global Voices Online. Posted by Onnik @ 5:25 pm. Filed under: […]
For me the stability of Armenia is much more important than other facts. If ex-president comes to power then how will he work with current prim minister? Hope our politicians are/will be wise enough not to delight our historical enemies and weaken Armenia by attacking to each other.
[…] an interesting post today on Armenia: Return of the King PresidentHere’s a quick […]
I am sure that what brings Ter-Petrosyan to Armenian Political life is a level of political culture, which our country lost during past teh years, no other politician can be compared with the first president and i hope people will take this chance to become a citizens.
Again with the “apathetic” Armenians. This time with 15,000 at a gathering you didn’t have enough empathy to show up at. If that weren’t bad enough, you call the citizens who are curious and–engaged–about what LTP has to say “rubberneckers.”
So, if they don’t show up to a rally that you, yourself, don’t show up to, they’re “apathetic,” and, if they do, they’re “rubberneckers.”
Armenians are either “apathetic” or they’re “rubberneckers.” Nothing in between.
Great. Thank you for that insight. I didn’t know LArd Curzon’s views still held sway.
[…] although Ter Petrosian’s supporters claim that the ex-president attracted 85,000 people to Yerevan’s Liberty Square last Friday, most independent observers put the number more like 10-15,000. And with opinion polls showing that […]
Armen Filadelfiatsi,
Firstly, you are attacking me personally and you may not do that on this site. Secondly, you are wrong and obviously didn’t read this post if only because I was there as the photographs prove.
Regarding apathy in Armenian society, you are also wrong and it is this aspect of politics in Armenia that nobody in the country disagrees with. Of course, you are outside the country and weren’t at the event posted abuot here.
Anyway, 10-15,000 is not a large rally, some of those in attendance were there out of curiousity and anyway, this is another blogger (Raffi K at Cilicia.com) who wrote that, and it not as large, for example, as the opposition rally in Tbilisi, Georgia.
All of the quotes above are from posts written by bloggers other than myself, so you actually take exception to what they wrote — with all but one being at the rally in question while you are in fact thousands of miles away.
Anyway, you have broken the rules of this blog by attacking me personally and further attacks without reasoned arguments or links to materials online which prove otherwise will be deleted.
I have already warned you about this on my other blog and not least because you also attack others who comment.
By all means comment and put forward your argument, but seeing as you are accusing me of something which I am not guilty of, the only option is to warn you that no further outbursts will be tolerated.
Onnik,
First of all, what I have written above is not an outburst. Pointing out that you call Armenians politically apathetic then turn around and call political rally attendees “rubberneckers” is not an outburst, it is an observation of a very glaring contradiction.
And please don’t tell me that you didn’t call them “rubberneckers.” You not only posted Raffi K.’s elitist characterization of them as such, you went so far as to start your post with a gratuitous definition of “rubberneck.”
Second of all, you would do well not run your site like a kindergarden where you play disciplinarian. You’ve tried this rather commonplace trick to belittle and silence me before. You’ve established a track record for taking on the role of a schoolteacher to “discipline” criticism you don’t want to hear. You’re are just going to have to learn to deal with criticism more constructively than shutting down people who disagree with you.
I’m not criticizing you for the hell of it. My criticism is based on important considerations, so listen up:
This tactic of putting the “natives of the orient” in a double-bind wherein they are either “savage marauders” or “childlike playthings,” either “treasonous” or “incapable of defending themselves,” and, yes, either “politically apathetic” or toys whose heads bob comically on a spring, this tactic is an imperialist one that dates back to the East India Company in the 17th century.
So is the tactic of claiming that the “oriental needs a monarch to rule him,” an idea that seems to underly your crossing out the word “king” when referring to Levon Ter-Petrossian.
So, you see, my last post, like most of my posts, was not an outburst at all. They are, rather, carefully considered positions based on facts interpreted in a theoretically informed way.
Importantly, it is not just you that appears to have this bias, and your being British has nothing to do with it, either. On the contrary, judging from their websites, many of the diasporans residing in Armenia have this bias, especially the younger ones who have grown up in the US.
Whether you and other diasporan Armenians living in Armenia want to consider what I am saying is up to you, but if you don’t, then at least don’t complain about native Armenian waiters and clerks being rude to you, like you’re always doing.
Although, by virtue of being thoroughly indoctrinated, your imperialist, orientalist assumptions might be invisible to you, to them its as glaringly obvious as the spike in their water bills when water became privatized, something none of you “political activists” made a peep about.
Voter Apathy Appears Widespread on Eve of Parliamentary Poll
By Marianna Grigoryan
Published May 9, 2007
http://www.eurasianet.org/armenia/news/050907.html
European MPs Concerned About Armenian ‘Voter Apathy’
Friday 13, April 2007
By Ruzanna Khachatrian
http://www.armenialiberty.org/armeniareport/report/en/2007/04/5D952C49-1EA5-462D-A186-963341E1C7A2.ASP
And I think an apology or at least an acknowledgment that you were wrong in saying that I “didn’t have enough empathy to show up at” a rally I was obviously present at is in order.
Regarding your accusation that I am attempting to silence you, to point out to readers that I never have.
However, I have placed Armen on moderation on my personal blog as he always reverts to personal attacks and I have to edit out his expletives.
An example of how his comments usually end up.
Another one which you used expletives in and which I had to edit out on my blog but which I post in full here now.
A question for other bloggers out there. I edited out his insults and put him on moderation. What would you guys do? Does he breach the standard rules for commenting or not?
test
Armen Filadelfiatsi, it’s becoming increasingly obvious that you don’t read. Look below and it’s quite clear:
Basically, send as many test messages as you like, but they’re all moderated as is the case with anyone else.
However, given your past record and inability to treat anyone with respect, I will stick very firmly to the said rules when considering yours.
So, you have a choice. Make proper comments and polite reasoned arguments without insults or attacks, or not comment at all. I will not allow you to disrupt this section of the Global Voices site as you tried to do on my blog.
Um, I sent a rather comprehensive explanatory message that you did not put up.
Armeni - I have to support Onnik on this, as I’m sure, that you can do perfectly sensible, reasoned judgments, and sometimes highlight angles to the problem, that I’d never even think of. However, you very often prefer to become personal. Why? A smart guy like you definitely can crush the opponent in a civilized debate!
PS: by the way - the Observer who has commented above is not me, and the positions s/he has stated have nothing to do with my standpoints whatsoever.
No, you didn’t send a thing.
There was nothing and the past speaks for itself. I have always let your comments through although I have often had to delete offensive and personal attacks and remarks from my blog. However, I will NOT LET you destroy and disrupt this one as well.
As I have pointed out, put your opinion forwards, but if you continue to make personal attacks on me or others you will be permanently banned because to be quite honest, I have enough to get your ISP to block you access for offensive remarks.
Make your points, argue your case, but DO NOT EVER make attacks ESPECIALLY when you are nearly always wrong. Your history shows you usually swear and insult people while also not being able to distinguish fact from fiction or reality from your own imagination.
And to repeat, there was no “comprehensive explanatory message” because you are lying. Sorry, that’s it and GV can quite easily check their server records to determine that.
But, because I know you are unable to write such a “comprehensive explanatory message” because let’s face it, you’re not here and everyone who lives in or knows this country would consider you so uneducated as to the reality here they’d be in stitches, I urge you to post it here AND send it to Global Voices to avoid you being able to make such claims on this blog again.
http://www.globalvoicesonline.org/contact/
I’ve already suggested to them that you should be kept under tight control because of your inability to remain civil or discuss. Personally, I think you should be banned because you’re not interested in discussion, you’re interested in destroying any attempts at reasoned debate.
You wrote:
Ok, so explain your “carefully considered positions based on facts interpreted in a theoretically informed way” when you wrote this:
Also, please explain your “carefully considered positions based on facts interpreted in a theoretically informed way” when you accused me of not being at a rally that I was. As there are photos on this post which prove I was there, I think this says a lot about you.
Again, my opinion is that unless you can make comments without attempting to disrupt, without attacking other people commenting, and without making personal attacks, you should be banned from Global Voices.
You waste my time with your rants and you scare off other people with something to say and you usually do so by personally insulting them.
Onnik, I’ve used one of your photos in my post here (http://uzogh.livejournal.com/116401.html).
While I have no information about the copyrights, credits, etc., I’ve put links to this post as a source for picture, and a link to your main blog under your name.
Please let me know, if I’ve done something wrong
Uzogh, pics on this page are by me and are licensed under Creative Commons for use for not-for-profit purposes as long as they are not altered and a credit is given. Anyway, they may be freely used within those guidelines. Cheers.
Yes, I did send a reply, but that reply was lost, whether it was your fault or mine or some other problem, I don’t know.
I would expend the effort of re-writing it, but the kind of kindergarden schoolteacher way you have gone about countering me in the interim, namely by cherry picking incendiary things that I have said without mentioning the context, rather bores me.
Not as much as it bores me, Armen, and especially when we’ve had the same “discussion” over on my blog where you also couldn’t back up your argument because it simply has no basis in truth.
http://oneworld.blogsome.com/2007/11/05/the-numbers-game-reprise/
As for taking your attacks on others “out of context,” quite simply, there is no “out of context” and no justification for your style of writing comments which invariably means attacking and insulting people without provocation.
Anyway, I once again ask you to write a reasoned comment proving me wrong with ample links, quotes and evidence to prove your case. However, you can’t because once again, you don’t know what you’re talking about which is why you nearly always have to revert to personal attacks.
Basically, I doubt you ever wrote anything of note to respond to this post at all. That’s the reason why there is nothing here and I doubt there was anything to post at all. So, prove me wrong. Now go ahead and post a substantiated comment. If you can, of course.
Onnik,
I don’t want to get into a fight with you. I think you are doing a halfway decent job of covering Armenia, and when I am faced with the prospect of doing damage to someone who is playing a positive role, I become disheartened.
There does seem to be a strain of old-world imperialism in your coverage, and that strain runs through many other diasporan blogs (and state department bureaucrats-in-training blogs, too, lets not forget). My intention is to draw your attention to it. You can face it or not; it’s up to you. Ultimately, historically, it will be a matter of whether the archive you leave behind is considered an archive belonging to a zombie, a predictable mouthpiece, or a conscious human.
You’ll leave behind what you’ll leave behind. I hope you go in the direction of the conscious human.
[…] radical opposition put its hopes on the return of Armenia's first president, Levon […]
Levon Ter Petrosian is THE KING PRESIDENT!!!!
I hope Armenia finally will open his eyes…