The leaders of the ‘Մեր ձևով’ (‘Our Way’) movement like to repeat that Nikol Pashinyan is a man without honour or principles. One could agree with this statement, if those who utter it did not themselves turn out to be a mirror image and accomplices of the same moral decline that they stigmatise. As we wrote earlier, everything was clear with the Turkish satrap a long time ago: he is sincere and consistent in his hatred towards everything Armenian, which cannot be said about his ‘opposition’.
Like any other virtue, integrity is measured by fundamental values and actions, not slogans. As in no other sphere of human activity, in politics actions are primarily manifested by the choice of friends and enemies. The political community is defined by these two categories.
So, what do we have in the end of the day? Friends of Pashinyan (at least, he thinks so) are Turkey, Azerbaijan, and generally everyone who helps him maintain power. This means that the so-called ‘opposition’ of all kinds is among them. His enemies are the Armenian nation, the entire Armenian world, the Armenian Church and everything they embody and are capable of.
So, who are the friends of the ‘Our Way’ movement? To begin with, a group of individuals who call themselves guardians of the Armenian identity and fighters for ‘national dignity’ have hired Robert Amsterdam as their lawyer. What do we know about Amsterdam’s friends? His close friend is the Turkish Sultan and one of the main ideological enemies of the Armenian world and the Armenian geopolitical project – Recep Erdogan. The one, who sponsors the continuation of the Armenian Genocide and with whom the alleged enemy of Samvel Karapetyan’s team, Turkish collaborationist Nikol Pashinyan, is happily posing.
Furthermore, in a Freudian slip, Amsterdam declares that he ‘will attack Armenia’ in the name of protecting Samvel Karapetyan. Defenders of the ‘defender’ will say that he was referring to the current collaborationist regime, and not the Armenian state, but this slip of tongue is an illustration of how narrow personal goals and thirst for power on the part of the current ‘Mer Dzevov’ team and their entourage justify any ‘collateral damage’ in the form of the present and the future of Armenia. ‘Mer Dzevov’ team had found no other ‘our way’ for the Armenian people other than someone supporting the genocidal regime in the person of Erdogan. If this is ‘our way’, then it is worth asking the question: then who are ‘we’?
Niccolo Machiavelli, a classic of political thought, wrote that in politics the end justified the means. In his apparently ‘naïve’ worldview, such a goal could be the salvation of the state and the preservation of its freedom. Even this most cynical of political thinkers would not have imagined that, against the background of the destruction of the state, the means themselves would become the goal – pitiful assets and fees. Indeed, for the sake of saving his state, the sovereign of Machiavelli would have made friends with the Satan himself, let alone a friend of Erdogan (although, is there a big difference?). But live broadcasts where a friend of international criminals compares Armenia to Mozambique has nothing to do with saving Armenia. Pashinyan himself has long been busy with such ‘state-building’, without the help of the ‘effective managers’ of the Tashir group.
Finally, nothing speaks more about unscrupulousness than a blatant lie. Representatives of the movement continue to deny any connection with the ‘former’ leaders and their teams, while being firmly affiliated with the ‘exes’. Karapetyan’s lawyer, Aram Vardevanyan, is a long-standing associate and defence lawyer of the second President of Armenia – Robert Kocharyan. Kocharyan expressed himself complimentarily about Karapetyan and the ‘Our Way’ movement. The media resources of the ‘former’ actively share and highlight the content of ‘Mer Dzevov’. However, this is rather a disservice to the movement, given the ex-authorities’ exorbitant anti-rating.
At the same time, without a shadow of hesitation, ‘Mer Dzevov’ movement has already admitted that they are considering cooperation with another ‘ex’ – Levon Ter-Petrosyan. With the very first politician responsible for the collapse of the Third Republic, its failed institutions, the catastrophic demographic situation, the loss of leverage hard-won by our soldiers and the Armenian world during the First Karabakh War, and, finally, the first ‘godfather’ of the Turkish collaborationist Nikol Pashinyan. Such promiscuity in relations (not to mention a possible alliance with Edmon Marukyan – the opportunist and ‘former’ ambassador-at-large of Pashinyan) proves that ‘Mer Dzevov’ has no serious intentions of replacing the Turkish satrap with the Russian governor.
Unscrupulousness of ‘Or Way’ goes hand in hand with their inconsistency. Economic development, creation of better business conditions, strengthening of family values, ensuring the right of the people of Artsakh to decent life, revival of confidence in the future among the youth, protection of the Armenian Apostolic Church — the ‘gentleman’s set’ of the movement is assembled from the vaguest formulations. For an Armenian voter, who is generally tired of traditional pre-election slogans about better life, this is empty noise. Where are original ideas? Where is the roadmap for achieving ambitious goals? Finally, what kind of an ideological engine do ‘Our Way’ and all those involved plan to use to travel into bright future? At this stage, it is absolutely unclear whether we are talking about national conservatism, patriotic liberalism, or simply a kind of Comprador[i] ideological construct that presupposes banal protection of business interests under the banner of spirituality.
Even when considering coalitions with forces with, to put it mildly, dubious reputation and ratings in the range of 1%, Samvel Karapetyan’s team is doing everything not to assume any political responsibility for preventing the final dismantling of the Armenian statehood, which is planned after the victory of the ‘Civil Contract’ in the 2026 elections. However, in reality, thereby ‘Mer Dzevov’ becomes a direct accomplice in this process. Crimes committed by a group of individuals are always punished more severely. But the team of ‘Our Way’ naively believes that a few seats in the parliament and the litigation ‘talent’ of Robert Amsterdam will save them from any punishment. It is quite logical though, if, in their worldview, the punishment is the loss of control over ‘Power Networks of Armenia’, and not ‘collateral damage’ in the form of the final disappearance of Armenia as a political entity.
‘Our Way’ plays by Pashinyan’s rules, on his field, and also makes substantial contributions to his legitimacy. If ‘Mer Dzevov’ movement is ‘our way’ and even, according to the leaders of the amorphous ‘movement’, ‘the Armenian way’, then it is time to make a choice: either we are unscrupulous creatures that measure national interest in centimetres of our own skin, or we reject this farce and send it to where it belongs – the dustbin of history. If unscrupulous, loyal, disorganised, inconsistent activity is really ‘the Armenian way’ then, alas, all of us will go to the landfill together with the ‘exes’ and the current ones.
[i] *Comprador (from Portuguese comprador — ‘buyer’) is a local trader, an entrepreneur, who mediates between foreign capital and the national market of a developing country.
