Every era has its own values…

(How the seizure of Shahumyan was prevented by suspending a session of the USSR Supreme Soviet)

The interview ‘How the Sadakhlo checkpoint was opened and Georgian grain was delivered to Armenia,’ published in Aravot, received widespread attention, and the facts voiced in it for the first time prompted a journalistic investigation. We were particularly interested in the part concerning independent human rights advocate and political analyst Arbak Khachatryan.

The highly veiled and noticeably ‘sparing’ account by former Traffic Police chief, police colonel and reserve officer Sahak Salnazaryan prompted us to approach him again, hoping to clarify details of unfamiliar pages in the history of those years of newly established Armenia.

In your interview with Aravot, you speak about historically important events. What is noteworthy is that they involve people who played important roles in the first years of independent Armenia and who had never been mentioned to this day.

Unlike the well-known actors present ‘on stage,’ their names never circulated in the press. Why did you decide to recall the past only decades later? Why now? Is this connected with the current domestic political situation?

Why now? Now, because our country has once again found itself on the threshold of serious trials. Now, when the world has entered a stage of uncertainty and Armenia faces crucial internal and external challenges, with its very existence essentially at stake, it is more important than ever to speak about real ‘crusaders’ rather than ‘film heroes.’ About people whose mission is to genuinely support our country in every possible and impossible way, rather than to make a name for themselves and earn dividends from it. This is Arbak Khachatryan.

In the difficult 1990s, thanks to several steps he took, we managed to find a way out of situations that seemed hopeless.

Today, when difficult times have come for Armenia and the whole world, he is acting again. I want to stress that, without being the ‘man’ of any government, including the current one, he always manages to solve Armenia’s pressing problems at an interstate level. He is doing the same now.

With his direct participation, work to bring together the intellectual circles of Armenia, the Russian Federation and Georgia has been underway for a second year and is already producing results.

For example, about 400 Georgian figures in science, art and culture declared at a recent gathering that they were ready to support Armenia, suffering from coronavirus infection, by every means.

I think few people know about the congress held in Tbilisi last year under the slogan ‘A New Generation for Peace,’ devoted to stability in the South Caucasus. Besides youth organizations from Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan, representatives of the UN, the United States and Germany took part. The idea and initiative for this congress also belong to Arbak Khachatryan, but he does not publicize it.

I am convinced that we need to speak about such people. I will tell you a few more facts from his biography.

— Please tell us…

— Where should I start? How, with support from Russian friends, when the concept of an ‘oligarch’ did not yet exist, he donated cars to Armenia’s newly established Traffic Police? Or how, with his support, 11 police officers from Kirovakan returned home after being arrested by USSR troops on the Armenian–Azerbaijani border, handed over to Azerbaijan and designated militants? Meeting senior officials of the USSR Prosecutor’s Office at Moscow’s Sevastopol Hotel, Arbak Khachatryan arranged through them to send a special investigative team to Baku.

Ultimately, that team managed to persuade Azerbaijan’s Prosecutor’s Office to transfer the case of the 11 Armenian police officers to the Armenian side. You should have seen the men’s reaction when they learned from the Soviet investigative committee that they would be returned to their homeland. On June 22, after Arbak’s call, we welcomed our police officers at the Gazakh post; I was a platoon commander at the time.

In one of my interviews I have already spoken about the bombing of the Izmir railway and the import into Armenia of essential supplies and wheat from Georgia’s reserve fund. To learn who made it possible to deliver wheat to Armenia through the Azerbaijani-populated Marneuli district during the war, you can ask Nodar Mumladze, the district’s prefect in those years.

(Following his advice, I contact Nodar Mumladze — editor.)

‘If it had not been for Arbak and Mamuka (Ilia Gvarishvili), I shudder to think what might have happened to the cargo transported to Armenia through Marneuli.’

It was solely their standing that made it possible to deliver grain to Armenia. What is more, without Mamuka and Arbak’s intervention, the bombed bridge would not have been restored. Mamuka spent days and nights on the grain train. I did play a role in sending grain to Armenia too, but my contribution is very modest compared with what these men did.

It is a pity that Shevardnadze and Sigua, Georgia’s former president and prime minister, are no longer here. They could have told much about Arbak, concluded Mumladze, gamgebeli (prefect) of Marneuli district in 1992–1995.

— Let us return to our conversation.

Of course. I cannot leave unmentioned that, when Armenia had run out of bread entirely, Arbak managed to arrange and transport to Armenia 150 KamAZ trucks loaded with grain. This was Georgia’s ‘untouchable reserve.’

Arbak approached Yerevan Mayor Hayk Marutyan with a proposal to recognize Ilia (Mamuka) Gvarishvili’s services by naming a city street after him. Gvarishvili held the position of head of the administrative bodies division of Georgia’s ministerial cabinet in 1992–2003.

Nothing will have been said about Arbak Khachatryan unless we note his role in two more situations decisive for Armenia. The first was preventing the deployment of USSR armed forces special units and their military action in Shahumyan. Arbak Khachatryan’s role in this is indisputable. It was at his request that Vladimir Foteev, a member of the USSR Supreme Soviet and chairman of the Union monitoring and oversight commission on the NKAO, contacted Marshal Shaposhnikov, the last minister of the USSR armed forces, and something incredible happened. The troops ready to invade Shahumyan pulled back. Can you imagine? This became possible by suspending the Supreme Soviet session and calling Shaposhnikov.

And the six Boeings packed to capacity with weapons in the decisive days of the Karabakh war… I will quote only the republic’s first president: ‘A golden bust of Arbak should be erected in Artsakh.’ When the president’s words were conveyed to Arbak, he merely gave a wry smile.

I cannot say more; I have no right to.

P.S. 1

Today, amid the coronavirus epidemic raging across the world, Arbak Khachatryan is working on a major regional program. It is vital to resolving the issue of ‘closed borders’ for Iran, Armenia and Georgia.

In parallel, without any state support, work is underway to implement unprecedented cultural programs involving outstanding figures in the arts from Armenia, Georgia, Russia and the West.

We also learned that Arbak Khachatryan’s legal successors, his wife and son, intend to file two lawsuits, one in Armenia and the other in Russia. The Khachatryans’ lawyer explained that this concerns unraveling a tangle of unlawful actions committed over the years and restoring justice.

In the 1990s, with the knowledge of Armenia’s top leaders, a process began to neutralize Arbak Khachatryan at any cost. He was taken into custody several times. In a flagrant violation of the law, the Khachatryan family was stripped of all its property. According to the lawyers, the documents in their possession unquestionably provide sufficient evidence to secure redress for the family’s material and non-material damage. It was also emphasized that compensation, amounting to tens of millions of dollars, would not be borne by the state. The claims are to be satisfied by former senior Armenian officials who participated in the confiscation of the Khachatryans’ property.

The lawsuit brought against the Russian authorities will be no less sensational. In 2003, the Armenian authorities, represented by President Robert Kocharyan, sent a semi-official letter to Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) asking it to deal with the person holding the position of adviser to the human rights commissioner under the Russian president. Russian President Vladimir Putin was also acquainted with the letter (compromat.ru, iz.ru, argumenti.ru).

We should stress that presidential elections were taking place in Armenia then, and if the opposition united, Robert Kocharyan would have had no chance of reelection to a second term. Khachatryan had significant influence on the country’s domestic political processes.

Although the arguments for neutralizing Khachatryan in the letters sent to Russia’s special services now raise a smile, they are very revealing: ‘Arbak Khachatryan organized Tigran Naghdalyan’s murder; he is a great friend of Osama bin Laden and Islamist extremists; he supplied Chechen militants with Igla antiaircraft missile systems,’ and many other ‘facts’ from the realm of fantasy.

In 2003, Arbak Khachatryan was arrested and spent 2.5 years in the notorious Lefortovo detention facility. What is most interesting is that, in 2007, he was reinstated as adviser to the Russian human rights commissioner but declined to work and resigned voluntarily; documents are available. Finally, we should add that the well-known Russian lawyer Vladimir Levin handled matters concerning his unlawful detention in Russia and compensation for the material and non-material damage caused to him.

P.S. 2

Seeking comment, we approached Arbak Khachatryan.

Regarding the lawsuits, he briefly noted that, given Armenia’s budget, plundered over decades, he could not allow the claim to be directed against the state.

‘Where is the budget for me to demand compensation from the state as well?’ he said.

Regarding cooperation with Armenia’s new authorities, the human rights advocate emphasized: ‘Of course, it is encouraging that the country’s current government is untainted by corruption. But is that enough for the country to progress?

Armenia’s previous leaders were like that too when they came to power. Moreover, they were men who had been through the war. But everyone saw how money and power corrupted them. They tore the country apart.

Today, young people have come to power who have neither seen war nor even an idea of what it is. From their predecessors they inherited a plundered country, a foreign debt of monstrous proportions and a weakened economy. They have no experience in diplomatic relations, and we see the mistakes being made in relations with geopolitical centers.’

From the outset, Nikol Pashinyan failed to embark on structural legal reforms. As a result, the ‘former rulers’ continue to control banks and financial resources, the judiciary and the security agencies. Dismissing this or that official does not amount to reforming the system.

The most important state institutions operate according to a scheme drawn up by the ‘former rulers.’

The arrogance of the new authorities is also incomprehensible. One gets the impression that, in governing the state, the first criterion is ‘who walked alongside them, and how far.’

On the other hand, coronavirus is simply destroying the country in every direction. I will say nothing about the numbers infected and dead.

The economic consequences of the epidemic will make themselves felt very soon.

What is most surprising is that, when you propose a concrete program or give advice to resolve issues in different areas, you immediately encounter officials’ ‘jealousy.’ They think you are reaching for power or claiming their jobs. It seems everyone imagines himself to be Napoleon. They do not even know that Napoleon ruined France (smiles — editor’s note). This ‘illness’ is characteristic of all our governments.

Most importantly, the world will no longer be what it was.

Before our eyes, the world’s financial and banking systems are collapsing. Money will no longer play its former role; human capital is coming to the fore. I have been speaking about this for more than ten years.

There is a historical pattern: when one center collapses, another takes its place. This may sound ridiculous or unbelievable now, but our region could become that new center, with a triad of Iran, Armenia and Georgia. If, of course, we can overcome the infection that has struck the world — I do not mean coronavirus…

Now you tell me: is it time to cooperate with Armenia’s new authorities, or not?

From the publisher:

It was indeed difficult to prepare this piece: every episode described above is the plot of a book. Arbak Khachatryan is categorically opposed to ‘PR.’ Nevertheless, we will consistently uncover all these historical episodes and present them to the public.

As an epilogue, a quotation from Khachatryan: ‘World leaders naturally want their countries to develop and their peoples to live well. They do not always succeed, however, and even when they do, it is often not at the right time. For example, Russian President V. V. Putin, one of the major authoritative world leaders, after governing a superpower for more than twenty years, finally enshrined in law that public officials may not hold dual citizenship or bank accounts abroad.

Yet the same Putin previously allowed Armenia’s leaders and some officials not only to hold Russian citizenship but also to own property and shares in leading Russian companies.

So every era has its own values.’

Arbak Khachatryan concluded by calling for an end to constantly blaming only the country’s former leaders. In his view, the main blame lies with the entourage — the ‘chameleons.’ The flawed systems and their adherents must be fought.

scannews.am

Interview

vakhtangmmargaryan