Ruben Rubinyan refutes Serzh Sargsyan`s statements, stating that  publication of 3rd President`s Office is nothing but a trick

ArmInfo.On April 14, Vice Speaker of the National Assembly of Armenia Ruben Rubinyan reacted to a document with the proposals of the OSCE Minsk Group to the parties to the negotiation process on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, published  by the office of 3rd President Serzh Sargsyan, 

It should be noted that in the published fragment of one of the  documents on Karabakh it was said that "the declaration is based on  the principle of a package agreement. The provisions contained in it  form a single whole. Their implementation cannot take place in  isolation from each other." Thus, Sargsyan refuted the statements of  the Prime Minister of the Republic Nikol Pashinyan, who, today in  Parliament, stated that "back in 1997 it was planned to divide the  issue into two parts, first the Karabakh issue, then the peace  agreement. " "The same goes for the 2016 package, the same goes for  the 2018 package. This package says very clearly that the initial  principles are agreed upon, and then negotiations between the  governments begin with the participation of representatives of  Nagorno-Karabakh.  Speaking of NK representatives, they meant NK  Armenians, Azerbaijanis of NK. Then the Azerbaijanis of NK would sit  at the negotiating table, and there would be no settlement until the  issue of Shushi, which has been on the table since 1996, is resolved.  Serzh Sargsyan was going to surrender Shushi? If not, then a war  would start, and then, in addition to the territories, part of  Karabakh would have to be surrendered," he said.

"And how does Serzh Sargsyan's Office justify that they didn't  actually negotiate on a phased option - by publishing a document for  2016, the title of which at the very beginning says that this is a  document on the first stage of the conflict resolution and further  steps, but they give the following justification - since this text  says that the decision or steps are in a single package, they cannot  be separated from each other, therefore, this is a package document,"  Rubinyan said.

The NA Vice Speaker stated that the publication of Serzh Sargsyan's  apparatus is nothing but a trick. "Even before the 2018 revolution,  Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, regarding the process of  resolving the conflict, several times said that a phased approach was  being proposed. In response to this, among other things, Armenian  Foreign Minister Eduard Nalbandyan reported that a phased solution  was being discussed in batch application, which in itself is a  strange statement," Rubinyan said. Meanwhile, according to Rubinyan,  Edward Nalbandyan's statement could be logical only in one case, if  the parties came to a decision on a package solution of this document  or on a package solution on all components of the conflict.

Firstly, as the Vice Speaker pointed out, the difference between the  staged and package approaches is that the staged option resolves the  conflict in stages, i.e. at the first stage, one of the components  can be solved.  At the same time, it is not known how and when the  next component will receive a solution. The package version of the  solution assumes either a single solution in one stage of all the  components of the conflict, or, at a minimum, an agreement is reached  on the solution of all components, but they are implemented in  stages.

Rubinyan insists that this document did not fix what status Artsakh  should have, when, where and with whose participation a referendum on  the final status of Artsakh should be held, what issue should be  raised at the referendum. "That is, we are dealing with the exact  opposite of a package solution, when there is a solution option that  does not describe how, when, by whom the central, cornerstone problem  of the conflict will be resolved. Therefore, Serzh Sargsyan discussed  a pure staged aproach," he said.