The former Armenian foreign minister Vartan Oskanian sometimes feels envy, but not for Armenian diplomacy. “But I do for Turkish diplomacy. I would never dare put a document like that on the negotiating table. I would not sign it, and I am not envious of the person that is to do it,” Oskanian stated at a discussion organized by the Civilitas Foundation.

Speaking of the initialed Armenian-Turkish Protocols, Oskanian said: “Reading the Protocols one arrives at the conclusion that someone and somewhere wrote them with Turks’ participation and then imposed on the Armenian side or the Armenian side was actually involved in working them out being convinced that Armenia’s further existence and development depends on the reopening of the Armenian-Turkish border.” According to him, it is not the signing of the documents that is unacceptable – they might be acceptable with a sentence or a couple of phrases removed. Oskanian also reminded the attendees that more than 190 countries have territorial problems. “A fourth of them in Europe, but they have embassies, mutual trade, and diplomats, respecting one another, continue negotiating and discussing different interpretations of historical facts and territorial claims,” Oskanian said.

He took Georgia as an example. "In our region we did not recognize the border with friendly, brotherly Georgia. “Only now are the two states demarcating the frontier. Georgia and Azerbaijan did not recognize the common border, and demarcation is not in progress, but they have diplomatic relations,” Oskanian said.

He is surprised at the fact that Armenia’s incumbent authorities either fail to see the real state of affairs or are unwilling to admit their different meaning. “For fifteen years Turkey has been maintaining the blockade, hoping for Armenia to grow economically and politically weak. It has never happened nor will. Rather, it is they that have to get out of the complicated political situation they have found themselves in. They need to reopen the border and seem to have found the way of doing it thanked to us. It is they that are under Europe’s powerful pressure because of the ‘admission schedule’. They need to reopen the border because they have urgent economic problems in their eastern regions. It is they that are experiencing great fear of the progressing process of international recognition of the Armenian Genocide, which died down under the USA’s pressure. Finally, it is they need to reopen the border to underline their decisive role in the region. Despite all that, it is our authorities that are making concessions to speed up the process. If the authorities initially failed to show foresight not to get into the present situation, they must at least find a way of saving the situation now.”