The opponents of the Armenia-turkey normalization process urge the Armenian people to unite and torpedo the ratification of Armenia-Turkish Protocols or get them amended, Artusha Shahbazyan, Secretary of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (Dashnaktsutyun) (ARFD) parliamentary faction, told a press conference. He said that the people must rally round matters of national importance now.

“Why should we unite with the Armenian National Congress? What is the purpose? Remove Serzh Sargsyan from the chair and seat Levon Ter-Petrosyan on it?” Shahbazyan asked? He pointed out that the President’s resignation is not the ARFD’s priority task nor is the party seeking power.

The party has not yet decided on its further steps to achieve this important aim. The priority task is to get the RA Constitutional Court to return a verdict of “unconstitutional” on the Protocols. If the efforts fail, actions of protest during the ratification process must be organized.

The party does not lose hope. “For 120 years we have been struggling for national interests and we will go on. We must struggle. We are struggling against Turks, while the authorities and the Armenian National Congress are struggling against us,” Shahbazyan said.

Responding to NEWS.am’s question s to whether the ARFD is urging the people “to struggle against Turks”, Shahbazyan admitted he meant the struggle against the Armenian authorities. “The present situation makes us accept the sad reality: the Armenian and Turkish authorities are acting on the same plane,” he said. Shahbazyan also said that the ARFD is not yet “shutting the door” for a dialogue with the authorities, but when the party “shut[s] the door, a problem will arise, and the issue of change of power and structural reforms may be raised.”