Armenia's first president, Levon Ter-Petrosyan, said that most of the opposition seems to think that if they can get rid of Nikol Pashinyan, it will be possible to avoid painful decisions, but this is naive. His remarks came on the air of the Public Television Company.
"Whoever comes may sign a document that will be even worse. First, they have not proven that they can be better. They can't, because they don't have the information; I don't either. It seems to me that all decisions will be bad for us. I see the task: choose the least painful decision out of all the bad ones, and in order to understand this, we have to possess information, and the only one who possesses it is Pashinyan," he said.
The first president said that Nikol Pashinyan is also afraid to sign because whatever document he signs, they will say, "Traitor, Turk."
"I don't want to get into the sphere of conspiracy theories. In my opinion, we [referring to the former presidents of Armenia and Artsakh and His Holiness - ed.] extend our hand to Pashinyan if we choose the least painful option. We take responsibility, for which I am ready. The success of something like this requires absolute sincerity on both sides, putting aside partisan and careerist interests. There are many people who think they will become president once they get rid of Pashinyan. In addition to famous faces, every day someone sets up a podium in the street and imagines himself to be the next leader of Armenia," he said.
The first president said he didn't want to go into detail about the presenter's remark that Armenia wants two things: to recognize Artsakh as part of Azerbaijan and to give it a corridor. "So much has been said about that. I don't know if it will work or not. It's empty talk," he said.
Asked whether Armenia is doomed to sign these documents, Levon Ter-Petrosian said there are no two neighboring states in the world that do not have peace agreements.
"More powerful countries than us have also surrendered. Yes, Armenia has capitulated. There can be nuances, Russia's proposal will be different, America's proposal will be different, in the end one will win. It was not our wish, circumstances, aggression of our adversaries, mistakes of our authorities led to it. You think I made a thousand and one mistakes, yes, but not in this direction. On the contrary, I was the first to say that this is the only way," he said.
To the presenter's remark that he was accused of not completing the process, Ter-Petrosian said:
"Who didn't let me finish it? We met in this room, I explained that if I had done something different, there would have been a civil war in Armenia. There was one element that could have balanced it, but did not fulfill its mission: our intellectuals."
