OPPOSITION RALLY DRAWS LACKLUSTER RESPONSE

C O N F I D E N T I A L YEREVAN 002075

SIPDIS

DEPT FOR EUR/CACEN, DRL

E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/28/2015
TAGS: PGOV PHUM ASEC AM
SUBJECT: OPPOSITION RALLY DRAWS LACKLUSTER RESPONSE

REF: A) YEREVAN 2061 B) YEREVAN 2074

Classified By: DCM A.F. Godfrey for reasons 1.4 (b, d).

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SMALL RALLY, LONG SPEECHES, NO EXCITEMENT
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1. (C) Opposition leaders came together November 28 in a
larger group than they have in the past, but still only
managed to draw about 2500 people to an afternoon rally on a
perfect fall day in Yerevan. One day after the
constitutional referendum that Council of Europe (CoE)
observers characterized as "marred" (ref B),an opposition
rally drew a crowd of mostly older men who came to listen to
a series of speeches from the various leaders of the
opposition. While the leaders who came together included
more of the opposition groups than at rallies in the past,
they still lacked a clear message and failed to generate any
excitement in the crowd. The rally began well after 3:00,
and participants began trickling away by 4:15 (even before
Republic Party leader Aram Z. Sargsian's speech),with
everyone heading home by 5:15. (Note: Public television
crews demonstratively filmed a lame street dog who had joined
the crowd, then quickly curled up and took a nap for most of
the time during the demonstration, clearly seeing the
sleeping dog as an apt image for the less-than-exciting
rally. End Note.)

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MORE LEADERS COMING TOGETHER MEANS MORE SPEECHES...
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2. (C) Kicking the rally off was People's Party leader Stepan
Demirchyan, followed by a locally well-known conductor, Ohan
Duryan. Republic Party official Artak Zeinanyan described
alleged vote fraud in detail, followed by a senior member of
the Armenian Academy of Sciences, by the Justice Bloc's
Viktor Dalakian, by the Democratic Partiy leader Aram G.
Sargsian, then the Liberal Party's Hovhannes Hovhannisyan,
Constitutional Rights Union Hrant Khachatryan, Heritage Party
leader (and former FM) Raffi Hovhannisian, Republic Party
leader Aram Z. Sargsian, New Times Party leader Aram
Karapetyan and National Democratic Union leader Vazgen
Manukyan. Although this group of opposition leaders came
together for the November 28 rally, it clearly still lacks a
unified message. While different speakers struck different
notes, however, they were unified in two areas -- urging each
person present to return November 29 "with five or ten more
people," and decrying the referendum results as falsified.

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...NOT MORE IDEAS
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3. (C) With government officials wisely not moving to impede
the rally in any way, Manukyan's call for "new ideas" and
comments that the opposition couldn't keep doing the same
things at rallies only sounded slightly plaintive. The one
thing that does unite the opposition is its desire to react
to the authorities. The authorities limited their presence,
however, to roughly 30 uniformed police (clearly directing
traffic) and a healthy number of well-behaved plainclothes
officers, but allowed the rally to take place; we don't
expect to see the GOAM making the same mistakes it made in
April 2004. Until the opposition can decide on a positive
message, we expect that future rallies (including the one
planned for November 29) will be largely restrained and
marked by the same lack of political passion we observed
November 28.
EVANS