Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
08YEREVAN127
2008-02-15 03:40:00
CONFIDENTIAL
Embassy Yerevan
Cable title:
THE DVD WAR: THE RULING PARTY STRIKES BACK,
how-toVZCZCXRO9030 PP RUEHLMC DE RUEHYE #0127 0460340 ZNY CCCCC ZZH P 150340Z FEB 08 FM AMEMBASSY YEREVAN TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 7020 INFO RUCNCIS/CIS COLLECTIVE PRIORITY RUEHAK/AMEMBASSY ANKARA PRIORITY 1462 RUEHNO/USMISSION USNATO PRIORITY 0546 RUEHLMC/MILLENNIUM CHALLENGE CORPORATION WASHINGTON DC PRIORITY
C O N F I D E N T I A L YEREVAN 000127
SIPDIS
SIPDIS
E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/12/2012
TAGS: PGOV PHUM KDEM AM
SUBJECT: THE DVD WAR: THE RULING PARTY STRIKES BACK,
NASTIER
Classified By: CDA Joseph Pennington, reasons 1.4 (b,d)
C O N F I D E N T I A L YEREVAN 000127
SIPDIS
SIPDIS
E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/12/2012
TAGS: PGOV PHUM KDEM AM
SUBJECT: THE DVD WAR: THE RULING PARTY STRIKES BACK,
NASTIER
Classified By: CDA Joseph Pennington, reasons 1.4 (b,d)
1. (C) Levon Ter-Petrossian's (LTP) campaign has for weeks
been distributing campaign DVDs, featuring the former
president's campaign speeches and rallies. This technique
has been somewhat effective, not only as a medium to reach
voters in the absence of fair television coverage, but also
as an additional means of dramatizing and accentuating that
lack of fair television access. The LTP campaign claims to
have distributed tens of thousands of the DVDs all across
Armenia, and it seems that these DVDs have indeed penetrated
far and wide. By 2008, even most rural villages have at
least a few households that own DVD players, so the potential
audience is large. This new technique harks back to the
late-Soviet dissident tradition of "samizdat": clandestinely
published manuscripts that were passed hand to hand among
Soviets thirsty for independent political information and
commentary.
2. (C) PM Serzh Sargsian's campaign -- or if not directly
the campaign itself, perhaps an ally -- has now started
reproducing and distributing their own DVDs. However, while
LTP's DVDs show the candidate's speeches, the ruling party
DVD is nothing but vicious anti-LTP propaganda. The prime
minister and his campaign are not mentioned at all. The DVD
contains three short "documentaries" that together comprise a
patchwork quilt of conspiracy theories and what passes
locally for deadly insult. For example, the former president
is accused of being the bastard child of a Turkish man, with
whom his mother had a secret adulterous relationship. The
movie is deeply imbued with anti-Semitism, making much of the
fact that LTP's wife is Jewish (true),while falsely alleging
that LTP is in the pay of the Israeli intelligence service,
in a conspiracy with Israel, Turkey, the Masons, British
Petroleum company, and the British Embassy in Armenia to
betray Armenia's interests, all with an alleged goal of
weakening Armenia to the point it can be invaded and annexed
by Azerbaijan.
3. (C) A relative of an Embassy employee works at the
pro-governmental television station where the DVDs were
created and are being duplicated on a large scale. LTP
campaign sources allege that the DVD is being distributed
especially by student/youth movements associated with the
Republican Party.
4. (C) COMMENT: This ham-handed move seems to smack of
desperation and speaks to the increasing nervousness that
ruling circles seem to have about the former president's
campaign. We judge this new DVD will actually harm
Sargsian's campaign overall, because it is so outrageously
over-the-top in its allegations that many people will see it
as a transparent smear campaign. Anecdotally, several of our
own staff that had previously clung to this dislike of LTP
based on his past record, upon seeing this DVD declared in
disgust, "That's it, I'm going to vote for LTP now! This is
too disgusting." Armenians have a culture that appreciates
and identifies with underdogs, and it looks as though the
ruling party campaign has once again managed to come across
as the heavy-handed bully.
PENNINGTON
SIPDIS
SIPDIS
E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/12/2012
TAGS: PGOV PHUM KDEM AM
SUBJECT: THE DVD WAR: THE RULING PARTY STRIKES BACK,
NASTIER
Classified By: CDA Joseph Pennington, reasons 1.4 (b,d)
1. (C) Levon Ter-Petrossian's (LTP) campaign has for weeks
been distributing campaign DVDs, featuring the former
president's campaign speeches and rallies. This technique
has been somewhat effective, not only as a medium to reach
voters in the absence of fair television coverage, but also
as an additional means of dramatizing and accentuating that
lack of fair television access. The LTP campaign claims to
have distributed tens of thousands of the DVDs all across
Armenia, and it seems that these DVDs have indeed penetrated
far and wide. By 2008, even most rural villages have at
least a few households that own DVD players, so the potential
audience is large. This new technique harks back to the
late-Soviet dissident tradition of "samizdat": clandestinely
published manuscripts that were passed hand to hand among
Soviets thirsty for independent political information and
commentary.
2. (C) PM Serzh Sargsian's campaign -- or if not directly
the campaign itself, perhaps an ally -- has now started
reproducing and distributing their own DVDs. However, while
LTP's DVDs show the candidate's speeches, the ruling party
DVD is nothing but vicious anti-LTP propaganda. The prime
minister and his campaign are not mentioned at all. The DVD
contains three short "documentaries" that together comprise a
patchwork quilt of conspiracy theories and what passes
locally for deadly insult. For example, the former president
is accused of being the bastard child of a Turkish man, with
whom his mother had a secret adulterous relationship. The
movie is deeply imbued with anti-Semitism, making much of the
fact that LTP's wife is Jewish (true),while falsely alleging
that LTP is in the pay of the Israeli intelligence service,
in a conspiracy with Israel, Turkey, the Masons, British
Petroleum company, and the British Embassy in Armenia to
betray Armenia's interests, all with an alleged goal of
weakening Armenia to the point it can be invaded and annexed
by Azerbaijan.
3. (C) A relative of an Embassy employee works at the
pro-governmental television station where the DVDs were
created and are being duplicated on a large scale. LTP
campaign sources allege that the DVD is being distributed
especially by student/youth movements associated with the
Republican Party.
4. (C) COMMENT: This ham-handed move seems to smack of
desperation and speaks to the increasing nervousness that
ruling circles seem to have about the former president's
campaign. We judge this new DVD will actually harm
Sargsian's campaign overall, because it is so outrageously
over-the-top in its allegations that many people will see it
as a transparent smear campaign. Anecdotally, several of our
own staff that had previously clung to this dislike of LTP
based on his past record, upon seeing this DVD declared in
disgust, "That's it, I'm going to vote for LTP now! This is
too disgusting." Armenians have a culture that appreciates
and identifies with underdogs, and it looks as though the
ruling party campaign has once again managed to come across
as the heavy-handed bully.
PENNINGTON