EUR A/S FRIED DISCUSSES TURKEY, KARABAKH AND

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 04 YEREVAN 000854 SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/17/2018 TAGS: PREL PGOV PHUM AM SUBJECT: EUR A/S FRIED DISCUSSES TURKEY, KARABAKH AND DEMOCRACY WITH ARMENIA'S OPPOSITION AND CIVIL SOCIETY REF: YEREVAN 844 YEREVAN 00000854 001.2 OF 004 Classified By: Ambassador Marie L. Yovanovich. Reason 1.4 (b/d) SUMMARY -------------- ¶1. (C) During A/S Daniel Fried's October 17-18 visit to Armenia, opposition and civil society figures complained about political rights and authorities' failure to heal the wounds from the flawed presidential election and March 1 unrest. While supportive of GOAM efforts on rapprochement with Turkey and resolving the Nagorno-Karabakh (NK) conflict, they state that President Sargsian lacked the legitimacy to resolve these issues. Moreover, they argued that the real motive of the president's foreign policy overtures is to distract the international community from the lack of democratic reform at home, and especially the political prisoners problem. A/S Fried assured that the USG will continue to press its democracy agenda in Armenia, while at the same time supporting Armenia's efforts at reconciliation with its neighbors, a process Fried viewed as essential to bolstering the country's independence, sovereignty, security and democratic development. Fried made the same points during a press conference on October 17. END SUMMARY. COMMON THEMES THROUGHOUT -------------- ¶2. (C) During his October 17-18 visit to Yerevan, A/S Fried met with the leader of the Armenian Apostolic Church, His Holiness Karekin II; civil society representatives; scholars and think tanks directors ; MPs from the opposition Heritage party; and leaders of the Armenian National Congress (ANC),a coalition of 18 opposition parties established in May by ex-President Levon Ter-Petrossian to dispute February's presidential election result and push for democratic reform. Not surprisingly, the ANC, Heritage Party, and civil society interlocutors articulated quite similar viewpoints, critical of authorities, and differing only in degree. The Catholicos was characteristically more pro-governmental. A/S Fried deployed consistent messages in all meetings about the importance of seizing the historical moment to achieve hoped-for breakthroughs on Turkey and Nagorno-Karabakh, and the importance for Armenia's opposition not -) out of misplaced political opportunism -- to derail processes that are fundamentally in Armenia's national interests. He also reassured that the United States would not neglect the democracy and human rights agenda, and would pursue these issues in parallel with regional stability issues. LITTLE PROGRESS ON DEMOCRATIC REFORM -------------- ¶3. (C) Opposition and civil society representatives complained about the suppression of political and civil liberties since President Sargsian took office, with some asserting the current situation is worse than it was under former President Kocharian. Of greatest concern is the continued detention of some 75 persons for their activities related to the presidential election and post-election protests that ended with the violent March 1 crackdown. Some have been held without charges for eight months, and the trials that have occurred to date have been a farce, opposition and civil society figures insist. There have been few acquittals, with guilty verdicts issued based on highly questionable evidence, as our own emboffs have witnessed evidence. Of equally great concern, according to opposition representatives, was that the authorities apparently plan to attribute criminal liability to 11 prominent opposition figures, including former Foreign Minister Alexander Arzumanian, for the ten deaths and over 200 injuries that occurred during the March 1 unrest. ¶4. (C) While interlocutors noted some welcome reforms, mainly in the economic sphere, they griped that President Sargsian speaks about democracy while simultaneously banning rallies and manipulating the judiciary. Even if Sargsian were to have noble intentions, ANC representatives claimed that his regime will be forever tainted by the March 1 deaths. They complained that the authorities continue to deny the vast majority of opposition applications to hold rallies, although the unauthorized ones have all proceeded without incident. They also claimed that police continue to harass their supporters during their nightly "political promenades" through downtown, and that police had beaten opposition supporters one evening just a week before Fried's visit. ¶5. (C) Participants highlighted recent local elections in and around Yerevan, which they alleged featured violence, attempted kidnappings, shooting between members of rival YEREVAN 00000854 002.2 OF 004 camps, beating of an election proxy, and serious vote fraud. If the authorities were truly committed to democratic change, said the civil society representatives, the message has yet to reach the grass roots who support the ruling regime. ¶6. (C) The suppression of media freedoms continues to be a major concern, according to these interlocutors. They pointed to September's two-year moratorium on the issuance of new TV broadcasting licenses that the National Assembly passed hastily, with three readings of the controversial legislation passed in just one day. They complained that all of Yerevan's 22 television stations are closely monitored and controlled by the authorities, and that radio is increasingly being pressured to come into line as well. MPs from the opposition Heritage party stated that the opposition should have the right to at least one TV frequency in Armenia. WEST SACRIFICING DEMOCRACY FOR A TURKEY AND NK SOLUTION? -------------- -------------- ¶7. (C) Interlocutors complained of the passivity of foreign governments in reacting to the Armenian authorities' democratic backsliding, noting that the failure to sanction Armenia has only emboldened the authorities to act with impunity. They were especially critical of the OSCE/ODIHR reports on the ongoing trials of opposition supporters, which they charged were more focused on observers' procedural compliance in compiling their reports than with the fairness of the legal proceedings they were tasked with observing. (Comment: The OSCE/ODIHR trial monitoring project has not published anything to date about its methodology or findings. We suspect that the opposition complaints on this are based mostly on supposition and inference. The Armenian trial monitoring project is being substantially funded by U.S. FREEDOM Support Act funds, at post's urging. We continue to believe this process will have value in systematically documenting the court proceedings against the politically-charged defendants from the March 1 events. End comment). RESOLVING MARCH 1, AND THE STATE OF THE OPPOSITION -------------- -------------- ¶8. (C) The opposition asserted it refused to cooperate with the National Assembly's ongoing inquiry into the March 1 events because parliamentary commission was stacked with pro-governmental forces. They said they could not go along with a commission where the authorities offered only three of the 11 seats to the opposition. They also claimed that authorities were using the commission to cover up their misdeeds, at which time they also expressed disappointment that the USG had supported the commission by inviting several former 9/11 commission experts to visit in mid-October and share lessons learned with the parliamentary commission. Both the ANC and Heritage have promised, however, to join a planned new fact-finding commission recently proposed by Thomas Hammarberg, the Council of Europe's Commissioner for Human Rights, which would give equal say to both the opposition and authorities. The fact-finding group is to reportedly serve as a consultative body to the parliamentary commission conducting the ongoing inquiry. ¶9. (C) Interlocutors also fretted over the public's gradual disengagement from politics. They attributed the waning interest to the public's recognition that they have no real outlet with which to express their displeasure with the status quo. ANC representatives said that their rally turnout has declined somewhat. (Note: although approximately 15,000 turned out for a rally later on October 17. End note). They also fretted that the current opposition will once again be weak if it fractures, and argued that the ANC risks breaking up altogether, since the only common bond that links its 18 constituent parties -- from liberal democrats to Marxists to socialists -- is a desire for democratic reform. ¶10. (C) Civil Society representatives stated their belief that neither the authorities nor the opposition led by Ter-Petrossian are truly interested in democratic reform. They said that while LTP may be very articulate and attracts supporters throughout society, his background and cryptic motives weaken his legitimacy as a genuine reformer. While LTP may have given shape to the country's current opposition movement, he also set precedents for restricting media freedoms during his tenure as Armenia's first president (1991-98). LTP also disappointed many of his pro-Western supporters with his pro-Russian remarks on the Georgia-Russia war in early August. Many of LTP's own supporters don't understand his current strategy, NGO representatives said, including his opposition to proposals for the authorities to amnesty the political detainees (largely on the principle that it would imply they were guilty of some offense). Civil YEREVAN 00000854 003.2 OF 004 society representatives also lamented the fact that Armenian politics continue to be largely personality-driven instead of issue-focused. ¶11. (C) Heritage, which is the sole opposition party in the National Assembly, holding just seven of 131 seats, is conscious of the need to develop Armenia's political culture. Its MPs seek to present a new model of a political party that works transparently, under the microscope of its constituents. But they said they could be only so effective given the current make-up of the National Assembly, where most of their proposals go ignored by the ruling coalition. They alleged that their party should have gained a greater number of seats in the May 2007 parliamentary elections, were it not for widespread vote fraud by the ruling regime. Its MPs hope that party leader Raffi Hovannissian will run in the next presidential election (2013),but fear that his chances will continue to be slim -- in spite of his popularity -- without changes to the current political system that curbs the media and severely restricts people's rights of association and assembly. The MPs fretted over their own security in recording voting irregularities in the presidential election, with several of them having been assaulted for doing so, and one of them, Armen Martirossian, having even been stabbed during the March 1 unrest. They added that law enforcement agencies have shown no interest in identifying or pursuing Martirossian's assailant, who remains at large as of today. RESOLVING CONFLICTS WITH TURKEY AND AZERBAIJAN -------------- - ¶12. (C) Most interlocutors expressed strong support in principle for the authorities' efforts at reconciliation with Turkey and reaching a compromise solution with Azerbaijan on Nagorno-Karabakh, though the opposition complained Sargsian was gaining undeserved international credit for doing so. They also hoped for an open border and diplomatic relations with Turkey, but remain concerned that the Presidents of all three countries -- Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Turkey -- may be unable to face down domestic opposition. They said that Presidents Sargsian and Aliyev need to devise a face-saving plan, which has eluded Armenian and Azerbaijani leaders in the past, to finesse difficult issues to reach a fair deal. ANC representatives argued that President Sargsian may make concessions, because of his political weakness, that he cannot make stick, and also argued that Sargsian might seem to make concessions to curry favor with mediators, while counting on Azerbaijani President Aliyev ultimately to reject any proposed deal. ¶13. (C) During A/S Fried's meeting with His Holiness Karekin II at the Mother See of Holy Edjmiadzin, the Catholicos expressed hope for a peaceful solution to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. But he also complained about bellicose rhetoric from Azerbaijan, noting that the Azerbaijani government a day before had announced plans to increase its military budget yet again. On Turkey, he noted that while Armenia's authorities have expressed willingness to re-establish relations with no preconditions, Turkey continues to raise its denial of the Armenian genocide and its linking the opening of the border with resolution of Nagorno-Karabakh. The Catholicos also complained about the Georgian government's alleged abrogations of the rights of the Armenian Apostolic Church in Georgia, and alluded to property disputes between the church and Georgian authorities. A/S Fried undertook to raise these concerns with Georgian authorities. ¶14. (C) ANC leader and Ter-Petrossian confidant David Shahnazarian said he supports the outreach effort to Turkey but disagrees with the authorities' approach, which includes agreeing to a historical commission on the Armenian genocide and a three-way mediation process involving Turkey, Armenia and Azerbaijan. While it is fine for scholars to discuss the events of 1915, there is a risk that at the political level one side will always refer to the work or findings of the commission to derail the process. He also expressed doubts about the viability of a three-country process among Armenia, Azerbaijan and Turkey to address the Nagorno-Karabakh issue. A/S Fried assured Shahnazarian and his ANC allies that the USG will continue to support the Minsk Group process as the negotiating framework on Nagorno-Karabakh. ¶15. (C) A/S Fried responded that the USG will continue to press the authorities on democratic reform, noting that a country's behavior inside its borders usually corresponds with its external behavior. However, the USG will at the same time support Armenia's efforts to settle the longstanding conflicts with Turkey and Azerbaijan, and pointed out it was in both Azerbaijan's and Armenia's own YEREVAN 00000854 004.2 OF 004 interests to reduce their dependence on Georgia as a transit route, the vulnerability of which the August crisis made abundantly clear. He noted as positive the less aggressive rhetoric coming out of Azerbaijan after the August war between Russia and Georgia, and believed that President Aliyev appears to have realized that speaking about war ultimately could lead to it, which would have disastrous consequences for Azerbaijan. A/S Fried suggested that the Azerbaijani military buildup -- announced the day before -- may be related to reasons besides Nagorno-Karabakh, given the country's other geopolitical challenges. He also expressed optimism about Turkish readiness for reconciliation, asserting that Turkey is becoming a more progressive and open country with time. He singled out the fact that thousands of Turks (very few of Armenian descent) demonstrated after the 2006 murder of ethnic Armenian journalist Hrant Dink, chanting "We are all Armenians." CORRUPTION -------------- ¶16. (C) Few people had anything encouraging to say about the authorities' efforts to combat corruption. They asserted that while President Sargsian publicly rails against corruption, and has undertaken some reforms, he is still the most corrupt figure in Armenia. They acknowledged that the authorities have taken some measures against low-level figures, and made a public show of cracking down on tax evasion by mandating the introduction of cash registers at all retail points. At the same time, however, they noted that there have been no reports of arrests for large-scale corruption. Civil society figures also cited a continuing lack of transparency in government dealings, such as the recent government decision to lower the water level of Lake Sevan and the opaque awarding of a tender to a third mobile phone provider without a transparent bidding process. Opposition and civil society interlocutors complained that the control of state resources may in fact be worse now than it was under former President Kocharian. (Comment: As it turned out, the mobile telephone license went to the well-known European telecoms firm Orange, which seems a well-qualified provider, and presumably is not enmeshed in Armenian corruption. End comment) A/S Fried has cleared this cable YOVANOVITCH