Warning: This is a rush transcript generated automatically and may contain errors.
Asbed: Hello, Hovik. Hello to our listeners to Groong’s Week in Review for May 10, 2026.
Hovik: Hello listeners, welcome to this week’s Week in Review. We’re going to try to talk about some news that happened last week and we’re testing out this format between Asbed and myself for just describing the news that happened and then of course also keeping our list of regularly appearing guests as a conversation format. So let us know what you think about that. We’re just testing some things out so we’ll see what works best in the future.
Asbed: So obviously the big topic from last week was the EPC meeting. There was the EPC and then there was the EU Armenia Summit and then there was the Yerevan Dialogue Convention or Conference or whatever. All of them in a sense were beauty contests as far as I’m concerned. To me, as I watched a number of tidbits and read a whole bunch of articles, and my god, there were hundreds of articles in government-sponsored media, it was basically Europe, Europe, Europe, peace, peace, peace, Pashinyan, Pashinyan, Pashinyan.
The whole thing was much more of a European-staged convention to nominate Pashinyan as their preferred candidate for Armenia. Well, I agree,
Hovik: but I also don’t think all those Europeans would make it all the way to Armenia or care about Armenia enough to come only to nominate Pashinyan. I mean, we like to think highly of ourselves, but they could just probably allow Aliyev to take over. I think the more important agenda they had was to come to Russia’s backyard and talk shit about Russia. And they did that with great skill.
Oh yes. And shit was flown all around the conference rooms.
Asbed: Say more about that. I’m interested in hearing what you think. I mean, Zelensky and tell us more.
Hovik: Well, I mean, we talked about this with Anna Grigoryan. We talked about this with Hovanes Ishkanyan and Nare Navasardyan the previous episode from that. And I don’t know if we want to rehash everything, but essentially, It was a platform where all the European leaders gave speeches criticizing Russia, but more importantly Zelenskyy was in Armenia.
Zelenskyy, the longtime ally of Azerbaijan who provided phosphorus weapons to Aliyev during the 2020 war, who provided a lot of other weapons to Azerbaijan, was in Yerevan, greeted Fetaid by Pashinyan and from this EPC summit he issued threats against Russia Russian Foreign Ministry of course responded in kind to Zelenskyy but also to Armenia saying that Armenia did not do enough to voice its own opinion or you know to clarify Zelenskyy’s remarks so Zelenskyy was there and also Yulia Tikhanovskaya who is Or who claims to be the president of Belarus in exile and is recognized.
Actually, I think Latvia explicitly recognizes her as the legitimate president. of Belarus and other countries of course don’t recognize the results of the Belarusian elections and she was given what’s important that it’s not that she was just there as an attendee she was given according to protocol diplomatic protocol the highest reception highest level reception it’s reserved for high officials and also she was given a protection state protection that is normally accorded to high ranking officials so I’m sure that pissed off Lukashenko now if you’re emotional you can say you know screw Lukashenko he hasn’t been very friendly to Armenia and with that I would not understand that argument but also Lukashenko is an important member of the, or Belarus is an important member of the Eurasian Economic Union, CSTO.
And if I had to choose between, let’s say, being friendly or having diplomatic relations between Armenia and Azerbaijan versus Armenia and Belarus, I would choose the latter. So anyway, I also want to say one thing.
Asbed: I think all of these states have been deeply realpolitik actors regarding Armenia. They’ve played You know, from an Armenian perspective, I would say that they have been deeply cynical actors on the international state, but they are all doing what’s best for their countries. Lukashenko was just fine with people like Serge Sargsyan, Robert Kocharyan, etc. But he has not been okay with Pashinyan.
So it’s a little difficult to say that they like or they hate Armenia. It’s just that with certain actors, in this case, Pashinyan in Armenia, they just haven’t worked with them. I mean, Lukashenko explicitly has said this. This guy is not our guy.
He’s basically a fifth column in the CSTO and the Eurasian Economic Union.
Hovik: What’s important, though, I think is, of course, we knew this was coming, but Russian authorities increased their criticism of Armenia, of course, right?
We know that Zakharova responded right after The EPC, but just a few days ago, I think on May 8, even Vladimir Putin from Russia He wanted a divorce from Armenia A civil divorce, but before that, he said that, you know, it’d be nice, it’s not his business, but it’d be nice if the people of Armenia held a referendum on this issue of leaving the Russian orbit and joining the European Union, in which case he would accept it and then they would proceed, and I’m quoting him, down the path of a gentle, civilized, and mutually beneficial separation.
But I think the undertone of that was that he does not believe that this is the will of the people of Armenia. And I think he’s right about that.
Asbed: Well, I think that meeting of the Eurasian Economic Union is coming up. I don’t know the exact date of it. May 28th. May 28th.
Pashinyan is not going because he’s going to watch his military inventory report to the people. And he’s sending Meher Grigoryan, Deputy Prime Minister, to the Eurasian Economic Union. And I have a feeling that at that point, these guys are going to be voting what to do with Armenia’s participation. The CSTO is already frozen for a couple of years, three years now.
And with the Eurasian Economic Union, they may decide that Armenia, as one of Putin’s aides said, Ushakov, I think, said, Armenia continues sitting on two chairs and that’s not going to continue anymore. So, you know, I have a feeling that these guys are going to change things.
Hovik: And the most ominous part of Putin’s statement was that we are going to, and I’m going to just quote him, he said, we’re all going through everything that’s happening in the Ukrainian direction right now, but how did it all start with Ukraine’s attempts to join EU? And, you know, Russia doesn’t have soft power skills, but… Their statements should be taken with, I think, gravity. And to me, this seems like essentially Pashinyan going the same route as Zelenskyy.
Asbed: And that may lead the whole country, the path of Ukraine.
Hovik: But the most crazy part about it is, I still don’t see how, I mean, it’s gonna, if Russia stops all trade with Armenia, if Putin acts on his threats and says, okay, no trade with Russia, you’re out of the EAEU, right? Who would that hurt? Armenia. 35.5% of Armenia’s trade is with Russia. I’m not even talking about Kazakhstan and any of the other stans but you are taking more than a third of your entire foreign trade just flushing it down the toilet and you know for Russia a trade with Armenia is 0.7%.
Asbed: I have a feeling that much of this hoopla that’s being made about trade with Azerbaijan, some of these trains that are coming through Azerbaijan to Armenia in the name of diversifying Armenia’s economy, well, I believe that Pashinyan thinks that he is resilient enough to survive such an event as the Eurasian Economic Union freezing trade with Armenia. But the reality is that the stuff that’s coming through Azerbaijan is actually Russian stuff, Kazakh stuff. There’s very little Azerbaijani stuff coming to Armenia. Under $1,000 of stuff that’s gone out of Armenia to other countries, $1,000 from a whole country.
So I’m quite concerned that in the name of diversification, which is basically code word of doing trade not with Russia, they think that they’ve made the country resilient to an embargo or a blockade like this.
Hovik: You know, it’s clear that that’s the will of the Western states, especially now the EU. Let’s say the US is currently out of the game. But we do remember the statement by, I think, Daniel Bayer a few years ago that Armenia should be prepared for some cold winters. And I think that is a scenario that the EU is fattening up Armenia for.
And we remember how they were talking about, well, if there is no grain, then we’re just going to eat rice. If there’s no wheat, you should be eating rice. Yeah. And I mean, to think that you can just change the behavior of the population immediately like that.
Asbed: There’s there are a lot of items that are being sold. I think at the EPC there was some mention of the Black Sea underwater cable that would help Armenia export electricity to Romania and Bulgaria. Armenia is not at all part of this, but this was being bandied about as if Armenia can export electricity. You know, if there is peace, Turkey and Iran can gobble up 10 times as much electricity as Armenia could ever produce.
Hovik: Yeah.
Asbed: There’s no need to think about exporting some electricity over a 1,200-kilometer cable all the way to Europe. It’s absolutely insane to think about that.
Hovik: Armenia is already exporting to Iran. Over previous years, I think Armenia is exporting as much as it could produce.
Asbed: It can, because of the infrastructure. They’re supposed to be doing something about And of course, now that there is complete peace in the South Caucasus, of course, Azerbaijan is blocking us, Iran is under attack, and Turkey is blockading us. That’s your peace. And Georgia is okay with us, let’s say.
But Georgia has also exited the orbit of the EU, and they’re much more independent as an actor right now, so they have their own national interests rather than Armenia’s interests to watch.
Hovik: One of the other more important threats or hints issued by Russians has been that The lifetime of the Armenian nuclear power plant could have been extended until 2036, but since Armenia has engaged European experts to renovate the ANPP, they can only certify it for five years. So essentially they’re capping the lifetime of the Armenian nuclear power plant, and we saw references to decommissioning the Armenian Nuclear Power Plant also from some of the Eurocrats.
Asbed: What do you think about this? I’m alarmed by news like this.
Hovik: I mean, it’s horrific. I mean, I don’t know which one to begin with saying. I mean, during the dark and cold years of the 1990s, the Armenian Nuclear Power Plant provided the necessary energy for Armenia to stand up on its feet. It was restarted in 1996, and it provides a strong energy independence, which is a critical component, I think, of sovereignty of states.
If you’re able to produce enough energy for your needs, especially In an environment where there’s this AI race going on, where states are racing to improve their capacity on AI, we’re voluntarily giving up any extra power that we can produce. For what? I don’t know.
Asbed: Hovik, let’s move forward. There was an EU-Armenia declaration that was made. 44 point declaration. Every time I see 44 something, I think about the 44 day war. Let’s talk about a couple of the notable points.
Which one did you want to discuss?
Hovik: Look, most of it was boilerplate, but there were some pretty important points in that joint declaration. The glaring, I mean, ridicule inviting statement was point number one, which spoke about democracy, fundamental freedoms, human rights, all while shutting down the opposition and condoning essentially what Pashinyan has been doing over the last eight years and especially over the last two years, arresting the opposition. No mention about that. I think that this is the first time that the EU has endorsed TRIP.
Point number 12.
Asbed: Before you move to that one, I just want to highlight that when we talked to Anna Gregorian and we asked if the opposition is actually being heard, if all the protesters and the protests and the message was being heard by the EU. And she said, I’m sad to say, I don’t think that they heard us, primarily because Pashinyan’s security services had removed all of those people, made sure that they were completely out of sight of the conference attendees.
Hovik: Yeah. And I’m sure that if the EU officials wanted to hear Armenians, they would be able to hear them. But of course, their silence so far speaks louder than whatever they could say. So point number 12 endorses TRIP and I think this is the first time that the EU came in on TRIP saying that it’s going to be an important corridor for communication.
I think for the EU the middle corridor which is a larger corridor between Central Asia through the Caucasus is important as a way to avoid Russian communication routes.
Asbed: You know, the 300 million euros that we talk about, it had a number of components to it. One of the components that they had mentioned was some kind of a unique regional development. They were going to allocate a bunch of money so that infrastructure services could be ramped up over there. But, you know, we’ll talk a little bit more about this later when I know you want to mention something about the demographics of these regions.
Hovik: I don’t know how, like, I’ve seen some numbers quoted in the media that, you know, essentially the entire Sunni region, there’s this strong emigration out of Sunni, and I wouldn’t blame them.
Asbed: And every region, every region, but we’ll talk about the specific numbers a little bit later.
Hovik: And of course point number 18 from that 44 point statement talked about the decommissioning of the nuclear power plant. Again, without having another option, without having a new power plant, decommissioning the old one is suicide. What’s not there in this report is also important. Even though point number 23 talked about the liberalization of visas, There was nothing earth shattering about that.
They said, you know, they welcome progress, the timeline and blah, blah, blah. But the end was no timeline. No timeline. Right.
Asbed: But, you know, I’ll play the devil’s advocate. I’m not a high Estancy and I don’t know how important it is, but how important is it? This visa liberalization, it’s like it’s the panacea. We’re going to be Europeans if we have a Schengen visa.
Is that true? Are we going to have 2 million Armenians visiting Europe every year? Or what is the problem that this is solving? Or is it just PR?
And I mean to ask that question honestly. I’m not saying it’s not important. I just have no idea what the importance of a Schengen Visa really is.
Hovik: I mean, it’s not that important. I think it would be important for those who are in dire poverty in Armenia who will use that visa to escape to Europe and seek asylum or something. That’s what I imagine. I think that’s what most people see.
It’s going to be a tourist visa for a month, I think, you know, at the best.
Asbed: But… With something like 25% poverty, how many Armenians are going to be tourists in Europe?
Hovik: Exactly.
Asbed: Okay, there’s a certain number. Of course, not everybody’s poor, so there’s going to be a certain number of tourists. There’s going to be a certain number of people who are visiting for conferences and things like that. But like I said, it’s not like two million Armenians are going to visit Europe every year.
And so I am concerned that there is a certain effort on the part of the government to deflate the issue of all these Armenians who are having problems emigrating.
Hovik: Yeah, it’s all smoke and mirror, yes, and it plays to that crowd who every year they file the American U.S. Immigrant Lottery, whatever it’s called, their only hope is to leave the country and it fuels that crowd, that rhetoric. So I think that anyone who, I mean, if I was middle class, I would maybe enjoy a less rigorous process for getting a visa to go to vacation in Europe, but Armenia has almost no middle class. I mean, okay, Armenia’s middle class has not improved.
In fact, the poor have remained the same.
Asbed: There’s a less than 2% improvement in the last eight years in the poverty rates.
Hovik: Yeah. But yeah, for those in high and middle classes, maybe they would think this is a good thing, but it’s not like you’re comparing this to the loss of your homeland. And anyway, enough said. And lastly, I think the last point I want to talk about is that anti-Russian statements also made their way into this 44-point declaration, specifically point number eight, which talked about Ukraine.
But it was interesting. I think this is called a firewall where they talk about blah, blah, blah, Ukraine seeking peace and sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine. And then as a separate additional statement says, the EU reiterated its call that it’s Russian aggression, but it was clarified that it was the EU reiterating its position, so apparently to shield Armenia. But nevertheless, it was an anti-Russian statement that was born in Yerevan.
Asbed: I want to mention one of the points that Zaharova made. was that Pashinyan had broken a personal promise to Putin not to let Armenia become a platform for anti-Russian activities essentially by allowing all those statements and by allowing Zelenskyy an enemy of Russia today you know if not an enemy of Armenia to come and make statements that you know Ukrainian drones are going to be hovering over The Victory Day Parade in Moscow. This is about May 9. I can see why Putin was not very happy about that.
Hovik: You know, there is a period when early in the 20th century, there was this trans-Caucasian scene, right, where it was the three republics, Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan. And I honestly feel that this is a remaking of by Europe and Turkey of that organization and how far-fetched is it to believe that maybe in two years I even like you know I can’t believe I’m saying this but in two years Armenian and Azerbaijani soldiers are going to be fighting against Russia side by side I mean how far-fetched is that
Asbed: I don’t want to speculate.
Hovik: Well, yeah, I think it’s much closer than before. What else do you want to talk about?
Asbed: Well, let’s just mention that on May 8th, the official campaign season began for the June 7th parliamentary elections, and the various parties went to their selected locations and launched their campaigns. I don’t remember all of them. I know that Hayastan Dashing started in Etchmiadzin. We talked to Anna Gregorian a few days ago, and she mentioned why that they had started there.
I know the Wings of Unity People started, I think it was Ghoshavank. I’ve seen a number of videos. It seems to me that Pashinyan started his campaign on the metro stations and he’s been roundly rejected. People have been refusing his lapel pins and have been telling him that what kind of country is he selling some kind of peace with a reduced nation.
So it really seems to me like I don’t want to seem optimistic, but people are not happy with the ruling party and the results. And I can go on and on about this, but I’m going to let you have your say, Hovik. What are you seeing with these campaigns launching?
Hovik: Well, actually, Pashinyan started his campaign in Syunik. And on the very first day, he basically set the tone for his campaign.
I mean we’ve heard everything from Pashinyan so for some it’s not surprising but I think he went beyond and above what he has done what he has said before he said that essentially Artsakh was never ours he said that we have never built anything there over the last three years no schools no kindergartens he said we did not lose Artsakh but in the process we found Armenia And of course he did not use the word Artsakh, he used Gharabagh I mean I think that’s a falsification in so many ways and so blatant that it offends the dignity of any Armenian that listens to that because
Asbed: just a few years ago Who needs enemies with a government like that?
Hovik: Sorry to say yeah it’s an occupational regime it’s an occupational regime and that
Asbed: is straightforward what basically Aliyev says it this could have been written in
Hovik: Aliyev’s palace and sent to him email to him yeah yeah and just to remind people in 2021 he was campaigning for the de-occupation of Artsakh in 2019 he was saying Artsakh is Armenia and that’s it so we went from Artsakh is Armenia to we never had Artsakh and
Asbed: Can I mention two things here that always stick in my mind? On that point, Artsakh is Armenia. That was one of his campaign promises. That was one of the platform, core platform tenets.
That’s a fail. That’s a complete failure. The other thing that he was campaigning on all the way back from 2018 was corruption. He was going to fight corruption and everything.
I can say today, after eight years, not one of the big people that he’s been slamming, slamming Kocharyan with his four billion dollars, Samvel Karapetyan, other people, not a single one of them has been arrested. Because he hasn’t found any kind of evidence, including all of the people that he’s put on in the courts. He hasn’t found the kind of evidence that can put these people behind bars. So that’s a fail.
So I’m not sure entirely how we can believe anything that he’s selling today during his campaign. All of these things have been a failure. And I would be surprised. I am shocked that people would actually vote for this stuff.
Hovik: Yeah, he opened bullshit criminal cases against Kocharyan, but none of those major people, has there been a judgment, a guilty verdict against any of them? Any of them, including all of them being his enemies in the campaigns right now? But I have to say, I think that the issue of Artsakh never being Armenian is pretty important to capitalize on and I hope the opposition is doing that because to me, to anyone who has been in Artsakh, to me it was an idyllic land and You see many multiple elements of statehood there. They had their own government, legislature, executive body, they had an army, and they were living their lives.
And if you look at how the citizens of Austria I think they had more respect for their land and more respect for their civic duty as a citizen not to litter the streets not to destroy things than many Armenians in Armenia which is why I’m saying how can a voter listen to this bullshit and then go and vote But I think that the base of Pashinyan is all those orders who would not care about this stuff, you know, because in order to care about national ideas, higher ideals, you need to have food on your table.
So he is counting on those poor people and elderly people who can be easily swayed by misinformation, disinformation against the formers, and they are like the reason why You weren’t doing good. And if you just vote for me one more time, then your lives will be better.
Asbed: And also on Artsakh status, right? We should talk about that. I want to ask you, I’m not sure exactly where you want to go, but I was going to ask you to talk a little bit about one of Pashinyan’s aides who had gone to various parts of Artsakh and continued the campaign right there since he was right on Pashinyan’s message. Didn’t Aliyev go all around Artsakh in the past week?
Hovik: He did, he did, but I think he’s Aliyev’s not aide, he’s not Pashinyan’s aide, but boss. But before we talk about what Aliyev did, I want to be clear. Artsakh was an Armenian land. The status of Artsakh was left open during all negotiations and effectively, de facto, it was in Armenian land and the international community recognized that this is an issue of negotiations and the issue of self-determination of the people of Artsakh must be respected.
So this is a complete falsehood from Pashinyan. Now, yeah, Aliyev and Pashinyan are playing tag team, right? Absolutely Aliyev loves visiting the captured territories, the occupied territories, and he went to occupied territories again to say two important things. He said, I think the first thing was Azerbaijanis haven’t done anything wrong and for him it’s incomprehensible why Armenians hate quote-unquote Azerbaijanis and he said that this needs to be examined by psychologists psychiatrists and other experts and then and this was the
Asbed: I think our shows are not long enough to give all the reasons for it and I think
Hovik: that in reality it’s Not hate, but it’s a reaction to decades of policy of genocide and ethnic cleansing, which led to the assertion of Armenia’s rights to self-determination. So while Armenians were fighting for their right of self-determination, for all the reasons I mentioned, Armenians did not behead people. Armenians did not proclaim Ramil Safarov, who the axe murderer who basically axed an Armenian in his sleep at a NATO Partnership for Peace Conference and then gave him a status of a hero. He was given a promotion He bribed Viktor Orban to extradite him to Azerbaijan, promising that he will serve his jail time in Azerbaijan.
At least that’s what Viktor Orban says.
Asbed: Maybe we should get Orban on the show and ask him.
Hovik: Orban, I think, is going to be a distant memory. But the more ominous part of Aliyev’s statement was that as long as there are forces that continue to hate Azerbaijanis and Armenia, the political forces, then we need to be vigilant. And if they come to power, he said Armenian people will face major problems. So that’s the affirmation of the…
And that’s the tag teaming with Pashinyan. Yeah, yeah. So, yeah, what are your thoughts on should we get our heads examined by psychologists?
Asbed: I am trying very hard not to get into this part of the conversation because I can get really upset very quickly. I think this is rhetoric on the part of Aliyev and like you said tag teaming with with Pashinyan basically Pashinyan says if I’m not elected there will be war and Aliyev says if Armenians do and he takes a bunch of things from the opposition agenda and says if those things happen Armenians will be in trouble just read between the lines of what’s going on here yeah
Hovik: So what else should we talk about? I think that maybe we should talk about, you know, given our time, I think, I don’t know if we can go into detail for each party’s campaign, but I do want to actually stick on the Pacinian topic. He continued his bluster, and just yesterday, I think, he threatened Galgich Tzaruqen’s son, saying that I will drag him… Yeah, right?
He called him, and I apologize for these words, but he called, he said, I’m going to bring your lock coat, which means, I don’t know, like bastard or whatever. Your son of a bitch. Yeah. I’m going to bring him from Belarus and drag him on his knees.
That was a threat made to Zarugyan. He said, your tongue has grown and I’m going to basically cut it short. Honestly, I don’t know if that brings more borders for him, but I think that he has basically locked in his base.
Asbed: Well, Zarugyan has a lot of people who like him in the regions. And I think Pashinyan burned some bridges there. And why? Zarugyan basically had said there’s absolutely no chance of him making any kind of a coalition with Pashinyan.
Basically, that’s what he had said. And this is what Pashinyan is saying. What Zarugyan had said was somewhat of a political statement. What Pashinyan is saying is a very inflammatory personal attack.
And I don’t think Tsarukyan will live that down. And I think that the people that support him are not going to live it down.
Hovik: yeah yeah of course this goes all over the heads of the Europeans who think that Armenia is a democracy but with threats like that with threats of violence and just language like that I don’t see how democracy can function the other thing I want to mention this ends up being all about Pashinyan which is maybe that’s the point but there was also this case when he was in Syunik and this contract soldier
Asbed: approached him. I haven’t seen the video, but I’ve read about this.
Hovik: Yeah, the contract soldier said, look, I just want to appeal to you to raise our salaries.
They’re too low. and he blew his gasket for he he reprimanded the soldier for not saluting him and for the way he was dressed i mean i think both of them were civilians as they’re as civilians passion had taken a vacation from his job in order to campaign is unique and the soldier was not in his military uniform which you’re not supposed to salute someone in when you’re not in a military uniform But on the spot, in front of cameras, publicly, he orders Suren Papikyan to fire the guy And just like that, the next day he was fired And what message does this send to the armed forces? What message does this send to people who…
He’s pretending to be this charismatic person, but then he has these episodes
Asbed: Now, well, he’s had a lot of episodes and we’ve seen a lot of videos, maybe one or two of them we can even put in the show notes. But let’s let’s with our remaining time, let’s talk about two issues. Let’s talk a little bit about the Swiss Peace Initiative, because I think that is kind of a significant thing. And also the rest of the season all the way to June 7 is going to have a whole bunch of polls.
There will be polls coming out either every week or at least one poll a week until June 7. Let’s talk about the Swiss Peace Initiative because this is an important initiative by the West. Switzerland, the Parliament, has basically taken this forward to convene. I’m not entirely sure what the platform would be.
Something to look into the rights of Artsakh Armenians, possibly their return. And a number of Armenian opposition parties have lined up with this, are supporting this. For example, A Country to Live, Aprelu Yerkir, Wings of Unity. As far as I know, to today, only strong Armenia has not yet signed, but we’re kind of hopeful that they will eventually sign.
But I also think that the ruling party is not going to sign anything like that.
Hovik: Yeah, yeah.
Asbed: Your thoughts?
Hovik: And also the Republican Party, but they’re not campaigning in the elections, but also the Republican Party actually has made a separate announcement months back,
Asbed: welcoming the Swiss Peace Initiative.
Hovik: Now, you know, critics say that it’s really, why is this even important? Why send the false hope? Because we know that Aliyev is not going to create any condition for Armenians to return, right? Even if he verbally agrees, well, let’s negotiate, let’s talk, you know, are Armenians going to be serving in Azerbaijan?
He’s going to demand that Armenians serve in the Azerbaijani army. He’s going to demand that they become Azerbaijani citizens.
So in terms of security guarantees, At least practically there is no avenue that I see that while the Sultan of Baku is in power while the dictator of Baku is in power there will be anything like that but I think it’s important to state your position and all the parties who are against the loss of Artsakh should be signatories of the statement the other part is that okay this is a Western thing so The West, the EU, has had a direct role in handing Artsakh on a silver platter to Aliyev with Parchinian, of course, with Parchinian’s active participation. So some anti-Europeans say, why should we support a European statement?
But I think precisely because of that. Strong Armenia has made a brand of not being very pro-Russian, endorsing CRIP, for instance. So this would be in line with those moves. Well,
Asbed: I think this is an important initiative because it provides a possible avenue to an international platform to deal with the Artsakh issue. That issue is not closed. However, Pashinyan and Aliyev did co-sign the dissolution of the OSCE-MG. So currently, there is no platform that deals with it.
And if there is an avenue here that brings that thing back on the international arena, the Artsakh cause back onto international arena, we should take it. Because there are 150,000 Artsakh Armenians who are displaced, who are homeless. And they will, you know, even if 150,000 of them are not going to come back because they don’t trust their future in a fascist country like Azerbaijan. I also believe that, you know, being an optimist, I also believe that Aliyev is not going to be there forever.
And eventually, Azerbaijan will not continue on a complete fascistic path. Eventually, there will be some form of democracy there. And that will be a little more conducive to all of its citizens, whether they are Azeris, or they are Armenians, or Leskians, or Talish. You know, Azerbaijan is multi-ethnic, even though they are small ethnicities.
Hovik: As unlikely as I see that happening in our lifetimes, I think that the chief benefit from this is keeping the issue alive in the international arena. Giving hope for the people of Artsakh is not a false hope, but even things like property rights, even things like, you know, let’s have a security, an escorted trip for some Armenians to visit the graves of their loved ones in Artsakh. Let’s provide a mechanism for Exhuming, unfortunately, I don’t know what else to say, for exhuming the bodies and re-burying them in Armenia so people can, you know, visit their graves, the graves of their loved ones.
There are a lot of issues to discuss, you know.
Asbed: Yeah. Plus, Pashinyan has said that Armenia has closed the case of Artsakh. Okay. He said that Armenia is not going to do anything for Artsakh Armenians, but the international community can.
Well, here they are. They are doing something. And so all of the opposition, well, most of the opposition presently is already signed up. Maybe all of them can sign up.
That’ll probably corner the ruling party in a place where it suddenly becomes the only Armenian political spectrum that is not supportive of the rights of Armenians. So I see this as a win-win for Armenian opposition parties to sign up to. Hovik, let’s go to the EVN poll and tell us a little bit about what the outcome seems to be from that poll.
Hovik: Yeah, so it’s published by EVN Report, but the poll is called Armenian Election Study, ARM-ES. It’s run by Nerses Kopalyan and another faculty, I believe, in the University of Las Vegas. And their report is essentially a complete, they’re predicting a complete victory for Pashinyan. Now, if you look at the percentages, it may not be that clear.
When they asked voters who would you vote for in the parliamentary elections if they were held tomorrow, 32.5% said civil contract. Now, that’s in alignment with other polls who also give that much. Maybe some said 20-something, but it’s in the ballpark. The problem comes when you look at the votes of the opposition and they gave strong Armenia 10% and Armenian Alliance 4% so Armenian Alliance would not even clear the threshold
Asbed: Well, Hovik, let’s also go to the other three numbers, which were huge. The refuse to answer was 25.4%, huge percentage. And then the I don’t know who I would vote for percentage was 14%. And then they have also put a whole bunch of something, a category they call other parties at 7.1%.
So I don’t know who these other parties are. They’re probably the Aram, Zaveni, Sargsyan type people that are all Pashinyan managed or something. So if you were to add 7% to their 32%, they have almost 40% of the vote on their side. But then there is like a 40% of the vote that is undecided, 25 plus 14, which is kind of an undecided and nebulous area.
Hovik: and that’s a stark difference from other polls that we’ve looked at that may be an indicator of why this poll is so skewed because they are talking to people in one way or another they end up talking to people who are more likely to support Pashinyan I don’t know whether it’s they introduce themselves some in a certain way that indicates that this is a pro-Pashinyan outlet or this is a pro-US outlet the biggest problem I see with this and other polls in Armenia to be fair is that they don’t publish their non-response rate. This is when a pollster calls and says, I’m doing a poll. Would you be willing to answer some questions for me?
And the respondent says yes or no. So no one publishes this. And this is an important metric to track.
Asbed: Why is that important?
Hovik: Because it would allow like it’s a Black Matter, right? You know, there are voters there that you’re not talking to for whatever reason, and it’s more difficult to estimate the actual results, especially if the non-response changes from poll to poll. That indicates societal tendencies, maybe fear to talk to a pollster. So especially if you’re the same polling agency, if you’re doing one after another, publicizing your non-response rate would provide more confidence and would allow additional data points on why did the non-response rate grow from, you know, 10% to 20% or, you know, to 80%.
So we don’t have any information on that. But then we come to this refuse to answer, right? 25.4% on this poll refused to answer versus when I look at the MPG poll which was 8.3% so they had a three-fold increase in the people who would not tell them who they’re gonna vote for in addition to that they’re like I don’t know you know they had 14% and 8% in the MPG poll said that you know I have difficulty responding And I think this is an indicator of this one clue of skew in their dataset.
About 40% of those who agreed to talk to them on the phone weren’t comfortable providing an answer on who they’re going to vote for, which is much different than other polls. And at the same time, when they gauge the intent to participate, people are saying, yeah, you know, 90% of the people are saying, according to them, I think that number is a little bit higher, which also is an indicator of skew or bias. 90% of people who talked to EVN Report in the last poll said that they would participate in the elections. So you call, they say, hello, do you want to answer our questions? Yes.
And out of those who said yes, 90% said they would participate in the elections or close to 90%. But when it came down to the question of who are you going to vote for, 40% said either I refuse to answer or I don’t know. And you can draw your own conclusions on why that would be when other polls say that that number should be closer to like 15% or 16%. Is that a sign that people maybe are uncomfortable disclosing their preferences to…
Asbed: Well, EVN Report is a deeply pro-Pashinyan outlet. So we should make sure that our listeners know about that. And we will put the slides that we’re talking about in the show notes, maybe even in the video, so that you can see what we’re talking about.
Hovik: Besides being pro-Pashinyan, I just want to address that because you can have your own opinions, right? But when you have the number one proportionate guy running the polls, it doesn’t instill confidence in the outcome. Let’s even assume that they’re doing their best to be, you know, robotic and not try to influence the respondent. There is clear bias.
You can, you can influence that response by not by falsifying numbers, but Influencing the sample of people who respond to your questions. And that can come from many different things, including your tone, your accent, the institution you’re affiliated with, and so on and so forth.
Asbed: Well, okay, Hovik. Anything to add?
Hovik: Well, if you’re still listening to us, good. And if you have not fallen asleep, some people say they like listening to our podcast and sleeping. I don’t know if I can take that as a compliment or a criticism, but whatever. Thank you, thank you for listening, everyone.
Asbed: There’s probably better ways to go to sleep. So that was our Week in Review for May 10. Today is May 12, 2026. We’ll talk to you next week.
Take care. I’m Asbed Bedrossian. And I’m Hovik Manucharyan. Bye-bye.
Hovik: Bye!