The Artsakh Movement is the Foundation of Armenia's Independence
When Pashinyan says the Artsakh Movement was a mistake, he's not critiquing a political campaign. He's saying that Armenian independence itself was a mistake.
The Artsakh Movement was not simply a political campaign or regional cause. Historian Pietro Shakarian argues it was the foundational struggle that gave birth to Armenia’s Third Republic (post-Soviet independent Armenia). The movement began in Stepanakert in the late 1980s as Armenians demanded the right to self-determination under Gorbachev’s glasnost and perestroika. It spread from Artsakh to Yerevan, catalyzing broader Armenian demands for sovereignty and eventually contributing to Armenia’s declaration of independence in September 1991.
When Pashinyan publicly rejects the Artsakh Movement and calls it a mistake, he is not offering a historical critique. According to Shakarian, he is fundamentally delegitimizing Armenian independence itself. The Third Republic’s legitimacy rests on the principle that Armenians have the right to determine their own future. To reject Artsakh self-determination is to reject the philosophical and historical ground on which modern Armenia stands. This extends to the memory of the 1965 demonstrations in Yerevan, which marked the emergence of Armenian national consciousness in the Soviet era and preceded the Artsakh Movement itself. Pashinyan has even suggested those demonstrations were orchestrated by the KGB, a claim contradicted by archival evidence that shows Soviet authorities were alarmed by, not orchestrating, Armenian nationalism.
The implications ripple across Armenian identity, history, and statecraft. By attacking the Artsakh Movement’s legacy, Pashinyan attacks the memory of the Armenian Genocide (which fueled national consciousness and the 1965 demonstrations), the independence struggle itself, and the right of Armenians anywhere to claim self-determination. For Shakarian, a scholar who has worked in Moscow and Yerevan archives, this represents not a policy disagreement but an assault on the foundational narrative of modern Armenian statehood. Understanding this clarifies why the suppression of Artsakh imagery, the removal of murals of fallen soldiers, and the pressure on institutions are not disconnected acts but part of a coherent project to redefine Armenia on Pashinyan’s terms-one severed from its recent history and national aspirations.
Transcript
Pietro A. Shakarian: That's really what it feels.
Asbed Bedrossian: What are the implications of Pashinyan's rejection of the Artsakh Movement and its legacy? Because he has expressly said that the Artsakh Movement was a mistake. He rejects it and he wants it forgotten by everyone.
Pietro A. Shakarian: The Artsakh Movement, Asbed, is the fundamental cornerstone for the Third Republic of Armenia, which is the post-Soviet Armenia, the independent Armenia that we have today. That all began, that all emerged, the Third Republic and its independence. Of course, there's also the larger context of the dissolution of the USSR. But in the Armenian context, it was driven by the movement To give the Artsakh Armenians the right to determine their own future, right? Gorbachev was coming in saying, we're talking about glasnost, Perestroika, democratization, right? And the people in Artsakh, Nagorno-Karabakh were saying, well, if you're talking about democracy, then why can't we make our own decision? And then eventually that movement that began in Stepanakert, that began in Artsakh, came to Armenia. It didn't begin in Armenia. It didn't begin in Yerevan. It began in Stepanakert and came to Yerevan. And the Armenians in Yerevan, the people of Yerevan, the people of the Armenian Republic, you know, began to express solidarity with Artsakh. And sooner, and over time, this movement, you know, to support the self-determination of Artsakhtsis became a larger movement, really,