Armenians storm their parliament over ‘painful’ Karabakh deal
Angry protests broke out in Armenia’s capital Yerevan early yesterday, with calls for Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan to resign after he agreed to a deal to end the conflict with Azerbaijan over the breakaway region of Nagorno-Karabakh.
Protesters stormed the prime minister’s official residence, as well as the parliament building. Emotions were running high after six weeks of conflict that claimed the lives of at least 1,300 Armenians in a country of only three million people.
Some demonstrators called for revolution, while others chanted “Artsakh is not for sale”, using the Armenian name for Nagorno-Karabakh.
Offices were trashed, with cigarette butts and empty bottles left behind. Mr Pashinyan said on social media that a computer, watch, some perfume and a driving licence had gone missing from his residence in the capital’s central Republic Square.
Opposition MPs gathered in the parliament’s main chamber, waiting for members of the ruling party to arrive and debate a deal they said was “without consensus”.
After a long night, Naira Zohrabyan, an MP from the opposition Prosperous Armenia party, said the details of the agreement had not been shared or debated.
“What kind of document is it? Is it a surrender? A ceasefire? All we know is that every decision should be democratically agreed in parliament,” she said.
By lunchtime, police said they had regained control of the parliament building.
Confidence in Mr Pashinyan was already low, with several opposition parties having called on Monday for him to step down.
Mr Pashinyan, whose whereabouts are unknown, announced the deal in a 2am Facebook post, later saying he had been forced to agree to it by Armenia’s military.
The post said it had been a
“very hard” decision and “unbelievably painful for me and our people”.
“I made the decision as a result of a deep analysis of the military situation and … based on the belief that this is the best solution in the situation,” he said.
Celebrations broke out in the Azerbaijani capital Baku after the announcement, although the full details are not yet clear. The country’s president, Ilham Aliyev, said he had agreed to a timeline to withdraw his forces from large parts of
Nagorno-Karabakh, and Armenia is thought to have agreed to the same.
Azerbaijan’s forces have made steady gains and on Sunday Mr Aliyev claimed they took the strategic and culturally significant city of Shusha, also known as Shushi, something Armenia denied.
The leader of the Nagorno-Karabakh region, Arayik Harutyunyan, said ethnic-Armenian forces lost some regions in the fighting and that the deal had been unavoidable because of Azerbaijani forces
drawing close to the enclave’s capital, Stepanakert.
After a ceasefire took effect early yesterday morning, hundreds of Russian peacekeepers were quickly sent to Nagorno-Karabakh and Mr Aliyev said Turkey, an important ally of Azerbaijan, will also play a role.
Conflict over the territory has simmered for decades, but spiralled into more fighting at the end of September with both sides being accused of attacking civilians and carrying out war crimes.
Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan announced the deal on Facebook, later saying he had been forced to agree to it