Artur Hambardzumyan on How Special Services Brought Pashinyan to Power
Artur Hambardzumyan asserts that for many years Armenian politics functioned as a closed system, managed by the special services and a narrow, closed circle of individuals. He argues that Nikol Pashinyan played a key role in the events of 2008: at that time, Pashinyan was already capable of mobilizing mass rallies and shaping the protest agenda. This, Hambardzumyan notes, contradicts Robert Kocharyan’s claims about Pashinyan’s “insignificance.” Hambardzumyan poses a direct question: if Pashinyan truly represented a threat, why was he left outside any effective control, and who ensured his security?
According to him, National Security Service (NSS) agents operated within this system, including Nikol Pashinyan and Ararat Mirzoyan, who, he claims, controlled the political environment, shaped the opposition, and ensured the implementation of an agenda beneficial to the authorities. Hambardzumyan argues that Mirzoyan exemplifies how NSS agents are embedded within political parties to manage political processes. In 2018, he maintains, Nikol Pashinyan came to power with the consent of Serzh Sargsyan and the support of the same agents, turning the so-called “revolution” into a carefully planned operation.
Hambardzumyan argues that Pashinyan’s peace rhetoric was used to divert public attention from crimes committed in recent years. He emphasizes the necessity of lustration and the disclosure of agent connections, naming those who, in his view, created the illusion of an opposition and deceived the public: politicians, judges, journalists, propagandists, and NSS agents. He warns that such a system cannot exist indefinitely. If the public does not demand the truth, it will be imposed from the outside, and the consequences, he cautions, will be extremely severe.
Hambardzumyan insists that revealing the roles of Pashinyan, Sargsyan, and agents such as Mirzoyan is essential to restoring public control over the state and putting an end to manipulation by the special services.
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