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Naira Karapetyan: 2017 Was a Breakthrough Year for PACE (EXCLUSIVE)

Panorama.am

“Armedia” IAA presents an exclusive interview with the Secretary of the United Liberal National Party (MIAK), Member of the National Assembly's 5th Convocation, Naira Karapetyan.


- Mrs. Karapetyan, as a deputy of the fifth convocation of the National Assembly, who carried out quite active work, how would you assess the parliamentary diplomacy of the new convocation and the efforts to reorganize it? 

- Let us consider the issue from 2 perspectives: the content and the organizational issues, as it also includes an element of reorganization.

Our country's foreign policy course is very clear and stable. The Comprehensive and Enhanced Partnership Agreement recently signed with the EU has further strengthened our positions. I would like to highlight one of the priorities of our parliamentary diplomacy: in parallel to keeping the foreign policy course intact, to have as priority the issue of the peaceful and pro-Armenian settlement of the Artsakh issue. Here number one issue of our diplomacy is keeping the settlement format - under the mandate of the Minsk Group, in spite of numerous attempts by Azerbaijan to take the issue to other platforms, in many cases to international parliamentary platforms. These attempts are all in vain due to the consistent and skillful work of our parliamentary diplomacy.

Naturally, the change of the country's governance system, which also means increase in the role of parliamentary diplomacy, initially creates certain difficulties, but they can be overcome due to joint work. The international parliamentary delegations, committees and friendship groups of the National Assembly should work synthesized, which will bring both greater results and will exclude carrying out the same work for two, three times. Currently, great work is being done in this direction.

I do not only mean information and technical unity. Besides, we should also remember that a deputy of the National Assembly is a political post, the represented political forces have their own political agenda, and many times the foreign sphere becomes the one around which it becomes the most difficult to unite. Political forces should also pay great attention to their composition. Here I think it is necessary to quote the phrase "the personnel determine everything".

Summing up all this, I can state that good environment is created for effective work.

 

- You have also been a member of the Armenian delegation to PACE and have been very active in the work of the Assembly. How would you assess the developments in that structure in 2017?

- For the PACE, 2017 can be called a breakthrough year. That was a year which can be conditionally called an "awakening year". What happened to PACE President Pedro Agramunt is a result of huge work, in which our delegation also has its share. Azerbaijan could not forever keep in its pocket a number of PACE members. Thus, everything started to be revealed. Unfortunately, this process cannot be described in details, because as I often like to repeat, foreign policy is like an iceberg, and the hidden part is often larger than what we see.

Thus, everything started from Italy – from the decryption of the correspondence between the former head of the PACE EPP group Luca Volonte and several Azerbaijani officials. The revelation clearly showed that the Italian deputy did services for Azerbaijan, receiving a large sum of money for the work done. This was the first cold shower for the PACE. For many years Azerbaijan has turned "the cradle of democracy" into "the cradle of bribery." We have repeatedly announced names, we have brought facts, and I am happy that it have started to give concrete results.

Being a member of statutory, political and social commissions, over the years I have faced many of the efforts of this or that pro-Azerbaijani lobbying group, which aim was to lead the Assembly into devious ways, to present distorted facts, and many times - open lies.

Pedro Agramunt was the leader of the lobbyists and I am very happy that the Assembly was so healthy and did not give way to the provocations organized by them, and during Agramunt’s presidency, an independent investigative body was created by PACE decision to investigate the bribery cases of the PACE deputies.

In parallel, the PACE Charter Commission made a number of amendments to ensure the transparency of the MPs' work and to increase their accountability to the PACE. Of course, the biggest victory was that the principle of recall of the PACE president was added in the Charter. Feeling how shameful the process would be, Pedro left. There were other resignations, too. This was a fiasco of Azerbaijan.

Let's not forget that this was the same Pedro, who, violating the same rules, even did not let to talk about bribing the MPs by Azerbaijan, switching off my colleagues’ and my microphones.

At present, good environment has been created in PACE, which gives our delegation a unique opportunity to continue to present Europe the incompatibility of Azerbaijan with the civilized world.

 

- And at the end, what would you wish to our readers in the New Year?

- Naturally, first of all I would like to wish peace - peace in the country, family, souls and hearts. I would also wish to be optimistic: all the difficulties are temporary, although visible, while optimism, I assure, leads to overcoming them rapidly. I also wish health, love, strength, confidence, and endless smiles. May 2018 be a year of realization of the most cherished dreams.


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