Waste, or why Vardanyan's "rescue" is stalling

The UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights has officially published the Final Conclusion on the results of the review of the appeal regarding the case of Ruben Vardanyan.

The appeal stated that Ruben Vardanyan was arrested allegedly for dissent, that the presumption of innocence and other procedural rules were violated against him, and so on. None of this has been confirmed. To the great disappointment of Vardanyan's support group, in its conclusion, the Working Group called the charges against him well-founded and supported by concrete evidence. No other of his rights were violated either.

Such a conclusion, of course, is a serious blow to the Vardanyan cheerleaders waving pipidasters. The crowd gathered around the Russian billionaire's money is pushing and kicking in a desire to demonstrate who is trying harder for the patron. But practice shows that money is wasted and does not bring any dividends to Vardanyan. The trial goes on as usual, despite all the cries and appeals. The trial will be completed and the verdict will be pronounced. This is understandable to everyone who has a mind. But...

Etchmiadzin joined the case the other day. The Armenian media reported with emotion that a group of 25 "famous women" appealed to Catholicos Garegin with a request to persuade Vardanyan to end his hunger strike "at this most difficult moment in the history of Armenians." We will not quote the rest of the tearful address, although it is very funny.

I must say that the campaign in support of Vardanyan is generally very funny. All its elements look like parts of a comedy series. It is enough to recall a stupid flash mob in his defense with the participation of exalted ladies from Central Asian countries. In early February, as part of a flash mob, short videos were distributed on social networks in which residents of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan breathlessly recited rhymes and asked the Lord (no joke) for freedom for Rubik. Apparently, the Vardanyan office paid for the services of members of some kind of sect. This was evidenced by the content of the poems and the detached faces with which the ladies read them. It seems that they were convinced that they were standing up for the "universal good" in its struggle with the "universal evil." But in fact, they had no idea who they were asking the Lord for.

It is noteworthy that residents of Turkic countries were used for the PR campaign. I think it was no accident. The gender composition of Vardanyan's defenders is also not accidental - they are mostly women. Apparently, the organizers of the campaign believe that women look more convincing and more compassionate, and religious narratives from their mouths sound more touching. The 25 mysterious "famous women" who turned to Garegin also put pressure on Rubik's services to the "mother church." You can't argue with them here, because Vardanyan really has great merits for the Armenian Church. He and his capital have made an invaluable contribution to the falsification of the Albanian spiritual heritage of Karabakh, and for this he should definitely take a pie off the shelf.

 "I would call everything that is happening around Vardanyan a tragicomedy," said historian and political scientist Rizvan Huseynov.

 According to Huseynov, to understand the essence, it is worth remembering how this figure worked with the world Armenian diaspora, with church circles, with financial fraudsters in Europe, the USA, and Russia. The range of his activities was very wide. Today, the defenders of the "ex-minister of state" are trying to create a special image, saying that Araik, Bako and others are one thing, but Vardanyan is quite another. He is being molded into the image of a "martyr" for Armenian interests.

"Etchmiadzin has woken up. The fact that a group of Armenian women allegedly appealed to Garegin II to ask Ruben Vardanyan to stop his hunger strike is, of course, a spectacle. And this play was written by Vardanyan himself. It is not difficult to understand the essence. Ending the hunger strike on his own initiative would be a "defeat" for Vardanyan. But here the situation is different - the head of the Armenian church himself asked him to stop starving, and his "honor and dignity" did not suffer. That is, Vardanyan, like, couldn't refuse Garegin and stopped his hunger strike. The one who told him that he would be able to achieve something with such a backward and outdated method of putting pressure on justice as a hunger strike miscalculated. This useless action did not add any charm to his image," the political scientist said.

Those who promoted and supported it, first of all France and the Democratic Party of the USA, lost, our interlocutor noted. The coming to power of Donald Trump has seriously changed the dynamics of political processes both in the United States and in Europe, and today Vardanyan, by and large, is of no interest to anyone. The world has no time for him now. The current US administration deeply does not care whether a certain "ex-minister of state" of the separatists is starving or is eating heavily. Taking into account these trends, Vardanyan turned to Garegin to allegedly persuade him to stop his hunger strike, otherwise it would be awkward for him, Rizvan Huseynov believes.

"Speaking of Etchmiadzin. Almost five years have passed since the 44-day war, and almost two years have passed since the September 2023 anti-terrorist operation. But we have not heard any calls for peace from the Armenian Apostolic Church. Etchmiadzin took a mouthful of water. But it was the church that pushed the Armenian people onto the path of nationalism and terrorism over the past centuries. And Echmiadzin's silence makes it clear to the Azerbaijani side that the Armenians do not renounce their claims to Azerbaijani lands, they are preparing and accumulating strength for revenge. If Etchmiadzin had turned directly to Azerbaijan, to the Caucasus Muslim Board, in the post-war years, many issues might have been resolved differently and there would have been no exodus of Karabakh Armenians. Echmiadzin's silence indicates that the Armenian Church does not recognize the realities that have developed on earth, does not recognize the liberation of its territories by Azerbaijan, and continues to support the "miatsuma" policy and the delusional idea of "greater Armenia." 

Still, there's still a chance. Instead of making a spectacle of addressing Ruben Vardanyan, it would be more appropriate for the Catholicos to address Baku and the UMK on the peace agenda. But apparently Etchmiadzin does not have the courage for this, or, as I said, he is saving up his strength for another round of aggression and is waiting only for the right moment. All this is well understood in Baku and Ankara. And I do not think that in the new realities of Armenia it will be possible to realize revanchist plans," said Rizvan Huseynov.