The leader of the Armenian separatists of Nagorno-Karabakh, who were expelled in September by Azerbaijan from this territory disputed for more than three decades, indicated on Friday that he was canceling the dissolution of the secessionist entities which he had previously announced for January 1 2024. “In the legal field of the Republic of Artsakh (name given by the Armenian separatists in Nagorno-Karabakh, editor’s note), there is no document providing for the dissolution of government institutions,” declared Samvel Chakhramanian during a meeting with other leaders in Yerevan.
“No document can lead to dissolution”
This spectacular turnaround comes less than ten days before the dissolution of the self-proclaimed separatist republic of Nagorno-Karabakh, planned since the end of September by a decree from Samvel Chakhramanian on January 1, 2024, more than 30 years after its creation. Azerbaijan and Armenian separatists had been fighting over territory since the breakup of the USSR and two wars had broken out, the first in the early 1990s and a second in 2020, won by Baku.
The decree, “it’s an empty piece of paper”, Samvel Chakhramanian’s office explained to AFP on Friday. “No document can lead to the dissolution of the Republic which was established by the will of the people,” the services of the leader of the Armenian separatists further argued. In fact, however, Samvel Chakhramanian no longer has any power over the fate of the enclave since a victorious offensive by Azerbaijan in September which retook the entire mountainous region.
100,000 people fled to Armenia
In the wake of this 24-hour military operation, the authorities in Baku arrested several separatist representatives and the region was emptied of almost all of its inhabitants, 100,000 people out of the 120,000 recorded fleeing to Armenia. It was at that time, ten days after Baku’s recapture of the enclave, that Samvel Chakhramanian signed a decree on the dissolution of “all government institutions” of the separatist republic “on January 1, 2024”.
As a result, “the Republic of Nagorno Karabakh” will cease “its existence”, it was written in particular. Since then, the authoritarian president of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliev, visited Khankendi, the main city of Nagorno-Karabakh (Stepanakert according to its Armenian name), in mid-October and raised the Azerbaijani tricolor flag. Building on this military victory in the enclave, he also called an early presidential election in early December on February 7, 2024, which could extend his reign that began in 2003 following the death of his father.