Sarik Minasian made the comment late on Thursday during a heated debate with his opposition challengers hosted by Armenian Public Television. One of those challengers, Ruben Mkhitarian, attacked Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian, saying that he “surrendered” Karabakh to Azerbaijan just a few years after declaring that “Artsakh is Armenia.”
Minasian responded by saying that during former Presidents Robert Kocharian’s and Serzh Sarkisian’s rule “Karabakh was such a bad place that people in Gyumri would pay money to avoid serving there.”
“Those people whose sons were taken to Karabakh during their compulsory military service considered themselves unfortunate,” he said.
The claim sparked a shouting match between the two candidates, forcing the moderators to interrupt the live debate.
Artak Beglarian, Karabakh’s Yerevan-based former premier and human rights ombudsman, condemned Minasian’s remark, saying that it is consistent with the Pashinian government’s efforts to “devalue Artsakh” and incite hatred towards the Karabakh Armenians.
“Everyone should keep in mind that hate speech within our people means inciting hostility towards each other and bringing grist to the enemy’s mill,” he told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service.
Beglarian argued that bribery among military officials affected army units deployed not only in Karabakh but also various parts of Armenia.
“The reason for the problem was not Artsakh but security risks,” he said. “[The illegal practice] manifested itself not only in Artsakh. It exists even now.”
“The candidate representing Civil Contract took the path of political suicide,” said Tigran Abrahamian, an Armenian opposition parliamentarian. “He also assumed responsibility for all the sins of these authorities, from the surrender of the homeland to the [mishandling of] Armenia’s security.”
Hakob Badalian, an independent political analyst, added his voice to the condemnations in a social media post.
“The candidate of the ruling party tried to attribute the behavior of a certain social stratum to an entire social, popular organism, which is essentially immoral and undignified manipulation against the public hundreds of thousands of whose sons have served in Artsakh over the past three decades,” he wrote.
Minasian already raised eyebrows late last month when he claimed that Azerbaijan regained control of Karabakh not because of Pashinian’s policies but because “we didn’t fight.” The remark outraged relatives of some of at least 3,800 Armenian soldiers killed during the 2020 war with Azerbaijan.
Pashinian likewise claimed last June that that Karabakh forces did not fight back the September 2023 Azerbaijani offensive that forced the region’s entire population to flee to Armenia. Parliament speaker Alen Simonian echoed the claim earlier this year. Karabakh activists and other critics accused them of spreading hate speech against the Karabakh Armenians.
At least 198 soldiers and 25 civilian residents of Karabakh were killed during the 24-hour hostilities in September 2023. The Azerbaijani Defense Ministry acknowledged roughly 200 combat deaths among its military personnel involved in the operation.