Fellow compatriots;

On January 12, 2010 the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Armenia examined the constitutionality of the obligations undertaken by Armenia according to the signed Armenian-Turkish protocols.

Thus began the internal process of ratifying the Protocols that endanger out national interests and contradict the founding principles of our state, as stipulated in the Constitution.

The ARF-Dashnaktsutyun had, from the start, rejected the three main points in the protocols which it considered to be preconditions aiming at: undermining the international recognition of the Armenian Genocide; legitimizing the current border between Armenia and Turkey; and linking the normalization of the relations between Armenia and Turkey with the resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict in Azerbaijan’s favor.

We were, and still are, convinced that the signed protocols contradict with Armenia’s constitution to a degree sufficient to provide the Constitutional Court with valid legal basis to consider the protocols unconstitutional.

While, unfortunately that did not occur, we are convinced that the mounting indignation expressed in Armenia and the Diaspora against the protocols which endanger our state’s national interests is yielding results.

First, as the decision reached by the Constitutional Court also indicates, the signing of the protocols is the result of the poor performance of Armenia’s Foreign Minister. Second, the Constitutional Court through its expressed legal position has set the establishment of diplomatic relations and the opening of the common existing border as the exclusive object of the protocols. Moreover the Constitutional Court did refer to the expressed concerns regarding the protocols and has provided enough legal basis for the Republic of Armenia to express reservations.

Specifically, the Constitutional Court asserts that the protocols are exclusively of a bilateral interstate nature and that the Republic of Armenia can not undertake any obligation concerning a third party. This in regards to the Artsakh issue.

On the issue of the Armenian Genocide, any obligation that Armenia undertakes can not contradict the provisions of the preamble of Armenia’s Constitution and article 11 of Armenia’s declaration of independence. In other words, that the Republic of Armenia supports the international recognition of the Genocide of Armenians in Ottoman Turkey and in Western Armenia.

The legal assertion of the interstate borders between Armenia and Turkey can not be realized through these protocols. The border issue is an open one. It can be resolved solely based on an inter-state agreement to be discussed in the future, based on the Constitution and laws of the Republic of Armenia.

The ARF-Dashnaktsutyun, appreciating these legal evaluations, asserts that they can completely diffuse the existing dangers, if at the time of the ratification, based on this decision of the Constitutional Court, according to international law, become an integral part of the protocols as reservations.

Fellow compatriots;

We can and have the right to consider that the Constitutional Court’s decision is the concrete achievement of our pan-Armenian struggle that has brought together political and social organization, as well as the whole nation.

However, the challenge still lies ahead. By multiplying our efforts, we should pressu and force the authorities of Armenia to complete this process and to bring it to a logical conclusion.

Our final goal is to normalize Armenian-Turkish relations without undermining our national and state interests, and specifically without any concessions from our just rights and the rights of the genenations to come.

Armenian Revolutionary Federation
January 12, 2010