Nikol Pashinyan

Now, Hamadeh has actually met with Armenian Ambassador Narek Magurchian.

Vartan Arabian, who's the consul, and back in August, he went to Yerevan and met with Pashinyan and Ararat Mirzoyan.

He is a member of the House Armed Services Committee and serves as a diplomatic mediator for the TRIP project.

How is it that this guy is getting a F?

The country is already mostly a one-party rule.

The police and the judiciary are fully controlled by the executive, really by one person, Pashinyan, to serve Pashinyan.

And Pashinyan, of course, aims to please Azerbaijan and Turkey.

So folks, we're recording this on Sunday evening, and the results of the precincts are coming in.

But to be honest, I want to say, and we'll cover these next week, but to be honest, I want to say don't hold your breath for most of these.

So this year, Strong Armenia and Savit Gharapetyan's party decided to join these elections and field the candidate along with four other powers.

So altogether, there were five parties in this contest.

And I think this is, as I said, this is one, you know, for strong Armenia, this is one too many for Pashinyan.

They are addressing the issue of so-called cessation, or not cessation, of freezing Armenia's membership in Euro-European Economic Union, based on Armenia's Parliament's decision to join the EU.

the arguments has been between Putin and Pashinyan, whether it's real or not real, et cetera.

The formal quest was go and do a referendum.

Our authorities said we are not going to do a referendum.

He said the government was studying the report and would respond, adding that while trade and economic ties matter, there is something that takes precedence and is more important than anything else, Armenia's sovereignty and independence.

Prime Minister Pashinyan went further, calling the report a political move rather than an economic one, and the third attempt to change the government in Armenia.

He also described it as the first time in our history that the metropolis, or the imperial center as he put it, is not pulling Armenia towards itself, but is indirectly telling us, we will expel you from us.

Meanwhile, Economy Minister Gabor Papoyan reported that exports of Armenian products to EU member states have increased by 51% year-on-year between January and September.

The investigator said some certificates contained false information about farming activities.

The official has been placed under house arrest.

And against this backdrop, Prime Minister Pashinyan called on national and local government officials to prevent the use of administrative resources and pressure during the municipal elections, warning that violations of the law and democratic principles would face disproportionately harsh response.

He also urged candidates and voters who say they have faced unlawful pressure to contact him directly.

Okay, well, take us to the first topic, Ovik.

One of the major topics in the Armenian news is this idea that Pashinyan has put forth that, hey, suddenly I have a solution to Armenia's territorial issues.

29,743 is the magic number, baby, and we better not forget that.

All the enclave issues, all the territorial issues need to be solved around that number.

That was what foreign minister or de facto foreign minister Mirzoyan said.

That was probably the top issue in terms of geopolitics in the Armenian media this week.

He actually, Pashinyan, said that, yeah, after recent exchanges, but we've come to this conclusion, or we have reason to believe that this is an agreeable position.

But what were those recent exchanges? The only exchange that they had was in Turkmenistan, where they had, like, maybe they passed each other in the lobby.

And Constitutional Court of Armenia said it.

And Pashinyan many, many times said that he is president of Republic of Armenia.

He is talking about a real Armenia.

But this is a tool for pressing over Armenia.

I think the Kazakhs have also done a lot, but at the same time, this recognition that it's better not to antagonize Russia too much.

And so you see it sometimes in Tokayev's statements and Pashinyan's statements when they talk about Russia.

There's a sort of recognition still that Russia is a major power.

I think Pashinyan also after the election now is trying to walk this fine balancing act where he's continuing the diversification.

But now that Putin is putting pressure on the Armenians regarding a referendum to decide between the Eurasian Economic Union and sort of proceeding on the European path, he's trying to navigate this rather cautiously.

Because again, I think there's this recognition that economically, these countries remain quite entangled with Russia, quite dependent on Russia.