Armen Grigoryan: New strategy will form new mentality - Mediamax.am

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Armen Grigoryan: New strategy will form new mentality

Armen Grigoryan
Armen Grigoryan

Photo: Mediamax

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Mediamax’s interview with Armen Grigoryan, Secretary of the Security Council of Armenia

 

The National Security Strategy of Armenia has been unchanged since 2007. You have mentioned a few days ago that the Council is currently preparing to introduce certain changes. What will they concern?

 

We are working with the format and concepts at the moment, outlining the interests that we need to take into account while updating the strategy. We want to clearly formulate our objectives and then the challenges, risks and issues that we can encounter as we pursue them.

 

Huge changes have taken place in the world and our region since 2007, including the April war and the fundamental political changes in Armenia. We need to create a document that registers these changes and responds to them.

 

What objectives have you outlined so far?

 

We have a general concept, but the National Security Strategy must be formulated as a result of comprehensive discussions, which secure the involvement of all state authorities, the National Assembly, civil society and expert community. We will have the final version of the document after these discussions.

Photo: Mediamax

What is the procedure going to be?

 

We have formed the structure of the discussions already and next week we will hold meetings with experts and representatives of the civil society.

 

Soon the Prime Minister is going to sign the decision to assemble a working group. We will talk with different states bodies about the structure and once we reach a consensus on our objectives and interests, we will move further with the update.

 

Which modern challenges that Armenia is facing should be added to the new strategy first and foremost?

 

Talking about challenges openly is difficult. Obviously, many of the challenges mentioned in the current strategy will remain, for instance, the threat of NK conflict settlement by force on the part of Azerbaijan, as well as the demographic issues. Cyber security and biosafety will be completely new additions to the document.

Armen Grigoryan Armen Grigoryan

Photo: Mediamax

How will the council formulate the stance on Karabakh conflict?

 

The primary issue is Artsakh’s participation in the peace talks. Other important components of our stance are the provision of security for Artsakh and the status of Artsakh. The latter is a matter of principle for us as much as the security.

 

What assessments does the council have of these changes?

 

All state authorities submit to us monthly reports about threats and we will take onto account the regular assessments of these threats when we review the strategy.

 

The change of mentality is important too.

 

Let me bring up an example. We received a report about a potential threat from a state body recently, which concerned a reservoir wall. Of course, we fixed the wall and prevented the incident that might have taken lives, but our analysis showed that the body, which received budget funds for fortification of the wall, did not use them for that purpose.

 

What was the threat in this case? Was it the wall or the management system? The latter, if you ask me.

 

The world is changing rapidly, threats are coming out of various places and we need a system of management that enables us to respond to these threats quickly.

 

How much time will it take to release the updated strategy publicly?

 

There are no concrete dates, but we plan to get the document ready before the year-end of 2019 and release it in early 2020.

Armen Grigoryan Armen Grigoryan

Photo: Mediamax

Active debates about the changes to the security strategy took place after the April war in 2016. Former president of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan made an announcement about the update of the strategy. Why has the process dragged on for so long?

 

It is actually a long process. After the changes that took place in April and May of 2018 (the Velvet revolution – Mediamax) we started to talk about the changes to the strategy again, but it took time to start working on the document. It requires time.

 

How will the authorities apply the updated strategy in their daily operations?

 

It is important that all authorities are going to participate in the process of formulating the strategy. The main principle is the change of mentality. We need to change the way we think about our place in the world, the region, and inside our country.

 

Taguhi Hovhannisyan talked to Armen Grigoryan

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