Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan announced at a press briefing that a draft of the new constitution would be published soon, followed by public discussions. The draft would then be submitted to parliament, where the ruling party would seek to convince the opposition that the issue is of fundamental importance, 1lurer.am reported.
“We will try to convince them. If that fails, we will pursue other scenarios, including the possibility of holding snap elections. Who said such a scenario was ruled out? For me, the challenge is that I have made commitments to Armenian citizens regarding both constitutional amendments and the signing and ratification of the peace agreement.
“I believe that if the people of Armenia want to see these commitments fulfilled, then we must fulfill them together with the people. If the Armenian people do not consider these commitments achievable, at some point it may become clear that my political mission has run its course. Therefore, this is an extremely important and fundamental issue for me,” he said.
According to Pashinyan, the issue represents a political mission for him, and he expects the Armenian people to support it.
“If it turns out that the Armenian people do not support this mission, I will consider my political mission in Armenia to have come to an end,” he stated.
Addressing Azerbaijan’s position, the prime minister said:
“We discussed this issue during our meeting in Bishkek. I told the Azerbaijani side that we find it unacceptable for Azerbaijan to constantly raise questions concerning our constitution, because this is part of our domestic agenda.
“The Azerbaijani side’s position is as follows: they said they acknowledge that the constitutional issue belongs to Armenia’s domestic political life, that it is an internal matter, and that no one has the right to interfere in the internal affairs of Armenia or other countries. They are simply informing us, since we are discussing matters related to the peace agreement, that they hold such a political position. I think the difference in wording may not seem significant, but in my view, and in reality, it is significant, because the constitution is our internal matter.
“We continually make the following assessment: if we are going to change the constitution anyway, and this is already part of our election platform and the government’s program, what prevents us from combining the pleasant with the useful?
“Now, because Azerbaijan says something like this, should we declare that we are abandoning our agenda and will not proceed along this path? No. We must continue along this path, and we must have a new constitution. We have spoken about this repeatedly. It is a very important and fundamental issue,” he said.
On September 8, Armenia’s Ministry of Justice denied reports that a draft of the new constitution had been published. The constitution was last amended in 2015, when Armenia transitioned to a parliamentary system of government. In early 2024, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan declared that Armenia needed a new constitution.
Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev has stated that signing a peace treaty would be impossible without amendments to Armenia’s constitution. Responding to his remarks, Armenia’s Foreign Ministry stated that the constitution and any amendments to it are Armenia’s internal affairs. The ministry described official Baku’s attempts to interfere in domestic Armenian discussions, which began in 2018, as gross interference in the country’s internal affairs.
