Karabakh Brushes Off Democracy Downgrade

Officials in Nagorny Karabakh have brushed off a decision the United States-based democracy watchdog Freedom House’s decision to downgrade its description of the entity from “partly free” to “not free” assessment, saying it was not their fault if there was no opposition.

The group’s Freedom in the World 2011 report, in which Karabakh was one of just three countries or territories – alongside Djibouti and Ethiopia – to sink to “not free”, raised concerns over the political direction the unrecognised republic was heading in.

“Nagorny Karabakh’s political rights rating declined from 5 to 6 and its status from Partly Free to Not Free due to the complete absence of opposition candidates in the May 2010 parliamentary elections,” it said.

Karabakh declared independence at the collapse of the Soviet Union, and its Armenian population broke free from Azerbaijani rule in a war that ended in 1994 with a ceasefire, but not a final settlement.

A spokesman for Karabakh’s president Bako Sahakyan said Freedom House had failed to investigate conditions there fully before coming out with its negative assessment.

“Which formations, parties or groups of people are considered to be in opposition by Freedom House? Surely some investigations were done? I think not,” spokesman Davit Babayan said.

He insisted that no one prevented political parties from forming an opposition; they just chose not to do so.

“Parties don’t just enjoy rights, they are guided by their own wishes. Why did no one take that into account in drawing up this assessment?”

Karabakh’s political elite united behind Sahakyan before the 2007 presidential election, and again in last year’s parliamentary poll. All three parties with seats in parliament compete to support the government, and it is rare for any member to vote against a proposal.

Journalists in Karabakh joke that if parliament’s computerised voting system shows a no vote, IT engineers are called to identify the fault in the software.

Masis Mailyan, who was foreign minister at the time, stood as a candidate in the 2007 presidential election, saying he wanted to improve Karabakh’s image and show it had an open political system. He lost badly, winning just 12.5 per cent of the vote, and was then dismissed as minister.

He says is concerned by the political trend under Sahakyan.

“Sadly, one does see a certain amount of backwards movement, but I don’t think the democracy situation has got so much worse that you can call Karabakh an unfree country,” he said. “But of course society, political parties and government have an obligation to secure democratic progress. Everyone has a share of the blame for what’s happening.”

Nevertheless, Mailyan still does not regard himself as an opponent of the government.

“I have always been an active supporter of reform, but I do not intend to set up an opposition party,” he said.

If he did decide to form an opposition party, he might find it hard to campaign, as there are currently no independent media outlets. None of the 30 newspapers or the three radio stations can survive without government funding.

The sole independent newspaper, Demo, used to be funded by the British organisation Conciliation Resources, but stopped publishing two years ago. Its editor Gegham Baghdasaryan said he decided to close it down of his own free will.

“In this country the political and civil sectors, as well as the free press, either semi-exist or don’t exist at all. There is no political opposition, so we [Demo] would often have been seen as an opposition newspaper, as the political opposition,” he said. “It’s hard to operate in conditions like these, where uniformity is described as unity.”

Christine Khanumyan, an opposition journalist who was born in Karabakh but now lives in Armenia, said there were no political prisoners, journalists were not attacked and the laws did not interfere with freedom of speech. But that was because the Karabakh government did not need to do any of those things, she said.

“Journalists from the Karabakh media aren’t very interested in investigating issues that might get them into trouble,” she explained. “Of course, there aren't any guarantees that there wouldn’t be repercussions if someone did become over-curious. It’s possible that journalists in Karabakh, too, might be beaten, threatened or arrested, but since reporters try to stay as far away as they can from that kind of thing, the authorities don’t do anything.”

If opposition parties were to emerge, they might struggle to gather much support in an environment that is still largely on a war footing.

Susanna Gabrielyan, for example, sells newspapers from a kiosk in Stepanakert, Karabakh’s main town, and says she is glad the country has no opposition.

“Those who speak against the government are spies,” she said.

Lusine Musayelyan is a correspondent for RFE/RL in Nagorny Karabakh.