Your trusted source

Russian publicist, member of the Russian Association of the International Law Denis Dvornikov deems as ‘catastrophic’ the 17 percent decrease of the Armenians’ positive attitude toward Russia as a main partner state.

Dvornikov reflected on the newly released data of the Eurasian Bank Research Center during the press conference held on Thursday in Yerevan.

Reflecting on the information cooperation between Armenia and Russia as well as the ongoing crises of mutual understanding, the speaker first of all pointed out to the short period of time the unease occurred.

“I guess we should first elaborate on the reasons, to analyze why that happened. To my personal observation, that is based on the monitoring of the Armenian media sources and the social media Armenian segment, Dmitri Rogozin should be blamed at least for the 10 percent of that negative trend,” Dvornikov said, referring to the Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitri Rogozin’s notorious statement about a “normal practice of selling offensive armaments to Azerbaijan” right after the April escalation in Nagorno Karabakh.

Another reason for the existing crisis, per the speaker, is the lack of perception of the Armenian realities among the Russian public, specifically Russia’s “failing to perceive the sensitivity of a certain situation, facts or realities in Armenia”.

“To me, the most important factor is the lack of empathy. Empathy is the capacity to understand or feel what another person is experiencing. If the statement of selling offensive weapons to Azerbaijan is a routine activity for the Russian politics, then as a high level official Rogozin should have realized that was a matter of extreme pain to every Armenian, especially for those residing in Nagorno Karabakh,” noted Dvornikov.

While stating his opinion, Dvornikov even suggested a title to reporters for covering his press conference: ”Russian diplomacy suffers from lack of empathy”.

The Russian publicist next singled out Levon Hayrapetyan’s arrest with the information vacuum around that case as well as Russian citizen of Armenian origin Marat Ueldanov’s detention in Baku  - as another reason for negative attitude among the Armenians toward Russia.
 
Dvornikov says Armenians are unable to fully understand Russia.

“Russia is a conflicting state governed from several power centers.” Dvornikov said, adding despite its apparently insensitive label, Russian diplomacy is quite flexible and acts based on what power center has a relative leverage at specific time and acts ‘more confidently and impudently’.
In this context Dvornikov highlighted the role of the Armenian community in Russia that has left out of the leverage sphere due to certain reasons.

Dvornikov also attached importance to the cooperation between the Russian and Armenian public circles to show what Armenia and Nagorno Karabakh are to ordinary Russian people. He informed that several trips had been organized to Nagorno Karabakh thus far, that included a concert of a Russian rock band in Stepanakert and online master classes for Artsakh young writers.