“Armenia was trapped:” Pashinyan on the 2020 war, emotions, and stopping prayers

I think it is natural that the events of 2020 were deeply emotional, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said in a conversation with reporters.

When asked about his personal experiences during the war, Pashinyan replied: 

“Probably for the first time in my conscious life, I stopped saying daily prayers after November 8, 2020. After that, I observed a long fast. For a week, I neither ate bread nor drank water. If you ask whether I had emotions, of course I did. But afterward, I began thinking about what had happened and why. And I realized – not immediately, of course – that Armenia had fallen into a trap because of the Karabakh movement, and that it was necessary to get out of that trap.”

Pashinyan stressed that he feels proud and satisfied that he managed to lead Armenia out of that trap: “My emotions today are connected to something else – I see certain individuals, operating with an espionage mentality, trying to drag Armenia back into the conflict trap. That is the whole story. I wonder whether there is any person for whom these topics are not emotional. If such a person exists… I would not be surprised if someone like Robert Kocharyan has no emotions. I think in prison emotions may gradually return. Yes, I am an emotional person. Is that news to you? Was I not emotional when I was an opposition MP or a journalist? A person without emotions is either a piece of wood or a blunt tool. Unfortunately, we see such blunt tools in politics today, being used by various forces.”