EVN Panel at Tufts Addresses International Developments Concerning Armenia

Titizian asked Kopalyan how the Israeli-US war on Iran impacts a future Armenia-Azerbaijan peace deal and TRIPP. He replied that the 2025 Washington Accords and the TRIPP project are cornerstones for the normalization and peace process, and if they do not work, the probability is that the peace process will not lead to a final peace. On the one hand, he said, “So my understanding, [based on] a lot of my conversations in D.C., is that at this point, the United States does not consider the developments in Iran to in any way create problems, complications, or limitations in going forward with TRIPP.” However, he said, that is predicated on this conflict only lasting a few months at the most. If it turns into a prolonged war, that would pose serious threats. TRIPP could be deprioritized compared to the US war effort.

There could also be a spillover effect of the Iran war, in which Azerbaijan is dragged into it, or broader regional instability and perhaps civil war or fragmentation of Iran takes place. Massive refugee influxes, or a fragmentation as in Syria or Libya would lead to chaos in the security realm. This would make TRIPP no longer a tenable project.

Questions to the Panelists

Burakovsky started the question-and-answer session by asking Titizian how public attitudes in Armenia might be shifting prior to the upcoming June parliamentary elections concerning the pursuit of peace, encroachments on Armenian sovereignty, and questions of justice.

Titizian said that EVN recently conducted a poll of potential voters and will be doing three more such polls ahead of the elections. There was robust support for TRIPP, she said, but close to 40 percent were uncommitted.

She also pointed to the threat of misinformation spreading anti-EU or anti-West narratives and promoting Russia as the security guarantor. She concluded: “Pashinyan’s Civil Contract party is pulling ahead, but much will depend on what happens economically. what happens to the southern parts of our country. So, a lot of these things are still up in the air.”

A Tufts graduate student asked Danagoulian about the dangers of Armenia using nuclear small module reactors (SMR) when their design has not been perfected. He also asked whether Armenia really only had a binary choice between Russia and the US as vendors of nuclear reactors, or could it also consider China or other suppliers. Danagoulian replied that the SMRs are more financially appropriate for Armenia due to the small size of Armenia’s electrical grid demands. There could be cost overruns and scheduling delays with new units, but Danagoulian said that they are based on older designs that are being improved or scaled down versions of larger extant designs.

To mitigate the risks of adopting newly designed units, Danagoulian said you can come to an agreement with the vendor as to who will pay the cost for delays or other problems, though you can probably not fully remove these risks.

As far as the different nuclear reactor vendors go, Danagoulian said that Russia and China have been making the same type of reactors for a long time and have perfected their supply chains and knowledge, whereas Americans tend to like to do each design of a reactor a little differently. Koreans also have had some recent excellent experience, he said. Danagoulian added that the Chinese reactors are actually cheaper than the others for a variety of reasons.

The problem is that Armenia does not need more than one reactor, so it cannot diversify suppliers, he said, plus even one reactor costs around ¼ of Armenia’s GDP.

Kopalyan interjected that Armenia cannot speak of diversification and then contract with Russia, which means maintaining dependency on Russia. Moreover, he said, “And also the current US administration’s approach is a little different on these matters. And so when they build relations with a certain country, they have certain expectations. And so the politics of this also cannot be ignored.”

The same student asked Titizian whether she was concerned about issues concerning free speech in Armenia, giving the example of government conflicts with the Armenian Church or the firing of the head of the Armenian Genocide Museum Institute for giving books about Karabakh to JD Vance.

She responded that freedom of speech should never come under threat. She said, “I’ve worked under three administrations, under the Kocharyan, Sargsyan, and now the Pashinyan administrations. And I have always practiced responsible journalism. I’ve never come under any kind of threat.”

At the same time, she said, “But are we seeing these trends that are concerning? Absolutely. And we have to speak up about it constantly.” She said, “the government has tried to passed some legislation that was concerning, but then with public outcry, it retreated every time. So this is the situation. And, you know, freedom of speech, we have to fight for that everywhere, not only in Armenia. Look at what’s happening here in the United States and in different parts of the world as well.”

As far as the clashes with the Armenian Church goes, Kopalyan replied that the government does not consider it to be an issue of church-state relations, but rather a national security issue. He said the government views the church leadership as being a subversive group that tried to undertake a theocratic coup and also an extension of Russian interests at the institutional level. Moreover, he said the church was seen as aligned with the prior regimes, while the government was also trying to separate the roles of church and state. He said this issue is heavily politicized in the diaspora as well.

A student asked about reports that the Armenian government plans to sign a deal concerning TRIPP with a Turkish company called Limak for 40 years, and that during the first 10 years the revenue will go to the Turkish government completely. Kopalyan said that this was not a tenable report. He said that as, “someone who’s been involved in sort of helping the negotiations in the process of TRIPP from the very start, I can tell you that we just got the feasibility study, and … the US-supported financial packet is not finalized.”

In other words, he said that decisions have not even been made on what the infrastructure and building process is going to be so there are no discussions about hiring yet. Moreover, the possibility of a Turkish company being hired has been consistently precluded.

The Mirror-Spectator asked whether the US would be actually committing or donating its own money to the costs of TRIPP and accompanying agreements, including potentially a nuclear reactor, or will it all be done through loans or “investments,” largely by private enterprises? Kopalyan responded that Armenia does not want the US to give it the $9 billion cost “because it puts Armenia in another dependency structure.” Instead, it is a 25- or 35-year collective investment, Kopalyan said.

Kopalyan continued; “The logic of expecting handouts from partners to address your energy needs isn’t a tenable option, so Armenia is considering various financial packages from international institutions. The United States, my understanding is, [as] part of the 1-2-3 agreement, will be willing to give some grants and so forth, which eventually are forgiven — things of that sort. … Specifically, if, for example, Armenia chooses to go to the United States and Westinghouse is doing the servicing and the management and the maintenance of it [the nuclear plant], clearly it’s going to be in the interest of the United States to offer certain incentives because it contracts a huge amount of big projects with American companies.”

The good part of this, Danagoulian added, is that the US is expecting to provide some kind of financing, meaning low interest loan guarantees. This means that the US is effectively taking upon itself a risk, therefore it has an interest in the success of Armenia. In other words, he said, “The United States will not want Armenia to burn down.”

An Armenian community member asked about the seismological danger of rebuilding a nuclear power plant in an earthquake-prone zone. Danagoulian said that Japan has one of the biggest sets of nuclear plants despite it being a very seismically active location, and another such location is California. He said that if done competently, nuclear plants can be made reliably seismically resistant in such locations.

A question about the effect the influx of Artsakh refugees have on Armenian domestic politics was addressed by Titizian. She responded, “I think from the state’s perspective, they tried to put together some benefit packages for the families. Were they perfect? No, they were not. Were expectations more than what the government could do? Perhaps. Was the government obligated to do more? I would argue, yes…I think that the expectation and the delivery did not match, and on both ends, there should have been a little bit more work done.”

She concluded: “And I really feel very strongly that anybody who tries to politicize the plight of the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh to score political points in Armenia should be considered a traitor. That’s my position, to be honest.”

The final question taken was from a Tufts University Armenian-American undergraduate, who asked how unresolved tensions between Armenia and Turkey would affect the border opening between the two countries. Kopalyan replied that Turkey had used the Nagorno-Karabakh issue as an obstacle to denying opening of the border, whereas every Armenian government since independence has wanted to normalize relations and open the border.

When the Karabakh issue was resolved, from the Turkish perspective, Turkey continued to dance around the issue due to two reasons. Baku exercises an informal veto on Turkish politics because of it funds a lot of the operations of the ruling political party in Turkey, especially in rural areas. Secondly, the US has been pressuring Turkey to open the border so Turkey’s strategic perspective is to see what it can get from the US in exchange for doing this. This situation, Kopalyan said, is basically outside of official Yerevan’s control.