Former director of the Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute Hayk Demoyan said that during U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance’s visit to Tsitsernakaberd, museum director Edita Gzoyan was accompanied by her direct superior — the Minister of Education, Science, Culture and Sports, who should have asked what gift would be presented to the guest.
In a post on Facebook, Demoyan wrote that the ministers of Foreign Affairs and Education, Science, Culture and Sports appeared to be unaware of the Armenian prime minister’s current foreign policy course.
“A definition of stupidity
Nikol Pashinyan should immediately demand the resignation of the Armenian prime minister because of the root causes that lead him to make decisions and create scandalous situations during protocol visits.
During U.S. Vice President Vance’s official protocol visit to Tsitsernakaberd, the fact that books about Artsakh were presented to the U.S. vice president through the Genocide Museum director, referring to the genocide committed against the Armenians of Artsakh as justification, demanding the director’s resignation and then openly declaring it, demonstrates complete and absolute insanity,” Demoyan wrote.
He then outlined several points regarding responsibility.
A responsible party
According to Demoyan, during a high-level official visit all protocol details should be thoroughly prepared and discussed in advance, including the schedule of the guest’s movement at Tsitsernakaberd and the gifts to be presented.
He argued that this was not done and that Gzoyan was not responsible. In his view, the main failures were those of the prime minister’s chief of staff and Armenia’s foreign minister, whom he said were not aware of the prime minister’s current foreign policy course.
B responsible party
Even with this oversight, Demoyan wrote, officials responsible for the state protocol who were present at Tsitsernakaberd and had enough time to learn about Gzoyan’s intention could have prevented it within seconds but did not do so.
He suggested that they were not interested in Prime Minister Pashinyan’s opinion on the matter.
C responsible party
Before the arrival of the high-ranking guest at Tsitsernakaberd, Gzoyan’s direct superior — Education, Science, Culture and Sports Minister Zhanna Andreasyan — was beside her, Demoyan said, adding that she should have asked what gift was planned for the guest.
According to him, this suggests that Andreasyan did not consider Pashinyan’s position or his statement that «the government is me».
Demoyan also noted that the Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute has a department studying the history and consequences of the genocide committed against Artsakh.
“According to Nikol’s logic, this department should be dissolved, or all employees should submit resignation letters, since the existence of such a department will be viewed as undesirable and dangerous,” he wrote.
In a postscript, Demoyan also recalled the disappearance of books from the museum’s collections in 2005 and the criminal case launched in 2007 at his initiative, suggesting that the episode might also be linked to Armenia’s foreign policy concepts and those implementing them.
Earlier, responding to questions about the resignation of the director of the Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said that Edita Gzoyan had submitted her resignation at his instruction.
When a journalist noted that the director had effectively been removed after presenting a book about Artsakh to U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance and referring to the Artsakh issue, Pashinyan said he considered it a provocative action.
