Nikol Pashinyan has once again used the threat of war to pressure Armenians into accepting further territorial concessions to Azerbaijan, this time over Tigranashen, while referring to the Armenian village by its Azerbaijani name, “Kyarki.”
“If someone says that Kyarki is within Armenia’s territory, that means they are saying the territory of the Republic of Armenia is not 29,743 square kilometers, but, say, 29,750. That means declaring war,” Pashinyan told reporters.
He also said the public could choose to follow what he called the “three-headed party of war,” adding that this time no one could say they had not been warned.
But the 29,743 figure does not decide the status of Tigranashen. Pashinyan himself acknowledged in 2023 that the legal basis of the claimed enclaves still had to be examined and said anyone claiming an enclave existed should produce the relevant map.
Tigranashen also remains part of Armenia under current Armenian law. Its transfer therefore cannot simply be treated as a settled territorial fact, particularly when no publicly established legal act showing how the area was lawfully transferred from Soviet Armenia to Soviet Azerbaijan has been presented.
Early Soviet maps from the 1920s and 1930s show no Azerbaijani enclave at Tigranashen. The village also sits on the key highway linking northern Armenia with Syunik and Iran.
Early Soviet-era map of the Armenian SSR
Armenian forces liberated Tigranashen in January 1990 in an operation involving an Ararat detachment led by Vazgen Sargsyan. Armenian fighter Tigran Melikyan was killed in the fighting, and the village was later renamed in his memory.
Pashinyan used the same threat during the 2024 surrender of territories in Tavush, including near Kirants, warning that stopping the process would lead to war.
Now the same argument is being used over Tigranashen: accept the concession, or be blamed for war.
At the same time, more than 200 square kilometers of Armenia remains under Azerbaijani occupation. Yet while Azerbaijani forces remain on Armenian territory, Armenians defending Tigranashen as Armenian territory are being told they are “declaring war.”
