The parliamentary group of one of the two formations in the ruling coalition in Romania, the National Liberal Party – Partidul Național Liberal (PNL), called on the Nobel Committee to reject the nomination of the Russian-Armenian oligarch and ex-prime minister of unrecognized Karabakh Ruben Vardanyan for the Nobel Peace Prize for 2024, wrote the Romanian edition of Newsweek magazine.
Twelve PNL MPs have signed an official letter which is about to be sent to the Nobel Committee - see it HERE
A few days ago, representatives of the PNL parliamentary group, whose quota includes the president of the country and the chairman of the Senate, asked the Nobel Committee to withdraw the nomination of Ruben Vardanyan from the list of candidates for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2024. Thus the Romanian parliamentarians joined the 18 deputies of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, who on April 21 of this year sent a collective letter to the Nobel Committee declaring Ruben Vardanyan an "enemy of Ukraine" and "sponsor of Russian aggression in the post-Soviet territories".
The letter of the PNL MPs quoted by the media stated that "Romania supports the struggle of the Ukrainian people” and therefore “is opposed to the nomination of one of the enemies of Ukraine for the Nobel Peace Prize”. “We, the signatories of this letter, as a sign of solidarity with the Ukrainian people, ask the Nobel Committee to withdraw the nomination of Ruben Vardanyan”, the address reads.
"We consider Ruben Vardanyan an enemy of Ukraine. According to the Ukrainian website "Peacemaker" this person is a "sponsor of Russian aggression in the post-Soviet territories", "helper of Russian-fascist invaders and terrorists" and "an accomplice in the crimes of the Russian authorities against Ukraine and its citizens," reads the press release of the PNL parliamentary group.
The MPs are adamant that since since October 2023 the level of partnership between Bucharest and Kyiv has been raised to strategic, and the Romanian military has been instructing Ukrainian pilots to fly F-16 fighter jets for over half a year, “ we find it unacceptable to whitewash the reputation of Ruben Vardanyan in favor of Russia at the hands of the Nobel Committee.
“We unanimously demand that the Nobel Committee withdraw Vardanyan's candidacy from the list of candidates for the 2024 Nobel Peace Prize and continue joint efforts to support Ukraine in the interest of peace on the entire European continent."
"As a member of parliament, I express my categorical disagreement with the intention to nominate for the Nobel Prize a person who supports Russian aggression in Ukraine”, announced on Facebook one of the signatories of the official address to the Nobel Committee, Gheorghe Pechingina from PNL: “ The Peace Prize should be awarded to those who campaign for peace! This nomination is a mockery of the very name of the person who founded this award!".
PNL MP Claudia Bencescu recalled that "the unjustified Russian aggression against the Ukrainian people has been going on for over 2 years”: “The whole Western world supports the Ukrainian people in their struggle for justice”. “Every day we witness crimes and horrors on the territory of the neighboring nation. In this whole nightmare, it is impossible for people who support the despotic Kremlin regime to be nominated for peace prizes. This is an insult to the whole world and is unacceptable. Long live Ukraine!”, Bencescu wrote.
Romanian MEP Cristian Terhes also sent a letter of protest to the committee: "I urge you to immediately withdraw the nomination of Ruben Vardanian from the list of candidates for the 2024 Nobel Peace Prize”
“As a close ally of the Russian president, Ruben Vardanyan, also known as "Putin's purse," is an enemy of peace and a sponsor of Russian aggression in the post-Soviet territories, including Moscow's war of aggression against Ukraine, which has already taken the lives of hundreds of thousands of people and forced millions of people to flee", urged Christian Terhesch.
The European parliamentarian believes that "nominating for the Nobel Prize a person with such an anti-peaceful past, who has openly sponsored Russia's aggression against sovereign states, undermines the credibility and reputation of the peace prize”: “This is why I call on you to withdraw Ruben's nomination Vardanyan from the list of candidates for 2024 and continue to nominate those who truly promote peace and not unjust, unprovoked wars and invasions against other nations, such as Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine."
In 2019, 22 MEPs called for sanctions against Vardanian, and in 2022, 46 members of the US Congress supported imposing personal restrictions against him. Now they are of the opinion that the decision of the Nobel Committee to include in the list of candidates for the most prestigious prize in the world the man "who should be immediately arrested" is in direct contradiction to the values of the Nobel Committee itself.
This is confirmed by: the Nobel Committee statement of September 2, 2023: "It is important and right to promote the values and messages that the Nobel Prize embodies - for example through last year's clear political message through the Peace Prize for Human Rights Defenders Russia and Belarus and Ukraine documented Moscow's war crimes."; The policy of the Nobel Committee in 2022 (the Russian and Belarusian envoys were not invited to the ceremony) and 2023 (the invitations to the representatives of Russia, Iran and Belarus were withdrawn after widespread public criticism).
In June 2023, on the initiative of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), Vardanyan was included in the Ukrainian database "Peacemaker". with the characteristic: "Complicit of the Russian-fascist invaders and terrorists”. As an accomplice in the crimes of the Russian authorities against Ukraine and its citizens, he is “subject to immediate detention and surrender to the Ukrainian law enforcement authorities or those of the NATO member states". The SBU also accuses him of "financing Russian aggression in the post-Soviet territories".
Two months later, the former head of the Security Council of the Armenian enclave of Karabakh, Samvel Babayan, told Armenian public television that Vardanyan acted “as a Russian agent in the South Caucasus in 2022-2023”
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In 2023, a number of leading international media also reported on Vardanian's ties to the Kremlin. "There can be no doubt that Vardanyan is a Kremlin man, as the Ukrainian government recognized him to be, imposing sanctions on him," wrote Politico on the case. According to Forbes magazine, Vardanyan “enjoys the blessing of Moscow".
The Romanian edition of the American magazine Newsweek commented that "while the EU and the US are fighting for peace in the Caucasus by reaching a peace agreement between Armenia and Azerbaijan over Karabakh, Russian billionaire Ruben Vardanian, who represents the interests of the Kremlin, called on people to are taking up arms".
No less scandalous are the revelations of The Washington Times about Vardanian's connections with the regime of the Ayatollahs in Tehran, especially against the background of Iran's public threats against the USA, Great Britain, France and Germany for their support for Israel after the Iranian attack on April 13, 2024. The publication states that "Vardanyan is one of the richest people in Russia” and “is one of Putin's close friends".
All this explains why Romanian and Ukrainian parliamentarians see the nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize of a man closely connected to two dictatorial regimes pursuing an aggressive militarist policy not only as a scandal, but also as sacrilege.