YEREVAN

Nikol Pashinyan, the 46-year-old writer and former journalist, was confirmed as Prime Minister on Monday as parliament – the National Assembly – met for the first time following snap polls in June.

Pashinyan presided over a crushing defeat to Azerbaijan in a decisive, six-week blitz by Baku’s forces-the decisive chapter of a nearly 30-year war. Azerbaijan was helped by its ally, NATO member Turkey, which helped build its army over a quarter-century.

But voters, obviously disillusioned with a war with Azerbaijan which had drained its economy, helped spur a massive exodus of its population by as much as 50 percent over recent years and seemed to have no end or actual logic in sight, propelled Pashinyan’s Civil Contract party to a huge victory.

Pashinyan virulently rejected charges by a loose coalition of ultranationalists, old-guard types he helped unseat in a 2018 “velvet revolution”, and Armenia’s overseas diaspora that he had “lost the war”.

He said Armenia, which lost close to 4,000 dead troops during the offensive, simply had no prospect of holding onto occupied Azerbaijani lands and had no choice but to essentially concede. However, an estimated 25,000 ethnic Armenians remain in the former Azerbaijani Soviet District of Nagorno-Karabakh. Baku says the entity does not exist.

The region is entirely within Azerbaijani territory though a main road links it to Armenia over Azerbaijani territory.

Pashinyan raised more eyebrows by daring to suggest that an eventual peace with Turkey, Armenia’s long-time foe, was inevitable since the two neighbours had to find a way to co-exist.

The war ended with a Moscow-brokered armistice in November 2020. However, many questions remain, including the demarcation of the formal border between the two countries and the re-establishment of trade and transport links.

Sporadic clashes have continued along the frontier, though Pashinyan may have a strong enough mandate to agree to a full and final peace agreement.

Pashinyan’s party won 71 out of 101 seats in the National Assembly.

Pashinyan will have 10 days to form a new government.