Yerevan does not want to repeat the mistakes of the past by relying too much on a single ally.

The Kremlin still has the convincing argument that is military force, but as Russia experiences defeat on the battlefield in Ukraine, its hand is now weaker than it once was.

The case against ex-president Robert Kocharyan has become the most explosive episode in Armenian politics since this past spring’s Velvet Revolution. It has unnerved Moscow, as well as Kocharyan’s allies in Yerevan, with the former fearing that Armenia is pivoting to the West and the latter accusing the Nikol Pashinyan government of political persecution. But the case against Kocharyan is neither geopolitical nor the beginning of a campaign of terror—it is all about the March 1 affair, Armenia’s Bloody Sunday.

It’s hard to call Pashinyan left- or right-wing, pro-Western or pro-Russian. He has two images: one of a charismatic revolutionary, capable of getting people on the streets to rally behind him, and the other as a pragmatic politician ready to make compromises and form tactical unions.

Armenia needs to find its own voice on foreign policy and ensure that its international partnerships do not limit the country’s ability to make sovereign decisions.