Levon Ter-Petrosyan - Comeback

Comeback

Since his resignation, Ter-Petrosyan rarely appeared in public and avoided contact with the media, although there were speculations that he would run for the office of president of Armenia in the general election in February 2003. He instead devoted his time to scientific research. In 2005-2007 Ter-Petrosyan published two volumes of his "The Crusaders and Armenians" historico-political research.

On September 21, 2007, Ter-Petrosyan gave his first public speech in nearly ten years at an event in Yerevan marking the 16th anniversary of Armenia's declaration of independence. In this speech he was strongly critical of Kocharyan. Subsequently, Ter-Petrosyan officially announced his candidacy in the 2008 presidential election in a speech in Yerevan on 26 October 2007. He accused Kocharyan's government of massive corruption, involving the theft of "at least three to four billion dollars" over the previous five years. He was critical of the government's claims of strong economic growth and argued that Kocharyan and his Prime Minister, Serge Sargsyan, had come to accept a solution to the problem of Nagorno-Karabakh that was effectively the same solution that he had proposed ten years earlier. A number of opposition parties have rallied behind him since his return to the political arena, including the People's Party of Armenia led by Stepan Demirchian, Armenian Republic Party led by Aram Sargsyan, Social Democrat Hunchakian Party, "Azadakrum" movement for Jirair Sefilian, "New Times" Party and the Heritage Party, led by Raffi Hovannisian.