The personnel reshuffle in the NKR Defense Army will not affect the combativity of the Artsakh Armed Forces, Major-General Arkady Ter-Tadevosyan (Kommandos), a Karabakh war hero, has told ArmInfo.
He says that Levon Mnatsakanyan, ex-deputy chief of the General Staff of the Armenian Armed Forces, who may become the commander of the NKR Defense Army, took part in the Karabakh war and he knows Karabakh perfectly, which is very important. "I suppose the appointment of Mnatsakanyan as the NKR defense minister will enhance the Defense Army's combativity," he says.
Kommandos thinks that the reshuffle in the Defense Army aims to involve younger personnel that will give a fresh impetus to the NKR Defense Ministry's activities.
To note, on June 15, Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan decreed appointing Lt.-Gen. Movses Hakobyan, Head of the NKR Defense Army, as deputy chief of the General Staff of the Armenian Armed Forces.
The press office of the Armenian President reports that Sargsyan also decreed dismissing Lt.-Gen. Levon Mnatsakanyan as deputy head of the General Staff of the Armenian Armed Forces.
Mnatsakanyan is rumored to replace Hakobyan, and the latter is rumored to become the chief of the General Staff of the Armenian Armed Forces in a year following the retirement of the incumbent chief of the General Staff, Yuri Khachaturov.