Thursday, Armenia, Azerbaijan Face Off At UN Court • Karlen Aslanian NETHERLANDS -- People walk toward the International Court of Justice in the Hague, August 27, 2018 Armenia accused Azerbaijan of serious human rights violations as the two South Caucasus nations that fought a six-week war last year faced off at the United Nations court in The Hague on Thursday. A lawyer representing Armenia, Yeghishe Kirakosian, made the accusation as a hearing opened at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) into a request by Armenia for judges to impose urgent interim measures to prevent Azerbaijan breaching an international convention to stamp out ethnic discrimination. Yerevan specifically wants the court to order Baku to release dozens of Armenian prisoners, shut down an anti-Armenian “park of trophies” in the Azerbaijani capital and stop destroying Armenian cultural and religious monuments in parts of Karabakh captured by it during the war. Kirakosian said Armenia is not asking the court to rule on the root causes of the war but “seeks to prevent and remedy the cycle of violence and hatred perpetrated against ethnic Armenians." “Azerbaijan captured, arbitrarily detained and tortured many Armenian servicemen and civilians and is now continuing to destroy Armenian cultural heritage and religious sites or deny their being Armenian,” he said. Lawyers representing Azerbaijan addressed the court later on Thursday. One of them, Peter Goldsmith, urged the UN tribunal to reject the injunctions sought by Yerevan, saying that Baku has fully complied with a Russian-brokered ceasefire that stopped the hostilities last November. He also claimed that the several dozen Armenians remaining in Azerbaijani captivity are guilty of “grave crimes.” Kirakosian dismissed such claims when he spoke with RFE/RL’s Armenian Service from the Dutch city. “It is crystal clear that all Armenians held by Azerbaijan are protected by international humanitarian law,” he said. Azerbaijan has filed a similar case alleging discrimination against its citizens by Armenia and also has requested the world court to impose interim measures. Hearings in the Azerbaijan case are scheduled to start on October 25. Rulings on both requests will likely be issued in coming weeks. But both nations' cases alleging breaches of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination will likely take years to reach their conclusion at the ICJ. Armenian, Azeri FMs In Fresh Talks Belarus - The foreign ministers of Russia, Azerbaijan and Armenia meet in Minsk, . The foreign ministers of Armenia and Azerbaijan met on Thursday for the second time in less than a month for talks mediated by their Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov. They also held separate talks with Lavrov before the trilateral meeting held on the sidelines of a gathering in Belarus’s capital Minsk of top diplomats from a dozen ex-Soviet states. The Russian Foreign Ministry publicized Lavrov’s comments made at the start of his conversations with Ararat Mirzoyan and Jeyhun Bayramov. “We spoke at length in Moscow recently but can today look at some additional issues of both bilateral character and of course the region,” Lavrov told the Armenian minister. “Karabakh must always receive our attention.” Speaking with Bayramov, he cited unspecified “issues that need to be resolved.” The Russian Foreign Ministry said that at their ensuing trilateral meeting the ministers “reviewed” the implementation of a Russian-brokered agreement that stopped the six-week war in Karabakh last November. “They concluded that most provisions of that Statement are being successfully implemented. They agreed to intensify work on the remaining issues,” it said without elaborating. Mirzoyan was cited by his press office as saying that Baku is continuing to hold dozens of Armenian prisoners of war and civilian captives in breach of the truce accord. He also reaffirmed Yerevan’s stated commitment to a “comprehensive and lasting settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh” advanced by the U.S., Russian and French co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group. The three mediators took part in Mirzoyan’s first meeting with Bayramov held in New York on September 24. In a joint statement, they said they “proposed specific focused measures to deescalate the situation and possible next steps.” They did not disclose those proposals. The mediators are expected to visit Armenia, Azerbaijan and Karabakh soon. It will be their first tour of the conflict zone since the 2020 war. The Karabakh issue also featured large during Russian President Vladimir Putin’s latest meeting with Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian held in Moscow on Tuesday. Pashinian described the meeting as “very productive” but did not give its details. Armenian Anti-Vaxxers May Have To Pay For COVID-19 Treatment • Artak Khulian Armenia - Anti-vaccine campaigners demosntrate in Yerevan, September 19, 2021. Armenians contracting COVID-19 after refusing to get vaccinated against the disease may soon be required to pay for their treatment in hospitals, a senior government official warned on Thursday. Deputy Health Minister Gevorg Simonian said the Armenian Ministry of Health is considering taking the harsh measure as part of its efforts to boost the very slow pace of coronavirus vaccinations in the country of about 3 million. According to the ministry, just over 344,000 people received at least one dose of a coronavirus vaccine and only 170,212 of them were fully vaccinated as of October 10. Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian deplored these “very bad” numbers last week and said relevant authorities must rely on their “administrative levers” more heavily to speed up the vaccination process. The authorities had already obligated all public and private sector employees to get inoculated or take coronavirus tests twice a month at their own expense, a requirement effective from October 1. Health Minister Anahit Avanesian revealed on Monday they could also introduce a mandatory coronavirus health pass for entry to cultural and leisure venues. Thanks to government funding, Armenia’s hospitals have treated all COVID-19 patients free of charge since the start of the pandemic. The government claims to have spent over $80 million for that purpose. Armenia -- A healthcare worker clad in protective gear looks after COVID-19 patients at the Surb Grigor Lusavorich Medical Center, Yerevan, June 5, 2020. Simonian said that forcing infected anti-vaxxers to cover their hospital expenses, worth an estimated 800,000 drams ($1,660) per person, would enable the government to cut the funding and spend more on subsidizing treatment of other serious illnesses. Davit Melik-Nubarian, an independent health expert, spoke out against the possible measure, saying that it would result in fewer hospitalizations and more deaths. He said the government should instead do more to explain the benefits of vaccination to skeptical people. Melik-Nubarian cited a recent opinion indicating that only 7 percent of Armenians categorically refuse to take vaccines. “Others are ready to change, in one way or another, their attitudes if they get answers to their questions,” he told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service. Coronavirus infections in Armenia have steadily grown since June not least because of the authorities’ lax enforcement of mandatory mask wearing in indoor public spaces and other sanitary rules. According to the Ministry of Health, 1,589 people tested positive for the coronavirus on Wednesday, the largest single-day number of cases recorded this year. The ministry also reported on Thursday morning 29 deaths caused by COVID-19 in the past day. Officials warned that Armenian hospitals are running out of vacant beds for COVID-19 patients. Armenian Government In No Rush To Brief Parliament On Border Tensions • Gayane Saribekian Iranian trucks are parked on the main road connecting Armenia with Iran. Armenia’s top defense and security officials appear reluctant to brief lawmakers on lingering tensions along the country’s border with Azerbaijan that have caused serious disruptions in Armenian-Iranian trade. The two main Armenian opposition forces demanded such a briefing immediately after Azerbaijani authorities began levying on September 12 hefty duties from Iranian vehicles passing through an Azerbaijani-controlled section of the main highway connecting Armenia and Iran. They said Defense Minister Arshak Karapetian and National Security Service (NSS) Director Armen Abazian must come to the National Assembly to answer questions about the Azerbaijani roadblock and the overall situation along the country’s borders. Parliament speaker Alen Simonian said he will consider organizing such a discussion. Simonian has made no further statements on the matter since then. It therefore remains unclear whether the authorities will accept the opposition demand. In a bid to step up the pressure on them, the opposition Hayastan and Pativ Unem blocs have drafted legislation requiring top security officials to appear before the parliament in such cases. They will try to push it through the parliament committee on defense and security first. The committee is scheduled to hold on Friday an emergency meeting initiated by its four opposition members. The committee’s chairman and six other members representing the ruling Civil Contract party have not yet commented on the opposition bill. “I hope that common sense will prevail and this initiative will not be blocked,” Pativ Unem’s Tigran Abrahamian told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service on Thursday. “The fact is that those officials who are supposed to be at least somewhat accountable to the public are dodging that in all possible ways,” he said. Opposition leaders have repeatedly condemned Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian’s government for handing over a 21-kilometer section of the Armenia-Iran highway to Azerbaijan shortly after last year’s war in Nagorno-Karabakh. Pashinian said at the time that the road section is located on the Azerbaijani side of Armenia’s Soviet-era border with Azerbaijan, a claim disputed by his political opponents. The Azerbaijani roadblock and its resulting negative impact on Iran’s cargo traffic with Armenia have fuelled unprecedented tensions between Tehran and Baku. Senior Armenian and Iranian officials have discussed the issue in recent weeks. Yerevan has pledged to accelerate the ongoing reconstruction of an alternative road in Armenia’s Syunik province which will allow Iranian trucks to bypass the Azerbaijani checkpoint. Reprinted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL Copyright (c) 2021 Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty, Inc. 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.