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    Categories: 2021

RFE/RL Armenian Report – 11/03/2021

                                        Wednesday, November 3, 2021


Senior U.S. Official Visits Armenia


Armenia - Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian greets U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary 
of State Erika Olson at the start of their talks in Yerevan, November 3, 2021.


Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian met with a visiting senior official from the U.S. 
State Department on Wednesday for talks that focused on the Nagorno-Karabakh 
conflict.

Erika Olson, the newly appointed deputy assistant secretary of state for 
Southern Europe and the Caucasus, arrived in Yerevan on Tuesday on the first leg 
of her tour of Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia. The State Department said she 
will “promote regional cooperation and discuss bilateral issues.”

Olson was also due to participate in Yerevan in an annual meeting of the U.S. 
ambassadors to the three South Caucasus states joined by Andrew Schofer, the 
U.S. co-chair of the OSCE Minsk Group, and a senior official from the U.S. 
Agency for International Development. The diplomats accompanied her during her 
talks with Pashinian.

An Armenian government statement on the meeting said Pashinian discussed with 
the U.S. officials “processes taking place in the South Caucasus,” prospects for 
a Karabakh settlement and the Minsk Group’s peace efforts.

It said he also briefed them on Russian-led efforts to forge transport links 
between Armenia and Azerbaijan and facilitate a demarcation of their volatile 
border.

According to the statement, Olson reaffirmed Washington’s readiness to 
contribute to a “comprehensive” solution of the Karabakh conflict and help to 
resolve “humanitarian issues” such as the release of Armenian prisoners still 
held by Azerbaijan.

The U.S. ambassador to Armenia, Lynne Tracy, has repeatedly said that the 
conflict remains unresolved after last year’s Armenian-Azerbaijani war. “We do 
not see the status of Nagorno-Karabakh as having been resolved,” Tracy insisted 
on September 13.

The Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry condemned those remarks. It echoed President 
Ilham Aliyev’s claims that Azerbaijan’s victory in the six-week war put an end 
to the conflict.

Olson met on Tuesday with Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan and Deputy Prime 
Minister Mher Grigorian. The latter is a co-chairman of a 
Russian-Armenian-Azerbaijani task force dealing with practical modalities of 
opening the Armenian-Azerbaijani border to cargo shipments.

The government statement said that “democratic reforms” in Armenia were also on 
the agenda of Pashinian’s talks with Olson. It said the prime minister praised 
the United States for continuing to support those reforms.



Armenia Hopes For Iran Sanctions Relief


Iran - Foreignt Ministers Ararat Mirzoyan (left) of Armenia and Hossein 
Amir-Abdolahian of Iran meet in Tehran, October 4, 2021


Armenia expressed hope on Wednesday that negotiations to revive Iran’s 2015 
nuclear deal with world powers will resume soon and result in the lifting of 
U.S. economic sanctions imposed on the Islamic Republic.

Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan said that would give a major boost to economic 
ties between the two neighboring states.

Armenian-Iranian relations are based on “mutual trust” and both Yerevan and 
Tehran are committed to deepening them in “economic, political and other 
spheres,” Mirzoyan said in an interview with the Paris-based magazine Nouvelles 
d’Armenie publicized by the Armenian Foreign Ministry.

Former President Donald Trump pulled the United States out of the landmark 
agreement with Iran in 2018 and reimposed crippling punitive measures, despite 
Tehran’s compliance with the deal that curbed its nuclear activities in exchange 
for sanctions relief. In response, Tehran has gradually breached limits imposed 
by the pact, including on uranium enrichment.

U.S. President Joe Biden has pledged to rejoin the deal if Iran returns to full 
compliance. But six rounds of indirect negotiations in Vienna that began in 
April failed to reach agreement and the talks were put on hold after Iran's 
presidential election in June that brought anti-Western hard-liner Ebrahim Raisi 
to power.


AUSTRIA -- European External Action Service (EEAS) Deputy Secretary General 
Enrique Mora and Iranian Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Abbas Araghchi wait 
for the start of talks on reviving the 2015 Iran nuclear deal in Vienna, June 
20, 2021.

Tehran is expected this week to give a precise date for the resumption of talks 
with the world powers, scheduled for the end of this month, according to top 
Iranian nuclear negotiator Ali Bagheri. On October 30, the leaders of the United 
States, Germany, France, and Britain called on Iran to return to nuclear talks 
and resume compliance with the 2015 nuclear accord to prevent a "dangerous 
escalation."

The U.S. sanctions have slowed or prevented the implementation of 
Armenian-Iranian energy projects, notably the ongoing construction by an Iranian 
firm of a third power transmission line connecting Armenia to Iran. They have 
also have had a negative impact on broader commercial ties between the two 
countries.

Meeting with Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian in Tajikistan on September 17, Raisi 
said an Armenian-Iranian intergovernmental commission on economic cooperation 
should become “more active.” The Iranian president proposed that Yerevan and 
Tehran set up “specialized working groups” that would deal with obstacles to 
their joint projects.



Body Of Late Armenian Politician Still Not Repatriated

        • Artak Khulian

Armenia - Former Interior Minster Vano Siradeghian.


Nearly three weeks after his death, the body of Vano Siradeghian, a prominent 
politician and former interior minister who fled Armenia over two decades ago, 
has still not been repatriated and buried.

Siradeghian was one of the leaders of a popular movement for Armenia’s 
unification with Nagorno-Karabakh who came to power in 1990. He became one of 
the newly independent country’s most powerful men when serving as interior 
minister in the administration of its first President Levon Ter-Petrosian from 
1992-1996.

One year after Ter-Petrosian resigned in 1998, Siradeghian was charged with 
ordering a string of contract killings. He strongly denied ordering those 
killings, saying that the charges were fabricated as part of then President 
Robert Kocharian’s efforts to neutralize his political foes.

Siradeghian fled Armenia in 2000 ahead of the Armenian parliament’s decision to 
allow law-enforcement authorities to arrest him. Although the authorities had 
Siradeghian placed on Interpol’s wanted list, his whereabouts always remained 
unknown to the public.

The death of the 74-year-old Siradeghian was announced by his wife and son on 
October 16. They did not specify its cause or reveal his last place of residence.

The Armenian government decided afterwards to form a commission that will 
organize his funeral. The commission is headed by the chief of Prime Minister 
Nikol Pashinian’s staff, Arayik Harutiunian, and comprises senior government 
officials, a deputy chief of the Armenian police as well as Siradeghian’s son 
Khachatur.

The latter told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service that his father’s body has still not 
been brought back to the country. He did not give any reasons for the apparent 
delay or possible dates for Siradeghian’s funeral.

Harutiunian declined to give any information when he spoke with journalists on 
Wednesday.

Siradeghian lived abroad under a new and false name, according to Khachatur 
Sukiasian, a wealthy businessman and pro-government parliamentarian who has long 
been close to the ex-minister.

This is why, Sukiasian told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service last month, repatriating 
his body is now fraught with some “difficulties.” “There are technical and legal 
issues,” he said.

Throughout his exile Siradeghian continued to enjoy the strong backing of 
Ter-Petrosian and members of the ex-president’s entourage. Ter-Petrosian’s 
Armenian National Congress (HAK) party has urged the Armenian authorities to 
allow Siradeghian’s family to bury him at the National Pantheon in Yerevan.



Pashinian Ally Set To Join Armenian Company Board

        • Marine Khachatrian

Armenia - Deputy Prime Minister Tigran Avinian (left) and Defense Minister Davit 
Tonoyan talk before a cabinet meeting in Yerevan, April 9, 2020.


The Armenian government said on Wednesday that it could appoint a political ally 
of Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian to the governing board of Armenia’s largest 
mining company in which it gained a minority stake last month.

The company, Zangezur Copper-Molybdenum Combine (ZCMC), changed hands following 
a government crackdown on its management and key shareholders who openly 
challenged Pashinian’s administration.

Russia’s GeoProMining group announced on October 1 that it has acquired 60 
percent of ZCMC and immediately “granted” a quarter of that stake to the 
government. The latter therefore owns 15 percent of the mining giant located in 
Kajaran, a small town in southeastern Syunik province.

GeoProMining gave no clear reason for the lavish donation. Later in October, 
another Russian company, which holds a minority share in ZCMC, challenged the 
legality of the takeover in an Armenian court.

Subsequent reports in the Armenian press said that Tigran Avinian, a senior 
member of Pashinian’s Civil Contract party and a former deputy prime minister, 
could soon become ZCMC’s new executive director.

Pashinian’s chief of staff, Arayik Harutiunian, effectively confirmed the 
reporters when he spoke with journalists on Wednesday. He said Avinian deserves 
the job “because he is a member of the political team and because we need people 
who can best represent Armenia’s interests in that company.”

In a written “clarification” issued shortly afterwards, the government said, 
however, that it is considering appointing Avinian as a member of ZCMC’s board 
of directors, rather than its CEO.


Armenia - A view of ore-processing facilities of the Zangezur Copper-Molybdenum 
Combine in Kajaran, August 12, 2019.

Avinian, 32, actively participated in the 2018 mass protests that brought 
Pashinian to power. He was appointed as deputy prime minister shortly after the 
“velvet revolution.”

Avinian resigned in August this year, saying that he objected to the ruling 
party’s list of candidates for the snap parliamentary elections held in June. He 
said he felt that it may be at odds with the “separation of business and 
politics” championed by Pashinian’s political team. He appeared to refer to two 
wealthy businessmen who were elected to the parliament on the Civil Contract 
ticket.

Avinian reportedly coordinated Civil Contract’s campaign in local elections held 
in several communities of Syunik on October 17.

Pashinian’s party was defeated in the most important of those communities 
comprising the towns of Goris, Meghri and Agarak. Their mayors affiliated with 
the main opposition Hayastan bloc were arrested in July on what they consider 
politically motivated charges.


Reprinted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL
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Emil Lazarian: “I should like to see any power of the world destroy this race, this small tribe of unimportant people, whose wars have all been fought and lost, whose structures have crumbled, literature is unread, music is unheard, and prayers are no more answered. Go ahead, destroy Armenia . See if you can do it. Send them into the desert without bread or water. Burn their homes and churches. Then see if they will not laugh, sing and pray again. For when two of them meet anywhere in the world, see if they will not create a New Armenia.” - WS