Friday,
Opposition Leader Unimpressed By Turkish-Armenian Dialogue
• Ruzanna Stepanian
Armenia -- Opposition leader Gegham Manukian at a news conference in Yerevan,
December 20, 2021.
A senior member of the main opposition Hayastan alliance downplayed on Friday
the significance of the latest Turkish-Armenian negotiations, saying that Ankara
is sticking to its preconditions for normalizing relations with Yerevan.
Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan visited Turkey on Wednesday as the Armenian
government sent more humanitarian aid to residents of a Turkish city ravaged by
last week’s catastrophic earthquake. Mirzoyan said on Thursday that he and his
Turkish counterpart Mevlut Cavusoglu agreed to speed up efforts to normalize
bilateral ties which began a year ago.
Parliament speaker Alen Simonian claimed on Friday that the two neighboring
states are now “quite close” to establishing diplomatic relations and opening
their border.
“If the Turkish side demonstrates sufficient will and resolve, I think that we
will solve that issue,” Simonian told reporters.
Gegham Manukian, a lawmaker representing Hayastan, insisted, however, that
Ankara only made “symbolic gestures” to Yerevan.
“The Armenian authorities are trying to present those gestures to their citizens
as historic developments,” he said. “But as the joint news conference of
Cavusoglu and Mirzoyan showed, Turkey is continuing to condition its relations
with Armenia by negotiations between Azerbaijan and Armenia and to speak in the
same language of preconditions.”
Manukian also dismissed Mirzoyan’s announcement that the Turkish-Armenian border
could be opened to citizens of third countries before this summer. He argued
that Turkish regions bordering Armenia are sparsely populated and attract few
foreign tourists.
“Who is going to cross the entire territory of Turkey to reach Gyumri through
the Margara bridge and then go to, say, Georgia, with their third-country
passport?” he asked at a news conference.
Cavusoglu said after his talks with Mirzoyan that the assistance provided by
Armenia could facilitate the normalization process. But he appeared to link that
process to the outcome of Armenian-Azerbaijani peace talks.
Chief Of New Armenian Police Force Sacked
• Narine Ghalechian
Armenia - Officers and vehicles of the newly established Patrol Service,
Yerevan, July 8, 2021.
The chief of a Western-funded major division of the Armenian police has been
sacked following an extraordinary traffic incident at Yerevan’s main square
which sparked accusations of incompetence directed at its officers.
Colonel Artur Umrshatian has headed the Patrol Service since it was set up in
2021 with financial and technical assistance provided by the United States and
the European Union.
The new police force was meant to introduce Western standards in road policing,
street patrol and crowd control in Armenia. Armenian and Western officials have
described its creation as a key element of police reforms announced by Prime
Minister Nikol Pashinian’s administration.
The Armenian Interior Ministry gave no reasons for Umrshatian’s sacking
announced on Thursday. The ministry’s press service refused to comment on it
afterwards.
The development came six days after a car raced chaotically through Yerevan’s
central Republic Square, driving on its sidewalks and nearly running over
pedestrians. On-duty Patrol Service officers reportedly took more than 20
minutes to stop the large SUV despite firing gunshots at its wheels. Its
apparently intoxicated driver managed to flee the scene but was arrested a few
hours later.
The incident was caught on mobile phone cameras and widely circulated on social
media, prompting a wave of criticism and ridicule from many users. Critics of
the government claimed that it exposed a lack of professionalism within the
Patrol Service whose officers reportedly have much higher wages than other
security personnel in Armenia.
Armenia - Colonel Artur Umrshatian.
The Armenian police did not respond to the criticism. Still, two Patrol Service
officers were fired earlier this week. One of them, Roman Mirzakhanian, was hit
and injured by the car during the February 10 incident.
Daniel Ioannisian, a civic activist monitoring the police, deplored the ensuing
sacking of Umrshatian. Ioannisian said that the latter was at the forefront of
police reforms and prevented nepotism and other corrupt practices within the
Patrol Service.
“There is resistance [to reforms] because Patrol Service officers treat officers
of other security bodies and ordinary citizens equally on the streets of
Yerevan,” he said. “Just recently, for example, a National Security Service
lieutenant-colonel was stripped of his driving license.”
Ioannisian also claimed that for the same reason the Patrol Service personnel
are subjected to disciplinary action more frequently than officers of other
police divisions.
Ioannisian’s Union of Informed Citizens (UIC) and two other non-governmental
organizations strongly criticized last month Pashinian’s decision to appoint
Vahe Ghazarian, the national police chief and his reputed childhood friend, as
interior minister. They pulled out of a government body coordinating police
reforms in protest.
Over the past year, the Patrol Service has also faced allegations of
ill-treatment of citizens. In particular, its officers clashed last November
with several residents of Vanadzor after accusing them of interfering with
Pashinian’s motorcade. One of those residents was hospitalized as a result.
Armenian Speaker Lauds Council Of Europe After Russian Criticism
Armenia - Parliament speaker Alen Simonian (right) meets Council of Europe
Parliamentary Assembly co-rapporters, Yerevan, .
Just days after Russia spoke out against European involvement in efforts to
resolve the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict, parliament speaker Alen Simonian
praised Council of Europe officials on Friday for seeking an end to Azerbaijan’s
blockade of the Lachin corridor.
Simonian met with Kimmo Kiljunen and Boriana Aberg, co-rapporteurs of the
Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly (PACE), at the start of their
fact-finding visit to Armenia. They are tasked with monitoring Armenia’s
compliance with its membership commitments to the Strasbourg-based organization.
The PACE did not specify the purpose of the visit in a statement issued earlier
this week. It said only that Kiljunen and Aberg will meet with senior officials
in Yerevan and visit three Armenian towns close to the Azerbaijani border.
The press service of the Armenian parliament said the PACE representatives
arrived in Armenia to “familiarize themselves with the situation created as a
result of the illegal blockade” of Karabakh’s land link with Armenia.
“We highly appreciate the work and involvement of the Assembly and you as
co-rapporteurs,” it quoted Simonian as telling them.
Simonian praised the co-rapporteurs for urging an immediate end to the blockade
just days after Azerbaijani government-backed protesters halted traffic through
the corridor on December 12. He also noted with satisfaction that a PACE
committee will release on soon a report on “humanitarian consequences” of the
blockade.
Russia - Russian State Duma Chairman Vyacheslav Volodin meets Armenian
parliament speaker Alen Simonian in Moscow, October 10, 2022
Simonian’s Russian counterpart, Vyacheslav Volodin attacked the PACE and the
European Parliament on Monday, saying that these and other Western bodies can
only fan tensions in the South Caucasus.
“And those who make statements in the direction of European institutions may
simply lose the country,” Volodin, who is a close ally of Russian President
Vladimir Putin, said in what appeared to be a stern warning to Yerevan.
The European Parliament urged Azerbaijan to “immediately reopen” the Lachin
corridor in a January 19 resolution hailed by Armenian officials. The resolution
also condemned the “inaction” of Russian peacekeeping forces in Karabakh and
called for their “replacement with OSCE international peacekeepers.”
The European Union also irked Moscow last month when it agreed to deploy more
than 100 monitors on Armenia’s volatile border with Azerbaijan. The Russian
Foreign Ministry accused the EU of seeking to “push back Russia's mediation
efforts at any cost.”
Reposted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL
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