Thursday,
Karabakh Premier Sacked
Nagorno-Karabakh - Businessman Ruben Vardanyan holds a news conference in
Stepanakert, September 2, 2022.
Ending weeks of speculation, Nagorno-Karabakh’s president, Arayik Harutiunian,
announced on Thursday the dismissal of his chief minister, Ruben Vardanyan,
demanded by Azerbaijan.
Harutiunian also expressed readiness to embark on a “dialogue” with Baku which
has been blocking Karabakh’s sole land link with Armenia for more than two
months. But he stressed that the Karabakh Armenians will continue to resist
Azerbaijani rule and assert their right to self-determination.
“Artsakh will never give up its sovereignty, and there can be no question of
integration with neighboring Azerbaijan,” he said in an address to Karabakh’s
population aired during a meeting in Stepanakert.
Azerbaijan has been trying to regain full control of Karabakh since its victory
in the 2020 war with Armenia. Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev said late last
week that Baku will be ready to negotiate over the “rights and security of
Karabakh’s Armenian minority” only if Vardanyan resigns and leaves “our
territory.”
Vardanyan is an Armenian-born billionaire businessman who was appointed as state
minister, the second-highest post in Karabakh’s leadership, last November two
months after renouncing his Russian citizenship. Baku condemned his appointment,
saying that it was engineered by Russia. Moscow denied that.
Nagorno-Karabakh - Karabakh's State Minister Ruben Vardanyan (right) and
President Arayik Harutiunian (second from right) pray during a Christmas mass at
Stepanakert’s Holy Mother of God Cathedral, January 6, 2023.
In recent weeks, there have been signs of a rift between Harutiunian and
Vardanyan related to the Azerbaijani blockade. Last month Vardanyan publicly
ruled out his resignation which reportedly was also sought by Armenia’s
government.
Harutiunian insisted that Vardanyan’s sacking is not the result of pressure from
Baku or Yerevan. He attributed his decision to “tactical differences” between
the two men over a number of “factors,” including the “interests of geopolitical
actors.”
The Karabakh leader also cited the need not to “deplete our resilience” in the
face of the continuing blockade that has caused serious shortages of energy,
food, medicine and other essential items in the Armenian-populated region. He
did not elaborate.
Harutiunian noted at the same time that “this crisis situation could
significantly ease in the coming days.” It was not clear if he hinted at the
impending lifting of the blockade.
Speaking during the cabinet meeting in Stepanakert, Vardanyan confirmed his
“differences” with Harutiunian but shed little light on them. He expressed hope
that Harutiunian’s “words are turned into action” so that “people don’t lose
faith” in them.
Vardanyan also linked his dismissal to strong “outside pressure” exerted on
Karabakh’s leadership. He went on to make clear that he will not leave Karabakh.
“Not only will I not leave, but I can't imagine myself without Artsakh. I will
happily continue with the activities that I have been doing so far,” the former
investment banker said, pointing to his charity projects launched in Karabakh.
“Azerbaijan, which hoped to bring us to our knees and break us, made a grave
mistake,” added Vardanyan. “Azerbaijan saw that we became more united.”
Pashinian Again Phones Putin
Armenia - Russian President Vladimir Putin and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol
Pashinian attend a CSTO summit in Yerevan, November 23, 2023.
Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian telephoned Russian President Vladimir Putin on
Thursday to discuss the latest Armenian-Azerbaijani peace talks.
The Kremlin said Pashinian briefed Putin on the results of his February 18
meeting in Munich with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and his “other
conversations with foreign partners.” It said they also touched upon the
implementation of Armenian-Azerbaijani agreements brokered by Russia and “the
current situation on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border.”
“Contacts on this matter at various levels will continue,” the Kremlin added in
a statement on the call which it said took place “at the initiative of the
Armenian side.”
An Armenian readout of the call likewise said the two men “exchanged thoughts on
the process of normalizing relations between Armenia and Azerbaijan.”
It said Pashinian also raised with Putin “the humanitarian, ecological and
energy crisis” in Nagorno-Karabakh caused by Azerbaijan’s continuing blockade of
the Lachin corridor. He again urged Moscow to take “necessary steps to overcome
it.”
Pashinian made the same appeal during his previous phone call with Putin
reported on January 31.
Armenian leaders have repeatedly accused Russian peacekeepers of doing little to
unblock the sole road connecting Karabakh to Armenia. Moscow has rejected the
criticism.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov called on Azerbaijan to end the blockade
when he spoke with his Azerbaijani counterpart Jeyhun Bayramov by phone on
January 17. Lavrov is scheduled to visit Baku next week.
The U.S. State Department indicated on Wednesday that European Union chief
Charles Michel is due to host another Aliyev-Pashinian meeting next week. The
Armenian government’s press office did not confirm the information on Thursday.
It said later in the day that Pashinian will fly to Berlin on March 2 on a
two-day visit during which he will meet with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
Earlier this week, the Russian Foreign Ministry again accused the EU and the
United States of using the Karabakh conflict to try to squeeze Russia out of the
South Caucasus.
Armenian FM Visits Quake-Hit Syria
• Nane Sahakian
Syria - Syrian President Bashar al-Assad meets Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat
Mirzoyan in Damascus, .
Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan met with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in
Damascus on Thursday as Armenia delivered a third batch of humanitarian aid to
Syrian victims of this month’s devastating earthquake in Syria and Turkey.
The Armenian Foreign Ministry reported that Mirzoyan discussed with Assad
Syrian-Armenian relations, “regional and international security” as well as
bilateral “cooperation on international platforms.” He held a separate meeting
with Syrian Foreign Minister Fayssal Mikdad.
According to the official Syrian news agency SANA, Assad praised his country’s
“historical” ties with Armenia and its worldwide Diaspora. He also thanked the
Armenian government for sending a search-and-rescue team and relief to the
northern Syrian city of Aleppo hit hard by the February 6 earthquake.
Mirzoyan flew to Damascus on board a transport plane that carried 32 tons of
food and medicine for Aleppo residents affected by the disaster. He toured the
war-ravaged city and met with the Armenian rescuers still working there later in
the day.
The magnitude 7.8 quake killed at least 1,400 people in Syria’s
government-controlled areas. The victims included several Syrian Armenians from
Aleppo.
“The schools here remain closed and people still live in fear,” Zarmig
Boghigian, the editor of the Aleppo-based Armenian-language newspaper Kantsasar,
told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service on Wednesday.
An estimated 80,000 ethnic Armenians, most of them descendants of survivors of
the 1915 Armenian genocide in Ottoman Turkey, lived in Syria before the outbreak
of its bloody civil war in 2011. At least half of them reportedly fled the
country during the fighting. Thousands took refuge in Armenia.
Armenia was one of the few countries that did not cut ties with Assad’s regime
and maintained functioning diplomatic missions Damascus and Aleppo throughout
the civil war. In 2019, it deployed, with Russia’s support, more than 80
demining specialists, army medics and other noncombat military personnel to
Syria, prompting criticism from the United States.
U.S. Signals Another Armenian-Azeri Summit
• Astghik Bedevian
U.S. - State Department spokesperson Ned Price speaks during a briefing at the
State Department in Washington, November 2, 2022.
Armenia and Azerbaijan will hold further high-level negotiations “in the coming
days” to try to build on “significant progress” made by them in recent months,
the U.S. State Department said on Wednesday.
“This [progress] has been the result of … trilateral engagement with the United
States, the work that the EU has done in their diplomacy as well, and what we
hope to see when the parties come together in Brussels in the coming days in the
talks hosted by President [Charles] Michel of the EU,” the department spokesman,
Ned Price, told a news briefing in Washington.
“So, we hope to see a continuation of that progress,” he said. “We are not being
Pollyannaish, but we are continuing to support this dialogue, this diplomacy,
towards a comprehensive solution in every way we possibly can.”
Price did not specify whether Michel will hold a trilateral meeting with
Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev.
The head of the European Union’s top decision-making body hosted a series of
talks between them last year.
The Armenian government would not say on Thursday whether the two leaders are
indeed scheduled to meet in Brussels. A government spokesman told RFE/RL’s
Armenian Service that he has “no information about the meeting at the moment.”
Aliyev and Pashinian met in Munich as recently as on Saturday for talks
organized by U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken. They reportedly
concentrated on an Armenian-Azerbaijani peace treaty discussed by the two sides
for the past year.
Germany - U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken meets Armenian Prime Minister
Nikol Pashinian and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev in Munich, February 18,
2023.
Aliyev spoke after the Munich summit of “progress” in Armenia’s position on the
treaty which he hopes will help to restore full Azerbaijani control over
Nagorno-Karabakh. Pashinian’s political opponents at home renewed afterwards
their allegations that he has accepted Azerbaijan’s terms of the peace deal.
The Western-mediated talks come amid Russia’s continuing attempts to regain the
initiative in the Armenian-Azerbaijani peace process.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov is scheduled to visit Baku next week.
According to the Russian Foreign Ministry, Lavrov will pay “special attention”
to the implementation of Armenian-Azerbaijani agreements brokered by Moscow.
“We call on our partners in Baku and Yerevan to resume joint work on each of the
areas of normalizing bilateral relations as soon as possible,” the ministry
spokeswoman, Maria Zakharova, said on Wednesday.
Zakharova implicitly criticized Yerevan for cancelling in December a planned
meeting of the Armenian, Azerbaijani and Russian foreign ministers in Moscow in
protest against the Azerbaijani blockade of the Lachin corridor.
Earlier this week, Moscow again accused the EU and the United States of using
the Karabakh conflict to try to squeeze it out of the South Caucasus.
Reposted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL
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