Wednesday,
Armenian Opposition Wants Information About Talks With Azerbaijan
• Ruzanna Stepanian
Armenia - Opposition youth activists demonstrate against the Armenian
government's policy on the Karabakh conflict, Yerevan, .
Opposition lawmakers have demanded that the Armenian government share with them
details of its ongoing negotiations with Azerbaijan on a bilateral peace treaty.
The two sides have exchanged in recent months written proposals regarding the
treaty which Baku hopes will help to restore full Azerbaijani control over
Nagorno-Karabakh. Few of their details have been made public so far.
Agnesa Khamoyan, a parliament deputy from the main opposition Hayastan alliance,
said on Wednesday that two months ago she sent a letter to Armen Grigorian, the
secretary of Armenia’s Security Council, asking him to let her see Yerevan’s
proposals sent to Baku.
“As a member of the National Assembly, I have a right to familiarize myself with
that document,” said Khamoyan. “They have not replied to me.”
She accused Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian’s government of deliberately
withholding such information from the public.
“They present one thing to the public but clearly negotiate on something else,”
she claimed.
Hayk Konjorian, the parliamentary leader of Pashinian’s Civil Contract party,
dismissed the opposition complaints when he addressed the National Assembly on
Tuesday. Konjorian argued that opposition lawmakers have previously turned down
Pashinian’s offers to meet with them behind the closed doors to discuss details
of the negotiating process.
Armenia - Opposition deputies Agnesa Khamoyan and Artsvik Minasian hold a news
conference in Yerevan, November 19, 2021.
“I can read and don’t need any intermediaries,” countered Khamoyan. “I can read
that treaty and don’t need any assistants, whether it’s Nikol Pashinian or
somebody else.”
Hayastan and the second parliamentary opposition force, Pativ Unem, regularly
accuse Pashinian of being ready to recognize Azerbaijani sovereignty over
Karabakh. As recently as on Tuesday, the Armenian parliament’s pro-government
majority rejected a Hayastan proposal to adopt a resolution voicing support for
the Karabakh Armenians’ right to self-determination.
Parliament speaker Alen Simonian said late last month that Yerevan and Baku
continue to disagree on “three or four” elements of the would-be peace treaty.
He did not disclose them.
Pashinian complained last week that the Azerbaijani side is rejecting most
Armenian proposals on the would-be treaty and making more demands unacceptable
to Armenia. He said that he will not sign any “capitulation” deals.
For his part, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev declared at the weekend that he
will not sign such an accord unless Yerevan recognizes Karabakh as a part of
Azerbaijan and accepts Baku’s terms for demarcating the Armenian-Azerbaijani
border. The Armenian Foreign Ministry responded by accusing Aliyev of “doing
everything to make peace in the region impossible.”
Armenian FM Signals Meeting With Russian, Azeri Counterparts
• Astghik Bedevian
Tajikistan - The foreign ministers of Armenia, Russia and Azerbaijan meet in
Dushanbe, May 12, 2022
Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan confirmed on Wednesday that his planned
trilateral meeting with his Russian and Azerbaijani counterparts could take
place soon.
The meeting was originally scheduled for the end of December. Mirzoyan cancelled
it in protest against Azerbaijan’s blockade of the sole road connecting
Nagorno-Karabakh to Armenia. Moscow criticized the move while trying to set a
new date for the talks.
Mirzoyan and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov discussed the matter when
they met in Moscow on Monday. Lavrov indicated that the trilateral talks will
likely be held soon.
“In the near future we will choose convenient dates for all three ministers,” he
told reporters.
“There is a possibility of such a meeting in the near future,” Mirzoyan told the
Armenian parliament. He did not give possible dates.
Answering questions from pro-government lawmakers, Mirzoyan also questioned the
effectiveness of Armenian-Azerbaijani peace talks.
“What is the point of reaching agreements on other issues if they will be
definitely violated by Azerbaijan and Azerbaijan will come up with tougher
demands on those issues some time later?” he asked.
The minister pointed to the continuing Azerbaijani blockade of the Lachin
corridor. He reiterated that it constitutes a gross violation of the 2020
ceasefire deal that placed the corridor under Russian control and committed
Azerbaijani to ensuring safe passage through it. Moscow and Baku must put an end
to the blockade, he said.
Armenian officials have repeatedly accused Russian peacekeepers of not doing
enough to unblock the vital road. Moscow has rejected the criticism.
Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev again claimed on Tuesday that traffic through
the Lachin corridor was not blocked by Azerbaijani government-backed protesters
on December 12. Numerous reports to the contrary are “false Armenian
propaganda,” Aliyev told U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken in a phone call.
Yerevan Officials Freed Shortly After Arrest
• Narine Ghalechian
Armenia - Former and current Yerevan municipality officials facing corruption
charges.
Two current and former senior officials from Yerevan’s municipal administration
were set free on Wednesday one day after being arrested on apparently corruption
charges.
Armenia’s Anti-Corruption Committee (ACC) kept refusing to explain why it
detained Davit Dallakian, the acting head of the municipality’s architecture and
urban development department, and Seyran Mejlumian, who served as chief of the
municipality staff until this week.
Sources told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service that the two men are facing criminal
charges stemming from the sale of municipal property which was allegedly grossly
undervalued by them.
Another senior local government official, Taron Miroyan, was also indicted as
part of the same criminal case. All three suspects did not return phone calls on
Tuesday.
Mejlumian tendered his resignation right after Yerevan Mayor Sargsian, who had
appointed him to that position, stepped down on Friday.
Isabella Abgarian, an independent member of the city council, said that a
Yerevan resident recently alerted her about a dubious privatization deal
administered by the mayor’s office before filing a complaint to law-enforcement
authorities.
“I don’t exclude that [the indictments] were made within the framework of the
same case,” Abgarian told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service.
“I had a chance to raise the matter with the mayor [Sargsian,] and he said, ‘I
don’t believe it because Seyran Mejlumian is a very honest man, my most trusted
official,’” she said.
The ex-mayor has not yet publicly commented on the indictments. It is not clear
whether he has been questioned by the ACC.
Sargsian’s resignation is widely seen as being part of the ruling political
team’s preparations for municipal elections that are due to be held in
September. Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian’s Civil Contract party has nominated
Deputy Mayor Tigran Avinian as its mayoral candidate.
U.S. Urges Armenia, Azerbaijan To ‘Deescalate’
U.S. - John Kirby, National Security Council coordinator for strategic
communications, answers questions during the daily press briefing at the White
House in Washington, February 17, 2023.
The United States has called on Armenia and Azerbaijan to defuse tensions in the
Nagorno-Karabakh conflict zone that have risen again in recent weeks.
“We urge all sides here to deescalate,” John Kirby, the White House national
security spokesman, told a news briefing in Washington late on Tuesday.
“We don’t want to see any of this violence, and we want to see all sides take
appropriate steps to deescalate the tension and to stop the violence,” he said.
Kirby refused to comment on the presence of Russian peacekeeping forces in
Karabakh.
The U.S. State Department insisted on March 6 that Washington is not competing
with Moscow in its efforts to facilitate an Armenian-Azerbaijani settlement.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken discussed those efforts with Azerbaijan’s
President Ilham Aliyev in a phone call earlier on Tuesday. He spoke with
Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian on Monday.
According to the State Department, Blinken told the two leaders that Washington
remains committed to helping the two South Caucasus nations reach a “sustainable
peace.”
Armenian leaders have repeatedly accused Azerbaijan this month of planning a
“new military aggression” against Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh. Pashinian
expressed concern over “Azerbaijan’s increasingly aggressive rhetoric” during
his conversation with Blinken.
For his part, Aliyev blamed the Armenian side for increased ceasefire violations
reported from the conflict zone in recent weeks. He also dismissed on Tuesday
U.S. calls for an end to the three-month blockade of the sole highway connecting
Karabakh to Armenia.
Reposted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL
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