Monday, Karabakh Running Out Of Food, Medicine • Susan Badalian • Narine Ghalechian Nagorno-Karabakh - Empty shelves at a supermarket in Stepanakert, January 17, 2023. Residents of Nagorno-Karabakh struggled with worsening shortages of food and medicine on Monday four days after Azerbaijan completely blocked relief supplies to the Armenian-populated region. Many essential items had already been in short supply since Baku blocked last December commercial traffic through the sole road connecting Karabakh to Armenia. Only vehicles escorted by the Russian peacekeeping forces and the International Committee of the Red Cross have been able to pass through the Lachin corridor for the last seven months. The movement of these humanitarian convoys was halted on Thursday following a shootout near an Azerbaijani checkpoint controversially set up in the corridor in late April. Armenia’s National Security Service (NSS) said that its border guards stopped a group of Azerbaijani servicemen manning the checkpoint from advancing into Armenian territory and placing an Azerbaijani flag there. The Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry insisted that they did not cross into Armenia while attempting to hoist the flag on a bridge located right next to the checkpoint. Health authorities in Stepanakert said on Monday that local hospitals have suspended non-urgent surgeries due to a resulting shortage of drugs and other medical supplies. According to them, a total of 175 critically ill Karabakh patients and their family members are now awaiting evacuation to hospitals in Armenia. Such evacuations were for months carried out by the ICRC. They too stopped on Thursday. “We are monitoring the situation and remain in touch with all decision-makers,” Eteri Musayelian, an ICRC spokeswoman in Stepanakert, told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service. “We hope to resume our work as soon as the situation allows.” Also, locals said that shops in and outside Stepanakert are running out of imported foodstuffs such as flour, cooking oil and sugar that have been rationed by the authorities since February. “We have ration coupons but there is little we can buy with them now,” complained Arega Ishkhanian, a Stepanakert resident. She also spoke of an increasingly “visible” shortage of fruit and vegetables. Artak Beglarian, a Karabakh official, warned at the weekend that Karabakh will run out of some types of food and medicine within several days if the relief supplies are not restored. “There is already an acute shortage of quite a few items: medicines, some foodstuffs, gasoline and diesel fuel,” he said. Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian on Friday condemned the complete blockage of humanitarian traffic through the Lachin corridor, accusing Azerbaijan of continuing its “policy of ethnic cleansing in Nagorno-Karabakh.” The Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry rejected the accusation. It said Baku will do everything to “integrate” the Karabakh Armenians into Azerbaijan’s “political, legal and socioeconomic frameworks.” Russia Plans Consulate In Strategic Armenian Region • Ruzanna Stepanian Armenia - A view of Kajaran, a town in Syunik province. Russia is planning to open a consulate in Armenia’s southeastern Syunik province bordering Iran and Azerbaijan, a senior Armenian official confirmed on Monday. “We welcome our international partners’ desire and interest to have diplomatic presence in Syunik in order to be able to better familiarize themselves with the situation on the ground,” Deputy Foreign Minister Vahan Kostanian told reporters. A senior official from the Russian Foreign Minister, Sergei Paltov, announced those plans late last month, saying that Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian discussed and welcomed them during his May 25 meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin held in Moscow. Paltov described the planned opening of the Russian consulate as a “very important step” when he visited Syunik’s capital Kapan together with other Russian officials late last week. He said the mission will provide consular services to about a thousand Russian nationals currently based in Syunik. The bulk of them are soldiers and border guards who were deployed by Moscow during and after the 2020 war in Nagorno-Karabakh. The deployment was aimed at helping the Armenian military defend the strategic region against possible Azerbaijani attacks. Armenia - Russian Ambassador Sergey Kopyrkin talks to Russian soldiers during a visit to Syunik, June 3, 2021. “The presence of our diplomats along with our border guards and military personnel in [the Syunik towns of] of Sisian and Goris as well as Russian entities will be an additional insurance net,” the Sputnik news agency quoted Paltov as saying during a meeting with the provincial governor, Robert Ghukasian. In his words, Russian diplomats could be stationed in Kapan this fall even before the official opening of the consulate. Syunik is Armenia’s sole region bordering Iran. Azerbaijani leaders have been demanding that Yerevan open a special corridor connecting Azerbaijan to its Nakhichevan exclave through Syunik. The Armenian side says it can only agree to conventional transport links between the two South Caucasus states. Iran is also strongly opposed to an extraterritorial corridor for Nakhichevan. It has repeatedly warned Baku against attempting to strip the Islamic Republic of the common border and transport links with Armenia. Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian reiterated that “red line” when he visited Armenia last October to inaugurate the Iranian consulate in Kapan. Russian Official Details Hurdles To Armenian-Azeri Transport Links • Karlen Aslanian • Lilit Harutiunian • Ruzanna Stepanian Armenia - Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian meets Russia's Deputy Prime Minister Alexei Overchuk, Yerevan, June 14, 2023. Russia’s Deputy Prime Minister Alexei Overchuk has shed light on remaining differences between Armenia and Azerbaijan that hamper the opening of their border to commercial traffic. Meeting in Moscow earlier this month, Overchuk and his Armenian and Azerbaijani counterparts reportedly made major progress on the functioning of a railway that would connect Azerbaijan to its Nakhichevan exclave through Armenia’s Syunik province. For its part, Armenia would be able to use the railway for cargo shipments to and from Russia or Iran. “A draft document has been formed and almost completely agreed at our level, although the main issue -- how ordinary Azerbaijanis and Armenians will interact with each other when crossing the border -- still needs to be worked on,” Overchuk told the TASS news agency in an interview published on Monday. He said the agreement must regulate all aspects of ensuring the security of Azerbaijanis entering Armenia and vice versa so that “nothing bad will happen to these people on the territory of the other country.” Overchuk said that he held a detailed discussion with Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian on the matter after the Moscow meeting. “Much was clarified, and something still remains and requires further discussion with the Azerbaijani side,” he added without elaborating. Azerbaijan’s Deputy Prime Minister Shahin Mustafayev claimed last week that Russian border guards will oversee “unfettered” transport links between Nakhichevan and western Azerbaijan passing through Armenia’s Syunik province. The office of Armenian Deputy Prime Minister Mher Grigorian insisted, however, that he and Mustafayev reached no such agreement during their trilateral talks with Overchuk. It said that under the terms of the Russian-brokered agreement that stopped the 2020 war in Nagorno-Karabakh the planned road and rail links will be under full Armenian control. Article 9 of the ceasefire agreement stipulates that the Russian border guards stationed in Armenia will “control” the transit of people, vehicles and goods between Nakhichevan and the rest of Azerbaijan. According to Armenia’s Deputy Foreign Minister Vahan Kostanian, this means that the Russians will largely “monitor” the commercial traffic, rather than escort it, let alone be involved in border controls. Pashinian and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev openly argued about the matter during a Eurasian Economic Union summit held in Moscow on May 25. Pashinian objected to Aliyev’s use of the term “Zangezur corridor,” saying that amounts to Azerbaijani territorial claims to Armenia. “The word ‘corridor’ does not constitute a claim to anybody’s territory,” countered Aliyev. Overchuk reiterated that the deal discussed by the three sides would commit Baku to recognizing Armenian sovereignty over the transit routes. “None of the parties questions the fact that individual sections of this road will be under the jurisdiction of the country on whose territory they are located,” he said. “Thus, in relation to this road, Azerbaijani legislation will be applied in Azerbaijan and Armenian legislation in Armenia.” Reposted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL Copyright (c) 2023 Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty, Inc. 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.