Author: Adrine Hakobian

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                                        Thursday, 

Armenian Mayor Arrested Over Attack On Protesters


Armenia - Davit Hambardzumian, the mayor of Masis.

The mayor of an Armenian town affiliated with the former ruling Republican 
Party (HHK) and four other men have been arrested on suspicion of assaulting 
protesters in Yerevan last month.

The incident took place in the city’s southern Erebuni district just hours 
after Nikol Pashinian, the main organizer of mass protests against HHK leader 
Serzh Sarkisian’s continued rule, was detained on April 22. Hundreds of 
Pashinian supporters demonstrating there were attacked by several dozen men 
wearing medical masks and wielding sticks and even electric shock guns. They 
threw stones at the crowd and beat up some of the protesters.

Law-enforcement authorities launched a criminal investigation into the attack 
after Sarkisian resigned as prime minister on April 23. Pashinian demanded such 
a probe immediately after being elected as the country’s new premier on May 8.

Armenia’s Investigative Committee said on Thursday that it has arrested five 
persons on suspicion of participating in the “mass disturbances” in Erebuni. It 
said they include Davit Hambardzumian, the mayor of Masis, a small town about 
10 kilometers south of Yerevan, his deputy Karen Ohanian and three other Masis 
residents.


Armenia - A screenshot of a video of thugs beating up an opposition protester 
in Yerevan's Erebuni district on 22 April 2018.

The law-enforcement body said its investigators have looked into online videos 
of the violence and other media reports about it. “The investigation is 
continuing,” it said in a statement. “Measures are being taken to ensure a 
comprehensive, full and objective examination of all circumstances of the 
incident.”

A screenshot of one such video publicized by the “Haykakan Zhamanak” daily 
purportedly shows that Hambardzumian was among the masked thugs who attacked 
the protesters in Erebuni.

It was not immediately clear whether the Masis mayor and the other detained men 
admit their involvement in the attack.

Hambardzumian, 32, is an HHK member who was elected mayor in 2016 with the help 
of the then ruling party. He is reportedly related to Arshak Hakobian, the 
chief bodyguard of Vladimir Gasparian, the former chief of the Armenian police 
sacked by Pashinian earlier this month.

Law-enforcement authorities have also made at least three other arrests in 
connection with similar incidents that occurred in two other parts of Yerevan 
during the Pashinian-led protest movement. Some Armenian media outlets have 
accused Yerevan Mayor Taron Markarian and Mihran Poghosian, a controversial 
parliamentarian, of orchestrating those attacks on protesters. Both men 
affiliated with the HHK deny that.




Greater U.S. Assistance To Armenia Under Discussion

        • Sargis Harutyunyan

Armenia - US Ambassador to Armenia Richard Mills speaks in Yerevan, .

The U.S. government is discussing with the new authorities in Yerevan the 
possibility of providing more economic assistance to Armenia under a special 
program designed to foster reforms in developing nations, U.S. Ambassador 
Richard Mills said on Thursday.

“We are very pleased to be fully engaged with the new government and have an 
opportunity to talk about how the U.S. government can help the new government,” 
Mills told reporters.

Armenia qualified for the Millennium Challenge Account (MCA) program shortly 
after Washington launched it in 2006, receiving $177 million for the 
rehabilitation of rural irrigation networks.

The Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), a U.S. government agency running 
the aid scheme, also planned to allocate $60 million for the reconstruction of 
the country’s rural roads. But it scrapped that allocation shortly after a 
disputed 2008 presidential election that was followed by a harsh government 
crackdown on the Armenian opposition.

The administration of former President Serzh Sarkisian tried unsuccessfully to 
restore Yerevan’s eligibility for the multimillion-dollar scheme in the 
following years. U.S. officials said, among other things, that it is not doing 
enough to combat widespread corruption.


Armenia - Prime Minister Tigran Sarkisian (L) and Patrick Fine, vice-president 
of the U.S. Millennium Challenge Corporation, visit a newly constructed pumping 
station in Ararat province, 03Oct2011.
The United States signaled its readiness to boost economic aid to Armenia 
following the recent democratic revolution there. Visiting Yerevan earlier this 
week, a U.S. deputy assistant secretary of state, Bridget Brink, offered U.S. 
assistance to the new Armenian government’s ambitious anti-corruption agenda.

Mills said Brink discussed with Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian and other senior 
Armenian officials “possible options” for increasing U.S. aid. Those include 
renewed MCA funding, he said.

“We will continue those discussions,” added the U.S. ambassador.

Immediately after Pashinian took office on May 8, the Armenian National 
Committee of America (ANCA), an influential lobbying group, renewed its calls 
for $140 million in fresh MCA funding to Armenia. In a letter to U.S. Secretary 
of State Mike Pompeo, the ANCA chairman, Raffi Hamparian, said that would help 
to cement the country’s “democratic development.”

Pompeo replied to Hamparian on May 17, saying that he shares the ANCA’s 
“enthusiasm about the peaceful, constitutional political transition that 
transpired in Armenia.” “We hope to see the Armenian government make progress 
on MCC’s eligibility criteria (‘scorecard’) this year so that the MCC Board of 
Directors may consider Armenia for a compact during the annual selection 
process,” he wrote.

The ANCA wants the MCC to mostly spend the proposed sum on improving science, 
technology, engineering and math education in Armenia’s underfunded public 
schools. It says that would ultimately benefit the country’s burgeoning 
information technology (IT) industry.




Energy Firm Hits Back At Armenian Government

        • Hovannes Movsisian

Armenia - An electricity transmission tower.

A company belonging to Russian-Armenian billionaire Samvel Karapetian said on 
Thursday it itself has pulled out of an agreement with the Armenian government 
to manage the country’s electricity transmission network.

The Russian-based company, Tashir Kapital, denied the recently appointed Energy 
Minister Artur Grigorian's claim that the new government has decided to 
terminate the management contract because some of its provisions are “not 
beneficial for the state.”

“During the process of termination of the agreement between the Armenian 
government and Tashir Kapital no provisions were discussed and there were no 
negotiations on any [specific] issue, especially with the participation of the 
newly appointed [energy] minister,” read a company statement.

The previous government moved last year to authorize Tashir Kapital to manage 
the High-Voltage Electric Networks (HVEN) for the next 25 years. Government 
officials said at the time that the new operator will cut costs by 
“synchronizing” Armenia’s power transmission and distribution networks. They 
said Tashir Kapital will also obtain large-scale loans that will be used for 
refurbishing electricity transmission lines and substations and building new 
facilities.

Grigorian did not specify the reasons for the government’s decision to scrap 
the deal when he spoke to journalists on Wednesday. For its part, Tashir 
Kapital gave no reasons for its purported decision not to run HVEN.

Instead, Tashir Kapital listed a raft of data meant to show that HVEN has been 
badly mismanaged and is a heavy burden on state finances. In particular, ts 
statement pointed to $520 million in outstanding debts incurred by the 
state-owned network in the last 15 years.

The statement said that Tashir Kapital would slash HVEN’s “inflated” 
operational costs by 40 percent if the deal did not fall through. The company 
also claimed that the cost of a planned new power transmission line connecting 
Armenia to Georgia, estimated by the government at $200 million, is 
disproportionately high. It said it could have built the line with only $70 
million in investments.

“HVEN cannot be of interest to Tashir Kapital as a source of profit,” added the 
statement. “The main motive for the negotiations was to ease [HVEN’s] impact on 
the [electricity] tariffs.”

Tashir purchased the Electric Networks of Armenia (ENA), the debt-ridden 
national power utility, and a large power plant in the Armenian town of Hrazdan 
from a state-run Russian energy company in 2015. The new owner appears to have 
significantly cut ENA’s massive losses since then.

Samvel Karapetian strongly supported former Prime Minister Karen Karapetian (no 
relation) throughout the latter’s tenure which came to an end when former 
President Serzh Sarkisian became prime minister on April 17. Karen Karapetian 
took over as acting prime minister after Sarkisian stepped down on April 23 
amid mass protests against his continued rule.




Pashinian Ends Visit To Georgia

        • Karlen Aslanian

Georgia - Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian is greeted by people outside 
an Armenian church in Tbilisi, .

Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian sounded optimistic about the future of 
Georgian-Armenian relations on Thursday as he toured Armenian-populated areas 
of Georgia at the end of a two-day official visit to the country.

Pashinian lavished praise on his Georgian counterpart Giorgi Kvirikashvili, 
calling him a “good friend” of Armenia the day after they met for the first 
time in Tbilisi.

“I want to say that the most important result of this visit is that a warm 
personal relationship, friendship has been established between Georgian Prime 
Minister Giorgi Kvirikashvili and me,” he said.

The two premiers pledged to give new impetus to bilateral ties after their 
talks. They attended later on Wednesday an official reception at the Tbilisi 
City Hall dedicated to the 100th anniversary of the establishment of Armenia’s 
first independent republic.

Speaking at the event, Kvirikashvili hailed the recent peaceful protests in 
Armenia that brought Pashinian to power. “All the signs are the changes in 
Armenia laid the firm foundation for Armenia’s further development,” he said.

Pashinian met with the influential head of the Georgian Orthodox Church, 
Patriarch Ilia II, and businesspeople in Tbilisi on Thursday morning before 
heading to Georgia’s Javakheti region mostly populated by ethnic Armenians. He 
visited several local towns and villages where scores of people gathered to 
greet him and listen to his speeches.


Georgia - Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian and Georgian Foreign Minister 
Mikheil Janelidze meet with residents of Akhalkalaki, .

“I believe that after this official visit a new page will be opened in 
Armenia’s relations with Georgia and Armenian-Georgian relations in general,” 
Pashinian said at a rally held in the village of Gandza. “We think that 
Armenian-Georgian relations must be based on the following new formula. 
Georgia’s government and people must be confident that there is no conspiracy 
and threats towards Georgia and the Georgian people in the actions of Armenia 
and the Armenian people.”

“By the same token, Armenia and the Armenian people must be confident that 
there is no conspiracy and threats towards Armenia and the Armenian people in 
the actions of the Georgian state and the Georgian people,” he added. “It is on 
this basis that we need to build a new relationship, new friendship, new 
brotherhood.”

Pashinian insisted that the current Georgian government is committed to 
tackling high unemployment and other socioeconomic problems in Javakheti that 
have long fueled discontent among local residents.




Press Review



“Zhamanak” comments on allegations by the National Security Service (NSS) that 
businessman Samvel Aleksanian’s Alex Holding group has evaded millions of 
dollars in taxes. “The NSS has revealed something which just about every active 
citizen of Armenia knows,” writes the paper. The only question, it says, is 
that how much Aleksanian and other influential tycoons paid the country’s 
previous rulers for their privileged positions in business.

“After the velvet revolution the [former ruling] HHK has found itself in a pit 
whit itself had dug,” writes “Zhoghovurd.” The paper sees an “outflow” of 
deputies from the HHK’s parliamentary faction, saying that the party has no 
“legislative levers” to force defectors to resign from the parliament. It says 
that the HHK itself had previously resisted calls for obligating such defectors 
to relinquish their parliament seats. “The HHK elite now regrets not taking 
that measure,” it says. “It did not occur to HHK figures that Serzh Sarkisian 
will resign and they will lose power one day.”

“Haykakan Zhamanak” suggests that the new Armenian government will try to 
achieve a reduction in the prices of electricity and natural gas in the 
country. “Even without complex calculations, it is evident that there are 
substantial resources for cutting the tariffs,” writes the paper. “The thing is 
that the energy and gas sectors have always been murky to the public. They are 
closed systems with huge amounts of money in circulation. For many years the 
Armenian energy sector has been controlled by loyalists of the ruling clan. 
People holding high-level and mid-level positions there have made huge 
fortunes.”

“Hayots Ashkhar” sees a growing Azerbaijani military threat to Armenia 
emanating from the Nakhichevan exclave. The paper points out that in recent 
weeks Azerbaijani troops deployed there have moved their positions closer to 
Armenian army posts at some sections of the Armenia-Nakhichevan border.

(Tigran Avetisian)

Reprinted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL
Copyright (c) 2018 Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty, Inc.
1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.
www.rferl.org

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