Author: Aram Torosian

National News Agency, Lebanon

Jan 23 2024

NNA – Caretaker Prime Minister, Najib Mikati, on Tuesday met with Caretaker Minister of Social Affairs, Hector Al-Hajjar, at the Grand Serail. 

On emerging, Al-Hajjar said, "We continued our discussion on two key matters. The first pertains to the 'Aman' program and overcoming the hurdle related to the parliament's issued text regarding the project amendment. We are on the path to a solution, and what the PM has proposed will be acceptable. The necessary points will be prepared in the coming week."

Regarding the issue of the most impoverished families, Al-Hajjar said that he had presented a proposal for the year 2024, over which an agreement has been reached on the required mechanism.

"The proposal will be sent to donor countries for implementation in 2024. In the coming days, the payment mechanism for the most impoverished families will be clarified,” he added. 

European Union Ambassador to Lebanon, Sandra De Waele, was also received by the Prime Minister. 

The EU diplomat briefed Mikati on the preparations underway for the eighth conference on Syrian refugees in Brussels.

Additionally, the Prime Minister met with Armenian Ambassador to Lebanon, Vahagn Atabekian, with whom he discussed bilateral relations.

Jan 3 2024

The heartwarming effort took place at the end of 2018 and January 2019. After fleeing Armenia due to political prosecution in 2010, the Tamrazyan family settled in the Netherlands. After a years-long process, the government denied their final request for asylum. Furthermore, they proceeded despite the fact that three children had been in the country for more than five years and were technically eligible for an amnesty.

As a last resort, the family first took refuge in a church in Katwijk. When the temple ran out of resources to help them, Bethel Church gladly stepped in. In addition to the service, they provided the family with lodging, psychological help, and in-house education for the children, who could no longer go to school.

To make the endeavor work, they relied on the kindness of 650 clerics from 20 different denominations around the Netherlands and neighboring countries. The clergymen and women would travel to Bethel Church, located in The Hague, and would take over from previous priests, sometimes pulling all-nighters with hymns and prayers to keep the immigration officers at bay. If any of them took a break, the authorities would be able to enter and arrest the five members of the family.

Luckily, everything worked out in the end. After 96 days, not only was the family given permission to remain in the Netherlands, but the effort also helped more people. “The purpose of the church shelter was to provide safety for the family who had exhausted all legal remedies and to come to a solution for families in similar situations. Now that more than 600 rooted children and their parents can stay in the Netherlands, the intended result has been achieved,” the church said in a statement.

“The church has become a home,” said Hayarpi, the eldest daughter, upon the end of the weeks-long mass. “We have had sad but also very beautiful moments. The Bethelkerk is for me now a special building, but I am glad that I can get out of it and can continue to build on my future.”

Jan 4 2024

On September 30th, 2023 the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees reported that more than 100,000 people have now fled to Armenia from Nagorno-Karabakh, which had a population of around 120,000 before the Baku government of Azerbaijan launched the successful lightning offensive on the region, according to Sky News. A total of 21,043 vehicles have crossed the Hakari bridge, which links Armenia to Nagorno-Karabakh, according to Nazeli Baghdasaryan, the press secretary to Armenia’s prime minister, Nikol Pashinyan, reported by The Guardian News. The region’s separatist ethnic Armenian government claimed on Thursday that “it would dissolve itself by the end of the year after a three-decade bid for independence,” The Guardian News reported. 

Pashinyan claims the large-scale migration amounts to “a direct act of an ethnic cleansing,” according to Sky News. Armenia’s ambassador-at-large, Edmon Marukyan, also criticized and claimed that these people were “ethnically cleansed from their ancestral homeland, from their homes where their parents, where their ancestors were living, and these people were totally cleansed from this territory,” the BBC reported. Meanwhile, Azerbaijan expressed the desire to integrate the ethnic Armenians in the region as “equal citizens” and dismissed allegations of ethnic cleansing raised by Armenia, BBC reported. Furthermore, Azerbaijan argued that the departure of the region’s residents is “their personal and individual decision and has nothing to do with forced relocation,” Sky News reported. Marukyan dismissed Azerbaijan’s assurances and claims as “a lie,” according to the BBC. 

This issue is historically and geopolitically complicated. It does not only involve the Armenian and Azerbaijan governments, as the conflicts between the two governments involve the Soviet Union and Turkey as well. Therefore, it is crucial to analyze the causes and the problems of regional tensions to improve the situation, as the issue is not unidimensional but multi-dimensional. In the end, civilians suffer from such conflicts, like the incidents which have caused migrations of ethnic Armenians from Nagorno-Karabakh. Therefore, such issues should be resolved from the core of the problem.

Modern-day Armenia and Azerbaijan became part of the Soviet Union in the 1920s. Nagorno-Karabakh was controlled by Azerbaijan but had a majority ethnic-Armenian population, according to the BBC. When both countries gained independence from the Soviet Union in the late 1980s, Azerbaijan sought to suppress the separatist movement in Nagorno-Kabakh, as the region wanted to become part of Armenia. This led to ethnic clashes and eventually to a full-scale war. There was another clash in 1992, but Russia intervened, and a ceasefire was agreed upon in 1994. Although Nagorno-Karabakh remained part of Azerbaijan, it had a separatist “government” run by ethnic Armenians and backed by the Armenian government. The region is still volatile, and Azerbaijan won back much of the territory. By the time both sides agreed to sign a Russian-brokered peace deal in November 2020, Azerbaijan had recaptured all the land Nagorno-Karabakh held by Armenia since 1994, the BBC reported. Azerbaijan is supported by Turkey while Russia supports Armenia. 

The Guardian News claims that “the departure of more than 80% of Nagorno-Karabakh’s population raises questions about Azerbaijan’s plans for the enclave that was internationally recognized as part of its territory”. However, this is not a simple issue that only requires examining the Azerbaijan government and its actions. The issue necessitates understanding the broad geopolitical scope to determine the roots of problems. If not, incidents like the recent migration will constantly repeat and threaten the human rights of civilians. 

Dec 19 2023

• CONFLICT AND PEACE
• SOUTH CAUCASUS

"Despite hopes, Armenia and Azerbaijan failed to sign a peace agreement by the end of 2023", writes Benyamin Poghosyan in this op-ed for commonspace.eu. "However, since the text of the document seems to be, by and large, already agreed, there are hopes that an agreement may be signed in the first half of 2024. Otherwise, the EU and US election cycles in the Summer and Autumn of 2024 may push the South Caucasus out of the West's radar. If this happens, Russia may resume its leading role as a negotiation platform between Armenia and Azerbaijan, pushing the two sides to sign a peace agreement in Moscow by the end of 2024", he argues. 

2023 started with mixed feelings in Armenia – Azerbaijan negotiations. It seemed that the October 2022 Prague statement, where the Armenian government recognized Nagorno Karabakh as part of Azerbaijan, paved the way for the signature of an Armenia – Azerbaijan peace agreement. Many perceived the status of Nagorno-Karabakh, and the fate of the Armenian population as the primary obstacle to the peace process. Meanwhile, the blockade of the Lachin corridor, imposed by Azerbaijan in mid–December 2022, added tensions in bilateral relations.

The negotiation process resumed in February 2023, as Armenian and Azerbaijani leaders met on the margins of the Munich Security Conference, a summit facilitated by the US Secretary of State. This meeting opened the way for months of intensive negotiations. The Armenian and Azerbaijani foreign ministers met twice in Washington in May and June 2023 to discuss a peace agreement, while Pashinyan and Aliyev met twice in Brussels in May and July 2023. In the meantime, the two leaders also met in Chisinau on June 1, 2023, on the margins of the second European Political Community summit, accompanied by the President of the European Council, the President of France, and the German Chancellor. The sides registered significant progress in elaborating the peace agreement, claiming that at least 70 percent of the text was agreed.

On the other hand, the continuation of the Nagorno-Karabakh blockade impacted the process negatively. On April 23, 2023, Azerbaijan established a checkpoint on the Lachin corridor, and since mid-June, banned all transportation in and out of the region, with rare exceptions of medical evacuations done by the International Red Cross. Azerbaijan pushed for the usage of the Aghdam road to supply Nagorno Karabakh, while Armenians rejected this option, fearing that it would be another step towards "reintegration into Azerbaijan." Armenia applied to the International Court of Justice, but Azerbaijan de facto refused to implement the court's decision. Upon Armenia's request, the UN Security Council discussed the situation on August 16, but the gathering ended without any statements or resolutions.

Despite the ongoing tensions around the blockade of Nagorno-Karabakh, negotiations on the peace agreement continued, and on September 11, Azerbaijan provided its latest version of the text to Armenia. However, Azerbaijan decided to use force to "close the Karabakh chapter" and launched a large-scale military offensive on September 19. Armenian government decided not to intervene militarily, and Russian peacekeepers took the same approach. Without any external support, the authorities of the self-proclaimed Nagorno Karabakh Republic were forced to capitulate and sign a decree on the dissolution of the Nagorno Karabakh Republic by the end of 2023. Within ten days, all Armenians left Nagorno-Narabakh, and on October 15, President Aliyev reviewed a military parade in Stepanakert with practically no Armenians remaining in the town.

Some hoped that the "destruction of Nagorno Karabakh" would facilitate the peace process. The EU put significant hope on the scheduled Granada meeting between President Aliyev and Prime Minister Pashinyan on the margins of the third European Political Community summit. The Secretary of the Armenian Security Council and Foreign policy advisor to President Aliyev met in Brussels on September 26, and everything indicated the sides were ready to sign a peace agreement by the end of 2023. Then, suddenly, Azerbaijan pulled away from negotiations. President Aliyev canceled his visit to Granada, citing France's decision to sell weapons to Armenia and the discussions at the European Parliament about Nagorno-Karabakh as the main reasons. Arguably, he demanded participation at the Granada meeting of President Erdogan, an offer rejected by France and Germany. Then President Aliyev rejected the EU offer to hold a leaders' summit in Brussels by the end of October 2023 in the "original Brussels format" and also canceled the meeting between Armenian and Azerbaijani foreign ministers scheduled for November 20, citing the anti-Azerbaijan statements by the US State Department officials during November 15 hearings in the US Congress. Simultaneously, Azerbaijan hinted at its readiness to resume negotiations in Moscow, within the 3+2 platform, or at the bilateral level. On November 30, the Armenian and Azerbaijani Commission on delimitation and demarcation met on the Armenia – Azerbaijan border and agreed on its charter. On December 7, 2023, Armenia and Azerbaijan made a significant step forward by adopting a bilateral statement on pushing forward the peace process, exchange of POWs, and also Armenia's support to Azerbaijan to host the COP 29 conference in Baku in 2024.

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Meanwhile, the US Assistant Secretary for European and Eurasian Affairs, James O'Brien, visited Baku and met with Azerbaijani President Aliyev on December 6. According to different sources, Armenia and Azerbaijan agreed to hold a foreign ministers meeting in January 2024 in Washington, while bilateral negotiations will probably continue. On February 7, 2024, Azerbaijan will hold snap Presidential elections, and a landslide victory of President Aliyev seems assured.

Thus, despite hopes, Armenia and Azerbaijan failed to sign a peace agreement by the end of 2023. However, since the text of the document seems to be, by and large, already agreed, there are hopes that an agreement may be signed in the first half of 2024. Otherwise, the EU and US election cycles in the Summer and Autumn of 2024 may push the South Caucasus out of the West's radar. If this happens, Russia may resume its leading role as a negotiation platform between Armenia and Azerbaijan, pushing the two sides to sign a peace agreement in Moscow by the end of 2024.      

 

https://www.commonspace.eu/node/12498