Author: Janet Ekmekjian

U.S. Congressman Adam Schiff calls out Azerbaijan for illegally holding numerous Armenian POWs

Janet Ekmekjian

 10:02, 6 September 2023

YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 6, ARMENPRESS. United States Congressman Adam Schiff has called out Azerbaijan for illegally holding numerous Armenian prisoners of war.

According to confirmed data, Azerbaijan is holding 33 Armenian prisoners of war from the 2020 war. Under the terms of the ceasefire agreement that ended the war, Azerbaijan was to release all POWs and other detainees but it failed to do so. According to numerous human rights advocates the number of Armenians POWs illegally jailed in Azerbaijan is much higher.

“To this day, Azerbaijan continues to illegally hold numerous Armenian prisoners of war, while the fate of many who are still missing remains unknown,” Schiff said on Facebook. “My thoughts are with the families in Armenia and Artsakh still missing loved ones. I pray for their safe return, even as I pray for an end to the brutal blockade,” he added.

In July 2023, Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan Azerbaijan of trying to use Armenian prisoners of war as a bargaining chip.

https://armenpress.am/eng/news/1118859.html?fbclid=IwAR1VK4OUZmUSnr3fOrxuz0fc1Ourb7UZNK4Aj6XQ9vZZfR_3DxiqTqmImN0

‘We don’t know how to kneel,’ Nagorno-Karabakh President vows to continue struggle

Janet Ekmekjian

 15:39, 30 August 2023

YEREVAN, AUGUST 30, ARMENPRESS. President of Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh) Arayik Harutyunyan held an online meeting with the Mayor of Paris and other French regional officials who escorted a humanitarian convoy intended for Nagorno-Karabakh to the entrance of Lachin Corridor on August 30.

Harutyunyan told the French officials that Artsakh will never forget friends who provided support.

“Last year, in December, I visited France and held meetings with our friends, and back then I warned about everything that’s happening today. Unfortunately, my predictions were right. Azerbaijan expects to bring the Artsakhis, Artsakh down to their knees through humanitarian pressure, but they won’t succeed. We know how to respect, but we don’t know how to kneel. We will fight for as long as we can. Although we don’t have any expectations from the world, the major powers, international organizations, but we will continue. The dignity we inherited throughout millennia is far more important to us,” Harutyunyan said in his speech.

He thanked all participants of the French initiative of sending humanitarian aid, stressing that Artsakh will never forget it.

Rally against nine-month Armenian blockade held in Uptown Waterloo (Canada)

Janet Ekmekjian
iHeartRadio, Canada
Sept 3 2023


A group gathered in Uptown Waterloo Saturday to bring attention to the nine-month supply blockade in Armenia.

The blockade has been happening in a separatist region of the country and is home to roughly 120,000 people.

"The only corridor between Armenia and Artsakh is being blocked by Azerbaijan," said Levon Sarmazian, chair of the Armenian National Committee of Southwestern Ontario.  "Currently there is a very big humanitarian crisis going on where there is no medicine, no food, and no transportation between those regions.

"We're hoping that the Canadian government can put pressure on Azerbaijan, which is a big player in the world with oil and trade. Hoping they can put pressure on them to open up the corridor and to stop this crisis from continuing."

Last month the Armenian UN Ambassador wrote a letter to the Security Council asking them to intervene. It came after the international criminal courts former chief prosecutor released a report warning, "there is a reasonable basis to believe that genocide is being committed."

Representatives for Azerbaijan have dismissed the report saying it, "contains unsubstantiated allegations."

The region was claimed by both Azerbaijan and Armenia following the fall of the Russian empire.

It broke away in the early 1990s before Azerbaijan retook the area three years ago.

[Sydney] Armenians demand govt pressure on ‘genocidal’ blockade

Janet Ekmekjian
NEOS KOSMOS, Australia
Se[t 1 2023

Armenian-Australians are demanding Foreign Minister Penny Wong diplomatically pressure Azerbaijan to end a blockade devolving into a humanitarian crisis.

Farid Farid (AAP)
1 September 2023 5:38pm

Hundreds of Australia’s Armenian diaspora have called on the government to increase pressure on Azerbaijan to lift a nine-month blockade over the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh territory that has left thousands starving.

Marching in central Sydney on Friday waving Armenian flags and holding “Aid for Artsakh” placards, the boisterous crowd including many children ended up at the Department of Foreign Affairs office to make their voices heard.

Artsakh is the Armenian name for the landlocked mountainous region in the South Caucasus.

“It took 253 days for this government to wake up to the reality on the ground … that mothers are losing their unborn children because there is no gas,” said John Jack Kajakajian of the Armenian Youth Federation of Australia.

“We implore you and the people in this building to utilise all bilateral and multilateral channels to help bring an end to this genocidal blockade,” he said in a message for Foreign Minister Penny Wong.

The community says it received a letter of support from the minister after months of lobbying, affirming the International Court of Justice’s ruling.

The UN’s top judicial body ordered Azerbaijan earlier this year to ensure free movement through the Lachin corridor, Armenia’s only access to Nagorno-Karabakh, but has been ignored.

The two former Soviet countries have contested the region for decades with several wars breaking out, mostly recently in 2020.

Azerbaijan wants to bring the approximately 120,000 Armenians living in the breakaway region under its control and has blocked the Lachin corridor since December.

Nanor Shokayan, 27, who has family in the region and visited them last year a few months before the blockade, says they have been struggling to stay alive.

“They’re struggling for their daily loaf of bread, struggling for medical care – there’s absolutely no food,” she told AAP.

“The sad thing is that there’s no food but some internet access so when they do connect with us they’re seeing the silence of the international community which is very disheartening for them.”

Ms Shokoyan compared the ongoing blockade to the first genocide of the 20th century where as many as one million Armenians were killed by Ottoman soldiers.

“The Armenian people have been through one genocide in 1915 … and what we’re seeing today is the continuation of that very genocide on the same group of people.”

Earlier in the week, French politicians including Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo tried to send an aid convoy but were unsuccessful.

Neither the EU, United States nor Russia have managed to mediate the crisis between the long-feuding neighbours.

Source: AAP (with DPA)


Construction site of U.S.-affiliated steel producer in Armenia targeted by Azeri military in heavy cross-border shooting

Janet Ekmekjian

 12:17,

YEREVAN, AUGUST 28, ARMENPRESS. The construction site of a steelworks owned by a U.S.-affiliated company in the Armenian village of Yeraskh came under heavy Azeri cross-border gunfire over the weekend.

In a statement released Monday, GTB Steel, the company building the steel mill, said that the Azeri forces even targeted the site accommodation of workers.

“The Azerbaijani Armed Forces, from August 25 to 27, fired high intensity, unprecedented number of shots in the direction of the plant which is under construction in Yeraskh, and also targeted the workers' site accommodation. More than 60 shots were fired,” GTB Steel said in the statement.

The construction site of the steel mill was targeted by the Azeri forces many times before. During one particular cross-border shooting on June 14, the Azeri forces shot and wounded two Indian construction workers. On June 15, the U.S. State Department said Washington was “deeply concerned” that two civilian workers of the U.S.-affiliated company sustained injuries from “gunfire from the direction of Azerbaijan.”

Armenian Victims of Azerbaijan’s Blockade: forgotten by all

Janet Ekmekjian
Aug 25 2023

Solène Tadié, National Catholic Register

FRIDAY, AUGUST 25, 2023

The people of Armenia, the world’s oldest Christian kingdom, are fighting once again for their survival. Nearly three years after the end of the latest war with Azerbaijan, following which it was forced to cede the long-disputed territory of Nagorno-Karabakh, the situation of the 120,000 people left in that region is now critical.
 

Azerbaijani military opens fire at Armenian border positions

Janet Ekmekjian

 12:51,

YEREVAN, AUGUST 21, ARMENPRESS. The Azerbaijani Armed Forces opened cross-border gunfire on Monday targeting Armenian military positions near Verin Shorzha hours after shooting at outposts in Khnatsakh, the Ministry of Defense said in a statement.

“On August 21, at 9:50 a.m., the units of the Azerbaijani armed forces discharged fire from different caliber small arms against the Armenian combat outposts nearby Verin Shorzha,” the Ministry of Defense of Armenia said.

The Armenian diaspora of Madras

Janet Ekmekjian
India – Aug 20 2023

 

In this series, we take a trip down memory lane, back to the Madras of the 1900s, as we unravel tales and secrets of the city through its most iconic personalities and episodes 

Venkatesh Ramakrishnan

CHENNAI: One of the oldest streets in the black town of Madras is named after a central Asian country. No wonder because the Armenians have contributed immensely to the growth of this city apart from many cities across the world too. For the unversed, there are Armenian streets in at least 50 cities across the world. Even today, Armenians are spread across the world outside Armenia, three times more than within their nation. 

This is a painful joke played by history on the landlocked country with its own rich heritage. Sandwiched between empires like the Ottoman Turks and Russia, Armenia was always easily accessible to the invaders. The knowledgeable lot of the Armenians left their motherland to seek their fortunes elsewhere.
Several times, Armenia vanished from the political maps, but the Armenian diaspora added wealth to the cities they settled in. 

They came here even before Madras was established. They were a thriving community in the Portuguese Santhome, 100 years before the foundation was laid for Fort St George. When Santhome started shriveling, they moved three miles north. Other Armenians started moving in mainly from Persia and the Philippines. 

As their people were spread across countries, this helped them set up a network that could not be rivalled by any other trading power. When the East India company loaded its goods onto a ship for England, the goods would take six months to reach the shores of Britain, crossing the cape of good hope. But a lot of the goods would be sent by the company through the Armenian land network. The list would reach the company headquarters a solid month before the ship with the goods docked. This prior information helped the company to find the best buyer for their goods and increased their profit manifold.

Armenians also lent to the company when there was a shortage of funds. It was their trading and the resultant taxes that enriched the city. Importantly, unlike the Portuguese or the Dutch they had no colonial ambitions and did not offer any competition to the company. Even in trade they carefully kept away the goods the company was dealing in. They were into jade, garnet, diamond and pepper trades. 

Soon they started emerging as the richest community in the town. Once, a group of Armenians decided that they would move back to Santhome and revive it as a trade centre. This frightened the company so much that they were given rights, equivalent to the Britishers and were ordered to stay back. 

One of the earliest Armenian printing presses was established in Madras in 1772. The first Armenian newspaper was also published here. The publisher- a deep patriot, printed a republican constitution for the Armenian nation when it became free.

The philanthropic nature of the Armenians is what makes their stay in Madras memorable. The most important Armenian citizen, who had a right to own property within the fort was Petrus Uscan. He built the Marmalong( Mambalam) bridge in Saidapet replacing an erstwhile causeway on the Adyar. The bridge has now been replaced though Uscan’s plaque remains. He also paved the steps for St Thomas Mount to enable pilgrims to climb to the church on it easily. 

But his help to madras was much bigger than all these munificence. When Marathas or Golconda Sultans wanted to invade Madras, Uscan was sent as an envoy seeking peace and negotiating a truce. The very survival of Madras today may have been due to his negotiation skills. 

As time went by, the company lost interest in trading and turned its attention towards conquest and tax farming. Armenians started moving towards greener pastures.

A road leading to the fort was named after the Armenians and their church was built there. 350 burial stones are in the garden of the church. Their separate burial ground was on the island. Because there are only a handful of Armenians today in Chennai, the church is only open for visitors. But every Sunday morning the bells from a three-storied bell tower ring and black town remembers a colourful memory of a tribe which enriched the city. — The writer is a historian and an author

https://www.dtnext.in/news/city/the-armenian-diaspora-of-madras-731016#bypass-sw

Sports: Door still open for Armenia to compete at World Shooting Championships in Baku

Janet Ekmekjian
Aug 15 2023

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  • By Philip Barker at the Baku Shooting Center

    •  

  •  Tuesday,

International Shooting Sport Federation (ISSF) secretary general Willi Grill has told Armenia that "we still have the door open for them to participate" on the eve of the ISSF World Championships here in Baku.

"All of you know we are for the sport, it is our priority, we are not involved in any political or other things and when I found out here there is a problem with Armenia," Grill explained today as the Championships were launched.

The Armenians opted not to attend the ISSF World Championships citing security concerns and tense political relations with Azerbaijan.

"This Organising Committee did everything it was possible to do, there is no exception," Grill insisted.

"Then it went in a direction where they wanted more guarantees, but all of you know, if somebody in the world ask you a guarantee for everything it does not exist."

Tension has existed between Azerbaijan and Armenia for over 35 years with disputes escalating into military action, particularly over the Nagorno Karabakh region.

More recently, there have been border skirmishes since 2021 and the Armenians opted not to attend the ISSF World Championships citing security concerns.

"Nobody can guarantee everything in this world, you can do everything that is possible and this was done here, every possibility to guarantee safety or whatever," Grill explained.

"I have come here so many years, never anything happened to me or anyone of our guests, so of course everybody has to decide by themselves.

"I understand also that the Government they don’t feel well and that is another issue."

Grill today insisted that any Armenian athletes who arrived in Baku would still be allowed to compete even though the deadline for entries had passed.

"We still have the door open, we still have places reserved if someone wants to come, we never say no, even if the deadline is over, we are able to manage that," he added.

"Everybody in the world is here so if Armenian athletes are listening and it is possible to come here to participate, it would be again very very nice to be here altogether."

Organisers say they expect 1,239 shooters from 101 nations to take part.

After a training day following tonight's Opening Ceremony, competition begins at the World Championships on Thursday (August 17) and continues until September 1.

https://www.insidethegames.biz/articles/1139879/armenia-still-welcome-issf-worlds