Author: Mary Lazarian

By News Desk

The mission of the American Armenian Rose Float Association is to promote and preserve Armenian culture and heritage through the art of float design.

Vibrant hues dance to the rhythm of the float theme, “Armenian Melodies,” featuring a beautiful Armenian Taraz, a dress shown on the float. It will be adorned with red Christmas mums, whole pomegranates, cranberry seeds, and dried apricots. The Shukar Birds, perched proudly at the back of the float, will be decorated with blue and purple statice, black beans and the warm glow of orange lentils. Feel the beat of traditional Daf drums, curated into a medley of brown flax seeds, crushed walnuts, and the deep blue of statice.

The most stunning aspect of the float is the homage to Garni Gorge, a gorge a short distance east of Yerevan, Armenia, just below the village of the same name, where the first-century AD Temple of Garni may be seen above the gorge. Along the cliff walls of the gorge are well-preserved basalt columns carved out by the Goght River. This floral portrayal of Garni Gorge is a rock wall adorned with white rice and seeds of light lettuce, poppies, and dark lettuce, a tribute to the Armenian terrain. Layered at the base are white and yellow roses mingled with apricots and pomegranates, complemented by blue statice flowers and pink cymbidium orchids.

This spectacle isn’t just a visual delight; it’s a celebration of Armenian heritage. It’s a testament to the commitment and dedication to inspiring, educating and raising awareness about the deep history of Armenian traditions and values.

The floats will journey the 5 ½ mile Parade route displaying their symbolic and spectacular storytelling sure to be embraced by millions of streetside and broadcast viewers from across the country and around the world drawn to America’s New Year Celebration.

Source: TOR

Armenia is taking an important step towards modernizing its public services delivery with the Strengthening Transparency, Accountability, and Access to Public Services through GovTech project launched today. Funded by the UK Good Governance fund, implemented by the Armenian Government, the launch of the initiative was marked by the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding between the World Bank, the Embassy of UK to Armenia, and the Yerevan Municipality.

The project aims to simplify business processes within national and regional government services, including streamlining and digitization of notary services, construction permits, public sector internal audit functions, and others, making their use faster for the public.

“The World Bank has supported public administration reform through a series of projects since 2004. The Strengthening Transparency, Accountability, and Access to Public Services through GovTech projec seeks to lay the groundwork for digital infrastructure to ensure the most efficient, cost-effective, and easy-to-use provision of public services via digital means. We believe that initiatives like these will contribute to a better business environment and will increase the transparency and accountability of public sector service delivery,” said Carolin Geginat, World Bank Country Manager for Armenia.

An important component of the project is an Annual Statistical Satisfaction Survey, which will collect public feedback and assess satisfaction levels on service delivery. To enhance government personnel capabilities, a capacity building component is included in the project to facilitate the practical implementation of acquired knowledge, ensuring a sustainable approach towards the improvement of public services.

“Public administration reforms are the most important package of reforms in the state administration system. This is not an internal process only, and directly affects the lives of businesses and people. After the signing of this memorandum, I am sure that we will start implementing the first actions with this great momentum and, in parallel, Yerevan Municipality will start implementing a wide range of public administration reform. Historically, the Municipality of Yerevan had a perception of a rather bureaucratic system, and the main goal of this project is to change those perceptions,” said Yerevan Mayor Tigran Avinyan.

The project is aligned with Armenia’s Digitalization Strategy, which serves as a roadmap towards creating an efficient government.  The project also complements the World Bank’s Public Sector Modernization Project-4 (PSMP4) lending operation, a comprehensive investment in the country’s public sector, aimed at modernizing Armenia’s public administration to improve efficiency, accessibility, and overall public service quality.

The World Bank is currently financing 10 projects in Armenia totaling $500 million. Since its inception in Armenia in 1992, the World Bank has provided around $2.7 billion from International Development Association (IDA) to which Armenia became a donor in 2023, International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD), and trust funds. The World Bank is committed to continuing its support to Armenia in its development path for reducing poverty and sharing prosperity.

• After Azerbaijan besieged and starved 120,000 Christian Armenians in the Republic of Artsakh in the South Caucuses for nine months, on September 19, 2023, Azerbaijan bombed Artsakh's communities.

• Hundreds of civilians, including children, were murdered. Almost all the Armenians of Artsakh have fled: they know that after all military raids, Armenians who have fallen into the hands of the Azerbaijani military have been treated with maximum cruelty.

• Beheading and mutilating Armenians appears to be a long-standing tradition of Azeri soldiers. These actions are promoted and rewarded by the State of Azerbaijan. Azeri soldiers who commit such ISIS-like war crimes not only escape accountability and are never prosecuted, rather they are treated as national heroes by their government.

• During Azerbaijan's military incursion into Armenia in September 2022, Azeri soldiers raped, mutilated and slaughtered a 36-year-old Armenian woman who served in the Armenian forces. They then posted a video demonstrating their war crime on social media. In it, the dead woman appears naked, with both of her arms and legs dismembered. One of her eyes is gouged out. A severed finger appears to be sticking out of her mouth, and another appears out of her private parts…. The Azeri soldiers videotaping can be heard laughing and joking in the background.

• So, will the US finally hold the government of Azerbaijan to account? Will it cut US military aid to Azerbaijan? Will it once again watch as Turkey and Azerbaijan massacre more Armenians and invade more Armenian lands?

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on October 13 that in the coming weeks, Azerbaijan could invade Armenia. Azerbaijan's President Ilham Aliyev has threatened Armenia with war multiple times.

Meanwhile, pro-Erdogan media outlets in Turkey are also playing their war drums against Armenians. The headline news in the pro-Erdogan newspaper Türkiye on October 3 refers to Armenians in Armenia's Syunik (Zangezur) province as "snakes", "gangs" and "terrorists". One headline reads: "The new nest of the snake is Zangezur". It claims that the Armenians displaced from Artsakh (also known as Nagorno-Karabakh) are receiving military training in "terror camps in Zangezur".

When the Turkish media uses such words, its intent is to prepare the public for an upcoming war against an "enemy".

On November 1, the Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention issued a Red Flag Alert "due to the alarming potential for an invasion of Armenia by Azerbaijan in the coming days and weeks".

The US government also knows that the next step for Azerbaijan and Turkey is to attack the Republic of Armenia.

After Azerbaijan besieged and starved 120,000 Christian Armenians in the Republic of Artsakh in the South Caucuses for nine months, on September 19, 2023, Azerbaijan bombed Artsakh's communities.

Hundreds of civilians, including children, were murdered. Almost all the Armenians of Artsakh have fled: they know that after all military raids, Armenians who have fallen into the hands of the Azerbaijani military have been treated with maximum cruelty.

Azeri soldiers, since their invasion began, have been uploading videos on social media showing themselves beheading and mutilating Armenians.

The Lemkin Institute of Genocide Prevention on September 23 noted:

"There are stories coming out of Artsakh of the beheading of children and the separation of older boys and men from women and children….. Azerbaijan has routinely treated Armenians with this level of barbarism, especially in the wars of 2016, 2020 and 2022. It is a country is run by people who do not hide their visceral hatred of Armenians."

Beheading and mutilating Armenians appears to be a long-standing tradition of Azeri soldiers. These actions are promoted and rewarded by the State of Azerbaijan. Azeri soldiers who commit such ISIS-like war crimes not only escape accountability and are never prosecuted, rather they are treated as national heroes by their government.

On February 19, 2004, for instance, during a three-month English language class that was part of the Partnership for Peace NATO-sponsored program in Budapest, Ramil Safarov, an Azerbaijani army officer, broke into the dormitory room of Armenian army Lieutenant Gurgen Margaryan at night and axed him to death while he slept. Safarov hit Margaryan 16 times on his head and neck with the axe, almost decapitating him.

A court in Budapest convicted Safarov in 2006 of murdering Markaryan and attempting to murder another Armenian participant of the course, Hayk Makuchian, in the same fashion. Safarov was sentenced to life imprisonment in 2006. However, when Safarov was extradited to Azerbaijan in 2012, he received a hero's welcome in the capital of Baku.

According to anthropologist Sarah Kendzior:

"On August 31, 2012, Ramil Safarov was extradited to Azerbaijan, where he was greeted as a hero. As an adoring crowd cheered, Safarov walked the streets of the capital draped in an Azerbaijani flag, carrying a bouquet of roses. He was pardoned by President Ilham Aliyev, promoted to the rank of major and given a new apartment and money by the Azerbaijani Defence Ministry."

In 2020, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ruled that Azerbaijan's actions amounted to the "approval" and "endorsement" of the "very serious ethnically-biased crime" that Safarov committed. The court concluded that "the acts of Azerbaijan in effect granted [Safarov] impunity for the crimes committed against his Armenian victims."

"In addition, the Court finds particularly disturbing the statements made by a number of Azerbaijani officials glorifying [Safarov,] his deeds and his pardon. It also deplores the fact that a large majority of those statements expressed particular support for the fact that [Safarov's] crimes had been directed against Armenian soldiers, congratulated him on his actions and called him a patriot, a role model and a hero."

During an Azeri raid against Artsakh on April 1-5, 2016, a Yazidi member of the Artsakh Defense Army, Kyaram Sloyan, was beheaded and mutilated by Azeri soldiers. Videos and pictures showing Azeri soldiers posing with Sloyan's severed head were posted on social media networks. The Sunday Times called them "shocking souvenir photos of uniformed Azerbaijani soldiers posing with the severed head".

Sloyan was reburied in his father's village in Armenia after the International Committee of the Red Cross retrieved his severed head and returned it to his family.

"When they brought the body, we didn't know that it's headless," Sloyan's grief-stricken father Kyalash told RFE/RL's Armenian service on April 11, 2016. "It was very painful to discover that. They brought the head yesterday."

The Azerbaijani officer who decapitated Sloyan reportedly became a national hero in Azerbaijan. President Aliyev awarded him a medal in May 2016.

The Office of the Human Rights Defender of the Artsakh Republic published an interim public report on the atrocities committed by the Azerbaijani Military Forces during the four- day war in April 2016.

The report noted that both civilians and servicemen were executed and mutilated by the Azeri Army. Some Artsakh soldiers were, "along with other forms of dismemberment, also subjected to beheading," Graphic images of the abuses were also published in the report.

During Azerbaijan's 2020 war against Artsakh, Azeri accounts once again posted videos on Telegram which showed Azeris beheading Armenian civilians, soldiers and prisoners of war. One was Yuri Asryan, a reclusive 82-year-old who had refused to leave his village on October 20, 2020 when the invading Azerbaijani forces approached.

During Azerbaijan's military incursion into Armenia in September 2022, Azeri soldiers raped, mutilated and slaughtered a 36-year-old Armenian woman who served in the Armenian forces. They then posted a video demonstrating their war crime on social media. In it, the dead woman appears naked, with both of her arms and legs dismembered. One of her eyes is gouged out. A severed finger appears to be sticking out of her mouth, and another appears out of her private parts.

The video also includes several other mutilated and beheaded Armenian men. The Azeri soldiers videotaping can be heard laughing and joking in the background.

The words of Kamil Zeynallı, an Azeri athlete with 1.7 million Instagram followers, demonstrate the Azeri path to national "heroism". Zeynalli said in a WhatsApp call later posted on social media:

"Shed the blood of the Armenians. You'll return to our country like a man. You'll be free like a man. Our president [Aliyev] is behind those who behead Armenians.

"Whoever cuts off the heads of Armenians, our esteemed president is by their side."

Azerbaijan tries to spread propaganda in the West about allegedly being a "tolerant" and "multicultural" society. This propaganda is refuted by Azerbaijan's rewarding soldiers who behead Armenians, among many other war crimes they commit against Armenians.

There is no government other than Azerbaijan that so proudly rewards soldiers who behead and mutilate their captives, except perhaps for the Palestinian Authority and the Islamic State (ISIS).

The jihadists' use of beheadings is based on Islamic scriptures and Islamic history:

"So when you meet those who disbelieve [in battle], strike [their] necks until, when you have inflicted slaughter upon them, then secure their bonds…, and either [confer] favor afterwards or ransom [them] until the war lays down its burdens. That [is the command]. And if Allah had willed, He could have taken vengeance upon them [Himself], but [He ordered armed struggle] to test some of you by means of others. And those who are killed in the cause of Allah – never will He waste their deeds." – Quran 47:4, Sahih International translation

"I will cast terror into the hearts of those who disbelieved, so strike [them] upon the necks and strike from them every fingertip." – Quran 8:12 : Sahih International translation

Beheadings have been commonly used by Muslims in their jihad (war in the service of Allah) against non-Muslims since the advent of Islam in the seventh century. (For more examples of Islam's use of beheadings and other forms of violence, see here.)

Azerbaijan's war against Armenians is jihadist as well as nationalist. During Azerbaijan's war against Armenians in 2020, Erdogan declared:

"We support Azerbaijan until victory… I tell my Azerbaijani brothers: May your ghazwa be blessed."

"Ghazwa" in Islam means a battle or raid against non-Muslims for the expansion of Muslim territory and/or conversion of non-Muslims to Islam. Erdogan thus openly announced that attacks against the Armenian territory constitute jihad. To fight against Armenians in Artsakh, Turkey was joined in Azerbaijan by mercenary jihadi terrorists from Syria, as well.

During the first Artsakh war (1991-94), which the Armenians won, Dr. Araks Pashayan, an expert on political Islam and Azerbaijan, noted that "mercenaries from Afghanistan, Iran, the United States, Russia and Turkey were included in Azerbaijani army, and particularly Turkey and Iran provided Baku with military instructors."

Mohammad Younas was among the thousands of Afghan fighters that Hezb-e Islami, a major Afghan Islamist party, sent to Azerbaijan in the 1990s to bolster Baku in its war against Armenians.

"If possible, I would again join the Muslims of Azerbaijan to defend them against non-Muslims," Younas told RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan. "My real motivation in going to Azerbaijan was participating in a jihad, but I also wanted to make some money," he said.

In the face of this barbarity, the world idly watches. Such complacency has allowed Azerbaijan to forcibly displace around 120,000 indigenous Armenians from their homeland of Artsakh. Armenians know what will happen if they try to live under the Azeri regime.

So, will the US finally hold the government of Azerbaijan to account? Will it cut US military aid to Azerbaijan? Will it once again watch as Turkey and Azerbaijan massacre more Armenians and invade more Armenian lands?

It is high time that the West sanctioned the Azerbaijani government and held it accountable for treating Armenians in the most brutal ways. As long as Western governments continue their military and commercial cooperation with Azerbaijan and turn a blind eye to its mass atrocity crimes, they will remain complicit in Azerbaijan's crimes.

Uzay Bulut, a Turkish journalist, a research fellow for the Philos Project, and a Distinguished Senior Fellow at Gatestone Institute.

The Youth Center, which has been operational for a decade, has positioned itself as not just a staple in the Burbank community but as the central hub for the Armenian diaspora in the area. Despite its prominence, the Center has faced an ongoing challenge of constant renovations to its aging infrastructure. This generous financial boost is expected to conclude these necessary enhancements, allowing the facility to optimize its focus on year-round activities and programming.

The ACF Burbank Beshir Mardirossian Youth Center currently serves as the base for seven Armenian organizations, all of which immensely benefit from the resources, space, and programs it offers. With this infusion of funds, the Center is poised to strengthen its role, ensuring the Armenian legacy and culture remain vividly alive and thriving in Burbank.

https://myburbank.com/friedman-secures-crucial-funding-for-the-burbank-armenian-cultural-foundations-renovations/

PACE has called on Azerbaijan to “create a climate of trust and the material conditions” for Armenians from Nagorno-Karabakh to be able to return to their homeland – including active steps to encourage and reassure them to do so.

In a resolution based on a report by Domagoj Hajduković (Croatia, SOC) following an urgent debate, the Assembly regretted the “long-standing and continuing failure on the part of the authorities of Azerbaijan to reassure the Armenian population of the region of their safety and the full respect of their rights”.

Almost the entire Armenian population of the region had left their ancestral homeland and fled to Armenia “out of a genuine threat of physical extinction, a long-standing policy of hatred in Azerbaijan towards Armenians, and a lack of trust in their future treatment”, the parliamentarians pointed out.

“It is not too late for Azerbaijan to redress the situation and prove its goodwill,” they said, noting Azerbaijan’s promises that the rights and freedoms of Armenian residents will be ensured, and its plans with respect to the reintegration of Armenian residents.

The Assembly also said the massive exodus of almost the entire Armenian population from the region had led to “allegations and reasonable suspicion that this can amount to ethnic cleansing”. Noting Azerbaijan’s strong statements refuting such allegations and suspicions, it called on the authorities to “spare no efforts in proving in deeds and words that this is not the case”.

By the time the last bus carrying ethnic Armenians from Nagorno-Karabakh arrived in Goris, an Armenian city on the border with Azerbaijan, the scale of the tragedy had become clear.

The 19 September lightning offensive by Azerbaijan ended thirty years of self-rule in the breakaway region, located within its borders but – historically and as a result of the long-running conflict – inhabited almost exclusively by ethnic Armenians.

Over 100,000 people, almost the entirety of the region’s population, streamed through the border and sought shelter in Armenia, whose government – just like the rest of the world – never recognised what the refugees call the Republic of Artsakh, despite being its closest ally.

As a result of the offensive and under pressure from a stifling blockade in place for nearly a year, the government of Artsakh announced it would disband all its institutions by January next year.

"While Azerbaijan has stated it would 'guarantee the rights' of Armenians who want to return to their homes in Nagorno-Karabakh, Armenians accuse it of ethnic cleansing"

The territory of Nagorno-Karabakh is internationally recognised as part of Azerbaijan. In the wake of the dissolution of the Soviet Union in the 1990s, ethnic Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh fought a war to secede from Azerbaijan, supported by Armenian forces.

The events of those years saw atrocities on both sides and resulted in the expulsion of more than 700,000 Azeris from Armenia, Nagorno-Karabakh, and the surrounding territories. An estimated 300,000 to 500,000 Armenians were displaced from Azerbaijan.

Peace negotiations led by the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) Minsk Group over the years failed to result in a settlement, and a low-intensity conflict continued.

All-out war flared up again in 2020, which saw Azerbaijan – backed by Turkey and strong from its oil boom – recover 80 percent of the territories previously lost, including one-third of Nagorno-Karabakh itself.

The rest of the territory was patrolled by a Russian 'peacekeeping' force following a Moscow-brokered ceasefire. Traditionally a close ally of Armenia, ties between the two countries have become strained over the last year.

Armenia's prime minister Nikol Pashinyan, a former journalist who came to power in 2018 after leading a protest movement against corrupt post-soviet elites, has made several moves, mostly symbolic, distancing his country from Russia.

That tension, as well as Russia's engagement in its war in Ukraine, could be the reason Russian forces on the ground in Nagorno-Karabakh failed to prevent the closure of the Lachin corridor connecting the enclave to Armenia in December 2022.

For months, the people of Nagorno-Karabakh had been queueing in breadlines and struggling to procure medicine and other essential items. Malnutrition and exhaustion clearly marked many of the faces of the thousands that crossed into Goris every day.

While Azerbaijan has stated it would “guarantee the rights” of Armenians who want to return to their homes in Nagorno-Karabakh, Armenians accuse it of ethnic cleansing.

“It was the latest in a larger escalation,” Richard Giragosian, director of the Regional Studies Centre in Yerevan, told The New Arab.

“So the fear in Armenia is Azerbaijan will not stop, will not be satisfied,” he added, explaining that the country is concerned about Russian “either complicity or incapacity”.

In the latest signal of its distancing from Russia, the Armenian parliament has voted to join the International Criminal Court (ICC), which binds the country to arrest Putin over war crimes in Ukraine should the Russian president set foot on its territory.

Yet Armenia remains a member of the Russia-led Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO). It also imports over 80 percent of its gas from Russia.

“I think the Armenian government is cutting its losses in terms of Nagorno-Karabakh and challenging the relationship with Russia,” Giragosian said. “But we're smart enough here in Armenia not to see NATO membership as the answer to all of our problems.”

"'It's less about Armenia looking to the West, as the West looking to Armenia'"

Filling the void

After the Azerbaijani offensive, hundreds of opposition protesters rallied in Yerevan. They called on Armenian president Pashinyan to resign over the crisis, calling him a “traitor.”

“This government was actually re-elected despite losing the war in 2020,” Giragosian explained. He believes that frustration over the fall of Nagorno-Karabakh will not topple the government. “I expect much of the frustration to shift away from the government and to target Russia for its inability to defend the Armenians."

Washington and Brussels have been moving to fill the void left by Russia. In January 2023, the EU launched a civilian monitoring mission in Armenia. “It's less about Armenia looking to the West, as the West looking to Armenia,” Giragosian said.

During a visit to Yerevan on 3 October, French foreign minister Catherine Colonna promised to supply military equipment to Armenia.

In response, Azerbaijan's president Ilham Aliyev said that France would be to blame for any new war in Armenia. Aliyev also boycotted a long-planned meeting with Pashinyan in Granada, Spain, in early October, which was attended by EU Council President Charles Michel, French President Emmanuel Macron and Germany's Olaf Scholz.

While some EU politicians have called for sanctions on Azerbaijan, Michel invited both Pashinyan and Aliyev to meet in Brussels by the end of October. On a visit to Tbilisi on 8 October, president Aliyev said Azerbaijan is ready to hold talks with Armenia, indicating Georgia as the preferred host for negotiations.

“This is the most promising moment there has ever been to get to a lasting peace,” said Matthew Bryza, an American diplomat and former co-chair of the OSCE Minsk Group, which included the US, France and Russia.

The Armenian side has also been signalling its willingness to sit down at the negotiating table. "Endless war is not beneficial for anyone," parliament speaker Alen Simonian told Armenian public television on 25 September.

“Armenia does not have any capacity to wage another war against Azerbaijan. Its military has been decimated in the last war,” said Bryza.

“If there were to be another flare-up of armed conflict, it wouldn't provide any hope to the Armenian side unless the Armenian military completely rebuilt itself. And that's not really something anyone's talking about,” he added.

Still, some analysts warn that disputes over border areas and trade routes could further prolong the conflict.

“The Azerbaijani strategy in this campaign is largely driven by domestic politics,” explained Giragosian.

“I see a father and son dynasty, authoritarian. A family ruling the country for over a quarter of a century, and needing conflict to distract the population from the lack of democracy and corruption.”

Ylenia Gostoli is a reporter currently based in Istanbul, Turkey. She has covered politics, social change, and conflict across the Middle East and Europe. Her work on refugees, migration and human trafficking has won awards and grants

https://www.newarab.com/analysis/how-nagorno-karabakh-shifted-regional-balance-power