Author: Sonya Jalatian

                                        Tuesday, 


Russian Anti-War Fugitive Detained In Armenia

        • Anush Mkrtchian

RUSSIA – An anti-war poster in Moscow.


Police in Armenia briefly detained on Tuesday a Russian man prosecuted in Russia 
for painting anti-war graffiti.

The 31-year-old man, Nikita Kamensky, was detained at Yerevan’s Zvartnots 
airport shortly after his flight from Istanbul landed in the morning. A police 
officer there told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service that he was set free a few hours 
later after signing a pledge not to leave the country.

A short statement released by the Armenian police said Kamensky was put on 
Russian law-enforcement authorities’ wanted list in December for “vandalism.” It 
said nothing about his possible extradition to Russia.

Armenia’s National Security Service (NSS), which usually deals with extradition 
cases, refused to comment.

According to OVD Info, a Russian human rights group, Russian authorities 
launched criminal proceedings against Kamensky in July after he painted at a 
Moscow subway station graffiti protesting against Russia’s war in Ukraine. They 
interrogated him and searched his home at the time. He reportedly pledged not to 
leave Russia during the investigation.

Kamensky could not be reached for comment. Yury Alexeyev, a Russian 
antigovernment activist based in Armenia, said his friends have already asked 
Armenian lawyers to represent him and help prevent his extradition to Russia.

Alexeyev and several other Russian expats have staged protests in Yerevan over 
the past year against Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. None of them is known to 
have been deported from the country.

“Nikita’s case is interesting in the sense that we will see what Armenia can 
do,” said Alexeyev.

Artur Sakunts, an Armenian human rights activist, said that despite a 
Russian-Armenian treaty on mutual extradition of fugitive criminal suspects the 
Armenian authorities must not extradite Kamensky or any other Russian critic of 
the war facing “political persecution” at home.

The Russian government enacted last spring laws that effectively criminalized 
vocal opposition to the military campaign in Ukraine.



Russia Objects To Azeri Checkpoint At Lachin Corridor


Azerbaijan -- Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov at a joint press conference 
with his Azerbaijani counterpart Jeyhun Bayramov in Baku, .


Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov indicated on Tuesday Russia’s opposition to 
Azerbaijan’s desire to set up a checkpoint on the sole road connecting 
Nagorno-Karabakh to Armenia which was blocked by Baku more than two months ago.

Visiting Baku, Lavrov said traffic through the Lachin corridor must be regulated 
in strict conformity with a 2020 Armenian-Azerbaijani agreement that placed it 
under the control of Russian peacekeepers stationed in Karabakh.

“It calls for the free movement of solely civilian and humanitarian cargo and 
civilians,” Lavrov said after talks with his Azerbaijani counterpart Jeyhun 
Bayramov. “In our contacts, we are trying to achieve that first and foremost 
through the peacekeeping contingent. The setting up of any checkpoint there is 
not envisaged.”

“But it is possible to dispel, by technical means, suspicions that the corridor 
is not functioning as intended. We discussed that today,” he said.

Lavrov alluded to Azerbaijani allegations that Armenia shipped landmines to 
Karabakh through the corridor in breach of the 2020 ceasefire brokered by Moscow.

Both Yerevan and Stepanakert have strongly denied the allegations voiced both 
before and after Azerbaijani government-backed protesters blocked Karabakh’s 
land link with the outside world on December 12. The Armenian side views the 
blockade as a gross violation of the truce accord.

Lavrov called for a “swift and full unblocking of traffic along the Lachin 
corridor” during a January 17 phone call with Bayramov. He said the following 
day that Moscow told Baku that the Russian peacekeepers “can check each vehicle 
for the absence of prohibited, non-humanitarian, non-civilian goods in it.”

The blockade has still not been lifted. The Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry said 
last week that Baku wants to set up a checkpoint on Karabakh’s lifeline road in 
order to ensure its “transparent” functioning. Yerevan rejected the idea.



Armenia, Azerbaijan Still Disagree On Peace Treaty

        • Ruzanna Stepanian

Germany - U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken meets with Azerbaijani 
President Ilham Aliyev and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian at the Munich 
Security Conference in Munich, February 18, 2023.


Armenia and Azerbaijan continue to disagree on some key terms of a bilateral 
peace treaty discussed by them, parliament speaker Alen Simonian said on Tuesday.

“There are at least three or four things regarding which … we have differences,” 
Simonian told reporters. He refused to disclose them.

Simonian said that the signing of such a treaty is also hampered by new 
conditions periodically set by Azerbaijan as well as Azerbaijani “provocations” 
on the border between the two states.

Meanwhile, Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov accused Armenia of such 
obstruction.

“At the moment, the Armenian side is obstructing the signing of the peace 
treaty,” Bayramov said after holding talks in Baku with his Russian counterpart 
Sergei Lavrov. “We can see that they also refused to participate in the third 
round of negotiations.”

He appeared to refer to Yerevan’s decision to cancel in late December a planned 
meeting of the Russian, Armenian and Azerbaijani foreign ministers in protest 
against Azerbaijan’s blockade of the Lachin corridor.

Lavrov also mentioned that decision when he spoke during a joint news conference 
with Bayramov. He said he is still ready to organize the meeting with Bayramov 
and Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan in Moscow.

“The Armenian side has stated that it has no objection [to the meeting] but has 
not yet given its final consent,” added Lavrov.

Despite the continuing Azerbaijani blockade, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol 
Pashinian agreed to meet with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev in Munich on 
February 18 for talks organized by U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

Following the Munich talks Aliyev spoke of “progress” in Armenia’s position on 
the peace treaty which he hopes will help to restore full Azerbaijani control 
over Nagorno-Karabakh. Pashinian’s political opponents at home renewed 
afterwards their allegations that he has accepted Azerbaijan’s terms of the 
peace deal.

Meeting with Lavrov on Monday, Aliyev expressed hope that 2023 will be a 
“breakthrough year for the normalization of relations between Azerbaijan and 
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.

 

                                        Thursday, 


Baku Still Reluctant To Lift Karabakh Blockade Despite Court Order


Nagorno-Karabakh - Azerbaijani servicemen stand guard at a checkpoint at the 
Lachin corridor blocked by Azerbaijani protesters, December 26, 2022.


Azerbaijan remained in no rush to restore traffic through the sole road 
connecting Nagorno-Karabakh to Armenia on Friday two days after a relevant order 
issued by the United Nations’ top court.

In a “provisional measure” requested by Yerevan, the International Court of 
Justice (ICJ) acknowledged that the land link was “disrupted” by Azerbaijani 
protesters more than two months ago. It said Baku should “take all measures at 
its disposal to ensure unimpeded movement of persons, vehicles and cargo along 
the Lachin Corridor in both directions.”

The court based in The Hague pointed out that a Russian-brokered agreement that 
stopped the 2020 war in Nagorno-Karabakh commits Azerbaijan to guaranteeing safe 
passage through the corridor.

Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian on Thursday described the injunction as 
“extremely important.” He said that the ICJ “obligated Azerbaijan to open the 
corridor” and that Baku must at least tell the Azerbaijani government-backed 
protesters to stop blocking the road. Failure to do so “could and should lead to 
concrete international consequences,” added Pashinian.

The Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry responded by accusing Pashinian of 
misrepresenting the ICJ decision. It said the court did not conclude that the 
blockade was organized by Azerbaijan’s government.

A ministry statement said that Baku is interested in a “transparent” functioning 
of the Lachin corridor and wants to set up a permanent Azerbaijani checkpoint 
there for this reason.

Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan rejected on Wednesday the idea of such 
a checkpoint which Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev discussed with Pashinian 
at their February 18 meeting in Munich. He said it runs counter to the terms of 
the 2020 truce accord.

The ICJ issued the order during its ongoing hearings on lawsuits filed by 
Armenia and Azerbaijan against each other. Analysts believe that the court lacks 
real means of enforcing its decisions.



Turkish-Armenian Air Cargo Traffic Yet To Start

        • Nane Sahakian

TURKEY -- A general view over of Istanbul airrport, April 5, 2019


Commercial cargo shipments by air between Armenia and Turkey appear to have not 
begun yet nearly two months after the lifting of a long-standing Turkish ban.

The two neighboring states agreed to allow mutual air freight traffic last July 
after a series of normalization talks held by their senior representatives. 
Ankara notified Yerevan in early January that it has formally allowed such 
shipments.

Garik Minasian, the head of a customs terminal at Yerevan’s Zvartnots 
international airport, said on Friday that no cargo planes from Turkey have 
landed there since then. He insisted that no Turkish imports to Armenia are 
banned at the moment.

So far there have also been no indications of Armenian exporters airlifting 
cargo to Turkey. According to Gagik Musheghian, an Armenian businessman based in 
Istanbul, Ankara has still not lifted a ban on imports of Armenian goods which 
has been in place since the early 1990s.

“You can’t [legally] bring anything from Armenia to Turkey,” Musheghian told 
RFE/RL’s Armenian Service.

The ban had been imposed in conjunction with the closure of Turkey’s border with 
Armenia. Ankara has since made its opening as well as the establishment of 
diplomatic relations with Armenia conditional on an Armenian-Azerbaijani peace 
deal acceptable to Azerbaijan. Turkish leaders have repeatedly reaffirmed this 
precondition since the start of the normalization talks with Yerevan in January 
2022.

After visiting Ankara last week, Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan said that he 
and his Turkish counterpart Mevlut Cavusoglu agreed to speed up the 
normalization process. Speaking at a joint news conference with Mirzoyan, 
Cavusoglu appeared to link that process to the outcome of Armenian-Azerbaijani 
peace talks.

Armenia banned most Turkish imports during the 2020 war with Azerbaijan, citing 
Ankara’s “inflammatory calls,” arms supplies to Azerbaijan and “deployment of 
terrorist mercenaries to the conflict zone.” Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian’s 
government lifted the ban a year later.



Armenia Again Abstains From UN Vote On Ukraine


USA – The results of the UN General Assembly's vote on a resolution demanding 
that Russia "immediately" and "unconditionally" withdraw its troops from 
Ukraine. New York, 


Armenia abstained late on Thursday from voting on a UN General Assembly 
resolution demanding that Russia immediately and unconditionally withdraw its 
troops from Ukraine.

The resolution adopted on the eve of the one-year anniversary of Russia's 
invasion reaffirmed support for Ukraine's "sovereignty" and "territorial 
integrity" and called "for a cessation of hostilities." It was backed by 141 of 
the 193 UN member states.

"Russia is just as isolated with its war as it was a year ago," German Foreign 
Minister Annalena Baerbock said.

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba also expressed satisfaction, saying 
Russia has failed to "undermine the international order" and that the coalition 
in support of Ukraine remains broad and strong.

Russian Ambassador to the UN Vasily Nebenzia called Ukraine "neo-Nazi" during 
the debate preceding the vote. He accused the Western powers of sacrificing the 
country and the developing world in their desire to beat Russia.

Russia and six other countries -- Belarus, North Korea, Eritrea, Mali, 
Nicaragua, and Syria -- voted against the resolution.

Armenia was among 32 nations that abstained. They included China, India, Iran, 
and South Africa.

UKRAINE - A Ukrainian serviceman walks an empty street in the front line city of 
Bakhmut, February 21, 2023.

Armenia also abstained when the UN General Assembly condemned the Russian 
invasion in March and October 2022. Its government has not publicly condemned 
the Russian military campaign, let alone joined the Western sanctions against 
Moscow.

Prior to the invasion, Armenia had voted against General Assembly resolutions 
condemning Russia’s annexation of Crimea and upholding Ukrainian sovereignty 
over the Black Sea peninsula. For their part, Ukraine’s current and former 
governments have repeatedly voiced support for Azerbaijan in the 
Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

Russia has long been Armenia’s main military and political ally. Relations 
between Yerevan and Moscow have soured in recent months because of what Armenian 
leaders see as a lack of Russian support in the conflict with Azerbaijan.


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.