Author: Tatoyan Vazgen

Asbarez: ANCA Taking Action against Manufacturers of US Parts Found in Turkish Drones Used by Azerbaijan to Kill Civilians in Artsakh and Armenia

Tatoyan Vazgen

November 3,  2020



ANCA’s Stop Drone campaign

Battlefield Evidence Reveals Bayraktar Drones Include U.S. Components and Technology Developed in California, Kansas, South Carolina, and Texas

WASHINGTON— Battlefield evidence confirms that Turkey’s Bayraktar drones – deployed by Azerbaijan against civilians in Artsakh and Armenia – contain parts and technology from U.S. firms, U.S.-based affiliates of foreign firms, and firms located in NATO ally countries (UK, France, Germany, Austrian, and Netherlands), reported the Armenian National Committee of America.

“As Americans of Armenian heritage, we will not – as a matter of U.S. law, legal liability, and basic morality – allow American parts or technology to be used by Turkey and Azerbaijan to kill civilians across Artsakh and Armenia,” said ANCA Executive Director Aram Hamparian. “Join with us in demanding legislative action from Congress, a ban by the State Department, and the immediate halt by each of these firms of any current, pending, or future sales or transfers to Ankara and Baku.”

The ANCA has organized a two-pronged campaign, targeting both Congress and the U.S. companies selling drone parts that have been used by Turkey and Azerbaijan to kill Armenians – asking Congress to enforce Arms Export Control laws and the companies themselves to cease any and all sales or transfers that place Armenians at risk.

Documentation can be found at anca.org/proof, a link recently retweeted by New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof to his 2,000,000 followers.

Through a grassroots letter-writing campaign – anca.org/stopdrones — and direct outreach, the ANCA is providing information documenting violations of U.S. and international law – including U.S. Arms Export Control laws – to the State Department, Pentagon, Justice Department and the U.S. Congress.

Separately, the ANCA is leading a daily call-tweet-write campaign to U.S. manufacturers encouraging them to stop sales and transfers, starting with Garmin, earlier Tuesday.

A part-by-part analysis obtained by the ANCA reveals that the following Bayraktar drone parts and technology are sourced in the United States:

  • Airborne Modem Transceiver, produced by ViaSat in Carlsbad, CA
  • Antenna, produced by Comant Industries in Fullerton, CA
  • GPS Receiver, Trimble Navigation, Sunnyvale, CA
  • Fuel Filter, produced by the US affiliate of German firm Hengst, in Camden, SC
  • Stub Bus Coupler, produced by MilesTek, in Lewisville, TX
  • GPS Navigation Unit, produced the U.S. affiliate of Swiss firm Garmin, Olathe, KS
  • Optical Unit, produced by U.S. affiliate of Canadian firm produced by Wescam, Orlando, FL
  • Radar Altimetre, produced by U.S. affiliate of German firm Smart Microwave Sensors, Irvine, CA
  • Sealed Fuel Reservoir, produced by U.S. affiliate of French firm Beringer, Greenville, SC



Azerbaijani troops flee from battlefield in panic

Tatoyan Vazgen

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 19:37,

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 30, ARMENPRESS. Suffering huge manpower losses, the servicemen of the Azerbaijani army fled from their positions in panic in Berdzor direction of Artsakh, ARMENPRESS reports the Information Center of Artsakh informs.

‘’Today the Azerbaijani armed forces were particularly active in the left wing of Berdzor direction of the frontline. Suffering huge manpower losses during the military operations, the servicemen of the Azerbaijani army fled from their positions in panic’’, reads the statement.

Military operations aimed at discovering and neutralizing the Azerbaijani subversive groups continued in some separate regions of Artsakh.

‘’One military equipment of the adversary was destroyed by an artillery fire nearby Tsaghkaberd’’, the Information Center said.

Tycoon Samvel Karapetyan vows to rebuild Stepanakert hospital after Azeri air strike

Tatoyan Vazgen

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 10:46,

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 29, ARMENPRESS. The billionaire tycoon Samvel Karapetyan, the owner of the Tashir Group conglomerate, has vowed to rebuild the maternity hospital of Stepanakert City that was destroyed by the Azerbaijani bombardment on October 28.

“I want to assure Artsakh’s people that we will certainly build a new, modern maternity hospital in Stepanakert. New lives will be born there again,” Karapetyan told RIA Novosti.

The maternity hospital of the capital city of Artsakh was hit by an Azeri air strike.

Editing and Translating by Stepan Kocharyan

PM Pashinyan tweets about civilian casualties, tags Donald Trump

Tatoyan Vazgen

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 00:52,

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 27, ARMENPRESS. Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan emphasized that civilians have been killed and injured as a result of Azerbaijan’s non compliance with the ceasefire, ARMENPRESS reports PM Pashinyan wrote in his Twitter micro blog, tagging the U.S. President Doanld Trump by whose efforts Armenia and Azerbaijan had agreed for a ceasefire.

‘’I would like to state that the efforts of the international community, this time brokered by the United States, to establish a ceasefire, have failed. As a result of continuous shelling by Azerbaijan, civilians were killed and wounded in Artsakh today’’, he wrote.

Despite the new ceasefire that was supposed to take effect 08:00 October 26, the Azerbaijani forces launched renewed attacks. The Azeri military also bombarded cities and villages of Artsakh.




LAUSD gives students day off for Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day

Tatoyan Vazgen
LA Daily News
Oct 7 2020
By LINH TAT | [email protected] |
PUBLISHED: October 6, 2020 at 11:58 p.m. | UPDATED: October 7, 2020 at 11:26 a.m.

The Los Angeles Unified school board passed an emergency resolution late Tuesday, Oct. 6, condemning Azerbaijan’s “unprovoked” attack on ethnic Armenians in the disputed territory of Nagorno-Karabakh, also known as Artsakh, as board members became the latest local officials to weigh in on the ongoing conflict overseas.

The board also voted unanimously in a separate resolution to give students the day off on April 24 of each year, starting next school year for Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day.

Los Angeles is home to the largest Armenian diaspora, and a number of students served by LAUSD are of Armenian descent.

Protests have taken place throughout L.A. County in recent days in response to the violence that erupted in Nagorno-Karabakh last week. The region lies within Azerbaijan but is controlled by ethnic Armenian forces. Both sides have blamed the other for the clashes.

But the LAUSD board made clear that members stand with the Armenian community.

“I am pleased that my colleagues joined me in calling out the outrageous and immoral attack on Armenia,” board member Scott Schmerelson, who sponsored the resolution, said in a statement. “Innocent Armenian civilians are dying as a result of this unprovoked attack on their country by Azerbaijan. It is important for people around the world to condemn the outrageous aggression.”

The resolution put forth by Schmerelson also called on the California State Teachers Retirement Fund to pull out of investments associated with the Republic of Turkey and for the Trump administration to unequivocally condemn Azerbaijan.

Earlier in the evening, during a discussion about giving students a day off to observe the Armenian Genocide, board member Jackie Goldberg said it’s critical for students to learn about the systemic killing of 1.5 million Armenians by the Turks during World War I — an event which the Turkish government has never recognized.

By allowing students to have the day off, “we are saying to the community that cares about this so deeply that we want to make sure that your children and your families do not have to choose between going to schools and commemorating an important and vital historic event, an event that all of us should have learned from, perhaps (sic) might have prevented the Holocaust that came some years later,” Goldberg said.

LAUSD board members now join other local elected officials in publicly stating their support for the Armenian community. L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti has also condemned the latest violence overseas.



​Azerbaijan claims advances in Karabakh, Armenia vows historic struggle

Tatoyan Vazgen
Reuters
Oct 3 2020
 
 
 
Azerbaijan claims advances in Karabakh, Armenia vows historic struggle
 
By Nvard Hovhannisyan, Nailia Bagirova
 
5 Min Read
 
YEREVAN/BAKU (Reuters) – Armenia said on Saturday it would use “all necessary means” to protect ethnic Armenians from attack by Azerbaijan, which said its forces had captured a string of villages in fighting over the mountain enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh.
 
Nagorno-Karabakh: 51 more killed in fighting with Azerbaijan
 
Ignoring a French attempt to mediate, the opposing sides pounded each other with rockets and missiles for a seventh day in the newest flare-up of a decades-old conflict that threatens to draw in Russia and Turkey.
 
The death toll rose to at least 230 in the fighting over Nagorno-Karabakh, an ethnic Armenian enclave inside Azerbaijan that broke away from its control in the 1990s.
 
Each side said it had destroyed hundreds of the other’s tanks. The Azeri side claimed gains, and President Ilham Aliyev sent congratulations to a military commander on the capture of a Karabakh village.
 
“Today the Azeri army raised the flag of Azerbaijan in Madagiz. Madagiz is ours,” Aliyev declared on social media. He later announced the capture of seven more villages.
 

Hundreds of people took to the streets of the Azeri capital Baku in celebration, waving flags and placards reading “Karabakh was and will be ours”.

It was not possible to independently verify the situation on the ground.

Armenian Defence Ministry official Artsrun Hovhannisyan said the situation was changing frequently. “In such a large war such changes are natural. We can take a position, then leave it in an hour,” he told reporters.

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan told his countrymen in a televised address that fighting all along the front was intense.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Armenia-Azerbaijan clashes: US, others must intervene as conflict escalates, experts say

Tatoyan Vazgen
Fox News
Sept 28 2020
By Hollie McKay | Fox News

It has mostly fallen into the lapse of being a frozen, forgotten fight, but the long-simmering tensions between Armenia and Azerbaijan reached new heights on Sunday – threatening serious implications for NATO and the looming possibility of an all-out war.

The most vitriolic clashes since 2016 erupted in the mountainous, thickly foliaged Nagorno-Karabakh terrain in the South Caucasus – a landlocked region not only defined by decades of tensions between the two countries but also a pivotal ingress for oil pipelines exporting to the globe.

"The resumption of fighting across the Azeri-Armenian border comes at a fragile, fraught time for the region and the world. There is a very real possibility that this crisis could drag in larger countries, either as part of a proxy war or potentially in a direct confrontation," Brett Bruen, a former White House director of global engagements, told Fox News. "Each side accuses the other of starting this latest round of hostilities. Yet, neither seems to be doing much to end the conflict."

The Nagorno-Karabakh has been a source for skirmishes since the 1994 ceasefire between the two former Soviet nations. The terrain technically rests in Azerbaijan, as per international law, but it is generally defined as being controlled and populated by the ethnic Armenians – with Armenia's support to run its affairs independently from Baku, the Azerbaijan capital, since the Soviet Union fell almost three decades ago.

AZERBAIJAN, ARMENIA FIGHT OVER DISPUTED REGION AS TANKS DESTROYED, HELICOPTERS SHOT DOWN

The prized parcel – rich in minerals, mulberry groves and alpine meadows – is a point of patriotic pride for both the Muslim majority Azerbaijan and Christian-dominant Armenia.

However, Azerbaijan's ambassador to Washington, Elin Suleymanov, told Fox News on Monday morning that the spike in violence should come as no surprise.

"It is obvious that the status quo is unsustainable, this (escalation) was not unpredictable, nor a one-time event," he said, claiming Armenian officials have rejected their repeated offers for substantial negotiations. "They have basically said, this is what it is. We have occupied. But this isn't disputed territory – this is, by the law, part of Azerbaijan."

Azerbaijan claims that its neighbor provoked it with a steady accession of aggression since July, launching "crossfire attacks" that put civilians in harm's way.

While the Armenia Embassy did not immediately respond to a request for comment Monday, officials have contended it was Azerbaijani forces that first opened fire with both an air and artillery strike over the weekend.

Funds raised within the framework of Pan-Armenian telethon will also be directed to help Lebanese and Syrian Armenians

Tatoyan Vazgen
Arminfo, Armenia
Sept 25 2020

ArmInfo. At the end of November, a traditional fundraising event initiated by the Hayastan All-Armenian Fund will take place, which will be aimed at development  of the border communities of Armenia and Artsakh.

The proceeds, as before, will be used to implement programs to strengthen the health  system in border areas, supply communities with drinking and  irrigated water, and stimulate the development of renewable energy.

At the same time, according to  head of the Fund Haykak Arshamyan,  this year the component of assistance to small and medium-sized  businesses will be expanded. He stated this to journalists within the  framework of the event dedicated to the rebranding of ARARATBANK. In  particular, he said that according to preliminary plans, if earlier  SMEs were assisted in the development of greenhouses in border  communities, then this year the list of directions will be expanded. 

In addition, it is expected that assistance will be provided to the  Lebanese and Syrian Armenians who want to develop business in the  border communities of Armenia and Artsakh. "Let's try to be useful to  them," he stressed. 



Sports: Yervand Mkrtchyan scores gold medal in Romania

Tatoyan Vazgen
News.am, Armenia
Sept 20 2020

Armenia’s national athletics team is participating in the championship of the Balkan states in the Romanian city of Cluj.

Yervand Mkrtchyan performed excellently and scored a gold medal after running in 3 minutes, and 47 seconds during the 1,500-meter race, as reported the press service of the Armenian Athletic Federation.

Mkrtchyan will also participate in the 800-meter race.


Artsakh announces relocation of Seat of Parliament to Shushi

Tatoyan Vazgen

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 12:36,

YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 19, ARMENPRESS. The government of Artsakh has announced the relocation of its Seat of Parliament from the capital city of Stepanakert to Shushi, the mountain town liberated by the Armenian forces in 1992.

The relocation will officially take place on May 9, 2022, the 30th anniversary of the Liberation of Shushi.

Meanwhile, the building of the new seat of parliament is under construction.

In a statement issued on Saturday, the President of Artsakh Arayik Harutyunyan said the Free Fatherland and Justice factions of parliament have endorsed his proposal on moving the seat.

“I think the other factions of parliament will join their colleagues’ stance,” he said.

The building which is planned to be allocated for the seat of parliament was originally being built as a courthouse but was never finished.

Harutyunyan hailed the move as politically and practically significant, and noted its meaningful importance for revaluing “our historic and victorious city.”

Editing and Translating by Stepan Kocharyan