Monday,
Karabakh Halts Public Transport Due To Blockade
• Susan Badalian
Nagorno-Karabakh - People walk past a closed gas station in Askeran, July 18,
2023.
Nagorno-Karabakh’s public transport system will be brought to a complete halt on
Tuesday because of severe shortages of fuel caused by Azerbaijan’s continuing
blockade of the Armenian-populated region.
Karabakh authorities said on Monday that they have run out of scarce fuel
reserved from buses and minibuses. They already suspended earlier this month
public transport in Stepanakert and curtailed bus services with other Karabakh
towns and villages for the same reason.
The vast majority of vehicles in Karabakh are powered by natural gas which was
supplied from Armenia before being pressurized and sold at local gas stations.
Azerbaijan disrupted a steady flow of the gas shortly after blocking commercial
traffic through the Lachin corridor last December. A gas pipeline feeding
Karabakh was most recently unblocked for just a few hours on July 8.
Baku tightened the blockade on June 15, banning emergency relief supplies that
were carried out by Russian peacekeepers and the International Committee of the
Red Cross through the sole road connecting Karabakh to Armenia and the outside
world. The move aggravated the shortages of food, medicine and other essential
items experienced by the region’s population.
The fuel crisis not only disrupted travel but also complicated food supplies
inside Karabakh. Local farmers now have trouble taking their produce to markets,
and there are growing problems with the delivery of flour to bakeries.
Nagorno-Karabakh -- A banner in Stepanakert in July 2023.
“It is very difficult to get the flour here,” Lyudmila Mezhlumian, a bakery
worker in Stepanakert, told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service.
Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan warned last week that Karabakh is now
“on the verge of starvation” as he urged stronger international pressure on
Azerbaijan. The United States, the European Union and Russia have repeatedly
called for an end to the Azerbaijani blockade. Baku has dismissed their appeals.
The humanitarian crisis is also affecting Karabakh’s struggling healthcare
system. The head of an intensive care unit at Karabakh’s main children’s
hospital said on Monday that it is increasingly hard for the parents of
seriously ill children living outside Stepanakert to transport them to the
facility.
Baku has frequently banned evacuations of Karabakh patients to hospitals in
Armenia carried out by only the ICRC during the blockade. It most recently
unblocked them last week after requiring those patients to be checked by
Azerbaijani medical personnel while passing through its checkpoint in the Lachin
corridor. The Karabakh premier, Gurgen Nersisian, said at the weekend that Red
Cross officials “somehow managed to convince” the Azerbaijani side not to film
“that process.”
Karabakh’s main security service said on Monday that local residents are
receiving Russian-language phone calls offering to help them safely “go to
Armenia via Baku.” It urged them to ignore the Azerbaijani “disinformation.”
Armenian FM Visits Iran
Iran - Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi meets Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat
Mirzoyan, Tehran, .
Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan discussed with Iran’s leaders Armenia’s ongoing
peace talks with Azerbaijan and described the Islamic Republic as his country’s
“special partner” during a visit to Tehran on Monday.
The Armenian Foreign Ministry said Mirzoyan briefed Iranian President Ebrahim
Raisi on the “latest developments in the process of normalization of
Armenia-Azerbaijan relations” and reaffirmed the Armenian government’s position
on the “establishment of lasting peace in the South Caucasus.”
The issue also topped the agenda of his separate talks with Iranian Foreign
Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian held earlier in the day. Mirzoyan complained
about Azerbaijan’s continuing blockade of Nagorno-Karabakh’s only land link with
Armenia, saying that it is hampering a peace deal currently discussed by Baku
and Yerevan.
Iran’s official IRNA news agency reported that, Mohammad Jamshidi, a top aide to
Raisi quoted him as warning against U.S. involvement in Armenian-Azerbaijani
peace talks.
“These negotiations have to be carried out based on the interests of the [two]
nations and without political conspiracies involving America and the Zionist
regime [Israel,]” Raisi said, according to Jamshidi.
In recent months, the United States has been at the forefront of international
efforts to broker a comprehensive peace treaty between Baku and Yerevan.
Mirzoyan and his Azerbaijani counterpart Jeyhun Bayramov held two rounds of
intensive U.S.-mediated talks in May and June.
They are scheduled to meet in Moscow on Tuesday for fresh talks that will be
hosted by Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. Russia has been very critical
of the U.S. peace efforts, saying that their main goal is to squeeze it out of
the region, rather than end the Karabakh conflict.
Raisi was also reported to reaffirm Tehran’s strong opposition to any
“geopolitical” border changes in the South Caucasus.
Iranian leaders have frequently made such statements in response to Azerbaijan’s
demands for an extraterritorial corridor to its Nakhichevan exclave that would
pass through Syunik, the sole Armenian province bordering Iran. They have warned
that the Islamic Republic would not tolerate attempts to strip it of the common
border and transport links with Armenia.
Mirzoyan praised Tehran’s stance on the “inviolability of our state borders”
during a joint news briefing with Amir-Abdollahian.
“For us, Iran has always been and remains and will continue to be a special
partner, including in overcoming the challenges in the current difficult
conditions,” he said.
According to another Iranian news agency, Mehr, the Armenian minister assured
Raisi that Armenia “will never become a platform for anti-Iranian actions” and
remains committed to deepening Armenian-Iranian ties.
Armenia’s Ruling Party Accused Of Electoral Foul Play
• Naira Bulghadarian
Armenia - Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian speaks at a congress of his Civil
Contract party, Yerevan, October 29, 2022.
An Armenian civic group has accused Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian’s Civil
Contract party and local government officials affiliated with it of abusing
their administrative resources to facilitate the party’s victory in forthcoming
municipal elections in Yerevan.
In an extensive investigative report released late last week, the Union of
Informed Citizens (UIC) said that the administration of a major local community
comprising the town of Spitak and surrounding villages is drawing up lists of
its Yerevan-based natives promising to vote for Civil Contract and its mayoral
candidate, Tigran Avinian, in the elections slated for September. It said the
process is overseen by Gevorg Papoyan, the ruling party’s deputy chairman.
The accusations are based on recorded phone calls between local officials and an
UIC activist posing as an aide to Papoyan. The audio of those conversations was
posted on the group’s fact-checking website.
Spitak’s deputy mayor, Hovik Hovhannisian, and six village chiefs can be heard
saying that they already have or will soon have such lists. Hovannisian says
that he personally spoke to 30 relatives and other Spitak-born residents of
Yerevan and that 23 of them assured him that they will vote for Pashinian’s
party.
In his words, Spitak officials explain to such voters “just how bad thing will
be for them” if Civil Contract loses the polls. They hope to earn the party
1,000 votes in this way, he says, adding that Spitak Mayor Kajayr Nikoghosian is
“100 percent” involved in the effort.
Armenia - Gevorg Papoyan.
Papoyan rejected the UIC report as slanderous and said he will file a defamation
suit against the Western-funded organization. Speaking to RFE/RL’s Armenian
Service at the weekend, the Civil Contract vice-chairman denied issuing
election-related instructions to the authorities in Spitak or any other
community. He said at the same time that the local officials are affiliated with
Pashinian’s party and have a right to campaign for its election victory.
The UIC leader, Daniel Ioannisian, countered that the officials admitted
ordering their subordinates to participate in that campaign. “If this is not a
case of abuse of administrative resources, then what is?” he said.
Armenia’s Office of the Prosecutor-General on Monday pledged to look into the
UIC allegations after being asked by RFE/RL’s Armenian Service to comment on it.
It is not clear why the prosecutors did not do that right after the release of
the report.
Ioannisian noted that such election-related practices were widespread under
Armenia’s former governments and that Pashinian for years decried them.
Pashinian and his political team claim to have eliminated electoral fraud in the
country after coming to power in 2018. The prime minister regularly states that
power finally “belongs to the people.”
His political opponents dispute the claim. They expressed serious concern over
the freedom and fairness of future Armenian elections after Pashinian installed
last October a longtime ally, Vahagn Hovakimian, as chairman of the Central
Election Commission. Hovakimian was a senior member of Civil Contract until the
appointment.
Opposition Lawmaker Sues Over Loss Of Parliament Post
• Artak Khulian
Armenia - Taguhi Tovmasian speaks druring a news conference in Yerevan, October
10, 2022.
An opposition lawmaker has asked a court in Yerevan to reinstate her as
chairwoman of the Armenian parliament’s standing committee on human rights.
The parliament’s pro-government majority voted to oust Taguhi Tovmasian on July
11 on the grounds that she did not attend most meetings of the parliament’s
leadership. It also claimed that Tovmasian did not stop “hate speech” when her
committee discussed on April 4 candidacies for the then vacant post of Armenia’s
human rights ombudsman.
Edgar Ghazarian, the opposition candidate for the post, enraged pro-government
deputies with his claim that the 2018 “velvet revolution” that brought Pashinian
to power was in fact a “Turkish-Azerbaijani revolution.” They shouted abuse and
threats at Ghazarian during the meeting chaired by Tovmasian.
Tovmasian, who is affiliated with the opposition Pativ Unem bloc, maintains that
that she did nothing wrong on April 4. She has also argued that the
parliamentary statutes did not require her to attend meetings of the National
Assembly’s Council consisting of speaker Alen Simonian, his deputies as well as
the committee chairpersons.
Tovmasian told reporters on Monday that she wants the court to invalidate her
ouster condemned by Pativ Unem and the other parliamentary opposition force, the
Hayastan alliance. She said it was “illegal” also because the parliament debated
it in her absence. Tovmasian said she had notified the parliament in advance
that she cannot attend the session because of being on sick leave.
“They can’t silence me by removing me from the post of the committee
chairperson,” added the former journalist and newspaper editor.
Prior to her dismissal, Tovmasian was the last remaining opposition head of a
parliament committee. Hayastan’s Ishkhan Saghatelian and Vahe Hakobian were
ousted as deputy speaker and chairman of the parliament committee on economic
affairs respectively in July 2022 after weeks of anti-government protests
organized by Hayastan and Pativ Unem. Another Hayastan deputy, Armen Gevorgian,
immediately resigned as chairman of a committee on “Eurasian integration” in
protest.
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.
Author: Zhanna Nahapetian
Asbarez: Civic Groups in Armenia Alarmed About EU’s Ongoing Backing of Azerbaijan
Azerbaijan installed a concrete barrier on the Lachin Corridor on June 22
Leading civic organizations in Armenia issued a statement sounding the alarm about the European Union’s continued support for Azerbaijan, the latest manifestation of which came through a statement by European Council President Charles Michel, who backed Baku’s scheme to send humanitarian aid to Artsakh via Aghdam (Akna), bypassing Armenia.
Michel told reporters following a meeting he hosted between Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and President Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan on Saturday that the Aghdam option should be considered while calling on Baku to open the Lachin Corridor.
“We are concerned that the announcement equates the Lachin Corridor to Aghdam as an option to address the current humanitarian crisis. This proposal ignores the fact that the source of the humanitarian crisis is Azerbaijan’s continued blockade of Nagorno-Karabakh, subjecting its population to famine and malnutrition to force them to submit to their demands, or worse, push them physically out of the territory,” said the statement.
“Furthermore, it does not solve other ongoing violations of human rights, including freedom of movement, access to health services, access to education, etc. We fear that should this proposal be pursued, it will worsen the current dire situation, putting the lives of people in Nagorno-Karabakh at risk,” the statement added.
“There is no alternative to the Lachin Corridor,” the groups said, adding that the International Court of Justice has confirmed the importance of ensuring unimpeded movement along the road in its order, which was reaffirmed earlier this month. Azerbaijan continued to ignore this order.
“Instead of addressing the root cause of the humanitarian crisis, the discussion of ‘alternative’ routes, such as Aghdam, diverts the international community’s attention from the source of the problem – the illegal blockade of a humanitarian corridor and the policy of ethnic cleansing by the Azerbaijani government,” explained the civic groups.
“Making the Aghdam road operational would directly support this policy by giving additional political and economic leverage to Azerbaijan over the Armenian population in Karabakh and further undermine their rights,” the statement added.
“Using hunger as a negotiation tactic should not be normalized,” the civic groups emphasized. “If the current situation of a total blockade persists, the act of offering food and supplies through Aghdam is tantamount to taking hostages and undermines any efforts to build trust between Nagorno-Karabakh and Azerbaijan within the context of a possible Baku-Stepanakert dialogue.”
“Should the international community yield to Azerbaijan’s unlawful actions and clear intentions of ethnic cleansing, it would effectively validate the wrongful closure of the Lachin Corridor and the captivity of 120,000 individuals since December 2022. Furthermore, this endorsement would legitimize the non-adherence to the ICJ’s order and discredit all existing and future agreements or international legal rulings,” the statement asserted.
In his statement ton Saturday, Michel also referred to efforts to facilitate the release of soldiers who inadvertently cross to the other side.
“While this is an important issue,” the civic organizations said, “it is crucial that the fate of all detainees and prisoners of war is not forgotten.”
“There are at least 35 confirmed prisoners of war and other civilian detainees in Azerbaijan. There have been reliable reports that they have been subjected to torture and inhuman and degrading treatment. Two of them were kidnapped earlier this year from Armenia proper, and the court in Azerbaijan sentenced them to lengthy prison sentences for ‘trespassing’ for allegedly attempting to supply a group of ‘saboteurs’ and for ‘armed terrorism conspiracy,’” the statement pointed out.
“Similar sham trials have also occurred in relation with other detainees captured during and after the 44-day war. It is obvious that access to justice is impossible under the current circumstances. Moreover, Azerbaijan appears to hold these detainees as a bargaining chip during the process of negotiations,” added the groups.
The civic organizations called on the international community to “prioritize efforts to immediately unblock the Lachin Corridor in accordance with the ICJ ruling, unite efforts in facilitating the immediate and unconditional release of all prisoners of war and other detained persons.”
Armenpress: Diversified cooperation, not a fundamental change of security system – analyst on Armenia-United States defense ties
09:16,
YEREVAN, JULY 19, ARMENPRESS. The Armenia-United States military cooperation has a history of many years and isn’t a new thing in principle, and taking into account Defense Minister Suren Papikyan’s recent visit to France, it is obvious that Yerevan seeks to obtain guarantees from its Western partners regarding both its security system and deepening the cooperation and finding alternative options in the defense area in order to withstand existing challenges, according to military-political analyst Davit Harutyunov.
Harutyunov spoke to ARMENPRESS on the cooperation between Armenia and the United States in the defense area.
The Chief of the General Staff of the Armenian Armed Forces, First Deputy Minister of Defense, Lieutenant General Edward Asryan visited Washington D.C., on July 17-18 and participated in the conference dedicated to the U.S. National Guard State Partnership Program's 30th Anniversary.
Throughout the event, meetings were held with the Chief of the National Guard Bureau, General Daniel R. Hokanson, the Director for Strategy, Plans and Policy, United States European Command, Major General Daniel Lasica, and the Adjutant General, Commander of Kansas National Guard, Brigadier General Michael T. Venerdi.
During the meetings, the current status and prospects for the development of the Armenia-Kansas partnership within the framework of the program and a number of issues related to bilateral cooperation with the United States were discussed.
“It’s clear what Armenia seeks, because our security system is experiencing a certain crisis in terms of external guarantees due to the Russian-Ukrainian conflict and Russia’s preoccupation with it. Nonetheless, cooperation with the United States is still limited due to objective reasons. In general, it’s a difficult process, and thus far no guarantees that the West could provide are visible. This is more about a diversified cooperation and not a fundamental change of Armenia’s security system,” Harutyunov said.
According to the analyst, the cooperation basically relates to the modification of the security system, encompassing the working experience of the past 20-30 years. Despite the West’s increasing weight in the recent period, Armenia still doesn’t have the necessary resources for any fundamental changes, Harutyunov said.
“The United States clearly understands that Armenia is closely integrated with the CSTO and has more comprehensive ties with Russia in the security field, therefore changing something at once would be simply impossible. But on the other hand this is a secondary circumstance, because some of the other CSTO members are rather effectively cooperating with the United States itself, and being a member of the CSTO isn’t a disruptive factor at all. Nevertheless, South Caucasus isn’t a priority region for the United States, and Washington doesn’t view South Caucasian countries to be a constituent part of its security system,” he added.
Some believe that closer integration with the West could open a new front against Russia in our region, Harutyunov noted.
Furthermore, Harutyunov said that integration would require huge resources which are now scarce because of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, and noted other factors such as East Asia and China. Moreover, closer cooperation with Armenia could cause Turkey’s discontent because Turkey is in a higher position than Armenia for the United States.
“In our case, changing the security system and the military arsenal would definitely imply rather serious resources and funds. In a best case scenario, we could speak about buying limited, individual elements of Western production and integrating them into our system, just like in the case of Indian-made armaments. Theoretically, the American side could provide us with a variety of armaments, but that equipment is very expensive. We don’t have the necessary resources for acquiring the kind of systems they have. And after all, the American military industrial complex is first of all supporting its allies,” Harutyunov said.
The analyst explained that the Armenian-American military cooperation is generally developing within the framework of the programs as part of NATO, as well as in the context of structural reforms in the Armenian Ministry of Defense, trainings of specialists, partnership between the two militaries, as well as involvement in peacekeeping missions.
Interview by Manvel Margaryan
Pashinyan-Michel-Aliyev trilateral meeting kicks off in Brussels
15:14,
YEREVAN, JULY 15, ARMENPRESS. The trilateral meeting between Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan, President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev and President of the European Council Charles Michel has started in Brussels.
ARMENPRESS reports, Nikol Pashinyan and Charles Michel met before the tripartite meeting. At the request of the President of Nagorno-Karabakh, the Prime Minister of Armenia conveyed the letter of the President of Nagorno-Karabakh to Charles Michel.
Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan, President of the European Council Charles Michel and President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev met in a trilateral format in Brussels on May 14. On June 1, a five-sided meeting was held in Chişinău with the participation of Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, European Council President Charles Michel, French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev.
Azerbaijan blocks vital route linking enclave to Armenia
France –
Baku announced the suspension of traffic on the Nagorno-Karabakh Lachin corridor on Tuesday, citing 'smuggling' activity on the part of the Armenian branch of the Red Cross.
Pressure is rising again in the disputed enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh. On Tuesday, July 11, Azerbaijan announced the suspension of road traffic in the Lachin corridor, the only road linking Armenia to this separatist territory, at the heart of a thirty-year conflict between Baku and Yerevan.
Azerbaijan says it took this measure because of "multiple smuggling attempts" via this checkpoint by vehicles belonging to the Armenian branch of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). In particular, border guards claim to have seized, between July 1 and July 5, around ten cell phones and hundreds of packs of cigarettes during search operations in these vehicles and have accused the NGO of failing to take steps to prevent these "illegal actions." The border crossing will have to remain closed until the "necessary investigations" are completed, they said. A criminal investigation has been opened.
The ICRC immediately denied wrongdoing, claiming that "no unauthorized goods were found" in one of its vehicles. The Geneva-based organization added, however, that it "regret[ted] that without [its] knowledge four hired drivers tried to transport some commercial goods in their own vehicles which were temporarily displaying the ICRC emblem." "These individuals," it asserted, "were not ICRC staff members and their service contracts were immediately terminated by the ICRC.”
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The Defense Army did not fire at the Azerbaijani positions in the occupied territories of Shushi region – MoD Artsakh
14:43,
YEREVAN, 12 JULY, ARMENPRESS. The statement released by the Ministry of Defense of Azerbaijan claiming that [Artsakh] Defense Army units opened fire around 09:25, July 12 at Azerbaijan’s positions located in the occupied territories of the Shushi region is yet another disinformation, ARMENPRESS reports, the Ministry of Defense of Artsakh said in a statement.
Azerbaijan Suspends Traffic Between Armenia And Nagorno-Karabakh
Azerbaijan assures that it is provisional. The country’s border guards announced in a statement on Tuesday July 11 that they had suspended “temporarily” traffic in the Lachin corridor, the only road linking Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh. The border guards motivated this measure by “multiple smuggling attempts” with vehicles belonging to the Armenian branch of the Red Cross through this checkpoint. They add that a criminal investigation has been opened and that the border post will be closed until the end of “necessary investigative measures”.
Since December 2022, Armenia has accused its neighbor of hindering supplies to the breakaway region and creating a humanitarian crisis there by blocking this corridor. Initially, Baku claimed that Azerbaijani environmental activists were blocking the road to expose illegal mines. In April, Azerbaijan then announced that it had installed, on grounds “safe”this checkpoint giving access from Armenia to the Lachin corridor.
At the end of June, the Armenian branch of the Red Cross announced that medical deliveries to Nagorno-Karabakh hospitals as well as transport of seriously ill patients had been suspended through the corridor.
The two countries have been fighting over the region since the late 1980s, resulting in two wars, the last of which, in 2020, saw the defeat of Armenian forces and significant territory gains for Azerbaijan. Part of the enclave, located in Azerbaijan, remains under the control of Armenian separatists, but it is now surrounded by territories held by Baku. Armenia also accuses Russian peacekeepers, deployed in Nagorno-Karabakh since the end of 2020, of failing in their obligation to ensure traffic on the Lachin corridor.
Armenpress: Armenia celebrates Constitution Day
09:00, 5 July 2023
YEREVAN, JULY 5, ARMENPRESS. July 5 marks Constitution Day in Armenia, a public holiday honoring the adoption of the constitution through a nationwide referendum on July 5, 1995. Since then, the constitution has been amended twice through nationwide referendums (in 2005 and 2015).
The constitution established Armenia as a sovereign, democratic, social state governed by the rule of law.
The 2015 amendments changed the political structure from a semi-presidential system to a parliamentary republic.
With 220 articles, the constitution defines the human being as the highest value in the Republic of Armenia, the public power’s duty to protect and respect the rights and freedoms of the people and that state power shall be exercised in conformity with the constitution and the laws, based on the separation and balance of the legislative, executive and judicial powers.
ARMENPRESS, BelTA open joint photo exhibition in Minsk on 30th anniversary of diplomatic ties between Armenia and Belarus
13:00,
YEREVAN, JUNE 29, ARMENPRESS. ARMENPRESS State News Agency is co-sponsoring a photo exhibition dedicated to the 30th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Armenia and Belarus. The exhibition titled “Armenia Through the Lens of a Belarusian Photographer and Belarus Through the Lens of an Armenian Photographer" will be opened together with BelTA, the Belarusian Telegraph Agency at the National Museum of History of Belarus in Minsk on June 29.
The event is organized by the Armenian Embassy in Belarus, with support from ARMENPRESS and BelTA.
“We highly value cooperation with our Belarusian partner and such initiatives which show the cultural similarities of the two countries, allow the societies to explore one another, the tourism attractions and historical landmarks. Armenian Ambassador to Belarus Razmik Khumaryan’s efforts in realizing this project have been invaluable,” ARMENPRESS Director Narine Nazaryan said, adding that the exhibition will further strengthen cooperation between ARMENPRESS and BelTA and lay the foundation for many more joint projects.
100 selected pictures at the exhibition will present the culture, traditions and nature of Armenia and Belarus.
Photo by Mkhitar Khachatryan – ARMENPRESS
Belarus is presented through the lens of ARMENPRESS photojournalist Mkhitar Khachatryan, while Armenia is presented through the lens of BelTA photojournalist Leonid Scheglov. The exhibition will be open until August 15 in Belarus, before its opening in Armenia in autumn.
Photo by Mkhitar Khachatryan – ARMENPRESS