Category: 2019

Azerbaijani press: Seyidov: 2019 to be more successful for Azerbaijan

Mary Lazarian
3 January 2019 13:30 (UTC+04:00)

Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 3

By Elchin Mehdiyev – Trend:

2018 can be described as a year full of many important events both for the whole world and for Azerbaijan, Samad Seyidov, head of the Azerbaijani delegation to PACE, told Trend.

“The last year was important from the point of view of implementation of energy, transport and other projects,” Seyidov, who is also chairman of the parliamentary committee for international and interparliamentary relations, said. “The most memorable event of 2018 in Azerbaijan was the re-election of Ilham Aliyev as the president.”

Seyidov stressed that this should be regarded as the most important event of the year, as all other achievements are directly related to this event.

"The Azerbaijanis expressed their confidence towards President Aliyev, and it is natural that the president has been carrying out his work at the highest level,” he said. “Of course, Azerbaijan has achieved great success both in domestic and foreign policy."

Seyidov stressed that such events as including the issue related to Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity in the resolution of the European Parliament, determination of the status of the Caspian Sea, high-level foreign visits, including the arrival of presidents, prime ministers, foreign delegations to Azerbaijan, holding various international forums in the country, the work on Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP), Trans Anatolian Natural Gas Pipeline (TANAP), the opening of the STAR Refinery in Turkey by the Azerbaijani state oil company SOCAR can be mentioned.

“These and other achievements testify that 2018 was very successful,” Seyidov stressed.

He said that 2018 was also successful in terms of the development of Azerbaijan’s relations with neighboring countries.

"During 2018, Azerbaijan further developed relations with Turkey, Georgia, Iran and Russia,” he said. “Azerbaijan was able to attract more trust and positive attitude from the Collective Security Treaty Organization than Armenia itself, which is a member of that organization, because Azerbaijan brought Armenia’s non-constructive position, which is contrary to good-neighborly relations, to the whole world."

“2018 was significant for Azerbaijan from the point of view of security,” Seyidov added.

"Choosing Azerbaijan as a venue for holding a meeting between the highest military representatives of the US and Russia, holding a joint Azerbaijani-Turkish military parade and further strengthening our army are of particular importance,” he said.

“Of course, all this influences the settlement of the Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict,” he said. “The recent processes demonstrate that Azerbaijan welcomes peaceful settlement of the conflict, but does not exclude the military solution to the conflict; on the contrary, Armenia is afraid of both peaceful solution and military solution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.”

Seyidov added that 2018 was very successful for Azerbaijan and this gives grounds to assert that 2019 will be even more successful for the development of the country.

The conflict between the two South Caucasus countries began in 1988 when Armenia made territorial claims against Azerbaijan. As a result of the ensuing war, in 1992 Armenian armed forces occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan, including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding districts.

The 1994 ceasefire agreement was followed by peace negotiations. Armenia has not yet implemented four UN Security Council resolutions on withdrawal of its armed forces from the Nagorno-Karabakh and the surrounding districts.


Book Review: Mr Five Per Cent by Jonathan Conlin review – the world’s richest man

Meline Chalian
The Guardian, UK
Jan 3 2019


Mr Five Per Cent by Jonathan Conlin review – the world's richest man

The story of the buccaneering Calouste Gulbenkian, wealthy oilman, who anticipated today’s unfettered global tycoons

What does the life of an Ottoman-born ethnic Armenian oil tycoon have to teach us about the modern world? Quite a lot, it turns out, judging by this fascinating biography of Calouste Gulbenkian, a dealmaker for the ages and, at his death in 1955, the world’s richest man.

Gulbenkian saw an oilfield only once, on a visit to Baku (then an oil-fuelled boomtown in the Russian empire, now the capital of Azerbaijan) as a 19-year-old graduate from King’s College London, but he was very quick to appreciate the importance of oil as a commodity, and the opportunity inherent in international competition for it. He combined excellent contacts in the Middle East with skills he learned as an entrepreneur in the City of London, and secured a 5% stake in all oil found beneath the Asian territories of the Ottoman empire.

When the deal was signed, on the eve of the first world war, his stake didn’t sound like much, but he fought for decades to hang on to it and, by the 1950s, he had a shilling for every pound earned from some of the world’s richest oilfields. And that really added up. In modern terms, he died with a fortune of almost £5bn.

He was clearly not an easy person to like, and fell out with almost everyone he came across, but his buccaneering qualities make him an extremely interesting person to read about. At one point, he exploited the young Soviet Union’s shortage of capital to build the nucleus of a world-class art collection. There are several Rembrandts missing from the Hermitage, thanks to his negotiating skills.

When Gulbenkian was born in 1869, Armenians were a significant minority in Istanbul, and dominated the city’s commercial sector, having taken advantage of a series of reforms passed by an Ottoman government keen to expand its decrepit economy. By the 1880s, however, the city was becoming uncomfortable for them, with the start of a wave of pogroms that peaked in the infamous Armenian genocide of 1915-17.

Gulbenkian had moved to London to study, and stayed, becoming a British subject, building his City career, and gradually abandoning the family’s merchant business. His life and career was, however, mostly transnational. “Empires and states, diplomats and statesmen, spheres of influence … all were distractions to Gulbenkian: to be ignored if possible, or else coached and co-opted,” Conlin notes.

He liked some countries, particularly Britain and France, where he kept his artworks and built a pleasure garden, but avoided entanglements that might cost him money. This is why he spent most of the second world war in Portugal, then a neutral dictatorship, and leaned towards whichever side looked like winning.

Gulbenkian looks remarkably like a modern oligarch, with his high-ranking connections in all countries, and his business interests “offshore”

And this is why his life has such relevance today: he is a relic of a previous age of globalisation, the freewheeling days before 1939 when money flowed around the world as unhindered by regulation as it does now, and the powerful were able to seek profits where they liked, and to dodge laws however they felt fit. As his daughter Rita, with whom he had a more than usually complex relationship, explained: “laws are made for everyone but us.”

Advertisement

Stripped of anachronisms, Gulbenkian looks remarkably like a modern oligarch, with his high-ranking connections in all countries, his border-straddling ambitions, his children at English schools, and his business interests in the liminal sphere we now call “offshore”. He used corporate structures to own property, and skilfully balanced his and his family members’ movements between countries to avoid being beholden to any tax authority.

He owned his portfolio of shares and bonds via a Liechtenstein entity called Anstalt Vega, which meant he paid only 100 Swiss francs in tax in 1931 – on assets valued at £4.6m (£288m in today’s money). Much of his empire was structured and controlled via the UK, but he had no intention of paying for the privilege.

After the second world war, with capital controls in force and countries trying to repair their economies while paying for welfare states, there was little tolerance for globe-trotting tax dodgers, so Gulbenkian stayed in Portugal, unwilling to risk the consequences of exposing himself to the revenue services of any of his former haunts. He flirted with the idea of endowing art galleries in London and the US but was concerned by the tax impact of visiting either country and, eventually, the Gulbenkian Foundation ended up in Portugal. It is now one of the largest sources of charitable donations in Europe, and the Gulbenkian is a major Lisbon art gallery.

Read more

Conlin had access to the foundation’s archives, which did not give up their secrets without a fight. Some of Gulbenkian’s early correspondence was in Ottoman Turkish, a language no longer spoken, and written in Armenian characters, an alphabet few people know. Decoding all this, and making sense of the worlds that Gulbenkian moved in, is a remarkable feat of scholarship.

Mr Five Per Cent is written precisely, with flashes of dry humour, and Conlin wears the depth of his research lightly. The story he tells is one of a businessman playing off great powers in the Middle East, exploiting loopholes in the world’s financial architecture, avoiding accountability, making a fortune for himself, and spending it on a life of luxury. Gulbenkian may have been a unique talent of a past age, but his heirs are all around us.

• Mr Five Per Cent: The Many Lives of Calouste Gulbenkian, the World’s Richest Man is published by Profile. To order a copy for £22 (RRP £25) go to guardianbookshop.com or call 0330 333 6846. Free UK p&p over £15, online orders only. Phone orders min p&p of £1.99.

The Strain Is Creeping Up at Borders. Anna Popova: United States Planned Creating Bio-Lab in Crimea

Vanyan Gary
Rossiyskaya Gazeta, Russia
Dec 25 2018
The Strain Is Creeping Up at Borders.
Anna Popova: United States Planned Creating Bio-Lab in Crimea
by Ksenia Kolesnikova
[Armenian News note: the below is translated from Russian]

An increasing number of nations bordering Russia place Pentagon-funded bio-labs on their territories. There are known cases when these labs tested experimental, not fully researched drugs. Research was conducted on infections lethal to humans: atypical plague and haemorrhagic fevers. For example, we are talking about the work of the Lugar Centre in Georgia. It is located less than 90 kilometres from the Russian border. It is a known that as a result of "experimental" treatments at this centre, dozens of people have died, and many of them died practically instantaneously, within a day. All these facts cause grave concern, says Anna Popova, head of Russia's Food Safety Regulator "Rospotrebnadzor" and Russian Federation's Sanitary Medicine Doctor General.

"The question is in whose interests such laboratories conduct their work. Nations admitting such "helpers" risk losing their sovereignty in terms of biological safety and create a hazard for their own citizens, first of all," Anna Popova said. "In Georgia, there are 10 biolaboratories that are managed by the US military agency [Department of Defense]. There are 10 [such labs] in Kazakhstan, three in Uzbekistan, eight in Azerbaijan, seven in Armenia and 11 in Ukraine."

According to the head of Rospotrebnadzor, the risks for the biological safety of the Russian Federation are increasing as well. The fact that through this work, new technologies for drones capable of delivering bloodsucking insects that can carry dangerous infectious diseases were created and patented is of utmost concern. A single such drone is capable of disseminating up to 50,000 infected mosquitoes.

"As a preventative anti-outbreak measure, Rospotrebnadzor is constantly monitoring mosquitoes on the Black Sea coast of Krasnodar Territory," Anna Popova said. "In 2018, the area of anti-mosquito spraying was more than 2,000 hectares."

The epidemiological situation in Ukraine is already becoming critical: diphtheria, measles, tuberculosis, polio… Outbreaks turn into full-fledged epidemics. And the system of the sanitary-epidemiological control has been totally decimated. Against this backdrop, there are 11 operational US laboratories in Ukraine.

"Launching another such lab was planned in Simferopol," says Anna Popova. "Collection of biomaterial from Crimea was set up with the view to transport it to the Western nations' labs, including 105 samples of human blood serum."

What can be the danger of these US labs at the borders with Russia, and what biological risks do they carry? Anna Popova cites the Ebola fever that was ravaging Africa several years ago. Upon careful studying of the virus strains, Russian scientists came to the conclusion that the outbreak that claimed the lives of tens of thousands started in the area where a US virology lab had been located. Furthermore, there are reasons to believe that the most dangerous, atypical strain of Ebola virus was artificially modified through genetic engineering.

Here is another, closer example. In the summer of 2018, a group of Russian children returned from Georgia in a very dire condition afflicted by an acute intestinal virus. The children were given all the necessary medical assistance. However, when the scientists studied the cause, it turned out that this strain had not been previously documented. It could also have been genetically modified.

How well is Russia protected against these threats? What guarantees our safety? This was the question posed by Rossiyskaya Gazeta correspondent to Anna Popova.

"An effective system of counteracting epidemiological threats has been created in Russia. This is the result of the intensive and, most importantly, systemic work of many services and agencies," she says. "Let me give you an example. The cases of measles in Russia are 15 per million people. In Europe there are 70, in Ukraine more than 300. In Georgia, there are more than 800 cases."

In addition, according to Anna Popova, Russian algorithms and outbreak rapid reaction protocols are some of the most effective in the world, and are used by many countries, including airport biosafety protocols.

"Population migration will only increase. This is one more risk of modern times. Infections spread very rapidly. Nowadays, airlines carry more than 4 billion people a year," Anna Popova emphasised. "We must take these rising risks into account."

Gazprom Armenia to compensate Russian gas price growth by cutting expenses

Emil Lazarian
ITAR-TASS
January 02, 2019 Wednesday 11:41 PM GMT


Gazprom Armenia to compensate Russian gas price growth by cutting expenses

YEREVAN January 3

The Russian gas price will not grow for Armenian consumers on account of reduction of costs of Gazprom Armenia, the subsidiary of the Russian gas holding dealing with natural gas supplies and sales, press secretary of the Armenia’s Prime Minister Arman Egoyan told TASS on Wednesday.

YEREVAN, January 3. /TASS/. The Russian gas price will not grow for Armenian consumers on account of reduction of costs of Gazprom Armenia, the subsidiary of the Russian gas holding dealing with natural gas supplies and sales, press secretary of the Armenia’s Prime Minister Arman Egoyan told TASS on Wednesday.

The price of Russian gas on the border with Georgia will grow but domestic tariffs will remain the same, Acting Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan said earlier.

"There is no talk about the subsidy from the government. The gas price for consumers will remain the same on account of reduction of expenses and performance improvement of Gazprom Armenia," the press secretary said.

The Russian gas price for Armenia was reconsidered from January 1, the Gazprom’s press service said earlier. It will total $165 per 1,000 cubic meters. The earlier price for Armenia was $150 per thousand cubic meters of gas.

Cinema: The universal appeal of cinematographer Tigran Mutafyan

Bedik Zaminian
Merinews (India)
January 2, 2019 Wednesday
 
 
The universal appeal of cinematographer Tigran Mutafyan
 
This lauded cinematographer has a list of diverse acclaimed films to prove his truly universal appeal and ability.
 
 
Cinematographer Tigran Mutafyan has a way of looking at things that other professionals in the film community respect and admire. That might seem like a somewhat redundant statement as a DP's role is centered on visual storytelling but there's more than this obvious factor that makes Tigran so sought after.
 
This Armenian born talent has an element to his approach that is universal in its appeal. While possessing his own signature style, he is simultaneously able to manifest imagery which translates to international audiences, as proven by his work in award-winning productions like Zoya, This Much, Cara, and others. His abilities have been utilized by Chinese filmmakers as well as American artists like will.i.am of the Black Eyed Peas. His peers and his employers often refer to Tigran with the moniker visual storyteller because it aptly refers to his ability to do so much more than simply capture images. Simply put, this cinematographer is able to retain his own style but tailor it to perfectly complement any tale that he is part of telling.
 
It's indisputable that filmmaking is an international endeavor in current times. Studios take great pains to include aspects that appeal to a worldwide box office of cultural diversity. Understanding and possessing this idea at a foundational level is optimal for any film professional. Filmmaker Eddie Liu's credits include The Mummy (Brendan Frasier), Mission Impossible III, The Forbidden Kingdom, and The Karate Kid (2010).
 
Concerning Mutafyan's work as DP on his film Dragon Scale, Liu declares, "I have found my cinematographer and partner in creating great valuable movies for the Chinese and International audiences. Among the top cinematographers I've worked with, Tigran is the best; so talented yet so humble, and on a constant quest to push himself to new levels." Currently in postproduction but soon to be released, Dragon Scale is a POV film that required some very inventive camera work.
 
The cinematographer describes, "There is a scene in which the hero's state changes dramatically. Following an attempted poisoning, he tries to escape. I wanted to make this a long shot to convey his very weak condition while passing through obstacles. I decided to follow the hero as he is attacked by a duo of bad guys and then fights over a bike, eventually escaping…all in a single shot. The stairs where very small so I asked the camera operator to start the shot from the second floor and pass the camera to me on the first floor in order to continue the rest of the shot. The distance was so high that I couldn't get the camera from the second floor. I asked the stunt people if they could help to pass the camera from the camera operator on the second floor to me. Because the stunt people couldn't keep the right framing, we put the camera on ropes and controlled it like a marionette. The stunt team was from JC stunt team (Jacky Chan) and they did great job safety and timing wise."
 
A cinematographer can sometimes be asked to perform miracles. Such was the case when Tigran served as DP on the film Super Density, released on Youku (China's version of Netflix) in 2018. One of the film's prominent locations was in a real museum. At the end of the day's shooting, the director informed his cinematographer that they had forgotten to capture one important shot which takes place in the daytime. The catch? The production had one hour to clear out before the real life museum opened its doors for business! Lacking the time to bring the full lighting back, Tigran improvised by using different diffusion papers and clothes and created a fake perspective for the background, placing it close to the character but faking this as the windows and other shapes on the background. LED lights were added to brighten it up and create a sense of daytime.
 
Awards are part of the recognition that directs attention to exemplary work. There have been many of these for productions which Tigran has been a part of including: This Much (Best Cinematography at Rahway International Film Festival and nominated for Best Cinematography at Women's Independent Film Festival), Cara (awards at the Best Shorts Competition, IndieFEST Film Awards, Los Angeles Independent Film Festival Awards), and others. While these accolades have increased his notoriety with the public, Tigran Mutafyan's reputation within the film community is well established and continues to find him employed amongst the most creative artists in the industry.
 
 

Theater: BEAST ON THE MOON Comes to the Finborough Theatre

Emil Lazarian
Broadway World
Jan 3 2019


by BWW News Desk

BroadwayWorld.com Jan. 3, 2019   

Beast on the Moon by Richard Kalinoski comes to the Finborough Theatre Tuesday, 29 January-Saturday, 23 February 2019. This is the first London production in more than 20 years.

The show is directed by Jelena Budimir, with set and costume design by Sarah Jane Booth. It is presented by All Ignite Theatre in association with Neil McPherson for the Finborough Theatre.

Cast includes George Jovanovic, Zarima McDermott, and Hayward B Morse.

So some are beheaded and some are crucified and some are slaughtered, and who wins the battle of who died the worst death? Who wins?

In a production commissioned by the Finborough Theatre, Richard Kalinoski's Beast on the Moon opens at the Finborough Theatre for a four-week limited season on Tuesday, 29 January 2019 (Press Nights: Thursday, 31 January and Friday, 1 February 2019 at 7.30pm).

Milwaukee in the 1920s. Aram believes he will begin a new life when his teenage 'mail-order' bride, Seta, arrives to join him. They are a couple united by history both survivors of the Armenian Genocide. But their painful, shared experience does nothing to promote domestic harmony as Aram is obsessed with creating a family to replace the one he lost in such savage circumstances, and Seta, just fifteen and trapped by the traditions of the old ways, struggles to embrace her new life in a new country

Richard Kalinoski's beautifully written, universal story of hope and healing, has been performed in more than twenty countries. Last performed in London in the 1990s, Beast on the Moon remains a play for our times a powerful exploration of legacy for so many refugees.

The Armenian Genocide of 1915-16 was perpetrated by the Ottoman Turkish Government against the Armenians, a Christian minority in a Muslim state. Up to one and a half million people died. To this day, the Turkish government refuses to admit that genocide ever took place.

Playwright Richard Kalinoski's Beast on the Moon, won the 2001 Best Play from the Repertory prize at the Moliere Awards and four other Moliere Awards. Since emerging as a triumph (Ben Brantley, The New York Times) at the 1995 Humana Festival in Louisville, Kentucky, Beast on the Moon has been translated into twenty languages and produced in venues all over the world including Athens, Brussels, London, Moscow, New York (Off-Broadway), Prague, Sao Paolo, Toronto and Tallinn, Estonia. It has garnered a host of awards including the Osborn Best New Play in America by an Emerging Playwright, awarded by the American Theatre Critics Association in 1996, and, in 2001, five Ace Awards including Best Play in Buenos Aires, Argentina. In 2005, the President of Armenia Robert Kachadarian awarded Kalinoski the Khorenatsi Medal for Contribution to the Arts from the Country of Armenia.

His other plays include Between Men and Cattle developed at the National Playwrights Conference (1995) and later produced at the Detroit Repertory Theatre and at Milwaukee's Next Act Theatre (2004), My Soldiers, a play about a female soldier returning from Iraq which was produced at the Detroit Repertory Theatre (2010) and was featured at the Regional American College Theatre Festival of the Kennedy Center at Michigan State University (2011), The Boy Inside which earned Second Place in the Kennedy Center's Mark David Cohen National Playwriting Contest (2016) and Front Room (2018) which was named as one of only eighteen new plays to be audio produced by the Ashland New Plays Festival in Ashland, Oregon, the home of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. Wisconsin native Richard Kalinoski is Resident Playwright at the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh in Northeastern Wisconsin where he teaches playwriting and theatre history.

Director Jelena Budimir returns to the Finborough Theatre following her acclaimed production of Bruce Graham's White Guy on the Bus which was nominated for four Off West End Awards including Best Director in 2018. She also directed Athena Stevens' new play Genie for Vibrant 2017 A Festival of Finborough Playwrights. Recently, she also devised and directed Back to the Future a Celebration of Education with members of Clean Break Theatre. Jelena was Associate Director at Chickenshed Theatre for 22 years where she developed the Studio Theatre, and led on Chickenshed's emerging writers' programme Write Here, Write Now. Direction includes Benjamin Zephaniah's Refugee Boy adapted by Lemn Sissay, Sarah Daniels' Gut Girls, The Comedy of Errors, Dario Fo's Can't Pay! Won't Pay!, Lysistrata, Our Country's Good by Timberlake Wertenbaker, Yard Gal by Rebecca Prichard and Ariel Dorfmen's Widows (Chickenshed) and Life After Death by Antuneil Thompson (Camden People's Theatre). She has also written extensively for young people and children. Jelena originally trained as an actor at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama her performance work includes fringe, rep and West End alongside film, TV and radio.

Discussions are after the evening performance and are free to ticketholders for that evening's performance. The run will be accompanied by the FINBOROUGHFORUM, a series of informal post-show discussions and debates. All events are free to ticketholders for that evening's performance of the play. FINBOROUGHFORUM events will be twitter friendly with live tweets from @FinboroughForum. Using the hashtag #finfor, the speakers will also answer questions posed on Twitter so everyone can be included, no matter where they are in the world. The events feature discussion with academics, writers and members of the cast and company.

The Armenian Genocide and Refugees
Saturday, 2 February after the evening performance
Hosted by Ara Sarafian (Gomidas Institute) and Misak Ohanian (Centre for Armenian Information and Advice).

The Armenian Genocide was the first genocide of the modern era. It led to the destruction of an entire nation on its ancestral lands and created a refugee crisis of biblical proportions. Hundreds and thousands of women and children who survived the genocide were eventually collected in safe-houses, orphanages and refugee communities – and then dispersed throughout the world in what became the Armenian diaspora we know today.

Blessed are the Peacemakers
Wednesday, 13 February after the evening performance
Hosted by Ara Sarafian (Gomidas Institute)

Despite the bitter legacy of the Armenian Genocide, many civil society and political groups in Turkey broke ranks with their own government in recent years and initiated a reconciliation process with Armenians. The Municipality of Diyarbakir, one of the largest cities in Turkey, took the lead in this process by showing contrition and beginning a healing process. This included the reconstruction of one of the largest churches in the Middle East in the city – Sourp Giragos Armenian Apostolic church – and inviting Armenians to call the city their own.

Music: Armenia’s Sergey Smbatyan to conduct New Year concert in Malta

Emma Nadirian
Panorama, Armenia
Jan 3 2019
Culture 18:05 03/01/2019 Armenia

The artistic director and principal conductor of the Armenian State Symphony Orchestra, Sergey Smbatyan will perform his first concert of 2019 in Valletta, Malta.

Maestro Smbatyan is set to conduct the Malta Philharmonic Orchestra in performance of its New Year concert on 6 January, the Armenian symphony orchestra told Panorama.am.

The concert, organized in collaboration with Malta’s presidential office, will be held at Mediterranean Conference Centre built in the 16th century.

Under the direction of Sergey Smbatyan, the Malta Philharmonic Orchestra will be performing pieces by Strauss, Rossini, Prokofiev, Tchaikovsky, Bernstein and other composers.

The concert program also features Sabre Dance from the ballet Gayane by Aram Khachaturian. Popular mezzo soprano Clare Ghigo will share the stage with the orchestra during the concert.  

Asbarez: Artsakh Foreign Ministry Memo on Missing Persons Circulated at UN

Aram Torosian
  • Armenia

    •  

  • Artsakh

    •  

  • Featured Story

    •  

  • Latest

    •  

  • News

    •  

  • Top Stories

44 mins ago

Artsakh’s Foreign Ministry in Stepanakert

STEPANAKERT—A memorandum prepared by the Artsakh Foreign Ministry focusing on missing persons resulting from the Azerbaijan-Karabakh conflict was disseminated in the United Nations and placed the organization’s website.

The Memorandum notes that the issue of missing persons in the context of the Azerbaijan-Karabakh conflict emerged long before the full-scale war, which was unleashed by Azerbaijan against the Republic of Artsakh (Nagorno Karabakh Republic) in 1991. Individual cases of hostage-taking and kidnapping of persons of Armenian nationality were taking place in Artsakh already in 1988–1989. The issue of hostages and missing persons became more acute as the conflict escalated. The practice of taking hostage persons of Armenian nationality became widespread during “Operation Ring” for the deportation of Armenian villages of Artsakh in 1991.

“Throughout the territory of Artsakh people were kidnapped, whereupon they found themselves in Azerbaijani prisons and other places of detention, where they were subjected to torture and other forms of cruel and inhuman treatment.

For eight months of 1991 only, 640 peaceful residents from different villages of Artsakh were illegally arrested or captured by Azerbaijani authorities; 127 Armenians were captured and sentenced on the ground of false accusations to different terms and 31 of them died as a result of widely practiced regular torture in Azerbaijani prisons and concentration camps”, the document reads.

The Memorandum also contains many well-documented facts about the torture of Armenian hostages and prisoners of war by the Azerbaijani side during the Azerbaijan-Karabakh conflict and after the signing of the 1994 ceasefire agreement.

The document also notes that by raising the issue of missing persons and at the same time rejecting any cooperation to address it, Azerbaijan is obviously pursuing a hidden agenda.

In particular, the Azerbaijani side is trying to manipulate the issue of prisoners of war and missing persons with a view to justifying crimes, committed by citizens of Azerbaijan Dilham Askerov and Shahbaz Guliyev, in the territory of the Republic of Artsakh.

This campaign is part of a state policy of incitement of Armenophobia in Azerbaijan and promotion of hate crimes against Armenians that has penetrated all spheres of public life. The existence of racism and xenophobia towards Armenians in Azerbaijan has been also confirmed in the documents of several international organizations.

Asbarez: Rouhani Praises Iranian-Armenians’ Patriotism

Kajoyan Gevork
  • Latest

    •  

  • News

    •  

  • Top Stories

43 mins ago

President Hassan Rouhani of Iran at the home of Alfred Gabri family (Photo by Tehran Times)

TEHRAN—President Hassan Rouhani of Iran said on Monday that Armenian-Iranians have practiced selflessness and devoted their lives to Iran’s prosperity, an aspect which he praised during a visit to an Armenian family living in Tehran, Tehran Times reported.

“Our fellow Armenian countrymen have practiced altruism along with Muslims, and today they are ready for altruism and this is very praiseworthy,” Rouhani told the family who lost their son in defending Iran.

The visit to the Alfred Gabri family took place on the New Year’s Eve, when Rouhani congratulated the family of the martyr on the new Christian year.

“Your son practiced altruism on the path of [protecting] the country. It is not easy to [tolerate] loss of a child, but your son was martyred on the path of the homeland which make it tolerable,” said Rouhani.

According to ISNA, Alfred Gabri was martyred by the Mujahedin Khalq Organization in 1991 in the western city of Gilan-e Gharb when he was 20 years old.

Vice-President for Martyrs and Veterans Affairs Hojatoleslam Val-Moslemin Shahidi accompanied Rouhani on the visit. A plaque of appreciation was given to the family of the martyr.

Iranian, Armenian Diplomats Discuss U.S. Sanctions

Ani Basmajian
  • Armenia

    •  

  • Featured Story

    •  

  • Latest

    •  

  • News

    •  

  • Top Stories

41 mins ago

Armenian Ambassador Artashes Toumanyan (left) with Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi in Tehran on Dec. 26

YEREVAN (RFE/RL)—Armenia’s ambassador to Iran has reportedly discussed with a senior Iranian official ways of reducing the impact of U.S. sanctions against Tehran on bilateral commercial ties.

According to the Armenian Foreign Ministry, Ambassador Artashes Tumanyan briefed Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi on recent political developments in Armenia and his government’s foreign policy priorities when they met on Wednesday.

A statement released by the ministry on Thursday said they then discussed Armenian-Iranian relations.

“In particular, they spoke about deepening the political dialogue, developing economic cooperation in the conditions of American sanctions, organizing high-level mutual visits and a number of other issues,” added the statement. It gave no other details.

Acting Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan made clear on December 22 that his government intends to “deepen not only economic but also political relations with Iran” despite the U.S. sanctions that have been re-imposed by President Donald Trump. He spoke at the official opening of an Armenian-Iranian joint venture in the northern city of Vanadzor.

Pashinyan said last month the United States “understands” Armenia’s desire to maintain a “special” relationship with the Islamic Republic.

Earlier in November, a team of U.S. officials visited Yerevan to explain the sanctions to Armenia’s government and private sector. Iran was also high on the agenda of U.S. National Security Adviser John Bolton’s October trip to Armenia. Bolton said after talks with Pashinyan that commercial and other traffic through the Armenian-Iranian border is “going to be a significant issue” for Washington.

With Armenia’s borders with Azerbaijan and Turkey closed due to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, Iran as well as Georgia serve as the sole conduits for the landlocked country’s trade with the outside world.

Armenia also imports Iranian natural gas and other fuel. The gas supplies should increase significantly after the ongoing construction of a third power transmission line connecting the two countries is completed next year.

According to official Armenian statistics, Armenia’s trade with Iran soared by 40 percent, to $297 million, in the first ten months of this year.