Month: September 2015

The Azerbaijani side violated the ceasefire 100 times at the line of contact between the armed forces of Nagorno Karabakh and Azerbaijan overnight, the NKR Defense Ministry said in a statement.

Despite the decreased number of ceasefire violations, the rival fired 1,800 shots in the direction of the Armenian positions using weapons of different caliber, including 60 and 80mm mortars.

The front divisions of the NKR Defense Army pressure the activeness of the rival and confidently continue with their military duty all along the line of contact.

A magnitude 5.3 earthquake was registered in Azerbaijan at 08:49 local time (04:49 GMT), the Armenian National Survey for Seismic Protection reports.

The quake measuring 7-8 at the epicenter was felt in a number of Armenian settlements, namely Vanadzor, Kapan, Stepanavan, Ijevan, Noyemberyan, Choratan, Aygedzor and Yerevan.

The Azerbaijani forces kept shelling the Armenian villages of Nerkin Karmiraghbyur, Vazashen and several others in the evening of September 3.

An Armenian civilian and a contract serviceman were reported injured. Spokesman for the Ministry of Defense Artsrun Hovhannisyan confirmed the news to .

He said both have been hospitalized. The wounds are not life-threatening.

Hovhannisyan dismissed the reports that the Armenian side is moving armored forces to the border.

On September 4, in accordance with the arrangement reached with the authorities of the Nagorno Karabakh Republic, the OSCE Mission conducted a planned monitoring of the Line of Contact between the armed forces of Nagorno Karabakh and Azerbaijan in the northern direction of Kuropatkino settlement of the NKR Martuni region.

From the positions of the NKR Defense Army, the monitoring was conducted by Personal Representative of the OSCE Chairman-in-Office, Ambassador Andrzej Kasprzyk and his Field Assistants Jiri Aberle (Czech Republic) and Yevgeny Sharov (Ukraine).

From the opposite side of the Line of Contact, the monitoring was conducted by staff member of the Office Peter Svedberg (Sweden) and Personal Assistant to the Personal Representative of the CiO Simon Tiller (Great Britain).

The monitoring passed in accordance with the agreed schedule. No violation of the cease-fire regime was registered.

From the Karabakh side, the monitoring mission was accompanied by representatives of the NKR Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Ministry of Defense.

Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan will meet with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin as part of a working visit to Moscow, President’s Press Office reports.

The leaders of the two countries will discuss a wide range of issues related to Armenian-Russian bilateral relations, cooperation in the political, economic and humanitarian spheres.

They will exchange views on issues of cooperation within the framework of integration processes after Armenia’s accession to the Eurasian Economic Union and will refer to the future programs.

Armenian Sargis Parsikian, born in 1954, was killed as Damascus came under heavy rocket attack on Thursday, September 3, Lebanon-based Aztag daily reports.

The funeral will take place today at the Armenian St. Sarkis Church in Damascus.

The attacks on the city over the past few days have left tens dead and wounded.

Jihadist militants from Islamic State (IS) have blown up three funerary towers at the ancient city of Palmyra, Syria’s antiquities chief has said, the BBC reports.

Maamoun Abdul Karim told the AFP news agency that “the best preserved and most beautiful” had been destroyed.

The multi-storey sandstone monuments, standing outside the city walls in an area known as the Valley of the Tombs, belonged to rich Palmyrene families.

Their demolition comes only days after IS blew up Palmyra’s two main temples.

The group, which captured the Unesco World Heritage site from government forces in May, has previously destroyed two Islamic shrines near Palmyra, which they described as “manifestations of polytheism”.

Within the framework of the “Shant-2015”strategic  command-post exercises the precious manuscripts of the Matenadaran Institute were moved to a special repository, Armenpress reports.

Director of Matenadaran Institute Hrachya Tamrazyan said “the Institution is one of the unique centers, which has secured the best safeguarding measures.”

“The new building is furnished with an unprecedented storage system, which is unique in the world. The items on display in different places can be moved to and kept in Matenadaran,” he said.

“Evacuation is a secret program. There are large storage areas in both the old and new building,” he said.

The Director assured the storages are safe even from natural disasters. “These repositories are meant for manuscripts and ancient books. The state has made huge investments in the creation of this system,” he noted.

As part of the “Shant-2015” strategic command post exercises Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan convened a special sitting of the Government.

The Ministers briefed on the process of implementation of directives in their respective spheres stemming from the scenario of the exercises, reported on the problems in certain situations and presented suggestions for their solution and for application of more efficient measures.

In his opening remarks President Sargsyan stressed the significance of the exercises, underlining that every drill pursues two objectives – to train and to check. The final goal is to be ready to take the most effective measures in case of real threat to the territorial integrity and security of the country.

After the exercises are over, the work of the participating agencies and their leaders will be assessed, plans for the elimination of the shortcomings will be worked out.

Armenian Public TV starts the new season on Monday, September 7 with the launching of a number of new and fresh programs and interesting projects.

Committed to its long-term traditions, the Public TV will offer educational-cultural, entertaining, social and cognitive, patriotic programs, as well as new feature films and documentary series.