Thursday, March 5, 2021
Kocharian Backs Armenian Military, Opposition
• Harry Tamrazian
Armenia -- Former President Robert Kocharian attends a court hearing in Yerevan,
March 3, 2021.
Former President Robert Kocharian on Thursday voiced strong support for the
Armenian military’s top brass and opposition forces demanding Prime Minister
Nikol Pashinian’s resignation and reaffirmed plans to participate in possible
fresh elections.
“If pre-term parliamentary elections take place I will participate in them. I
think I have enough experience for that,” Kocharian told Russian media outlets
at a news conference in Yerevan.
“Am I confident that I will win? Well, I have never lost elections,” he said,
according to the TASS news agency.
Pashinian on Monday again expressed readiness to hold snap parliamentary
elections to end a post-war political crisis deepened by the Armenian military’s
February 25 demands for his resignation. An alliance of opposition parties
holding anti-government rallies in Yerevan wants such polls to be conducted by
an interim government to be formed after his resignation.
Kocharian, who is not affiliated with any party, has repeatedly encouraged his
supporters to take part in the rallies that resumed on February 20.
“I support the format created by the opposition movement and believe that there
is no need to revise it,” he said on Thursday, referring to the alliance called
the Homeland Salvation Movement. He again praised Vazgen Manukian, the
alliance’s candidate to serve as an interim prime minister.
Like the opposition forces, the ex-president backed the Armenian army’s General
Staff in its standoff with Pashinian sparked by last week’s controversial
sacking of a senior general.
The army top brass accused the government of misrule and demanded its
resignation in an unprecedented statement issued on February 25. Pashinian
rejected the demand as an attempt to stage a coup d’etat.
“I don’t think that we should be very afraid of that word [coup,]” another
Russian news agency, RBC, quoted Kocharian as saying. “If the military elite
feels responsible for the country’s future, one must not rule out steps that
could become fateful. But this is my view, not an appeal.”
Kocharian has been at loggerheads with Pashinian’s government ever since it took
office in May 2018. He was arrested in July 2018 on coup charges rejected by him
as politically motivated.
The ex-president, who had ruled Armenia from 1998-2008, was released on bail in
June 2020 pending the outcome of his ongoing trial. The trial resumed on January
19 nearly four months after being effectively interrupted by the war in
Nagorno-Karabakh.
Russia has criticized the criminal proceedings launched against Kocharian.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly made a point of congratulating
him on his birthday anniversaries and praising his legacy.
Putin’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, on Thursday described Kocharian as “Russia’s
great friend.” But he insisted that the Kremlin is not supporting or guiding
Kocharian’s political activities in any way.
“Participants of political processes in Armenia do not need to coordinate their
steps with the Russian president,” Peskov said, adding that the vast majority of
them stand for close ties between the two countries.
Kocharian called for Armenia’s “deeper integration” with Russia after the
Karabakh war stopped by a Russian-brokered ceasefire on November 10. He said
that only Moscow can help Armenia rebuild its armed forces and confront new
security challenges
Pashinian announced on New Year’s Eve plans to further deepen the
Russian-Armenian relationship, saying that his country now needs “new security
guarantees.”
Fired General Sues Armenian Authorities
• Sargis Harutyunyan
Armenia - The first deputy chief of the Armenian army's General Staff, Tiran
Khachatrian, speaks at a news conference, November 26, 2020
A general whose controversial sacking last week heightened political tensions in
Armenia has asked a court to reinstate him as first deputy chief of the Armenian
army’s General Staff.
Lieutenant-General Tiran Khachatrian was relieved of his duties on February 24
in a decree initiated by Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian and signed by President
Armen Sarkissian.
The decree came just hours after a pro-opposition media outlet quoted
Khachatrian as laughing off Pashinian’s claim that the Armenian army’s most
advanced Russian-made missiles seriously malfunctioned during last year’s war in
Nagorno-Karabakh.
In a February 25 statement, the army’s top brass strongly condemned the sacking,
accused Pashinian’s government of incompetence and misrule and demanded its
resignation. The prime minister responded by accusing the military of a coup
attempt and moving to fire the chief of the General Staff, Onik Gasparian.
Gasparian’s dismissal appears to have been delayed by President Sarkissian and
opposition groups. The latter have voiced strong support for the military and
stepped up their street protests aimed forcing Pashinian to resign.
Court records posted on a judicial website indicate that Sarkissian is the main
defendant in the civil case filed by Khachatrian on Wednesday. The prime
minister’s office and the General Staff will be involved in the legal action as
“third parties.”
The Armenian government declined to comment on the lawsuit. Sarkissian’s office
could not be reached for comment.
Khachatrian has made no public statements since his sacking. Incidentally, the
general received Armenia’s highest military award, the title of National Hero,
from Pashinian during the autumn war with Azerbaijan.
Pashinian’s claim about the Iskander missile systems also provoked a storm of
criticism from Russian pro-government lawmakers and pundits. They accused him of
incompetence and deceit. Russia’s Defense Ministry said, for its part, that it
was “bewildered and surprised” by the remarks.
Pashinian effectively retracted the claim on Monday. His press secretary said he
was misled by other Armenian officials.
Iran Said To Return ‘Missing’ Armenian Plane
• Satenik Hayrapetian
Iran - A Boeing 747 of Iran's national airline is parked at Mehrabad
International airport in Tehran, June 2003.
An Armenian government agency said on Thursday that civil aviation authorities
in neighboring Iran have pledged to return an Armenian passenger aircraft that
mysteriously landed in Tehran last month.
The Boeing 737-300 leased by Fly Armenia Airways, a private carrier, reportedly
went missing on February 20 for still unclear reasons.
The company said that the plane underwent repairs in Estonia’s capital Tallinn
and was due to proceed to Ukraine for further maintenance. It said the plane
ended up at Tehran’s Mehrabad airport due to technical problems that emerged
during that flight.
Other reports claimed that the plane took off from the Bulgarian city of Varna
and was due to fly to Sharjah airport in the United Arab Emirates.
Many in Armenia questioned the airline’s explanation. Some speculated that the
Boeing 737-300 was secretly sold to Iran in violation of U.S. sanctions.
The U.S. Embassy in Yerevan expressed concern about the incident and urged the
Armenian authorities to ascertain the plane’s whereabouts. It warned that the
sanctions prohibit any transfer of U.S.-made aircraft or their spare parts to
the Islamic Republic.
Armenia’s Civil Aviation Committee launched an inquiry into the plane’s possible
disappearance.
In a statement released on Thursday, the committee said that it has reached a
“tentative agreement” with Iranian authorities on the plane’s return to Armenia.
It said that Iranian officials have informed their Armenian colleagues that the
plane is still malfunctioning and that Iranian aviation specialists need more
time to decide whether it can safely fly to Yerevan.
“The [Armenian] Foreign Ministry is informed, and efforts are being made to
bring the plane back to Armenia,” a Fly Armenia spokesman, Arsen Haytayan, said
for his part.
Haytayan declined to clarify why the plane deviated from its intended flight
path.
Armenia’s National Security Service (NSS) is conducting a separate, criminal
investigation into the circumstances of its flight to Iran. The NSS has not
charged anyone so far.
Armenian Health Minister Concerned About Coronavirus Resurgence
• Narine Ghalechian
Armenia -- Health Minister Anahit Avanesian speaks during a cabinet meeting in
Yerevan, March 4, 2021.
Health Minister Anahit Avanesian called on Thursday for a renewed strict
enforcement of the Armenian government’s sanitary rules, saying that coronavirus
infections in the country have increased in recent days after more than three
months of steady decline.
According to health authorities, 491 Armenians tested positive for COVID-19 on
Wednesday and 360 others on Tuesday, sharply up from the daily number of cases
registered by them in February.
“As of yesterday, 491 out of 2,922 [coronavirus] tests came back positive, which
indicates a positivity rate of 16 percent,” Avanesian told a weekly cabinet
meeting in Yerevan.
“While we had a positive rate of 5-7 percent in January and early February, now,
as you can see, it stands at 16 percent. According to our projections this
figure will increase further next week,” she said, adding that the health
authorities have to again set up more hospital beds for COVID-19 patients.
“We need to revert to mask-wearing and other strict preventive measures,”
stressed the minister. She went on to urge relevant state bodies to enforce
physical distancing rules in shopping malls, buses, restaurants and resorts.
Wearing a face mask not in all enclosed spaces and outdoors has been mandatory
in Armenia since June. The authorities largely stopped fining people not
complying with this rule following the September 27 outbreak of the war in
Nagorno-Karabakh.
The daily number of new COVID-19 cases reported by them grew rapidly as a
result. It began steadily falling in mid-November despite a continuing lax
enforcement of the anti-epidemic rules.
Few Armenians now wear masks not only on the street but also in shops.
Health experts believe that recent rallies held in Yerevan by both the Armenian
opposition and the government have also contributed to the resurgence of
coronavirus cases. Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian and virtually all key members
of his team, including former Health Minister Arsen Torosian, did not wear masks
during one such rally held on Monday.
Torosian, who is now the chief of Pashinian’s staff, also called for renewed
compliance with the sanitary rules on Thursday.
It remained unclear when the authorities will start vaccinating people against
COVID-19. They have indicated that they will provide free vaccines to only “high
risk” groups of the country’s population.
Health officials said in January that that Armenia will receive the first batch
of vaccines before the second half of February. However, Avanesian said on
Thursday that negotiations with vaccine suppliers are still going on.
“We hope that we will have the first batch in the course of this spring,” she
told Pashinian.
According to the Ministry of Health, 3,208 Armenians have died from COVID-19 so
far. The figure does not include the deaths of 820 other people infected with
the virus. According to the ministry, those fatalities were primarily caused by
other diseases.
Reprinted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL
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