Author: Ani Kharatian

Azerbaijan continues grossly violating international humanitarian law – Artak Beglaryan

Ani Kharatian

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 12:02,

YEREVAN, JANUARY 13, ARMENPRESS. Azerbaijan continues to heavily violate international humanitarian law speculating the issue of captured civilians and war prisoners, Chief of the Artsakh Presidential Staff Artak Beglaryan said on Twitter.

“Many PoWs and civilians from wartime, 64 PoWs and some civilians from postwar period are prisoned there without Azerbaijan’s confirmation to ICRC and Russian mediators”, Beglaryan said.

Armenian FM sends letter to UN Gen.-Sec. presenting situation over NK

Ani Kharatian

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 18:31,

YEREVAN, JANUARY 13, ARMENPRESS. Foreign Minister of Armenia Ara Aivazian sent a letter to the UN Secretary General Antonio Gutterres on January 12 comprehensively presenting the situation over the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict following the large-scale military aggression launched by Azerbaijan on September 27, 2020, ARMENPRESS was informed from the press service of the MFA Armenia.

In his letter, the Minister notes that amid the unprecedented global health crisis, the violation of the decades-long ceasefire in the region has led to numerous casualties, large-scale ethnic cleansing of the indigenous people of Artsakh, deliberate destruction, desecration and vandalism of the Armenian religious and cultural monuments.

In the letter, the Foreign Minister of Armenia touched upon the cases of violations of the November 9 trilateral statement`s provisions by Azerbaijan, noting that more than a month after the ceasefire was established, Azerbaijan carried out military operations in Hin Tagher and Khtsaberd villages in Hadrut region of Artsakh. It was noted that during the military attack, the Azerbaijani armed forces captured 64 Armenian servicemen, violating Azerbaijan’s commitments to maintain the ceasefire established by the trilateral statement.

The incomplete implementation of the Article 8 of the trilateral statement by Azerbaijan was emphasized in the letter, which mandates the “exchange of prisoners of war, hostages, and other detained persons and dead bodies”. It was stressed that Azerbaijan, in fact, refuses to implement its commitment which is a blatant violation of international humanitarian law.

Minister Aivazian drew the attention of the UN Secretary General to the reluctance of Azerbaijan regarding the cooperation with international organizations in cultural heritage protection. “Lasting and sustainable peace in the region could be achieved only through the comprehensive resolution of the conflict that will include the status of Nagorno-Karabakh based on the realization of the right of self-determination of the people of Artsakh”,- concluded the Foreign Minister of Armenia.

Ankara Says Russian S-400 Missile Defense Systems Ready for Operation

Ani Kharatian

January 12,  2020



Russia sold its S-400 Defense System to Turkey

Head of Turkey’s Presidency of Defense Industries Ismail Demir said on Monday that the Russian S-400 missile defense systems are ready for operation in Turkey, the 24TV channel informs, according to Tass.

“The S-400 are ready for use, the armed forces will decide when such a need arises,” the TV channel quotes Demir as saying.

Demir also said that Turkish enterprises continue working on the project of developing US F-35 fighters, despite Washington’s decision to exclude Turkey from this program.

According to Demir, if Ankara wished to do so, “a second S-400 regiment would already have been in Turkey today.” “This is what would have happened if we had chosen a quick and easy path, but we aim for the maximum. With the information that we get from working with S-400, we plan to reach the S-400 level in our work on creating our own missile defense systems by 2025-2026,” he added.

Russia and Turkey signed a deal on the delivery of S-400 anti-aircraft missile systems to Ankara in 2017. Turkey was the first NATO state to purchase those systems from Russia.

Turkey’s decision to acquire the Russian-made S-400 surface-to-air missile systems caused a sharply negative reaction from the United States and NATO as a whole. The United States is not abandoning its attempts to make Turkey give up the Russian air defense systems. In October 2020, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that Ankara was not going to give up the S-400 systems despite the US pressure. He also rejected the threats of sanctions and suggested the United States should finally stop threatening Turkey and try to impose them in reality.

Azerbaijan constantly delays POW release to cause mental suffering to Armenian people, ombudsman says

Ani Kharatian
Panorama, Armenia
Jan 12 2021
 
 
Azerbaijan is evidently politicizing the issue of prisoners of war (POWs), which is inadmissible, Armenia’s Human Rights Defender (Ombudsman) Arman Tatoyan told a news conference on Tuesday.
 
He underlined that politicizing humanitarian issues in the post-war stage is unacceptable and a gross violation of international humanitarian law.
 
“According to the international standards, prisoners of war must be released and returned to their home countries immediately after the end of hostilities. It is prohibited to launch criminal proceedings against them, their detention or arrest, which is considered a punishment, is also banned. Moreover, artificially protracting these issues is also prohibited, in fact, it amounts to a war crime,” the ombudsman said.
 
According to Tatoyan, Azerbaijan is pursuing a policy of applying the November 10 trilateral statement only to the previous situations.
 
“This is also inadmissible. It should be applicable to situations after November 10 as well, that is, so long as the parties have prisoners who are largely connected with the military operations,” he said.
 
The ombudsman noted that Azerbaijan constantly delays the release of POWs to cause mental suffering to the Armenian people, especially to the families of the prisoners, and to play with the people’s feelings, at the same time causing tensions.
 
“Our study shows that this is obviously part of Azerbaijani policy. Besides, they do not unveil the real number of prisoners,” Tatoyan said.
 
Asked whether he is ready to meet with the commissioner for human rights of Azerbaijan, Tatoyan said. “I am ready, there is no problem, but I have always had a precondition that if issues related to Artsakh are to be discussed, the Artsakh ombudsman must take part in the meeting as well, as it is a human rights-related issue, not a political one. In the case of Armenia, I am always open for cooperation as the human rights defender of Armenia,” he added.
 

COVID-19: Armenia reports 157 new cases, 561 recoveries in one day

Ani Kharatian

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 11:20,

YEREVAN, JANUARY 11, ARMENPRESS. 157 new cases of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) have been confirmed in Armenia in the past one day, bringing the total number of confirmed cases to 162,288, the ministry of healthcare said today.

561 more patients have recovered in one day. The total number of recoveries has reached 149,873.

2 more patients have died, raising the death toll to 2931.

1025 tests were conducted in the past one day.

The number of active cases is 8782.

The number of patients who had coronavirus but died from other disease has reached 702 (2 new such cases).

Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan

Leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan hold first post-war meeting

Ani Kharatian
EurasiaNet.org
Jan 11 2021
Together with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Nikol Pashinyan and Ilham Aliyev signed an agreement to create new transportation infrastructure aimed at “unblocking” the region’s many closed borders.
Joshua Kucera Jan 11, 2021
The leaders of Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Russia have met in Moscow in their first summit since last year’s war in the Caucasus, and agreed to create new, joint transportation infrastructure.
 
Russian President Vladimir Putin hosted Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, and the three men met for about four hours. Following the talks they made a joint press appearance and released a four-point agreement to create a list of projects to begin working jointly on “unblocking” the region’s borders.
 
What specific projects might be under consideration were not yet clear. The November 10 ceasefire agreement that ended the war between Armenia and Azerbaijan, signed under Russian brokerage, stipulated that a new corridor would be opened through southern Armenia to connect Azerbaijan’s mainland with its exclave of Nakhchivan. Ahead of the meeting, Pashinyan’s spokesperson Mane Gevorgyan said that other projects were under discussion as well, including those aimed at letting Armenia transit through Nakhchivan to Iran and to use the existing railroad through Nakhchivan that, in Soviet times, used to connect Yerevan with southern Armenia.
 
Under the tripartite agreement signed January 11, the three countries will form a working group led by the deputy prime ministers of each country, and expert groups under that. They will be working on a quick schedule: the working group will meet by January 30 and within a month after that the expert groups will come up with a list of projects. By March 1, they will present the projects to the three countries’ leaderships for approval.
 
“I’m sure that the implementation of agreement will benefit both the Armenian and Azerbaijani people, the region as a whole, and Russia,” Putin said following the signing of the statement.
 
The new projects could dramatically reshape the region, as Armenia’s borders with both Azerbaijan and Turkey have been entirely closed since the first war between the two sides in the 1990s. That has meant that Armenia has open borders only to its north, Georgia, and south, Iran. Azerbaijan’s isolation has not been as extreme but it faces inconveniences in connecting Nakhchivan with the rest of the country.
 
The meeting was the first for the two foes since the war last year. Putin greeted each of his Caucasus counterparts with a handshake and a bro hug, but Aliyev and Pashinyan merely nodded at each other and said “zdravstvuite.”
Following the talks, Putin stood between the two of them as they made statements in turn. Aliyev took an optimistic approach, saying that the conflict was over, the November 10 agreement was “being implemented successfully” and that the transportation agreement would offer a bright future.
 
Pashinyan took a darker tone, saying that the conflict remained unresolved and taking issue with Aliyev’s (and Putin’s) satisfaction with the implementation of the November 10 deal. “Unfortunately, we did not solve the issue of prisoners of war today, and it is the most sensitive and painful issue. We agreed to continue the work in that direction,” he said. He did offer praise for the new transportation deal: “The economic innovations can lead to more reliable security guarantees, and we are ready to work constructively in that direction.”
 
Aliyev and Pashinyan entered the meeting from very different domestic circumstances. Aliyev is riding high after the decisive military victory, which saw Azerbaijan regain control of a significant amount of the territory in and around Nagorno-Karabakh that it had lost to Armenians during the first war between the two sides in the 1990s.
 
Pashinyan, meanwhile, is fighting for his political life, and ahead of the meeting his many opponents sought to take advantage. Many claimed (with no basis) that he would be meeting with Aliyev to arrange new territorial concessions, and he will no doubt be forced to consider his domestic weakness as he negotiates with his two counterparts.
 
On the morning that Pashinyan flew to Moscow, protesters attempted to block the road to the airport to prevent him from being able to leave, though they didn’t succeed.
 
Vazgen Manukyan, whom a coalition of opposition parties have put forward as a candidate to replace Pashinyan, announced that the prime minister “does not represent Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh” and that “any decision that runs contrary to the interests of Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh will be recognized as illegitimate and will be canceled” following Pashinyan’s departure.
 
Aliyev likely had a much freer hand in the negotiations, but was facing expectations that he would do something to limit what Baku has seen as a sympathy toward Armenians on the part of the Russian peacekeeping contingent that is enforcing the ceasefire agreement. “Sanctions should be stipulated for a peacekeeping mission if it goes beyond its mandate,” government-friendly political analyst Qabil Huseynli told the website JAMNews ahead of the meeting.
 
 
 
Joshua Kucera is the Turkey/Caucasus editor at Eurasianet, and author of The Bug Pit.

COVID-19: Armenia confirms 361 new cases in one day

Ani Kharatian

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 11:08, 8 January, 2021

YEREVAN, JANUARY 8, ARMENPRESS. 361 new cases of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) have been confirmed in Armenia in the past one day, bringing the total number of confirmed cases to 161,415, the ministry of healthcare said today.

573 more patients have recovered in one day. The total number of recoveries has reached 147,961.

7 more patients have died, raising the death toll to 2908.

1700 tests were conducted in the past one day.

The number of active cases is 9850.

The number of patients who had coronavirus but died from other disease has reached 696 (1 new such case).

Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan

COVID-19: Armenia reports 201 new cases, 812 recoveries in one day

Ani Kharatian

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 11:20, 7 January, 2021

YEREVAN, JANUARY 7, ARMENPRESS. 201 new cases of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) have been confirmed in Armenia in the past one day, bringing the total number of confirmed cases to 161,054, the ministry of healthcare said today.

812 more patients have recovered in one day. The total number of recoveries has reached 147,388.

11 more patients have died, raising the death toll to 2901.

1218 tests were conducted in the past one day.

The number of active cases is 10,070.

The number of patients who had coronavirus but died from other disease has reached 695 (3 new such cases).

Armenpress: Car bomb explodes in Syrian border town: casualties reported

Ani Kharatian

Car bomb explodes in Syrian border town: casualties reported

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 17:03, 2 January, 2021

YEREVAN, JANUARY 2, ARMENPRESS. A car bomb exploded in a vegetable market in the northeastern Syrian town of Ras al Ain close to the border with Turkey, with reports of several killed and wounded, Reuters reports citing Syrian state news agency SANA.

Two children were among those killed and their mother was wounded in the explosion, SANA reported, adding the blast also killed several Turkish-backed fighters.