17:33,
YEREVAN, 28 AUGUST, ARMENPRESS. The Central Bank of Armenia informs “Armenpress” that today, 28 August, USD exchange rate up by 0.01 drams to 385.99 drams. EUR exchange rate up by 0.29 drams to 417.26 drams. Russian Ruble exchange rate down by 0.03 drams to 4.05 drams. GBP exchange rate down by 1.23 drams to 485.61 drams.
The Central Bank has set the following prices for precious metals.
Gold price down by 18.62 drams to 23771.10 drams. Silver price up by 0.01 drams to 300.13 drams.
17:50,
YEREVAN, AUGUST 25, ARMENPRESS. It has been a month since the “Generation AI” high school pilot project was launched and is being presented in various regions of Armenia engaged in this initiative. This program is developed by the Foundation for Armenian Science and Technology (FAST) and implemented in partnership with the RA Ministry of Education, Science, Culture and Sports (MoESCS) and field organizations. In pursuit of presenting program details and perspectives, the FAST’s team visited the south of Armenia, Syunik region, to meet with teaching staff, parents, and students of Kapan High School N2. The Foundation also donated computers to the school to empower students with modern resources, enabling them to delve into the world of artificial intelligence and become proficient in its applications.
“The main goal of the “Generation AI” program is to nurture a generation of competitive AI specialists right from their school years. Recognizing Syunik’s pivotal role in Armenia, the decision was made to modernize the school’s computer infrastructure. This step is crucial in equipping students with the essential resources required for a superior education. With this, we encourage the involvement of different organizations in the process of supporting the schools and enhancing the schools’ labs with new technologies”, mentioned Suzanna Shamakhyan, Vice President of Strategic Programming at FAST. She highlighted the importance of consolidating the efforts of various ecosystem players to achieve systemic change in the country.
An interactive info session was held, during which beneficiaries were introduced about the program’s components, benefits, and prospects of artificial intelligence, including its recent advancements and practical applications. The ceremonial opening of the newly outfitted computer lab occurred in participation with the director of Kapan High School N2, Rita Ovchyan, and Suzanna Shamakhyan. On that day, the students also had the opportunity to test their learning skills with one of the program’s educational platforms for Python programming.
Sixteen high schools, from six different regions and Yerevan, will execute the “Generation AI” program beginning in September 2023. The program will involve at least 250 high school students and 40 educators in the 2023-2024 school year.
In the framework of the visit, Gevorg Parsyan, the mayor of Kapan, met the representatives of the Foundation, Suzanna Shamakhyan and Anush Ayvazyan. They discussed the details of the “Generation AI” program during which the Foundation team underscored the importance and readiness of combined efforts from various sectors to drive technological advancements and achieve substantial outcomes in the Kapan community.
As the Foundation’s regional visits continue, the upcoming events will unfold in other cities, featuring interactions with industry professionals in Gyumri and Vanadzor. The momentum of the “Generation AI” program highlights a collaborative spirit aimed at propelling Armenia’s educational and technological landscape forward.
***
FAST was founded in 2017 by aiming to support Armenia’s transformation into a science-driven, innovative country by 2041 through scientific discovery and innovation. To reach this milestone, FAST has designed and structured numerous programs and initiatives to become independent parts of the STI ecosystem, ensuring continuous sustainability. FAST has implemented 25 programs impacting more than 10,000 beneficiaries in the last six years.
INTRODUCTION
As the world condemns Azerbaijan’s blockade of the Lachin Corridor, we must not lose sight of the deeper threat fueling the humanitarian catastrophe: the full-scale ethnic cleansing and potential genocide of Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh and parts of Armenia.
The University Network for Human Rights, in collaboration with students, lawyers, and academics from Harvard Law School Advocates for Human Rights, UCLA’s Promise Institute for Human Rights, Wesleyan University, and Yale’s Lowenstein Project conducted two fact-finding trips in Nagorno-Karabakh and four in Armenia between March 2022 and July 2023.
We documented atrocities perpetrated by Azerbaijani forces against ethnic Armenians during the 44-Day Nagorno-Karabakh War in 2020, after the ceasefire, during the 2022 attacks in sovereign Armenia, as well as in times of relative peace. Among these are extrajudicial killings of civilians, including the elderly and disabled; enforced disappearance of Armenian troops; torture and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment of prisoners of war; death threats, intimidation, and harassment of residents of border communities; and life-threatening restrictions on freedom of movement and access to vital infrastructure.
Our findings are based on dozens of firsthand testimonies from forcibly displaced persons, families of missing or forcibly disappeared soldiers, families of victims of extrajudicial killings, returned prisoners of war (POWs), and current residents of Nagorno-Karabakh and border communities in Armenia. Most names have been altered to protect the privacy of victims and families.
The uptick in abuses began during the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh War, also known as the 44-Day War, during which Azerbaijani and Armenian forces engaged in full-scale combat in and around Nagorno-Karabakh.
By the conclusion of the war, Azerbaijan had assumed control of a significant portion of Nagorno-Karabakh; no Armenians remain in those areas: If they had not fled before their villages fell, Azerbaijani forces captured or executed them.
Despite provisions of the ceasefire agreement suspending military activity, Azerbaijan has taken advantage of its expanded power to commit grave abuses against the residents of Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenian border towns, Armenian troops stationed close to the line of contact, and prisoners of war in Azerbaijan’s custody.
In fall 2023, we expect to release a substantial report detailing violations committed by Azerbaijani state forces after the conclusion of the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh War, including the lack of accountability for wartime atrocities, as well as ongoing threats to the security of the Armenians still living in Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenian border villages. Our report will be based on testimonies from nearly 100 residents of the region, thousands of pages of official and media reports, and analysis of open source data, including satellite imagery and video content circulated on social media platforms.
For now, given the grave violations committed over the past three years and with increasing intensity in recent weeks, the closure of the Lachin corridor, and the very real threat of mass forced displacement, widespread starvation and genocide, we have decided to publish an abridged version of the report now.
We conclude here, and in the report to be issued, that the Azerbaijani government, at the highest levels, has condoned, encouraged, facilitated the commission of or directly perpetrated the most egregious forms of violence against Armenians.
Moreover, the abuses we documented are not a string of unrelated rights violations; taken together, these abuses reveal a synchronized, comprehensive campaign to empty Nagorno-Karabakh and parts of Armenia of Armenians. Over the past three years, thousands of Armenians have faced an impossible decision: abandon their homes — and sometimes their sick or elderly family members — or face death or worse at the hands of Azerbaijani forces. Today, the population of Nagorno-Karabakh, sequestered by Azerbaijan’s total prohibition on movement along the Lachin Corridor, may not even have the luxury of choosing escape. As the humanitarian crisis in the Lachin Corridor reaches a boiling point, the door is closing on the chance to prevent another genocide against ethnic Armenians.
Azerbaijan has deployed a series of mutually reinforcing measures that have made life in Nagorno-Karabakh impossible for its 120,000 inhabitants.
Our team spoke with dozens of residents of Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenian border communities who described a range of abusive tactics intended to cause or resulting in the forced displacement of ethnic Armenians:
The Mechanisms of Forced Displacement used by Azerbaijan:
These mechanisms play out against a backdrop of celebratory displays of torture and killings of Armenians and unapologetic destruction of property and cultural heritage.
This situation will result in the mass exodus of ethnic Armenians from Nagorno-Karabakh (if Azerbaijan lifts the blockade of the Lachin corridor), the coerced surrender of the self-declared independent republic to Azerbaijan, or the slaughter of the Armenians still living in Nagorno-Karabakh.
According to several people with whom University Network researchers spoke, one of the principal forms of violence that has driven many from their homes has been Azerbaijani’s use of intense and persistent shelling. For instance, in Khramort, a village on the eastern border of Nagorno-Karabakh close to the frontline, residents claim that the shelling that occurred at the onset of the war still continued when our team interviewed them in March 2022, just one day after they fled to Stepanakert.
Susana, an epidemiologist who lived in the village with her daughter and grandchildren, had already been displaced earlier in the war from Hadrut, the location of some of the most brutal killings of civilians during the 2020 war. In Khramort in 2022, she explained how relentless shelling has impeded simple day-to-day activities and caused many to flee.
“There is no way to continue living in Artsakh. They are violating human rights in every possible way from every possible side.”Displaced Civilian Woman from Khramort, Nagorno-Karabakh (2022)
The Human Rights Ombudsman of the Republic of Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) documented the intimidation of the civilian population of Khramort and other border villages in a report published in March 2022.
The report presents detailed accounts of the use of high caliber weapons, including grenade launchers and firearms, on agricultural lands and equipment and near administrative and residential areas, prompting the evacuation of women and children as well as the cessation of all agricultural activity.
Over a period of five days, shelling from Azerbaijan pushed Armenian residents in seven different communities from two of the easternmost regions of Nagorno-Karabakh to cease agricultural work and thus sacrifice their only source of livelihood, and to abandon their homes. At the time that report was published, the Human Rights Defender stated that,
“Russian peacekeepers are unable to provide security guarantees for civilians engaged in agricultural work.”INTERIM REPORT: On violations of the rights of Artsakh people by Azerbaijan in February-March 2022 (linked above)
A year later, when University Network researchers returned to Armenia to conduct additional fact finding, we found that Azerbaijani forces had attacked sovereign Armenia as well, particularly in border villages of the Vardenis and Syuniq regions, using the same tactics: shelling of administrative and civilian structures, firing on agricultural and grazing lands, as well as killing or theft of livestock.Azerbaijan has deployed a series of mutually reinforcing measures that have made life in Nagorno-Karabakh impossible for its 120,000 inhabitants.
Our team spoke with dozens of residents of Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenian border communities who described a range of abusive tactics intended to cause or resulting in the forced displacement of ethnic Armenians:
The Mechanisms of Forced Displacement used by Azerbaijan:
These mechanisms play out against a backdrop of celebratory displays of torture and killings of Armenians and unapologetic destruction of property and cultural heritage.
This situation will result in the mass exodus of ethnic Armenians from Nagorno-Karabakh (if Azerbaijan lifts the blockade of the Lachin corridor), the coerced surrender of the self-declared independent republic to Azerbaijan, or the slaughter of the Armenians still living in Nagorno-Karabakh.
According to several people with whom University Network researchers spoke, one of the principal forms of violence that has driven many from their homes has been Azerbaijani’s use of intense and persistent shelling. For instance, in Khramort, a village on the eastern border of Nagorno-Karabakh close to the frontline, residents claim that the shelling that occurred at the onset of the war still continued when our team interviewed them in March 2022, just one day after they fled to Stepanakert.
Susana, an epidemiologist who lived in the village with her daughter and grandchildren, had already been displaced earlier in the war from Hadrut, the location of some of the most brutal killings of civilians during the 2020 war. In Khramort in 2022, she explained how relentless shelling has impeded simple day-to-day activities and caused many to flee.
“There is no way to continue living in Artsakh. They are violating human rights in every possible way from every possible side.”Displaced Civilian Woman from Khramort, Nagorno-Karabakh (2022)
The Human Rights Ombudsman of the Republic of Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) documented the intimidation of the civilian population of Khramort and other border villages in a report published in March 2022.
The report presents detailed accounts of the use of high caliber weapons, including grenade launchers and firearms, on agricultural lands and equipment and near administrative and residential areas, prompting the evacuation of women and children as well as the cessation of all agricultural activity.
Over a period of five days, shelling from Azerbaijan pushed Armenian residents in seven different communities from two of the easternmost regions of Nagorno-Karabakh to cease agricultural work and thus sacrifice their only source of livelihood, and to abandon their homes. At the time that report was published, the Human Rights Defender stated that,
“Russian peacekeepers are unable to provide security guarantees for civilians engaged in agricultural work.”INTERIM REPORT: On violations of the rights of Artsakh people by Azerbaijan in February-March 2022 (linked above)
A year later, when University Network researchers returned to Armenia to conduct additional fact finding, we found that Azerbaijani forces had attacked sovereign Armenia as well, particularly in border villages of the Vardenis and Syuniq regions, using the same tactics: shelling of administrative and civilian structures, firing on agricultural and grazing lands, as well as killing or theft of livestock.
Azerbaijan has employed the mechanisms of forced displacement incrementally. This has led to a general under-acknowledgement of the overarching threat presented by individual acts of encroachment on the autonomy and security of Armenian communities in Nagorno-Karabakh and along the Armenian border.
To illustrate: Azerbaijan’s obstruction of freedom of movement along the Lachin Corridor has gradually increased since the end of the 44-Day War.
Based on information gathered by the University Network through conversations with individuals and organizations familiar with the process of transiting the Lachin corridor, we strongly believe that Azerbaijan played a decisive role in denying foreigners, including journalists and human rights defenders, access to Nagorno-Karabakh.
A year later, freedom of movement was dramatically restricted even further, as the Azerbaijani government supported — if not directly facilitated — protests by its citizens that blocked the corridor. The protests were eventually replaced by the creation of the formal border checkpoint, followed by the installation of a concrete barrier, until ultimately reaching a state of complete prohibition of all movement of people, goods, services and humanitarian aid, including International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) medical transport vehicles.
“Baku appears to view the checkpoint as a way of asserting control of territory that legally belongs to Azerbaijan but remains out of its hands under the armistice terms, and which Baku now refers to as the ‘former Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast.’ Indeed, a mid-level Azerbaijani official characterised the move to Crisis Group as a ‘reclamation of sovereignty.'”International Crisis Group, “New Troubles in Nagorno-Karabakh: Understanding the Lachin Corridor Crisis” (2023)
Another Azerbaijani official told Crisis Group that Baku will use the new checkpoint to “observe, control and influence” Nagorno-Karabakh (emphasis added by University Network).
In parallel, Azerbaijan has taken advantage of its appropriation of basic infrastructure to increasingly undermine Karabakh Armenians’ access to basic services. In February 2022, residents of Nagorno-Karabakh started experiencing disruptions in the flow of gas through Shushi (Shusha), the city that had been taken by Azerbaijan in the last days of the 2020 War. In September 2022, after Azerbaijan acquired control of electricity cables traversing the Lachin Corridor, Nagorno-Karabakh drastically increased its reliance on scarce internal water resources to generate hydroelectric power.
Territorial encroachment has also been incremental: After the initial transfer of some areas in accordance with the terms of the 44-Day War ceasefire agreement, Azerbaijani forces moved further in on sovereign Armenian territory on several occasions throughout 2021. These operations culminated in the September 2022 attacks across four distinct civilian and touristic areas in the southeast of Armenia. The September 2022 attacks brought with them another round of arbitrary detentions, torture of Armenian captives, and summary executions.
There has been no reliable buffer between vulnerable Armenian communities and grave threats to their security. Russian forces in Armenia, Lachin, and Nagorno-Karabakh have been insufficient to protect civilian Armenian populations from intimidation, physical attacks, and arbitrary detention. While the presence of the EU Mission in Armenia, a civilian monitoring mission created by the European Union, has offered some oversight, at the time of writing, the threats facing the Armenian population of Nagorno-Karabakh fall outside their mandate.Azerbaijan has employed the mechanisms of forced displacement incrementally. This has led to a general under-acknowledgement of the overarching threat presented by individual acts of encroachment on the autonomy and security of Armenian communities in Nagorno-Karabakh and along the Armenian border.
To illustrate: Azerbaijan’s obstruction of freedom of movement along the Lachin Corridor has gradually increased since the end of the 44-Day War.
Based on information gathered by the University Network through conversations with individuals and organizations familiar with the process of transiting the Lachin corridor, we strongly believe that Azerbaijan played a decisive role in denying foreigners, including journalists and human rights defenders, access to Nagorno-Karabakh.
A year later, freedom of movement was dramatically restricted even further, as the Azerbaijani government supported — if not directly facilitated — protests by its citizens that blocked the corridor. The protests were eventually replaced by the creation of the formal border checkpoint, followed by the installation of a concrete barrier, until ultimately reaching a state of complete prohibition of all movement of people, goods, services and humanitarian aid, including International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) medical transport vehicles.
“Baku appears to view the checkpoint as a way of asserting control of territory that legally belongs to Azerbaijan but remains out of its hands under the armistice terms, and which Baku now refers to as the ‘former Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast.’ Indeed, a mid-level Azerbaijani official characterised the move to Crisis Group as a ‘reclamation of sovereignty.'”International Crisis Group, “New Troubles in Nagorno-Karabakh: Understanding the Lachin Corridor Crisis” (2023)
Another Azerbaijani official told Crisis Group that Baku will use the new checkpoint to “observe, control and influence” Nagorno-Karabakh (emphasis added by University Network).
In parallel, Azerbaijan has taken advantage of its appropriation of basic infrastructure to increasingly undermine Karabakh Armenians’ access to basic services. In February 2022, residents of Nagorno-Karabakh started experiencing disruptions in the flow of gas through Shushi (Shusha), the city that had been taken by Azerbaijan in the last days of the 2020 War. In September 2022, after Azerbaijan acquired control of electricity cables traversing the Lachin Corridor, Nagorno-Karabakh drastically increased its reliance on scarce internal water resources to generate hydroelectric power.
Territorial encroachment has also been incremental: After the initial transfer of some areas in accordance with the terms of the 44-Day War ceasefire agreement, Azerbaijani forces moved further in on sovereign Armenian territory on several occasions throughout 2021. These operations culminated in the September 2022 attacks across four distinct civilian and touristic areas in the southeast of Armenia. The September 2022 attacks brought with them another round of arbitrary detentions, torture of Armenian captives, and summary executions.
There has been no reliable buffer between vulnerable Armenian communities and grave threats to their security. Russian forces in Armenia, Lachin, and Nagorno-Karabakh have been insufficient to protect civilian Armenian populations from intimidation, physical attacks, and arbitrary detention. While the presence of the EU Mission in Armenia, a civilian monitoring mission created by the European Union, has offered some oversight, at the time of writing, the threats facing the Armenian population of Nagorno-Karabakh fall outside their mandate.
To say that this situation is unsustainable for Armenians living in Nagorno-Karabakh is a gross understatement. Viewed alongside the discriminatory policies and hate speech emanating from the highest levels of the Azerbaijani government, as well as directly from perpetrators of abuses as they are committing them, there is only one way to read the situation: Azerbaijan is openly pursuing a policy of ethnic cleansing and is dangerously close to carrying out the genocide of the Nagorno-Karabakh Armenians.
Allegations of ethnic cleansing are not alarmist. Genocide Watch had issued a Genocide Warning in September 2022, considering “Azerbaijan’s assault on Armenia and Artsakh” to have fulfilled four key steps on the road to genocide: dehumanization, preparation, persecution and denial. In August 2023, former ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampos asserted, “There is an ongoing Genocide against 120,000 Armenians living in Nagorno-Karabakh.”To say that this situation is unsustainable for Armenians living in Nagorno-Karabakh is a gross understatement. Viewed alongside the discriminatory policies and hate speech emanating from the highest levels of the Azerbaijani government, as well as directly from perpetrators of abuses as they are committing them, there is only one way to read the situation: Azerbaijan is openly pursuing a policy of ethnic cleansing and is dangerously close to carrying out the genocide of the Nagorno-Karabakh Armenians.
Allegations of ethnic cleansing are not alarmist. Genocide Watch had issued a Genocide Warning in September 2022, considering “Azerbaijan’s assault on Armenia and Artsakh” to have fulfilled four key steps on the road to genocide: dehumanization, preparation, persecution and denial. In August 2023, former ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampos asserted, “There is an ongoing Genocide against 120,000 Armenians living in Nagorno-Karabakh.”
II. ARBITRARY DETENTION, TORTURE, AND ENFORCED DISAPPEARANCEII. ARBITRARY DETENTION, TORTURE, AND ENFORCED DISAPPEARANCE
Azerbaijan arbitrarily detained, forcibly disappeared and tortured prisoners of war during the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war. Many of these victims remain in custody or are unaccounted for. Following the ceasefire, Azerbaijan has continued to carry out these same abuses against Armenians captured in their incursions into sovereign Armenian territory.
Capture of Armenian soldiers occurred in places with no ongoing hostilities, as soldiers retreated from combat zones in Nagorno-Karabakh, as well as in contested border locations. Since the ceasefire, Azerbaijan has seized Armenians outside the scope of regular military operations, including by detaining Armenian civilians who accidentally crossed unmarked borders in disputed territory; detaining villagers as they tended to their land and herded their livestock; and capturing Armenian soldiers in groups through entrapment. The latter has occurred after surprising or luring in Armenian soldiers and feigning good-faith negotiations.
Azerbaijani forces have also subjected Armenians to due process violations after detaining them, including: spurious charges such as illegally crossing a border in the context of a territorial dispute; use of coerced self-incriminating testimony; and lack of access to interpreters, adequate legal representation and trial by an independent and impartial tribunal.
Torture and cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment have taken place throughout detention, and differences in conditions and treatment tend to correlate with the location or stage of detention: initial capture, transfer, holding cell/military police custody, State Security Service (SSS) custody, and prison.
The worst treatment has taken place in the military police stations, in SSS buildings, or during the transfer of captives between detention sites. The ICRC has had access to captives only when detainees are in prisons (the final stage of captivity), not when they are in military police or SSS custody, therefore the worst torture violations have gone unnoticed and unpunished.
Forms of torture and mistreatment have included prolonged and repeated beatings with batons, skewers, brooms, and firearms; lacerating wrists with zip-ties; employment of electro-shock and stress positions; sleep deprivation; confiscation of warm clothing during extreme cold; deprivation of food, water, and hygiene products; and infliction of mental suffering and humiliation.
Torture has sometimes been accompanied by expressions of religious or ethnic discrimination. Additionally, Azerbaijani state forces have often shared videos of torture on social media and public television, which serves to further humiliate the victims, instill fear among Armenians, and perpetuate the forced displacement of those remaining in Nagorno-Karabakh.
Perpetrators of torture have included soldiers, special forces, military police, SSS officials, as well as guards and wardens in prisons and other detention centers. Azerbaijani forces also reportedly recruited civilians, including doctors and their patients and minors, to participate in acts of torture in jails and during transfers.
Hundreds of Armenians have been detained and at least 37 remain in detention as of August 17, 2023.
These numbers likely do not capture the full extent of captivity, given that at least some of the people who have at some point been considered missing have been forcibly disappeared – held in secret detention in military police or SSS custody and subjected to the most extreme forms of torture. These Armenian POWs were detained in undisclosed sites and in Baku prisons while Azerbaijan denied knowledge of detainees’ locations to the families, the ICRC, and the Armenian government, despite video evidence that numerous individuals were in custody.
University Network researchers interviewed returned POWs who were in Azerbaijani custody for months before their status changed from “missing” to “POW,” as well as returned POWs who reported being in detention in Azerbaijan alongside Armenians who to this day are classified “Missing in Action” or “MIA.”
Some returned POWs have continues to face challenges even after their release. At least one returned POW told the University Network that an Armenian National Security Service official reprimanded him for not killing himself to avoid capture.
In general, the Armenian government has not provided adequate psychological support to returned POWs. With respect to missing persons, for nearly two years, families of the missing have doubly suffered due to the Armenian government’s failure to communicate clear and accurate information. This may be changing thanks to the creation of a new institution dedicated to handling issues of POWs, hostages and missing persons.Azerbaijan arbitrarily detained, forcibly disappeared and tortured prisoners of war during the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war. Many of these victims remain in custody or are unaccounted for. Following the ceasefire, Azerbaijan has continued to carry out these same abuses against Armenians captured in their incursions into sovereign Armenian territory.
Capture of Armenian soldiers occurred in places with no ongoing hostilities, as soldiers retreated from combat zones in Nagorno-Karabakh, as well as in contested border locations. Since the ceasefire, Azerbaijan has seized Armenians outside the scope of regular military operations, including by detaining Armenian civilians who accidentally crossed unmarked borders in disputed territory; detaining villagers as they tended to their land and herded their livestock; and capturing Armenian soldiers in groups through entrapment. The latter has occurred after surprising or luring in Armenian soldiers and feigning good-faith negotiations.
Azerbaijani forces have also subjected Armenians to due process violations after detaining them, including: spurious charges such as illegally crossing a border in the context of a territorial dispute; use of coerced self-incriminating testimony; and lack of access to interpreters, adequate legal representation and trial by an independent and impartial tribunal.
Torture and cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment have taken place throughout detention, and differences in conditions and treatment tend to correlate with the location or stage of detention: initial capture, transfer, holding cell/military police custody, State Security Service (SSS) custody, and prison.
The worst treatment has taken place in the military police stations, in SSS buildings, or during the transfer of captives between detention sites. The ICRC has had access to captives only when detainees are in prisons (the final stage of captivity), not when they are in military police or SSS custody, therefore the worst torture violations have gone unnoticed and unpunished.
Forms of torture and mistreatment have included prolonged and repeated beatings with batons, skewers, brooms, and firearms; lacerating wrists with zip-ties; employment of electro-shock and stress positions; sleep deprivation; confiscation of warm clothing during extreme cold; deprivation of food, water, and hygiene products; and infliction of mental suffering and humiliation.
Torture has sometimes been accompanied by expressions of religious or ethnic discrimination. Additionally, Azerbaijani state forces have often shared videos of torture on social media and public television, which serves to further humiliate the victims, instill fear among Armenians, and perpetuate the forced displacement of those remaining in Nagorno-Karabakh.
Perpetrators of torture have included soldiers, special forces, military police, SSS officials, as well as guards and wardens in prisons and other detention centers. Azerbaijani forces also reportedly recruited civilians, including doctors and their patients and minors, to participate in acts of torture in jails and during transfers.
Hundreds of Armenians have been detained and at least 37 remain in detention as of August 17, 2023.
These numbers likely do not capture the full extent of captivity, given that at least some of the people who have at some point been considered missing have been forcibly disappeared – held in secret detention in military police or SSS custody and subjected to the most extreme forms of torture. These Armenian POWs were detained in undisclosed sites and in Baku prisons while Azerbaijan denied knowledge of detainees’ locations to the families, the ICRC, and the Armenian government, despite video evidence that numerous individuals were in custody.
University Network researchers interviewed returned POWs who were in Azerbaijani custody for months before their status changed from “missing” to “POW,” as well as returned POWs who reported being in detention in Azerbaijan alongside Armenians who to this day are classified “Missing in Action” or “MIA.”
Some returned POWs have continues to face challenges even after their release. At least one returned POW told the University Network that an Armenian National Security Service official reprimanded him for not killing himself to avoid capture.
In general, the Armenian government has not provided adequate psychological support to returned POWs. With respect to missing persons, for nearly two years, families of the missing have doubly suffered due to the Armenian government’s failure to communicate clear and accurate information. This may be changing thanks to the creation of a new institution dedicated to handling issues of POWs, hostages and missing persons.
Edgar: “The longest day of my life”
Azerbaijani forces captured Edgar along with two other Armenian soldiers when they were several kilometers from Jermuk city in sovereign Armenian territory in September 2022, nearly two years after the ceasefire that ended active hostilities over Nagorno-Karabakh. The three Armenian servicemen had been separated from their unit while following a command to retreat, one day after fighting erupted on the Armenia-Azerbaijan border. After trekking through ravines and wading through rivers all night, they were only a few hundred meters from safety when they were captured:
“We basically reached the forest. I couldn’t imagine in my worst nightmares that the enemy had reached those places. We thought we were safe. When the youngest guy felt really bad we decided to take a break and sleep for like two hours and after that continue on our way. And when we woke around seven in the morning we saw the forest before our eyes, and we saw that there were only several hundred meters to the forest, so we started moving and after we took several steps the enemy sniper from behind a nearby boulder said ‘put down your weapons or I’ll shoot’. When they said put your weapons down, the boys with me put down their weapons but I didn’t put down mine, thinking, ‘What should I do?’ It was obvious if we put down our weapons… maybe we get taken captive, maybe we get shot, maybe something worse happens (no need to go into detail). I bought time by pretending I didn’t understand Russian… At that moment it was difficult to make the decision to live. I made that choice remembering my mother, my sister… My guys turned around and looked at me and asked me, please put down your weapon. So I put down my weapon and we became captives.
“At the beginning they were threatening us, taking out knives, making motions of cutting ears. I wasn’t scared because I was sure I would pass out before they cut my ears.”
Edgar’s captors eventually transported him to military police custody in Azerbaijan:
“I stayed there for only one day, but it was the longest day of my life…They keep you in a small room, there is a small hole in the door where they can watch you, and you are supposed to stay still like this [sits upright and stiffens his body] all the time, whether it is day or night or if you want to go to the toilet, it doesn’t matter. They forced us to stand.”
When the University Network interviewer asked how long, Edgar responded:
“Always…
“They only let us move when they gave us food, which happened once a day, a piece of bread this size [holds his thumb and index finger about three centimeters apart]. I was lucky because I was there only for one day, but the worst part about being at the military police station is that four to five people came every 45-50 minutes and hit you very hard, really, really hard. It doesn’t matter if you stayed still or moved. It was their job and they enjoyed it very much, I think.”
Edgar was in the prison for approximately one week before the first visit of the Red Cross.
On September 22, the day before the Red Cross came “we were brought a variety of items – soap, shampoo, clothes, a pillow (until then we had no pillow), a blanket (until then we didn’t have a blanket, it was cold), and they even set up a television set. They also brought books.
“Before they had brought books that were basically Azerbaijani propaganda about how awful Armenians are…When the Red Cross came they also brought books translated into Armenian, Jack London, Agatha Christie…When we saw the ICRC come we could finally breathe because that meant that the world knew about us. Until then we thought we would be in Baku for months or years and that would be considered disappeared.”
That fear was well-founded. Azerbaijani forces had captured Hagop in Armenia in November 2021. Weeks transpired before Azrebaijani authorities officially acknowledged that Hagop was in their custody. In an interview with University Network researchers, Hagob recalled how while he was in prison,
“[An interrogator] told me that I was considered to be MIA. He told me that they could do whatever they wanted to those of us considered MIA—that they could kill and bury me and no one would ever know anything.”
III. EXTRAJUDICIAL KILLINGS AND MUTILATION OF THE DECEASEDIII. EXTRAJUDICIAL KILLINGS AND MUTILATION OF THE DECEASED
Azerbaijani forces have carried out extrajudicial killings of Armenian soldiers and civilians both during and following the 44-Day War for which on one has been held to account.
Postwar killings have ranged from summary execution of soldiers in the wake of combat who had been injured and/or disarmed prior to their execution to entering communities and killing the civilians who remain. Among non-combatants who have been extrajudicially killed are the elderly and disabled who would not or physically could not escape before Azerbaijani forces overtook their towns.
Azerbaijan’s leadership condones and encourages the cruelest forms of violence against Armenians through widespread hate speech and racist propaganda, as well as by failing to investigate and hold perpetrators to account.
The acts of many executions were filmed and posted to social media by the perpetrators themselves, then widely circulated on TikTok and Telegram.
Azerbaijani forces have also filmed the bodies of combatants killed in action, which they mutilated post mortem. It is not always apparent solely based on the content of the videos whether the mutilation occurred before or after death, but practices include chopping off limbs, carving messages across torsos, exposing victims’ genitals and breasts, inserting digits or foreign objects into victims’ mouths and empty eye sockets, severing victims’ heads, placing severed heads onto the bodies of animals, and other forms of horrific treatment. Azerbaijani forces have also summarily executed and mutilated civilians who remained in the towns that they captured and soldiers whom they took after an Azerbaijani victory in the battlefield.
Subsequent to the killings, Azerbaijani authorities unjustifiably held onto the bodies of many of the victims for months before handing them over to Armenian authorities, prolonging and deepening the emotional suffering of victims’ families. During that time, stickers, memes and emojis surfaced, displaying the victims in made-up degrading scenes. They were often sent by perpetrators to family members through their social media feeds and messages. The latter practice occurred in the case of soldiers killed in combat as well.
The widespread and numerous nature of these killings in conjunction with frequent expressions of praise from the Azerbaijani public and the absence of accountability suggests that this has been a systematic practice within the Azerbaijani military, rather than isolated or fringe cases.
Armenian families whose relatives are presumed or proven to have been killed extrajudicially have experienced significant obstacles in their search for information and in their efforts to recover their loved ones’ remains. The Armenian government has also failed to provide adequate administrative support to elderly and ill family members of victims as they navigate Armenian bureaucracy in search of information, accountability and reparations.
Home or Survival: An Impossible Decision
M. was born in a village in Nagorno-Karabakh in the 1940s. She grew up in Baku but fled with part of her family to Armenia in the late 1980s amidst increasing ethnic violence against Armenians in Azerbaijan. Despite this tumultuous childhood, it wasn’t until October 2020, at 83 years old, that she lived through the most horrific experience of her life.
When the war broke out, M. was living in Azokh village, taking care of her elderly brother Yuri, two years her junior. Azokh is less than twenty kilometers from Hadrut, one of the decisive battlegrounds during the 44-Day War. No matter how much M. insisted, Yuri refused to leave the home his father had built for him and his siblings. M. remained by Yuri’s side for weeks, taking shelter in basements, listening to drones fly overhead and hearing the daily shelling from nearby Hadrut city. Eventually, fear overcame her, and she was forced to leave Azokh, where her brother remained. “When you already see and feel the war right there, you think only about escape.”
Six days after M. fled their village, Azerbaijani forces entered Azokh. They captured Yuri, apparently dragging him out of his house. An Azerbaijani soldier began filming Yuri’s final moments. He begged for his life as another soldier sawed at his throat with a knife. The soldier who filmed the murder posted it on Telegram for the world to see.
Yuri’s death was devastating for his family. “Imagine how it affects me as his sister,” M told our team. “I feel like I don’t even exist, I cannot find my place. It feels like I don’t even exist in this world.”Azerbaijani forces have carried out extrajudicial killings of Armenian soldiers and civilians both during and following the 44-Day War for which on one has been held to account.
Postwar killings have ranged from summary execution of soldiers in the wake of combat who had been injured and/or disarmed prior to their execution to entering communities and killing the civilians who remain. Among non-combatants who have been extrajudicially killed are the elderly and disabled who would not or physically could not escape before Azerbaijani forces overtook their towns.
Azerbaijan’s leadership condones and encourages the cruelest forms of violence against Armenians through widespread hate speech and racist propaganda, as well as by failing to investigate and hold perpetrators to account.
The acts of many executions were filmed and posted to social media by the perpetrators themselves, then widely circulated on TikTok and Telegram.
Azerbaijani forces have also filmed the bodies of combatants killed in action, which they mutilated post mortem. It is not always apparent solely based on the content of the videos whether the mutilation occurred before or after death, but practices include chopping off limbs, carving messages across torsos, exposing victims’ genitals and breasts, inserting digits or foreign objects into victims’ mouths and empty eye sockets, severing victims’ heads, placing severed heads onto the bodies of animals, and other forms of horrific treatment. Azerbaijani forces have also summarily executed and mutilated civilians who remained in the towns that they captured and soldiers whom they took after an Azerbaijani victory in the battlefield.
Subsequent to the killings, Azerbaijani authorities unjustifiably held onto the bodies of many of the victims for months before handing them over to Armenian authorities, prolonging and deepening the emotional suffering of victims’ families. During that time, stickers, memes and emojis surfaced, displaying the victims in made-up degrading scenes. They were often sent by perpetrators to family members through their social media feeds and messages. The latter practice occurred in the case of soldiers killed in combat as well.
The widespread and numerous nature of these killings in conjunction with frequent expressions of praise from the Azerbaijani public and the absence of accountability suggests that this has been a systematic practice within the Azerbaijani military, rather than isolated or fringe cases.
Armenian families whose relatives are presumed or proven to have been killed extrajudicially have experienced significant obstacles in their search for information and in their efforts to recover their loved ones’ remains. The Armenian government has also failed to provide adequate administrative support to elderly and ill family members of victims as they navigate Armenian bureaucracy in search of information, accountability and reparations.
IV. GENOCIDAL DISCOURSE AND POLICIES
The rights abuses committed during and following the 44-Day War exist in a context of decades of racial animosity expressed by Azerbaijani leadership towards ethnic Armenians. The Azerbaijani government has fomented ethnic hatred by destroying cultural heritage sites, utilizing genocidal rhetoric about Armenians, and promoting discrimination in State institutions and projects. Hate speech and discrimination against Armenians in Azerbaijan is not new, and has worsened during and following the 2020 war; as many of our older interviewees recalled from their own lives, pervasive hate speech and discrimination in Azerbaijan has been a major driver of violence against ethnic Armenians at least since the 1980s. In November 2017, the Advisory Committee on the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities of the Council of Europe acknowledged that “an entire generation of Azerbaijanis has now been raised with a rhetoric of hate, hostility and victimhood, which may have an impact on prospects of future reconciliation.”
Hateful rhetoric has emanated from the highest levels of the Azerbaijani government. President Aliyev has referred to ethnic Armenians as “barbarians and vandals,” who are infected by a “virus” for which they “need to be treated.” Elnur Aslanov, head of the Political Analysis and Information Department of the Presidential Administration, referred to Armenia as a “cancerous tumor,” while Ziyafat Asgarov, First Deputy of Parliament called Armenians a “disease.”The rights abuses committed during and following the 44-Day War exist in a context of decades of racial animosity expressed by Azerbaijani leadership towards ethnic Armenians. The Azerbaijani government has fomented ethnic hatred by destroying cultural heritage sites, utilizing genocidal rhetoric about Armenians, and promoting discrimination in State institutions and projects. Hate speech and discrimination against Armenians in Azerbaijan is not new, and has worsened during and following the 2020 war; as many of our older interviewees recalled from their own lives, pervasive hate speech and discrimination in Azerbaijan has been a major driver of violence against ethnic Armenians at least since the 1980s. In November 2017, the Advisory Committee on the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities of the Council of Europe acknowledged that “an entire generation of Azerbaijanis has now been raised with a rhetoric of hate, hostility and victimhood, which may have an impact on prospects of future reconciliation.”
Hateful rhetoric has emanated from the highest levels of the Azerbaijani government. President Aliyev has referred to ethnic Armenians as “barbarians and vandals,” who are infected by a “virus” for which they “need to be treated.” Elnur Aslanov, head of the Political Analysis and Information Department of the Presidential Administration, referred to Armenia as a “cancerous tumor,” while Ziyafat Asgarov, First Deputy of Parliament called Armenians a “disease.”
Genocidal and expansionist remarks by government officials reveal the aims of tThis degrading rhetoric is exacerbated by genocidal and expansionist language by powerful government officials.
“Turkey and Azerbaijan could together wipe Armenia off the face of the Earth at a blow, and the Armenians should beware of that thought.”Elman Mammadov, former Azerbaijani Parliamentarian
The original interview appears to have been removed.
“Our goal is the complete elimination of Armenians.”Hajibala Abutalybov, Former Mayor of the Capital of Azerbaijan, Baku
Evidence presented by United States Congressman Joseph Knollenberg at a hearing before the Committee on Foreign Affairs
“[Armenia’s capital] Erivan is our historical land and we, the Azerbaijanis, must return to these historical lands. This is our political and strategic goal, and we must gradually approach it.” President Aliyev
Discourse from these high-level leaders has inevitably bled into popular Azeri society. In a nationwide address during the hostilities in September 2020, President Aliyev described how “Azerbaijani soldiers drive [Armenians] away like dogs.” This phrase exploded across Azerbaijani social media and eventually became a popular hashtag.
More examples of such vitriolic sentiments followed suit across Azerbaijani social media.
“We must kill Armenians. No matter whether a woman, a child, an old man. We must kill everyone we can and whoever happens. We should not feel sorry; we should not feel pity. If we do not kill (them), our children will be killed.”Nurlan Ibrahimov, public relations and media manager of the Azerbaijani football club “Qarabağ”
Deeply entrenched anti-Armenian hatred does not end with bigoted rhetoric by government figures and in official materials, but is effectuated in policies and programs.
Azerbaijan opened a Military Trophy Park after its victory in the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh War featuring degrading statues of defeated Armenians; though the park was subsequently downsized after Armenia applied to the International Court of Justice to issue a provisional measure closing the park, it remains open to the public. In another post-war example, Azerbaijan began producing a commemorative stamp showing a split-screen image of an Azerbaijani soldier and a man in a chemical biohazard suit standing over a map of Azerbaijan and fumigating the area of Nagorno-Karabakh.
Ethnic hatred has underpinned much of the Azerbaijani forces’ deliberate infliction of physical pain, emotional suffering, and public humiliation upon Armenians captured or executed both in wartime and peacetime.
This is particularly apparent in the widely circulated videos of soldiers using discriminatory rhetoric as they attack soldiers and civilians, including the sexual mutilation of bodies of female combatants and other forms of extreme violence. The widespread regard for Armenians as a people to be eradicated from or supplanted in the region has underlain Azerbaijani soldiers’ practice, recounted in our interviews with victims and documented widely, of forcing captives to declare Nagorno-Karabakh to be Azerbaijan’s and Azerbaijan’s alone.
These methods are consistent with the overarching pattern of ethnic discrimination that characterizes all the categories of rights violations analyzed in the forthcoming report.Genocidal and expansionist remarks by government officials reveal the aims of tThis degrading rhetoric is exacerbated by genocidal and expansionist language by powerful government officials.
“Turkey and Azerbaijan could together wipe Armenia off the face of the Earth at a blow, and the Armenians should beware of that thought.”Elman Mammadov, former Azerbaijani Parliamentarian
The original interview appears to have been removed.
“Our goal is the complete elimination of Armenians.”Hajibala Abutalybov, Former Mayor of the Capital of Azerbaijan, Baku
Evidence presented by United States Congressman Joseph Knollenberg at a hearing before the Committee on Foreign Affairs
“[Armenia’s capital] Erivan is our historical land and we, the Azerbaijanis, must return to these historical lands. This is our political and strategic goal, and we must gradually approach it.” President Aliyev
Discourse from these high-level leaders has inevitably bled into popular Azeri society. In a nationwide address during the hostilities in September 2020, President Aliyev described how “Azerbaijani soldiers drive [Armenians] away like dogs.” This phrase exploded across Azerbaijani social media and eventually became a popular hashtag.
More examples of such vitriolic sentiments followed suit across Azerbaijani social media.
“We must kill Armenians. No matter whether a woman, a child, an old man. We must kill everyone we can and whoever happens. We should not feel sorry; we should not feel pity. If we do not kill (them), our children will be killed.”Nurlan Ibrahimov, public relations and media manager of the Azerbaijani football club “Qarabağ”
Deeply entrenched anti-Armenian hatred does not end with bigoted rhetoric by government figures and in official materials, but is effectuated in policies and programs.
Azerbaijan opened a Military Trophy Park after its victory in the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh War featuring degrading statues of defeated Armenians; though the park was subsequently downsized after Armenia applied to the International Court of Justice to issue a provisional measure closing the park, it remains open to the public. In another post-war example, Azerbaijan began producing a commemorative stamp showing a split-screen image of an Azerbaijani soldier and a man in a chemical biohazard suit standing over a map of Azerbaijan and fumigating the area of Nagorno-Karabakh.
Ethnic hatred has underpinned much of the Azerbaijani forces’ deliberate infliction of physical pain, emotional suffering, and public humiliation upon Armenians captured or executed both in wartime and peacetime.
This is particularly apparent in the widely circulated videos of soldiers using discriminatory rhetoric as they attack soldiers and civilians, including the sexual mutilation of bodies of female combatants and other forms of extreme violence. The widespread regard for Armenians as a people to be eradicated from or supplanted in the region has underlain Azerbaijani soldiers’ practice, recounted in our interviews with victims and documented widely, of forcing captives to declare Nagorno-Karabakh to be Azerbaijan’s and Azerbaijan’s alone.
These methods are consistent with the overarching pattern of ethnic discrimination that characterizes all the categories of rights violations analyzed in the forthcoming report.
Azerbaijan’s aspiration to “wipe out” Armenians affects not only Armenian people, but also physical symbols of their existence as a culture and society. To this end, Azerbaijan has carried out a multi-pronged attack on Armenian cultural heritage that has involved destruction, erasure and revisionism, and obstructing access to cultural sites:
1. Destruction. Azerbaijani forces have destroyed Armenian churches, cemeteries, museums, and monuments during the 2020 war and afterwards as they took control of additional territory.
2. Erasure and revisionism. As a matter of state policy, Azerbaijan has imposed revisionist history of Armenian cultural monuments that have come under their control by erasing Armenian writing and markings from structures. Meanwhile, high-level officials have publicly expounded revisionist discourse. The revisionism has extended to a successful campaign to rename and publish false historical data about Armenian churches on Google Maps, including sites known to and visited by our team.
3. Obstructing access. Intimidation by Azerbaijani forces near border communities have effectively blocked residents and pilgrims from reaching places of worship.
In March 2022, the European Parliament passed a resolution acknowledging, “Elimination of the traces of Armenian cultural heritage in the Nagorno-Karabakh region is being achieved not only by damaging and destroying it, but also through the falsification of history and attempts to present it as so-called Caucasian Albanian.” Further, the resolution strongly condemned “Azerbaijan’s continued policy of erasing and denying the Armenian cultural heritage in and around Nagorno-Karabakh” and recognized that the “erasure of the Armenian cultural heritage is part of a wider pattern of a systematic, state-level policy of Armenophobia, historical revisionism and hatred towards Armenians promoted by the Azerbaijani authorities.”Azerbaijan’s aspiration to “wipe out” Armenians affects not only Armenian people, but also physical symbols of their existence as a culture and society. To this end, Azerbaijan has carried out a multi-pronged attack on Armenian cultural heritage that has involved destruction, erasure and revisionism, and obstructing access to cultural sites:
1. Destruction. Azerbaijani forces have destroyed Armenian churches, cemeteries, museums, and monuments during the 2020 war and afterwards as they took control of additional territory.
2. Erasure and revisionism. As a matter of state policy, Azerbaijan has imposed revisionist history of Armenian cultural monuments that have come under their control by erasing Armenian writing and markings from structures. Meanwhile, high-level officials have publicly expounded revisionist discourse. The revisionism has extended to a successful campaign to rename and publish false historical data about Armenian churches on Google Maps, including sites known to and visited by our team.
3. Obstructing access. Intimidation by Azerbaijani forces near border communities have effectively blocked residents and pilgrims from reaching places of worship.
In March 2022, the European Parliament passed a resolution acknowledging, “Elimination of the traces of Armenian cultural heritage in the Nagorno-Karabakh region is being achieved not only by damaging and destroying it, but also through the falsification of history and attempts to present it as so-called Caucasian Albanian.” Further, the resolution strongly condemned “Azerbaijan’s continued policy of erasing and denying the Armenian cultural heritage in and around Nagorno-Karabakh” and recognized that the “erasure of the Armenian cultural heritage is part of a wider pattern of a systematic, state-level policy of Armenophobia, historical revisionism and hatred towards Armenians promoted by the Azerbaijani authorities.”
Vardan, keeper of Armenian cultural heritage
During one of our trips to Armenia, University Network Researchers sat down with Vardan Asatryan, father, husband, and keeper of history and culture in Nagorno-Karabakh. He holds two masters degrees – one in political science and one in economics – but his true passion lies in preserving the stories of Armenian history and culture in the Nagorno-Karabakh region for future generations of Armenians.
With financial help from the Armenian diaspora, Vardan curated a museum in the town of Shushi in Nagorno-Karabakh that told the history of Armenian cultural heritage in the region through art, carpets, and artifacts, some dating as far back as 2000 years. Today, much of his collection has been seized by Azerbaijani forces, feeding a growing fear that the artifacts and the thousands of years of historical connection between Armenians and Nagorno-Karabakh will be lost forever.
Vardan is eager to explain how carpets tell a story, many times a religious one. The designs of the carpets are not random, but have a beginning and an end, a top and a bottom, and – as Vardan likes to say – are “the original pixelated images.” With the displacement of people like Vardan, there are fewer people who can help keep this history and these stories alive.
Like many other Armenians from the Nagorno-Karabakh region, Vardan is currently living in Yerevan, forcibly displaced from his home in the final days of the 44-Day War. Vardan’s museum was located in a civilian area. After a few days of intense shelling, with one artillery round landing in the front yard of one of his museums, Vardan resigned himself to the fact that Shushi would be lost to Azerbaijani forces. With the help of a friend and two soldiers who happened to be passing by, they rescued 50 paintings from his collection to immediately send out of Nagorno-Karabakh. To stay undetected by Azerbaijani drones, the vehicles transporting the items drove in the middle of the night without headlights for approximately thirty kilometers before crossing into safety at the Armenian border.
Vardan did not have time to rescue items from the second building, including 99 ceramics, 120 carpets, 50 bronze artifacts, and pieces from a midcentury exhibit. Azerbaijani troops posted videos online of them capturing and ransacking what was left of his museum, and President Ilham Aliyev called Vardan out by name, accusing him of being a thief and “stealing” Azerbaijani culture. After showing our researchers that video, Vardan reflected, “How could I leave my artifacts there – what would happen to them? They would pillage my museum like they did the second building. They would claim it as theirs.… If I had left them there, us as a culture, you would say goodbye to us. The history of our culture weaved into the carpets would disappear.”
Vardan eventually wants to bring the artifacts back to Artsakh, but he knows that this isn’t possible. “Shushi is full of Azerbaijanis, so how could I go back?” He hopes to publish a book on the historical Armenian culture in Nagorno-Karabakh to help preserve the history and culture for future generations.
Nearly a year ago, the University Network issued the following statement:
If the current escalation is allowed to continue, these (and perhaps greater) atrocities will likely be repeated. Equally terrifying is the very real possibility that Armenia–cornered and desperate–will sacrifice the people of Nagorno-Karabakh to secure the country’s territorial integrity… In the absence of accountability for the violations committed during and in the aftermath of the 44-day war in 2020, Azerbaijan, Turkey, and Russia may well allow the situation to degenerate into wholesale ethnic cleansing and slaughter of civilians in Nagorno-Karabakh, convinced that the world will shrug its shoulders and move on.
Unfortunately, the above holds true now more than ever. The window to prevent yet another collective failure to live up to “never again” is closing.
RECOMMENDATIONS
To Azerbaijan:
Cease all attacks and encroachment on Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenia in accordance with the November 9, 2020 ceasefire agreement.
Stop thwarting the free movement of goods, services, and people into, out of and throughout Nagorno-Karabakh along the Lachin Corridor.
Ensure that there are no obstructions to the optimal functioning of infrastructure providing gas, electricity, and essential services in Nagorno-Karabakh.
Given the ample evidence that ethnic hatred puts Armenians at high risk of mistreatment in Azerbaijani custody: a. Cease detentions of Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh and border areas with Nagorno-Karabakh or Armenia; and b. Release all Armenian prisoners detained in Nagorno-Karabakh and border areas with Armenia. c. If there is a legitimate basis to believe that Armenians have committed war crimes or crimes against humanity, they should be tried before a legitimate international or domestic court with jurisdiction outside of Azerbaijan.
End all secret detention and share all information in the possession of any and all state agents regarding the whereabouts and fate of Armenians who remain classified as “missing” with the ICRC, Armenian government, victims’ families and independent human rights monitors.
Prevent future violations of international humanitarian and human rights law including arbitrary detentions, enforced disappearances, torture, desecration of cultural heritage and extrajudicial killings. Specifically, to the Legal Department of the Azerbaijani Ministry of Defense, provide proper legal advice to military commanders and personnel employed in detention centers that makes clear the obligation to issue and follow only commands consistent with international humanitarian law, human rights law, and the international binding treaties that further obligate Azerbaijan.
Investigate all allegations of arbitrary detention, torture and ill-treatment of detainees in Azerbaijan’s custody, enforced disappearance and extrajudicial killings at all levels of government, and hold those responsible to account. Engage constructively with the international community in carrying out these investigations.
Azerbaijani public officials at all levels must refrain from spreading hate, calling for violence, and advocating discriminatory measures against Armenians, including by putting an end to state programs that perpetuate and reward discrimination.
Take immediate measures to prevent continued destruction of Armenian cultural heritage. Rectify any damage that has already been incurred.
To Armenia:
Take the long-term mental health impacts of prolonged detention and torture seriously, and provide accommodations to conscripts and mental health resources (for example, regular visits with psychologists and support groups) to returned prisoners of war.
Ensure the provision of adequate administrative, logistical, psychological and socio-economic support to family members of victims of extrajudicial killings, arbitrary detention, torture, and possible enforced disappearance, especially those who are elderly and/or disabled.
To the International Community:
Independent human rights monitoring mechanisms should conduct investigations into rights abuses, including inspecting detention sites in Azerbaijan and visiting border communities in Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenia, in a way that complements the role of the International Committee of the Red Cross.
Encourage Armenia and Azerbaijan to negotiate an agreement that ensures the continuity of the political and administrative independence of Nagorno-Karabakh, including by protecting it from any efforts to force its population into submission through measures such as the blockade of the Lachin Corridor and abusive control of vital infrastructure.
Improve security of residents of border communities in Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenia through the establishment of a multinational peacekeeping force to complement or eventually substitute the Russian presence.
To the private sector:
Conduct a review of the naming and description of cultural sites that have been introduced on social media and web mapping platforms since September 27, 2020. Correct inaccurate naming and descriptions.
Going forward, conduct robust, independent fact-checking and consult with experts in the cultural history of the region before assigning names and descriptions to cultural sites in and around Nagorno-Karabakh, in particular in those areas that have recently been taken over by Azerbaijan.
Design and implement effective policies to curb speech inciting violence against Armenians on social media platforms.Nearly a year ago, the University Network issued the following statement:
If the current escalation is allowed to continue, these (and perhaps greater) atrocities will likely be repeated. Equally terrifying is the very real possibility that Armenia–cornered and desperate–will sacrifice the people of Nagorno-Karabakh to secure the country’s territorial integrity… In the absence of accountability for the violations committed during and in the aftermath of the 44-day war in 2020, Azerbaijan, Turkey, and Russia may well allow the situation to degenerate into wholesale ethnic cleansing and slaughter of civilians in Nagorno-Karabakh, convinced that the world will shrug its shoulders and move on.
Unfortunately, the above holds true now more than ever. The window to prevent yet another collective failure to live up to “never again” is closing.
Khoren and Nanar wrapped in the Armenian flag
“If it wasn’t the best thing in the world, I wouldn’t have gone back three times.” My friend Ani’s words kept ringing in my head as I stood at the entrance to the educational and cultural youth center of Ninotsminda. My excitement and nervousness mingled together, creating a sense of anticipation I hadn’t felt before.
I felt overwhelmed by the crowd as about 120 kids barged into the center to greet this year’s Camp Javakhk counselors. Their eyes were wide with curiosity and excitement. The more extroverted kids started asking questions and immediately initiated conversations. The shy ones simply stared, smiled and walked away.
The participants were split into three groups—red, blue and orange—according to their age. Each group was paired with two counselors and a few local teenagers, or oknagans, eager to assist. Patil and I were co-counselors for the youngest group, ages 8 to 10.
During the daily schedule’s free period, I connected with participants from other groups. I sat on the stairs with the older girls and learned about their hobbies and interests. Their talents surprised me—one was a yellow belt in karate, another was a language enthusiast, and another was an adept bead maker.
Amid the excitement, kids tugged my arms, urging me to visit their impromptu “tattoo salon,” where they passionately sketched the Armenian and Artsakh flags, the iconic silhouette of Mount Ararat and a cross on my hands. In their vibrant strokes, I saw not only artistic _expression_ but also a profound connection to our national identity and heritage and a shared love for our homeland.
In their vibrant strokes, I saw not only artistic _expression_ but also a profound connection to our national identity and heritage and a shared love for our homeland.
We headed to a field near the center of the village, and despite the scorching sun, being with fellow counselors, oknagans and kids lightened the walk. The view of the field took my breath away, reinforcing my belief that I was in heaven. I immediately messaged my friend Ani: “You were right!”
As the days progressed, bonds formed with both the kids and my fellow counselors. Amidst the countless moments that wove the tapestry of our camp experience, a few stood out as favorites: the morning marzank, or exercise, which we always ended by playing “Gats” by Taline and Friends and dancing with the kids as our absolute silliest selves; our time spent at the field, embracing the breathtaking landscape and even learning some karate moves; dancing to Armenian music with the older girls, celebrating our shared heritage.
The late-night planning sessions and candid talks with my fellow counselors brought us closer together. We shared stories, laughter and a common purpose. Each counselor added something unique to the mix. Tania’s homemade tahdig offered a taste of tradition and love. Lorik’s thoughtful preparation ensured a cup of tea was always at hand. Aram became a companion in appreciating the beauty of Manuel Menengichian’s songs. Naira shared a sense of humor that melted away our exhaustion. Patil radiated sunshine with her optimism and good vibes. Isabel’s presence as the best roommate and confidant added warmth to every moment. These connections, simple yet strong, shaped an unforgettable journey at camp.
The campers’ reluctance to say goodbye was a testament to the bonds we’d built. Kids gifted us handmade bead rings and heartfelt letters, accompanied by the admonitions to “please don’t forget me.” Khoren and Hovo gave us persistent hugs and invitations to their homes. In those moments, I realized that being a Camp Javakhk counselor extended far beyond our five short days together. It was about leaving an indelible mark on their lives and carrying their stories with us, wherever we went.
As a Camp Javakhk counselor, I witnessed growth not only among the campers but also in myself. Saying goodbye to the campers, I realized I carried more than just memories. I was taking with me a renewed sense of purpose and a deeper connection to Javakhk and our fellow Javakhktsis.
The Javakhk region, with its rich history and cultural significance, stands as a testament to the enduring spirit of the Armenian people. This added a layer of meaning to the opportunity to immerse myself in this vibrant community. As I bid farewell, I carried the weight of this importance alongside the memories, a reminder of the responsibility we each held in preserving and cherishing the heritage of this remarkable region.
STATEMENT BY MRS NATHALIE BROADHURST,
DEPUTY PERMANENT REPRESENTATIVE OF FRANCE TO THE UNITED NATIONS, CHARGÉE D’AFFAIRES A.I.
New York,
Thank you Madam President, and thank you also to the representative of OCHA for her briefing.
I welcome the presence here today of the Foreign Minister of Armenia.
I would like to highlight three points.
Firstly, the restrictions and total blockage of traffic on the corridor linking Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh for more than eight months are now causing a humanitarian crisis.
The persistent blocking of the Latchine corridor by Azerbaijan continues to isolate the population of Nagorno-Karabakh from the rest of the world, with no legitimate reason to justify such a situation, which runs counter to the principles of international humanitarian law.
This situation, combined with the interruption of gas and electricity supplies, the drying up of water resources, the difficulties encountered by the population in gaining access to seeds, and the shortage of fuel which is hampering agricultural work, is now degenerating into a humanitarian crisis: the risk of famine and widespread shortages, including of medicines, is imminent.
France deplores the blocking of the humanitarian aid convoy dispatched last July by the Armenian authorities in an attempt to remedy this tragic situation. The restrictions and obstacles imposed on the activities of the ICRC and other humanitarian actors, in violation of international law, are not acceptable.
In view of the gravity of the humanitarian situation, France calls for the unconditional and immediate restoration of the free movement of goods, people and merchandise along the Latchine corridor, in both directions, and for a continuous supply of gas and electricity to the population.
Since our last public meeting, the International Court of Justice issued an order on February 22, 2023. This order indicated provisional measures, which are binding, and require Azerbaijan, in accordance with its obligations under the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, to “take all measures at its disposal to ensure the unimpeded movement of persons, vehicles and goods along the Latchine corridor in both directions”. In its Order of July 6, 2023, noting the precariousness of the situation between the Parties, the Court confirmed “the need for effective implementation of the measure indicated in its Order of February 22, 2023”.
As the UN Secretary-General did on August 2, France once again calls on Azerbaijan to abide by its international obligations, and to implement the provisional measures indicated by the International Court of Justice.
In light of the gravity of the situation, France welcomes the ICRC’s action on the ground, and will reinforce its support. France calls for immediate, free and unhindered access for humanitarian organizations and UN agencies to the populations concerned, and for the reopening of the Latchine corridor.
Madam President,
France remains fully committed to promoting a lasting and just peace in the region.
To this end, we call for a resumption of negotiations aimed at resolving all outstanding issues, including the rights and guarantees of the population of Nagorno-Karabakh. This can only be achieved through dialogue, excluding any use or threat of force.
Alongside the European Union, France will continue to contribute to efforts to promote dialogue between Armenia and Azerbaijan. It fully supports and participates in the mediation efforts led by the European Union to promote a process of normalization.
We will support the search for progress on all subjects under negotiation, including the draft peace treaty, border demarcation, humanitarian issues and the opening of communication routes. France stands ready to contribute to these objectives, in liaison with all the parties and stakeholders.
Thank you very much.
https://onu.delegfrance.org/france-once-again-calls-on-azerbaijan-to-abide-by-its-international-obligations
NTERVENTION DE MME NATHALIE BROADHURST,
REPRESENTANTE PERMANENTE ADJOINTE DE LA FRANCE AUPRÈS DES NATIONS UNIES
CHARGÉE D’AFFAIRES A.I.
AU CONSEIL DE SECURITE
New York, le 16 août 2023
Je vous remercie Madame la Présidente, et je tiens également à remercier la représentante du BCAH pour son exposé.
Je salue la présence parmi nous aujourd’hui du ministre des Affaires étrangères de l’Arménie.
Je souhaite insister sur trois points.
Premièrement, les restrictions puis le blocage total, depuis plus de huit mois de la circulation sur le corridor reliant l’Arménie et le Haut-Karabagh, provoquent aujourd’hui une crise humanitaire.
Le blocage persistant du corridor de Latchine par l’Azerbaïdjan continue d’isoler la population du Haut-Karabagh du reste du monde sans qu’aucune raison légitime ne puisse justifier une telle situation, qui va à l’encontre des principes du droit international humanitaire.
Cette situation, combinée aux interruptions de fourniture de gaz et d’électricité, au tarissement des ressources en eau, aux difficultés qui ont été rencontrées par la population pour avoir accès à des semences, à la pénurie de carburant qui entrave les travaux agricoles, dégénère aujourd’hui en crise humanitaire : le risque de famine et de pénuries généralisées, y compris de médicaments, est imminent.
La France déplore le blocage du convoi d’aide humanitaire dépêché en juillet dernier par les autorités arméniennes pour tenter de remédier à cette situation dramatique. Les restrictions et obstacles apportés aux activités du CICR et des acteurs humanitaires, en violation du droit international, ne sont pas acceptables.
Face à la gravité de la situation humanitaire, la France appelle au rétablissement sans conditions et sans délais de la libre circulation des biens, des personnes et des marchandises, le long du corridor de Latchine, dans les deux sens, et d’un approvisionnement continu de la population en gaz et en électricité.
Depuis notre dernière réunion publique, la Cour internationale de justice a rendu une ordonnance, le 22 février 2023. Cette ordonnance a indiqué des mesures conservatoires, qui ont force obligatoire, et qui prescrivent à l’Azerbaïdjan, conformément aux obligations qui lui incombent au titre de la Convention internationale sur l’élimination de toutes les formes de discrimination raciale, de « prendre toutes les mesures dont il dispose afin d’assurer la circulation sans entrave des personnes, des véhicules et des marchandises le long du corridor de Latchine dans les deux sens ». Dans son ordonnance du 6 juillet 2023, constatant « la précarité de la situation entre les Parties », la Cour a confirmé « la nécessité d’une mise en œuvre effective de la mesure indiquée dans son ordonnance du 22 février 2023 ».
Tout comme l’a fait le Secrétaire général des Nations Unies le 2 août, la France appelle à nouveau l’Azerbaïdjan à se conformer à ses obligations internationales, et notamment à mettre en œuvre les mesures conservatoires indiquées par la Cour internationale de justice.
Face à la gravité de la situation, la France salue l’action du CICR sur le terrain auquel elle renforcera son appui. La France demande l’accès immédiat, libre, sans entrave des organisations humanitaires et des agences des Nations Unies aux populations concernées et la réouverture du corridor de Latchine.
Madame la Présidente,
La France reste par ailleurs pleinement engagée pour favoriser une paix durable et juste dans la région.
Nous appelons à ce titre à une reprise des négociations, vers le règlement de l’ensemble des questions en suspens, y compris celle des droits et garanties pour la population du Haut-Karabagh. Ce règlement ne peut être atteint que par la voie du dialogue, en excluant tout recours à la force ou toute menace du recours à la force.
Aux côtés de l’Union européenne, la France continuera de contribuer aux efforts pour favoriser le dialogue entre l’Arménie et l’Azerbaïdjan. Elle apporte son plein soutien et participe aux efforts de médiation menés par l’Union européenne pour promouvoir un processus de normalisation.
Nous appuierons la recherche de progrès sur l’ensemble des sujets en négociation, notamment le projet de traité de paix, la délimitation de la frontière, les questions humanitaires, et l’ouverture des voies de communication. La France se tient à la disposition des parties pour contribuer à ces objectifs, en lien avec l’ensemble des partenaires et des parties prenantes.
Je vous remercie./.
21:38,
YEREVAN, AUGUST 17, ARMENPRESS. The Chinese Ambassador to Armenia, Fan Yong, has said that discussions are underway with Armenia on organizing direct flights between the two countries.
Speaking at a press briefing, Ambassador Fan Yong also said that the two countries are developing investment cooperation in the financial integration sector based on mutually beneficial grounds, and are ready to deepen it.
“According to statistics, China’s investments in Armenia comprise approximately fifty million dollars, whereas Armenia’s investments in China comprise fifteen million dollars. Certainly, I can’t say that these are large numbers, but I think we can work around it,” the Ambassador added.
20:30,
YEREVAN, AUGUST 16, ARMENPRESS. The Azerbaijani Defense Ministry continues to disseminate disinformation, the Armenian Defense Ministry warned Wednesday evening.
“The statement disseminated by the MoD of Azerbaijan that allegedly on August 16, at around 6:20 p.m., units of the Armenian Armed Forces discharged fire against the Azerbaijani combat positions located in the eastern part of the border, does not correspond to reality,” the Armenian Defense Ministry said in a statement.
Azerbaijan released three different fake news reports on August 16: twice falsely accusing Armenia of opening fire on the border and falsely accusing Armenia of an attempted raid. All accusations were denied by the Armenian authorities and described as disinformation.
Recent events in the South Caucasus have highlighted an overlooked development in the global weapons market: the rise of India as an arms exporter. Armenia has purchased Indian armaments amid ongoing tensions with Azerbaijan, a close ally of Pakistan and Turkey, procuring a variety of munitions, including anti-tank missiles, Pinaka Multiple-Launch Rocket Systems (MLRS) and long-range artillery. Baku became particularly concerned after Azerbaijani media outlets streamed a video allegedly showing the transfer of Pinaka MLRS complexes to Armenia via Iran. On July 26, Azerbaijani Presidential Foreign Policy Advisor Hikmat Hajiyev met Indian Ambassador Sridharan Madhusudhanan, informing him that the Azerbaijani government was closely following and increasingly concerned about “deepening” military cooperation between Armenia and India. Hajiyev also urged India to revise its decision to supply weapons to Armenia, as supplying lethal weaponry while Yerevan and Baku are holding peace treaty discussions “paves the way for Armenia’s militarization” and “impedes the establishment of lasting peace and security in the South Caucasus” (Trend.az, July 26).
New Delhi’s emergence as a defense exporter is relatively recent. While India currently remains the world’s leading arms importer, it has taken significant steps not only to diversify its defense procurement strategy but also to export weapons to over 80 countries, with the United States as a prominent customer. The Pinaka MLRS, developed by India’s Defense Research and Development Organization (DRDO), is often considered a counterpart to the American HIMARS (High-Mobility Artillery Rocket System). Moreover, Indian companies have received orders from major US defense firms to supply parts for advanced weapons platforms, including F-16 fighters as well as Chinook and Apache helicopters. The Armenian export orders, which include Pinaka MLRS, artillery and various caliber ammunition, along with other systems, have further boosted India’s 2023 weapons exports (Economic Times, June 13).
Beyond their potential to destabilize the fragile de-facto truce in the South Caucasus, Western concerns over Armenia’s weapons purchases were heightened by the fact that the Indian arms transited through heavily sanctioned Iran, being delivered through the Iranian Port of Bandar Abbas on the Persian Gulf and then overland by road to the Nurduz border crossing to Armenia (News.ru, July 26).
Overall, Indian-Armenian armament deals predate the latest dispute, with security cooperation between the two sides dating back to at least 2011; military-technical cooperation dates back to 2017 (Media.az, July 31). Such defense exports are bound to rise as a result of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s resolve to make the country Atmanirbhar Bharat (“self-reliant India” ) in military supplies (Economic Times, June 13). India’s lucrative defense sector is closely linked to the Modi government’s economic and strategic ambitions and forms an increasingly central element in the government’s “Made in India” program. Spurring on New Delhi’s drive for self-sufficiency in arms production is rising governmental concern that the spate of additional sanctions imposed by the US and its North Atlantic Treaty Organization partners on Russia in the wake of its “special military operation” (SVO) against Ukraine is likely to constrain further Indian arms imports from Russia—a major concern for India’s military, which remains heavily dependent on them.
Despite the gaps in arms production, Indian defense exports have undergone an extraordinary 800-percent increase since 2016–2017, from around $184 million (₹Rs 1,522 crore) to about $1.66 billion (₹Rs 13,800 crore). Buoyed by this surge, New Delhi has set the goal of expanding defense exports to $4.23 billion (₹Rs 35,000 crore) by 2024–2025 (Economic Times, June 13).
Encouraging domestic arms production is spurred by the significant cost of imports over the past two decades, during which India spent over $60 billion on arms procurement, with nearly $39 billion being purchased from Russia. In response, Indian Defense Minister Rajnath Singh has articulated a vision of ordering over $100 billion worth of weaponry from the domestic arms industry over the next decade, symbolizing India’s commitment to increasing its self-sufficiency (IndraStra, August 2).
All in all, munitions purchases between the Armenian and Indian militaries have rapidly increased as of late (Caliber.az, July 26). The most recent deals build on earlier Indian-Armenian military contacts, as the pair had previously signed contracts worth over $400 million. For an earlier military purchase in 2020, Armenia bought four Indian Swathi latest-generation phased array radars for $40 million, jointly produced by the DRDO and Bharat Electronics to detect and direct counter-battery fire against enemy ordinance. (EurAsian Times, July 27).
New Delhi’s decision to sell military equipment to Armenia in greater quantities has had wider regional repercussions, leading Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to describe the sale as an “unfriendly move” (Daijiworld.com, August 4).
The sale of India’s first indigenously designed and developed Pinaka Multiple-Barrel Rocket Launchers further indicates a broader potential global niche market for Indian-manufactured weaponry, which can undercut more expensive US, European, Russian and Chinese armaments in hotspots throughout the Global South, including in Africa. In the interim, Indian-Azerbaijani ties continue to be lukewarm against the backdrop of Baku’s close security ties with Islamabad (see EDM, June 21).
Additional Armenian purchases of Indian armaments seem likely, as Yerevan has authorized a 46-percent increase from its 2022 defense budget to $1.3 billion for 2023 (Caspian News, July 27).
A primary objective of Modi’s “Made in India” initiative is to lessen the technological disparity with India’s better-equipped rival, China, which is further complicated by Beijing’s close alliance with Pakistan. A further challenge facing the Indian military is the impact of Russia’s stalemated invasion in Ukraine, which has hampered Moscow’s ability to fulfill arms and equipment orders, which may serve to further incentivize India’s Atmanirbhar Bharat program. While Russian President Vladimir Putin cannot be happy about India’s weapons sales in the post-Soviet space, he cannot afford to alienate India, as it is a critical market for Russian arms and energy exports amid shrinking global demand for both (see EDM, April 27).
For Russia, Armenia broadening its options for arms imports is yet another disquieting reminder of Moscow’s diminishing influence in its “front yard,” as it sinks further into the mire of its Ukrainian assault, with the US, China and now India maneuvering in the resultant Eurasian geopolitical vacuum.
August 8, 2023
Monday, August 7, 2023
Opposition Figure Elected Parliament Speaker In Nagorno-Karabakh
• Ruzanna Stepanian
David Ishkhanian, newly elected speaker of the Karabakh parliament, Stepanakert,
August 7, 2023.
An opposition figure representing a nationalist party with links across the
far-flung Armenian diaspora has been elected parliament speaker in
Nagorno-Karabakh, fueling speculation about a possible shift in local politics
largely influenced by Azerbaijan’s blockade of the region in recent weeks.
David Ishkhanian, a member of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation
(Dashnaktsutyun), a minority group in the 32-member Karabakh parliament, was
installed to the top legislative post by a secret ballot of 22 to 9 on Monday,
nine days after former speaker Artur Tovmasian announced his resignation.
The ruling Free Homeland – United Civil Bloc faction, of which Tovmasian was a
member, denied any political motives behind his resignation, saying that it was
his personal decision driven by “health matters.”
Tovmasian himself acknowledged that it was his personal decision, but stressed
that despite his resignation he remained committed to the cause of
self-determination of the region that proclaimed its independence from
Azerbaijan in 1991.
The change in Nagorno-Karabakh’s main political body comes amid a continuing
blockade of the region by Azerbaijan that has installed a checkpoint at the
Lachin corridor connecting it with Armenia and effectively blocked all cargoes
coming to Nagorno-Karabakh from there.
Azerbaijan’s cutting off the transport link between Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenia
and thus tightening its grip on the region that it considers to be part of its
sovereign territory is the latest in a series of similar steps that Baku has
taken since the Armenian defeat in a war three years ago.
Stepanakert and Yerevan insist that the Lachin corridor must remain under the
control of Russian peacekeepers that were deployed in the region following a
Moscow-brokered ceasefire agreement that put an end to six weeks of fierce
fighting in Nagorno-Karabakh in November 2020.
The current blockade has also revealed some growing differences between the
ethnic Armenian leadership in Stepanakert and the government of Prime Minister
Nikol Pashinian in Armenia. In particular, Nagorno-Karabakh’s ethnic Armenian
government has repeatedly cautioned Pashinian against questioning the region’s
self-determination by recognizing it as part of Azerbaijan – a condition that
Baku puts forward for a peace treaty to be signed with Armenia.
Incidentally, Dashnaktsutyun is also in opposition to Pashinian in Armenia and
demands that the current Armenian government refuse to pursue a policy that
would jeopardize Nagorno-Karabakh’s self-determination.
Metakse Hakobian, a member of the Karabakh parliament’s opposition Justice
faction who said she had voted for Ishkhanian’s candidacy, told RFE/RL’s
Armenian Service that the oppositionist’s nomination for the post was a “cunning
move” on the part of Nagorno-Karabakh’s President Arayik Harutiunian.
“In the hopeless situation in which he [Harutiunian] has found himself in now
and which he is no longer able to cope with, he also considers this as a
lifeline, thinking that over time there will emerge a structure, a person who
will be able to more confidently oppose the authorities in Armenia. This is a
cunning move, because Arayik Harutyunyan has never done anything for the good of
the state or based on the interests of the state,” the opposition lawmaker
claimed.
Hakobian said that the Justice faction voted for Ishkhanian’s candidacy and
welcomes his election because it hopes that a parliament speaker representing
Dashnaktsutyun “will be able to act more independently and turn the
Nagorno-Karabakh parliament into a separate decision-making political entity.”
At the same time, Hakobian claimed that an opposition candidate’s election as
parliament speaker could also be designed by Harutiunian as a step to split the
local opposition, something that she said the authorities would not be able to
achieve.
Meanwhile, Marcel Petrosian, who heads the second largest faction in
Nagorno-Karabakh’s parliament, United Homeland, which is linked with former
secretary of the region’s Security Council Samvel Babayan, said that they voted
against the candidacy of Ishkhanian because the ruling faction did not consult
them before his nomination.
“That’s not how things are done. In fact, it turns out that they have brought
the opposition to power in a roundabout way,” he said.
Attempts by RFE/RL’s Armenian Service to contact the leader of the
Nagorno-Karabakh parliament’s pro-government Free Homeland – United Civil Bloc
faction during the day were unsuccessful.
It emerged later that Harutiunian and two former Karabakh presidents Arkady
Ghukasian and Bako Sahakian had approached Dashnaktsutyun with an offer to have
Ishkhanian elected parliament speaker in Nagorno-Karabakh.
Gegham Manukian, a Dashnak lawmaker in the Armenian parliament, told RFE/RL’s
Armenian Service that “after long discussions the party gave its consent,
considering the crucial moment for Artsakh [Nagorno-Karabakh – ed.].”
Manukian made it clear, however, that the Dashnak representative would be free
to resign in case of differences with Nagorno-Karabakh’s government on key
issues.
Meanwhile, Armenian Parliament Speaker Alen Simonian congratulated Ishkhanian on
the election as Nagorno-Karabakh’s parliament speaker in a telephone
conversation reported by the press office of Armenia’s National Assembly today.
Russian Peacekeepers Said To Refuse To Provide Security To Karabakh Protesters
• Ruzanna Stepanian
A Russian officer meets with ethnic Armenian activists the near the command
headquarters of the Russian peacekeeping force in Nagorno-Karabakh. August 4,
2023.
The Russian peacekeeping force deployed in Nagorno-Karabakh has declined to
provide security to participants in a local protest planning a trip to an
Azerbaijani checkpoint at the Lachin corridor to try to break what authorities
in Stepanakert view as an illegal blockade of the region.
In a written reply to participants of the planned protest on buses a deputy
commander of the peacekeeping force reportedly said that the terms of the
deployment of the Russian military under a trilateral statement signed by the
leaders of Russia, Armenia and Azerbaijan in November 2020 to end a six-week war
in Nagorno-Karabakh did not provide for the possibility of escorting protests on
wheels and ensuring the security of various demonstrations and rallies.
“Peacekeepers are there to check for prohibited items, in particular, firearms
and explosives, among participants of traffic at checkpoints,” Russian officer
Sazonov, who introduced himself only by his surname, wrote, as quoted by Artur
Osipian, a Karabakh activist engaged in the local movement against the
Azerbaijani blockade.
The Russian representative also reportedly dismissed claims being disseminated
on social media in Azerbaijan that Russian troops intended to use force against
Azerbaijani officers at the checkpoint of the Hakari bridge on the pretext of
providing the security for a peaceful Karabakh Armenian protest. Sazonov, as
presented by Osipian, stressed that peaceful protests were not grounds for
holding any military operation by the Russian peacekeeping force.
Having a written reply from Alexander Lentsov, the commander of the Russian
peacekeeping forces, was the demand of members of the movement for unblocking
the Lachin corridor that they presented to the command of the Russian contingent
in Nagorno-Karabakh last Friday.
Participants of the movement say that the intended goal of their action is “to
show to the world that [Azerbaijani President Ilham] Aliyev is lying when he
says that the road is open.”
It is unclear yet whether members of the movement will attempt their announced
protest on dozens of buses towards the Azerbaijani checkpoints in the coming
days, but activist Osipian said that they remained adamant despite the reply of
the Russian peacekeeping force command that he described as preposterous.
“Now let the Russians explain how providing the security of a dozen or a hundred
civilian vehicles is different from providing the security of one civilian
vehicle,” Osipian said in a Facebook video.
The activist claimed that with this latest development “the Kremlin has revealed
its true face, showing that the Russians are together with Azerbaijan.”
“We have great suspicions now that along with Azerbaijan it is the Russian
peacekeepers, or should I say occupation troops, which they are, who subject us
to a blockade… We do not lose heart, we will continue our struggle,” Osipian
said.
Amid severe shortages of food, medicines, fuel and other basic products brought
on by the Azerbaijani blockade Nagorno-Karabakh’s ethnic Armenian authorities
stressed last week that while they were not part of the civil initiative and did
not provide it with logistics, they treated with understanding the demands of
the movement.
Meanwhile, at least one opposition member of the region’s parliament, Metakse
Hakobian, claimed last week that the “theatrical” initiative was being guided by
authorities in Stepanakert and Yerevan to discredit the Russian peacekeepers.
Russian peacekeepers deployed in Nagorno-Karabakh as part of the 2020 ceasefire
agreement have increasingly been criticized in Stepanakert and Yerevan for their
inability to act in accordance with their mission stated in the document, that
is, to protect the security of the local population.
They are also blamed for effectively ceding control of the Lachin corridor, the
only road connecting Nagorno-Karabakh with Armenia, to Azerbaijan earlier this
year amid a perceived weakening of Russia’s political and military positions in
the region due to its largely failing invasion of Ukraine.
Echoing this widely held belief, Nagorno-Karabakh’s ethnic Armenian leader
Arayik Harutiunian acknowledged on Sunday that Russia’s inability to implement
“the most important provision [of the ceasefire agreement] concerning the Lachin
corridor” is “a consequence of the Russo-Ukrainian war.”
Armenia Urges International Action To End Karabakh Blockade
Ani Badalian, a spokersperson for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Armenia
A diplomatic representative in Armenia has stressed the need for international
calls and decisions on restoring free and safe access to Nagorno-Karabakh to be
acted upon amid a deteriorating humanitarian situation in the Armenian-populated
region surrounded by Azerbaijan.
Problems with shortages of foodstuffs, medicines and other essential goods have
remained acute in Nagorno-Karabakh for weeks as Azerbaijan continues to keep a
convoy of Armenian trucks with humanitarian supplies stranded at the entrance to
the Lachin corridor, the only road connecting Armenia with the region on which
Azerbaijan set up a checkpoint in April and tightened the effective blockade
several weeks later.
The United States, the European Union and Russia have repeatedly called for an
immediate end to the blockade of the corridor that Yerevan and Stepanakert
insist must remain only under the control of Russian peacekeepers in accordance
with the terms of a Moscow-brokered trilateral ceasefire agreement that put an
end to a deadly six-week Armenian-Azerbaijani war in Nagorno-Karabakh in 2020.
Baku has dismissed such appeals, saying that the Karabakh Armenians should only
be supplied with food and other basic items from Azerbaijan.
A number of international organizations have also issued appeals urging the
reopening of the Lachin Corridor. Among them was the Parliamentary Assembly of
the Council of Europe (PACE).
In a tweet on Monday a spokesperson for Armenia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs
referred to a PACE resolution adopted on June 22 that was based on the report of
one of its members, Paul Gavan.
“Now clear steps are needed to implement all international calls and decisions,”
Ani Badalian wrote, without elaborating. She cited Gavan, an Irish politician,
as saying that “what we are witnessing now is a deliberate attempt to ethnically
cleanse the Armenian population of Nagorno-Karabakh.”
Edmon Marukian, Armenia’s ambassador-at-large, also recently wrote on Twitter
that people in Nagorno-Karabakh faint on a daily basis due to malnutrition,
publishing a photograph of one such reported incident.
“The leadership of Azerbaijan bears direct responsibility for this and the
international community is sharing this responsibility by doing nothing to save
people’s lives,” Marukian contended.
Nagorno-Karabakh’s ethnic Armenian leader Arayik Harutiunian on August 6
described the Azerbaijani blockade of access to the region for goods from
Armenia as a genocidal policy. He again ruled out the possibility of
humanitarian supplies to the region that seeks independence from Baku by
Azerbaijan.
Armenia and Azerbaijan have been locked in a conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh for
decades. Some 30,000 people were killed in a war in the early 1990s that left
ethnic Armenians in control of the predominantly Armenian-populated region and
seven adjacent districts of Azerbaijan proper.
Decades of internationally mediated talks failed to result in a diplomatic
solution and the simmering conflict led to another war in 2020 in which nearly
7,000 soldiers were killed on both sides.
The 44-day war in which Azerbaijan regained all of the Armenian-controlled areas
outside of Nagorno-Karabakh as well as chunks of territory inside the Soviet-era
autonomous oblast proper ended with a Russia-brokered ceasefire under which
Moscow deployed about 2,000 troops to the region to serve as peacekeepers.
Tensions along the restive Armenian-Azerbaijani border and around
Nagorno-Karabakh leading to sporadic fighting and loss of life have persisted
despite the ceasefire and publicly stated willingness of the leaders of both
countries to work towards a negotiated peace.
Karabakh Leader Sees Risk Of Renewed War With Azerbaijan
Arayik Harutiunian, leader of Nagorno-Karabakh, Stepanakert, Aug 6, 2023.
Azerbaijan seeks to renounce a 2020 Russian-brokered ceasefire agreement with
Armenia and renew hostilities against Nagorno-Karabakh, the region’s ethnic
Armenian leader warned over the weekend.
In an August 6 interview with Nagorno-Karabakh’s Public Television Arayik
Harutiunian also cautioned Armenia against taking any steps that would “question
the self-determination” of Karabakh Armenians.
Speaking about the current blockade of Nagorno-Karabakh by Azerbaijan
Harutiunian claimed that it was already a siege warfare employed by Baku.
“Azerbaijan continues to exert pressure to extract maximum [concessions].
Azerbaijan is seeking to hold Nagorno-Karabakh Armenians in some sense hostage,
while simultaneously committing genocide and putting pressure on the Armenian
authorities and international actors in terms of having a more privileged
version of the Zangezur road,” the Karabakh leader said, referring to what
Armenians perceive as Baku’s plans to get an extraterritorial corridor to its
western Nakhichevan exclave via the southern part of Armenia.
Armenia insists that a road via its Syunik province (also called Zangezur in
both Armenia and Azerbaijan), which is part of the 2020 ceasefire agreement,
should remain under Armenian sovereignty. In contrast, Yerevan stresses that the
Lachin corridor must remain under the control of Russian peacekeepers in
accordance with the terms of the trilateral statement that put an end to a
44-day Armenian-Azerbaijani war in Nagorno-Karabakh in which nearly 7,000
soldiers were killed from both sides.
Yerevan and Stepanakert accused Baku of violating the terms of the agreement by
installing a checkpoint at the Lachin corridor in April and then tightening the
effective blockade of the Armenian-populated region in June.
The blockade, which has effectively been in place since last December when a
group of pro-government Azerbaijani activists began a protest in the Lachin
corridor, cutting off Nagorno-Karabakh’s connection with Armenia, has resulted
in severe shortages of foodstuffs, medicines and other essentials in the region
populated by some 120,000 Armenians.
Authorities in Stepanakert stress that Nagorno-Karabakh’s population is
increasingly suffering from malnutrition and facing the imminent threat of
starvation. They have already reported cases of people fainting while standing
in queues for rationed bread.
In his latest interview Harutiunian said that Azerbaijan’s actions amounted to
genocide. Baku routinely denies such claims.
The United States, the European Union and Russia have repeatedly called for an
immediate end to the blockade. Baku has dismissed their appeals, saying that the
Karabakh Armenians should only be supplied with food and other basic items from
Azerbaijan.
The Karabakh leader, however, again rejected Baku’s offer of an alternative
route for humanitarian supplies passing through Azerbaijan-controlled Agdam. He
said that Azerbaijan, whom Stepanakert views as the cause of the situation,
cannot be the one to offer a remedy.
“First they turn it into a concentration camp, and then they start offering what
they want and as much as they want,” Harutiunian said. “Any proposal addressed
to us must first of all respect our dignity, be within the framework of our
dignity and comply with international humanitarian standards,” he added.
The Karabakh leader confirmed the news that a meeting between representatives of
Stepanakert and Baku, which was supposed to take place on August 1 in Bratislava
with the mediation of the West, did not take place. He claimed it was Azerbaijan
who refused to hold the meeting.
Armenia insists that a solution to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict should be found
through an internationally visible dialogue between representatives of
Stepanakert and Baku that would discuss the rights and security of the region’s
ethnic Armenian population. Armenia views this as an essential prerequisite for
a durable peace agreement with Azerbaijan. Azerbaijan insists that no special
treatment is required for Karabakh Armenians, while pledging that if
reintegrated they will enjoy all the rights that other citizens of Azerbaijan,
including ethnic minorities, have.
Reposted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL
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