Wednesday,
Armenian, Azeri FMs May Meet Again
• Sargis Harutyunyan
Belgium - The foreign ministers of Armenia and Azerbaijan and the OSCE Minsk
Group co-chairs meet in Brussels, 11 July, 2018.
The foreign ministers of Armenia and Azerbaijan may meet again soon for further
negotiations on reviving the Nagorno-Karabakh peace process.
Azerbaijan’s Elmar Mammadyarov and his recently appointed Armenian counterpart,
Zohrab Mnatsakanian, held their first face-to-face talks in Brussels on July
11. The U.S., Russian and French mediators co-chairing the OSCE Mins Group, who
were present at the talks, said they agreed to meet again “in the near future.”
Mammadyarov said on Tuesday that the meeting will likely take place in New York
in September.
The Armenian Foreign Ministry did not confirm or deny this. The ministry
spokesman, Tigran Balayan, told RFE/RL’s Armenian service (Azatutyun.am) that
there is no final agreement yet on the date and venue of the next
Mammadyarov-Mnatsakanian encounter.
Speaking at a news conference in Baku, Mammadyarov seemed satisfied with his
first contact with Mnatsakanian. He said that the latter is a “more
professional diplomat” than the previous Armenian foreign minister, Edward
Nalbandian.
A July 12 statement by the mediators said that Mammadyarov and Mnatsakanian
discussed “a range of possible confidence-building measures” at their Brussels
meeting. Armenia’s current and former governments have said that such measures
are essential for making major progress towards a peaceful resolution of the
Karabakh conflict.
“Unfortunately, with its actions and rhetoric Azerbaijan is undermining an
atmosphere conducive to peace and we will be acting accordingly,” Prime
Minister Nikol Pashinian said on Wednesday.
Pashinian said in that regard that Defense Minister Davit Tonoyan was right to
warn over the weekend that the Armenian side will strike back harder if Baku
again launches offensive military operations in Karabakh.
The commander of Karabakh’s Armenian-backed army, went further on Tuesday,
warning that the Armenian military could “paralyze Azerbaijan’s economy” with
missile strikes. Baku responded by threatening devastating strikes on key
facilities in Armenia, including the Metsamor nuclear plant.
Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev likewise threatened to hit “strategic”
Armenian targets during a June 26 military parade in Baku.
Still No Candidates For New Yerevan Mayor
• Anush Mkrtchian
Armenia - A general view of central Yerevan against the backdrop of Mount
Ararat, 5Nov2014.
Armenia’s leading political groups have not yet nominated candidates for the
vacant post of Yerevan’s mayor ahead of fresh municipal elections expected soon.
The city’s previous mayor, Taron Markarian, resigned on July 9 under apparent
pressure from Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian and his political allies.
Markarian, who had been in office since 2011, is a senior member of former
President Serzh Sarkisian’s Republican Party of Armenia (HHK). He was reelected
by the current city council formed by Yerevan residents in May 2017.
The HHK-controlled council deliberately failed to elect a new mayor on July 16.
Under Armenian law, the central government can now disband the legislature and
call fresh municipal elections. A spokesman for Pashinian said earlier this
month that the government will not do that before July 30.
That means the polls will not be held before September. Observers believe that
Pashinian’s Civil Contract party will be the favorite to win them.
At least four members of Civil Contract have expressed their desire to be its
mayoral candidate. Those are comedian Hayk Marutian, parliament deputy Alen
Simonian, Deputy Labor Minister Zaruhi Batoyan and an aide to Pashinian, Srbuhi
Ghazarian.
The party’s governing board discussed Marutian’s and Ghazarian’s candidacies
late on Tuesday. It will meet with the two other potential candidates in the
coming days.
It remains unclear whether Civil Contract will contest the elections on its own
or jointly with the two other parties making up the Yelk alliance. “Wait for
one week and you will find out,” said Eduard Aghajanian, the chief of the prime
minister’s staff.
The May 2017 vote was boycotted by Pashinian’s coalition partners, the
Prosperous Armenia Party (BHK) of businessman Gagik Tsarukian and the Armenian
Revolutionary Federation (Dashnaktsutyun).
A senior BHK figure, Naira Zohrabian, said the party will join the mayoral race
this time around.“Active discussions” are now underway on who should be its
mayoral candidate, said Zohrabian.
According to Arsen Hambardzumian, a Dashnaktsutyun leader, the party is
“inclined” to participate in the upcoming polls.
Meanwhile, a senior HHK member, Ruben Tadevosian, said the former ruling party
has not yet decided whether it will also enter the fray. “When the date of the
city council election is determined we will discuss that and let you know,” he
told RFE/RL’s Armenian service (Azatutyun.am).
U.S. Mulls Trump-Pashinian Meeting In September
• Nane Sahakian
Belgium - U.S. President Donald Trump and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol
Pashinian talk during a NATO summit in Brussels, 11 July 2018.
The United States is exploring the possibility of organizing a meeting of
President Donald Trump and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian in New York
in September, a senior U.S. diplomat said on Wednesday.
“We are looking at whether it might be possible for President Trump and the
prime minister to meet when they are both in New York around the margins of the
UN General Assembly,” U.S. Ambassador Richard Mills told reporters in Yerevan.
“I know both sides would like to see a meeting happen, but as you can imagine,
the schedules of both the president and the prime minister are very tight,” he
said. “So we will have to see if we can find a way to make that happen.”
“But no decision has been made yet on whether it will be possible,” added Mills.
Trump and Pashinian greeted each other and chatted briefly during a NATO summit
held in Brussels two weeks ago. But they have held no talks yet. The Armenian
premier took office on May 8 after mass protests organized by him brought down
the country’s pervious government.
Last week several pro-Armenian members of the U.S. House of Representatives
started collecting the signatures of fellow lawmakers on their joint letter to
Trump urging him to meet Pashinian in New York. It says that Pashinian led a
peaceful revolution that “can be a model for nations seeking democracy around
the world.”
“As Armenia seeks to bolster government transparency, strengthen democratic
institutions, and empower civil society, it is critical for the United States
to deepen its ties with this regional partner at every level of government,”
reads the letter. “Without question, your meeting with Prime Minister Pashinian
would help to further this goal and strengthen dialogue between our countries.”
Some of those lawmakers met with Armenia’s First Deputy Prime Minister Ararat
Mirzoyan in Washington last week.
Pashinian expressed readiness to “strengthen and expand” Armenia’s relationship
with the U.S. when he congratulated Trump on America’s Independence Day on July
4. “Your support [to Armenia] is called-for today more than ever before,” he
wrote.
Afghans Detained On Armenia’s Border With Turkey
Armenia -- A border-guard watchtower on the Armenian-Turkish frontier pictured
against the backdrop of Mount Ararat.
Russian border guards deployed in Armenia said on Wednesday that they have
detained five citizens of Afghanistan who crossed into the country from
neighboring Turkey.
A statement by the guards’ headquarters in Yerevan cited by the Armenpress news
agency described the Afghans as members of a “criminal group that tried to
illegally enter Armenia.”
“The intruders have been handed over to law-enforcement bodies of the Republic
of Armenia in a legally defined manner,” it said. “A set of necessary measures
are being taken to ascertain all circumstances of the incident.”
A photograph released by the Russians showed three blindfolded men lying on the
ground.
Armenia’s National Security Service (NSS), which is also charged with
protecting the country’s borders with Turkey and Iran, made no statements on
the incident.
The NSS reported in May that it is investigating possible links with “terrorist
groups” of six Bangladeshi men who were detained while crossing into the
country from Azerbaijan’s Nakhichevan exclave which also borders on Turkey and
Iran. It said they claimed to have accidentally strayed into Armenian territory
while trying to reach Turkey “for the purpose of finding work.”
The men were charged at the time with illegally border crossing, a serious
criminal offense in Armenia.
Press Review
“Zhamanak” says that Armenian officials have made ambiguous statements on
Armenia’s participation in an upcoming NATO-led military exercise in Georgia.
The paper suggests that Yerevan is wary of a negative reaction from Moscow. “We
don’t know yet what its decision will be but there is no doubt that this is the
problem and that Yerevan will take a look at it before making a final
decision,” it says. “Russia always makes tough statements on NATO presence in
Georgia and that is understandable. Moscow does not want to see the alliance
expand into an area of its vital interests.”
“Zhoghovurd” says that one negative consequence of the democratic revolution in
Armenia is the emergence of more “one-man parties” with disproportionate
ambitions. There are already about 100 parties registered in the country. The
paper says that the vast majority of them violate provisions of an Armenian law
on political parties, including a requirement to hold conventions at least once
in two years. And they get away with that, it complains.
“Aravot” reacts to a decision by Echmiadzin’s municipal council to strip Manvel
Grigorian, a retired general prosecuted on corruption charges, of the title of
the town’s honorary citizen. The paper says that while the charges levelled
against Grigorian are very serious indeed the council should have waited for a
court ruling on the case before making such a decision.It says the council
should have also held a discussion on why Grigorian had received the title in
the first place.
“Hraparak” claims that Russia has made a “political decision” to raise the
price of its natural supplied to Armenia. The existing gas price is set by a
Russian-Armenian agreement that will expire at the end of this year. The paper
quotes an unnamed Russian source as saying that Moscow is “bewildered” by some
of the statements and actions of the new Armenian government.
(Tigran Avetisian)
Reprinted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL
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