Author: Chmshkian Vicken

June 1 2023

The warring states of Armenia and Azerbaijan are negotiating a peace agreement with international mediation, which could come about by autumn. Chancellor Scholz is now taking part in the talks.

Dry, cracked earth can be seen where the Sarsang reservoir should still be well filled at this time of year – in northern Nagorno-Karabakh. The photos taken by a local journalist confirm what can also be seen on satellite images: the water level has been falling rapidly since January.

A lack of precipitation contributed only a small part to this. Rather, it is political decisions in the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan that could lead to a massive energy and environmental crisis in the coming weeks.

According to Armenian sources, since January the reservoir’s power plant has had to replace the electricity that otherwise travels from Armenia to Nagorno-Karabakh via overhead power lines. These cables run across territory retaken by Azerbaijan in the 2020 war. Armenia complains that Azerbaijan does not allow the lines to be repaired.

The heartland of Nagorno-Karabakh is an Armenian-inhabited enclave protected by Russian troops. However, these troops are largely watching as Azerbaijan ramps up the pressure and worsens the supply situation in Nagorno-Karabakh.

However, Azerbaijan’s actions are also damaging to the country itself. Because the water from the Sarsang reservoir used for the electricity supply will also be lacking for irrigation in the summer for Azerbaijani farmers.

The case shows how urgent a solution to the conflict between Armenians and Azerbaijanis is. In addition to Russia, the USA and the EU are involved in efforts to reach a peace agreement.

During the European Political Community Summit in Moldova today, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and French President Emmanuel Macron will accompany a meeting of representatives of both states: Armenia’s Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev.

Since Aliyev accused Macron of an “anti-Azerbaijani attitude”, Scholz should act as a counterweight to Macron. Macron had accused Azerbaijan of a massive attack on Armenian territory in September 2022 and promised Armenia support for its territorial integrity. In view of the large community of diaspora Armenians in France, Macron’s statement is motivated not least by domestic politics.

Aliyev, on the other hand, leaves no doubt that he wants to dictate the conditions for peace and rhetorically increased the pressure before the talks in Moldova. He called for the government and parliament in Nagorno-Karabakh to be dissolved. The Armenians there must become “normal, loyal citizens of Azerbaijan”.

Prime Minister Pashinyan has already given up the claim to independence for Nagorno-Karabakh. For more than a year he has stopped talking about the Armenians’ right to self-determination in Nagorno-Karabakh, but about the recognition of Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity. On May 22, he made it clear that he also recognized that Nagorno-Karabakh belongs to Azerbaijan, but that the Armenians there must be given rights and security.

The debate flared up again in Armenia as to who was to blame for the defeat in the 2020 war: Pashinyan, who was only elected in 2018, or the current opposition around politicians like ex-President Robert Kocharian, who himself comes from Nagorno-Karabakh. She had not used the years since the capture of Azerbaijani territory in the first war in the early 1990s to negotiate a stable peace. And it had failed to equip the military to match Azerbaijan’s modernized armed forces.

After losing the war in 2020, the opposition around Kocharian was able to mobilize thousands to protest against Pashinyan. Despite this, he was re-elected in 2021. Basically, everyone in Armenia is aware that Nagorno-Karabakh is lost for the country – and that the protecting power, Russia, is only pursuing its own interests. While Russia’s leadership around President Vladimir Putin wants to maintain its military presence, it shows that it sees a more important economic and political player in Azerbaijan than in Armenia.

However, political expert Eric Hacopian warns in Yerevan that there will only be lasting stability in the region if an agreement leads to a just peace for the Armenians. Otherwise there is a risk of a new, endless war.

He outlines the minimum conditions in the interview tagesschau.de So: Negotiations between the leadership of Nagorno-Karabakh and the regime in Baku would have to take place in an international format, mediated by the international community. The final agreement must be guaranteed by the international community. And there must be an international presence on the ground to protect the local population and enforce the details of the agreement.

Details of governance in Nagorno-Karabakh, possibly modeled on other conflict zones such as the Balkans, could be worked out later. It is crucial that Baku does not exercise “direct rule” over the Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh. Otherwise there is a threat of ethnic cleansing and, in the worst case, a new Srebrenica, Hacopian warns urgently.

In addition, the planned expansion of the infrastructure in the entire region must also be worthwhile for Armenia. It is with the prospect of security and economic recovery that Pashinyan is trying to convince the population of an agreement.

Aliyev, too, needs stability and economic prospects as Azerbaijan’s oil and gas resources will run out in the foreseeable future. In addition, after the last major attack on Armenia in September 2021, he apparently realized that he cannot currently achieve his goals with military offensives. The risk of an escalating confrontation is probably too great for the regional powers Iran, Turkey and Russia.

In this respect, there is a chance that, with appropriate international pressure, an agreement will be reached by the autumn that both countries can live with. The door to peace is a crack open.

Jamaica Plain News, MA

June 1 2023

Residents, families and staff members recently gathered together to meet Ren de Leon, the new executive director of the Jamaica Plain nonprofit Armenian Nursing and Rehabilitation Center.

“A drive and passion for senior care has propelled me to keep reaching for excellence,” said de Leon.” I can’t think of a better organization than ANRC to continue my career. I am looking forward to getting to know each and every one of our families and residents.”

The only casualty of Israel’s Operation Shield and Arrow, 80-year-old Inga Avramyan, was an Armenian immigrant who cared for her disabled husband.

According to their grandson, Arthur, the couple may not have had enough time to reach the shelter because of his grandfather’s disability. His grandfather, Sergei, is an amputee following a serious car accident over a decade ago and uses a wheelchair.

“They didn’t make it to the safe room. He must have gotten nervous, and she tried to help him get up, but the alarm started too late, they had much less than a minute and a half to get to the safe room and they didn’t make it,” he said.

“It was hard for him to move around, he’s an amputee because he was injured in a car accident and paralyzed in half his body,” Arthur explained.

On the day the rocket hit Avramyan’s home, her family arrived at her apartment shortly after the incident but were denied entry due to the risk of collapse. “The scene was harsh, everything was destroyed, there was nothing left,” Arthur said.

Avramyan lived in an apartment on the second floor of the damaged building on Smilansky Street, with her husband Sergei, also in his 80s. The couple, who had been married for more than 50 years, immigrated to Israel from Armenia.

Inga was apparently hit by a collapsed beam or falling ceiling piece. Sergei sustained minor injuries from the strike.

“He has minor bruises. It was a real miracle. He just survived,” Arthur recounted.

He related that during the explosion there was a hole in the wall and his grandfather, who was on the bed at the time of the explosion, partially flew out through the hole, while still lying on the bed. A photo of Sergei’s head “sticking out” from the hole in the building wall circulated on social media.

According to the IDF spokesperson, the rocket hit the city of Rehovot following a technical malfunction in the Iron Dome missile defense system.

Ehud Yellin, the Avramyans’ landlord who lives directly opposite spoke with Ynet news.

“They are a very nice couple, pensioners from Armenia who immigrated to Israel. She took care of him with devotion. She took exceptional care of him. Sergei is a man to admire. My heart aches for them,” he said.

“Grandma was a Russian language teacher, an educated woman,” said their grandson Arthur. “My grandfather had a manufacturing plant. Both had high status in Armenia, but in Israel they found it difficult to get along with the Hebrew language.”

“After the accident…he became paralyzed in half his body, and moved around in a wheelchair,” he continued. “Grandma took care of him with devotion and love. She raised us all. Grandma was a woman of valor. I don’t know what Grandpa will do without her.”

“He communicated only with her. She was his whole life,” Arthur related sadly. “There was a love between them that you don’t see every day. Grandma wanted to live her life with dignity and that’s how she ended it.”