17:37, 16 December, 2020
YEREVAN, DECEMBER 16, ARMENPRESS. Deputy Prime Minister of Armenia Mher Grigoryan will travel to Russia from December 17 to 19 to “discuss issues related to the Armenian-Russian economic cooperation agenda”, the government said.
Grigoryan will be in St. Petersburg on December 17th and later on the same day he will travel to Moscow until the 19th.
Editing and Translating by Stepan Kocharyan
November 10th saw the signing of the Azerbaijan-Armenian peace deal, ending six weeks of bloody conflict. Large swathes of Nagorno-Karabakh were awarded to Azerbaijan after being seized during the war. Ethnic Armenians who resided in these areas fled Armenia, often destroying their homes in the process. During the war, international law pertaining to the proper conduct of conflict was regularly flouted. Urban areas in both countries have been attacked using a weapon known as ‘cluster bombs,’ resulting in the death and injury of numerous civilians. These weapons are inherently indiscriminate, and their use on populated areas is abhorrent. Both countries must outlaw the use of these weapons immediately and renew efforts of negotiation to prevent further conflict.
Belkis Wille, senior crisis and conflict researcher at Human Rights Watch has condemned the use of cluster munitions, stating that “Both Armenia and Azerbaijan should immediately stop using cluster munitions, destroy their stockpile, and join the Convention on Cluster Munitions.” The 2008 Convention on Cluster Munitions expressly prohibits the use of cluster munitions. Neither Azerbaijan nor Armenia have joined the treaty, allegedly due to the dispute over Nagorno-Karabakh. The recent peace deal alone is unlikely to stabilize Nagorno-Karabakh. As noted by Olga Olika of the International Crisis Group in The Guardian, “The deal ends six weeks of heavy fighting, but it is not a comprehensive peace treaty,” adding that, “many of the details are still vague.” This leaves significant concerns about the effectiveness of the deal to maintain peace.
It is still unknown how peace will be maintained long-term. Before the war, peace was partly maintained through the use of open dialogue between the respective leaders of Azerbaijan and Armenia. Talks broke down over Armenia’s claim that Nagorno-Karabakh would always be Armenian land, and the six week long war soon followed. Communication must be restored, and must be made resolute enough that it can weather disagreements. A comprehensive agreement over Nagorno-Karabakh must be reached through cooperative dialogue and negotiation, or the territorial dispute will remain an unresolved grievance for both countries, which will likely result in further conflict.
The conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh is a territorial dispute spanning decades. In the late 80s, Karabakh Armenians accused Azerbaijan with forced ‘Azerification’ of Karabakh, and sought to transfer control of the region to Armenia, by petitioning Moscow. Moscow refused the petition, and conflict erupted in 1988 between Karabakh and Azerbaijan. Armenia soon joined, and the conflict escalated until 1994 when Nagorno-Karabakh was recognized as independent by Azerbaijan. Territorial disputes and conflicts have regularly occurred over the region since. The recent free election of Nikol Pashinyan in Armenia brought hope that relations between the two countries would improve. However, the recent dispute broke out, in part due to Pashinyan’s claim that Karabakh was and always would be ‘Armenia.’ The involvement of Turkey and Russia also complicate relations. Turkey adamantly supports Azerbaijan’s claim, while Russia maintains good relations with both countries.
The dispute between Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenia and Azerbaijan is a complex grievance. All the actors involved are deeply invested in territorial security. Yet the region has been a constant state of conflict and insecurity for decades. To foster mutual security, Armenia and Azerbaijan must outlaw the use of the cluster bombs, and should approach further negotiations as openly as possible. Future negotiations should assess the interests of key players, particularly Nagorno-Karabakh and Azerbaijan. Without these key steps, it seems likely that Nagorno-Karabakh will remain a significant security issue which will result in further conflict, death and displacement of civilians.
19:27, 9 December, 2020
YEREVAN, DECEMBER 9, ARMENPRESS. Opposition rally demanding PM Pashinyan’s resignation ended near the National Assembly. ARMEPRESS reports the united candidate of ‘’Fatherland Salvation Movement’’ for PM’s post Vazgen Manukyan said at the end of the rally that their struggle is not political.
‘’Our struggle is not political, it’s not for changing the power. This is a national struggle. I have been one of the leaders that led you to victory and we created an independent state. Now I again tell you, let’s go together and we will win’’, Manukyan said.
Vazgen Manukyan served as the first Prime Minister of Armenia from 1990 to 1991 under President Levon-Ter Petrosyan. He then served briefly as Defense Minister.
He was the President of the Public Council from 2009 to 2019.
The three captives transferred from Azerbaijan to Armenia on December 9 through the mediation of Russian peacekeepers are elderly civilians, who were handed over to the Armenian side due to serious health problems, the Armenian Unified Information Center reports.
Deputy Prime Minister Tigran Avinyan’s Office reported earlier today that three Armenians held in Azerbaijani captivity had been repatriated.
13:51, 8 December, 2020
YEREVAN, DECEMBER 8, ARMENPRESS. Protesters calling for the resignation of Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan are blocking streets in different parts of Yerevan. Police officers are attempting to restore traffic.
Protesters have blocked the Myasnikyan Avenue with a heavy truck.
ARF official Gegham Manukyan, who was demonstrating with the protesters on Mashtots Avenue, was detained by police.
Demonstrations are ongoing in many parts of the city.
Editing and Translating by Stepan Kocharyan
Azerbaijani Opposition Activist Gets One Year In Prison
December 01, 2020 15:27 GMT
• By RFE/RL's Azerbaijani Service
Azerbaijani oppositionist Mahammad Imanli (file photo)
BAKU -- A member of the opposition Azerbaijan Popular Front Party (AXCP),
Mahammad Imanli, has been sentenced to one year in prison for breaking
coronavirus measures, a charge he rejects as false, calling it politically
motivated.
On December 1, Judge Mirheydar Zeynalov of the Sabuncu district court in Baku
found Imanli guilty of failing to comply with coronavirus precautions and
"spreading the disease."
Imanli rejected the court's findings saying he was sentenced "only because I am
a member of the AXCP."
A day earlier, a prosecutor at the trial asked the judge to sentence Imanli to
18 months in prison.
Imanli has insisted that a police statement noting he was detained on July 20
was false.
According to him and his lawyers, he was detained on July 16 and kept in a
police station for four days, during which time he was interrogated regarding
his participation in unsanctioned rallies in Baku in support of the country’s
armed forces amid an escalation of military tensions with neighboring Armenia.
Imanli is one of almost 50 AXCP members arrested in July after the rallies in
support of the Azerbaijani Army.
Investigators have said that, during the unsanctioned rallies in mid-July, AXCP
activists clashed with police injuring some of them, upended private vehicles,
and damaged parliament.
Many of the activists who were detained were charged with damaging private
property, attacking law enforcement officers, and disrupting public order.
Dozens of AXCP members have been arrested, and some imprisoned, in recent years
on what their supporters have called trumped-up charges.
Opponents of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, Western countries, and
international human rights groups say his government has persistently persecuted
critics, political foes, independent media outlets, and civic activists.
Aliyev denies any rights abuses. He took power in 2003 shortly before the death
of his father, Heydar Aliyev, a former KGB officer and communist-era leader who
had ruled Azerbaijan since 1993.
Armenia’s second President Robert Kocharyan revealed the reasons for his silence over the past one month in an interview to the Fifth Channel on Friday, stating the Armenian society needed some time to know “the whole truth” about the war in Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh), which would make his remarks “more substantial”.
In Kocharyan’s words, unfortunately, it took thousands of casualties and the loss of almost a third of the homeland for the public to realize “the bitter truth” that the so-called “people’s government” brought its own people to their knees.
Asked whether it was possible to avoid the war, the former president said: “Undoubtedly. I am sure that the Armenian authorities did their best to make the war inevitable. They simply did everything possible. We can just look through the points. I have nothing new to tell you, as I was following the media over the past month, almost everything is stated there. We can just summarize it all to see the whole picture.”
“First, the negotiation process was brought to a deadlock. The contradictory statements created a situation where even the co-chairs could not really understand what the Armenian side wanted. And the impression was that Armenia was just inventing various tricks to push the talks into a dead end. The war started at a time when almost no one doubted that the negotiation process was disrupted or failed because of the Armenian side,” the ex-president said.
According to him, the Armenian authorities legitimized the Azerbaijani military aggression against Artsakh.
“The legal basis for the existence of the Artsakh Republic is the exercise of the right of nations to self-determination. Now, in fact we changed our statements and brought the settlement of the issue to the plane of the territorial integrity of countries. That is the reason why the international community viewed the Azerbaijani aggression as the restoration of its territorial integrity. How many countries have condemned Azerbaijan for starting a war? Can you tell me? How can we describe this other than a diplomatic collapse, a failure?” he said.
The former president held the Armenian premier responsible for both issues.
16:01, 3 December, 2020
YEREVAN, DECEMBER 3, ARMENPRESS. Armenia’s justice ministry denies the rumors according to which minister Rustam Badasyan has submitted a resignation letter.
Earlier today the media outlets spread reports, claiming that justice minister Rustam Badasyan has resigned.
Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan
11:39,
YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 30, ARMENPRESS. Lt. General Jalal Harutyunyan is recovering normally after being wounded in action in late October during the Azerbaijani attacks while serving as Minister of Defense of Artsakh. At the time of being wounded he was in a combat position of the Defense Army.
The Ministry of Defense told ARMENPRESS that the Lt. General will soon be discharged from hospital.
“Jalal Harutyunyan will be discharged from hospital in two or three days and he will continue outpatient treatment” Defense Ministry of Armenia Director for Information and Public Relations Gevorg Altunyan told ARMENPRESS.
Because Harutyunyan was incapacitated from performing his duties as Minister of Defense, he was replaced the day after he suffered the injuries. Harutyunyan received the Hero of Artsakh title afterwards.
Editing and Translating by Stepan Kocharyan