Author: Emil Lazarian

Over 40 ANCA national and local leaders consulted with Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) on ramping up efforts to break Azerbaijan’s Artsakh blockade during a virtual town hall held on February 27th.

GLENDALE, Calif. – Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA) leaders from across the State of California held a virtual briefing with Congressman Adam Schiff (D-Burbank) to discuss the humanitarian crisis unfolding in Artsakh as a result of Azerbaijan’s blockade – now in its third month. The briefing included the participation of a broad number of ANCA stakeholders – along with ANCA grassroots leaders across the country – to urge the Biden administration to take immediate steps to pressure Azerbaijan to end its genocidal campaign against Artsakh’s indigenous Armenian population.

“The blockade of the Lachin Corridor, an unconscionable act of aggression by Azerbaijan, has created a humanitarian crisis,” said Congressman Schiff. “Since the beginning of the blockade more than two months ago, innocent men, women, and children in Artsakh have suffered through freezing temperatures and rolling blackouts. The United States must use every diplomatic and economic tool at its disposal to end this illegal blockade, and cut off all aid to Baku.”

Congressman Schiff continued, “The work of the ANCA, its local chapters, and the many members who volunteer their time and dedication is so important, and ensures their voices are heard in the halls of Congress. I look forward to continuing to work closely with the Armenian National Committee of America to stand with the people of Armenia and Artsakh, as well as the members of the diaspora, and speak out against this violence, demand real action from the US, and bring peace and prosperity to Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh.”

Congressman Adam Schiff represents the single largest Armenian-American constituency in the United States and has been a stalwart friend and ally of the community throughout his tenure. Having fought over decades for US recognition of the Armenian Genocide, H.Res.296 – authored and introduced by Rep. Schiff in 2019 – was passed with overwhelming bipartisan support in the House, with an identical measure adopted in the Senate by unanimous consent shortly after. In his role as chairman of the influential House Intelligence Committee, Congressman Schiff also championed the inclusion of language in successive National Intelligence Authorization Bills mandating the US Government to conduct assessments of the threat Azerbaijan posed to Armenia and Artsakh, and the impact of US military assistance on the balance of power in the region. Congressman Schiff is the first member of US Congress to have called for the recognition of Artsakh’s independence, and at President Biden’s last State of the Union address invited Artsakh’s Permanent Representative Robert Avetisyan to attend as his guest in order to draw attention to Artsakh and Azerbaijan’s ongoing blockade.

Over 30 leaders from ANCA chapters across California, including the ANCA’s San Francisco, Silicon Valley, Fresno, San Fernando Valley, Glendale, Burbank, La Crescenta, Pasadena, Hollywood, Orange County, and San Gabriel Valley chapters, participated in the meeting, which also included insights by ANCA National Board Members Zanku Armenian and Aida Dimejian, along with ANCA Government Affairs Director Tereza Yerimyan and Programs Director Alex Galitsky.

ANC Artsakh Executive Director Gev Iskajyan, who moved to Artsakh from California a year ago, provided a briefing from the ground on the latest dire humanitarian crisis unfolding in Artsakh. “What we are witnessing in Artsakh is nothing short of a genocide by attrition,” remarked Iskajyan. “As Azerbaijan seeks to starve the Armenian people to the brink of extinction, it is vital the U.S. take tangible action to hold Azerbaijan to account. Congressman Schiff has championed efforts to hold Turkey and Azerbaijan accountable throughout his career, and we look forward to working with him to maximize pressure on the Biden Administration to ensure this blockade is lifted.”

In addition to his powerful advocacy to secure Congressional, and ultimately Presidential, recognition of the Armenian Genocide, Congressman Schiff has recently led efforts to condemn Azerbaijan’s ongoing detention and torture of Armenian prisoners of war (POWs) through the introduction of H.Res.240 – as well as the condemnation of Azerbaijan’s assault on Armenia in September 2022 with the introduction of H.Res.1351. As co-chair of the Congressional Armenian Caucus, Congressman Schiff is also one of the lead co-authors on H.Res.108 – the ANCA-backed bipartisan resolution condemning Azerbaijan’s blockade of Artsakh and calling for an immediate end to U.S. military assistance to Azerbaijan.

During the virtual town hall with Rep. Schiff, ANCA San Francisco’s Roxanne Makasdjian drew attention to the dire implications of Azerbaijan’s state-sponsored anti-Armenian hate speech in the U.S., citing the hate crimes perpetrated against the Armenian community in the Bay Area.

In response to Congressman Schiff’s decades of advocacy on behalf of Artsakh – ANCA Government Affairs Director Tereza Yerimyan remarked, “this is a bipartisan Congressional wake-up call for the Biden Administration to end its unconscionable military assistance program with Azerbaijan. American taxpayers should not be subsidizing Baku’s attempts to ethnically cleanse Artsakh’s Armenians. Thanks to Rep. Schiff’s leadership over the years, the will of Congress is clear. It is long overdue for the Administration to stand with the freedom-loving people of Artsakh, and hold Azerbaijan accountable for its brazen aggression.”

During the virtual town hall with Rep. Schiff, ANCA San Francisco’s Roxanne Makasdjian drew attention to the dire implications of Azerbaijan’s state-sponsored anti-Armenian hate speech in the U.S., citing the hate crimes perpetrated against the Armenian community in the Bay Area.

During the call, Congressman Schiff fielded a range of questions from local chapter leaders on a number of pressing community priorities. Roxanne Makasdjian of ANCA San Francisco drew attention to the dire implications of Azerbaijan’s state-sponsored anti-Armenian hate speech in the US, citing the hate crimes perpetrated against Armenian community property and school in the Bay Area where the community center was set on fire and the school was vandalized and shot at with guns. ANCA Hollywood’s Lara Yeretsian noted the failure of successive administrations to deliver reports mandated by statute on the impact of US military assistance to Azerbaijan. ANCA Orange County representative Haig Minasian spoke of how USAID has failed to deliver any direct assistance to Artsakh since the 2020 Artsakh War despite congressional mandates, and the community’s disappointment with the Administration’s and USAID’s Samantha Power’s refusal to characterize the blockade as a humanitarian crisis.

During the virtual town hall with Rep. Schiff, ANCA San Francisco’s Roxanne Makasdjian drew attention to the dire implications of Azerbaijan’s state-sponsored anti-Armenian hate speech in the U.S., citing the hate crimes perpetrated against the Armenian community in the Bay Area.

“Not a single member of our community is untouched by the humanitarian crisis unfolding in Artsakh today,” remarked ANCA National Board Member Zanku Armenian. “Much of our community are descendants of survivors of the Armenian Genocide, and see what is happening today as a direct continuation of that crime because Turkey and Azerbaijan have not been held accountable. Our community’s extensive grassroots, led by our ANCA local chapters, remain united in common purpose to ensure our government acts immediately to hold Azerbaijan’s dictatorship to account – and we look forward to continuing to work with Congressman Schiff to ensure the Biden Administration honors the pledge he made when he recognized the Armenian Genocide to prevent atrocities whenever and wherever they occur.”

Since the first day of the blockade, the ANCA has been working with the White House, State Department, and Congressional leaders – urging them to stop U.S. military assistance to Azerbaijan and to send emergency humanitarian assistance to Artsakh. Thousands have already used the ANCA online portal to call, tweet and write the White House and Congressional leaders to immediately address this growing Artsakh humanitarian crisis.

President Harutyunyan introduces the newly-appointed State Minister of the Artsakh Republic Gurgen Nersisyan

Artsakh President Arayik Harutyunyan has announced that Prosecutor General Gurgen Nersisyan will replace Ruben Vardanyan as State Minister.

Harutyunyan announced Vardanyan’s removal in a televised address on February 23.

“I am grateful to Mr. Vardanyan for the fact that, in both friendship and professional relations, he always tried to share responsibilities with me to the maximum extent and did not try to put [pressure] on me by citing constitutional norms,” Harutyunyan said. 

In the week following Vardanyan’s dismissal, official representatives from Artsakh and Azerbaijan held two meetings. The meetings, held on February 25 and March 1, were the first since the start of Azerbaijan’s blockade of Artsakh. 

On March 1, Lusine Avanesyan, spokesperson for the Artsakh president, said that the representatives discussed “humanitarian and infrastructural issues.” Specifically, they addressed the restoration of movement along the Lachin Corridor and electricity and gas supply from Armenia to Artsakh.   

The Azerbaijani side said that the representatives discussed the “reintegration of Armenian residents living in the Karabakh region into the Republic of Azerbaijan.” They said that the head of the committee investigating illegal mining in Artsakh attended the meeting. They did not mention the lifting of the blockade of Artsakh. 

President Harutyunyan ruled out “any integration process with Azerbaijan” during a cabinet meeting on March 1 announcing Nersisyan’s appointment. “However, this does not mean that we will avoid contacts to solve problems of an infrastructural and humanitarian nature,” he said. 

Ruben Vardanyan (Photo: NKR InfoCenter)

Azerbaijani authorities had been critical of Vardanyan’s appointment as State Minister, accusing him of having been exported from Russia to Artsakh to serve Russian interests. On February 18, just days before Vardanyan’s dismissal, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev said that Azerbaijan would refuse to negotiate with Artsakh officials as long as Vardanyan was in power.

Aliyev said that Azerbaijan was ready to “start practical communications with representatives of the Armenian community in Karabakh.” “But we can do it only when the Russian citizen-criminal oligarch, a person involved in money laundering in Europe, Vardanyan, is out of our territory,” Aliyev told reporters on February 18 on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference. 

Harutyunyan denied that he dismissed Vardanyan to fulfill Aliyev’s request. “No one can feel more pained by this decision than I do,” Harutyunyan said. Harutyunyan did not give a clear reason for dismissing Vardanyan. He said that he and Vardanyan shared strategic differences on internal and external issues.

Vardanyan held the position of State Minister for just three months following his appointment by Harutyunyan in November 2022. The Russian Armenian billionaire renounced his Russian citizenship last September and moved to Artsakh. 

The powers of the state minister’s office expanded significantly during Vardanyan’s brief tenure. Vardanyan launched an operational headquarters to manage the state response to the blockade of Artsakh. 

Since his dismissal, Vardanyan has said that he will continue to live in Artsakh and pursue humanitarian initiatives. 

These leadership changes are taking place amid Azerbaijan’s ongoing blockade of Artsakh, which surpassed 80 days this week. A group of Azerbaijanis claiming to be eco-activists protesting illegal mining in Artsakh has closed the Lachin Corridor, the sole route connecting Artsakh and Armenia, since December 12. Artsakh is facing a humanitarian crisis, as imports of food and medicine from Armenia have come to a halt. Gas and electricity supplies from Armenia to Artsakh have also been periodically disrupted since the start of the blockade, which Artsakh authorities blame on Azerbaijan.

Hospitals in Artsakh have temporarily suspended treatments due to the blockade. At least 750 people are awaiting medical treatment. A number of illnesses have increased in Artsakh since the start of the blockade, including a 58-percent increase in heart disease, a 36-percent increase in strokes, and an 11-percent increase in childbirth complications, according to official data.

On February 22, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that Azerbaijan must “take all measures at its disposal to ensure unimpeded movement of persons, vehicles and cargo along the Lachin Corridor in both directions.” 

“The disruption on the Lachin Corridor has impeded the transfer of persons of Armenian national or ethnic origin hospitalized in Nagorno-Karabakh to medical facilities in Armenia for urgent medical care. The evidence also indicates that there have been hindrances to the importation into Nagorno-Karabakh of essential goods, causing shortages of food, medicine and other life-saving medical supplies,” the United Nations court said. 

Under the trilateral ceasefire agreement ending the 2020 Artsakh War, Azerbaijan “guarantees traffic safety along the Lachin Corridor of citizens, vehicles and goods in both directions.”

Azerbaijani authorities denied that the ICJ had ruled that the Lachin Corridor is closed. The Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry said that the ICJ had not determined that the government of Azerbaijan is responsible for the closure of the corridor. 

While speaking with reporters in Munich, Aliyev also proposed the establishment of checkpoints along the Lachin Corridor. 

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov ruled out the creation of checkpoints along the Lachin Corridor while speaking with reporters on February 28. He said that the corridor must operate in compliance with the trilateral ceasefire ending the 2020 Artsakh War, “which means the need to ensure free movement for exclusively civilian and humanitarian cargo and civilians.” 

However, Lavrov said it may be “possible to use technical means to remove the existing suspicions that the corridor is really used for its intended purpose.” 

In the weeks before closing the Lachin Corridor, Azerbaijani authorities accused Armenia of using the route to illegally transport mines. Last week, the ICJ rejected a request from Azerbaijan for provisional measures ordering Armenia to stop using the Lachin Corridor for this purpose.

The war in Ukraine has disrupted global supply chains, creating significant complications for transit routes crossing the Russia-Europe border. The world economy, still reeling from COVID-19, found itself in another crisis. Yet, even before the pandemic and the war in Ukraine, the primary sea transit routes connecting Southeast Asia with Europe, like the Suez Canal, were congested due to the growing cargo volumes. As one of the rising stars of the global economy, India was looking forward to establishing alternative routes to reach Europe. In 2000, India, Iran and Russia signed an agreement to launch the International North-South Transport Corridor (INSTC) to connect India with Europe via Iran and Russia. Three main routes were identified to connect India with Russia: via Iran and Azerbaijan, via Iran and the Caspian Sea and via Iran-Turkmenistan-Kazakhstan. According to the initial plan, the cargo should enter northern Europe from Russia, creating an India-Europe route that circumvents the Suez Canal.

However, the war in Ukraine and the complete rupture in Russia-West relations brought the realization of this plan into danger. As the new cold war disrupts Russia-West economic and political relations, any large-scale transit of cargo passing the Russia-Europe border looks too risky for the international logistic and insurance companies. At the same time, India’s need for additional trade routes to reach Europe circumventing the Suez Canal remains valid. In parallel to the discussions around INSTC, Iran in 2016 put forward a new international transport corridor project, Persian Gulf-Black Sea, which should connect Iran with Europe via the South Caucasus. The negotiations were paused during the COVID pandemic, but all potential participants of the project – Iran, Armenia, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Bulgaria and Greece – expressed their interest in participating.

In recent years, India invested in the Iranian port of Chabahar, viewing it as a focal point to reach Central Asia via Afghanistan circumventing Pakistan. The 2021 takeover of Afghanistan by the Taliban made the transit via Afghanistan challenging. However, India continued its efforts to modernize Chabahar Port and received the US sanctions waiver for its investments. Currently, Chabahar does not have access to the Iranian railway network, but Tehran plans to bring the railway to Chabahar. As India looks for additional routes to reach Europe, circumventing the Suez Canal and avoiding the negative impact of Russia-West confrontation, the Persian Gulf-Black Sea corridor fits well into these plans.

The corridor itself may connect Iran with Georgia via either Armenia or Azerbaijan. Armenia and Azerbaijan have railway and highway connections with Georgia, and Azerbaijan has a railroad up to the Azerbaijan-Iran border. There is a missing link of some 165 kilometers inside Iran (the Rasht-Astara line) to connect Azerbaijani and Iranian railways. In January 2023, Russia and Iran agreed to launch the construction with Russian funding. Azerbaijan also has a highway connection with Iran.

Armenia does not have a direct railway connection with Iran. In November 2021, Azerbaijan closed the main Armenia-Iran highway in the Goris-Kapan section, forcing Yerevan to construct an alternative road to reach the Iran border, which cannot serve large-scale transit cargo transportation. There is a functioning railway from Yerevan up to the Armenia-Nakhichevan border in Yeraskh, and Nakhichevan has a railway connection with Iran via Julfa. However, as Armenia-Azerbaijan peace negotiations are at an impasse due to the maximalist position of Azerbaijan, no international transit project may rely on that possibility. 

However, if an Iran-Azerbaijan-Georgia route may seem more realistic from a purely logistical point of view, geopolitics tells another story. Iran-Azerbaijan relations are at a historical low, given the Azerbaijan-Israel growing defense and security cooperation and Azerbaijan’s criticism against alleged violation of rights of Azerbaijanis living in Iran. Iran uses Azerbaijan’s territory to reach Russia, and providing additional leverage to Azerbaijan will not serve Iranian interests. India also may have reservations about putting Azerbaijan into the India-Europe route. Azerbaijan is not India’s enemy but cultivates friendly relations with Pakistan and is a strategic ally of Turkey, which under President Erdogan has pursued an anti-Indian stance. At the same time, the emerging Pakistan-Turkey-Azerbaijan alliance does contribute to Azerbaijan-India relations. Thus, for Iran and India, Azerbaijan is not a preferable way to connect Iran with Georgia and Europe.

However, geopolitical considerations are not enough to convince states and multinational logistic and insurance companies to invest billions of dollars on a project which depends on the narrow alternative road connecting Goris with Kapan in the mountainous Syunik region of Armenia. To become a transit country for the India-Europe transit route via Iran and Georgia, Armenia needs new highways connecting it with Iran and Georgia. 

The “North–South” project, the 555 kilometer Bavra-Meghri highway, which should connect the Armenia-Georgia and Armenia-Iran borders, started in 2012. Paradoxically, only 35 kilometers of the highway were finished during the past 11 years; construction continues on the Talin-Gyumri section, which connects Yerevan with the Georgian border. However, nothing has been done along the Yerevan-Meghri part besides constructing the 20 kilometer Yerevan-Artashat section. The Artashat-Meghri part is divided into three subsections: Artashat-Sisian, Sisian-Kajaran and the Kajaran-Iranian border. Recently, the government announced a Kajaran-Iranian border section tender, and the winner will be announced this spring. The EU promised to provide up to 700 million euros for the Sisian-Kajaran part, and negotiations are underway regarding the construction modalities.

Meanwhile, the Artashat-Sisian section (around 170 kilometers) remains in the initial projecting phase. If Armenia wants to be part of the India-Europe transit route, it should significantly accelerate its efforts to finish the southern part of the road connecting Artashat with the Iranian border and the northern section connecting Gyumri with the Georgian border. Given the extensive experience of Indian companies in taking part in large-scale infrastructure projects abroad and India’s interest in launching the India-Europe transport corridor route via Iran and Georgia, Armenia should start negotiations with India to discuss the involvement of Indian funding and Indian companies into the North-South project.