We will continue the unconditional contacts to develop bilateral relations. Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan of Armenia stated this after his meeting with Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu of Turkey, according to Report.
“Armenia is determined to establish peace in the region,” Mirzoyan added, speaking to reporters Saturday in Antalya, Turkey.
The intelligence director general of the province of West Azerbaijan in northwestern Iran said Israel’s largest spy network had been eliminated in the province, Mehr reported.
The spy network tried to carry out acts of sabotage inside Iran, but thanks to the vigilance of the intelligence forces, these threats were neutralized and the spy network was eliminated, the director general of intelligence of the West Azarbaijan province said on Saturday evening.
The scope of the intelligence forces is to disrupt pre-planned plots and destroy anti-security groups, as well as to identify infiltrators and their leaders, he added.
Representative Judy Chu (D-Calif.) added her voice to the growing list of elected officials who have marked the anniversary of the Sumgait and Baku pogroms.
Chu joins representatives Adam Schiff, Brad Sherman, Tony Cárdenas and State Senator Anthony Portantino, among others who voiced their support for the people of Artsakh and condemned Azerbaijan ongoing aggression Armenia and Artsakh.
Below is Chu’s statement.
Madam Speaker, as the Representative of America’s largest and oldest Armenian population, I rise today to commemorate the Baku and Sumgait Pogroms and to reaffirm that the US stands on the side of democracy and peace–and that means standing with the Armenian people.
Over 30 years ago, as the lines of the Soviet Union were fading, the people of Artsakh were united and voted for greater independence from Azerbaijan. But this peaceful movement for self-determination was followed by premeditated and government-sponsored attacks. Over the next two years, the Armenian population of Artsakh was repeatedly victim to brutal and racially motivated pogroms. Hundreds were murdered, and thousands were displaced in Baku, Sumgait and Kirovabad.
These pogroms were a direct assault on the right of self-determination in Artsakh, and it is an assault that is continuing today. In the fall of 2020, as the world was struggling to contain the coronavirus pandemic, Azerbaijan launched yet another war of aggression against the peaceful people of Artsakh, destroying homes and villages and once again displacing thousands.
This violence is unacceptable, which is why I immediately called for a cease fire and have called for an end to U.S. military assistance to Azerbaijan. We must also ensure the humanitarian needs of the Armenian people are being met, which is something I have pushed Samantha Power, the Administrator of USAID, to help us do.
Having had the privilege of visiting Artsakh in October 2019, I’ve seen the pride of the people there and I know how strong they are. That is why I know that, just as their spirit could not be defeated after the Sumgait and Baku pogroms, it will not be defeated today.
I am proud to stand with the Armenian people in their fight for democracy and human rights and stand united in rejecting the violence from Azerbaijan that has destroyed too many lives.
10:55,
YEREVAN, MARCH 11, ARMENPRESS. Around 10:20, March 11 the Azerbaijani forces fired two 120mm mortar shells in the direction of the Khnapat village (Askeran region) in Artsakh. The shells hit the area near the village school, the Artsakh Ministry of Interior said.
No one was hurt in the attack.
In addition, the Ministry of Interior said that now the Azerbaijani military deployed in positions adjacent to the Taghavard village in Martuni region are using loudspeakers to threaten the villagers, telling them to leave the territory.
The Ministry of Interior said the regional police departments are preparing materials over the incident.
By Trend
The Committee on Foreign Relations and Inter-Parliamentary Relations of the Azerbaijani Parliament has made a statement on the resolution of the European Parliament dated March 10, 2022, the press and public relations department of the parliament told Trend.
According to the statement, on March 10, the European Parliament adopted another resolution biased against Azerbaijan.
The statement noted that this resolution, based on the absolutely false information of Armenia and the Armenian lobby in the European Parliament, regarding the 30-year occupation of Azerbaijani lands [until their liberation in the 2020 second Karabakh war], including the facts of vandalism committed on these lands against Azerbaijan’s cultural heritage, calling into question its territorial integrity and sovereignty, and undermining efforts aimed at ensuring long-term peace and stability in the region, simultaneously including a number of dangerous moments, also casts a shadow on the efforts of mankind to eliminate religious, racial discrimination and intolerance.
This resolution, aimed at misleading the international community, can definitely be called the next decline of European democracy, the statement stressed.
“The negligence and indifference of the European Parliament to universal human values raise serious questions. The resolution of the European Parliament completely denies the vandalism committed by Armenia during the 30-year occupation against the cultural heritage of Azerbaijan. The period of occupation was accompanied by war crimes and crimes of Armenia against humanity,” the statement further said. “Along with deliberate destruction of cities and villages, Armenia annihilated the entire cultural heritage of the Azerbaijani people in these territories. Numerous historical, cultural and religious monuments, archaeological sites, libraries and museums, museum exhibits, unique manuscripts, cemeteries were systematically ruined and looted.”
“Mosques were razed to the ground or turned into places for keeping cows and pigs, desecrating them. Vandalism was committed not only against monuments belonging to the Islamic religion. Albanian and Christian churches were also destroyed, an attempt was made to Armenize them by making architectural changes,” the statement pointed out.
The statement emphasized that despite the numerous appeals of Azerbaijan, Armenia prevented the visits of UNESCO missions and other specialized international structures to the previously occupied territories to assess the state of cultural heritage. The indecisiveness of international structures encouraged Armenia to further expand the scale of destructions.
“The fact is notable that the European Parliament, which repeatedly refers to UNESCO in its resolution, but at the same time denies these facts and accuses Azerbaijan of obstructing the mission of this organization, over the past years has never raised the issue of the consequences of the Azerbaijani territories’ occupation by Armenia, the vandalism committed against its cultural heritage,” the statement said. “The current resolution of the European Parliament contradicts not only the principles of international humanitarian law, but also the principles adopted by the European Union itself against the destruction of cultural and religious monuments.”
“It’s also necessary to emphasize the fact that as a result of the meeting held on February 4 this year in a video format with the participation of the President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev, President Emmanuel Macron as the French Presidency of the European Union, President of the Council of the EU Charles Michel and Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan, consent was expressed to sending a UNESCO mission to Azerbaijan and Armenia,” the statement reminded.
“This confirms the need to study the state of cultural heritage in the territory of Armenia, which belongs to the Azerbaijani people. For some reason, the European Parliament doesn’t touch upon this issue at all. The European Parliament presents cultural monuments which, as it claims, belong to Armenians as part of the ancient Christian and common heritage of mankind,” the statement noted.
“The way of thinking denying the destruction and serious damage of 67 mosques, and razing monuments of Islamic culture to the ground during the occupation, encouraging religious and racial discrimination, indulges extremely dangerous tendencies. In general, the resolution doesn’t mention the cultural heritage of Azerbaijan. The resolution also distorts the essence of the International Court of Justice decision (December 2021) with reference to lawsuits filed by Armenia, which were rejected by the court,” the statement pointed out.
“In general, this resolution of the European Parliament contradicts the efforts of goodwill that the EU leadership has been demonstrating lately in the matter of ensuring peace, stability and security in the South Caucasus,” the statement further said. “Temples of all religions, all cultural monuments on the territory of Azerbaijan are protected and restored by the state. This resolution of the European Parliament is just a piece of paper, and it cannot cast a shadow on the high national, spiritual and cultural values of the Azerbaijani people.”
“The Parliament of Azerbaijan strongly condemns the attempt made by the European Parliament to spread biased false information and calls for refraining from provocations that could disrupt the normalization process in the region,” concluded the statement.
16:40,
YEREVAN, 12 MARCH, ARMENPRESS. The Foreign Ministry of Armenia issued a press release over the meeting between Foreign Minister of Armenia Ararat Mirzoyan and Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu.
“On March 12, on the margins of the Antalya Diplomatic forum Foriegn Minister of Armenia Ararat Mirzoyan met with the Foriegn Minister of Turkey Mevlut Cavusoglu.
Minister Mirzoyan thanked Minister Cavusoglu for the invitation.
The Foriegn Ministers reiterated their willingness to conduct the process aimed at full normalization and good neighbourly relations between Armenia and Turkey without preconditions. They also agreed that normalisation is needed for the entire region.
The two Ministers expressed their support to the works of the Special Representatives of the two countries to that end”, reads the press release.
Iran and Azerbaijan have agreed to build a transport corridor that links the Caucasian state to its exclave of Nakhchivan bypassing Armenia through the Iranian territory.
Iran’s semi-official Tasnim news agency said in a Saturday report that Tehran and Baku had signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) on building the 55-Kilometer Zangezur-Nakhchivan highway through Iran.
The MoU was signed between Azerbaijan’s Deputy Prime Minister Shahin Mustafayev and visiting Iranian transportation minister Rostam Qassemi.
However, details of the project published in the Azerbaijani media showed that the link connecting Zangezur in west Azerbaijan to Nakhchivan will be in the form of a corridor that runs just five kilometers from the border between Iran and Armenia and will include railways, roads and electricity transfer facilities.
Baku had been seeking to set up a similar corridor to Nakhchivan through the Armenian territory in return for granting access to Armenia to a corridor that connects the country to Karabakh region inside Azerbaijan.
Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev praised the regular political negotiations between Baku and Tehran, calls for stronger bilateral cooperation between the two neighboring countries.
The idea has been mooted periodically since the end of a war between Azerbaijan and Armenia in July 2020. However, it has been rejected by Armenia while getting a cold reception from Iran.
Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev said in a Saturday meeting with with Qassemi that the corridor between Zangezur and Nakhchivan through Iran will become a major transit route in the region.
Aliev’s foreign policy advisor Hikmat Hajiyev also described the signing of the MoU on the project as a historic event.
“Armenia’s policy of blockade of Nakhchivan over many years will be ceased thanks to the implementation of this project,” Hajiyev was quoted as saying by Azerbaijan’s official Azertac news agency.
Azerbaijan’s Foreign Minister Jehun Bayramov announced that his country has handed Armenia a new proposal of five articles on the normalization of relations between them and is waiting for a response.
This came in a statement to The Eastern Herald, Friday, on the sidelines of his participation in the Antalya Diplomatic Forum, which is being held in the Turkish state of Antalya.
He noted that the main reason for the lack of relations between Armenia and Azerbaijan for many years was the “occupation factor”.
“Everyone knows that more than 30 years ago Armenia occupied the Azerbaijani territories by force and expelled the Azerbaijani citizens,” said Peramov.
He indicated that Armenia’s occupation of his country’s lands was the main obstacle to establishing relations between the two countries.
He pointed to the demise of Aqaba after his country regained control over occupied governorates after launching an operation to liberate its lands.
On September 27, 2020, the Azerbaijani army launched an operation to liberate its occupied lands in the Karabakh region.
After fierce battles that lasted 44 days, on November 10, 2020, Azerbaijan and Armenia reached a ceasefire agreement, which stipulated the restoration of Baku control over the occupied provinces.
He stressed that his country supports the normalization of relations with Armenia despite all the difficulties and problems that occurred in the past, and stated that a year ago, his country’s President Ilham Aliyev expressed his readiness to sign a peace agreement with Armenia.
He stated that his country had not received a response from Armenia to its proposal a year ago.
He added, “There was no response from the Armenian side to our (previous) proposal. To show its goodwill, the Azerbaijani side recently submitted a new (second) proposal to Armenia.”
He continued, “If Armenia sincerely wants to normalize relations, then this is a very good opportunity for them. Armenia’s response will soon become clear and we will take appropriate steps.”
He explained that the proposal consists of 5 articles that include basic principles, and considered the preconditions for starting the normalization process unacceptable.
Earlier on Friday, the work of the second edition of the forum was launched in the state of Antalya, southwest Turkey, and will be held at the “Nest” Exhibition and Convention Center, from March 11-13, under the slogan “Rebuilding Diplomacy”.
https://www.easternherald.com/2022/03/12/azerbaijan-armenia-new-proposal/
12:26,
YEREVAN, MARCH 11, ARMENPRESS. Azerbaijan’s policy of ethnic and religious hatred has a clear goal – to evict Armenians from Artsakh and carry out ethnic cleansing, Human Rights Defender of Artsakh Gegham Stepanyan said during a discussion today relating to Azerbaijan’s ethnic hatred policy and its consequences.
“The policy of ethnic and religious hatred by Azerbaijan has been carried out also during the Soviet years, and the authorities of the Azerbaijani SSR have always run a policy for making the life of Armenians in the territory of Artsakh not so favorable”, he said.
According to him, after the first Artsakh war when the ceasefire was signed, it seemed it was possible to ensure the security of Artsakh and its residents’ right to life on its own, but after that Azerbaijan’s policy of Armenophobia further deepened. “It entered schools, various specific events were being organized, everything was done to bring up a generation in Azerbaijan that literally hates and doesn’t tolerate the Armenian people, moreover, the Armenian Christian people, because there are the two components both the ethnic hatred and the religious one”, he said.
The Ombudsman of Artsakh said they witnessed that hatred during the 2020 war because Azerbaijanis were not only brutally killing and torturing the Armenian soldiers, but also were desecrating the Armenian Christian heritage.
14:30,
YEREVAN, MARCH 11, ARMENPRESS. Minister of Finance Tigran Khachatryan received on March 11 Acting UN Resident Coordinator in Armenia Lila Pieters Yahia and her delegation, the ministry said in a news release.
In the context of the ongoing Russian-Ukrainian military operations, Minister Tigran Khachatryan presented the impact on the Armenian economy. He highlighted and appreciated the continuous close cooperation with the UN and its specialized agencies aimed at strengthening the economy and effectively implementing the sustainable development goals in Armenia.
Lila Pieters Yahia stated that Armenia is not only a part of the United Nations family, but also a very active member. She said the United Nations is ready to provide its further anti-crisis support to Armenia to resist the current new economic situation.