Author: Hambardsumian Paul

Artsakh universities hold classes online

Hambardsumian Paul

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 14:07, 8 November, 2020

YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 8, ARMENPRESS. The universities in Artsakh are holding classes online during the ongoing war unleashed by Azerbaijan.

The state university of Artsakh will resume the classes on November 10, Artsakh’s minister of education, science and culture Lusine Gharakhanyan said at a press conference in Armenpress.

“The higher educational institutions in Artsakh have started their work. The Artsakh state university will start the classes on November 10, whereas the technology university and the Mesrop Mashtots university in Shushi have already started the online classes. The teaching staff is from Artsakh”, the minister said.

She said they will soon solve the study organization issue in vocational schools and colleges.

Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan

​Azerbaijan says key Karabakh town captured, Armenia says it didn’t happen

Hambardsumian Paul
France 24
Nov 8 2020
 
 
 
Azerbaijan says key Karabakh town captured, Armenia says it didn’t happen
 
Issued on: 08/11/2020 – 18:09
 
A crater following recent shelling in the town of Shusha, in the course of a military conflict over the breakaway region of Nagorno-Karabakh, October 29, 2020. © Vahram Baghdasaryan/Photolur, REUTERS
 
Azerbaijan said Sunday its forces had captured the key town of Shusha from Armenian separatists in Nagorno-Karabakh, but Armenia insisted that fighting for the strategically vital area was ongoing.
 
The capture of Shusha would be a major victory for Azerbaijan six weeks after new fighting erupted over Nagorno-Karabakh, an ethnic Armenian enclave that broke away from Azerbaijan’s control in the 1990s.
 
The fortress town sits on cliffs around 15 kilometres (nine miles) from Nagorno-Karabakh’s largest city Stepanakert and on the main road through the region to the territory of Armenia, which backs the separatists.
 
Both sides have reported fierce clashes around the town in recent days, after Azerbaijani forces swept across the southern flank of Nagorno-Karabakh and pushed through its mountain passes.
 
In a televised address to the nation on Sunday, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev announced that the town had been captured.
 
“With great pride and joy, I inform you that the town of Shusha has been liberated,” said Aliyev, dressed in military fatigues and standing in front of an Azerbaijani flag.
 
“Our liberation march continues. We will go to the end, until the complete liberation of the occupied territories,” Aliyev said.
 
Celebrations in Baku
 
Flag-waving Azerbaijanis celebrated in the capital Baku after Aliyev’s announcement, with cars honking their horns as residents crowded along city streets despite coronavirus restrictions.
 
“I did not leave the house for a week, but today I came out to say that Shusha has been liberated. We are happy, congratulations to all my people,” 32-year-old Baku resident Shargiya Dadashova said.
 
Armenian officials said the battle was far from over.
 
“The fighting continues in Shushi, wait and believe in our army,” Armenian defence ministry official Artsrun Hovhannisyan said, using the Armenian name for the town.
 
Armenian defence ministry spokeswoman Shushan Stepanyan said there was “the most ferocious combat” for the town, while the Armenian government said taking Shusha was an “unattainable pipe dream for Azerbaijan”.
 
“Despite heavy destruction, the fortress city withstands the blows of the adversary,” it said.
 
In the streets of the Armenian capital Yerevan, residents said they did not believe the town had been taken.
 
“To know who controls Shushi we will listen to the commanders of our army, not Aliyev,” 50-year-old Arman said on the city’s central Abovyan Street.
 
“In any case I can assure you that the war will not be finished if the Azerbaijanis take Shushi.”
 
Shusha had been a majority Azerbaijani city before the 1990s conflict and has been a rallying cry for authorities in Baku promising to retake Nagorno-Karabakh.
 
New clashes broke out in late September between Azerbaijan and the Armenia-backed separatists over control of Karabakh, which declared its independence nearly 30 years ago.
 
That declaration has not been recognised internationally, even by Armenia, and it remains a part of Azerbaijan under international law.
 
The recent flare-up has been the worst in decades, with more than 1,000 people confirmed dead including dozens of civilians, although the death toll is believed to be much higher.
 
Diplomatic efforts
 
Fighting has continued despite several attempts by Russia, France and the United States to help reach a ceasefire.
 
The three countries make up the “Minsk Group” of mediators that helped broker a truce between the ex-Soviet rivals in 1994 but have failed to find a lasting solution to the long-simmering conflict.
 
Diplomatic efforts appeared to intensify as the fighting raged around Shusha, with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday speaking by phone to Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan and French President Emmanuel Macron.
 
Turkey is a key ally of Azerbaijan and on Sunday Erdogan congratulated Baku after its claim of retaking Shusha, saying it was “a sign that the liberation of the rest of the occupied territories is near”.
 
Turkish involvement would be key in any agreement to halt the fighting and there were reports Sunday of a plan to agree a ceasefire and deploy Russian and Turkish peacekeepers to Nagorno-Karabakh.
  
Ankara has been a fierce supporter of Azerbaijan, a fellow Muslim and Turkic country, while Moscow has a defence pact with Armenia and a military base on its territory.
 
Aliyev met Sunday with the Turkish foreign and defence ministers in Baku.
 
Dmitry Trenin, a political analyst and head of the Moscow Carnegie Center, said the conflict had reached a “decisive point”.
 
“Russia and Turkey are finalising the modalities of (a) ceasefire, Armenian withdrawal, corridors and peacekeepers,” he wrote on Twitter. “New regional order is being sealed.”
 
(AFP)
  
 

Nagorno-Karabakh Says Its Two Largest Cities Under Fierce Attack

Hambardsumian Paul
U.S. News
Nov 6 2020
By Reuters, Wire Service Content Nov. 6, 2020


By Margarita Antidze

TBILISI (Reuters) – Three residents of Nagorno-Karabakh’s largest city were killed during overnight shelling by Azeri forces, the enclave’s ethnic Armenian-controlled Emergency and Rescue Service said on Friday, as the battle for control of its major settlements intensified.

Azerbaijan denied the reports of shelling in Stepanakert. Two independent observers said fighting appeared to be moving deeper into the enclave, with Azeri troops stepping up attacks on its biggest two cities.

At least 1,000 people – and possibly many more – have died in nearly six weeks of fighting in and around Nagorno-Karabakh, a mountainous enclave internationally recognised as part of Azerbaijan but populated and controlled by ethnic Armenians.

The conflict has underlined the influence of Turkey, an ally of Azerbaijan, in a former Soviet region long dominated by Moscow, which has a defence pact with Armenia. It also threatens the security of Azeri oil and gas pipelines.

The Nagorno-Karabakh Emergency and Rescue Service said residential buildings and public infrastructure in Stepanakert had been targeted. It said that the three people killed had been inside the same house.

Reuters was unable independently to verify these reports. Three sources working in Stepanakert said that the city – known in Azerbaijan as Khankendi – had come under heavy shelling late on Thursday.

Shushi, 15 km (9 miles) to the south and the enclave’s second-largest city, had also come under bombardment overnight and several houses were on fire, the Emergency and Rescue Service said. The city is of strategic importance to both sides.

Azerbaijan’s defence ministry said allegations that it had shelled civilian areas were “misinformation”.

It has previously accused Armenian-controlled forces of shelling cities under its control, including Terter and Barda, as well as Ganja, the second-largest city in Azerbaijan. Dozens were killed in those attacks.

Thomas de Waal, analyst at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and author of a book on the 1990s Nagorno-Karabakh war, said the conflict appeared to be moving toward a potentially bloody battle for Shushi, known to Azeris as Shusha.

“Shusha has great importance for Azerbaijanis, as a cultural and historical centre and the town where they had a majority population before the war,” de Waal told Reuters.

“That is almost certainly why their military operation was diverted from Lachin towards the city,” he said. “It has great importance for Armenians too: it sits above Stepanakert and is the site of Karabakh’s cathedral.”

BROKEN CEASEFIRES

Three ceasefires have failed to halt the bloodiest fighting in the South Caucasus for more than 25 years. Both sides accused each other of launching attacks within hours of an agreement on Oct. 30 to avoid deliberately targeting civilians.

The Nagorno-Karabakh defence ministry said combat operations continued overnight along all major sections of the front line. It said that “multiple attempts” to attack Shushi were repelled.

Olesya Vartanyan, Crisis Group’s Tbilisi-based senior analyst for the South Caucasus, told Reuters that fighting near Shushi had “been intensifying during the last week, with more face-to-face clashes closer to the town”.

“The side that controls Shushi automatically gains control over Stepanakert,” she said. “Even if Baku decides to stop the war after taking Shushi, this will still significantly decrease the chance of ethnic Armenians returning to their homes in Stepanakert.”

The Nagorno-Karabakh defence ministry says 1,177 of its troops have been killed. Azerbaijan does not disclose its military casualties, while Russia has estimated 5,000 deaths on both sides.

Around 30,000 people were killed in the 1991-94 war.

(Reporting by Margarita Antidze in Tbilisi, Nvard Hovhannisyan in Yerevan and Nailia Bagirova in Baku; Writing by Robin Paxton; Editing by Alex Richardson)

CivilNet: “Photographes pour la paix en Artsakh”, des images pour le Haut-Karabakh

Hambardsumian Paul
CIVILNET.AM

6 November, 2020 13:02

Rebecca Topakian est une artiste photographe parisienne d’origine arménienne.  Elle est à l’origine d’un projet appelé “Photographes pour la paix en Artsakh.” Elle a sélectionné un panel de photos d’artistes qui ne dépeint pas la violence mais qui honore l’amour. La somme récoltée des photos ira au Fond arménien de France pour aider les réfugiés du Haut-Karabakh, victimes d’une guerre déclenchée par l’Azerbaïdjan sur leur terre le 27 septembre dernier.

Russia says it works with Turkey to achieve ceasefire in Karabakh

Hambardsumian Paul

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 18:45, 3 November, 2020

YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 3, ARMENPRESS. Russia will continue cooperating with Turkey and use its entire influence in the region to prevent a military solution of the Nagorno Karabakh conflict, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in an interview to Komersant newspaper.

Lavrov said that Moscow and Ankara are close partners and are able to display a flexible and pragmatic approach and cooperate with each other in a strategic vision.

He pointed out Syria and Libya to be the obvious examples of practical and substantive cooperation between the Russian and Turkish diplomats, militaries and intelligence agencies.

“The situation in case of Nagorno Karabakh principally differs, and I’ve partially spoken about this in my answers to the previous questions. I repeat, we have never hidden and we aren’t hiding that we are not in favor of a solution to the crisis by force, we seek a speedy halt in combat operations,” Lavrov said.

Lavrov emphasized that both the parties to the conflict, as well as their foreign partners should steadily adhere to the agreements on ceasefire, the creation of verification mechanisms and the re-launch of substantive negotiations by a concrete timetable.

“And although it wasn’t possible to achieve a stable ceasefire at once, we will continue using our entire influence in the region, we will work with our Turkish colleagues, in order to stop the further development of a military scenario, so that dialogue gets established between the sides, and so that we convince Baku and Yerevan to come to the negotiations table,” Lavrov said.

Editing and Translating by Stepan Kocharyan

Martuni residents unharmed from latest Azeri bombing

Hambardsumian Paul

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 12:18, 1 November, 2020

YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 1, ARMENPRESS. The residents of the town of Martuni and nearby villages are unharmed from the latest Azerbaijani bombardment, Martuni mayor Vadim Danielyan told ARMENPRESS. “The town was bombarded from 3 o’clock in the night until the morning. At this moment it’s calm. A civilian building was destroyed. Fortunately there are no victims among the peaceful population,” he said, presenting updates as of 10:50.

He said there is power outage in the town. The gas supply is partially interrupted, but water supply proceeds normally.

Editing and Translating by Stepan Kocharyan

France sends its Ambassador back to Turkey

Hambardsumian Paul

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 19:20, 1 November, 2020

YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 1, ARMENPRESS. Ambassador of France to Turkey Herve Magro returns to Ankara, ARMENPRESS reports Foreign Minister of France Jean-Yves Le Drian informed.

On October 24 France had recalled its Ambassador from Turkey following for consultations insulting remarks by the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who suggested Emmanuel Macron, needed mental health treatment.

“The city is shaking from strikes” – Stepanakert under massive Azeri bombardment

Hambardsumian Paul

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 08:33,

STEPANAKERT, OCTOBER 29, ARMENPRESS. The Azerbaijani armed forces re-launched the bombardment attack at the city of Stepanakert, the capital of Artsakh from early morning October 29.

More than a dozen strikes have hit the city in the morning, with incoming reports saying “the city is shaking from the strikes”.

Stepanakert City was shelled by the Azeri military overnight as well, with 5 missiles hitting the city.

The capital of Artsakh came under heavy bombing on October 28 also, when the Azeri military delivered a precision strike at the city’s maternity clinic.

09:20 – Artsakh emergency authorities say the first Azeri missile hit the city at 08:03, minutes after the air raid sirens were activated. The Azeri military fired Smerch multiple rocket launchers, hitting a residential home. The home and an adjacent building were completely destroyed, and one vehicle was damaged. The homeowner and his neighbor were wounded and hospitalized.

 

Editing and Translating by Stepan Kocharyan

Armenian, Russian security chiefs discuss situation in Nagorno-Karabakh

Hambardsumian Paul
TASS, Russia
Oct 26 2020
 
 
Armenia’s defense ministry reported on Monday morning that Baku had violated the ceasefire, opening artillery fire at the positions of the Nagorno-Karabakh defense army in the northeastern section of the contact line

YEREVAN, October 26. /TASS/. Armenian Security Council Secretary Armen Grigoryan has highly estimated Russia’s role in the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, the press service of the Armenian Security Council said on Monday after his telephone conversation with his Russian counterpart, Nikolai Patrushev.

“During the conversation with Patrushev, Grigoryan touched on the situation at Artsakh’s (the unrecognized Nagorno-Karabakh republic – TASS) border with Azerbaijan stressing that that the war had been unleashed by Azerbaijan and pointing to Turkey’s destabilizing interference. He also highly estimated Russia’s role in the conflict settlement. Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev stressed the necessity of peaceful and diplomatic settlement of the conflict,” it said.

Armenia’s defense ministry reported on Monday morning that Baku had violated the ceasefire, opening artillery fire at the positions of the Nagorno-Karabakh defense army in the northeastern section of the contact line.

On Sunday evening, Azerbaijan and Armenia, with the United States’ mediation, agreed another humanitarian ceasefire in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict zone that entered into force from 07:00 Moscow time on October 26.

Renewed clashes between Azerbaijan and Armenia erupted on September 27, with intense battles raging in the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh. The area experienced flare-ups of violence in the summer of 2014, in April 2016 and this past July. Azerbaijan and Armenia have imposed martial law and launched mobilization efforts. Both parties to the conflict have reported casualties, among them civilians. Fighting continues in the region despite the previous ceasefire agreements.

The conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the highland region of Nagorno-Karabakh, a disputed territory that had been part of Azerbaijan before the Soviet Union break-up, but primarily populated by ethnic Armenians, broke out in February 1988 after the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Region announced its withdrawal from the Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic. In 1992-1994, tensions boiled over and exploded into large-scale military action for control over the enclave and seven adjacent territories after Azerbaijan lost control of them. Talks on the Nagorno-Karabakh settlement have been ongoing since 1992 under the OSCE Minsk Group, led by its three co-chairs – Russia, France and the United States.


France recalls Ambassador from Turkey

Hambardsumian Paul

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 21:03,

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 24, ARMENPRESS. France has recalled its Ambassador from Turkey for consultations following the incident that Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said that French President Emmanuel Macron needs ”mental treatment”, ARMENPRESS reports AFP agency informs.

”President Erdoğan’s comments are inadmissible. Impoliteness and rudeness are not a method. We demand Erdoğan to change his policy, because it’s dangerous in all respects”, an official from  Élysée Palace told AFP.

He added that the Ambassador will also meet with Emmanuel Macron to discuss the situation.