Author: Kalantarian Kevo

Russia Has Appointed “Attendant” To Armenia

Hakob Badalyan, Political Commentator
Comments – 25 October 2014, 15:04

The head of the Russian Customs Committee Andrey Belyaninov has made a
scandalous statement on the issue of customs on the border of Armenia
and Artsakh in the light of membership of Armenia to the Eurasian
Economic Union.

In answer to the reporter’s question on the customs he said “we are
not planning anything for the time being”, the Russian Regnum
reported.

In other words, the issue has not been resolved but there is just an
interim arrangement. Perhaps, this is what the president of Kazakhstan
Nursultan Nazarbayev meant when he announced at the October 10 summit
in Minsk that a compromise had been reached on the borders of Armenia.
Apparently, this is the compromise – for the time being the customs
issue will not be brought up, and later it will depend on how Armenia
will behave.

In any case, it turns out that Armenia has not rejected the customs
issue altogether but has agreed not to speak about it for the time
being.

The head of the Russian customs service has announced that they will
not deal with the activities of the customs on the border of Armenia
and Artsakh. This statement is also interesting because it arouses
questions as to whether they mean the checkpoint in Kashatagh or
another facility that will be created later. Belyaninov said they are
not going to interfere with the customs. Again, not they have no right
to interfere, not they are not competent to interfere, they simply are
not planning to. In other words, if they want, they are empowered.

In addition, the first step has already been taken. Belyaninov has
announced that he has appointed his representative to Armenia who will
soon visit Armenia. First, it is interesting that the head of the
Russian Customs Service is speaking about appointing his
representative to Armenia while this official should have been
appointed by the Eurasian Economic Union. Besides, the Armenian
parliament has not ratified the treaty on membership to the Eurasian
Union, and formally the membership of Armenia is still uncertain.
Although, Moscow knows that the Armenian parliament is deprived of
will and national dignity and approval of an imperial project would
hardly encounter any hindrance there.

At the same time, Belyaninov has announced that his representative
will probably visit the border but will not interfere with the
activities of the BCP. In other words, for the time being Russia will
choose the audit option which will be implemented between Armenia and
Artsakh. In other words, the customs representative becomes Moscow’s
“attendant” in Armenia or simply de facto government of Armenia which
will keep Artsakh and Armenia under control, which has huge military
and political importance for both Armenia and Artsakh and for the
region in general. Moscow cannot establish its control there through
its own military presence, and for the time being the issue will be
resolved through the customs representative.

By the way, it is interesting that Moscow is announcing about it on
October 24 when the opposition goes on a rally. An interesting
parallel is drawn between the rallies of non-governmental forces and
destiny-making decisions on Armenia in the Eurasian Union. It is
interesting to know what will coincide with the third rally.

IHS Jane’s: Azerbaijan to refrain from provocations on contact line,
fearing miscalculation

14:05 25/10/2014 » REGION

The Azerbaijani authorities’ ongoing clampdown on civil society is
geared towards parliamentary elections in 2015, reads the article
published on IHS Jane’s site.

According to the article, on 6 October, the Norwegian Helsinki
Committee awarded 98 political prisoners in Azerbaijan the prestigious
annual Andrei Sakharov Freedom Award. Since the beginning of the year,
the Azerbaijani authorities have been carrying out a systematic
campaign against the opposition and civil society by arresting
prominent political dissidents, democracy activists, and human rights
defenders. In September, security officials raided the office of
apolitical, US-based non-governmental organisation (NGO) International
Research and Exchanges Board (IREX), which is exclusively engaged in
promoting educational activities. The government froze IREX’s bank
accounts as well as those of the local office of Transparency
International.

IHS assesses that the campaign is orchestrated by the influential head
of the presidential administration Ramiz Mehdiyev, President Ilham
Aliyev’s main adviser on domestic policy, in response to the ouster of
former president Viktor Yanukovych in Ukraine, which increased
suspicions that the Western-funded NGOs will likely be used to foment
civil unrest in Azerbaijan, the article reads.
By weakening both civil society and any political opposition,
President Ilham Aliyev is hoping to avoid protests in the run-up to
the parliamentary elections Scheduled for November 2015. The crackdown
is likely to succeed and ultimately result in the desired election
outcome.

A ceasefire violation, resulting in several fatalities, along the Line
of Contact (LoC) between Azerbaijan and the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic
(NKR), which occurred on the night of 31 July/1 August, marked the
most significant escalation In response to the violence, Russian
president Vladimir Putin arranged a meeting in Sochi, attended by the
Azerbaijani and Armenian presidents. Aliyev was reportedly warned not
to entertain any notions of resolving the Karabakh conflict by force,
according to several Azerbaijani military analysts.

In an attempt to mitigate a potential Armenian ballistic missile
threat, Azerbaijan is developing missile defence capability. Likely
modelled after Israel’s “Iron Dome”, this air defence system is
designed to shield Azerbaijan’s key government buildings, military
installations, and critical energy infrastructure, including the
Sangachal terminal, from potential retaliation by Armenia using its
Russian-supplied Scud-B and Tochka-U ballistic missiles.

The current stalemate over Ukraine creates strategic uncertainty and
makes it more likely that the Azeri government will abstain from
provocations for fear of potential miscalculation. Finally, Azerbaijan
will host major international sporting events in 2015 (First European
Games), 2016 (42nd Chess Olympiad and F1 European Grand Prix), which
also mitigate war risks in the three-year outlook.

According to Azerbaijani sources close to 100 Azeri nationals are
reported to have died in the Syrian conflict, but there are no
reliable estimates of the number currently fighting there. News
reports from Azeri open sources suggest there are between 100 and 400
fighters. Azerbaijani militants take advantage of a visa-free regime
with Turkey to travel to Syria. A number of factors have resulted in
Sumgait emerging as the hotspot of Sunni extremism. There are periodic
police raids in Sumgait and other hotspots, including northern areas
populated by ethnic minorities (Qusar and Qakh districts), the article
reads.

Armenia-political-protest
Armenia: nearly 16,000 demonstrators in the capital against President

Nearly 16,000 people gathered Friday in Yerevan, capital of Armenia,
to protest against President Serzh Sarkisian and to demand early
presidential and parliamentary elections.

“A powerful movement for a change of government is being born,” he
told the crowd Levon Ter-Petrossian, Armenian former President and
leader of the opposition Armenian National Congress party.

“Our country needs a new government with new policies,” for its part,
said the head of prosperous Armenia party Gagik Tsarukian.

The demonstration was led by the three main opposition parties in the
country: Prosperous Armenia, the Armenian National Congress and
Heritage.It aimed to protest against the government’s economic policy
and its failure in the fight against corruption.

Mr. Tsarukian pledged to organize a national campaign to mobilize
other protesters.

Last Friday, the first event had already attracted nearly 10,000
people “against corruption and poverty” in this former Soviet republic
in the Caucasus.

The protests came as Armenia has recently joined the Eurasian Economic
Union, which already Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan.

The Union, a project dear to Russian President Vladimir Putin to come
into force on 1 January 2015 and aims to promote closer integration of
these countries.

The decision of Armenia to move closer to Russia in November 2013
sparked a heated debate and protests in this former Soviet republic.

AFP

Saturday, October 25, 2014,
Stéphane © armenews.com

Azerbaijan has extended the term of arrest of Leyla Yunus; She s
accused for partaking at a seminar with Armenains

08:01, 25 Oct 2014

Azerbaijan has extended the term of arrest of human rights activist,
director of the Institute for Peace and Democracy, Leyla Yunus for 4
months.

The court rejected the defense motion to replace the restrictive
measure on house arrest. Azerbaijani human rights activist are
transfered to the Investigative Prison of the Ministry of National
Security, where her husband Mr. Arif Yunusov has been detained since
August 5. They are accused of treason, fraud, tax evasion and illegal
business.

Leyla Yunus remained in the Detention Unit for 2.5 months and
regularly complained of psychological and physical torture.

Recall, the West has repeatedly called for the release of Leyla Yunus
and her husband, still their names are missing in the list of 80
political prisoners amnestied by a decree signed by Azerbaijani
President Ilham Aliev last week.

Haykakan Zhamanak: Rosneft not to invest in Nairit Plant

Saturday, October 25, 2014

Haykakan Zhamanak’ daily writes citing its sources that Russia’s
Rosneft Company sent an official letter informing the Armenian
government that it refuses to make investment in Narit Plant.

Statements about the Russian company’s investments were made at the
highest level for a long time. Ex-Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan said
following a meeting with Russian counterpart Dmitry Medvedev that
Rosneft planned to invest $500 million.

TODAY, 11:09
Aysor.am

AINA Assyrian International News Agency
Oct 25 2014

Never Forget, and Never Again

By Paul Benjamin

Since the genocide of Armenians, Pontic Greeks and Assyrians (also
called Chaldeans and Syriacs) in the Ottoman empire in 1915, these
communities have been subject to a diaspora with new settlements in
countries far from their ancestral ones.

A diaspora is defined as a scattered population with a common origin
in a smaller geographic area.

Imagine an American diaspora where for every one America still living
in the United States, five have fled to escape ethnic persecution. Now
you can stop imagining that scenario and come to terms with the fact
that this is the current state of affairs for Assyrians.

Assyrians are now residing in Sweden, the United States, Canada,
Germany, Australia, Russia, Netherlands, France, Jordan, United
Kingdom, and many other countries that have opened their doors.

The total population of Assyrians living in countries outside their
native and indigenous homelands of Iraq, Iran, Syria and Turkey
outnumber those living in the original homelands by five to one. This
is not by choice; rather, it is driven by ethnic persecution.

Flip a typical six-sided die. Roll a 1 through 5 and you flee your
home. Roll a “lucky” 6 and you’re now living in your home with the
incessant fear that it’s only a matter of time before you’re forced to
flee too. And the diaspora has continued to grow since the invasion of
Iraq. Recent events driven by IS (Islamic State) in Iraq and Syria
have dramatically driven that number up.

In fleeing, Assyrians have integrated into their new home countries,
learning multiple languages and cultures, and have contributed to all
aspects of life, from technical and legal to medical and political.
Assyrians have learned how to adapt to their new homes.

But how will the Assyrian culture or any other diaspora community
preserve its rich heritage and not totally assimilate?

Education

The Jewish community has been one of the most persecuted communities
in the world. From the exodus in the Old Testament to the Holocaust,
Jews have endured as a strong and resilient community. An impressive
193 Jews have been awarded the Nobel Prize; that is roughly one
quarter of all award winners since 1901.

What can another diaspora community learn from the Jews?

The more educated you are, the more you will be able to contribute
back to society and at the same time drive change for your ethnic
community. The state of Israel was not created overnight. Jews
prepared themselves for the opportunity back in the mid-1800s by
educating and supporting their people. The statement may be
oversimplified, as preparations may have even started earlier than
that, but my point is this: Education is the key to driving change for
the community.

How can Assyrians/Chaldeans/Syriacs start?

Go to school and educate yourself in a field that you are passionate in.
Be the best at what you do. Others in your ancestral homelands are
being killed for having your ethnicity. Use it as motivation to drive
yourself.
Be proud of your ethnicity. Learn who you are and teach others. If
someone asks if you are Persian or Arab or Italian or Greek or even
Japanese (yes, I got Japanese once), be polite while explaining and
educating them as to who you really are.
Preserve your language. I have been in many conversations with people
who think Neo-Aramaic (Assyrian) is an “extinct language.” New schools
and even apps — Assyrian ABCs, ZalinVille, Ishtar Games, Assyrian and
many others — have been developed to preserve the language and
culture. Use those tools to educate yourself, your children and your
families.
Get involved by joining grassroot efforts like A Demand for Action,
your local association, your federation or political party and support
each other.
Internalize the saying “Never forget, and never again.”
Choose your life, your passions, and your career and become the best
in whatever it is, and always remember that you are also an
ambassador. You have a voice to give to the unheard. It’s only when
the diaspora understands the value of both melting into the societies
they live in and preserving their ethnic identity that it can
flourish.

By raising awareness, rallying, fundraising and debating, we have made
known, to the rest of the world, that the ongoing ethno-religious
genocide at the dirty hands of Islamic extremists will not be
tolerated.

Never forget the atrocities that have happened to your ancestors, and
never allow something like this to happen again.

‘RISING GROUND’, BY PHILIP MARSDEN

October 24, 2014 4:59 pm

Review by William Taylor

ornwall has its own flag as well as its own language, customs and
folklore. No doubt one day it will have its own parliament. And in
the meantime, in Philip Marsden, it has its own itinerant philosopher,
heir to the roving antiquaries of old.

It has certainly had a few of these over the years. With a copy of
Geoffrey of Monmouth’s Life of Merlin in their knapsack, successive
individuals have gone in search of the meaning of the Neolithic stone
circles on Bodmin Moor and the Arthurian traditions of Tintagel,
as well as those granite tors and tombs scattered across the far
western tip of this island finger. It was a left to a group of
Victorian clergy, some of whom clearly had a bit too much time on
their hands, to consolidate a range of theories about the Druidic
origins of such monuments.

All these characters ornament Rising Ground, but as an interpreter
of ritual landscape Marsden himself remains cheerfully agnostic. Of
Glastonbury Tor he writes, “maybe it really is the energy lines,
those hidden channels of power that converge at this place to give
it its aura and generate its miracles. Or maybe it’s simply the shape
of the hill.”

Marsden himself is not a native of Cornwall (he grew up in Somerset)
but he was a frequent visitor from early childhood. In The Bronski
House (1997) he describes crossing the river Tamar into Cornwall
over an old stone bridge and relishing that feeling of passing into
an unfamiliar place: abroad.

That continuing search for “abroad” took him to Ethiopia, Armenia
and Russia (as his back catalogue attests) but he has more recently
found himself back in Cornwall again and writing within the parameters
provided by a couple of days’ hike. In Rising Ground he wonders whether
all along his real interest has been in the shaping importance of
place and what he calls “the capacity of places to create mythologies
around them”.

This train of thought is triggered by a move upriver, like a returning
salmon or bass, into a new home in the middle of what sounds to me
like absolutely nowhere. As his family settles in, Marsden sets out on
a parallel journey to search for this spirit of place, walking west
across the county towards that dangerous cape where land disappears
into sea.

Others who have travelled this path have got lost with their esoteric
theories in the moors, trying, like George Eliot’s Casaubon, to
search out the key to these mythologies. This number includes the
Tudor topographer John Leland who ends up, burnt out and exhausted,
with an incomplete manuscript; and the 20th-century chronicler John
Blight, who finishes his days in a Penzance asylum. “Certain subjects
have the capacity to swallow you whole,” Marsden warns, “and one of
these is the interpretation of ancient monuments.”

However, it is Marsden’s close attention to the immediacy of his
experience – the shape of the particular hill, the sound of the
curlew’s cry in the early hours, the feel of heather crunching beneath
his feet – that keeps him, and us, interested in this journey.

And when his own ideas get too speculative he typically takes a scythe
to a thicket in his garden or pulls on his walking boots and heads for
the hills. By letting go of the attempt to find an epic resolution to
the quandaries he has set himself, he settles for occasional moments
of lyric apprehension. His nowhere momentarily becomes a somewhere.

And as it does, Marsden vividly shows us the importance of
particularity as a doorway into inhabiting our deepest understanding
of what it means to be a human being walking this earth.

If “crossing the Tiber” (after the river that separates the Vatican
City from the rest of classical Rome) refers colloquially to the act
of converting to Catholicism, then “crossing the Tamar” could equally
well refer to the moment of being seized by a fresh sense of the
holiness of landscape. Marsden is our apostle here, though a modest
one, more poet than preacher, as he invites us to join him in gazing
upon a succession of Cornish wonders. And not a dowsing rod in sight.

Rising Ground: A Search for the Spirit of Place, by Philip Marsden,
Granta, RRP£20, 368 pages

William Taylor is a clergyman in the London Borough of Hackney and
author of ‘This Bright Field: A Travel Book in One Place’ (Methuen)

AFTER UKRAINE, RUSSIA BEEFS UP MILITARY IN ARMENIA AND KYRGYZSTAN

Silk Road Reporters
Oct 24 2014

Published by John C. K. Daly
October 24, 2014

For years Russia has complained about what they describe as NATO’s
expansion eastward. Noted diplomat-historian George F. Kennan in 1997
clearly foresaw the consequences of such actions when in 1997 he wrote
in a newspaper commentary, “Expanding NATO would be the most fateful
error of American policy in the post-Cold War era. Such a decision
may be expected… to impel Russian foreign policy in directions
decidedly not to our liking.”

The 1997 NATO Madrid Summit invited the first countries of the former
Warsaw Pact – the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland – to join the
alliance. Worse for Moscow was to follow. At the NATO Nov. 2002 Prague
Summit, not only were former Warsaw Pact members Bulgaria, Romania,
Slovakia and Slovenia invited to begin accession talks, but former USSR
republics Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania as well. NATO membership for
both Georgia and Ukraine has been discussed at subsequent summits,
and at the most recent summit held in Britain Sept. 4-5 NATO’s web
page noted that the alliance “increased support to Ukraine in the wake
of the crisis with Russia” and “continued condemnation of Russia’s
illegal and illegitimate ‘annexation’ of Crimea and destabilization
of Eastern Ukraine.”

For better or worse, the Ukrainian crisis, which began late last year,
has worsened Russian-Western relations to their lowest level since the
1991 breakup of the USSR. Russia has now belatedly begun to push back,
strengthening its bilateral relations with a number of post-Soviet
republics and using both the Collective Security Treaty Organization
(CSTO – current membership Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan,
Russia and Tajikistan, observer states – Afghanistan and Serbia)
and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO – member states China,
Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan; observer
states – Afghanistan, India, Iran, Mongolia and Pakistan; Dialogue
Partners – Belarus, Sri Lanka and Turkey; guests – the Association of
Southeast Asian Nations [ASEAN] and the Commonwealth of Independent
States [CIS]) to increase its Eurasian military capabilities.

On Oct. 15 Colonel General Viktor Bondarev, head of the Russian
air force, briefed reporters on Moscow’s intention to accelerate
efforts to create a CSTO unified air defense network in response to
the Ukrainian crisis reenergized NATO.

The plans outlined by Bondarev indicate that NATO’s intensifying
of activities on Russia’s periphery rather than cowing the Kremlin
are instead leading to “impel Russian foreign policy in directions
decidedly not to our liking.” Bondarev stated that within Russia
“By 2020… 47 airfields, including in Crimea and in the Arctic,
will be renovated under the state armaments program,” adding that by
2025 the Russian air force will have restored and reopened over 100
military airbases.

Outlining plans outside Russia, negotiations with Vietnam, Cuba,
Venezuela and Nicaragua to establish bases for Russian strategic
bombers continue.

Even before the conflict in Ukraine erupted, in 2013 Russian
fighters were deployed to the Belarus Baranovichi airbase as part
of the countries’ integrated regional air defense network and Russia
announced that it would station fighter aircraft at a Russian-built
airbase in Lida, Belarus, near the border with Poland and Lithuania.

Bondarev announced that the Russian air force now plans to establish
a new airbase in the Belarusian city of Babruysk, which will be home
to a squadron of Russian Su-27 fighters. As Belarus shares frontiers
with NATO members Latvia, Lithuania and Poland, Moscow’s message
could hardly be more clear.

It is in Russian aviation deployments further afield in the post-Soviet
Caucasus and Central Asia CSTO member states that NATO will be unable
to mount substantive countermeasures. In the Caucasus, Russian-Armenian
relations have been fairly stable throughout the post-1991 era,
with security and economics being the main areas of cooperation. As
Azerbaijan has drifted over the last two decades into the Western
orbit because of its energy wealth, Armenia has remained firmly allied
to Russia, with the two nations emphasizing Russian involvement in
negotiating a peaceful resolution to the Nagorno-Karabakh struggle
as a co-chairman of the OSCE Minsk Group, which has been mediating
the broader Azeri-Armenian conflict since March 1992.

Given the strained nature of its relations with Azerbaijan and Turkey,
Armenia sees military-political cooperation with Russia as an essential
element of its security and defense policy. Besides Russian military
bases in Armenia, Russian border guards assist Armenia in protecting
its borders with Turkey and Iran. Armenia is an active CSTO member,
the only member of the CSTO in the South Caucasus. Russia is also
Armenia’s main investor, with its total exceeding $3 billion through
2012, mainly in the energy and communications sectors.

Underlining Russia’s deep involvement in Armenia’s transport sector,
a Feb. 2008 agreement between the Russian and Armenian governments
transferred Armenian Railways to Russian Railways’ subsidiary, South
Caucasus Railways for 30 years. The agreement committed the Russians
to investing $230 million in Armenia during the first five years of
operations and subsequently an additional $240 million.

Armenia also purchases natural gas from Russia at preferential rates,
with only Belarus receiving a better price.

In the wake of deteriorating Western-Russian relations over Ukraine,
the Russian air force is upgrading the Soviet-era Erebuni airbase
in Armenia, which houses the Russian 3624th Air Base and currently
hosts a squadron of MiG-29 fighters and Mi-24 attack helicopters. As
the Ukrainian crisis deepened, in Jan. the Russian Southern Military
District press service confirmed that a contingent of Mi-24P attack
helicopters, Mi-8MT and Mi-8SMV military transport helicopters were
scheduled for deployment at Erebuni later in the year. Underlining
Russia’s strengthening presence in Armenia, 3,000 Russian and Armenian
military personnel from Erebuni and other facilities on Oct. 13-19
held military preparedness joint exercises, which included Erebuni
MiG-29s, at Armenia’s Kamhud and Alagyaz training facilities.

Besides Erebuni, the Russian 102nd Military Base is in the Armenian
city of Gyumri. In stark contrast to Ukraine’s years-long haggling
with Russia over the terms of its lease of Sevastopol for the Black
Sea Fleet, in Aug. 2010, Russia and Armenia agreed to prolong the
Gyumri lease agreement until 2044.

Russia provides Armenia with armaments, investment and political
support, for which Armenia reciprocates by providing territory
for Russian military base deployment, thereby contributing to the
preservation of Russia’s presence in the South Caucasus. Since the
Ukrainian crisis erupted, Russia’s strengthening of its military
presence in Armenia sends a strong message to neighboring NATO member
Turkey, as well as NATO Partnership for Peace (PfP) associates Georgia
and Azerbaijan.

Farther east, Bondarev noted that Russia is negotiating with Kyrgyzstan
to reconstruct the Kant airbase outside the capital Bishkek to support
Russian strategic bombers, which currently houses a Russian fighter
squadron under CSTO auspices.

In many ways Kyrgyzstan and its air bases represents the height of
the more than decade-old shadow “Great Game” conflict for Central Asia
between Russia and the West, which began in earnest after the Sept.

11, 2001 terrorist attacks in the U.S, after which Washington sought
military access to Central Asia to mount military operations against
the Taliban and al Qaeda in Afghanistan.

The U.S. by the end of the year had acquired air bases at both
Karshi-Khanabad in Uzbekistan and Manas in Kyrgyzstan, only to lose
them later through inept foreign policy. The U.S.-Uzbekistan Status
of Forces Agreement (SOFA), signed Oct. 6, 2001, less than a month
after the 9-11 attacks, permitted the U.S. to station up to 1,500 U.S.

troops at the Karshi-Khanabad (K2) airbase 90 miles north of the
Afghan border. The following month, the Manas airbase was established
on Dec. 4, 2001, under the joint Kyrgyz-U.S. SOFA.

The Pentagon selected Manas above Kyrgyzstan’s other 52 airports
because its 14,000-foot runway, originally built for Soviet bombers,
could be utilized by USAF C-5 Galaxy cargo planes and 747s to support
Operation Enduring Freedom. In contrast, Russia’s Kant airbase,
12 miles outside Bishkek Kant and just 20 miles from Manas, was
established in Oct. 2003, nearly two years later, its first military
base outside the Russian Federation since the 1991 collapse of
the USSR.

In 2013, as events in Ukraine deteriorated, on Oct. 27 Russian air
force commander Viktor Sevastianov, visiting Kant to mark the 10th
anniversary of its founding, announced that the number of planes based
at Kant, then consisting of 10 Sukhoi fighters, two Mi-8 helicopters
and roughly a dozen other transport and training airplanes “will
at least double by this December.” The previous month Russia and
Kyrgyzstan signed an agreement allowing the Russian air forces
to continue operations at Kant until 2032 with possible five-year
extensions, in exchange for Moscow’s writing off $500 million in
Kyrgyz debt.

On July 29, 2005, due to Washington’s mixed diplomatic signals
straining relations over the May 2005 tragedy in Andijan, Uzbekistan,
under the terms of the SOFA Uzbekistan told the U.S. to vacate K2,
which was completed in Nov. 2005.

After the departure of U.S. forces from Uzbekistan, Manas, 400 miles
and 90-minutes flying time to Afghanistan, became the main hub for
U.S. operations in Afghanistan, processing more than 5.3 million U.S.

servicemen, 98 percent of all military personnel involved in Operation
Enduring Freedom, with 1,200 U.S. servicemen performing aerial
refueling, personnel and 42,000 cargo airlift missions, according to
Colonel John Millard, commander of the 376th Air Expeditionary Wing
and Manas base head.

But Washington’s inept policies towards Kyrgyzstan eventually soured
bilateral relations over Manas. Kyrgyz complaints included inadequate
rent, corrupt fuel contracts and environmental concerns. Things came to
a head on Dec. 6, 2006, when 20year-old U.S. soldier Zachary Hatfield
shot and killed 42 year-old Kyrgyz Aleksandr Ivanov, an ethnic Russian
Kyrgyz, at the airbase’s entry gate. Ivanov worked for Aerocraft Petrol
Management, which provided fuel services for Kyrgyz and international
civilian aircraft. Hatfield maintained that he fired in self-defense
after Ivanov approached him with a knife. Despite promises to make
Hatfield available to the Kyrgyz judicial system, the Pentagon whisked
him out of the country, greatly angering the Kyrgyz population.

In addition, Russia was offering various forms of financial assistance
and soft loans which went unmatched by Washington, deeply mired in
its dealings with corrupt President Kurmanbek Bakiyev, who in April
2010 in the face of massive demonstrations fled the country. On
Nov. 8 2011, newly elected President Almazbek Atambayev announced
that he would close Manas when its lease ran out in 2014. On June 3,
2014 American troops vacated the base and it was handed back.

Not surprisingly, in the wake of NATO’s expansion and Western protests
over Ukraine, Russia is shoring up its military and economic presence
in the post-Soviet space where possible, whether through bilateral
arrangements or multilateral organizations such as CSTO. Given
that on Oct. 10 Armenia joined the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) of
Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan, launching on Jan. 1, 2015, which is
dominated by the sheer weight of the Russian economy and Kyrgyzstan
has applied as well, it seems certain only that Western influence in
the Caucasus and Central Asia, particularly in Armenia and Kyrgyzstan
can only diminish further, even as NATO steps up its patrols around
Russia’s borders.

Dr. John C. K. Daly is a non-resident Fellow at the Johns Hopkins
Central Asia Caucasus Institute in Washington DC.

ARMENIA CONDEMNS OTTAWA ATTACKS

22:12, 23 Oct 2014

Armenia condemns the attacks in the Canadian capital.

“We condemn October 22nd terrorist attacks in Ottawa, the target of
which was the Canadian Parliament,” Spokesman for the Ministery of
Foreign Affairs of Armenia Tigran Balayan said in a statement.

“We are convinced that such actions will not undermine the
determination of the international community in the fight against
terrorism,” he said.

REPRESSION IN AZERBAIJAN: NO PRIZE FOR LEYLA YUNUS

The Economist
Oct 22 2014

LEYLA YUNUS did not win the European Parliament’s Sakharov Prize
for Freedom of Thought this year–it went to Denis Mukwege, a
Congolese gynecologist who has battled sexual violence against
women–but she was one of the three finalists. That gives me an
excuse to write about her, and to put it bluntly, she needs the
attention. Ms Yunus is one of Azerbaijan’s leading civil society
activists, known among other things for documenting the government’s
forced evacuations of Baku residents to make way for gleaming new
oil-financed real-estate developments. Since July 30 she has been
in jail, accused by prosecutors of the fanciful-sounding charge of
spying for Armenia. Her real offence appears to have been angering
the government of president Ilham Aliev.

During a visit to Brussels early this year, Mr Aliev claimed that
his country had no political prisoners. Ms Yunus and fellow activist
Rasul Jafarov responded by publishing a list of such prisoners on
the internet, which (as of its last update in early July) totaled
109 names, including one of Mr Aliev’s chief political rivals. (This
may help explain why Mr Aliev won re-election last year with 85%
of the vote, without running a campaign.) As a result of their
activities, Ms Yunus and Mr Jafarov are now eligible to be included
on their own list of political prisoners. (Mr Jafarov was arrested
on August 2.) Meanwhile, this spring, Ms Yunus launched a citizen
diplomacy initiative, inviting Azerbaijanis and Armenians to talk
about how to end their countries’ 25-year-long frozen conflict over
Nagorno-Karabakh. That initiative is the basis of the government’s
treason accusations, which international human rights organisations
term absurd. Other Azerbaijani civil society groups have faced an
intensifying crackdown in recent months.

“I think the Azerbaijan government took advantage of the world’s
attention being focused on Ukraine and on Ebola, so they decided to
cut off the last voices of civil society,” says Ms Yunus’s daughter
Dinara. Dinara, who was granted political asylum in the Netherlands
five years ago, says her mother was transferred from a regular prison
to an isolated Security Ministry detention centre on October 20. Her
father, the historian Arif Yunus, is held at the same facility, after
being arrested August 5. He has been charged with treason, as well.

Both elder Yunuses suffer from medical conditions, and Leyla Yunus
has told her lawyer of being beaten, both by prison guards and by a
cellmate. Dinara says she is unsure whether her parents are receiving
their medications in the Security Ministry prison; she has not been
able to communicate with them.

Even as it tightens the screws on the opposition and civil society,
Azerbaijan remains a member in good standing of the Council of Europe,
and indeed currently holds that group’s rotating presidency. The
Council (a 47-member advisory body with no enforcement powers, not
to be confused with the European Union) has yet to intercede on Ms
Yunus’s behalf. The European Parliament’s human rights committee,
which awards the Sakharov prize, says it will send a delegation to
Azerbaijan to meet with Ms Yunus and “support [her] in her fight for
democracy and freedom in her country.”

Mr Aliev may not take much notice of that delegation. Azerbaijan has
grown fantastically wealthy on oil revenues over the past 25 years.

The international petroleum majors who extract 80% of the country’s
oil, including BP, might carry more weight in Baku, and Ms Yunus’s
family have called on BP to pressure the government to release her.

Dinara Yunus is unsure what tactics would help get her mother released,
but she is convinced that gentle suasion will not.

“Governments like to go with silent diplomacy, but as we see, it only
makes things worse,” she says. “If someone speaks out loudly at a high
level, a president or prime minister, maybe it will change something.”

It seems worth a shot.