Author: Talar Tumanian

At least 80 Armenian captives kept off the record by Azerbaijan, warns expert

Talar Tumanian

 16:06,

YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 30, ARMENPRESS. The actual number of Armenian captives held in Azerbaijan is a lot higher than Baku has officially acknowledged, prominent lawyer and international law expert Siranush Sahakyan has said.

Azerbaijan has so far officially confirmed that it holds 55 Armenians captive. These captives are civilians, POWs, and political prisoners, Sahakyan said at a press conference on November 30.

According to Sahakyan, this figure includes 6 civilians, 41 prisoners of war and 8 high-ranking ex-politicians and ex-military officials, who are considered to be political prisoners. “But this is just the number of officialized captives,” Sahakyan said, adding that Azerbaijan is actually holding at least 80 more Armenians captive, both civilians and POWs, and hasn’t officially confirmed this.

Armenian Community Steps Up Resistance to Land Deal as Xana Gardens Intensifies Violent Takeover Efforts November 17, 2023

Talar Tumanian
     Nov 17 2023
November 17, 2023
Arda Aghazarian


With speed and determination, the Armenian community of Jerusalem has organized itself to stand up to Israeli attempts to seize historic and vital Armenian communal property.

Jerusalem Story has published several stories about the standoff between Israel and Jerusalem’s Armenian community regarding control of Armenian church property. Since that reporting earlier in November, aggressive moves by Israeli entities have forced the Armenian community to respond quickly and collectively to defend their rights. At stake is not only the rights of the Armenian community but also the very presence of the Christian community in Jerusalem. 

The Armenian property at the center of this drama is estimated to extend over 11,500 square meters, which makes up 25 percent of the Armenian Quarter of the Old City.1 Since 2021, the hotel development company Xana Gardens Ltd. has claimed that through an agreement with the Armenian Patriarchate, it now has the right to develop it.

However, over the summer, a delegation of Armenian local and international lawyers2 was finally able to obtain the contract, and they discovered a number of serious irregularities.

On November 1, 2023, the Armenian Patriarchate of Jerusalem announced that on October 26, 2023, it informed Xana Gardens Ltd. of its decision to cancel the 2021 agreement it had signed with the company regarding the property.

The Patriarchate said that an extensive legal review post-signing found that the contract had been unlawful, falsely represented, and with undue influence, and that it disregards the Patriarchate’s legal position.3 Moreover, its legal team filed a case in Israel courts to cancel the agreement on October 31, 2023.

Spiralling Out of Control

On November 5, Xana Gardens majority shareholder Danny Rothman/Rubinstein, an Australian-Jewish investor, and his deputy, Israeli Palestinian citizen George Warwar, brought in about 15 settlers armed with assault rifles and trained attack dogs to provoke, harass, and intimidate the Armenian community—as well as to create facts on the ground.

At least one person present among the settlers, an investigation by The New Arab found, is a known extremist member of the Israeli settlement movement who identifies himself as a “hilltop settlement activist,” is associated with right-wing Israeli Minister of National Security, Itamar Gen-Gvir, and had previously been placed in administrative detention by Israel in 2005.4

About a week later, Armenians were shocked to see bulldozers in the area. Because the case has not yet been decided in the courts, the company has no legal standing to do anything in the area. Yet the Xana bulldozers proceeded to demolish parts of the Armenian Quarter’s parking lot area and threatened to cause more harm.

Demolitions Underway

On Sunday, November 12, 2023, a Xana Gardens bulldozer attempted to demolish a stone wall by the Armenian parking lot. The Armenian community immediately organized themselves and set up a barricade to block access to the site.

At 7:00 a.m. the next day, two bulldozers showed up and attempted to tear down the barricade. They were confronted by community members who created a human fence, preventing the bulldozers from moving.

The community members were joined by the Patriarch, and again they erected a tent to maintain a physical presence on the site.

Substantial Escalation

Despite the valiant efforts of Armenian community members, some of the area has been bulldozed, and more settlers with heavy arms showed up.

On Wednesday, November 15, things got especially tense when around 20 Israeli police forces showed up. Although the community argued that no legal decision had been made about the property and no permits had been secured for the demolition work, the police demanded the premises be vacated and threatened that they would detain and arrest the community members. They then did in fact detain three people—one of them a minor—for answering back to them, presumably to intimidate the group; the three were soon released. The two adults were ordered to stay away from the site for 15 days.5

Hagop Djernazian, an active member of the Armenian community and a spokesperson on this issue, has noted that the Israeli police has been cooperating with the company to remove the community members and take possession of the land. In a public statement dated November 17, he described the armed people who barged into the area as “mafia” that were hired to harm and provoke the community members and priests.

Urgent Pleas

On November 16, the Armenian Patriarchate of Jerusalem released an urgent communique, saying “The Armenian Patriarchate of Jerusalem is under possibly the greatest existential threat of its 16-century history,” which “fully extends to all the Christian communities of Jerusalem.” The statement concluded, “We plead with the entirety of the Christian communities of Jerusalem to stand with the Armenian Patriarchate in these unprecedented times as this is another clear step taken toward the endangerment of the Christian presence in Jerusalem and the holy land.”6

On November 17, the Armenian National Committee issued a statement on the matter:

Armenian Patriarchate of Jerusalem

On November 18, 2023, the Patriarchs and Heads of the Churches in Jerusalem added their voice with another communique, which stated, in part:

As of this time, the community intends to guard the land with their own physical presence around the clock. Several community members made it a point to sleep on the site. Worried and exhausted, they nevertheless have found great strength in working collectively to protect the area. They have been providing tea, coffee, soups, and food—and have even been organizing leisurely activities (such as playing UNO and having informal lectures) to keep each other company during this difficult time. They have also set up an online fundraiser to gather resources for legal and organizing expenses to raise awareness about this urgent issue.

The creative and ingenious ways in which the Armenians have been organizing themselves offers a lesson in the power of collective work. Meanwhile, there is still much anxiety and deep concern about the dire consequences of losing this property: It would deny the community members access to and use of their land, eliminate their only remaining parking space inside the Old City, and even displace some residents from their homes. It would also insert a much-coveted link between West Jerusalem and the Jewish Quarter of the Old City.

Most importantly, it would eradicate the unique character of this important part of the city and erase the significant history and presence of its people.


https://www.jerusalemstory.com/en/article/armenian-community-steps-resistance-land-deal-xana-gardens-intensifies-violent-takeover

Armenpress: Armenia and India discuss energy cooperation

Talar Tumanian

 09:46, 23 November 2023

YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 23, ARMENPRESS. Minister of Territorial Administration and Infrastructures Gnel Sanosyan has spoken via videocall with India’s Minister of New and Renewable Energy Raj Kumar Singh.

Sanosyan underscored that the Armenia-India relations have been rapidly developing in the recent period, the ministry said in a readout.

Gnel Sanosyan attached importance to the fact that Armenia recently joined the International Solar Alliance and expressed hope that the relations will develop rapidly within this framework as well.

Issues related to bilateral and multilateral cooperation in the energy sector were discussed.

Minister Sanosyan attached importance to the participation of Indian companies in building, rebuilding and modernization projects of Armenian energy infrastructures.

Mutual visits of professional teams to Armenia and India for exchange of experience and capacity-building was highlighted.

As before, so now we consider Russia our friendly country– Pashinyan

Talar Tumanian

 17:45,

YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 24, ARMENPRESS.  Armenia has considered and continues to consider the Russian Federation a friendly country, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has said in response to a question from the public.

“As before, so now we consider Russia our friendly country. And in relations with friendly countries there are issues that need to be addressed. And we are guided by this logic. We hope and will do everything possible so that our relations with the Russian Federation are built on mutual respect, and respect for the interests, independence, and sovereignty of the parties," added Pashinyan.

Some issues in talks with Azerbaijan require presence of mediators, says Armenian Deputy FM

Talar Tumanian

 15:28,

YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 23, ARMENPRESS. Some issues in the talks between Armenia and Azerbaijan require the presence of mediators, Deputy Foreign Minister Mnatsakan Safaryan has said.

“We’ve numerously said that there are issues where the presence of mediators is mandatory. There are issues where the presence of mediators has a very important role,” he said when asked whether Armenia is in favor of holding talks with Azerbaijan without mediators.

Such issues include the rights of the forcibly displaced population of Nagorno-Karabakh, Safaryan said, adding that Armenia attaches importance to the presence of international mechanisms in this issue. There are other issues that require guarantees, he said.

“At this moment the issue of the rights of the forcibly displaced population is being raised by Armenia,” Safaryan said.

Armenia and Azerbaijan have agreed to hold a meeting on border delimitation on November 30.

EUROPE HAS FAILED ARMENIA by Antonia Arslan

Talar Tumanian
FIRST THINGS
Nov 21 2023

by Antonia Arslan



Iam Armenian-Italian. One morning three years ago, I woke to the news that my beloved Artsakh was under attack. I remember sucking in my breath as the words of the Italian song “Bella ciao” flooded my head: Una mattina mi son svegliato / O bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao ciao ciao / Una mattina mi son svegliato / E ho trovato l’invasor—“One morning I woke up / Oh goodbye beautiful, goodbye beautiful, goodbye beautiful, bye, bye, bye / One morning I woke up / And I found the invader.” 

I know invaders. I lived through a war as a child growing up in Veneto. I remember the sight of soldiers with machine guns, and checkpoints. I remember food rationing. I remember “Pippo,” the solo fighter plane that could drop a bomb or tin foil, could fire at us or just fly away. I remember the whistle of a bomb as it dropped from the sky. I remember the English pilot we hid and fed, and whose parachute we transformed into shirts for us girls. And I remember the darkness of those nights of the war, when we all covered our windows with thick blackout curtains. Oh, do I remember the invasor. I am old, very old.

I was a child then, and like all children considered myself immortal. I had the luxury of seeing the horrors of the invasor from afar. This does not mean that I did not know them—that I wasn’t there when my mother risked being arrested by the Nazis, or when my father and grandfather worriedly wondered if Armenians would be traded for alliances, or when they hid Jews in their clinic.

It also does not mean that I did not know what I had to do during the war. Despite what modern parents may think, children can and need to shoulder their own responsibilities. I did. I was the eldest. I knew that my parents could not protect the littler ones if they had to watch out for me too. So every night, I made sure my shirt and skirt were properly folded, and my shoes and socks were placed where I could quickly reach them if the air-raid sirens went off. I also knew what to do during an air-raid. One night my parents forgot me while they hurried with the other children to get to the bomb shelter. With the sirens howling, I quickly dressed and made my way down the staircase. When I got to the atrium, I saw my grandfather. “Are you afraid?” he asked me. “No,” I replied. “I am not either,” he said. So we sat side by side on a bench and heard the bombs drop on the city.  

I remember the joy we all felt when the Americans arrived. With them came food (chocolate and peanut butter, most importantly), protection, smiles, and laughter. It was not just a liberation. It was a sunrise: a chance to start anew. I owe Americans my life. When I was about to die from one of those terrible diseases that all wars bring, my grandfather was able to purchase the penicillin that broke the fever that caused me to lose all of my hair. 

I watched the world begin to rebuild. There were ominous signs then, signs that I have since understood are the aftermath of our terrible modern ideological wars: a referendum that all of Italy suspected had been manipulated, the private vendettas against the collaborators and allies of the invasori, the micro–civil war in central Italy that the writer Giovannino Guareschi described so well. The war was over when Italy began its massive effort to start over. Ideological warfare was not. 

The Cold War had already broken out while Adenauer, Schuman, and De Gasperi began to lay out the plans for a united Europe. We, the children of the war, rejoiced in their plans. They meant freedom: a solid future. Such was my own hope in the united Europe that I stayed in the Europa-Haus dormitory while I studied in Göttingen, and lived alongside my Spanish, French, German, and Norwegian friends. We all wore pins with the European flag.

But the ideological battle that the war had left in its wake killed our dream before it was born. The late sixties were filled with loud, angry protests, and the seventies with terrorism. Worse than the violence was the hypocrisy of those who ignored the underlying discord, who refused to address it. And now that hypocrisy has destroyed Nagorno-Karabakh.

The war that I grew up in never really ended. It has reached my beloved Artsakh, the Artsakh in which I drank Tuti oghi (mulberry vodka) under a star-filled sky near the excavations of the old city of Tigranakert, the city founded by the great Armenian king Tigran the Great. It was handed over to Azerbaijan after the 44-Day War in 2020. And now, more recently, over 100,000 Armenians have been driven from Nagorno-Karabakh after Azerbaijan launched an attack in September. 

I saw that governments would make grand statements about morality and do nothing. I saw that they would try to take advantage of the unrest in the Caucasus in order to further their own ideological agendas. I saw that it would be the people, my people, the Armenians of Artsakh, who would suffer. 

I hope the United States, who liberated us before, will remember its extraordinary generosity. Our memories of violence stretch back millennia. Centuries and centuries of wars and invasions have made hypocrites of us. 

But America is young; it can still be a beacon, an example. Rep. Chris Smith of New Jersey has introduced a bill to “prevent ethnic cleansing and atrocities against ethnic Armenians.” He recognizes that this is not a matter of “two sides” who “simply have differences,” as Matthew Miller, the U.S. State Department spokesman, claimed days after innocent Armenian civilians were bombed by Azeris. I thank Rep. Smith for his support—and, more importantly, for caring about the truth, which is so often the first casualty of war.

Antonia Arslan was a professor of modern and contemporary Italian literature at the University of Padua. She is the author of the international bestseller Skylark Farm.




OPEC Fund supports Armenia’s green, inclusive and sustainable development with €50mln loan

Talar Tumanian
ZAWYA
Nov 21 2023

The program was developed with the World Bank, which has provided a parallel loan of €92.3 million (US$100 million equivalent) for its implementation

Press Release

ARMENIA

The OPEC Fund for International Development (The OPEC Fund) is supporting green, inclusive and sustainable development in Armenia with a €50 million loan through its program lending instrument.

This program aims to support the government’s developmental efforts to foster climate change mitigation and adaptation, improve environmental management and energy efficiency, enhance equity, promote human capital development and strengthen governance. The program was developed with the World Bank, which has provided a parallel loan of €92.3 million (US$100 million equivalent) for its implementation.

OPEC Fund Director-General Dr. Abdulhamid Alkhalifa said: “We are pleased to partner with the government of Armenia and the World Bank to support this ambitious program, investing in the development of human capital and improving climate change resilience. The program will support Armenia’s long-term development ambitions and national plans, while helping it to achieve multiple Sustainable Development Goals.”

Armenia’s Green Inclusive and Sustainable Development Program is in line with the government’s five-year development plan (2021-2026) and includes fundamental steps such as a reform of the public investment management framework, a review of the justice system and relevant environmental legislation, an overhaul of the social assistance system and a modernization of the national curriculum strengthening Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM).

-Ends-

About the OPEC Fund

The OPEC Fund for International Development (the OPEC Fund) is the only globally mandated development institution that provides financing from member countries to non-member countries exclusively. The organization works in cooperation with developing country partners and the international development community to stimulate economic growth and social progress in low- and middle-income countries around the world. The OPEC Fund was established in 1976 with a distinct purpose: to drive development, strengthen communities and empower people. Our work is people-centered, focusing on financing projects that meet essential needs, such as food, energy, infrastructure, employment (particularly relating to MSMEs), clean water and sanitation, healthcare and education. To date, the OPEC Fund has committed more than US$24 billion to development projects in over 125 countries with an estimated total project cost of US$190 billion. The OPEC Fund is rated AA+/Outlook Stable by Fitch and AA, Outlook Positive by S&P. Our vision is a world where sustainable development is a reality for all.

https://www.zawya.com/en/press-release/companies-news/opec-fund-supports-armenias-green-inclusive-and-sustainable-development-with-50mln-loan-dq1e4g70

The Resurrection of a Conflict: Analyzing the Nagorno-Karabakh Situation

Talar Tumanian
Nov 9 2023



By:Nikita Triandafillidis

Date:

November 9, 2023

Two months ago, Azerbaijan attacked Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh, violating the 2020 ceasefire agreement. Analysts and witnesses alerted the world about a potential second Armenian genocide, disguised as anti-terror operations by Azerbaijani forces.

The world leaders and international institutions expressed their usual default statements, calling for de-escalation of the conflict, protection of human rights, and how they monitor the situation with great concern. A month later the world forgot about the thousands of ethnic Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh, who under a new hostage agreement that they signed with the Azerbaijani side, will see the Republic of Artsakh, as it’s known among Armenians, dissolved and erased by January 1st, 2024.

It is important to shed light on the situation in the region, a region that has been in turmoil for decades. To uncover the truth behind Azerbaijan’s victory and shifting geopolitical tensions, it is essential to analyze the history, conflicts, and recent attacks on Armenians over the past three years.

An endless bloodshed

The enclave in southwestern Azerbaijan, surrounded by Azerbaijan’s recognized territory, has been the subject of numerous controversies for a long time. The Republic of Artsakh has always been at the center of violence since the early 19th century when tensions between Christian Armenians and Muslim Azerbaijanis were a daily phenomenon. However, tensions eased when the Soviet Union took control of the area, establishing an ethnic population of Armenians inside the territory of Azerbaijan.

The Soviet system of control, together with their promotion of an international proletarian spirit that ignored religion, seemed to have been efficient enough to stop any ongoing bloodshed. However, tensions were resurrected again in the 80s, when the grip of the Soviet Union on the region was loosening. Without Soviet control, the region became a field of human loss and tragedy as tens of thousands of people from both sides lost their lives. From 1988, until the peace treaty agreement in 1994, this mountainous region in Azerbaijan had experienced, firsthand, the bloody aftermath of the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Almost three decades later, the conflict restarted in 2020, with both sides accusing each other of attacking first. After weeks of fighting, the Russian Federation negotiated a peace treaty between the two sides by establishing Russian peacekeepers to monitor the area. In addition, the Lachin corridor was to be established and controlled by the Russians, to ensure the safety of a passage between Armenia and the disputed area in Nagorno-Karabakh.

Three years later, in September 2023, Azerbaijan launched a supposed anti-terror operation, aiming to disarm and neutralize any Armenian military presence in the area. Almost 200 people lost their lives. In the following days, Azerbaijan had complete control of the region. With the fall of the Republic of Artsakh, thousands of ethnic Armenians fled to Armenia, warning the international community that a second Armenian genocide would be underway.

The total control of Nagorno-Karabakh by the Azerbaijanis and their crimes against the Armenians has been purposely ignored by the majority of the world. What’s interesting are the factors and political games that have allowed Azerbaijan to act this way, persecuting Christian Armenians and ignoring international rules of combat. Azerbaijan, an artificially made state, created by the Soviet Union, has risen in the political arena. Analyzing their success and the failures of Armenia is critical to have a clearer view of the rapidly shifted geopolitical outlook of the area.

The Failures of Nikol Pashinyan: The Shift Toward the West

Since 2018, Nikol Pashinyan has emerged as the leading figure for the nation of Armenia. For years, he has been advocating for closer ties with Moscow, a logical approach since Moscow has been a close ally of Yerevan. However, for the last couple of years, Pashinyan has lured Armenia to make the same mistakes that the country of Georgia had made years ago. Turn to the West for help. By implying that Russia is incapable of being a security guarantor for the region, Pashinyan condemned the Armenians of Nagorno Karabakh to flee their homeland and become persecuted refugees. In a matter of a few years, Pashinyan managed to bring the relations between Russia and Armenia to a cold level, foolishly believing that the shift towards the West would be beneficial for his country.

Ignoring the common security concerns between the two states and choosing to consult the West for help, while at the same time pointing the finger at Russia, show the incapabilities of Pashinyan to lead his country. Inviting U.S. soldiers to stage joint drills with Armenian soldiers and withdrawing its representative from the CSTO military bloc, would have never achieved anything positive for Armenia. However, short on options to save his political position, Pashinyan gambled that the West would back him up after witnessing his anti-Russia rhetoric. On the contrary, his actions only managed to waste precious time in peacefully resolving the conflict and ensuring the safety of the ethnic Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh.

Pashinyan’s visits to Prague and Brussels months before the resurrection of the conflict proved to be wasteful and harmful. By choosing to follow newly agreed declarations of the past, Pashinyan completely ignored several trilateral agreements that have been in place since 2020. For example, the deployment of a CSTO observer mission to areas bordering Azerbaijan was not brought into existence, simply because they were never signed in the first place by the Armenian leadership.

The implementation of the trilateral agreements of 2020 between Russia, Azerbaijan, and Armenia, were completely stalled because of this Armenian shift towards the West. By acknowledging the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan but at the same time choosing not to address and guarantee the safety of the Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh, Nikol Pashinyan showed the world how little he and his pro-western government cared for an actual ceasefire and a resolution guaranteeing the safety of Armenians in the area.

Today, after the one-day war defeat of the ethnic Armenians, Pashinyan is mostly focused on his internal government failures and the major protests that are being formed all over Armenia. Even now Pashinyan continues to use Western rhetoric regarding the protests, labeling them as Russian-led groups, seeking to disturb peace. However, no matter how much he wants to portray these reactions against his failures as Russian-backed “color revolutions”, his accusations have no basis in reality. What matters is that in reality, thousands of people lost their homes, their lives, and in a way their own identities, by relying on a man who had no desires other than saving his political image and position of authority over Armenia.

Azerbaijan’s Political Maneuvers: The Hidden Hand of Israel

Over the last few years, Azerbaijan has been benefiting from its close alliance with Israel. For someone who might not be involved in the geopolitics of the Caucasus area, this alliance might seem very random. However, both states have been benefiting from each other, and with the current victory of Azerbaijan, and the ongoing war of Israel against Hamas, this alliance might grow even stronger. Israel has enjoyed the imports of oil from Azerbaijan and in return, Azerbaijan has received much-needed weaponry. Weapons and military technology that were critical to their victory in Nagorno-Karabakh.

It has been reported that at least 60% of Azerbaijan’s weapons purchases came directly from Israel. Tactical and intelligence drones in particular, that provided an advantage over the mountainous region of Nagorno-Karabakh, were critical in the victory of Azerbaijan. By supplying weapons to Azerbaijan, Israel managed to get access to a steady oil supply and be within proximity of its archenemy, Iran. This discreet alliance between Baku and Tel Aviv has allowed Israeli forces valuable access to Azeri infrastructure and airfields. Reports from within the country show Mossad agents operating near the borders with Iran. It is speculated that the border region between Azerbaijan and Iran is a vital area for the ongoing spy network of Israel against Iranian forces.

Antagonizing Iran is the main driving force behind this alliance. However, supporting Azerbaijan against Armenia has also various economic results for Israel. Thousands of Armenians have fled their lands, leaving behind the vast lands needed for development. Azerbaijan has announced the promotion of lucrative investments in the stolen lands of what was once been the Republic of Artsakh. As a result, this has attracted the attention of Israeli companies that cannot wait to get their hands on these investment opportunities. These investments are mostly focused on the renewable energy, health, and agriculture sectors.

The Role of The Big Players

A war between two states affects not only the nations fighting but also a plethora of various states seeking to benefit by siding and supporting the right side. One such nation is Erdogan’s Turkey. Since the resurrection of this conflict back in 2020, Turkey has been a close ally of Azerbaijan, providing it with weapons, resources, and valuable political security against Armenia. The unconditional support of Turkey towards Azerbaijan brought numerous benefits to Turkey. Primarily, it guaranteed a steady flow of oil towards it, which allowed Turkey to diversify from its energy dependency on Russia. In addition, apart from its energy security concerns covered, Turkey can also benefit economically from Azerbaijan’s win. With the war over and the Nagorno-Karabakh area cleared of ethnic Armenians, Azerbaijan can focus on building valuable infrastructure in the area, focusing on creating a road towards its exclave Nakhchivan, which can be a significant economic boost for trading between both nations.

Apart from Turkey, the U.S., E.U., and Israel can be more than happy to see Azerbaijan dominate in the area, as that means that Azerbaijan can potentially replace Russia as a reliable energy partner. Of course, the support of the U.S and the E.U countries towards Azerbaijan has been labeled as hypocritical as we listen every day on the news platforms how they denounce violence and worry about the protection of human rights, yet they purposefully ignore the crimes that Azerbaijan has committed.

How else could someone describe their behavior if not hypocritical, when they have allowed Azerbaijan to desecrate one of the world’s oldest Christian communities? There have already been reports about the destruction of Christian monuments and churches. This systematic destruction of cultural heritage will only get worse, as thousands of Armenians flee from the area fearing for their lives. Not to mention the numerous acts of barbarity committed by the Azerbaijani forces. Torture, beheadings, and executions of Armenian soldiers, the use of cluster and phosphorus munitions against civilians, psychological and physical violence against women and children, and many more horrific actions committed by the armed forces of Azerbaijan. Yet, we see no condemnation from the West, we do see however leaders praising Azerbaijan as a strategic energy partner, sacrificing every inch of integrity left in them just to go against Russia in the hopes of weakening the country.

Lastly, a state that was mentioned already a few times in this conflict is Russia. The Russian Federation has been the de facto political actor in the area and the conflict. Unlike other countries that seek to choose a side, Russia has been trying to achieve a balance between both fighting sides, as it is vital for it to remain as neutral as possible, hoping to bring stability to the area. Russia has deep historical ties with Armenia due to a common religion and common strategic ambitions. However, Russia needs to treat Azerbaijan with the same mutual respect, as it risks losing its sphere of influence in the Caucasus to Turkey and the West.

While some would suggest that the defeat of Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh could pose a setback for Russia, they will be undeniably mistaken. With the defeat of Armenia, the noose is getting tighter on Nikol Pashinyan and his pro-western government. Massive protests erupted in Yerevan and other major cities in Armenia, calling for the resignation of Pashinyan and dissolution of the government. Something like that could only benefit Moscow, as a shift towards a pro-Russian stance in the internal affairs of Armenia will guarantee Russia’s grip on the region.

No matter who gains more from Azerbaijan’s victory, one thing is for certain. Thousands of people lost their lives and homes over the past three years. Thousands of people found themselves as refugees in their land. They have been witnesses to the barbarity of Azerbaijan’s forces and their hatred towards Christianity. They have seen the international community failing them and close allies turning their backs on them. In the end, another proxy war has ended, with all the different players involved gaining different things. Cruelty and barbarism from the Azerbaijani side have masqueraded as a just war, while ignorance from the West has been labeled as a strategic partnership. Three years later, peace has been labeled as a massive exodus for the Armenian people and the destruction of the Christian community.

https://moderndiplomacy.eu/2023/11/09/the-resurrection-of-a-conflict-analyzing-the-nagorno-karabakh-situation/

AW: A plea to all Armenians to think about the genocide of the Palestinians

Talar Tumanian
November 8, 2023 Tamar Shirinian Op-Eds 0

A horrifying scene. A man rides his bicycle along the al-Rashid coast in Gaza. He cries out in grief and horror – ya Allah – as his phone records a moving image of dead women and children, in pools of blood, left lying amongst their few earthly possessions in suitcases, broken and littered along the road like their bodies. As the Israeli government told residents of Northern Gaza to relocate to the South, some heeded the call in hopes that they might find safety there. They did not make it, killed by Israeli forces on the road.

I watched this scene on X, formerly Twitter, on the evening of November 3. I couldn’t breathe. I felt like I couldn’t quite exist. The world broke; it was not possible to be a human in a reality of such profound inhumanity. I sat crying, sobbing, the image continuously replaying. I did not want to watch it anymore. I could no longer bear it, hearing the cry ya Allah, but I felt paralyzed, unable to turn it off.

My reaction was only partially attributable to the video’s own objective display of horror. This could not entirely be the explanation, because since October 7, I have seen images of dead children pulled out of rubble and placed in a line waiting for burial; children who were alive and yet looked somewhere closer to death, whitened with the dust of their home that had just been bombed by Israel all around them; children in shock, unable to cry, unable to speak; children running after the caskets of their fathers, begging them not to leave; children wanting their mothers, but whose mothers could not be found or who had been found dead; mothers burying their children; mothers, fathers, aunts, uncles and grandparents wailing at the loss – their personal loss, their collective loss. While I have cried, while I have sobbed, while I have lived in rage for the last month that such an atrocity is taking place, something else happened to me in that moment. 

Protesters hold Palestinian flags and a banner reading, “Stop the Genocide. Free Palestine.” (Wikimedia)

The scene – bodies strewn, a cry of shock and disbelief, the display of humans outside of the space of humanity, as if there is no such thing as a humanity any longer – pulled out of me, out of my unconscious perhaps, scenes I never witnessed but read about. Scenes that I have only read in words and that have produced pictures in my head. I realized at that moment that the video – the documentation of this unfolding reality – was exactly how I had produced moving images of scenes of horror of the Armenian aghed, the catastrophe. Amid the daily images we are seeing of the horror caused by Israel in Gaza as well as in the West Bank and Jerusalem, that scene was what philosopher Roland Barthes called “the punctum,” that one part of the whole image that stings, that takes you somewhere else, that touches you in particular. The history of the aghed was no longer history, no longer in the past. It was happening right now, and I was witness to it.

What has been unfolding in Gaza is the ansahmaneli (infinite, limitless) suffering that Zabel Yessayan wrote about in Among the Ruins. Let us revisit Yessayan’s writing.

“The destroyed city stretches out under the generous and dazzling sun like an endless cemetery. Nothing but ruins on every side…Nothing has been spared. All the churches, all the schools and all the dwellings have been trans-formed into heaps of charred and deformed stones, among which rises here and there the carcass of an apartment building. From the west to the east, from the north to the south, all the way to the distant Turkish quarters, cruel and implacable hatred has burnt everything, devastated everything.”

In these words, how can one not see the rubble, the ruins of churches, hospitals, schools, homes and refugee camps, that Israel has made of Gaza in just a few weeks? In these words, how can one not see the red skies of constant explosions as bombs are dropped all across the land? In these words, how can one not see the skeletal remains of apartment buildings collapsed, sometimes on their sides, sometimes as if inside out, sometimes in the midst of scenes of people desperately digging to find the dead and, by summoning up all superhuman hope, the surviving? “Are you taking me to the cemetery?” asks a young girl as she is pulled out of rubble. “No, my darling, you are living and beautiful like the moon,” responds a man carrying her out. While there is celebration of having saved one, all those involved know quite well that there is no safety anywhere, for any of them.

Every Armenian who has been watching the mass deportation – the ethnic cleansing – of Armenians from Artsakh in devastation, in horror and in rage should be called to this cause as their own cause. The genocide – the senseless catastrophe – that Israel is doing to Palestinians today is a part of the Armenian cause.

More words from Yessayan:

“When I saw for the first time these pale orphans with their haggard appearances, gathered together by the hundreds, I was unable – despite superhuman efforts – to grasp the totality of their misfortune, and still today I cannot. Particular details and images come to mind, certainly, but never have I been able to take account of the infinite (ansahmaneli), bloody history that each of these children represents. For a long time I was incapable of attending to any one of them in particular. I heard a confused, uncertain, indefinite (ansahmaneli) tragic ululation, expressed by the totality of these still childish, still distracted gazes that had not yet understood what had happened. This bloodbath, this stream of spilled blood, this despair of a humanity driven mad, caught between fire and blade, all this remained beyond my imagination, and I believe this was the case for everyone involved.”

In these words, how can we not see the ungraspable, a violence without any sense or possibility of sense, a violence without mourning and possibility of mourning, that is unfolding right now, every day? Surely, we can see the reality beyond imagination that Yessayan writes about in the fact that 825 families from Gaza have now been erased from the civil registry. That doctors now have a new acronym, one that became necessary in the practical work they have been trying to do in Gaza: WCNSF – Wounded Child No Surviving Family.  

I write this not to navel-gaze, not as an exercise in exploring my own feelings. I write this as a plea. Every Armenian, whose sense of history and identity has been shaped in one way or another by the mass slaughter that took place in the hands of the Ottoman Empire at the end of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth centuries, should be called to this cause as their own cause. Every Armenian who has been watching the mass deportation – the ethnic cleansing – of Armenians from Artsakh in devastation, in horror and in rage should be called to this cause as their own cause. The genocide – the senseless catastrophe – that Israel is doing to Palestinians today is a part of the Armenian cause. To speak about this and to act against this in any way we can is our responsibility as survivors. 

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Tamar Shirinian is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. Her work explores nationalism, gender and sexuality.


Speaker Alen Simonyan, German legislator Michael Roth discuss need for sanctions against Azerbaijan

Talar Tumanian

 13:56,

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 23, ARMENPRESS. Speaker of Parliament Alen Simonyan met on Monday with German lawmaker, Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Bundestag (German parliament) Michael Roth.

Simonyan and Roth attached importance to the sustainable development of the bilateral friendly relations and strengthening of interparliamentary cooperation, the parliament’s press service said in a readout.

The depopulation of Nagorno-Karabakh and its aftermath resulting from the Azeri policy of ethnic cleansing was also discussed. The German lawmaker said that they did not take sufficient steps to prevent the Azerbaijani aggression against the population of Nagorno-Karabakh.

On behalf of the Armenian parliament, Speaker Simonyan expressed gratitude for the principled and targeted speech regarding the war unleashed by Azerbaijan made during the September 21 UNSC meeting on Nagorno-Karabakh.

The Speaker and the German parliamentarian discussed the need for possible sanctions against Azerbaijan. Speaker Simonyan reiterated that Armenia has adopted an agenda of peace and is proposing a roadmap of regional peace.