Category: 2019

The following information was released by the International Committee of the Red Cross:

In Armenia, the ICRC focuses on providing civilians living along the international border, missing persons and their families, mine victims and people deprived of their liberty with assistance. In addition, we promote the dissemination and implementation of the International Humanitarian Law (IHL) among national authorities, academics, students and military personnel. Our key partner in Armenia is the Armenian Red Cross Society (ARCS) with whom we coordinate activities aimed at helping people affected by the conflict.

In 2018, we continued helping the most vulnerable households in communities located along the international border between Armenia and Azerbaijan, where the socio-economic situation is particularly challenging. As a result, 145 families in Dovegh and Aygepar villages of Tavush region received financial assistance to start small-scale businesses. Additionally, we provided multipurpose cash assistance to 50 extremely vulnerable families who were unable to manage business activities because of their age, health condition or other circumstances.

We supported the border villages of Sarigyugh, Baghanis, Koti and Aygepar through construction of a pumping station and a water intake, installation of plastic reservoirs, water meters, public taps, pipelines, concrete manholes and other technical components.

3300 people gained better access to water.

In the Soviet times, Sarigyugh received its drinking and irrigation water from a reservoir in neighboring Berkaber. As a result of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, water supply networks in the village were badly damaged and the residents were left without this critical resource for about 20 years. We constructed water intake and pumping station, installed public taps and water collecting tanks. 800 residents of Sarigyugh have got a better access to water. CC BY-NC-ND/ICRC/Arshaluys Barseghyan

We also continued to construct safer spaces, wall in exposed windows, and build protective walls for kindergartens, schools and other public buildings, part of which were done thanks to a partnership with the ARCS and the German Red Cross.

1335 people enhanced their safety and benefited from reduced exposure to conflict-related hazards.

Nearly 25 years of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, border schools in Armenia and Azerbaijan still feel the need to keep their children secure. CC BY-NC-ND/ICRC/Gohar Ter-Hakobyan

Along with instructors of the ARCS, we organized first-aid courses, provided life-saving skills and first-aid boxes to around 200 members of civil protection rescue teams of the Ministry of Emergency Situations.

We continued to collect biological reference samples in the form of buccal swabs from blood relatives of those who had gone missing in connection with the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. Until now, in Armenia, we have collected samples from 1,122 blood relatives of 344 missing persons.

In 2018, over 320 mine victims and members of their families improved their living conditions through our supported micro-economic initiatives, the house repair programme and unconditional cash grants.

In November, the Government of Armenia approved a bill enabling Armenian and foreign detainees without possibility of short family visits to contact their families via a video-call service. We supported the implementation of a video-call service pilot project as well as donated computers and IT accessories to penitentiaries across the country.

3000 detainees were visited for monitoring of their treatment and conditions and supported to maintain family contact.

We introduced the rules of IHL to members of the Armenian Armed Forces, trained and briefed around 390 military instructors, commanders and deputy commanders of border units as well as troops departing for peace support missions abroad. In addition, we ran four sessions on the ICRC mandate and IHL basics to troops stationed along the international border in Tavush region.

In 2018, we expanded the scope of our national-level summer course on IHL and launched the first Regional Summer School. We also organized the national moot court competition and supported the 11th edition of the IHL International Conference for Young Researchers in Yerevan, thus engaging students, experts and practitioners from Armenia and across the world.

For more information please read our overview of activities and facts and figures in 2018.

[Armenian News note: The below is translated from Azeri]

The defence minister in Baku has praised his country’s army and said it is capable of defeating Azerbaijan’s archfoe Armenia.

Zakir Hasanov made the remarks in an interview with the “Pulse of the day” (“Gunun nabzi”) programme on state-owned AzTV television channel. The interview, which appears to have been pre-recorded, aired on 3 April.

Throughout the interview, which lasted 42 minutes, Hasanov praised the military, political, and economic policies of and reforms by Ilham Aliyev, the president of the country and commander-in-chief of Azerbaijan’s Armed Forces.

Azerbaijan vs Armenia

Asked to comment on the phrase “new war in exchange for new territories”, uttered by Armenia’s defence minister regarding the Karabakh territorial conflict between the two countries, Hasanov said the remark was only meant for domestic consumption in Armenia. He said Armenia was “not in a position to attack” Azerbaijan because its economy and army were not good enough. He added that Azerbaijan would defeat Armenia if the latter attacked it.

Hasanov commented on the April 2016 fighting, in which Azerbaijan reclaimed some of its land held by ethnic Armenian troops. He said Azerbaijan’s economy and therefore its army got stronger “by the day” and that the president’s army reforms resulted in a “crushing blow” dealt to the Armenians. He said the results for the Armenians were “catastrophic” as “20 per cent of the Azerbaijani army” defeated the Armenian army within three or four days. He also praised the patriotism that he said Azerbaijani army officers and civilians demonstrated during the April fighting.

Army is taken care of

Hasanov said the president took care of the army, and rejected accusations that conditions in which army soldiers lived were bad. He said Azerbaijan completely met the demand of the army with weapons and that it was prepared to start fighting at any moment. He said more than 1,000 different kinds of weapons and munitions were produced in Azerbaijan.

Hasanov said personnel policy was one of the priorities in the army reform which he said covered soldiers’ trainings at different training centres, military schools, their education abroad and exchange of expertise. He said Azerbaijan learnt from the combat experience of foreign countries that conducted military operations, such as Turkey, and that Azerbaijani military specialists studied in military schools in more than 10 “leading countries”. “Most of our personnel-related issues have been resolved now,” he said.

He praised the fact that there was “strong public monitoring of the army”. He said “wonderful cantonments” had been built for soldiers, and that 90 per cent of military bases would be rebuilt by the end of the year and 100 per cent in the next couple of years. He said the cabinet, the president and different monitoring organisations monitored the spending of “the big amount of money” allocated to the army. “Today, the Azerbaijani state, the Azerbaijani people have created [good] conditions for their army that… probably the world’s leading states do not have,” he said, adding that he could say so based on what he had seen in other CIS counties and NATO countries. He also cited unnamed “military attaches of leading countries” as telling him that their countries did not have military bases like those in Azerbaijan. “The conditions created for Azerbaijani soldiers are at a high level,” he said, adding that very few other states provided free flats to officers with a perfect army service record. He said more than 1,000 soldiers had received free flats from the state since 1992 and that this was one of the priorities in the president’s army reform. “The Azerbaijani army’s fighting efficiency being high today is a result of the reforms in the Azerbaijan army,” he said.

International involvement

Hasanov also spoke about Azerbaijan’s international military exercises. He said there were plans to conduct joint drills with “fraternal Turkey” and “fraternal Pakistan”. He praised the performance of Azerbaijan’s Air Defence in a recent exercise in which it was “attacked” by Turkey’s Air Force.

He said there were “bilateral and trilateral plans” to protect Azerbaijan’s energy pipelines that ran through Georgia. He added that Baku used Nato’s experience to improve its army and that Azerbaijan participated in different Nato programmes that he said contributed to his country’s army’s combat readiness.

Hasanov added that Azerbaijan was a peace-loving country and its combat readiness was high. He said because the Azerbaijani army was so strong the UN had asked Baku to provide more military officers for international peacekeeping operations. “Azerbaijan is on the right path and we will make a contribution to peace in the future as well,” Hasanov concluded.