Category: 2020

Azerbaijani Press: ECHR’s Judgement Upon Armenian Intelligence Serviceman’s Death Prompts Reaction In Baku

Markos Nalchajian
Caspian News, Azerbaijan
Feb 13 2020

By Mushvig Mehdiyev

Leyla Abdullayeva, Spokesperson to the Foreign Ministry of Azerbaijan / Report.Az

Tensions between Armenia and Azerbaijan simmered again this week as foreign ministries of the two countries exchanged remarks on a judgment of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) upon the death of an Armenian intelligence serviceman in Azerbaijan in 2010.

The ECHR held in a Chamber judgment on January 30 that the authorities in Baku are responsible for the death of an Armenian intelligence serviceman in military police detention in Azerbaijan in 2010 as it is insisted in “Saribekyan and Balayan vs Azerbaijan” case launched by the parents of the deceased. Reactions from Baku and Yerevan to the court ruling were quite contradictory. 

Armenia’s foreign ministry interpreted the court ruling as an evidence of the violation of human rights by Azerbaijan. The foreign ministry in Baku, however, said the decision of ECHR is not unanimous and final, and that it is looking into the right of appealing the document to the court’s Grand Chamber.

“Azerbaijan has the right to appeal this decision to the Grand Chamber of the Court within three months,’’ Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry’s Spokesperson, Leyla Abdullayeva said in a written statement issued on Tuesday.

‘‘We are currently conducting appropriate investigations in this regard. I would like to emphasize that the ECHR's decision was not unanimous.”

“The statement of the Armenian Foreign Ministry contradicts the idea of preparing the two countries for peace, which was accepted in joint statements personally by the foreign minister of this country and exposes the true intentions of the Armenian leadership.”

The “Saribekyan and Balayan vs Azerbaijan” case came up following the application of Mamikon Saribekyan and Siranush Balyan, parents of the Armenian intelligence serviceman Manvel Saribekyan, who was captured and died in Azerbaijan. 

Saribekyan was detained by the Azerbaijani military during an operation against an Armenian sabotage group in the north-west of the Armenian-Azerbaijani line of contact on September 11, 2010. When captured, he carried several intelligence items with him. According to initial observations, he was part of a group that attempted to cross the line of contact and blow up a school in Azerbaijan.

While in detention at a military police station in Baku, Saribekyan committed suicide on October 5, 2010 and the Baku Military Prosecutor’s Office launched a criminal investigation, which revealed that he hanged himself in a cell where he was kept. Despite a forensic report that was made and issued under the surveillance of the representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross in Baku, the Prosecutor General in Armenia insisted that Saribekyan was killed. But, the final outcomes of the investigation in Azerbaijan proved in January 2011 that Saribekyan had committed suicide and had been held in proper conditions with no assault on him.

Leyla Abdullayeva said torture and killing are what Azerbaijani nationals suffered from the hands of the Armenian military since the very start of anti-Azerbaijan sentiments in Armenia in the late 1980s and after the occupation of Azerbaijani territories in the early 1990s.  

“The policy of ethnic cleansing against Azerbaijanis living in the territory of present-day Armenia was further aggravated in the late 1980s and forced expulsion reached its climax with the deportation of Azerbaijanis from the Gafan region in 1988-89,” she said.

“With the military occupation of Nagorno-Karabakh and seven surrounding regions of Azerbaijan, Armenia carried out bloody ethnic cleansing against the local Azerbaijani population of the region, resulting in hundreds of thousands of Azerbaijanis being displaced,” Abdullayeva said, adding 613 Azerbaijani civilians were massacred by Armenians in just one night in Khojaly on February 26, 1992.

The Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding districts of Azerbaijan are currently under Armenia’s occupation as a result of the full-scale war in 1991-1994. The bloody war launched by Armenia following the collapse of the Soviet Union has also killed 30,000 ethnic Azerbaijanis and displaced one million.

Meanwhile, Abdullayeva recalled the ECHR decision on “Chiragov and others vs Armenia” case in 2015, saying Armenia's responsibility has been re-established in that ruling, and the existence of an illegal formation in Azerbaijan’s occupied territories through the military, political, financial and other support of Armenia is confirmed. 

The “Chiragov and others vs Armenia” case was put forward by six Azerbaijani nationals from the occupied Lachin region of Azerbaijan in 2005. They insisted that they were forcibly displaced from their houses in Lachin after the region’s occupation in May 1992 and Armenia did not allow them to return back. ECHR justified their appeal in June 2015.

Syria parliament recognizes 1915-1917 Armenian genocide as tensions with Turkey surge

Vatche Chakhmakhchian
The Japan Times
Feb 13 2020
This file photo released by the Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute purportedly shows soldiers standing over skulls of victims from the Armenian village of Sheyxalan in the Mush valley, on the Caucasus front during the First World War. Syria's parliament Thursday recognized the 1915-1917 murder of up to 1.5 million Armenians as genocide, as tensions run high with Turkey after deadly clashes in northwest Syria. | AFP-JIJI

AFP-JIJI

  • Feb 14, 2020
  •         

DAMASCUS – Syria’s parliament on Thursday recognized the 1915-1917 killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians as genocide, as tensions run high with Turkey after deadly clashes in northwest Syria.

“The parliament … condemns and recognizes the genocide committed against the Armenians by the Ottoman state at the start of the twentieth century,” the legislature said in a statement.

The Armenians seek international recognition that the mass killings of their people under the Ottoman Empire from 1915 to 1917 amounted to genocide. They say 1.5 million died.

Turkey strongly rejects the accusation and says both Armenians and Turks died as a result of World War I. It puts the death toll in the hundreds of thousands.

The Syrian parliament’s latest move comes after weeks of tensions between Ankara and Damascus over deadly clashes between their forces in northwest Syria that Ankara says has killed 14 of its soldiers.

Russia-backed Syrian government forces have since December upped their deadly bombardment of the last major bastion of opposition in northwest Syria, where Ankara supports the rebels and has deployed troops.

The offensive on the jihadist-dominated bastion of Idlib has also forced 700,000 people from their homes toward the closed Turkish border, the United Nations says.

Turkey, which already hosts more than 3 million refugees, fears a massive fresh influx from Syria and has kept its border closed to newly displaced people in Idlib.

It has sent reinforcements to the war-torn-country in recent weeks, a move that Damascus says serves to protect rebels and halt its Idlib advance.

“We are currently living through a Turkish aggression that relies on the same hateful Ottoman thinking” as “the crimes carried out by Erdogan’s forefathers against the Armenian people,” Parliament Speaker Hammouda Sabbagh said.

Beyond Idlib, Turkey and its proxies have conducted three operations in Syria against both the Islamic State group and Kurdish fighters it views as “terrorists.

After the last incursion, Turkey set up a “safe zone” in a 120-km (70-mile) long strip inside Syrian territory along its southern border.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Wednesday threatened to strike Syrian government forces “everywhere” if its soldiers come under renewed attack.

Damascus hit back that he was “disconnected from reality.”

Clashes between Armenians and Turks had already started at the end of the 19th century, costing between 100,000 and 300,000 Armenian lives between 1895 and 1896, according to Armenian sources.

That came as growing nationalist sentiments in the Balkans and elsewhere threatened Ottoman authority, particularly since Greek independence in 1830.

Turkey says the Armenians collaborated with the Russian enemy during World War I, and accuses them of killing tens of thousands of Turks.

In 1915, thousands of Armenians suspected of being hostile to Ottoman rule were rounded up and a special law a month later authorized deportations “for reasons of internal security.”

Many Armenians were forced into exile in the Syrian desert and a large number were killed, either on the way to detention camps or after they arrived.

Some were burned to death, others were drowned, poisoned or died from disease, according to foreign diplomats and intelligence services at the time.

The eastern Syrian region of Deir Ezzor lies on the desert route taken by thousands of Armenians during their forced exile by the Ottoman empire.

A genocide memorial in the area contained some of the remains of the victims and served as a pilgrimage site for Syria’s Armenians before it was bombed by jihadis in 2014.

In 2010, then-Armenian President Serzh Sarkisian visited the site, which also served as a church, and said it was to Armenians what Auschwitz is to the Jews.

Turkey’s defeat in the First World War led to the creation of an independent Armenian state in 1918.

Before the start of Syria’s civil war in 2011 with the repression of anti-government protests, the country counted tens of thousands of Armenians.

Second city Aleppo was once home to the largest contingent: 150,000 out of 350,000 Syrian Armenians, according to Syria specialist Fabrice Balanche.

But when the government recaptured Aleppo from rebels in late 2016, just 10,000 were left there. Thousands had fled to Armenia, neighboring Lebanon or even farther afield to the United States, Canada, and Europe.

Parliaments in nearly 30 countries have passed laws, resolutions or motions recognising the Armenian genocide.

The U.S. Congress in December recognized the mass killings as genocide, angering Turkey. President Donald Trump’s administration said it did not agree.


Armenia-UAE friendship group members with ambassador Isa al-Zaabi discuss cooperation prospects

Hambik Zargarian
Arminfo, Armenia
Feb 13 2020

ArmInfo.The members of the Armenia-UAE friendship group met with the UAE Ambassador to Armenia Mohammed Isa al-Zaabi. This was reported by the press service of the parliament.

According to the source, the head of the friendship group Narek  Zeynalyan noted that regular business forums, bilateral tourism,  flights, the presence of almost six thousandth Armenian community in  the UAE, etc., testify to the relations formed between the two  countries.

Zeynalyan noted with satisfaction that about 20 enterprises operate  with the participation of Arab capital in Armenia. He assured that in  the post-revolutionary period a favorable investment environment was  formed in Armenia.

Ambassador Mohammed Isa al-Zaabi described the bilateral relations as  excellent and noted that his country recognizes the importance of  cooperation with Armenia, in particular, in the cultural,  educational, humanitarian fields, as well as in the field of latest  technologies. He said that the Emirates are interested in the  activities of the creative center "TUMO" and would like to create  such a center in their country.  Turning to the growing tourism year  after year, the ambassador noted that Armenia is a safe country and  his compatriots visit the whole family with Armenia. N. Zeynalyan  informed the ambassador that more than 11 thousand tourists from the  UAE visited Armenia last year.

The interlocutors also discussed issues of cooperation at  inter-parliamentary venues.  The ambassador said that the UAE is  interested in the parliamentary experience of the RA, therefore,  mutual visits and contacts with parliamentarians can be very  effective.

In this context, the creation of the UAE-Armenia friendship group was  discussed. Mutually expressed the hope that the activities of  friendship groups will contribute to the further development of  productive cooperation.

The interlocutors concluded the meeting expressed confidence that the  vectors of cooperation and the ways to achieve success are numerous. 

Silence of country`s leadership in connection with death of servicemen is unacceptable

Toneyan Mark
Arminfo, Armenia
Feb 13 2020

ArmInfo. In the first months of 2020, 12 soldiers were already killed in our army and all of them died not from the enemy's attack,  meanwhile t the Ministry of Defense reports only unexplained circumstances, " head of the Armenian Association of Investigative Journalists Edik Baghdasaryan said.

It should be noted that since the beginning of the year, 10  servicemen became victims of unlawful acts committed in the Armenian  Armed Forces and the Artsakh Defense Army. On February 12, it became  known that two more military servicemen had died.

"The response of the country's leadership to this tragedy is only  silence. The defense ministers of Armenia and Artsakh are silent, the  presidents are silent, the speaker and parliamentarians are silent.  The Prime Minister delivers speeches, but for some reason only on  other topics. He also prefers to remain silent on this subject"   Baghdasaryan wrote  on his Facebook page.

Baghdasaryan notes that the whole nation is discussing a referendum  with a view to dismissing 7 judges of the Constitutional Court, and  he expresshis conviction that the question of deposition of judges of  the Constitutional Court is certainly not worth one soldier's life.

On the fact of the death on February 12 of two servicemen from  gunshot wounds, criminal cases were opened. According to the  Investigative Committee, an investigation is underway, necessary  investigative and other procedural actions are being taken to ensure  a comprehensive, complete and objective investigation.

On February 12, at around 11:30 a.m., on a military position of the  Defense Army soldier of the NKR Defense Army, born in 2000 Tigran  Manvelyan, received a fatal gunshot wound and died on the way to the  military hospital. On the same day, at around 13:00, another soldier,  Tigran Mkhoyan received a gunshot wound to the head. He also died on  the way to the military hospital. 

Will there be direct air communication between Armenia and Jordan?

Arbi Tashjian
Arminfo, Armenia
Feb 13 2020

ArmInfo. It is planned to establish direct air communication between Armenia and Jordan. At the February 13 meeting, the RA National Assembly ratified the agreement  between the Government of the Republic of Armenia and the Government  of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan on air traffic.

According to the Chairperson of the Civil Aviation Committee of the  Republic of Armenia Tatevik Revazyan, the agreement was signed on  November 1, 2018 in Aman. The document provides for equal rights for  air carriers of the two countries, while liberalizing issues such as  the appointment by the parties of their air carriers, price  regulation, frequency of flights, and service destinations. At the  same time, the parties commit themselves to ensuring the safety of  air transportation, ensuring equal competitive conditions. The Head  of the Committee emphasized that the ratification of the agreement  would enhance bilateral relations, increase tourism flow and  positively affect the country's economy.

At the same time, she admitted that at this stage, airlines operating  in Jordan and Armenia have no interest in organizing direct flights  between the two countries to increase tourist flow, however, this  does not mean that this issue does not need to be regulated. "Today,  new directions began to develop very quickly, and it turned out that  there were countries with which we did not have any agreements at  all, and this would create obstacles if we did not resolve this  situation," Tatevik Revazyan added. She found it difficult to say  whether it is possible in principle to organize flights to Jordan,  since, as she admitted, today there are many different kinds of  obstacles, including visa ones, however, through transit, with  certain restrictions, it is possible. The head of the Committee also  said that similar agreements are currently in effect with 49  countries, and the next step is to conclude an agreement with the  European Union.

Syrian Ambassador to Armenia: We urge all parliaments in the world to recognize and condemn the Armenian Genocide in the Ottoman Empire

Vardan Badalian
Arminfo, Armenia
Feb 13 2020

ArmInfo.The resolution on the recognition of the Armenian Genocide, adopted today by the Syrian parliament, confirms that the Armenian Genocide was committed by the  Ottoman Empire in the territories of Syria and Western Armenia. The  Ambassador of Syria to Armenia Mohammed Haj Ibrahim announced this at  a press conference.

"The Syrian parliament today recognized and condemned the Armenian  Genocide committed by the Ottoman Empire in the early 20th century.  It also condemns any attempt by anyone to deny this crime and distort  historical truth. The resolution confirms that this crime is one of  the most cruel, most heinous crimes against humanity, "the Ambassador  emphasized.

According to Haj Ibrahim, the Syrian parliament also calls on all  parliaments of the world and the international community to recognize  and condemn the 1915 Armenian Genocide. "Today, terrorist groups that  commit terrible acts against the Syrian people are the grandchildren  of those who once committed genocide against Armenians and other  peoples. Turkey is now aggressing against Syria, and terrorist groups  operating in Idlib and elsewhere are supported from the Turkish  government, "he stressed.

The Syrian Ambassador to Armenia stated that the Armenians who  survived the Genocide and moved to Syria have always been an integral  part of Syrian society. According to him, the Armenians in Syria  continued to live in safety, preserving their religion, language and  identity. There are many churches in Syria that perpetuate the memory  of the victims of the Armenian Genocide, and this year the history of  the Armenian Genocide will appear in history textbooks.

Asked why only today the Syrian parliament adopts a resolution  recognizing the Armenian Genocide, the Ambassador replied: "This  issue has long been studied, and the Syrian government treats Syrians  of Armenian descent with all respect and sympathy. Mass pogroms of  Armenians have always been mentioned in Syria as part of those events  held in the Armenian-populated areas of Syria. In 2015, the then  speaker of the Syrian parliament took part in events dedicated to the  100th anniversary of the genocide, and this year the parliament  issued a statement stating that that genocide was committed against  Armenians. "

It should be noted that on February 13, the Syrian parliament  unanimously adopted a resolution on the recognition and condemnation  of the Armenian Genocide in the Ottoman Empire. Thus, the Syrian  parliament joined the more than 30 parliaments of the world that  adopted resolutions on the recognition and condemnation of the  Armenian Genocide.

The fact of the genocide of the Armenian people in the Ottoman  Empire, whose victims in 1915 were up to 1.5 million ethnic  Armenians, is recognized by many states. Uruguay was the first in  1965, followed by France, Italy, the Netherlands, Belgium, Poland,  Russia, Lithuania, Slovakia, Sweden, Switzerland, Greece, Cyprus,  Lebanon, Canada, Venezuela, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Vatican,  Bolivia, Czech Republic, Austria, Luxembourg. The European Parliament  and the World Council of Churches also recognized the Armenian  Genocide.

Legendary Soviet spy Alexey Botyan dies at 103

Diana Dabaghian
Panorama, Armenia
Feb 13 2020
Society 12:25 13/02/2020 Region

Legendary Soviet-Armenian intelligence officer, Hero of Russia Alexey Botyan has died at the age of 103, RIA Novosti reported.

In 1945 he led the operation to liberate the Polish city of Krakow. The legendary spy had just turned 103 years old.  

Botyan joined World War II on September 1, 1939 as an officer of the Polish air defense forces. During the first days of the war, the intelligence agent shot down one of the flying machines of the Nazi army, downing three others during the Warsaw defense. 

Armenian government approves funding for political parties, blocs

Emil Lazarian
Panorama, Armenia
Feb 13 2020

The Armenian government adopted unanimously on Thursday a draft law on providing financial assistance to the political parties and blocs that garnered three or higher percent of the votes during the December 2018 snap parliamentary elections in the country.

Under the bill, a total of 105 million 725 thousand Armenian drams will be allocated to four parties and one bloc. In particular, the ruling My Step bloc will receive 78 million 6 thousand drams, the Prosperous Armenia Party – 9 million 150 thousand drams, the Bright Armenia Party – 7 million 56 thousand drams, the former ruling Republican Party of Armenia – 5 million 208 thousand drams, and the Armenian Revolutionary Federation-Dashnaktsutyun (ARF-D) – 4 million 303 thousand drams.

Addressing the cabinet meeting, Deputy Prime Minister Tigran Avinyan stressed that the development of the party system is crucial for a parliamentary country. “Parties in Armenia should develop and continuously operate at a higher level,” he said. 


Sports: Armenia wins gold, bronze medals at European C’ships

Emil Lazarian
Panorama, Armenia
Feb 13 2020
Sport 11:52 13/02/2020Armenia

Armenian Greco-Roman wrestlers on Wednesday won three medals, including two gold and one bronze, at the 2020 European Championships underway in Rome, Italy.

Artur Aleksanyan (97 kg) clinched the gold medal after taking a 7-1 win over Nikoloz Kakhelashvili in the final bout, the National Olympic Committee reported. The Armenian athlete won his fifth European title. 

Gevorg Gharibyan (60 kg) beat Turkey’s Kerem Kamal 5-5 to claim the European champion’s title. The bout ended in a draw, but preference was given to the Armenian wrestler for performing a more complex trick.

Meanwhile, wrestler Karen Aslanyan (67 kg) won a bronze medal after defeating his rival from Hungary 7-5. 

Earlier another Armenian wrestler Karapet Chalyan had also won a bronze at the European Championships.  

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