Category: 2020

Nagorno-Karabakh: victory of London and Ankara, defeat of Soros and the Armenians

Greg Madatian
Voltaire Network
Nov 24 2020
by Thierry Meyssan

The Pentagon, which had planned the war in Nagorno-Karabakh, was overtaken by its British allies. But none of the great powers worried about the deaths it would cause. Moreover, while London and Ankara renewed their historic alliance, Washington and Moscow gained nothing, while George Soros and the Armenians lost much.

VOLTAIRE NETWORK | PARIS (FRANCE) | 24 NOVEMBER 2020

After 44 days of war, Armenia was forced to sign a ceasefire with Azerbaijan, acknowledging the loss of part of its territories. However, as we reported in the form of an interrogation, the initial plan of the United States was to blame Turkey, let it massacre part of the Armenian population, then intervene, overthrow President Erdoğan and restore peace [1].

However, this plan did not work. It masked a British ploy. Underhandedly, London took advantage of the confusion of the US presidential election to double-cross Washington. It used the situation to try to deprive Russia of the map of Nagorno-Karabakh and resume the “Great Game” of the nineteenth century. [2] At the time, London was the ally of the Ottoman Empire against the Tsarist Empire. When Moscow realized this, it imposed a cease-fire to stop the massacre.

Throughout the 19th century, the British and Russian empires engaged in a fierce rivalry to control the Caucasus and all of Central Asia. This episode is known in England as the “Great Game” and in Russia as the “Tournament of Shadows”.

Russia began to win the game when it seized Nagorno-Karabakh. By a domino effect, it then extended its domination over the Caucasus.

In view of this historical precedent, London now believes that recovering Nagorno-Karabakh could allow it to undermine Moscow’s influence in the Caucasus and then throughout Central Asia.

The current British Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, claims to be the continuator of the imperial policy of Winston Churchill, of whom he is a biographer. He has just made public a costly plan to modernize his armies [3].

To relaunch the “Great Game”, on July 29, 2020, he appointed Richard Moore, director general of the Foreign Office, as director of MI6 (foreign secret services). He had previously served as His Majesty’s ambassador to Ankara, speaks Turkish fluently, and has made friends with President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. He did not take up his new post until October 1, four days after the Azeri attack on Nagorno-Karabakh.

Richard Moore is a personal friend of Prince Charles, himself patron of the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies, where the intellectuals of the Muslim Brotherhood have been trained for twenty-five years. The former Turkish president, Abdullah Gül, is also administrator of this center.

As ambassador to Ankara (2014-17), Richard Moore accompanied President Erdoğan to become the patron of the Brotherhood.

He also played a role in the British withdrawal from the war against Syria in 2014. London did not intend to pursue a conflict in which it had engaged for colonial purposes, but which turned into a US imperial operation (Rumsfeld/Cebrowski strategy).

Richard Moore has just undertaken a tour of Egypt and Turkey. He was in Cairo on November 9th (the day of the Russian imposition of a cease-fire in Karabagh) to meet President al-Sissi and in Ankara on November 11th. Officially, he would not have had an audience with his old friend, President Erdoğan, but only met his spokesman at the White Palace.

In the Azeri-Turkish war in Nagorno-Karabakh, Washington believed it could count on President Armen Sarkissian and the Armenian Prime Minister, Nikol Pashinyan, one of George Soros’ men, [4] as bait.

George Soros is an American speculator who pursues his own political agenda, but works in concert with the CIA [5]. Unfortunately, the British do not have the same relationship with Soros: he owes his fortune to a vast operation against the pound sterling (on Black Wednesday, September 16, 1992), hence his nickname “the man who broke the Bank of England”.

London let Washington do it first. The Americans encouraged the “Two-State Nation” (Turkey and Azerbaijan) to forcibly end the Artsakh Republic.

MI6 helped its Turkish partner to transfer jihadists to Azerbaijan [6], not to kill Armenians, but Russians. But there are were Russians in Karabagh yet.

Soros reacted by sending Kurdish mercenaries to support the Armenian side [7].

Pretending to play the US game, London supported Baku and Ankara. During the first days, the three powers of the Minsk Group (in charge of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict since the dissolution of the USSR) – i.e. the United States, France and Russia – all three tried to obtain a halt to the fighting and a resumption of negotiations [8]. When they each successively noted Azeri bad faith, they presented a proposal for a resolution to the Security Council. For Washington, it was a question of operating in a coordinated manner a reversal, from neutrality to the condemnation of the “two-state nation”.

In the first days, the Armenians defended themselves as best they could. However, the head of state, Armen Sarkissian, modified the plans of the military staff and brought up inexperienced volunteers to the front. [9] Sarkissian has dual Armenian-British nationality. The result was a massacre among the Armenian army.

Suddenly, the United Kingdom announced that it would use its veto if the text was put to a vote. The United States, taken aback, publicly accused Azerbaijan of bad faith on 25 October.

But it would take another two weeks for Russia to understand that Washington, entangled in its presidential election campaign, was no longer handling the issue.

It is only around October 6 that Russia became certain of the existence of an English trap in the American trap. It quickly concluded that London had relaunched the “Great Game” and was preparing to steal its influence in Nagorno-Karabakh.

Russian President Vladimir Putin called his Turkish counterpart on October 7th. He negotiated with him a cease-fire very unfavorable to the Armenians. Erdoğan, who has understood that he will not be able to resist a stabilization of the political situation in the United States, agrees to gain only territory and renounces the relaunch of the Armenian genocide. President Putin then summoned his Azerbaijani counterpart, Ilham Aliyev, and the Armenian Prime Minister, Nikol Pachinian, to the Kremlin. He saved what could still be saved by forcing his interlocutors to sign a ceasefire on October 10tj under the terms negotiated by Erdoğan [10]. His priorities were to draw up the Russian military presence via a peace force and then to stop the bloodbath. He then addressed the Russian people to announce that he had saved the interests of his country by saving Armenia from an even more terrible defeat.

The Armenians realized, far too late, that by taking them away from Russia for the USA, Nikol Pachinian had bet on the wrong horse. They understand in retrospect that however corrupt the former team that led them was, it was patriotic, while Soros’ men are opposed to the very concept of nationhood, and therefore to the independence of their country.

Demonstrations and resignations followed one another: the Chief of Staff, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, the Minister of Defence, but not the Prime Minister. For his part, the Azerbaijani President, Ilham Aliyev, is jubilant. He mocks copiously the Council of Europe and the Parliament of the European Union, proclaims his victory and announces the reconstruction of the conquered territories [11]. The British will have new privileges for British Petroleum and apply to exploit the Azeri gold mines.

Thierry Meyssan
Translation
Roger Lagassé
           

[1] “Will Artsakh (Karabagh) be the tomb of Erdoğan ?”, “Karabagh: NATO supports Turkey while seeking to eliminate President Erdoğan”, by Thierry Meyssan, Translation Roger Lagassé, Voltaire Network, 6 and 15 October 2020.

[2] The Great Game. On Secret Service in High Asia, by Peter Hopkirk, John Murray (1990).

[3] “Boris Johnson Statement to the House on the Integrated Review”, by Boris Johnson, Voltaire Network, 19 November 2020.

[4] “Larisa Minasyan: OSF-Armenia has supported and supports the velvet revolution in the country”, Arm Info, March 5 2019.

[5] “George Soros, speculator and philanthropist”, Voltaire Network, 15 January 2004.

[6] “4 000 jihadists in Nagorno-Karabakh”, Voltaire Network, 29 September 2020.

[7] “Soros sent 2 000 Kurdish mercenaries to Armenia, says Erdoğan”, Voltaire Network, 29 October 2020.

[8] “Third Karabakh ceasefire breached”, Voltaire Network, 27 October 2020.

[9] Conférence de presse du chef d’état-major sortant, le général Movses Hakobyan, Erevan, 19 novembre 2020.

[10] “Statement by Presidents of Azerbaijan, Armenia and Russia”, Voltaire Network, 10 November 2020.

[11] “Ilham Aliyev’s Victory Speech”, Voltaire Network, 20 November 2020.


Azerbaijan should guarantee Armenians access to Nagorno-Karabakh’s churches

Maral Chavushian
Washington Examiner
Nov 24 2020
by Michael Rubin

 

 | 05:21 PM


STEPANAKERT, NAGORNO-KARABAKH — Azerbaijanis celebrated the recapture of Shusha, a cliff-top town revered by both Azeris and Armenians, shortly before a Russia-imposed ceasefire in the war over this disputed territory. Shusha is less than five miles from Stepanakert, the capital of Nagorno-Karabakh’s self-declared independent Republic of Artsakh. Many refugees from the Shusha fighting now search for shelter within sight of a town whose homes had been in their family for generations. While Azerbaijani leader Ilham Aliyev has said ethnic Armenians can remain as residents of Azerbaijan, the actions of his forces and those of the Syrian militiamen who support them tell a different story: They have tortured and mutilated prisoners, both military and civilian, and posted videos of gruesome, Islamic State-style beheadings on social media platforms such as Telegram.

Azeris may justify their actions in Armenian attacks on Azeri villages in previous Nagorno-Karabakh wars and the fact that many Azeris had fled towns such as Shusha when they fell under complete Armenian control more than a quarter-century ago. Without moral equivalence, the reality is that both Azeris and Armenians have narratives that are often diametrically opposed, and both can point to abuses perpetrated by the other side. There is a darker reality that while Armenians often refer to Azeris as adversaries, Aliyev has incited his population to despise Armenians in the crudest ethnic and religious terms. The fact that Azeris, or the forces they fought alongside, now behead Armenians while chanting “Allahu Akbar” is not a spontaneous development.

Against this backdrop, this mountainous quarter of the Caucasus is increasingly subject to both great power and regional competition. The shattering of the status quo was less due to a precipitous erosion in Armenia’s ability to deter the Azeri army than in the fact that Turkey and Israel supported and supplied Azerbaijan, while Armenia not only fought alone but also found itself blockaded by Georgia and Iran. The United States forfeited its diplomatic role despite its Minsk Group co-chairmanship, while Russia, despite its extensive ties to Armenia and professions of neutrality, sold arms to Azerbaijan. Washington may consider the Caucasus peripheral to its interests, but the competition and potential for genocide, jihadism, and instability throughout the region amplify Nagorno-Karabakh’s importance.

Perhaps Shusha can provide both an opportunity to reverse demonization in this mountainous region and restore accountability, especially in the face of Azerbaijan and Turkey’s framing of their war in religious terms.

Rather than cleanse Armenians from a town so intertwined with their heritage, the Minsk Group co-chairs (Russia, France, and the United States) might insist on the right for Armenians to visit Shusha and other key towns by prearranged permit and group buses escorted by Russian peacekeepers. Azerbaijan might cry foul, but there is precedent.

To drive rapprochement, North Korea created a special tourist zone for South Koreans at Mount Kumgang, 30 miles north of the demilitarized zone. Within a decade, a million South Koreans made the day trip to a resort there. It did not always go smoothly (in 2008, North Korean troops shot and killed a South Korean woman) but it did enable some interaction subsequently augmented by the construction of the Kaesong Industrial Park.

The situations are not exactly analogous: Korea is divided by ideology; Azerbaijan and Armenia are divided by language and religion. But the basic logic holds, and so does a test: Should Aliyev refuse access to escorted Armenian visitors, he will confirm himself more closed-minded than even North Korea’s leadership. Should he instead acquiesce to site visits to the region’s churches, monasteries, and other Christian sites, he will increase accountability and could prevent desecration and destruction of the region’s Christian heritage.

The guns may be silent, but key details of diplomatic arrangements in the region remain unresolved. The Minsk Group should reinforce that Aliyev’s triumphalism is both premature and inappropriate. Azeris may have been taught to hate Armenians, but it is time to remind Baku that they must nevertheless live with them and that the world will ensure that the erasure of Armenian heritage begun more than a century ago by Ottoman and Turkish troops cannot continue under Aliyev’s watch.

Michael Rubin (@Mrubin1971) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. He is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and a former Pentagon official.


Armenian forces leaving Kalbajar district — senior officer

Karapet Navasardian
TASS, Russia
Nov 24 2020
According to him, Azerbaijani forces are to enter the region at 06:00

KALBAJAR, November 24. /TASS/. Last Armenian military units are leaving the Kalbajar district in Nagorno Karabakh, which is to be handed over to Azerbaijan under the November 25 agreement, a motorized rifle brigade commander told TASS on Tuesday.

“We managed to hold our positions here [in the Kalbajar district] throughout the entire war, and yielded nothing to them. Now, the Azerbaijanis are 12 km away,” the officer said. “We are now dismantling our outposts in the mountains and, after that, we will blow up the remaining buildings of our military base to prevent them from falling into the hands of the Azerbaijanis. Once it is done, we will leave for Armenia. At the moment, our military unit is among the last ones remaining here.”

According to him, Azerbaijani forces are to enter the region at 06:00 (05:00 Moscow time) on November 25.

Renewed clashes between Azerbaijan and Armenia erupted on September 27, with intense battles raging in the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh. The area experienced flare-ups of violence in the summer of 2014, in April 2016 and this past July.

On November 9, Russian President Vladimir Putin, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan signed a joint statement on a complete ceasefire in Nagorno-Karabakh starting from November 10. Under the document, the Azerbaijani and Armenian sides are to maintain the positions that they held and Russian peacekeepers are to be deployed to the region.

In line with the agreements, Azerbaijan is to assume control over the Agdam district until November 20, Kalbajar district – until November 15, and the Lachin district – until December 1. Later, Baku agreed to postpone the handover of the Kalbajar district until November 25.

UN stands ready to respond to humanitarian needs in Nagorno Karabakh

Emil Lazarian
Public Radio of Armenia
Nov 24 2020

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has confirmed on Monday that relevant UN agencies are ready to cooperate with Russia in the Nagorno-Karabakh region to undertake humanitarian assessment on the ground.

“The UN Secretary-General has made clear publicly, we hope that the cessation of hostilities will enable humanitarian actors to have the necessary access to all people in need in all areas affected by the conflict, including people displaced by the conflict, particularly in and around Nagorno-Karabakh,” UN Secretary General’s Spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said during a press briefing. 

“As the Secretary-General stressed in his most recent phone calls with the Foreign Ministers of both Armenia and Azerbaijan, the UN stands ready to respond to the humanitarian needs and is prepared to work with all concerned accordingly. The same has been conveyed to the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs,” the Spokesperson said.

“In response to a request from the Russian Federation and pending further details on the role and operating modalities of the “Russian Inter-agency Humanitarian Response Centre”, the Secretary-General has confirmed that the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) and relevant UN entities are ready to cooperate and to discuss possible interaction and collaboration on the ground, including for the purpose of undertaking an initial independent inter-agency assessment in Nagorno-Karabakh and surrounding areas, as soon as conditions permit, in order to obtain a comprehensive picture of the humanitarian needs on the ground,” Dujarric stated.  


Spanish Congress adopts motion on Nagorno Karabakh

Kanayan Tamar
Public Radio of Armenia
Nov 24 2020

The Spanish Congress of Deputies has adopted another motion proposed by MP John Iñarritu, in which the Congress expresses its condolences to the families of the civilian and military victims of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

The motion also reaffirms deep friendship with the Armenian people, highlights the importance of protection of Armenian cultural and religious sites under Azerbaijani control.

The motion stresses the importance of increasing EU humanitarian aid to the people of Nagorno-Karabakh, if necessary, as well as ensuring the return of internally displaced persons and refugees to their homes.

None of the political forces represented in the Congress voted against the motion.


Armenian Forces in Nagorno-Karabakh Mourn a Lost War but Doubt that Peace will Last

Jagharian Tania
Washington Post
Nov 23 2020
By Liz Cookman and

Robyn Dixon

Moscow bureau chief and foreign correspondent

November 23

STEPANAKERT, Nagorno-Karabakh — For Armenian soldiers on the losing side of the short but brutal Nagorno-Karabakh war, the loss of territory to Azerbaijan remains so bitter that some say they would have preferred to fight on.

The sting of the Moscow-brokered peace deal was acute at a military outpost in Stepanakert, the main city in the enclave governed by a pro-Armenian government but within the internationally recognized borders of Azerbaijan.

It also reflected the wider outrage in Armenia and among ethnic Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh, raising further questions about whether the pact can hold despite nearly 2,000 Russian peacekeepers deployed to enforce it.

Russian President Vladimir Putin warned Armenia on Friday that the only alternative to the truce would be another “suicidal” war.

In biting cold and clutching plastic cups of homemade ­cognac, the Armenian troops watched the smoke from houses in the hilltop town of Shusha — known in Armenia as Shushi — which was ceded to Azerbaijan’s government.

Azerbaijan lost Nagorno-Karabakh and seven surrounding districts in the 1988-1994 Nagorno-Karabakh war after ethnic Armenians in the enclave split away. Nagorno-Karabakh’s independence was not recognized by any state, including Armenia, and more than two decades of peace talks under the Organization of Security and Cooperation in Europe failed to bring agreement on the return of territory to Azerbaijan or on the enclave’s status.

Under the deal brokered by Putin, Azerbaijan recovered the seven districts and part of Nagorno-Karabakh, including the strategic town of Shusha.

Many of the dead in Nagorno-Karabakh were conscripts, barely older than children. Others were volunteer soldiers from across Armenia and the diaspora who left their lives and jobs behind to join the war effort.

“Rescuers found one man alive today,” said a 40-year-old soldier, an Armenian who left his home in St. Petersburg and a job at a granite plant to fight.

He spent five days battling in a village below Shusha, traveling from the front line in the east of the enclave. He spoke on the condition of anonymity to candidly discuss his views on the war and the cease-fire.

The Armenian fighters held out for as long as they could, he said, but they were outgunned by Azerbaijan, which had a critical battlefield edge with attack drones purchased from ally Turkey and others.

“It hailed shells. They hit our transportation, and eventually they surrounded us in three different areas. This is how we were defeated, and they could go on to take Shushi,” he said, using the Armenian name for the town. “We were so close to each other. I killed an Azerbaijani soldier at a range of just 15 meters.”

[Cease-fire in Nagorno-Karabakh brings protests in Armenia, celebrations in Azerbaijan]

Senior Russian officials — Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, Health Minister Mikhail Murashko and others — arrived in the Armenian capital, Yerevan, on Saturday to reinforce the deal, as protests over it continued.

Shoigu said nearly all Russian peacekeepers were in place. “A total of 23 posts have been deployed. We’re monitoring the road to Stepanakert, ensuring the return of refugees. Peaceful life has already been established. And our main task is preventing bloodshed,” Shoigu said in a meeting with Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, who has faced calls to resign over the deal.

“If it was up to me, we wouldn’t have a cease-fire. We would have stood until the end, and we would have been victorious,” said Seryan Karabeteyan, 48, a construction worker and veteran from the 1990s war who also fought in Shusha.

“But there were a lot of casualties. We took out a lot of wounded and a lot of dead from the gorge with many types of injuries, but mostly bullet wounds,” he said, bundled in a thick military coat. His father-in-law was killed in 1992 fighting in the last war.

“For sure there will be war again, sooner than you think, and I will be back. Whether my wife is ready for it or not, my death would be for our Armenian nation,” he said.

The Kalbajar district is one of the seven adjacent to Nagorno-Karabakh that had been controlled by ethnic Armenians for decades but were being returned to Azerbaijan under the terms of the truce.

Many in the area burned their houses, killed their animals and cut down trees, determined to leave nothing behind for the Azerbaijanis.

Some scrawled their names on cliff walls in a last statement of ownership.

“Did I put on a roof and make renovations so that an Azerbaijani can enjoy it? It is better to destroy the things you love than allow that. Those who couldn’t take their stuff killed the animals and burned the rest,” said Hovsep, 35, a pig and sheep farmer who gave only his last name.

He volunteered on the front line for six weeks as a machine-gun operator. He smoked a cigarette and watched with weary eyes as flames licked through his home after he set it ablaze.

[Nagorno-Karabakh peace deal puts fearful Armenians on the move]

One couple took a plastic bottle they had filled with spring water from their garden, with tears in their eyes. It was for their children, who had already fled to Yerevan, as one last reminder of home.

“My husband has told Russian peacekeepers to live here,” said Alina Ohanyan, 47, who was also fleeing her home near the Dadivank Monastery, a religious site for 1,000 years.

She worked with a friend to rip up the floorboards in the house her family built 20 years ago. They removed the windows and said they would not leave anything useful behind.

“[My husband] even asked if he could join their regiment so he could stay,” she said, referring to the Russian peacekeepers. “He told them that they can take this house and live in it, but if an Azerbaijani will live in it, then they must burn it to the ground.”

Many believe, or at least hope, that they will return someday.

“The cease-fire won’t stay this way. It won’t last long,” war veteran Pavel Makunyan said as he brought his band of 150 volunteer soldiers down from their front-line post near Askeran after the fighting finished.

“We have been fighting for decades, and we will fight on,” he added. “Maybe not today, but tomorrow.”

Makunyan is a well-known figure in Armenia. He served in Soviet forces before fighting in the 1990s war and later becoming one of the main figures in a hostage crisis in Yerevan in 2016, when he and others seized a police station by force and called for the resignation of the government at the time.

His men gathered in the border town, hugging one another and returning their guns while smoking cigars and sharing pomegranates, the juice dripping onto the ground.

“You know, when we came, I said we are nothing without a victory, but we have not been defeated,” Makunyan told them. “It will not end with this, but future generations — we have something to fight for.”

Dixon reported from Moscow.


Vahram Dumanyan replaces Arayik Harutyunyan in the post of Minister of Education

Khondkarian Raffi

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 18:30,

YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 23, ARMENPRESS. By the decree of the President of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan, Arayik Harutyunyan has been relieved of the post of Minister of Education, Science, Culture and Sport. As ARMENPRESS was informed from the press service of the President’s Office, Vahram Dumanyan has been appointed to the post.

Vahram Dumanyan is the dean of Faculty of Informatics and Applied Mathematics at the Yerevan State University.