Category: 2022

By Nick Lewis/CPJ Central Asia correspondent on January 6, 2022 10:40 AM EST

When Armenia’s government took office after the 2018 Velvet Revolution, it seemed to usher in a new era of press freedom for the former Soviet Republic. But local journalists fear those days could be over as Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s government implements new legal amendments on insult and defamation.

Under the amendments to the country’s civil code, signed into law last October 11, persons found guilty of insulting and defaming another person will now be fined triple the previous penalty — up to three million Armenian drams (US$6,300) and six million drams (US$12,600) respectively, according to news reports. 

The changes to the civil code come after the July 30 introduction of criminal charges for “grave insult,” in which those found guilty of repeatedly “cursing or insulting a person’s dignity in another extremely obscene way” can face up to three months in prison or fines of up to three million drams (US$6,300). Fines for first offenses against government officials and public figures are higher than fines for first offenses against private individuals.

Members of parliament with Pashinyan’s ruling Civil Contract party have defended the measures as necessary to combat disinformation and abusive language online. But press freedom advocates told CPJ they fear the new laws will be used as a tool to clamp down on critical outlets and will lead to self-censorship, especially as lawsuits against the press have sharply increased in number in recent years, according to a study by local press freedom group the Committee to Protect Freedom of _expression_.

CPJ emailed the parliament and the press secretary of the Armenian prime minister for comment, but did not receive any replies.

Boris Navasardian, president of Yerevan Press Club, an independent local journalists’ association, told CPJ by telephone that the amendments pose a threat to journalists critical of authorities. The measures are a “transparent attempt to abuse selective justice against journalists and media that are oppositionally minded towards the government,” Navasardian said.

When Pashinyan, himself a former journalist, took power in 2018 after igniting a nonviolent pro-democracy movement known as the “Velvet Revolution,” journalists looked forward to a freer media environment and long overdue reforms. Unlike his predecessor, Serzh Sargsyan, Pashinyan has avoided directly interfering in news coverage and media diversity has increased.

Yet hoped-for reforms – above all in the areas of access to official information and television market liberalization – have failed to materialize. Since coming to power, Pashinyan’s government has had a confrontational relationship with the press, much of which is still owned by individuals close to the former regime, and has shown itself to be increasingly sensitive to criticism following Armenia’s defeat in last year’s Nagorno-Karabakh war.

In August, the parliament banned journalists from entering the legislative chamber without advance permission and limited media interviews of legislators to a designated area only. The authorities also forcefully removed journalists from the parliamentary press room to stop them recording brawls that occurred in parliament on August 24 and 25.

The new legal changes did not pass without debate. The law tripling penalties for insult and defamation was originally adopted by parliament on March 24, but following discussions with journalistic organizations, President Armen Sarkissian referred it to the Constitutional Court to check its constitutionality. On October 5, the court ruled in favor of the bill.

Ashot Melikyan, chairman of Committee to Protect Freedom of _expression_, told CPJ by telephone that the new maximum fines entail a real risk of financial collapse for many outlets in Armenia and are likely to lead to increased self-censorship among journalists. The fines are reportedly 30 times the normal monthly salary of an Armenian journalist.

Before he was a politician, Pashinyan himself was on the receiving end of such fines. In 1999, when he was chief editor of the newspaper Oragir, then interior minister Serzh Sargsyan sued the paper for slander. 

“The lawsuit resulted in a six-million-dram fine and since they weren’t able to pay it, the newspaper went bankrupt,” Shushan Doydoyan, the head of local NGO Freedom of Information Center, told Eurasianet. “Now they are doing the same thing that was done against them.”

An explanatory note on a draft version of the amendments includes reference to an existing civil code provision to prevent media outlets found guilty of defamation or insult from being fined an amount that would “impede the normal operation of the media outlet,” the note said. Yet both Melikyan and Navasardian expressed concern that courts are not sufficiently independent of the government to guarantee against devastating fines.

On the criminalization of grave insult both Melikyan and Navasardian voiced concern that “grave insult” is not clearly defined and can potentially be used against media outlets. Navasardian said that the inclusion of private individuals as potential complainants is “a trick to cover the real intention to protect [Pashinyan] and his close team members.”

Ruling party MPs originally proposed a third bill banning media outlets from citing anonymous sources, but after criticism from media organizations and the Council of Europe, the human rights body of the European Union, they revised it to make outlets legally responsible for statements published from “unidentified sources,” Melikyan said. The measure is widely thought to be directed against anonymous Telegram channels whose sometimes dubious claims are often reprinted by traditional media, according to news reports.

Melikyan told CPJ that problems of media polarization and disinformation have been acute since the late 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war, with opposition outlets linked to the previous regime pushing the boundaries of legitimate journalism. But he said that the “repressive” measures taken by the government are not the way forward. He advocates promoting media self-regulation – through initiatives such as the independent Armenian Media Ethics Observatory and its code of ethics, signed by dozens of media outlets – as well as fact-checking projects and efforts to raise media literacy.

Navasardian agrees, arguing that the government’s moves are only likely to exacerbate media polarization. “When you have such a transparent intention to implement selective justice,” he says, “you will never have a civilized system of media regulation.”

Turkey and Armenia, longtime enemies, will begin new talks next week in Moscow to normalize relations and open the last closed border left over from the Cold War.

The January 14 meeting came more than two months after President Joe Biden called on Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Rome to work to establish diplomatic relations with landlocked Armenia and open the country’s common borders. official. Turkey closed the border in solidarity with Azerbaijan, an ally that fought a war with Armenia over the disputed territory of Nagorno-Karabakh in 1993.

Washington and European capitals are backing talks to reach a lasting solution to the conflict and to counter Moscow’s influence in the Soviet hinterland. Russia’s determination to dominate the region has re-emerged after sending troops to quell protests in Kazakhstan. Turkey’s goal is to tell US-led NATO allies who are dissatisfied with Russia’s acquisition of air defense systems that it is trying to stop Russian expansionism and become a safe trade route between China and the West.

“Normalization with Armenia fully corresponds to this picture. This will help Turkey to weaken Moscow’s influence in the region and expand Turkey’s influence, “said Emre Peker, Eurasian Group’s European Director.

Richard Giragosian, director of the Center for Regional Studies in the Armenian capital, Yerevan, said normalization of relations for landlocked Armenia was “an important means of overcoming isolation.”

Turkey’s and Armenia’s sharp animosity stems from the massacre of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire, and tensions over how to characterize the events of 1915, when 1.5 million Armenians were deported, killed and marched to their deaths. Armenians, backed by the Biden administration, describe it as genocide. Outraged by this characteristic, Turkey says that Armenians and Turks were killed in ethnic clashes during the collapse of the empire after Armenian groups sided with Russia in World War I.

In 2020, the Turkish army supported Azerbaijan when the armed conflict with Armenia over the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, which is an enclave with an ethnic majority, re-ignited inside Azerbaijan. Azerbaijan has regained control of parts of Nagorno-Karabakh and surrounding areas with the firing of armed drones supplied by Turkey. A troubled ceasefire was drafted by Russian President Vladimir Putin, but no peace agreement was signed.

Turkey has said that the dispute over the genocide allegations will not be on the table, and Giragosian commented on Armenia’s unconditional policy as “the issue of genocide has been postponed and entrusted to the post-normalization reconciliation process.”

But the road can be rocky. Peker said there was a “big risk” that the Armenian diaspora, along with the Armenian government, which in the past claimed that Turkey recognized the genocide, would play a role in decision-making.

After the agreement reached in 2009, previous attempts to defuse tensions failed after Turkey demanded the withdrawal of Armenian forces from Nagorno-Karabakh as a precondition.

The new talks come ahead of Ankara’s expected talks in Washington, including Turkey’s purchase of S-400 air defense systems from Russia, which has poisoned relations between NATO allies. Last week, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu stressed that Turkey is in full coordination with Azerbaijan, and that Turkish and Armenian representatives are expected to work on a roadmap that includes confidence-building measures in preparation for the meetings.

If Turkey agrees to open its border, businesses on both sides of the sleepy border could thrive, as it would link Armenia directly to one of the Middle East’s largest economies. Armenia lifted its embargo on Turkish goods on Jan. 1 in response to pressure from its business community seeking a way out for exports. The two countries have already agreed to resume direct charter flights.

“Armenia can open its economy. The lifting of the blockade will reduce the influence of both Iran and Russia in Armenia, “said Michael Rubin, a resident scientist at the American Institute of Entrepreneurship. “At the same time, businesses in eastern Turkey can benefit. There will be no real losers. “

Sarah Khojoyan from Bloomberg contributed to this report.

ANI
7th January 2022, 22:37 GMT+11

Yerevan [Armenia], January 7 (ANI): Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin over the phone and discussed the situation in Kazakhstan.

"Pashinyan and Putin discussed the situation in Kazakhstan, as well as the progress in implementing joint steps within the CSTO [Collective Security Treaty Organization]," Sputnik quoted, according to the Armenian Cabinet of Minister's statement on Friday.

Pashinyan, as the current rotating chair of the CSTO, officially gave the order to begin the peacekeeping mission in protest-hit Kazakhstan. In the same light, Armenia's permanent representative to the United Nations informed the organization of the CSTO mission in the Central Asian country.

Hundreds of citizens and military personnel were injured and killed in Kazakh city of Almaty during the recent riots, Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev said on Friday expressing his condolences to the families of those killed during the protests, Sputnik reported.

Kazakhstan is witnessing a massive protest over soaring fuel prices across the country.

The protest took place in the western town of Zhanaozen against the doubling of the price of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), which most Kazakhs use as car fuel, Al Jazeera reported.

Amid nationwide agitation in Kazakhstan, protesters earlier pulled down the statue of the country's first President Nursultan Nazarbayev. A state of emergency has been declared in the country in the light of the eruption of this violent protest. (ANI)

A Greek court released a prominent Turkish-Armenian writer living under a temporary permit in Greece after fleeing a Turkish prison on Friday.

Sevan Nisanyan, a 66-year-old linguist and blogger was arrested on the island of Samos last week and faced deportation. He had been detained after Greek authorities refused to renew his residence permit, his wife Ira Tzourou said on Facebook and Twitter.

The court released him on the condition that he leave Greece within two weeks.

The Armenian Embassy in Greece issued a statement on January 2 that it had sent a representative to the prison where Nisanyan was being held. It added that since Nisanyan is an Armenian citizen he would be welcomed back to Armenia.

In a Facebook post on Friday, Nisanyan wrote, “I have been released from custody after eight days in jail. Great thanks to everyone who sent their love and encouragement during these difficult days.”

The Turkish-Armenian writer had been jailed in Turkey in 2014 on charges of illegal construction, a case he claims was punishment for his outspoken views about restrictions on freedom of _expression_ in the country.

He escaped from a low-security prison in 2017 and sought asylum in Greece.

Nisanyan had also previously been convicted in Turkey of blasphemy over a 2012 blog defending an anti-Islam film that ridiculed the Prophet Mohammed and sparked angry protests across the world.

A court on Syros has ordered the release from detention of Sevan Nişanyan, following an appeal from the Turkish-Armenian writer and linguist.

Police on the Cycladic island arrested Nişanyan on December 30.

According to his wife, Nişanyan had gone to the police precinct to renew some paperwork, but was arrested pending a deportation order that was issued two months previously while he was out of the country.

In 2014, Nişanyan was jailed in Turkey in 2014 on charges of illegally building in Kirkintzes (Şirince), a village once inhabited by Greeks. Following his escape from a low-security prison in 2017, he settled in Greece.

https://www.ekathimerini.com/news/1175154/syros-court-orders-release-of-turkish-armenian-writer/

News that Armenia is deploying soldiers to Kazakhstan has not been received well among Armenians.

The Defense Ministry confirmed on January 7 that it had sent 100 soldiers from a peacekeeping unit as part of the Collective Security Treaty Organization peacekeeping mission to Kazakhstan. 

Since the protests began on January 2 in Kazakhstan’s western city of Zhanaozen, they have spread throughout the country and resulted in the deaths of dozens of civilians and police. 

The Armenian involvement in the CSTO mission is ironic on several levels.

For one, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan – who, as the current chair of the CSTO’s Security Council, formally announced that the organization had agreed to Kazakhstan President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev’s request for military aid to defend him from street protesters – had himself come to power in 2018 as the result of popular street protests.

In those protests, the then-ruling authorities chose not to use force to suppress the protests. As part of the campaign to pressure the government to step down, Pashinyan urged supporters to surround government buildings. Armenia’s service members in Kazakhstan will now be "protecting important state and military facilities," the ministry said in its statement.

Pashinyan initially gained prominence as one of the leaders of the 2008 protests against fraudulent elections, which the then-government violently suppressed in what eventually became known as the “March 1” events.

On top of that, the CSTO famously declined to come to Armenia’s aid in 2021 as Azerbaijan carried out incursions into Armenian territory, which Armenians argued should have triggered the CSTO’s mutual defense provision. 

And many Armenians perceive Kazakhstan, which shares Turkic roots with Azerbaijan, to be more sympathetic to their enemy.

“The people of any country must choose their own government; no other country has the right to interfere in its internal affairs. Today, the Armenian armed forces have a mission to protect the borders of our country,” a coalition of pro-Western NGOs said in a statement. “We condemn the short-sighted and irresponsible actions of the Armenian government.”

Armenian officials have tried to push back against the criticism.  

“The public has raised concern about why Armenia appealed for help [to the CSTO] and didn’t receive it, and is now providing it,” Armen Grigoryan, the secretary of Armenia’s Security Council, told public television. “First of all, it’s a matter of responsibility, if Armenia has an interest in the CSTO mechanisms functioning, and the answer is a clear yes,” he said. 

He also disputed the notion that what was happening in Kazakhstan was a legitimate protest. “It is not a revolutionary process but a terrorist one, you have seen the videos of armed men,” he said.

While officials in Kazakhstan (and Russia, which dominates the CSTO) have claimed that the unrest there is the result of external terrorist forces, that should not be taken seriously, said human rights advocate Artur Sakunts.

“In 2008, during the March 1 protests, people were robbing stores and they never found out who was doing it,” he told RFE/RL, suggesting that provocateurs could have been operating then as now in Kazakhstan. “Here we are dealing with a similar thing. There is a component of sabotage, and we can’t just call everything ‘terrorism.’”

"Pashinyan should have just voiced concern over a situation, but he tried to be more Catholic than the Kremlin and fulfilled the Kremlin's command," said Sakunts, referring to Pashinyan’s claim that the protests in Kazakhstan were the result of “external interference.” As for Grigoryan’s argument about the functioning of the CSTO, Sakunts responded: “Who are you to make it function, did you look at our resources? If you could make it function, you should have made it function for us.”

Some also wondered if Pashinyan could try to invoke the CSTO in case of protests against his government. Grigoryan, in his explanation, “openly confessed why Nikol was sending troops to Kazakhstan,” said military analyst Karen Vrtanesyan in a Facebook post. “If something threatens Nikol's government tomorrow or the next day, Kazakhstan will send its troops to Armenia." 

But Armenia, as a member of the CSTO and reliant on Russian help, has few choices, argued Maria Karapetyan, a member of parliament from the ruling Civil Contract party. She argued that critics want Armenia to leave the CSTO and "make a different geopolitical choice."

"If we leave the CSTO, what [other bloc] should we join? They should propose the next step," Karapetyan told RFE/RL's Armenian Service.