27.06.2022 14:31
YEREVAN, June 27, /ARKA/. The Moscow Stock Exchange (MOEX) started today trading with the Uzbek sum, Armenian dram and South African Rand, Russian news agency TASS reported.
MOEX expects the move to expand the opportunities for professional market participants, including foreign partners.
Anadolu news agency reports that during the visit to the Kelbajar region, Ilham Aliyev stated that “if Yerevan continues the old tactic of dragging out dialogue with Azerbaijan, including on the issue of delimitation and demarcation of the border, then Armenia itself will eventually become the losing party.”
“Yerevan claimed that Azerbaijan would never be able to return its lands by force of arms. They hoped for the line of defense and engineering structures built during the 30 years of occupation. Besides, the terrain conditions were not on our side. But we destroyed this myth, demonstrating that willpower, the unity of the people and the authorities, as well as the patriotism of the military, is something that nothing can resist. Revanchists in Armenia must realize what they will have to face,” Aliyev said.
PanARMENIAN.Net – Azerbaijani Defense Minister Zakir Hasanov announced an increase in the number of soldiers serving in the country’s Armed Forces after the Second Karabakh War, Interfax.az reports.
Hasanov noted on Monday, June 27 that after the Second Karabakh War, Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev instructed the military to bring the country’s army to “a new level”.
According to him, Aliyev wants the Azerbaijani army to represent “a small-scale model of the Turkish Armed Forces”, as well as to provide the troops with the latest weapons and military equipment.
Also Monday, Aliyev said Baku has signed new contracts for the purchase of “the most modern weapons.”
Aliyev and Hasanov made the remarks during a visit to the Karvachar region, which came under Azerbaijani control during the Second Karabakh war.
Azerbaijan’s refusal to return the Armenian captives aims at discrediting the actions of Russian peacekeepers in Nagorno Karaabkh and along the Lachin corridor, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said during an online press conference today.
“I say this during meetings with our Russian counterparts, as well. I’m stressing this because more than 90 percent of our compatriots has been taken captive after the deployment of Russian peacekeepers and in the area of their responsibility,” PM Pashinyan said.
‘We continue to raise the issue on international platforms. We have filed cases with international courts and we will be consistent in our efforts to ensure that all captives are repatriated,” he added.
The Prime Minister stressed that Azerbaijan is trying to politicize humanitarian issues and make those a subject of political manipulation.
“This is an anti-humanitarian step, which also goes against the trilateral statement of November 9 and the civilized humanitarian logic, in general,” he added.
As for the number of Armenians kept in Azerbaijani captivity, PM Pashinyan said it’s necessary to distinguish between two groups.
He said in case of 38 people it has been confirmed that they are in Azerbaijan. The second list includes names of people, whose presence in Azerbaijan has not been confirmed.
The statements from Azerbaijan accusing Armenia of dragging out the start of negotiations on a peace treaty, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said at an online press conference today.
Without going into much detail, the Prime Minister noted that after those statements the Armenian Ministry of Foreign Affairs proposed the Azerbaijani side to arrange a meeting of the top diplomats so that they can reach agreement on the further course. It is yet to receive a response.
He reminded that during earlier meetings it was agreed that Armenian and Azerbaijani officials should keep in contact to organize the further work, but Azerbaijan has boycotted that work at least once.
He added that the Azerbaijani side refused to participate in the meeting on the level of the Secretary of Armenian Security Council and the Adviser to the President of Azerbaijan which was scheduled in Brussels today.
There is no alternative to the peace agenda, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said at an online press conference today.
He added, however, that the establishment of peace cannot be a unilateral agenda, it should be a reciprocal constructive process.
“The peace agenda has no alternative today, had no alternative yesterday and will have no alternative tomorrow, and we have been doing and will continue to do our best to open an era of peace for the Republic of Armenia and the region,” the Prime Minister said.
He noted that the alternative is a new war.
The Prime Minister added that Azerbaijan has repeatedly refused from meetings, at the same time accusing Armenia of refusing to talk.
“Why is it doing so? My assessment is that it pursues the aim of forming legitimacy for new war against Armenia,” Nikol Pashinyan stated.
“We have no illusions about Azerbaijan’s goals and intentions,” the Prime Minister said, noting that promoting the agenda of peace is an issue of principle for the Armenian authorities.
“I have said on many occasions that on this path we need strong nerves, balanced approach and maximal soberness,” he added.
The spouse of former Ukrainian Ambassador to Armenia Alexander Bozhko publically insulted Armenian opposition MP Gegham Nazaryan, who lost his son Abgar in the 2020 war in Artsakh.
Raisa Karagyozyan made a rude comment on Nazaryan’s Facebook post on Sunday.
“Our country is lacking two things. There is a great lack and need for two things. By saying the country, I mean the average citizen of Armenia,” the lawmaker wrote.
In her comment on the post, the Ukrainian diplomat’s wife questioned the Armenian nationality of the deputy.
“What kind of Armenian are you? You must be of Tatar-Mongolian descent. You are Chingizids, that’s why, having become a slave of Putin the Chingizid, you support Muscovites. Like Muscovites, you are also a descendant of Genghis Khan, I can see it from the photo,” she said.
Incidentally, the profile picture of Gegham Nazaryan’s Facebook page is not of him, but of his fallen son. Karagyozyan’s comments angered many users.
Artur Davtyan, an MP from Armenia’s ruling Civil Contract party, has tendered his resignation, the parliament said on Monday.
Under the Armenian law, the deputy is entitled to withdraw his resignation within one week. Otherwise, the parliament speaker will draw up a protocol on the official termination of his duties.
Armenia’s former Justice Minister Artak Zeynalyan, who has been nominated for a judge of the Administrative Chamber of the Court of Cassation, on Monday refused to comment on the scandalous audio recording involving the judicial watchdog head.
Ruben Vartazaryan, the dismissed SJC chairman, released last week a secretly recorded audio of his conversation with acting SJC head Gagik Jhangiryan, who can be heard warning Vartazaryan to resign or face criminal charges. The Investigative Committee is probing the audio scandal.
Opposition groups and activists have demanded Jhangiryan’s resignation and prosecution for illegal interference in the work of law-enforcement agencies.
“A legal process is underway and I, as a candidate for judgeship, cannot publically comment on it at this point,” Zeynalyan told reporters on Monday.
In response to the remark that he had not yet been elected to the post and could express his position, Zeynalyan stated that the rules of judicial ethics also apply to candidates.
He promised to act in full compliance with the law if elected.
Economist Suren Parsyan on Monday reacted to the closure of the Stepantsminda-Larsi highway, which connects Armenia and Russia via Georgia, due to damage caused by heavy rains.
“Various reports suggest that the road maintenance work may take 1-2 weeks,” he wrote on Facebook.
“Now is the most active period of agricultural exports, so even a few days of downtime will cause great damage to exporters and farmers.
“Amid the closure of the Upper Lars checkpoint, the devaluation of the dollar and the rise in fuel prices, exporters have already suffered great losses and will simply not sustain another blow; they will go bankrupt, also leading thousands of farms to bankruptcy,” the economist said.
He urged the Armenian government to immediately start talks with other regional countries to use an alternative temporary road.