Friday,
Torture Allegations Against Armenia’s Top Investigator ‘Still Probed’
• Naira Bulghadarian
Armenia - The head of the Investigative Committee, Argishti Kyaramian, speaks
during a cabinet meeting in Yerevan, January 19, 2023.
The National Security Service (NSS) is still investigating allegations that the
head of another Armenian law-enforcement agency personally tortured four
criminal suspects during a separate inquiry, prosecutors said on Friday.
One of those suspects, Tigran Arakelian, publicly accused Argishti Kyaramian,
who runs the Investigative Committee, and the chief of the committee’s Yerevan
division, Azat Gevorgian, of beating him up in the latter’s office during his
initial, brief detention in June.
Kyaramian dismissed the“baseless” allegations before prosecutors ordered the NSS
to investigate them. His investigators brought more charges against Arakelian
and arrested him in July. It emerged around the same time the three other
suspects also claimed to have been ill-treated by Kyaramian in custody.
The Office of the Prosecutor-General said on Friday that the four-month NSS
probe is still not over. It did not explain why the security service is taking
so long to assess the veracity of the torture allegations.
Zhanna Aleksanian, a human rights activist, believes that the NSS and the
prosecutors were never serious about finding out the truth.
“The NSS knows all too well that it needs the green light [from Armenia’s
political leadership] to open a case against Kyaramian,” Aleksanian told
RFE/RL’s Armenian Service. “There is just no way they could state that he
tortured those people.”
Kyaramian, 32, is widely regarded as one of Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian’s
trusted lieutenants, having held five high-level positions in the Armenian
security apparatus and government since 2018.
All four arrested men are accused of blackmailing state officials and other
individuals on orders issued by Vartan Ghukasian, a controversial video blogger
thought to be based in the United States. The Investigative Committee charged
Ghukasian with extortion, calls for violence and contempt of court before a
Yerevan court issued in May an international arrest warrant for him. The blogger
nicknamed Dog denies the accusations.
Armenia Coy About Joining Multilateral Talks On Caucasus Peace
Armenia - The main government building in Yerevan's Republic Square decorated
and illuminated by Christmas lights, December 7, 2022.
Armenia is considering an Iranian invitation to a meeting of the foreign
ministers of the three South Caucasus states as well Iran, Russia and Turkey, a
senior Armenian official said on Friday.
The multilateral talks would be held within the framework of the so-called
“Consultative Regional Platform 3+3.” Deputy foreign ministers of all regional
states except Georgia formally created it at a December 2021 meeting in Moscow.
Georgia said at the time that it will not join the cooperation framework because
of its long-running conflict with Russia. No further meetings are known to have
been held in that format since then.
Some regional players, notably Iran, sought to revive the format after last
month’s Azerbaijani takeover of Nagorno-Karabakh. Iranian Foreign Minister
Hossein Amir-Abdollahian told a visiting senior Armenian official early this
month that it could be an effective mechanism for addressing security challenges
in the region. Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev predicted afterwards that the
six nations will hold more multilateral talks.
The Azerbaijani news agency Trend reported on Thursday that their foreign
ministers, including Armenia’s Ararat Mirzoyan, will meet in Tehran soon. The
Armenian Foreign Ministry did not confirm its participation. According to Deputy
Foreign Minister Vahan Kostanian, the Armenian government has not yet decided
whether to attend the meeting.
Amid its deepening rift with Moscow, Yerevan now appears to be putting the
emphasis on Western mediation of the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict. Prime
Minister Nikol Pashinian expressed hope earlier this week that he and Aliyev
will meet in Brussels again and finalize a bilateral peace treaty before the end
of this year.
Russia claims that the main goal of the U.S. and European Union peace efforts is
to drive it out of the South Caucasus. Iran also opposes the West’s involvement
in regional affairs.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov spoke with his Azerbaijani counterpart
Jeyhun Bayramov by phone on Friday. According to a Russian readout of the call,
they discussed, among other things, their countries’ “approaches to the
activities of the Consultative Regional Platform 3+3.”
Karabakh Leader Faces Protests In Yerevan
• Susan Badalian
Armenia - Samvel Shahramanian, the Karabakh president, addresses protesters
outside the Karabakh mission in Yerevan, .
Samvel Shahramanian, the exiled president of Nagorno-Karabakh, appeared to
backtrack on his decision to dissolve the unrecognized republic as he was
confronted by angry Karabakh refugees in Yerevan on Friday.
More than a hundred of them gathered outside Karabakh’s permanent representation
to Armenia in the morning to demand answers on Azerbaijan’s September 19-20
military offensive that allowed Baku to regain control over the region and
caused the mass exodus of its ethnic Armenian population.
The mainly male protests also sought explanations for Shahramanian’s September
28 decree which said that the self-proclaimed Nagorno-Karabakh Republic, set up
in September 1991, will cease to exist on January 1.
“No document can dissolve the republic created by the people,” Shahramanian told
the angry crowd when he emerged from the building. “I am going to publicly
explain this soon.”
Shahramanian said he signed the decree to stop the hostilities and enable the
Karabakh Armenians to safely flee their homeland.
“We saved the lives of our guys, we saved the lives of our civilian population
which was in danger. Had the war been stopped an hour later, they would have
entered the city [of Stepanakert] and slaughtered people,” the Karabakh leader
added in his first public comments made since the Azerbaijani assault.
The protesters were unconvinced. Some of them broke into the building shortly
afterwards, forcing Shahramanian to meet with them. The meeting did not satisfy
them either.
Armenia - Protesters storm the Karabakh mission in Yerevan, .
Shahramanian again emerged from his office early in the afternoon, condemning
the protesters’ “provocations” and urging them to disperse. The crowd did not
heed the appeal, continuing to block an adjacent street.
Some protesters stopped and vandalized a car that drove out of the Karabakh
mission’s compound later in the afternoon. They also brawled with people,
presumably Karabakh officials, sitting in the black SUV.
The chief of Shahramanian’s staff was reportedly injured in the violence. A
spokesman for the Armenian Interior Ministry said that four men were detained on
the spot.
Some Armenian opposition figures were quick to accuse Prime Minister Nikol
Pashinian of organizing the protest through other Karabakh leaders loyal to him.
They said Pashinian, who faced mass protests in Yerevan late last month, is thus
trying to deflect the blame for the fall of Karabakh. Pashinian’s political
allies have openly blamed the region’s current leadership, backed by the
Armenian opposition, for the Azerbaijani takeover of Karabakh and its almost
full depopulation.
Shahramanian was elected president by Karabakh lawmakers mostly critical of
Pashinian just ten days before the Azerbaijani offensive. His predecessor Arayik
Harutiunian, who was arrested by Azerbaijan after the assault, was thought to be
more loyal to Pashinian.
According to Armenian press reports, Shahramanian has tried in vain to meet with
Pashinian since joining more than 100,000 Karabakh Armenians in taking refuge in
Armenia.
EU Said To Expand Border Monitoring Mission In Armenia
• Heghine Buniatian
Armenia - European Union monitors patrol Armenia's border with Azerbaijan.
The European Union is planning to expand its monitoring mission deployed along
Armenia’s border with Azerbaijan in February, a senior European official said on
Friday.
The diplomat told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service that the EU will likely approve the
expansion in the coming weeks. He could not say how many additional monitors are
due to be sent to Armenia.
The mission currently consisting of 100 or so observers and experts was launched
at the request of the Armenian government and with the stated aim of preventing
or reducing ceasefire violations along the border. Russia, Armenia’s
increasingly estranged ally, has opposed it from the outset, saying that it is
part of broader U.S. and European Union efforts to drive Moscow out of the South
Caucasus.
The Azerbaijani takeover of Nagorno-Karabakh has raised more fears in Yerevan
that Azerbaijan will invade Armenia to open a land corridor to its Nakhichevan
exclave. Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian urged Western powers to prevent Baku
from “provoking a new war in the region” when he addressed the European
Parliament on Tuesday.
“We have made it very clear to President Aliyev and Azerbaijani representatives
that we are very concerned by any attempt to infringe on Armenia’s sovereignty
and territorial integrity,” said the diplomat. “This is something that we take
seriously.”
In his words, the EU is committed to “helping to strengthen Armenia” in addition
to continuing its efforts to broker a peace treaty between Armenia and
Azerbaijan.
The Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict is on the agenda of a meeting in Luxemburg of
the foreign ministers of EU member states scheduled for Monday. It will be
chaired by EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell.
Reposted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL
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