Category: 2023

https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Europe/2023/1005/Armenians-decry-use-of-Isra__;!!LIr3w8kk_Xxm!sZFH81hLvH5vovWejDq4IwfCb9XpwNltR1w1NrFPJLOkphsLZCtgv9i0Rr8DPyV48_zBLkqwVatEevEqHw$
 
eli-arms-in-Karabakh-invasion 


Weeks before invading Nagorno-Karabakh, Azerbaijan received weapons
shipments from Israel. Azerbaijan went on to recapture the region, causing
thousands to flee - and bringing Israel's national interests in the Caucasus
to light.

By Isabel Debre Associated Press
October 5, 2023
|
TEL AVIV
Israel has quietly helped fuel Azerbaijan's campaign to recapture
Nagorno-Karabakh, supplying powerful weapons to Azerbaijan ahead of its
lightning offensive last month that brought the ethnic Armenian enclave back
under its control, officials and experts say.

Just weeks before Azerbaijan launched its 24-hour assault on Sept. 19,
Azerbaijani military cargo planes repeatedly flew between a southern Israeli
airbase and an airfield near Nagorno-Karabakh, according to flight tracking
data and Armenian diplomats, even as Western governments were urging peace
talks.

The flights rattled Armenian officials in Yerevan, long wary of the
strategic alliance between Israel and Azerbaijan, and shined a light on
Israel's national interests in the restive region south of the Caucasus
Mountains.

"For us, it is a major concern that Israeli weapons have been firing at our
people," Arman Akopian, Armenia's ambassador to Israel, told The Associated
Press. In a flurry of diplomatic exchanges, Mr. Akopian said he expressed
alarm to Israeli politicians and lawmakers in recent weeks over Israeli
weapons shipments.

"I don't see why Israel should not be in the position to express at least
some concern about the fate of people being expelled from their homeland,"
he told the AP.

Israel has a big stake in Azerbaijan, which serves as a critical source of
oil and is a staunch ally against Israel's archenemy Iran. It is also a
lucrative customer of sophisticated arms.

 "There's no doubt about our position in support of Azerbaijan's defense,"
said Arkady Mil-man, Israel's former ambassador to Azerbaijan and current
senior researcher at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel
Aviv. "We have a strategic partnership to contain Iran."

Azerbaijan's September blitz involving heavy artillery, rocket launchers,
and drones - largely supplied by Israel and Turkey, according to experts -
forced Armenian separatist authorities to lay down their weapons and sit
down for talks on the future of the separatist region.

The Azerbaijani offensive killed over 200 Armenians in the enclave, the vast
majority of them fighters, and some 200 Azerbaijani troops, according to
officials.

There are ramifications beyond the volatile enclave of 4,400 square
kilometers (1,700 square miles). The fighting prompted over 100,000 people -
more than 80% of the enclave's ethnic Armenian residents - to flee in the
last two weeks. Azerbaijan has pledged to respect the rights of ethnic
Armenians.

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has termed the exodus "a direct act
of an ethnic cleansing." Azerbaijan's Foreign Ministry strongly rejected the
accusation, saying the departures are a "personal and individual decision
and [have] nothing to do with forced relocation."

Israel's foreign and defense ministries declined to comment on the use of
Israeli weapons in Nagorno-Karabakh or on Armenian concerns about its
military partnership with Azerbaijan. In July, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav
Gallant visited Baku, the Azerbaijan capital, where he praised the
countries' military cooperation and joint "fight against terrorism."

Although once resource-poor Israel now has plenty of natural gas off its
Mediterranean coast, Azerbaijan still supplies at least 40% of Israel's oil
needs, keeping cars and trucks on its roads. Israel turned to Baku's
offshore deposits in the late 1990s, creating an oil pipeline through the
Turkish transport hub of Ceyan that isolated Iran, which at the time
capitalized on oil flowing through its pipelines from Kazakhstan to world
markets.

Azerbaijan has long been suspicious of Iran, its fellow Shiite Muslim
neighbor on the Caspian Sea, and chafed at its support for Armenia, which is
Christian. Iran has accused Azerbaijan of hosting a base for Israeli
intelligence operations against it - a claim that Azerbaijan and Israel
deny.

"It's clear to us that Israel has an interest in keeping a military presence
in Azerbaijan, using its territory to observe Iran," Armenian diplomat
Tigran Balayan said.

Few have benefited more from the two countries' close relations than Israeli
military contractors. Experts estimate Israel supplied Azerbaijan with
nearly 70% of its arsenal between 2016 and 2020 - giving Azerbaijan an edge
against Armenia and boosting Israel's large defense industry.

 "Israeli arms have played a very significant role in allowing the
Azerbaijani army to reach its objectives," said Pieter Wezeman, senior
researcher at the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, which
tracks arms sales.

Israeli long-range missiles and exploding drones known as loitering
munitions have made up for Azerbaijan's small air force, Mr. Wezeman said,
even at times striking deep within Armenia itself. Meanwhile, Israeli
Barak-8 surface-to-air missiles have protected Azerbaijan's airspace in
shooting down missiles and drones, he added.

Just ahead of last month's offensive, the Azerbaijani defense ministry
announced the army conducted a missile test of Barak-8. Its developer,
Israel Aerospace Industries, declined to comment on Azerbaijan's use of its
air defense system and combat drones.

But Azerbaijan has raved about the success of Israeli drones in slicing
through the Armenian defenses and tipping the balance in the bloody six-week
war in 2020.

Its defense minister in 2016 called a combat drone manufactured by Israel's
Aeronautics Group "a nightmare for the Armenian army," which backed the
region's separatists during Azerbaijan's conflict with Nagorno-Karabakh that
year.

President Ilham Aliyev in 2021 - a year of deadly Azerbaijan-Armenian border
clashes - was captured on camera smiling as he stroked the small Israeli
suicide drone "Harop" during an arms showcase.

Israel has deployed similar suicide drones during deadly army raids against
Palestinian militants in the occupied West Bank.

"We're glad for this cooperation, it was quite supportive and quite
beneficial for defense," Azerbaijani's ambassador to Israel, Mukhtar
Mammadov told the AP, speaking generally about Israel's support for the
Azerbaijani military. "We're not hiding it."

At a crucial moment in early September - as diplomats scrambled to avert an
escalation - flight tracking data shows that Azerbaijani cargo planes began
to stream into Ovda, a military base in southern Israel with a
3,000-meter-long airstrip, known as the only airport in Israel that handles
the export of explosives.

The AP identified at least six flights operated by Azerbaijan's Silk Way
Airlines landing at Ovda airport between Sept. 1 and Sept. 17 from Baku,
according to aviation-tracking website FlightRadar24.com. Azerbaijan
launched its offensive two days later.

During those six days, the Russian-made Ilyushin Il-76 military transport
lingered on Ovda's tarmac for several hours before departing for either Baku
or Ganja, the country's second-largest city, just north of Nagorno-Karabakh.

In March, an investigation by the Haaretz newspaper said it had counted 92
Azerbaijani military cargo flights to Ovda airport from 2016-2020. Sudden
surges of flights coincided with upticks of fighting in Nagorno-Karabkh, it
found.

 "During the 2020 war, we saw flights every other day and now, again, we see
this intensity of flights leading up to the current conflict," said Akopian,
the Armenian ambassador. "It is clear to us what's happening."

Israel's defense ministry declined to comment on the flights. The
Azerbaijani ambassador, Mammadov, said he was aware of the reports but
declined to comment.

The decision to support an autocratic government against an ethnic and
religious minority has fueled a debate in Israel about the country's
permissive arms export policies. Of the top 10 arms manufacturers globally,
only Israel and Russia lack legal restrictions on weapons exports based on
human rights concerns.

"If anyone can identify with [Nagorno-Karabakh] Armenians' continuing fear
of ethnic cleansing it is the Jewish people," said Avidan Freedman, founder
of the Israeli advocacy group Yanshoof, which seeks to stop Israeli arms
sales to human rights violators. "We're not interested in becoming
accomplices."

This story was reported by The Associated Press

https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/the-monitors-view/2023/1004/Big-leaps-t__;!!LIr3w8kk_Xxm!tU6aF9EU86RS9o5X7UGYdmJgBFehaIJjmYL_IxaGd_SJRI6jJmVBeHV7twP0wE43LXjkXeXCCTqV7rhUGQ$
 
o-escape-Russia-s-orbit 



Armenia joins the International Criminal Court, the latest move among former
Soviet states to affirm civic principles different from the Kremlin's.

By the Monitor's Editorial Board
October 4, 2023

The Soviet Union, with its 15 states, collapsed more than three decades ago.
Yet for 14 of those states, the struggle to escape Russia's orbit and
autocratic ways continues. The latest example is Armenia. Its parliament
voted Tuesday to join the International Criminal Court, joining 123 other
nations and obligating Armenia to arrest Russian leader Vladimir Putin on
war crime charges if he sets foot in the country.

Like most former Soviet states, Armenia was shocked at last year's invasion
of Ukraine. It also saw how Russia, a treaty ally, failed last month to
prevent Azerbaijan from taking by force an ethnic Armenian enclave within
the recognized Azerbaijani border. Joining the International Criminal Court
is Armenia's way to deal with both events.

"Large parts of Armenian society, particularly young people, feel betrayed
by Moscow and will probably drift out of Russia's sphere of influence,"
writes Alexander Gabuev, director of the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center in
Berlin, in the Financial Times.

As former Soviet states keep making moves to distance themselves from
Moscow, Mr. Putin is becoming more isolated. In September, he was forced to
visit the pariah state of North Korea to ask for military aid. "The world is
getting smaller for the autocrat in the Kremlin," said Ursula von der Leyen,
president of the European Commission.

Since the Ukraine invasion, Moldova has beefed up its defenses against
Russian disinformation. In the Central Asian nation of Uzbekistan, many
parents worry that Russian-language schools will teach Kremlin propaganda.
Other countries in that region have sought to broaden ties with the West. In
New York last month, Joe Biden became the first American president to meet
the heads of state of the five Central Asian countries - Kazakhstan,
Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. Last year, many of
those states welcomed tens of thousands of young Russian men fleeing the
military draft.

In Kazakhstan, Russia's war in Ukraine "has been jarring for many Kazakhs,
including those whose first language is Russian," sociologist Azamat
Junisbai told The Beet news site. As a result, many Russian speakers in
Kazakhstan are learning the Kazakh language in a sign of civil loyalty.

"The Russian war of aggression against Ukraine showed how values of
democracy and civic engagement can unite people of different backgrounds and
overcome heavy colonial legacies," Botakoz Kassymbekova, a historian at the
University of Basel, told The Beet. "Kazakh Russians play a pivotal role in
post-colonial healing and a decolonized future, just as those who identify
themselves as Kazakhs do."

The responses to Russia's aggression vary in its borderland states. Yet
almost all are affirming an independence within even as they cope with a
threat without.

                                        Thursday, October 5, 2023


Putin Blames Yerevan For Azeri Takeover Of Karabakh

        • Aza Babayan

Russia - Russian President Vladimir Putin gestures while speaking at the annual 
meeting of the Valdai Discussion Club in Sochi, October 5, 2023.


Russia’s President Vladimir Putin on Thursday claimed that Russian peacekeepers 
could not have thwarted Azerbaijan’s September 19-20 military offensive in 
Nagorno-Karabakh and blamed it on Armenia’s recognition of Azerbaijani 
sovereignty over the region.

The Armenian government urged the peacekeepers to step in to protect Karabakh’s 
population hours after the start of the Azerbaijani assault. Russian officials 
ruled out such intervention, leading Yerevan to accuse Moscow of not honoring 
its obligations spelled out in a 2020 truce accord brokered by it.

“The peacekeepers only had the right to monitor the ceasefire regime,” Putin 
countered during an annual meeting of Russia’s Valdai Discussion Club.

He said that Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian sharply downgraded the 
status of the Russian peacekeeping contingent when he recognized Karabakh as 
part of Azerbaijan during Armenian-Azerbaijani summits organized by the European 
Union in October 2022 and May 2023. Pashinian’s moves legitimized Baku’s 
military action that led to the mass exodus of Karabakh’s ethnic Armenian 
population, he said.

“I learned about Armenia's recognition of Karabakh as part of Azerbaijan from 
the press, they did not inform us separately,” Putin added in another stern 
rebuke of the Armenian leader.

Other Russian officials as well as the Foreign Ministry in Moscow similarly 
pointed to Pashinian’s decision, denounced by the Armenian opposition, in the 
months leading up to the Azerbaijani takeover. They used it to try to justify 
the peacekeepers’ failure to reopen traffic through the Lachin corridor blocked 
by Azerbaijan last December.

Many in Armenia feel that the peacekeepers could have also prevented Azerbaijan 
from arresting about a dozen current and former leaders of Karabakh, who are now 
facing long prison sentences in Baku. The authorities in Stepanakert have long 
been known for their pro-Russian views.

Putin expressed hope that Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev will show clemency 
for the jailed Karabakh Armenian leaders “now that all territorial issues for 
Azerbaijan have been resolved.” But in another jibe at Pashinian, he suggested 
that the Armenian authorities “don’t quite want to see them in Yerevan.”




European Leaders Voice ‘Unwavering Support’ For Armenia


Spain - German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, French President Emmanuel Macron and 
Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian meet during an EU summit in Granada, 
October 5, 2023.


The leaders of the European Union and its key member states, France and Germany, 
expressed strong support for Armenia’s territorial integrity and promised more 
aid to refugees from Nagorno-Karabakh when they met with Prime Minister Nikol 
Pashinian on Thursday.

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev was also due to attend the meeting held on 
the sidelines of a European Union summit in the Spanish city of Granada. But he 
withdrew at the last minute, citing pro-Armenian statements made by French 
leaders and the rejection of his demands that Turkish President Recep Tayyip 
Erdogan be allowed to join the talks.

A senior aide to Aliyev said on Thursday that he is ready to hold a trilateral 
meeting with Pashinian as well as European Council President Charles Michel in 
Brussels “soon.”

A joint statement issued after the Granada talks said Michel, French President 
Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz “underlined their unwavering 
support to the independence, sovereignty, territorial integrity and 
inviolability of the borders of Armenia.”

“They also expressed their support to the strengthening of EU-Armenia relations, 
in all its dimensions, based on the needs of the Republic of Armenia. They 
agreed on the need to provide additional humanitarian assistance to Armenia as 
it faces the consequences of the recent mass displacement of Karabakh 
Armenians,” added the statement.

The EU allocated 5.2 million euros ($5.5 million) in humanitarian aid to the 
refugees shortly after the mass exodus of Karabakh’s ethnic Armenian population 
resulting from Azerbaijan’s September 19-20 offensive. Ursula von der Leyen, the 
head of the European Commission, said earlier on Thursday that the EU’s 
executive body will double that sum in addition to giving the Armenian 
government 15 million euros in “direct budgetary support.” Von der Leyen held a 
separate meeting with Pashinian in Granada.

Spain - Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian meets with European Commission 
President Ursula von der Leyen in Granada, October 5, 2023

The Azerbaijani takeover of Karabakh raised more fears in Yerevan that Baku will 
also attack Armenia to open an exterritorial land corridor to Azerbaijan’s 
Nakhichevan exclave. Michel, Macron and Scholz appeared to allude to such a 
possibility in their joint statement with Pashinian. It called for the “strict 
adherence to the principle of non-use of force and threat of use of force.”

Pashinian indicated on Wednesday that he and Aliyev were very close to signing 
in Granada a “framework document” laying out the key parameters of an 
Armenian-Azerbaijani peace treaty and the delimitation of the long border 
between the two South Caucasus states. He said he still hopes that it will be 
signed “at an opportune time.”

Baku and Yerevan have disagreed, at least until now, on the mechanism for the 
border delimitation. The Armenian side has insisted on using 1975 Soviet 
military maps for that purpose.

The European leaders clearly backed Yerevan’s stance during the Granada talks. 
Their joint statement cited the “urgent need to work towards border delimitation 
based on the most recent USSR General Staff maps that have been provided to the 
sides.”




Armenia’s First Foreign Intelligence Chief Named After ‘Training’

        • Naira Bulghadarian

Armenia - Human rights ombudswoman Kristine Grigorian attends a public 
discussion in Yerevan, March 2, 2022.


Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian has appointed Armenia’s former human rights 
ombudswoman, Kristine Grigorian, as the first head of a foreign intelligence 
agency formally set up by his government about a year ago.

Armenia already had intelligence services operating within its National Security 
Service (NSS) and military when the National Assembly approved last December the 
creation of the Foreign Intelligence Service (FIS). The NSS division is supposed 
to be fully replaced by the FIS within three years. The new agency directly 
subordinate to Pashinian has still not officially started its operations.

“The main task of the service is to forecast opportunities and external threats 
to the state and society and to provide political decision-makers with reliable, 
credible intelligence information about them,” Pashinian’s press secretary, 
Nazeli Baghdasarian told the Armenpress news agency following Grigorian’s 
appointment announced on Wednesday.

Grigorian unexpectedly resigned as ombudswoman in January after less than a year 
in office. She said at the time that she is planning to move on to another job.

The 42-year-old lawyer, who has never worked for security agencies before, has 
not been seen in public since then. A senior pro-government lawmaker, Gagik 
Melkonian confirmed rumors that she underwent relevant training before taking up 
her new post.

“He has been trained but I don’t know where,” Melkonian told the Hraparak daily. 
“She came back and got appointed.”

Citing another, unnamed source, the paper claimed that Grigorian was trained by 
“Western intelligence services.” It noted that the chief of Britain's foreign 
intelligence agency, Richard Moore, visited Yerevan and met with Pashinian just 
days before the Armenian government pushed a bill on the FIS through the 
parliament. U.S. Central Intelligence Agency Director William Burns visited 
Armenia in July 2022.

Grigorian could not be reached for comment, and nothing is known about the 
structure and size of her nascent agency. Nor have Pashinian and his political 
allies explained the choice of the FIS chief.

Grigorian’s appointment came amid mounting tensions between Armenia and Russia. 
The parliament controlled by Pashinian’s party added to those tensions on 
Tuesday when it approved a government proposal to ratify the founding treaty of 
an international court that issued an arrest warrant for Russian President 
Vladimir Putin in March. The move was condemned by Russia but welcomed by the 
European Union.




Former Defense Chief Vows To Fight For Pashinian’s Ouster

        • Ruzanna Stepanian

Armenia- Defense Minister Arshak Karapetian and Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian 
visit the Yerablur Military Pantheon, Yerevan, September 21, 2021.


Arshak Karapetian, a former Armenian defense minister and national security aide 
to Nikol Pashinian, has blamed him for the fall of Nagorno-Karabakh and pledged 
to fight for his removal from power.

In a surprise video message circulated late on Wednesday, Karapetian charged 
that Azerbaijan’s September 19-20 military offensive and resulting takeover of 
Karabakh were “made possible by the Armenian authorities’ cowardice and treason.”

The retired general also blamed them for Azerbaijan’s arrests of about a dozen 
former and current leaders of Karabakh, including Armenian-born billionaire 
Ruben Vardanyan. He alleged that Pashinian himself asked Baku to jail Vardanyan 
because he regards the latter as a formidable political opponent.

Karapetian branded Pashinian’s political team as “a bunch of cowards and 
amateurs” who have also put Armenia’s independence and territorial integrity at 
serious risk. He said he has therefore set up a “political movement to liberate 
Armenia from internal and external enemies.”

“In the near future, you will see and feel the seriousness of my intentions,” he 
said in what was his first public statement in almost two years. He gave no 
details of his planned push for regime change.

Karapetian, 57, had served as chief of Armenian military intelligence until 
being fired in 2016 by then President Serzh Sarkisian. Pashinian appointed him 
as his national security adviser shortly after coming to power in May 2018. The 
premier promoted him to the post of defense minister in August 2021 only to 
dismiss him three months later.

Armenia - Defense Minister Arshak Karapetian visits a disputed section of the 
Armenian-Azerbaijani border, November 17, 2021.

Karapetian claimed that he was sacked because he ordered the Armenian army to 
resist Azerbaijani attempts to seize more Armenian territory and visited 
Karabakh in his ministerial capacity.

The Armenian government did not react to the allegations on Thursday. Senior 
lawmakers from Pashinian’s Civil Contract party were likewise reluctant to 
comment on them at a news conference in Yerevan. Still, they made no secret of 
their contempt for the ex-minister who was for years thought to be a figure 
loyal to Pashinian.

“This question offends my common sense,” one of them, Arman Yeghoyan, said when 
asked for comment. He insisted that “nobody could be sacked for protecting 
Armenia’s borders.”

Another pro-government lawmaker, Artur Hovannisian, said that the Armenian media 
should not take Karapetian seriously because he has “offered his services to a 
concrete center.” It was not clear whether Hovannisian referred to Russia, whose 
relationship with Pashinian’s administration has been rapidly deteriorating.

In his Facebook video, Karapetian signaled support for Armenia’s continued close 
ties with Russia while effectively acknowledging the failure of the Russian 
peacekeeping mission in Karabakh.

“Together with our current authorities, the enemy is trying to redirect our 
national anger towards our Russian brothers,” he said before urging Moscow to 
“more resolutely counter attempts to destroy the Armenian people and our 
statehood.”

Significantly, Karapetian recorded and posted the same message in Russian. He 
did not clarify whether he is currently in Armenia.



Reposted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL
Copyright (c) 2023 Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty, Inc.
1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.