Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan on Sunday signalled a major foreign policy shift away from Russia, following Moscow’s refusal to enter the latest conflict with Azerbaijani over the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region.

Pashinyan told the nation in a televised address that his former Soviet republic’s current foreign security alliances were “ineffective” and “insufficient”.

He added that Armenia should join the International Criminal Court (ICC) — a tribunal which has issued an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin over his actions in Ukraine.

“The systems of external security in which Armenia is involved are ineffective when it comes to the protection of our security and Armenia’s national interests,” Pashinyan said.

His address aired just days after Azerbaijan claimed full control over Nagorno-Karabakh after a lightning offensive that forced rebels in the ethnic Armenian territory to agree to disarm.

The separatists’ apparent capitulation could mark the end of a conflict between the Christian and Muslim Caucasus rivals that has raged — off and on — through the three decades since the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Armenia is a member of the Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO) — a Russian-dominated group comprised of six post-Soviet states.

The group pledges to protect other members that come under attack.

But Russia is bogged down in a war in Ukraine and has grown more isolated on the international stage.

It argued that Yerevan itself had recognised the disputed region as part of Azerbaijan, and refused to come to Armenia’s aid.

“It has become evident to all of us that the CSTO instruments and the instruments of the Armenian-Russian military-political cooperation are insufficient for protecting the external security of Armenia,” he said.

“We must transform and supplement the instruments of Armenia’s external and domestic security, in cooperation with all the partners who are ready for mutually beneficial steps,” Pashinyan said.

– ‘Respect our sovereignty’ –

Pashinyan’s address came after days of increasingly strong criticism in Moscow of what has been Russia’s main ally in the volatile Caucasus.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Saturday accused Armenia of “adding fuel to the fire” with its public rhetoric.

Moscow had earlier this month summoned Armenia’s ambassador following its decision to host US forces for small peacekeeping drills.

Russian state television commentators have been attacking Pashinyan and other Armenian leaders for their criticism of Moscow.

Pashinyan’s comments about the ICC threaten to generate particular anger in the Kremlin.

ICC judge Tomoko Akane issued an arrest warrant for Putin in March for the war crime of allegedly unlawfully deporting Ukrainian children.

Putin has avoided visiting other ICC member nations to avoid the possibility of arrest.

Pashinyan sent the Rome Statute — a founding document of the ICC — for parliamentary ratification earlier this month.

The Armenian leader said the ICC could help “ensure our security”.

“The decision is not directed against CSTO and the Russian Federation,” Pashinyan said of his desire to join the tribunal.

He concluded his address by calling “on our colleagues to respect out sovereignty”.

– ‘Aggravating tensions’ –

Independent Armenia analyst Beniamin Matevosyan said Pashinyan was “deliberately aggravating tensions with Russia”.

“He is openly telling Russia: if you don’t help keep Armenians in Karabakh, I’ll quit CSTO,” he said.

Matevosyan said the Nagorno-Karabakh supporters and people with roots in the region were leading the protests that have been simmering across Armenia in the past few days.

“He is afraid of the 120,000-strong mass of people (from Karabakh). He is seeing that so many Karabakhis are taking part in the street protests these days,” Matevosyan told AFP.

Pashinyan’s new diplomatic line is also running up against the hard reality that Russia still has a military base in the Armenian city of Gyumri that offers Moscow important geopolitical influence.

The base is believed to house 3,000 soldiers and has existed since World War II.

Armenia analyst Hakob Badalyan added that, in view of the war in Ukraine, Western powers may be unwilling to become more involved in the region.

“The West doesn’t want to assume the responsiblity,” Badalyan said. “It is telling Armenia: negotiate and make peace with (rivals) Turkey and Azerbaijan.”

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Saturday accused Armenia of “adding fuel to the fire” with its public rhetoric.

Moscow had earlier this month summoned Armenia’s ambassador following its decision to host US forces for small peacekeeping drills.

Russian state television commentators have been attacking Pashinyan and other Armenian leaders for their criticism of Moscow.

Pashinyan’s comments about the ICC threaten to generate particular anger in the Kremlin.

ICC judge Tomoko Akane issued an arrest warrant for Putin in March for the war crime of allegedly unlawfully deporting Ukrainian children.

Putin has avoided visiting other ICC member nations to avoid the possibility of arrest.

Pashinyan sent the Rome Statute — a founding document of the ICC — for parliamentary ratification earlier this month.

The Armenian leader said the ICC could help “ensure our security”.

“The decision is not directed against CSTO and the Russian Federation,” Pashinyan said of his desire to join the tribunal.

He concluded his address by calling “on our colleagues to respect out sovereignty”.

– ‘Aggravating tensions’ –

Independent Armenia analyst Beniamin Matevosyan said Pashinyan was “deliberately aggravating tensions with Russia”.

“He is openly telling Russia: if you don’t help keep Armenians in Karabakh, I’ll quit CSTO,” he said.

Matevosyan said the Nagorno-Karabakh supporters and people with roots in the region were leading the protests that have been simmering across Armenia in the past few days.

“He is afraid of the 120,000-strong mass of people (from Karabakh). He is seeing that so many Karabakhis are taking part in the street protests these days,” Matevosyan told AFP.

Pashinyan’s new diplomatic line is also running up against the hard reality that Russia still has a military base in the Armenian city of Gyumri that offers Moscow important geopolitical influence.

The base is believed to house 3,000 soldiers and has existed since World War II.

Armenia analyst Hakob Badalyan added that, in view of the war in Ukraine, Western powers may be unwilling to become more involved in the region.

“The West doesn’t want to assume the responsiblity,” Badalyan said. “It is telling Armenia: negotiate and make peace with (rivals) Turkey and Azerbaijan.”

Nagorno-Karabakh is internationally recognised as part of mostly Muslim Azerbaijan.

But its status has been under dispute for centuries.

(This story has not been edited by News18 staff and is published from a syndicated news agency feed – AFP)

The first group of Nagorno-Karabakh refugees since Azerbaijan’s lighting assault against the separatist region entered Armenia today, an AFP team at the border said.

The group of a few dozen people passed by Azerbaijani border guards before entering the Armenian village of Kornidzor, where they were registered by officials from Armenia’s foreign ministry.

The group was primarily comprised of women, children and the elderly.

Some said that they came from the border-area village of Eghtsahogh, while other said they travelled longer distances.

One man said that he had been part of the separatist resistance until Azerbaijan’s offensive forced the rebels on Wednesday to sue for peace and agree to disarm.

“Our families were in shelters,” said the man, who was in his 30s and came from the village of Mets Shen but did not give his name.

“Yesterday, we had to put down our rifles. So we left,” he said.

Meanwhile, Armenia has urged the United Nations to send a mission to ensure the safety of ethnic Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh.

Accusations of ethnic cleansing plans

For the second time since the swift Azerbaijani operation in the mountainous territory, the top diplomats of the adversaries clashed at the United Nations as Western powers voiced alarm.

Armenia has accused Turkish ally Azerbaijan of planning ethnic cleansing. It has stoked memories of mass killings in the waning days of the Ottoman Empire that Armenians, the US and many historians consider genocide.

“After failure of preventing genocide in Rwanda, the United Nations managed to create mechanisms for prevention, thus making the ‘never again’ a meaningful pledge,” Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan said.

“But today we are at the brink of another failure,” he said in a speech to the UN General Assembly.

He called for the United Nations to send a mission immediately to Nagorno-Karabakh to “monitor and assess the human rights, humanitarian and security situation on the ground”.

Azerbaijan’s foreign minister, Jeyhun Bayramov, had accused Armenia of disinformation when the two top diplomats joined a special Security Council session Thursday.

Yesterday, Mr Bayramov also spoke at the General Assembly and said that Azerbaijan, which is mostly Muslim, would respect the Armenians, who are Christian.

“I wish to reiterate that Azerbaijan is determined to reintegrate ethnic Armenian residents of the Karabakh region of Azerbaijan as equal citizens,” Mr Bayramov said.

“We continue to firmly believe that there is a historic opportunity for both Azerbaijan and Armenia to establish good neighbourly relations and coexist side by side in peace,” Mr Bayramov said.

US calls for protections

Russia, which sent peacekeepers after earlier violence in 2020, yesterday was supervising the disarmament of ethnic Armenian fighters.

If the surrender is completed, it could effectively end a conflict that has erupted periodically since the fall of the Soviet Union.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who had led three rounds of talks seeking a diplomatic solution, voiced “deep concern” for the ethnic Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh in a telephone call with Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan.

Mr Blinken told him that the US is pressing Azerbaijan “to protect civilians and uphold its obligations to respect the human rights and fundamental freedoms of the residents of Nagorno-Karabakh and to ensure its forces comply with international humanitarian law,” State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said.

Azerbaijan’s swift offensive, which killed some 200 people, has sparked protests in Armenia against Russia, which had been tasked with guaranteeing the truce after the 2020 fighting.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, speaking to reporters at the UN, accused Western powers of “pulling the strings” to undermine Moscow but also said: “Unfortunately, the leadership of Armenia from time to time adds fuel to the fire itself.”

Mr Lavrov pointed to one senior Armenian politician who said that Russian President Vladimir Putin had handed Nagorno-Karabakh over to Azerbaijan.

“It is ludicrous to accuse us of this,” Mr Lavrov said, while adding that he expected Armenians to maintain in Moscow’s orbit and not ally with “those who swoop in from abroad”.

A declaration signed in 1991 in Kazakhstan’s largest city Almaty, then known as Alma-Ata, stated that existing borders of newly independent countries that had been Soviet republics were inviolable.

The declaration “meant that Nagorno-Karabakh was part of Azerbaijan – pure and simple as that,” Mr Lavrov said.

While Azerbaijan has promised to safeguard human rights in Nagorno-Karabakh, ethnic Armenians left behind are fearing persecution.

Armenia on Sunday called for the deployment of a UN mission in Nagorno-Karabakh to monitor human rights and ensure the safety of ethnic Armenians in the region.

The call for a UN mission comes after Azerbaijan launched a military operation to take full control of the disputed enclave, forcing Armenian fighters there to surrender. A cease-fire deal was agreed on Wednesday.

Azerbaijan has said it is committed to protecting the rights of ethnic Armenians Nagorno-Karabakh. But fear of persecution is soaring high among the civilian population left behind in the breakaway region.

“The international community should undertake all the efforts for an immediate deployment of an interagency mission by the UN to Nagorno-Karabakh with the aim to monitor and assess the human rights, humanitarian and security situation on the ground,” Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan said in a speech to UN delegates in New York.

While speaking at the UN, Azerbaijan’s foreign minister said the government would continue with efforts towards “advancing post-conflict peace-building, reintegration, and peaceful coexistence.”

The flare up in the region has prompted a strong response from members of the UN Security Council who have condemned the military operation by Azerbaijan and called for peace.

Russia had been a traditional ally of Armenia, but their relations have deteriorated recently. Armenia also held military exercises with the US this month, angering Moscow.

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said on Sunday that his country’s current foreign security systems “ineffective,” a veiled criticism towards Russia.

“The systems of external security in which Armenia is involved are ineffective when it comes to the protection of our security and Armenia’s national interests,” Pashinyan said.

Russia had peacekeeping troops deployed in the region under a 2020 cease-fire agreement between Armenia and Azerbaijan, to prevent fresh violence from breaking out.

Moscow was also overlooking the disarmament of ethnic Armenian separatists.

The latest conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh left some 200 people dead, according to Armenia. It has also sparked protests in Armenia against Russia, which had been tasked with ensuring the truce after the 2020 fighting.

Dismissing its role in the conflict, Russia has instead accused Western leadership of “pulling the strings” to undermine Moscow. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that, “Unfortunately, the leadership of Armenia from time to time adds fuel to the fire itself.”

NEAR KORNIDZOR, Armenia, Sept 24 (Reuters) – Russian peacekeepers will escort the homeless families of Nagorno-Karabakh Armenians to Armenia if they want, the ethnic Armenian authorities of the breakaway region said on Sunday.

“We inform you that families who have become homeless as a result of recent military operations and who have expressed desire to leave the republic will be carried out by Russian peacekeepers,” the authorities said in a statement posted on Facebook.

“The government will soon provide information about the transfer of other population groups.”

The ethnic Armenian population in the breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region will leave for Armenia after Azerbaijan reclaimed the territory in a brief offensive, a local official says.

“Our people do not want to live as part of Azerbaijan. Ninety-nine point nine percent prefer to leave our historic lands,” David Babayan, an adviser to Samvel Shahramanyan, the president of the self-styled Republic of Artsakh, told Reuters. The region is known as Artsakh to Armenians.

“The fate of our poor people will go down in history as a disgrace and a shame for the Armenian people and for the whole civilized world,” Babayan said, adding that those responsible will have to answer before God.

Azerbaijan’s short offensive this week ended in a Russia-brokered ceasefire in which separatist Armenian fighters agreed to surrender and lay down their arms. The truce apparently marked the end of a conflict that has raged on and off for three decades.

Although internationally recognized as part of Azerbaijan, the landlocked mountainous region is home to 120,000 ethnic Armenians, who make up the majority of the population, and have created their own de facto government, rejecting Azerbaijani rule.

Azerbaijan says it will guarantee the rights of those living in the region. But Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and international experts have repeatedly warned of the risk of ethnic cleansing of Armenians in the enclave.

Babayan’s comments come as the first aid reached Nagorno-Karabkh Saturday since the ceasefire began.

The convoy consisted of nearly 70 metric tons of humanitarian supplies including wheat flour, salt, dried yeast and sunflower oil, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said in a statement on X, formerly known as Twitter.

The aid had been transported along the Lachin corridor, the only road connecting Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh, the ICRC said.

The road has been blockaded since December 2022 by Azerbaijan, making it inaccessible to civilian and commercial traffic.

The ICRC added that it carried out the medical evacuation of 17 people who were wounded during fighting and had delivered medical supplies and body bags as aid.

“Given the scale of humanitarian needs, we are increasing our presence there with specialized personnel in health, forensics, protection, and weapons contamination,” the ICRC said.

Russia – the traditional regional power broker – has delivered 50 tons of aid, including rations and basic necessities, to Stepanakert, the region’s capital, Russian state news agency RIA Novosti reported Saturday.

At least 200 people were killed and over 400 others wounded in Azerbaijan’s military operation, officials said.

US Senator Gary Peters, who is currently in Armenia leading a US Congressional Delegation, said he viewed the blockade at the Lachin corridor with the US ambassador to Armenia Kristina Kvien and governor of Armenia’s Syunik province, Robert Ghukasyan.

“I’ve talked to many people who are very concerned about their loved ones, families and what has happened to them,” Peters told reporters on Saturday.

“They know they have been suffering as a result of the blockade over many months, shortages of food, medical supplies, basic gasoline and petrol,” he added. “It’s a dire situation from what I have heard and I’m very concerned.”

KORNIDZOR, Armenia — The first convoys of civilians have left Nagorno-Karabakh for Armenia on Sunday following an Azerbaijani military offensive amid growing warnings that a mass exodus could be on the cards.

Humanitarian organizations and the Armenian government said that dozens of people had been evacuated after Azerbaijan agreed to open the Lachin Corridor that links the breakaway territory to the country. According to the Ministry of Health, the Red Cross escorted 23 ambulances carrying “seriously and very seriously wounded citizens of Nagorno-Karabakh.”

Meanwhile, other civilians say they had begged the Russian peacekeepers to take them across, after Karabakh Armenian leaders on Tuesday accepted a surrender agreement following just 24 hours of fierce fighting and shelling.

At a checkpoint near the village of Kornidzor, on the border with Azerbaijan, a steady stream of civilian cars is now crossing over — many laden down with bags or filled with loose bedding and other possessions.

On the border, POLITICO spoke to Artur, a Karabakh Armenian who had been stranded by the 9-month-long effective blockade of the region that preceded the fighting. Awaiting news of his relatives after Azerbaijani forces launched their offensive, he received a call from his sister to say she had been evacuated with the Russian peacekeepers.

After an hour of waiting anxiously, he was reunited with 27-year-old Rima. Sitting in the back of an SUV, she cried as her two children — aged three and one — unwrapped bars of chocolate, a luxury they have done without amid severe shortages of food and other essentials. “We’ve arrived,” she said.

Marut Vanyan, a local blogger, said many others were planning to follow suit. “People right now say everyone is leaving. In Stepanakert, there is no second opinion, everyone is trying to find a few liters of petrol and be ready any time, any second, for when we are going,” Vanyan said, speaking after being able to charge his telephone at a Red Cross station in Stepanakert, Nagorno-Karabakh’s de facto capital.

At an International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) emergency aid point in Kornidzor, the first village inside Armenia on the road from Nagorno-Karabakh, one elderly man asked the camera crews and journalists why they had only taken an interest once the situation reached crisis point. “Where were you when we were in Karabakh? You want to film? Here are my legs,” he said angrily, raising the ends of his trousers to reveal bandaged, bruised shins.

“This morning, an hour before we left, my husband called to say an evacuation was being organized,” said 32-year-old Karina Kafyan, one of the first to escape Nagorno-Karabakh. “The evacuation was starting in Berdadzor and Mets Shen villages in the Shushi region — whoever has  petrol or gas can leave. Now the whole village is waiting for a bus or car or anything to bring fuel so they can leave together as a village. There are maybe 120 people there.”

As night fell, a line of white medical vehicles, flanked by Red Cross vehicles bearing the large red cross, cut through the mountains toward the border city of Goris. At a hospital on the outskirts, lit up by blue flashing lights, a group of doctors, orderlies and police officers were there to meet the convoys, unloading stretchers and racing into the building.

“We have been able to facilitate the passage of 23 ambulances of the Ministry of Health of Armenia carrying 23 patients that were wounded in the recent hostilities,” Zara Amatuni, a spokeswoman for the International Committee of the Red Cross told POLITICO outside. “After Goris, they will probably be taken to other specialized clinics across Armenia,” she said.

“We’re now trying to have a clear assessment of the needs of people on the ground, but we do see the need for us to beef up our resources. As a neutral intermediary in touch with the relevant decision-makers on all sides, during the week we’ve been able to provide for some critical needs, including providing some very much needed medical supplies to the local hospitals, transfer of 26 wounded people from the battlefield to the local hospitals, and we’ve transferred the bodies of 30 people killed for dignified burials,” Amatuni said.

Figures collected by the government of Armenia and shared with POLITICO show 1,050 civilians have been registered as displaced after entering Armenia as of 10 p.m. Sunday. Officials stressed that the process is ongoing and many more are expected.

Armenia’s prime minister warned earlier that, despite assurances from Russia, “the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh still face the danger of ethnic cleansing.”

“If the needs of the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh are not met [so that they are able to stay] in their homes, and effective mechanisms of protection against ethnic cleansing not put in place, then the likelihood is increasing that the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh will see expulsion from their homeland as the only way out,” Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan predicted.

At the same time, Pashinyan said Armenia would welcome its “brothers” from the exclave — inside Azerbaijan’s internationally recognized borders but held by Nagorno-Karabakh’s ethnic Armenian population since a war that followed the fall of the Soviet Union.

The prime minister’s stark warning comes just two days after Pashinyan said he “assumed” Russia had taken responsibility for the fate of the population, after Karabakh Armenian leaders accepted a Moscow-brokered surrender agreement following almost 24 hours of fierce fighting with Azerbaijani forces. The embattled prime minister, however, said he believed there was a genuine hope that locals would be able to continue living in Nagorno-Karabakh.

Shortly after Pashinyan’s address, the official information center for the unrecognized Nagorno-Karabakh Republic issued a statement saying “the families of those left homeless as a result of recent military action and who expressed a desire to leave the republic will be transferred to Armenia accompanied by Russian peacekeepers.” Officials will provide information “about the relocation of other population groups in the near future,” according to the statement.

According to Azerbaijan’s foreign policy adviser, Hikmet Hajiyev, the government will “also respect the individual choices of residents.”

“It once again shows that allegations as if Azerbaijan blocked the roads for passage are not true,” Hajiyev told POLITICO. “They are enabled to use their private vehicles.”

Dozens of trucks carrying 150 tons of humanitarian aid, organized by the ICRC and the Russian Red Cross, gained rare access to the region via the Lachin Corridor, controlled by Azerbaijani troops on Saturday. Azerbaijan says the arrangement shows it is serious about “reintegrating” the Karabakh Armenians after their armed forces turn in their weapons and the unrecognized government disbands.

Azerbaijan has said the Karabakh Armenians can continue to live in the region if they lay down their weapons and accept being governed as part of the country.

However, in an interview with Reuters on Sunday, David Babayan, an adviser to the Karabakh Armenian leadership, said that “our people do not want to live as part of Azerbaijan. 99.9% [would] prefer to leave our historic lands.”

Accusing the international community of abandoning the estimated 100,000 residents of the besieged territory, Babayan declared that “the fate of our poor people will go down in history as a disgrace and a shame for the Armenian people and for the whole civilized world. Those responsible for our fate will one day have to answer before God for their sins,” he said.

Pashinyan has accused citizens with close ties to the Nagorno-Karabakh leadership of fomenting unrest in the country, with protesters clashing with police in the capital of Yerevan as criticism of his handling of the crisis grows.