Armenpress: ICRC calls for resumption of urgently needed humanitarian deliveries across Lachin Corridor

Chalian Meline

 11:27,

YEREVAN, AUGUST 19, ARMENPRESS. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has called on decision-makers to find a compromise and make it possible to resume urgently needed humanitarian deliveries to blockaded Nagorno-Karabakh.

“The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) remains the only humanitarian organization operating across the Lachin corridor to respond to growing humanitarian needs. The latest deliveries of medical supplies occurred July 7, while the latest delivery of food occurred June 14. The ICRC is urging decision-makers to find a compromise and make it possible to resume urgently needed humanitarian deliveries,” the ICRC said in a statement.

The Lachin Corridor, the only road connecting Nagorno-Karabakh to Armenia and the rest of the world, has been blocked by Azerbaijan since late 2022. The Azerbaijani blockade constitutes a gross violation of the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh ceasefire agreement, which established that the 5km-wide Lachin Corridor shall be under the control of Russian peacekeepers. Furthermore, on February 22, 2023 the United Nations’ highest court – the International Court of Justice (ICJ) – ordered Azerbaijan to “take all steps at its disposal” to ensure unimpeded movement of persons, vehicles and cargo along the Lachin Corridor in both directions.  Azerbaijan has been ignoring the order ever since. The ICJ reaffirmed its order on 6 July 2023.

Azerbaijan then illegally installed a checkpoint on Lachin Corridor. The blockade has led to shortages of essential products such as food and medication. Azerbaijan has also cut off gas and power supply into Nagorno Karabakh, with officials warning that Baku seeks to commit ethnic cleansing against Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh. Hospitals have suspended normal operations.

The Armenian diaspora of Madras

Karapet Navasardian
India – Aug 20 2023

 

In this series, we take a trip down memory lane, back to the Madras of the 1900s, as we unravel tales and secrets of the city through its most iconic personalities and episodes 

Venkatesh Ramakrishnan

CHENNAI: One of the oldest streets in the black town of Madras is named after a central Asian country. No wonder because the Armenians have contributed immensely to the growth of this city apart from many cities across the world too. For the unversed, there are Armenian streets in at least 50 cities across the world. Even today, Armenians are spread across the world outside Armenia, three times more than within their nation. 

This is a painful joke played by history on the landlocked country with its own rich heritage. Sandwiched between empires like the Ottoman Turks and Russia, Armenia was always easily accessible to the invaders. The knowledgeable lot of the Armenians left their motherland to seek their fortunes elsewhere.
Several times, Armenia vanished from the political maps, but the Armenian diaspora added wealth to the cities they settled in. 

They came here even before Madras was established. They were a thriving community in the Portuguese Santhome, 100 years before the foundation was laid for Fort St George. When Santhome started shriveling, they moved three miles north. Other Armenians started moving in mainly from Persia and the Philippines. 

As their people were spread across countries, this helped them set up a network that could not be rivalled by any other trading power. When the East India company loaded its goods onto a ship for England, the goods would take six months to reach the shores of Britain, crossing the cape of good hope. But a lot of the goods would be sent by the company through the Armenian land network. The list would reach the company headquarters a solid month before the ship with the goods docked. This prior information helped the company to find the best buyer for their goods and increased their profit manifold.

Armenians also lent to the company when there was a shortage of funds. It was their trading and the resultant taxes that enriched the city. Importantly, unlike the Portuguese or the Dutch they had no colonial ambitions and did not offer any competition to the company. Even in trade they carefully kept away the goods the company was dealing in. They were into jade, garnet, diamond and pepper trades. 

Soon they started emerging as the richest community in the town. Once, a group of Armenians decided that they would move back to Santhome and revive it as a trade centre. This frightened the company so much that they were given rights, equivalent to the Britishers and were ordered to stay back. 

One of the earliest Armenian printing presses was established in Madras in 1772. The first Armenian newspaper was also published here. The publisher- a deep patriot, printed a republican constitution for the Armenian nation when it became free.

The philanthropic nature of the Armenians is what makes their stay in Madras memorable. The most important Armenian citizen, who had a right to own property within the fort was Petrus Uscan. He built the Marmalong( Mambalam) bridge in Saidapet replacing an erstwhile causeway on the Adyar. The bridge has now been replaced though Uscan’s plaque remains. He also paved the steps for St Thomas Mount to enable pilgrims to climb to the church on it easily. 

But his help to madras was much bigger than all these munificence. When Marathas or Golconda Sultans wanted to invade Madras, Uscan was sent as an envoy seeking peace and negotiating a truce. The very survival of Madras today may have been due to his negotiation skills. 

As time went by, the company lost interest in trading and turned its attention towards conquest and tax farming. Armenians started moving towards greener pastures.

A road leading to the fort was named after the Armenians and their church was built there. 350 burial stones are in the garden of the church. Their separate burial ground was on the island. Because there are only a handful of Armenians today in Chennai, the church is only open for visitors. But every Sunday morning the bells from a three-storied bell tower ring and black town remembers a colourful memory of a tribe which enriched the city. — The writer is a historian and an author

https://www.dtnext.in/news/city/the-armenian-diaspora-of-madras-731016#bypass-sw

Karabakh: Peace is long overdue

Emil Lazarian
Jewish Journal
Aug 20 2023
In 2020, as a result of the second Karabakh war,  Azerbaijan liberated its territories from the occupation and immediately began the extraordinary task of rebuilding.

As a survivor of the Khojaly massacre, I have often said that the only thing worse than what I went through is to witness the denial of my experience, and the tragic experience of thousands of my friends, relatives and fellow citizens. Thankfully, in these times, the horrific tragedy I endured is universally recognized and the denial of it is universally condemned. 

Across 30 years of violent occupation, Armenia left a most unforgettable mark on Azerbaijan’s Karabakh region; including the ethnic cleansing and utter destruction of 900 Azerbaijani villages and 7 cities; altogether over 10,000 sq km of territory. Generations of Azerbaijanis from occupied territories, nearly 1 million people, have spent decades as internally displaced people (IDPs) while their hometowns were literally plundered & obliterated under Armenian occupation. 20,000 Azerbaijanis did not survive the brutal invasions of the early 1990s; including murdered women, children and the elderly. When Armenia invaded Karabakh, nothing was sacred and nobody was spared. 

In 2020, as a result of the second Karabakh war,  Azerbaijan liberated its territories from the occupation and immediately began the extraordinary task of rebuilding. The degree of devastation, across what was once the most beautiful region in the country, is nothing short of overwhelming. Since liberating Karabakh, Azerbaijan has already invested nearly 7 billion dollars toward reconstructing many of the destroyed cities and villages, all decimated under occupation. 

Azerbaijan’s proactive reconstruction is for the sake of the forcibly displaced, to honor and facilitate their right of return to their ancestral lands. Since 2020, over 1,000 Azerbaijani refugees have returned home; 10,000 more are projected to return before 2024.  

Horrifically, there are over 1 million landmines Armenian forces planted and scattered across the occupied territories during 30 years and during their withdrawal in 2020. Azerbaijan has been removing these precarious deathtraps since 2020, and has been doing it all alone, without much international assistance. These landmines, which have killed or seriously injured over 300 Azerbaijanis since the end of the 2020 war, present an enormous challenge for rebuilding the liberated areas and bringing back the forcibly displaced.

While Azerbaijan focuses on reconstruction, Armenia has spent the last 2.5 years since the war ended on efforts to disrupt and undermine the recovery and the long overdue peace they agreed to. Armenia has been misusing the Lachin Road, which connects Karabakh to Armenia, to smuggle in more landmines, weaponry, soldiers, and for other illegal activities. In order to end these illegal activities, which endanger peace and stability in the region, Azerbaijan was compelled to establish a checkpoint on its state border with Armenia on April 23, 2023. Nearly. 2,000 Armenians safely used this checkpoint to travel to and from Armenia till June 15, when Armenia fired at Azerbaijani border guards, seriously injuring one of them. Since then the checkpoint has been open for medical evacuations. Overall, more than 700 Armenian patients have been transferred by ICRC to Armenia via the Lachin Road since last December.

Azerbaijan has offered a much shorter road via the city of Aghdam to deliver all supplies to Karabakh Armenians. Regrettably, the Armenian side has installed concrete barriers on this road to prevent such deliveries. 

The refusal to utilize Aghdam, and the hoaxful, public accusations against Azerbaijan regarding a so-called blockade into Karabakh, further demonstrate Armenia’s priorities. Rather than abide by international law, and allow the transfer of aid to the Armenians of Karabakh, the Armenian side and its lobby groups in the West are spending millions on media campaigns and politicians decrying a “blockade”. The goal is to gain international sympathy toward the full opening of the Lachin Road without any control, and continue smuggling arms, soldiers and landmines into Azerbaijan’s sovereign territories. 

With so many challenges on the table, I am proud of my homeland for doing everything possible to make Karabakh a safe home for everyone, including ethnic Armenians.

I feel deeply privileged to witness the restoration of Azerbaijan’s Karabakh region to its stunning and thriving history and beauty, and to know that my own daughter and generations to come can live in peace and prosperity in our ancestral homeland. I’m hopeful that these efforts to demoralize and destroy our sovereignty and safety will end; that the nationalist and diaspora movements perpetuating violence and spending millions to resuscitate a lost and unlawful war, will change course, and choose peace. I believe the world will see through the games, and take a stand against the misuse of public trust, and demand Armenia truly engage in the peace process with Azerbaijan for the sake of reconciliation between our two people. Despite the bloody wars and conflict, I am certain Azerbaijanis and Armenians can once again live peacefully together. It’s time to make it a reality


“From Crisis to Catastrophe: Azerbaijan’s Blockade of Nagorno-Karabakh” – Richard Giragosian

Parkev Tvankchian
Aug 20 2023

The current situation in Nagorno-Karabakh is desperate and has descended from crisis to catastrophe. Faced with a blockade imposed by Azerbaijan back in December 2022, the Armenian population of Karabakh is forced to endure severe shortages of basic foodstuffs, critical medicine and other needed supplies. With reports of worsening conditions, and the first death directly attributed to starvation and malnutrition, the coming days and weeks will be critical.

Driven by the urgency of this challenging situation, Armenia has focused on diplomacy, forging the intervention of the UN Security Council and a forceful response by the international community.

Yet beyond the severe shortages of food, medicine and other staples of daily life, more recently, the siege has only triggered the dangerous curtailment of local emergency services, such as fire and police response, and an end to trash collection, which prompts concerns over a public health emergency in this hot summer season.

The Azerbaijani Strategy

From a broader perspective, Azerbaijan’s siege of the Armenian population in Karabakh is neither new nor unprecedented.

The Azerbaijani policy to retake Nagorno-Karabakh goes even beyond this weaponisation of food and has also been matched by the sporadic yet effective disruptions of gas supplies, interference with electricity and the enforced closure of the Lachin Corridor, the sole access for the Armenian population in and out of Karabakh.

More specifically, Azerbaijan’s reliance on siege warfare is only the latest move in Azerbaijan’s strategy to drive out the Armenian population from the region. This strategy has succeeded mainly due to increasing Azerbaijani strength and Russian weakness.

While around 2000 Russian peacekeepers, deployed in November 2020 as part of the fragile ceasefire that ended the second war for Karabakh, have yet to break the stalemate and enforce the terms of the truce, which promises free and unfettered access through the Lachin Cor

Armenian frustration with Russian inaction has prompted a perception of Russian complicity. This was most recently evident with the display of desperation by local Karabakh Armenians who blocked access to the Russian peacekeeping base. While the weakness of the Russian peacekeepers in the face of Azerbaijani aggression only encouraged escalation by Baku, the peacekeepers’ use of force was limited to dealing with the local Armenian population.

This was the case on 16 August when a Russian armoured personnel carrier was used to remove the protesters forcibly. And this was only the latest affirmation that Russian “peacekeepers” fail to keep any sense of “peace.”

In open defiance of Moscow, Azerbaijan exploits Russia’s inability to act. This weakness, mainly due to Russia being distracted and overwhelmed by its invasion of Ukraine, has triggered a degree of collaboration, with Russian peacekeepers unwilling to challenge the blockade.

Against that backdrop, Russia has become a severe challenge to Armenia as an unreliable security partner and provider. The unwillingness to counter Azerbaijan’s siege of Karabakh has shown Russia’s failure to fulfil even the most fundamental obligation to uphold the ceasefire agreement.

Thus, in diplomatic terms, Azerbaijan has already taken advantage of the situation by increasing pressure on Armenia and Karabakh. Azerbaijan’s strategy consists of more than simply taking advantage of the distraction presented by the war in Ukraine or increasing pressure on Armenia, however. It stands out as a bold defiance of Russia. In this context, Azerbaijan has become quite emboldened to challenge Russia. And bolstered by Turkish support, this Azerbaijani strategy is only likely to continue.

The Outlook for Diplomacy

After a series of concessions and compromises from Armenia, the post-war period has done little to foster security or forge stability. In fact, since the end of the war in November 2020, a dangerous precedent remains. That precedent is rooted in the seeming victory of the authoritarian states of Azerbaijan and Turkey over the struggling democracy of Armenia.

It is further distressing as an apparent validation of the force of arms over diplomacy. Such a “might make right” lesson also undermines European values and, if left unchallenged, legitimises using force as a military solution to an essentially diplomatic dispute.

The blockade of Nagorno-Karabakh also undermines the diplomatic negotiations underway between Armenia and Azerbaijan. These bilateral talks focus on a draft Armenia-Azerbaijan peace treaty.

Yet even with a peace treaty likely to be signed by the end of the year, any such treaty will be limited to bilateral, inter-state relations, with little real bearing on the status and no binding element on the security of Nagorno-Karabakh.

The core question, however, is what kind of peace and on what terms? Any possibility of a punitive peace, based on coercive diplomacy and maximalist posturing by Azerbaijan, does nothing to inspire confidence in future stability.

An additional concern stems from the lack of confidence in Azerbaijan to uphold the terms of such a peace treaty, making the “day after” any peace treaty a particularly significant worry. Instead, there needs to be much more done by the West to ensure a more durable and lasting peace after a treaty is concluded. And there must be a punitive price to pay for any violations of any such peace treaty.

What is Driving Azerbaijan’s Maximalist Posturing?

But the underlying motivation for Azerbaijan’s creation of the humanitarian catastrophe and aggressive threats stems from weakness, not strength, insecurity, and confidence. More specifically, the 2020 war for Karabakh was a dangerously incomplete “victory” for Azerbaijan.

Despite the unprecedented direct support from Turkey, Azerbaijan did not win enough militarily. By failing to retake Nagorno-Karabakh by force, Azerbaijan has relied on a steady escalation designed to threaten Armenia and isolate Karabakh.

An essential domestic political agenda drives Azerbaijan’s escalation and maximalist posturing in this context. This is evident in the very nature of the Azerbaijani regime, where the father-son Aliyev dynasty has ruled the country for over a quarter of a century.

And to distract from the lack of democracy and entrenched family corruption, the Azerbaijani leadership follows a classic authoritarian model of needing an enemy. The apparent lack of legitimacy makes Azerbaijan more dangerous, and its demands for concessions are insatiable, demonstrating that Azerbaijan is the primary obstacle to post-war peace and stability.

Arzakh (Nagorno-Karabakh): Warnings of genocide go unheeded

Aram Torosian
Italy – Aug 19 2023
19.08.23 – Bolzano, Göttingen 

The Associazione per i Popoli Minacciati (APM) ( Association for Threatened Peoples) reacted with dismay and anger to the news of the death of K. Hovhannisyan, 40, from Stepanakert in Arzakh. Arzakh Human Rights Ombudsman Gegham Stepanjan announced yesterday that Hovhannisyan had literally starved to death. He suffered from severe malnutrition and could no longer receive medical care. He thus became a victim of Azerbaijan’s eight-month-long blockade of the Lachin Corridor which was drastically tightened in mid-June 2023, cutting off the Armenian population of Arzakh from all supplies. Since the beginning of the blockade, human rights organisations, genocide researchers and currently also Luis Moreno Ocampo (first chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court 2003-2012) have warned of the consequences of the blockade in an expert opinion on international law. Ocampo confirms that the Armenian population of Arzakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) is at risk of genocide. The President of the Republic of Arzakh defines the situation as “genocide in a large concentration camp”. All of these warnings fell on deaf ears. We cannot stand by while more people die in Arzakh.

On several occasions, the Association for Threatened Peoples, together with other NGOs, has called on European politicians to initiate effective sanctions against Azerbaijan’s blockade, so that the International Court of Justice order of 22 February 2023 to lift this blockade is finally implemented. To date, however, these steps have not yet materialised.

The blockade of the Arzakh region, inhabited almost exclusively by people of Armenian ethnicity, has very serious existential consequences for all the approximately 120,000 inhabitants and now represents a real threat. Food is no longer available for 2,000 children under the age of 12 months. The number of premature births and miscarriages has tripled. A baby abortion was reported today as an ambulance was not available due to a lack of fuel. The consequences of the blockade are being felt especially in the health sector of Arzakh, affecting the most vulnerable groups such as children, pregnant women, the chronically ill and the elderly. Lack of food has led to malnutrition and starvation.

“A curious proposal on Karabakh”: a document attributed to Lavrov

Kajoyan Gevork
Aug 19 2023

  • JAMnews
  • Yerevan

Lavrov’s proposal on the rights of NK Armenians

Russia’s proposal to ensure the rights and security of the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh is being discussed in Armenia. The document was published by Tigran Petrosyan, head of the anti-crisis council under the president of the unrecognized NKR. He claims that Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov presented this proposal to his counterparts from Armenia and Azerbaijan on July 25, during a regular trilateral meeting.

Judging by the points of the published document, Armenian experts came to the conclusion that the head of the Russian Foreign Ministry “describes a scenario for ensuring the rights of NK Armenians as a national minority within Azerbaijan.” So far, it is not clear whether the head of the Russian Foreign Ministry really presented such a proposal. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Armenia did not refute, but did not confirm the published information either. “We have not received such a document through official channels,” the foreign minister of the unrecognized republic said the day before.

Armenian political scientists and politicians believe that “the leak was in the interests of the Artsakh authorities,” who wanted to declare in this way that they did not agree with this proposal.

Russia has repeatedly stated that it sees the future of the “former NKAR” as part of Azerbaijan. In March 2023, after meeting with his Armenian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov once again publicly stated this, drawing parallels with the rights of Kosovo Serbs. “About the same rights were stipulated ten years ago in an agreement between Belgrade and Pristina on the creation of a Serbian community in Kosovo: language, local self-government, education, culture, religion, special economic ties with Serbia. I think a similar package of rights is needed for the people of Karabakh,” he stressed.

  • “Waiting for a resolution”: details of the UN Security Council meeting at the request of Armenia
  • “A UN Security Council resolution without forceful support is ordinary paper.” View from Baku
  • Armenia appeals to UN Security Council on issue of blockade of NK. Experts on expectations

Tigran Petrosyan published a draft document allegedly discussed at the negotiating table on his Facebook page. He presented it as Lavrov’s proposal on the Karabakh issue. The document is entitled “Basic principles and parameters for ensuring the security and rights of the Armenian population in the territory of the former NKAO of the Azerbaijan SSR in accordance with the legislation of the Republic of Azerbaijan.” It consists of 14 items.

Petrosyan claims that the head of the Russian Foreign Ministry presented the document to the Armenian and Azerbaijani ministers during the July meeting.

The last trilateral meeting of the foreign ministers of Russia, Armenia and Azerbaijan took place on July 25 in Moscow. After a bilateral meeting with the Azerbaijani Foreign Minister, Lavrov said that a number of documents are being prepared for discussion by the leaders of the countries. However, he did not provide details about their content.

The document attributed to Lavrov refers to the “equal legal protection” of the Armenian population, “the exclusion of discrimination on ethnic, linguistic, religious or other grounds”, the prevention of “forced / involuntary resettlement” from their places of compact residence.

“Legislative prohibition of persecution, punishment or any restriction on the rights of representatives of the Armenian population under the pretext of their participation in local authorities and armed formations, excluding persons found guilty of war crimes in court,” reads one of the points of the draft.

The document contains clauses that the Armenian population should be proportionally represented in the republican and local structures of the legislative, executive and judicial authorities of Azerbaijan, including the prosecutor’s office and the police.

It also talks about providing guarantees to the Armenians of

  • free practice of one’s religion,
  • preservation of Armenian culture and identity,
  • receiving education in Armenian,
  • privacy
  • unimpeded receipt of economic and humanitarian aid from outside.
  • Relations between Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenia are also mentioned.

“Ensuring, on the basis of a separate agreement between the Republic of Armenia and the Republic of Azerbaijan, close cultural, educational, scientific, media, sports and other humanitarian contacts between the Armenian population in the territory of the former Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Region of the Azerbaijan SSR and the Republic of Armenia.”

It is noteworthy that the document was published on the day of the discussion of the issue of the situation in NK in the UN Security Council. Petrosyan said: “Today Putin has the opportunity to change his attitude and plans at the meeting of the UN Security Council.”

A group of local residents held a protest in front of the military base of Russian peacekeepers stationed in NK. They said that “all deaths will remain on Putin’s conscience”

The position presented in the document on ensuring the rights of Karabakh Armenians in the status of a national minority within Azerbaijan was declared by the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the unrecognized NKR to be divorced from reality. Sergey Ghazaryan believes that Baku’s policy does not give grounds for such an approach to any of the mediators:

“If any of the mediators had such hopes, then, seeing the results of the policy pursued by Azerbaijan, which deliberately dooms 120,000 people to starvation, when militant statements are heard from the Azerbaijani side every day, threats to use force, when the Armenian historical and cultural heritage is being destroyed , none of the mediators can have any reason to believe that this concept can be implemented.”

Since the middle of June, Azerbaijan has banned the delivery of not only food, but also humanitarian goods from Armenia. How people survive and what do they think about their future?

Political scientist Alexander Iskandaryan:

“Even if we assume that this is true, and such a text really exists, and that this is really a proposal from the Russian side, the main thing is missing there. Technologies are not described, how what is written will be guaranteed, how these points will be implemented, who will monitor and what mechanism will work. Without clarification of these issues, this text does not make much sense.“

International Relations and Security Specialist Sosi Tatikyan:

“Armenians are being given the status of a national minority with certain rights. This is a very low bar and cannot be accepted. This means that the central government of NK will be dissolved, instead, Artsakh Armenians will be offered quotas in Azerbaijani bodies.

The “separation for the sake of salvation” scenario is unrealistic, we cannot implement it. But instead, we should at least expect that the status of political rather than cultural autonomy will be granted, that Artsakh will be preserved as a territorial unit. If at one time the US and the EU gave Kosovo the highest status of secession, and then gradually of sovereignty, then they cannot now lower this bar to such a level in the event of a conflict that is most similar to it.

They should at least try to secure a status close to political autonomy for the Artsakh Armenians, which requires strong pressure on Azerbaijan. The US can and should think about imposing sanctions against Azerbaijan.”

Politician Arman Babajanyan:

“To submit such a document for discussion without a comprehensive understanding of the settlement of the Karabakh problem is simply unacceptable. In the issue of the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict, Moscow openly sided with Baku. Is Yerevan capable of such a strategic turn, when these actions of the Russian Federation will be evaluated and our actions will be equivalent to the behavior of the Russian Federation?

The leak occurred precisely on the part of the Artsakh authorities, clearly showing that Artsakh is not going to put up with this. This is a very important indicator. But not only do they disagree, political steps, actions, statements should follow.”

Former MP Gayane Abrahamyan:

“Does Lavrov believe that his proposal can be implemented at all? When he says that Armenians should not be discriminated against, which court will decide? Will an Azerbaijani judge have to decide that an Armenian worker has been discriminated against in any body? This is simply absurd, this is the most curious proposal that was on the negotiating table.

Another important question is whether peacekeeping forces will be here or not. This document does not address this issue in any way. It doesn’t even mention the November 9 [2020, ceasefire document in Karabakh signed by the leaders of Armenia, Azerbaijan and Russia]. There are two options: either they think that they will stay there and do not even see the need to mention it, or they really intend to leave.

Perhaps the goal is to further strengthen the Russian-Turkish monitoring mechanism operating in Agdam, perhaps they will be present there.

Since nothing is said about this, I assume that they are thinking about leaving so that there is only a Turkish presence. So that there is no international presence, peacekeeping forces or humanitarian organizations. This is a document about ethnic cleansing of Armenians or their expulsion from Artsakh.”

Lavrov’s proposal on the rights of NK Armenians JAMnews (jam-news.net)

Armenians see a new genocide taking place. Azerbaijan sees propaganda.

Vanyan Gary
Washington Post
Aug 18 2023

Analysis by Ishaan Tharoor

The firsthand accounts are harrowing. There’s no food on shelves in stores. Children stand for hours in bread lines to help feed their families. Mothers walk for miles in search of cooking oil and other provisions. Electricity, gas and water are in short supply. Ambulances can’t whir into motion for lack of fuel. Clinics report a surge in miscarriages in pregnant women who are malnourished, anemic and consumed by stress.

Such is the apparent state of the isolated and increasingly desperate ethnic Armenian enclave in Nagorno-Karabakh, whose 120,000 people are enduring what local authorities and a host of international experts describe as a blockade at the hands of Azerbaijan, the country within which the territory sits. Armenia and Azerbaijan have fought multiple wars over Nagorno-Karabakh after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the advent of their independent nation-states. Though recognized by the international community as part of Azerbaijan, Nagorno-Karabakh and some areas surrounding it have been governed for decades by a separatist ethnic Armenian entity.

For the entirety of this year, Azerbaijan has restricted movement along the Lachin corridor, the sole route connecting Armenia directly to the enclave, which Armenians refer to as Artsakh. The restrictions intensified this summer, with the International Committee of the Red Cross unable to deliver humanitarian assistance to the region and trucks with hundreds of tons of supplies stranded on the roads. The plight of the afflicted communities led Luis Moreno Ocampo, a former chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, to publish an opinion earlier this month determining that the conditions of starvation inflicted on the enclave’s ethnic Armenians was an act of genocide. He cited an article in the Genocide Convention that referred to “deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction.”


“The idea of genocide is not just about killing, but about removing people from the land,” Moreno Ocampo told me during a phone call this week. In his report, he wrote: “There are no crematories, and there are no machete attacks. Starvation is the invisible genocide weapon. Without immediate dramatic change, this group of Armenians will be destroyed in a few weeks.”


On Wednesday, the situation was discussed at an emergency session of the United Nations Security Council. Various officials, including U.S. ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield, called on Azerbaijan to “restore free movement through the corridor.” Armenian foreign minister Ararat Mirzoyan said the deprivation imposed on the enclave was a form of warfare that would lead to the “ethnic cleansing of the people of Nagorno-Karabakh.”

That sentiment was echoed in Washington by a handful of U.S. lawmakers. “Azerbaijan’s systematic ethnic cleansing of the people of Nagorno-Karabakh through a large-scale and unprovoked invasion is unconscionable,” Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) told me, referring to the territory seized by Azerbaijan during a lopsided six-week war in 2020 that saw thousands die. “Particularly egregious is their weaponization of the blockade to starve the people of Nagorno-Karabakh and block humanitarian assistance.”

Responding to these charges, Yashar Aliyev, Azerbaijan’s U.N. envoy, described talk of a blockade as “unfounded and groundless allegations” and said his government was subject to an Armenian “campaign” to “manipulate and mislead the international community.” Officials in Baku claim that the restrictions on movement along the Lachin corridor, which is supposed to be administered by Russian peacekeepers, are necessary to stop, among other things, the illicit supply of arms from Armenia into the enclave. They point to the intransigence of the de facto authorities in Nagorno-Karabakh, who have refused the delivery of supplies through an alternate eastern road from Azerbaijan.


“An administration of occupation is blocking the Azerbaijani government’s provision of food and medicine to an Azerbaijani region. Tellingly, nowhere in the Ocampo report is this mentioned,” wrote Hikmet Hajiyev, top foreign affairs adviser to Azerbaijan’s long-ruling President Ilham Aliyev. “Claiming they are under threat while engineering a crisis to galvanize the international community’s support is intended to convince the world that Azerbaijanis and Armenians cannot live together, as we once did.”


The impasse reflects the profound gulf between the two sides. Some analysts believe that Azerbaijan, wealthier and reinforced by Turkish and Israeli arms, is pressing its considerable advantage with the world distracted by the war in Ukraine to apply intolerable pressure on the separatist enclave in its midst. Armenia and Azerbaijan have been locked in rounds of negotiations over a lasting peace settlement that would normalize ties and find an acceptable accommodation over the status of Nagorno-Karabakh.


But the current crisis has highlighted the existential fears and deep-seated enmities felt on both sides. As Armenians around the world raised the alarm over the plight of blockaded Nagorno-Karabakh, Azerbaijani media focused on the discovery of a mass grave of Azerbaijani people in the city of Shusha, dating back to the battles of the 1990s and the area’s occupation by ethnic Armenian forces. The city was “liberated” by Azerbaijan in the brief 2020 war, which saw Baku’s forces seize significant swaths of territory captured by Armenian troops in the earlier phase of the conflict.

Now, some ethnic Armenians who fled Shusha — known to Armenians as Shushi — in 2020 find themselves in even more dire straits. One of those is Alvina Nersesyan, a resident of the enclave and mother, who briefed reporters on a virtual call organized by Armenian officials on Thursday. She described the “fearful” bread lines in Stepanakert, the enclave’s de facto capital, known in Azerbaijan as Khankendi, and lamented that she doesn’t “even say the words for sweets anymore,” lest she upset her deprived children who are “too small to understand the situation.”

The immediate hardships are recognized by diplomats elsewhere. “Access to food, medicine, baby formula and energy should never be held hostage,” Thomas-Greenfield said Wednesday. “We urge the government of Azerbaijan to restore free movement through the corridor.”

“U.S. officials believe that Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh are managing to survive only because of backyard gardens and other home-produced food,” wrote Post columnist David Ignatius. “They fear that within two months, as winter approaches, the population could face starvation. Armenians dread a repetition of the Ottoman genocide of 1915, an ever-present historical memory for Armenians around the world.”

Moreno Ocampo summoned that deep, bitter history, noting that hundreds of thousands of Armenians who perished more than a century ago were driven from their homes by Ottoman forces and left to die of hunger. “Starvation was the weapon of the genocide in 1915 and now Azerbaijan is using starvation against Armenians,” he told me. “It’s tragic but history is repeating, and that’s why humanity has to react.”

By Ishaan Tharoor

Ishaan Tharoor is a foreign affairs columnist at The Washington Post, where he authors the Today’s WorldView newsletter and column. In 2021, he won the Arthur Ross Media Award in Commentary from the American Academy of Diplomacy. He previously was a senior editor and correspondent at Time magazine, based first in Hong Kong and later in New York.



https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/08/18/nagorno-karabakh-azerbaijan-armenia-genocide-propaganda/

Nagorno-Karabakh blockade crisis: Choking of disputed region is a consequence of war and geopolitics

Arpi Talalian
The Conversation
Aug 18 2023
Nagorno-Karabakh blockade crisis: Choking of disputed region is a consequence of war and geopolitics

Wars have consequences – and they are drastically different for the winners and losers.

In the South Caucasus, a region far from most Americans’ attention, the democratic republic of Armenia lost a short but devastating war three years ago to Azerbaijan, its larger, richer neighbor.

That defeat is being felt hardest today by the increasingly desperate people of Nagorno-Karabakh. Known by Armenians as Artsakh, or “Black Garden,” the enclave – Armenian in population but within Azerbaijan territory – has been subjected to a devastating monthslong blockade that has prevented food and medical supplies reaching its 120,000 residents.

In the words of one former International Criminal Court prosecutor, what is occurring may amount to “genocide.” On Aug. 16, 2023, the U.N. Security Council held a special meeting after an appeal by the Armenian ambassador for the international community to act and help a region “on the verge of a full-fledged humanitarian catastrophe.”

As a long-time analyst of the history and politics of the South Caucasus, I see the fate of Nagorno-Karabakh being tied not just to its warring neighbors but to the geopolitical concerns of the two powers – one regional, the other global – that could best intervene. With Russia and the United States preoccupied elsewhere, the choking in Nagorno-Karabakh is being largely ignored.

The current crisis has been decades in the making.

Nagorno-Karabakh was the consequence of Soviet nationality policy that recognized the autonomy of the region in the early 1920s.

In the late 1980s, as the Soviet empire began to crumble, Armenians demanded that Nagorno-Karabakh be joined to its republic. Outraged by the Armenian demands and demonstrations, Azerbaijani pogroms of Armenians erupted in an industrial Azerbaijani town, Sumgait, far from Nagorno-Karabakh, and the capital, Baku, and ethnic cleansing followed on both sides.

The violence escalated into the First Karabakh War. A 1994 armistice brokered by Russia settled the issue for 26 years, with Armenia controlling the region. By then, Nagorno-Karabakh had declared independence, though no country – not even Armenia – formally recognized it. To much of the international community, the principle of territorial integrity favored the claims of Azerbaijan. Armenians countered with appeals to the principle of national self-determination for the region.

In those decades, Armenians invaded and expanded their hold over other parts of Azerbaijan, with about a million Azerbaijanis made to leave their homes and becoming displaced persons in their own country. Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of Armenians fled from Azerbaijan to avoid more violence from angry, embittered Azerbaijanis.

And there the frozen conflict remained, with neither side willing to make the necessary compromises to resolve their disputes.

But time favored Azerbaijan, with its oil riches and loyal ally Turkey supplying ever more sophisticated weapons. In 2020, the autocratic Azerbaijani leader Ilham Aliyev launched an attack on Armenian forces, prompting the Second Karabakh War. Aided by Turkish drones, Israeli weapons and Syrian mercenaries, Azerbaijani forces routed the Armenians. After 44 days of brutal bloodletting, the Armenian government of democratically elected Nikol Pashinyan was forced to agree to a cease-fire brokered by its powerful regional ally Russia.

But with Vladimir Putin’s Russia soon mired in its disastrous war in Ukraine, Azerbaijani forces repeatedly crossed the border into Armenia. And then in December 2022, Azerbaijanis blockaded the Lachin corridor, the only effective access road from Armenia to Nagorno-Karabakh. Disguised as an ecological protest against Armenian mining in the region, the blockade was understood by Armenians to be aimed at obliterating Nagorno-Karabakh and driving the last Armenians out of Azerbaijan.

The blockade has now lasted eight months, trapping Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh with dwindling supplies of food and medicine.

The immediate concern is the welfare of the Karabakh Armenians, but there are larger matters at play as well. At the moment when the United States and NATO frame their support for Ukraine as a struggle to preserve a fledgling democracy against an autocratic, expansionist Russia, Western powers do not appear to be willing to press as forcefully to prevent the repressive Aliyev regime from brutal policies that appear to be aimed at driving Armenians out of Nagorno-Karabkh.

Having just returned from a stay in Armenia, I can testify that the mood among Armenians appears far from despair. Their civil society is strong and vocal, and from my observance the country is displaying resilience and determination to overcome the consequences of the war. Pashinyan, the former journalist who led the 2018 revolution that ended with his election as prime minister, was overwhelmingly reelected after he had led the country through its catastrophic failure in the 2020 war. Having rejected the oligarchic rule of the former government, it appears clear that the nation is continuing along a democratic path.

But given Azerbaijan’s apparent ambitions, Armenians desperately require support from other nations. They live in a dangerous and hostile neighborhood, and their only close-at-hand supporter at the moment is Iran.

Plans are underway to build a north-south highway that will increase the flow of traffic and goods from India and Iran to Armenia and on to the West while bypassing Azerbaijan. But the United States frowns on that relationship with Tehran, as well as Armenia’s continuing, fraught connection with Russia.

Moreover, with the world concerned with consequential conflicts and disputes in other places – Ukraine, the South China Sea and Syria – Armenia appears irrelevant in the larger geopolitical calculations.

Yet it remains oddly significant, not only as an endangered democracy. Armenia is a small country around which relations between Turkey and Russia, Iran and the United States, Azerbaijan, Iran and Israel turn. Its fate is tied to larger issues of the building of new understandings of how the future strategic blocs of states will be formed.

Two global strategic visions are currently at play that affect the South Caucasus. As the United States struggles to maintain its role as a global superpower from the Pacific Ocean to Latin America to the Middle East and Europe, other powers – including Russia, China, India, Brazil and much of Africa – seriously question the role of the unique hegemony of the United States.

The nine countries of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and the five BRICS states – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa – are poised to reassess their positions in an international system that many hope will reflect a multipolar, and decidedly not unipolar, world.

Armenia is caught in the middle of all this, trying to stay afloat as greater powers compete for a place in the sun. The United States is far away and preoccupied with other problems. Russia is closer but bogged down in a wasteful war of its own choosing. And Azerbaijan and Turkey are on its borders.

Armenia’s fragile hope is that far away in New York, as the U.N. Security Council takes up its concerns, humane and democratic considerations will eclipse, at least for the near future, the greater tragic consequences of geopolitics.

https://theconversation.com/nagorno-karabakh-blockade-crisis-choking-of-disputed-region-is-a-consequence-of-war-and-geopolitics-211717

U.S. Ambassador visits Sanahin Monastery in Lori Province, Armenia

Jalatian Sonya

 11:43,

YEREVAN, AUGUST 19, ARMENPRESS. U.S. Ambassador to Armenia Kristina Kvien visited the Sanahin Monastery in the Lori Province to view ongoing preservation work in the complex, the U.S. Embassy in Armenia said in a statement on social media.

“Ambassador Kvien visited Sanahin Monastery in beautiful Lori to view ongoing preservation work on several elements of the complex, funded by the Ambassadors Fund for Cultural Preservation. While there she was also greeted by the Mayor of Alaverdi. The U.S. fund is supporting preservation of a group of Eastern monuments in the complex, including the St. Hakop Chapel, the memorial-khachkar of Grigor Tuteordi, and the St. Harutyun Church, and is being led by the Armenian Association of the Architects Restoring Historical Monuments NGO. The U.S. Embassy is proud to support conservation of this important site of Armenia’s rich history and cultural heritage,” the U.S. Embassy said.

French, Chinese foreign ministers discuss Nagorno-Karabakh

Maghakian Mike

 11:57,

YEREVAN, AUGUST 19, ARMENPRESS. French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna has discussed the situation in Nagorno-Karabakh with her Chinese counterpart Wang Yi during a phone call, according to the French foreign ministry.

A readout issued by the French foreign ministry said that Colonna and Yi discussed the situation in Nagorno-Karabakh, Ukraine and Niger, in addition to other issues pertaining to bilateral and multilateral cooperation.

The Lachin Corridor, the only road connecting Nagorno-Karabakh to Armenia and the rest of the world, has been blocked by Azerbaijan since late 2022. The Azerbaijani blockade constitutes a gross violation of the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh ceasefire agreement, which established that the 5km-wide Lachin Corridor shall be under the control of Russian peacekeepers. Furthermore, on February 22, 2023 the United Nations’ highest court – the International Court of Justice (ICJ) – ordered Azerbaijan to “take all steps at its disposal” to ensure unimpeded movement of persons, vehicles and cargo along the Lachin Corridor in both directions.  Azerbaijan has been ignoring the order ever since. The ICJ reaffirmed its order on 6 July 2023.

Azerbaijan then illegally installed a checkpoint on Lachin Corridor. The blockade has led to shortages of essential products such as food and medication. Azerbaijan has also cut off gas and power supply into Nagorno Karabakh, with officials warning that Baku seeks to commit ethnic cleansing against Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh. Hospitals have suspended normal operations.