Ethnic cleansing in Nagorno-Karabakh and a jostling sea of powers

Edgar Tavakalian
Green Left
Oct 26 2023
Leo Earle 
Nagorno-Karabakh

In the course of just one week in late September, the entire population of ethnic Armenians fled Nagorno-Karabakh.

Azerbaijan launched a full-scale invasion of Nagorno Karabakh (also known as Artsakh) on September 19, bombing towns and villages. According to a statement issued by the Russian Socialist Movement (RSM), the invasion was carried out under the pretext of an “anti-terrorist operation”.

“Aliyev’s militarist regime has overtly fomented nationalist hysteria and prepared for a new war aimed at ethnic cleansing,” wrote RSM.

“[A]ccording to the Human Rights Ombudsman of the Republic of Artsakh, Gegham Stepanyan, 200 people were killed and 400 wounded,” including children, women and the elderly.

The invading force demanded the withdrawal of Armenian troops and the dissolution of Nagorno-Karabakh’s authorities.

After 24 hours of fighting, the region’s authorities laid down their arms and agreed to a Russian-brokered ceasefire. This precipitated an agreement to dissolve the region’s state institutions by the end of this year, and caused the mass exodus.

The Lachin corridor — the only highway connecting the territory of Artsakh/Nagorno Karabakh to Armenia — had been blockaded by Azerbaijan since December last year, leading to shortages of critical supplies. Gas supplies to Nagorno Karabakh were also suspended, threatening a humanitarian catastrophe.

This blockade and invasion follows the 2020 war, and continues a long, complex and violent history in the region.

These events represent a shifting hegemony in the region, and the diverging political economies of Armenia and Azerbaijan over the past 30 years. The conflict fuses imperialist power contests, the building of nation-states in the post-Soviet period and the ravenous competition for resources stirred by capitalist globalisation.

In Azerbaijan, the ruling Aliyev family has been in power since 1994, when former KGB officer and Azerbaijani SSR leader, Heydar Aliyev, took over. His son Ilham Aliyev came to power in 2003, and has cemented a longstanding authoritarian regime propped up by oil and gas revenues.

The power of the Azerbaijani state and its crony-capitalist political elites goes beyond its massive arms trades and security infrastructure, extending to offshore money laundering and the corruption of political elites globally.

New extractivist British-owned projects in Artsakh, in which the Aliyev’s have their own stakes, is characteristic of this complicated, but profit-driven pattern. As Sevinj Samadzade, writing in Jacobin, points out, “the pursuit of blockade, war, and control becomes a tool to serve its interests at the expense of the working class and broader society. The family’s authoritarian governance of the nation-state secures the population’s compliance for its stabilizing and overseeing capitalism.”

The ruling class of Armenia on the other hand, while also couching political and social discontent in nationalistic language, took the path of a “mild imitation democratic” regime, according to Dmitri Furman.

The first post-Soviet president of Armenia was removed by a bloodless military coup in 1998. The Robert Kocharyan (1998‒2008) and Serzh Sargsyan (2008‒18) presidencies tethered political legitimacy to a hard line on Nagorno-Karabakh, fuelling violence and serving to weaken legitimacy in the wake of recent events.

While the economies of the two countries after the First Nagorno-Karabakh War, (1988‒94) were more or less of equal size, the Azerbaijani economy today is 10 times that of Armenia’s. Azerbaijan, known as “the land of fire” for its immense oil resources, has attracted Western capital. Armenia on the other hand, has remained economically and diplomatically subjected to Russia.

I travelled to Armenia’s capital Yerevan in October last year, just after Russian President Vladimir Putin’s “mobilisation speech”, following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Accommodation was booked out, as 100,000 Russians had fled there since the invasion — making up 10% of a Yerevan’s one million population.

A vestige of historic Russian-Armenian ties, the Russians I spoke to in Yerevan felt much safer there than in neighbouring Georgia or Azerbaijan.

Russia’s stance proved crucial in the recent invasion of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Aliyev’s speeches have mentioned that “the status quo is dead” — his government’s new central idea for the resolution of the conflict — in other words, no autonomy for Nagorno-Karabakh.

Since 2020 Russia has supplied a “peace-keeping” force in Nagorno Karabakh. But its role and allegiance has shifted since its invasion of Ukraine. Its historic ally Armenia has drifted toward the West and Russia’s changing relationship with Turkey may have sent a signal to Turkey’s ally Azerbaijan that it had a green light to assert complete dominance over Nagorno-Karabakh.

As a result of weakening Russian power, the region is now embedded in layers of contradictory arrangements.

The Baku-Tblisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline and the Baku–Tbilisi–Erzurum natural gas pipeline — both comissioned in 2006 — pass through Turkey and Azerbaijan, but intentionally bypass Armenia, Russia and Iran.

In the context of the war in Ukraine, this has enabled Azerbaijan to present itself as a reliable supplier of energy to Europe. Last year the European Commission signed a deal for Azerbaijan to double its natural gas supply to the European Union over the next five years. Despite this, Azerbaijan augments its own exports with Russian gas, helping Putin circumnavigate sanctions.

On top of this, Azerbaijan’s contentious relationship with Iran has endeared it to Israel and Washington. Turkey has further propped up and supported Azerbaijan, and Aliyev’s long-demanded Zangezur corridor — which would connect it with Turkey and cut-off Armenia from its smaller border with Iran — is seeming increasingly likely.

The ongoing ethnic cleansing of Nagorno-Karabakh’s ethnic Armenians is now prompting action from Europe and the West.

In a resolution adopted on October 5, Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) condemned Azerbaijan’s attack on Nagorno-Karabakh and called for targeted sanctions against officials in Baku. MEPs said the attack “constitutes a gross violation of international law and human rights and a clear infringement of previous attempts to achieve a ceasefire”. The resolution said the current situation “amounts to ethnic cleansing” and called on “the EU and member states to immediately offer all necessary assistance to Armenia to deal with the influx of refugees … and the subsequent humanitarian crisis”.

However, with the entire ethnic population having fled, is it a case of too little too late, where immediate material interests have blinded diplomatic and humanitarian solutions?

https://www.greenleft.org.au/content/ethnic-cleansing-nagorno-karabakh-and-jostling-sea-powers

EU signs €10 million grant to support education opportunities in Armenia

Emma Jilavian
Oct 26 2023

The European Commission is to provide a grant of €10 million to improve education infrastructure in Armenia. The agreement was signed at the Global Gateway Forum in Brussels on 25 October, in the presence of Armenian President Vahagn Khachaturyan, by EU Commissioner for Enlargement and Neighbourhood Olivér Várhelyi and European Investment Bank (EIB) Vice-President Thomas Österos.

The project will see the construction of two extra-curricular education and teacher training centres in the municipalities of Kapan and Goris in the Syunik region in Southern Armenia. The centres will be operated by the Children of Armenia Fund (COAF) – a non-profit organisation dedicated to advancing educational opportunities and building infrastructure for children and families in rural Armenia.

The centres will provide after-school educational opportunities and access to services for children and young adults between the age of 6 and 18. Using a dedicated transport network, up to 6,000 students will get the opportunity to follow a curriculum covering subjects such as mechanics, programming, entrepreneurship, languages, arts, music, and athletics. In addition, students will have access to social workers, education counsellors, study trips and presentations from external experts and professionals.

The project, implemented through EIB Global, supports the flagship initiative ‘Investing in education, notably in the Syunik region’ for Armenia, under the European Union’s Economic and Investment Plan for the Eastern Partnership. It is also an integral part of the Team Europe Initiative on Resilient Syunik which aims to support the socio-economic resilience of the Southern region of Armenia, which has been most affected by the 2020 hostilities and the recent plight of mass displacement of Karabakh Armenians.  

“Today’s announcement is another proof of the EU’s commitment to Armenia’s reforms in education, to enhance its quality, modernisation and relevance to economy and society,” said Commissioner Várhelyi. “Education is a priority under the Economic and Investment Plan’s flagships for Armenia, and I am pleased to see that the construction of two non-formal education centres in the Syunik region will be a reality. This will ensure the quality of rural education and workforce development and prepare young people of Armenia, including vulnerable groups, to find appropriate jobs in a competitive job market.”

President Khachaturyan said the investment was an important step towards the realisation of the two non-formal education centres to be constructed in the Syunik region: “This can help to further strengthen the links between formal and non-formal education as the latter is an essential auxiliary to the former. Moreover, the construction of these smart centres in Syunik will contribute to a bigger goal of developing the southern regions of Armenia.”

The Global Gateway Forum in Brussels on 25-26 October for the first time brings together an assembly of government representatives from the European Union and across the globe, alongside key stakeholders from the private sector, civil society, thought leaders, financial institutions, and international organisations to promote global investment in transformative infrastructure.

Global Gateway is the EU’s positive offer to reduce the worldwide investment gap and boost smart, clean and secure connections in digital, energy and transport sectors, and to strengthen health, education and research systems. The Global Gateway strategy embodies a Team Europe approach that brings together the European Union, EU Member States, and European development finance institutions. Together, it aims to mobilise up to €300 billion in public and private investments from 2021 to 2027.

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Armenpress: Armenia needs to diversify security relations: Nikol Pashinyan

Ani Basmajian

 22:53, 25 October 2023

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 25, ARMENPRESS. Armenia should diversify its relations in the security sphere. Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan stated this in an interview with The Wall Street Journal reporter Yaroslav Trofimov, noting that in the case of aggressive actions by Azerbaijan against Armenia, the Collective Security Treaty Organization and Russia did not implement the actions described in the CSTO Charter and the agreement signed between Armenia and Russia

“In your speech to the European Parliament, you mentioned that you are disappointed with the behavior of some of your allies. Could you be more specific, what do you think your formal allies in the CSTO allies, particularly Russia, should have done differently, and what are your expectations from your Western partners?” asked The Wall Street Journal reporter.

“We are not talking about this for the first time and we have talked about the fact that in May 2021 and September 2022, Azerbaijan carried out aggressive actions against Armenia and occupied territories. The Collective Security Treaty and the Charter of the Collective Security Treaty Organization clearly state the actions to be taken when aggression against a member state occurs. What was described did not happen and, of course, it is disappointing for both the Armenian government and the Armenian public.

Also, we have a bilateral agreement with Russia in the field of security, and the actions described in that agreement also did not take place, which also raised very serious questions among both the Government and the public.

As for the relations with other partners, I will be more honest if I say that these situations, in fact, led us to a decision that we need to diversify our relations in the security sector. And we're trying to do that now,’’ answered PM Pashinyan.

 To the question that actually right now Armenia still has that agreement with Russia and there are Russian military bases in Armenia and whether Russia's military presence in Armenia is an asset or a liability, Nikol Pashinyan answered: “You know, at least at this moment I have already said that, unfortunately, we have not seen the advantages in the sidelines of the cases I have described.”

“Does this mean that you are planning to call that Russia withdraws its military bases from Armenia?” asked the correspondent.

“We are not discussing such a question. We are now more focused on discussing other issues, we are trying to understand what is the cause of such a situation, and of course, I also think that this will be the agenda of working discussions between Armenia and Russia, Armenia and the Collective Security Treaty Organization.’’

“Quite senior officials in Russia, including former President Medvedev, have used really insulting words against you and called for a coup against you or removing you from office. How did you respond to all this, and in your opinion, what are the reasons for this campaign against you in Russia?” asked Trofimov.

“You know, if I'm not mistaken, I didn't directly respond to that and I'm not going to respond publicly in addition to what I have already said. But it is also obvious that those facts you mentioned at least raise questions, and the answers to those questions must be found, because such an approach violates many rules, starting from not interfering in each other's internal affairs and diplomatic correctness and, of course, it also creates problems at personal dimension, because such a wording, such a language and such a position are incomprehensible for people who have worked with each other for quite a long time,” noted PM Pashinyan.

We should try to make our environment as manageable and predictable in terms of security, says Armenian PM

Ani Kharatian

 23:17, 25 October 2023

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 25, ARMENPRESS. Armenia's understanding of the security sphere, first of all, is based on the fact that we should try to make our environment as manageable and predictable as possible in terms of security. And Armenia, in turn, should be predictable for the environment. Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan stated this in an interview with Wall Street Journal reporter Yaroslav Trofimov

Answering the correspondent's following  question : "When you talk about diversifying your relationship, what do you mean by that, what can other countries do?" Do you expect the military presence of other partners, an American or French military base or maybe India? In practice, how do you see it?" Nikol Pashinyan answered: ''I want to say that we  do wrong when by security we mean only the army, only weapons, because, unfortunately, in many cases we see that there are countries that do not have a problem with weapons, but have a problem with security. And there are countries that have a weapon  problem but no security problem. Of course, it depends on many circumstances, environment, etc.

Now, our understanding of security is, first of all, based on the fact that we should try to make our environment as security-manageable and predictable as possible. And we have to be predictable for the environment. That is, the threats are generally mutual, and sometimes it is very difficult to find the starting point, because it is always a chicken and egg situation.

And sometimes there is no point in even looking for this starting point, because nothing changes from it. And when we talk about regulating our security relations, by regulating security relations we do not mean that we should bring weapons from other places and shoot at neighboring states. In this very area of security, we must shape relationships with our neighbors to build the right security relationships.

PM Pashinyan considered the delimitation of borders with Azerbaijan, mutual recognition of territorial integrity, rules for opening communications, all of them to be very important parts of the security policy.

‘’The approach according to which we must find allies somewhere, bring weapons to shoot at our neighbors, is not our approach. Of course, we have fears that our neighbors will shoot at us. But these concerns also need to be managed. But on the other hand, I think that any modern country should and has the right to have a modern army, has the right to develop its armed forces, has the right to meet its security needs. We think that security should not be ensured only by the army, but we also need to go for peace in the region…. By the way, in my speech in the European Parliament I said that we mean by  saying peace.

When we talk about peace, we mean that the borders of all countries in the region are open to each other on the same principles; we mean that these countries are connected by economic ties, connected by political dialogue and conversation, and connected by cultural ties. This is an important security component. Because it allows your opponent to understand you better, and it allows you to understand your opponent better. This is what makes it possible for mutual ties to be formed, and the security of your opponent to some extent becomes important for you, and your security also becomes important for your opponent, because otherwise economic risks, political risks may arise,'' said Nikol pashinyan.

''You talked about interconnectivity, which presumably also includes transit from Azerbaijan to Nakhichevan. The existing agreements call for the role of Russian FSB in controlling, managing this traffic. Do you think FSB should really play a role here, or can Armenia and Azerbaijan deal with this on their own, without Russia's involvement?'' asked Wall Street Journal reporter Yaroslav Trofimov.

''First of all, I would like to emphasize that there is no separate agenda regarding the connection between Azerbaijan and Nakhichevan. Such an agenda exists in the context of the opening of regional communications, when all regional communications must be opened. This is the second. Thirdly, it is not written anywhere that any body of the Russian Federation should have control over any territory of the Republic of Armenia. Nowhere is it written that the Republic of Armenia agrees for any limitation of its sovereign right. It is not written anywhere that any function assigned to the state institutions of the Republic of Armenia should be delegated to someone else. It is not written anywhere and it is not intended, there is no such thing that someone else should provide security in the territory of the Republic of Armenia. No such thing was written.

In general, after the failure of the peacekeeping contingent of the Russian Federation in Nagorno-Karabakh, many questions arise, and these questions are legitimate, because by saying failure I mean that it is a fact that the peacekeeping troops of the Russian Federation were unable or unwilling to ensure the safety of the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh. Very serious questions arise here, but on the other hand, there has never been any talk of restricting any sovereign right of the Republic of Armenia and there can be no such talk.

But on the other hand, I want to say that as I already said at the European Parliament, and as we already agreed at the last Brussels meeting and which was expressed in the July 15 statement of the President of the European Council, Charles Michel, the opening of regional communications should take place on the basis of countries' sovereignty and jurisdiction,'' Nikol Pashinyan answered.

As a result, should the western regions of Azerbaijan have a transport connection with Nakhichevan, including through the territory of Armenia? Yes of course. Can the Republic of Armenia use those same routes, for example, to provide a railway connection between its different parts? Yes of course: In that case, can Azerbaijan use the transport routes of Armenia for international trade? Yes of course. Should Armenia have the opportunity to use the roads of Azerbaijan for international trade? Yes of course. Should international trade participants have the opportunity to trade with Turkey, Iran, and Georgia through the territory of Armenia as a global trade route? Yes of course. And we make this proposal, we are ready for this solution and we call this proposal "Crossroads of Peace" and we invite all our partners to make this project a reality together.

Great efforts should be made so that the Armenians of Karabakh want to return there– PM

Arpi Talalian

 23:41, 25 October 2023

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 25, ARMENPRESS. Taking into account the fact of ethnic cleansing, starving people, in fact, forced displacement, very great efforts should be made so that the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh would have the desire to return there, if the possibility of this realistically exists.
Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan stated this in an interview with Wall Street Journal reporter Yaroslav Trofimov.
In response to the question about the future of 100,000 Armenians who had to leave Nagorno-Karabakh, Nikol Pashinyan answered: ‘’There is a short-term future, there is a medium-term future and there is a long-term future. In the short term, our task is to meet the most urgent needs of our compatriots who have become refugees. In the medium term we want them to have decent opportunities for living. Our approach is that if they do not have the opportunity or desire to return to Nagorno-Karabakh, we should do everything for them to stay, live, and create in the Republic of Armenia.’’
The Prime Minister noted: “Their future largely depends on what proposal Azerbaijan will make to them, or what position it will take, or what conditions Azerbaijan will create. And in this regard, will the international community encourage it and what will it support? Taking into account the fact of ethnic cleansing, starving people, in fact, forced displacement, very great efforts should be made so that the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh would have the desire to return there, if the possibility of this realistically exists.  There are questions that can even reach a dozen. The first is how realistically this possibility exists, and if it exists, to what extent people will trust this possibility? These are very serious and deep issues.

Armenia does not oppose its ideas of peace to the regional interests of peace: Armenian PM

Arpi Talalian

 23:59, 25 October 2023

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 25, ARMENPRESS. The Republic of Armenia can be peaceful if our region is peaceful. That's why Armenia does not oppose its ideas of peace in any way to the regional interests of peace and does not separate them from them. Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan stated this in an interview with Wall Street Journal reporter Yaroslav Trofimov.

Answering the correspondent’s following question: “The international environment has obviously changed in the last three years and in the war in Ukraine, Russia and the USA, together with its allies, are at opposite sides. In your opinion, how did Russia's invasion of Ukraine impact Armenia's security environment?” Nikol Pashinyan expressed his belief  that all the events taking place are interconnected by internal connections, including the 44-day war in Nagorno-Karabakh in 2020.

“ Of course those impacts are very direct and now in the modern world they are felt, visible and significant even thousands of kilometers away, but the events you mention are happening in our region, near our transport routes, or on our transport routes.

But also our reaction to the events is that our region needs peace, and we consider it important to pursue this policy consistently, because you see, there is a very important nuance that I mentioned again in my speech in the European Parliament, which sometimes can remain unnoticed, unrecorded. When we say that we have a peace agenda, the Republic of Armenia can be peaceful if our region is peaceful, there cannot be such a situation that our region is not peaceful, but the Republic of Armenia is peaceful. And for that reason, we do not oppose or separate our ideas of peace from the regional interests of peace in any way. And this is a very important wording, a very important feature that I would like to emphasize,’’ Pashinyan noted.

“If we look at the history of relations between the Armenian people and Russia over the centuries, this tension that we see now, I would not call it break necessarily, but maybe for many people the feeling of being betrayed, how historical is this tension?” asked Trofimov.

You know, if you emphasize the historical context, in that historical context I would not so much emphasize the relations between Armenia, the Armenian people and Russia, as I would emphasize the relations between Armenia and Turkey or between Armenia and the Turkish-speaking peoples of the region, or rather, Armenia's relations with Turkey and Azerbaijan. Here are all the questions and here are the answers to all the questions. And I bring forward this logic that we should work, first of all, to improve our relations in our region, with whom we have good relations, to make those relations better. We are talking about Georgia and the Islamic Republic of Iran. And with countries, with which we have strained relations or no relations at all,  we should create these relations and try to move forward step by step.

It is a very important circumstance and, frankly speaking, I do not have the answer to that question and I am trying to find the answer to the question what Armenia should do. It is very important to what extent we will be able to formulate regional interests, moreover, in this context, we can understand regional interests a little narrower and a little wider, in the context of the South Caucasus and in a wider context.

Much depends on to what extent we will be able to formulate regional interests, because when there are no formulated regional interests, tensions begin to arise between the interests of sovereign countries, which, if not managed, turn into escalations and wars. But the correct and competent way to manage these tensions is to have an understanding of regional interests, because you know, we cannot make all the countries and peoples of the region to be identical, with identical thinking, identical ideas, perceptions and so on, and there is no need to do that, because what becomes a cause of contradictions can sometimes become a cause of complementarity, not to mention that these cultures, histories, traditions can complement each other.

But it is necessary to find that formula of how to formulate and arrange them so that they do not collide, but complement one another.

In other words, it’s not so that we have defined the task but we cannot solve it, we just have not defined the task, that is, we still do not have the title. Now I think we should have that title and try to create content under that title. 

I cannot boast of the fact that we are doing this work in the region to a sufficient extent, but I think that if we stay within the framework of those agreements that are already known and about which I have spoken, the chances that something similar will happen will increase,'' the Prime Minister said.

Yan Girls to represent Armenia in Junior Eurovision 2023 Song Contest

Emil Lazarian

 10:01, 26 October 2023

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 26, ARMENPRESS. Yan Girls will represent Armenia in the "Junior Eurovision 2023" Song Contest with the song called "Do It My Way". Armenia’s entry for this year was chosen through a competition announced by the Public TV of Armenia.

In 2023, Nané, Nancy, Kamilla, Syuzanna, and Aida formed the group Yan Girls to participate in the Junior Eurovision Song Contest. Inspired by the legendary K-pop artists, Yan Girls brings the familiar sound to a completely new level with influences from traditional Armenian music elements. Young, colourful, rebellious and poppy, they sing about the importance of staying true to yourself, being confident and doing things the best way – their way. “Do It My Way” was composed by Tokionine, the lyrics are written by Maléna and Vahram Petrosyan – the same team behind JESC 2021 winning song “Qami Qami”. The music video is directed by Artur Manukyan.

Nancy is 11 years old. Most of all, she loves singing and painting and is fond of art. Her favourite music genre is Pop. Her favourite music artists are Iveta Mukuchyan, Aram MP3, Dua Lipa, Beyonce, Black Pink, and BTS. Her biggest dream was to represent Armenia in Junior Eurovision.

9-years-old Aida is passionate about singing and dancing. Her favourite music genres are K-pop and Hip-hop, with her favourite groups being BlackPink, Triple Charms, and BTS. In her free time, she loves surfing. She has many dreams – one being the lead actress in a movie, and the biggest one is having her own song and dance studio. 

Syuzanna is 10 years old. She sings, dances, plays piano, and does artistic gymnastics. Her best friend is her dog – the first to listen to all her songs.

Kamilla is 11 years old. She has played piano, and drums and has sung since the age of 4. She loves active games and puzzles. In her free time, she builds unique structures with Legos. Her favourite music genre is classical and contemporary pop music.

Nané is 11 years old. She loves to sing and dance and pose for the camera. Her hobby is painting, and she’s proud that some of her paintings have been parts of different exhibitions.

Armenpress: Eurowings to launch Yerevan-Berlin roundtrip flights

Arbi Tashjian

 11:21,

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 28, ARMENPRESS. Eurowings will launch Yerevan-Berlin roundtrip flights in May 2024, the Armenian Embassy in Germany has announced.

The embassy's discussions with Eurowings were conducted together with Berlin legislator Martin Petzold and   European and Armenian Professionals Association official Mikayel Minasyan, the Armenian Embassy said in a statement.

''Over the past few months, the Armenian Embassy in Germany, together with Member of the Berlin House of Representatives, Prof. Dr. Martin Petzold and European and Armenian Professionals Association official Mikayel Minasyan has had many discussions with Eurowings , aimed at including this route in the summer flight schedule.''

Flights can already be booked for May 31, 2024  at the following link: https://www.eurowings.com/de.html ։




Pashinyan congratulates Czech Prime Minister on National Day

Arpi Talalian

 11:40,

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 28, ARMENPRESS. Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has congratulated Prime Minister of the Czech Republic Petr Fiala on the Czech National Day.

"I warmly congratulate you on the national holiday of the Czech Republic,” PM Pashinyan said in a letter addressed to PM Fiala published by his office. “I am pleased to note the activation of interstate relations between Armenia and the Czech Republic in the current year. I fondly remember our meeting and constructive discussion within the framework of my official visit to the Czech Republic in May of this year. I highly appreciate the Czech Republic's support for democratic reforms in Armenia, as well as for the process of establishing and strengthening peace and stability in our region. Taking this opportunity, I wish new successes to you, and peace and prosperity to the friendly people of the Czech Republic,” the Armenian PM said.