Monday, January 8, 2024


French Ex-PM Quits Armenian Investment Fund


France -- Former Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin addresses journalists at 
Paris courthouse, 14Sep2011


Dominique de Villepin, a former French prime minister, has resigned from the 
governing board of an underperforming state fund tasked with attracting foreign 
investment in Armenia following a management overhaul initiated by the country’s 
government.

Villepin joined the Armenian National Interests Fund (ANIF) two months after it 
was set up by the government in May 2019. The ANIF said at the time that the 
appointment is part of its efforts to bring together a “world-class Board of 
Directors” that will help it achieve its goals. It attracted only one more board 
member, Italian investment banking consultant Isidoro Lucciola, however.

The fund’s track record has also been less than impressive. It claims to have 
attracted only $210 million in foreign direct investment in the Armenian economy 
over the last four-and-a-half years.

Over 95 percent of that money is due to be invested by an Abu Dhabi-based 
company contracted in 2021 to build Armenia’s first big solar power plant. The 
project appears to have fallen well behind schedule.

In a weekend statement, the ANIF announced that the Ministry of Economy 
appointed three new board members, all of them Armenian government officials, 
who promptly voted to fire the fund’s executive director, David Papazian. One of 
those officials, Deputy Economy Minister Ani Ispirian, also replaced Villepin as 
boar chairperson.

The statement gave no reason for these moves. It said that both Villepin, who 
had served as France’s prime minister from 2005-2007, and Lucciola resigned as 
board members “after this decision of the Ministry of Economy.” The two foreign 
members of the ANIF’s Investment Committee, Khaled Helioui and Michael Thompson, 
also tendered their resignations.

The Ministry of Economy has not yet commented on this personnel changes or the 
future of the ANIF’s operations.

The current Armenian government has attracted few large-scale Western 
investments despite claiming to have eliminated “systemic” corruption and 
created a level playing field for all businesses.

It has also helped to effectively disrupt a multimillion-dollar gold mining 
project launched by a British-American company, Lydian International, a decade 
ago. The company invested $370 million in the massive Amulsar gold deposit and 
planned to start mining operations there in late 2018.

Those plans were thwarted after several dozen environmental protesters started 
blocking all roads leading to Amulsar following the 2018 “velvet revolution” in 
the country. Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian’s government did not revoke Lydian’s 
mining licenses. But it also refrained from using force to end the blockade.

Lydian filed for bankruptcy protection in Canada in late 2019 before being 
restructured. Its new owners and Pashinian’s government reached in February 2023 
an agreement to revive the project. They said the company needs to raise $250 
million for finishing the construction of mining and smelting facilities at 
Amulsar and installing other equipment there.

In 2022, the government controversially rejected a $300 million bid by a 
consortium of French companies to build a big ski resort on the slopes of 
Armenia’s highest mountain, Aragats. It approved instead a more modest project 
proposed by an obscure Russian-Armenian businessman for the same location. The 
project has still not been implemented.




Armenia-Azerbaijan Talks Still In Limbo

        • Ruzanna Stepanian

Armenia - Sargis Khandanian attends a parliament session in Yerevan, September 
13, 2021.


Armenia has received no “concrete” proposal yet from Azerbaijan to hold direct 
negotiations at the border between the two countries, a senior Armenian lawmaker 
insisted on Monday.

Azerbaijan’s Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov said on December 28 that Baku has 
proposed such a meeting between him and his Armenian counterpart Ararat 
Mirzoyan. The Armenian government has still not publicly responded to Bayramov’s 
statement.

“I think that no such proposal with a concrete venue and date [of the meeting] 
has been made to Armenia yet,” Sargis Khandanian, the chairman of the Armenian 
parliament committee on foreign relations, told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service. “When 
there is such a proposal Armenia will decide whether to accept or reject it. We 
can’t regard public statements as concrete proposals.”

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken had been scheduled to host Bayramov and 
Mirzoyan in Washington on November 20 for further negotiations on an 
Armenian-Azerbaijani peace treaty. Baku cancelled the meeting in protest against 
what it called pro-Armenian statements made by a senior U.S. State Department 
official.

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev’s top foreign policy aide, Hikmet Hajiyev, 
said on December 19 that Washington must reconsider its “one-sided approach” to 
the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict before it can mediate more peace talks.

Louis Bono, a U.S. special envoy for the Armenia-Azerbaijan peace talks, was in 
Yerevan on Monday, meeting with Armen Grigorian, the secretary of Armenia’s 
Security Council. Grigorian’s office gave few details of their talks.

Hajiyev declared last week that Baku and Yerevan do not need third-party 
mediation in order to negotiate the peace treaty. “We are not against honest 
mediation in principle but prefer direct discussions,” he told a German 
newspaper.

Khandanian signaled that the Armenian side continues to prefer Western-mediated 
talks to direct contacts sought by Baku.

“We will be happy if any party, any mediator, who already has experience in 
organizing negotiations, initiates them,” he said.

Khandanian added that the success of the peace process depends on Aliyev 
agreeing to formalize the key parameters of the peace treaty on which he and 
Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian orally agreed during their 2022 and 2023 
meetings in Brussels. Those include mutual explicit recognition of each other’s 
borders.

Armenian analysts have suggested that Baku does not want Western mediation 
anymore because it is reluctant to sign the kind of agreement that would 
preclude Azerbaijani territorial claims to Armenia.

Yerevan has said, at least until now, that the two sides should use Soviet 
military maps printed in the 1970s as a basis for delimiting the 
Armenian-Azerbaijani border. Its position has been backed by the European Union 
but rejected by the Azerbaijani side.




Iran Reaffirms Opposition To ‘Geopolitical Changes’ In South Caucasus


Iran - Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanaani speaks in Tehran, 
August 11, 2022.


Iran reiterated its strong opposition to “geopolitical changes” in the South 
Caucasus on Monday after a Turkish government minister said that an 
extraterritorial corridor connecting Azerbaijan to its Nakhichevan exclave and 
Turkey through Armenia should be opened by 2029.

“We are making a lot of efforts to establish peace, stability, and security in 
the regional countries,” Nasser Kanaani, the Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman, 
was quoted by the official IRNA news agency as saying. “We emphasize that 
developing transit cooperation cannot be a basis for geopolitical changes and 
violation of the territorial integrity and national sovereignty of countries.”

Kanaani responded to weekend comments by Turkey’s Transport and Infrastructure 
Minister Abdulkadir Uraloglu about the so-called “Zangezur corridor.” Uraloglu 
said that Turkey and Azerbaijan are now building their respective sections of 
the highway and railway that would pass through Syunik, the sole Armenian 
province bordering Iran.

“The whole process of creating this corridor will take five years. So I think 
that we will complete all work in 2028,” he added, according to Turkish media.

Iran has repeatedly warned against attempts to strip it of the common border and 
transport links with Armenia. Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi reportedly told a 
visiting Azerbaijani official in October 2023 that the corridor sought by Baku 
is “resolutely opposed by Iran.”

The Islamic Republic’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei likewise made this 
clear to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan when they met in Tehran in 2022. 
Erdogan complained about Iran’s stance on the issue after visiting Baku a year 
later. He claimed that unlike Tehran, Yerevan does not object to the idea of the 
“Zangezur corridor.” The Armenian government has rejected the Azerbaijani and 
Turkish demands on numerous occasions.

A senior Azerbaijani official, Hikmet Hajiyev, said last October that the 
corridor “has lost its attractiveness for us” and that Baku is now planning to 
“do this with Iran instead.” But he appeared to backtrack on that statement in a 
newspaper interview published last week. Hajiyev said that the planned 
construction of a new road and railway connecting Azerbaijan to Nakhichevan via 
Iran does not mean that Azerbaijan has abandoned the idea of “Zangezur corridor.”

Hajiyev confirmed that Baku wants to make sure that people and cargos travelling 
to and from Nakhichevan are not checked by Armenian border guards or customs 
officers. He claimed that this would not violate Armenia’s territorial integrity.




Karabakh To Stay On Armenian Church Agenda


Armenia - Catholicos Garegin II leads Christmass mass at the St. Gregory the 
Illuminator Cathedral in Yerevan, January 6, 2024.


Catholicos Garegin II offered solace to Nagorno-Karabakh’s displaced residents 
at the weekend, saying that the Armenian Apostolic Church will continue to fight 
for their rights and will never forget their depopulated homeland.

The supreme head of the church also urged Armenians to close the ranks to 
counter “Azerbaijan's expansionist ambitions and encroachments” as he celebrated 
a Christmas mass at the Saint Gregory the Illuminator Cathedral in Yerevan.

“Let us eliminate artificially created gaps between us, let us live with love 
for each other so that the vineyards of our nation and homeland will be 
brightened with heavenly blessing,” he declared in his Christmas message read 
out during the liturgy boycotted by Armenia’s leadership.

Garegin said that those divisions, coupled with “complicated geopolitical 
events,” contributed to Azerbaijan’s September 2023 recapture of Karabakh that 
forced the region’s practically entire population to flee to Armenia.

“In such manner, Artsakh remained alone during the days of disasters. Armenians 
from Artsakh were forcibly displaced from their homeland and became homeless,” 
he said.

Garegin went on to praise the more than 120,000 Karabakh Armenian refugees for 
coping with their ordeal with “heroic and unbeatable spirit and dignity.”

NAGORNO-KARABAKH - Men examine a bomb crater near the Holy Savior Cathedral 
after shelling by Azerbaijan's forces in Shushi, October 29, 2020

“Artsakh will never become a past for us,” he said. “We will continue to cherish 
it in our hearts and souls, making every effort to protect the rights of Artsakh 
Armenians. Stay full of hope, God will provide you and give blessings for the 
hardships you have endured. You are not alone in your difficulties.”

The Catholicos similarly spoke of a “relentless pain of immense losses in our 
hearts” resulting from “the occupation and depopulation of Artsakh” in his New 
Year’s Eve speech which was controversially not aired by Armenian state 
television run by Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian’s loyalists. By contrast, 
Pashinian made no direct mention of the loss of Karabakh in his address to the 
nation.

Pashinian as well as members of his government and political team were again 
conspicuously absent from the Christmas mass, underscoring their discord with 
the Armenian Apostolic Church. The tensions rose further in October when Garegin 
blamed Pashinian for Azerbaijan’s September 19-20 military offensive in Karabakh.

The church earlier repeatedly condemned Pashinian for recognizing Azerbaijani 
sovereignty over Karabakh. The premier accused the church of meddling in 
politics in May 2023, prompting a scathing response from Garegin’s office.



Reposted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL
Copyright (c) 2024 Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty, Inc.
1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.

 

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Billionaire hedge-fund manager Bill Ackman spent months publicly pressuring
Harvard to cut ties with its embattled president, Claudine Gay. Mean-while,
a friend of his on Harvard's governing board was among a small group pushing
for change.

Tracy Palandjian is a member of the Harvard Corporation, the insular
12-person group with broad authority to manage the university. Though the
group stood by Gay-it accepted her resignation last Tuesday "with
sorrow"-Palandjian is one of a handful of its members who had privately
questioned whether she could continue as president, people familiar with the
matter said. Others who lost faith in her leadership included private-equity
executive Paul Finnegan and investor Timothy Barakett.

An alumnus of Harvard's economics program and its business school,
Palandjian, 52, is co-founder and CEO of Social Finance, a nonprofit that
raises money from investors for projects meant to reduce government
spending. Until December, she also sat on the board of Pershing Square
Holdings, the publicly traded arm of Ackman's investment firm.

The two met years ago through Harvard's alumni network. Palandjian launched
Social Finance in 2011, modeling it on a similar business her cofounders had
built in the U.K. Ackman's charitable foundation was one of its earliest
backers, contributing $1.5 million soon after it launched. His foundation
has given millions more in the years since.

After the New York Times reported in late December that Palandjian told a
group of academics that replacing Gay might not go far enough to get the
university back on track, Ackman tweeted a link to the article.

"Now that's the Tracy Palandjian I know," he said.

Palandjian joined the board of Ackman's publicly traded investment fund,
known for taking stakes in companies including Chipotle and Hilton, in 2021.

She was added to the Harvard Corporation in April 2022, after serving on the
board of overseers from 2012 to 2018. She was also part of the search
committees that selected former Harvard President Lawrence Bacow in 2018 and
Gay in 2022.

Ackman, a fellow Harvard alum, made his name as an activist investor before
morphing into a social crusader in recent years, mainly through lengthy
diatribes posted on his X account. He began zeroing in on Gay's handling of
antisemitism on campus soon after the Oct. 7 attack on Israel and sent a
handful of open letters that became increasingly critical of her leadership
when she was accused of plagiarism.

Ackman called Palandjian a handful of times to rant during his quest to get
Gay removed. He tweeted in early December one of his "friends" on the
Harvard board had ghosted him and that the two haven't spoken about Harvard
since early November, people familiar with the matter said.

While it isn't unusual for members of the corporation to be in contact with
other alumni and stakeholders, critics have accused Harvard of appeasing
wealthy donors like Ackman.

On Dec. 13, Pershing Square said Palandjian decided to retire from its
board, effective Jan. 1, because of increased demands of her work and other
board positions. Her departure was also to avoid conflicts as Ackman amped
up pressure on Gay to resign, people familiar with the matter said.

People who have worked closely with Palandjian say she is an expert
networker who is politically adept in the boardroom.

"She stays in a safe place until she understands where the chips are going
to fall," one of the people said. "She doesn't want to be on the losing side
of any discussion."

Another person said she tries to hear everyone out to best steer the group.

Palandjian was raised in Hong Kong and came to the U.S. as a teenager.

While an undergraduate at Harvard, she met her future husband, Leon
Palandjian, a doctor who worked and invested in life sciences before
becoming chief risk officer of his family's company, Intercontinental Real
Estate Corp.

Tracy Palandjian completed a stint at McKinsey & Co. before receiving an MBA
from Harvard Business School and working at asset manager Wellington
Management.

With the help of two fellow Harvard Business School alumni, she launched
Social Finance, which raises money from investors for social programs,
aiming to improve efficiency in government spending.


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