Armenia achieved progress in judicial reforms – CoE official
News.am, October 07, 2014,https://news.am/eng/news/
President of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan on Tuesday received a delegation led by Nils Muižnieks, the Council of Europe (CoE) Commissioner for Human Rights.
The President stressed that Armenia underscores cooperation with the CoE and the latter’s assistance in the ongoing reforms in the country. In Sargsyan’s words, Armenia has also had productive cooperation with the institution of the CoE Commissioner for Human Rights. He expressed confidence that Muižnieks’ visit to Armenia will give new impetus to bilateral relations.
In turn, the CoE Commissioner for Human Rights noted that when coming to Armenia they had decided to focus on the country’s judicial reforms, gender equality, and domestic violence issues. Muižnieks stressed that he is pleased to learn that a progress has been achieved in these domains.
EU-Armenia Relations
Armenia and EU should create ground for cooperation: Dirk Lorenz
Armenpress.am, October 07, 2014, https://armenpress.am/eng/news/
The European Union respects the decision of the Republic of Armenia to join the Eurasian Economic Union. The Head of the Political, Economic, Press and Information Department of the EU delegation in Armenia Dirk Lorenz stated about it during the talk with the journalists.
“We respect the independent decision of the Republic of Armenia to join the Eurasian Economic Union and are ready to continue the cooperation in the directions, which do not hinder Armenia’s EEU membership”, - said Dirk Lorenz, Armenpress reports.
The Head of the Political, Economic, Press and Information Department of the EU delegation in Armenia stated that Armenia and the European Union should try to create legal ground for the further cooperation.
General News on Armenia
NATO-Armenia staff talks completed
Mediamax.am, October 07, 2014, https://www.mediamax.am/en/
On October 6-7, Yerevan hosted staff talks between the representatives of NATO Allied Joint Force Command and the Department on Defense Policy of the Armenian Defense Ministry.
The NATO Delegation arrived in Yerevan to support the Armed Forces of Armenia in the implementation of the objectives of Armenia-NATO Individual Partnership Action Plan.
The sides discussed progress made by the Armed Forces of Armenia within the Partnership for Peace program, the educational needs of Armenian Armed Forces in order to raise the interoperability with NATO Forces, outlined the main areas of cooperation for 2015-2016 and drew a roadmap of Armenia-NATO Individual Partnership and Cooperation Plan for 2015.
CIS Council of Heads of States to take place on October 10
Times.am, October 07, 2014, https://www.times.am/?p=96043&
On October 10 the CIS Council of Heads of States will take place in Minsk. Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan will participate in the meeting as well.
Accoridng to the official web-site of Kremlin, the CIS summit will focus on the development of multilateral cooperation in the economic, humanitarian and law enforcement areas. A number of corresponding agreements and decisions are being prepared for signing, as well as the Statement on Strengthening the International Drug Control System.
The leaders will approve an appeal to the peoples of the CIS member states and the global community in connection with the 70th anniversary of Victory in the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945.
Key Armenian Party Explains ‘Regime Change’ Tactic
Azatutyun.am, October 07, 2014, https://www.azatutyun.am/
Gagik Tsarukian’s Prosperous Armenia Party (BHK) and its opposition allies are concentrating on the prevention of sweeping constitutional changes in their joint effort to unseat President Serzh Sarkisian, a senior BHK figure said on Tuesday.
Stepan Markarian elaborated on BHK’s first-ever public endorsement of radical opposition calls for “regime change” in Armenia, which was voiced during a rally held in the northern city of Vanadzor on Monday.
“Regime change is about us being against amending the constitution in order to prevent the authorities from reproducing themselves,” Markarian told reporters. “We have always said that the government will be changed in Armenia. That’s what our constitution says.”
“We are dealing with a departing president. We are dealing with a government departing with the president. Even if nothing occurs the authorities will quit power,” he said.
Tax Circulation Law: Government to revise controversial provisions amid traders’ continuing protests
Tert.am, October 08, 2014, https://www.tert.am/en/news/
In response to fair vendors’ continuing protests against the new Tax Circulation Law, Armenian Prime Minister Hovik Abrahamyan has promised government efforts to revise several controversial provisions.
After a meeting with several protesting vendors on Monday, he issued an instruction asking the minister of finance to elaborate and submit to the parliament a new draft law.
But the measure is not found satisfactory, as vendors do not expect it to offer an exhaustive solution to the problem.
The controversial law, which went into effect on October 1, requires inventory and document circulation procedures for all small- and medium-sized businesses in Armenia.
Mikael Melkumyan of the opposition-leaning Prosperous Armenia party is of the opinion that the government efforts will be limited only to delaying the effective date of the relevant provision until February 1.
Armenia nuclear plant maintenance works will last until November 11
News.am, October 07, 2014, https://news.am/eng/news/
Energy and Natural Resources Minister Yervand Zakharyan on Tuesday visited the Armenian Nuclear Power Plant (ANPP), and got familiarized with the ongoing annual planned repairs and refueling at the plant.
The repair works at the ANPP got underway on September 27, and they will last 46 days.
In the minister’s words, the plant’s prophylactic repairs are progressing according to schedule.
“After opening the reactor, [however,] it was found out that it will be necessary to carry out additional work. [So,] we have invited corresponding specialists from the Russian Federation and the Czech Republic,” Zakharyan said after the tour of the plant.
General News on Karabakh
Armenian, French FMs discuss Karabakh settlement, forthcoming presidential meeting
Armradio.am, October 08, 2014, https://www.armradio.am/en/
On October 7 Armenian Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian had a meeting with his French counterpart Laurent Fabius.
The issue of settlement of the Karabakh issue was on the agenda. Hailing the constructive involvement of France and the other Minsk Group co-chairing countries in the process, Minister Nalbandian emphasized the importance of their joint efforts to solve the issue exceptionally in a peaceful way.
Edward Nalbandian and Laurent Fabius referred to the preparations for the meeting of the Armenian and Azerbaijani Presidents to be held in Paris later this month.
In this context Edward Nalbandian reiterated Armenia’s willingness to continue to work jointly with the Minsk Group Co-Chairs to reach a solution.
The Foreign Ministers of Armenia and France stressed the high level of bilateral political relations, enhanced by the frequent reciprocal visits.
The interlocutors discussed a number of issues on international and regional agenda.
Baku Places New Restriction on Conflict Zone Reporting
Asbarez.com, October 07, 2014, https://asbarez.com/127680/
Azerbaijani journalists who report from areas near front lines facing Armenian forces will be subjected to new restrictions, reports the Institute for War and Peace Reporting. The government of Azerbaijan says this is because reporters are getting things wrong and giving away state secrets, but critics of the move say it will silence attempts to find out what is going on in under-reported parts of Azerbaijan.
Plans for stricter regulation of the press were announced by President Ilham Aliyev in August, with an order to prevent confidential information on defense matters being published in the media, including the internet. He also called for the prosecution of anyone engaged in “leaking state secrets.”
Finally, he instructed the government to come up with new rules to govern the way journalists are given accreditation to report from front-line areas.
Aliyev’s instructions came after a sudden rise in violence in the Karabakh conflict zone. The increased level of violence seen this summer has since subsided, but it seems to have left the government in Baku much more concerned about controlling the flow of reporting and other information from frontier zones.
Azerbaijani saboteurs’ trial to commence in Karabakh
News.am, October 08, 2014, https://news.am/eng/news/
he investigation is completed in the case into Smbat Tsakanyan, 16, who was brutally killed by Azerbaijani saboteurs, and the case has been forwarded to the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic (NKR) capital city Stepanakert seat of the NKR First Instance General Jurisdiction Court.
The case already has been taken into consideration, but the trial date has not yet been set, the court informed Armenian News-NEWS.am.
“The judge is examining the case, and the trial date will be set in the future,” they stated.
Two persons are accused in this case; they are Azerbaijani saboteurs Dilham Askerov and Shahbaz Guliyev, who are facing numerous criminal charges.
CSTO Chief Visits Armenian-Azeri Border
Azatutyun.am, October 07, 2014, https://www.azatutyun.am/
The Russian head of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) paid a first-ever visit to Armenian army positions on the border with Azerbaijan on Tuesday more than two months after an upsurge in fighting in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict zone.
Accompanied by Armenian Defense Minister Seyran Ohanian, Nikolay Bordyuzha, the CSTO secretary general, met with Armenian soldiers guarding a section of the border with Azerbaijan’s Nakhichevan and inspected their dugouts and fortifications.
Photographs released by the Armenian Defense Ministry showed the two men looking through binoculars towards the Azerbaijani side of the frontier. A ministry statement said an Armenian army general briefed them on the situation in the area and “preemptive actions” taken by his troops against ceasefire violations.
News from International Sources
The Confusing Direction of the EEU
The Diplomat, October 07, 2014, https://thediplomat.com/2014/
The Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) still remains a few months from formalization, but a growing number of questions are being asked about the group’s growth and direction continue. Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova have oriented toward Brussels, while Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Azerbaijan continue to show scant interest in the Moscow-led grouping. Armenia and Kyrgyzstan stand as the only legitimate candidates for enlargement, with Tajikistan consciously remaining at a distance.
As such, instead of recruiting more states to join the would-be “geopolitical pole,” Moscow has turned toward another avenue for expansion: the unrecognized statelets dotting the post-Soviet landscape. While Transdnistria and South Ossetia have been largely quiet on the matter, Abkhazian politicians have made noises about joining the EEU. Likewise, representatives from “Novorossiya” – the fanciful name Russian-led separatists have given themselves in Ukraine – say they intend to join the union.
However, before Russia can rope these frozen conflicts further into Moscow’s fold, it must deal with a relatively unlikely obstacle – and it will have to deal with it quickly. During the May 29 summit in Astana, which saw the heads of Kazakhstan, Russia and Belarus sign the formal EEU documents, Kazakhstan President Nursultan Nazarbayev abruptly blocked Armenia’s planned promotion to full membership in the union. Citing a letter from Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev, Nazarbayev noted opposition to the proposal to accede Nagorno-Karabakh along with Armenia. Only states within their UN-recognized borders were to be allowed in, added Nazarbayev (Crimea notwithstanding, for reasons that remain unexplained).
The preacher refusing to give up the keys to a Yangon church
BBC.com, October 07, 2014, https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-
A recent Magazine article reported on the dwindling number of Armenians in Myanmar, also known as Burma. As Jonah Fisher reports from Yangon, the head of the Armenian Church has been to meet the local congregation and has made some changes.
To mark the visit of the head of the Armenian Church the garden was tidied, the fence re-painted, and one of Yangon's new heritage plaques erected outside.
It proudly states that at the age of 152, St John the Baptist's is "Yangon's oldest surviving church".
For most of those years Yerevan has had very little to do with this small remote outpost.
Now that's changing and Catholicos Karekin II came to Yangon to try to resolve a dispute over the management of the church and its property.
When the last full Armenian (both parents) in Myanmar died six years ago, effective control had passed into the hands of a man who had no connection with either Armenia or the Orthodox tradition.
A Letter from Stepanakert: A Weary Calm amid War-Footing
EurasiaNet.org, October 07, 2014, https://www.eurasianet.org/
In Stepanakert, the capital of Nagorno Karabakh, time marches on, even as the locals seem stuck in place.
Try as they might to lead normal lives, there is no escaping the conflict with Azerbaijan, now in its 26th year. Men in military uniforms are omnipresent and the physical reminders of war are inescapable. Stepanakert was pummelled by Azerbaijani shellfire during the hot phase of the conflict in the early 1990s, and although much of the city has been rebuilt, plenty of buildings still bear the scars of those bombardments.
…Not everyone is so accepting of the status quo. Vera Grigorian, who heads the Union of Relatives of the Artsakh War Missing in Action Soldiers (URAWMS), works to promote contacts with the mothers of missing Azerbaijani troops, hoping that such an initiative could one day help lead to a breakthrough in peace talks.
“We are all mothers together,” she told a EurasiaNet.org correspondent. “Neither the mothers, nor the soldiers caused the war; we didn’t want it.”
Grigorian’s son Spartak was captured and held as a POW. In 2009, the Red Cross filmed him in an Azerbaijani prison. The video suggested that he had recently been subjected to a severe beating; since then, there has been no information about him.
“He’d just gotten married three months before,” Grigorian said, speaking about her son’s capture. “His wife cried [and waited] for five years. I told her: “Go, start a new life, find a new husband and have children.” What can you do?” she sighed. In all, 239 Karabakhi soldiers remain officially listed as unaccounted for…
News on Turkey
UK Shifts Policy on Armenian Genocide after Jurist Robertson’s Report
Asbarez.com, October 07, 2014, https://asbarez.com/127656/uk-
Geoffrey Robertson, prominent British expert on international law, wrote a 40-page report in 2009, exposing the false and inaccurate statements on the Armenian Genocide by the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO).
Robertson’s investigative report, “Was there an Armenian Genocide?” was based on internal British documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, which revealed that the Foreign Office had denied the Armenian Genocide and misled the British Parliament on this matter in order to curry favor with Turkey.
Mr. Robertson had sent me an advance copy of his new 286-page book, “An Inconvenient Genocide: Who Now Remembers the Armenians?” to be published this month in the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, and the United States. Anyone who reads this influential jurist’s meticulously researched book will have no doubt about the true facts of the Genocide and Armenians’ just claims for restitution.
The confidential FCO documents recently obtained by Robertson reveal that the British government has made a gradual shift in its position on the Armenian Genocide, going from denial to declining to state its position. The Foreign Office acknowledges that the change in governmental policy is a direct result of the powerful legal arguments advanced by Mr. Robertson in his 2009 report.
At least 12 dead in Turkey as fate of Kobani stirs up tensions
Todayszaman.com, October 08, 2014, https://www.todayszaman.com/
At least 12 people died on Tuesday during violent clashes across Turkey, local media reported, as the fate of the besieged Syrian border town of Kobani stirred up decades of tensions with Turkey's Kurds.
Violence erupted in Turkish towns and cities mainly in the Kurdish southeastern provinces, as protesters took to the streets to demand the government do more to protect Kobani, a predominantly Kurdish settlement which has been surrounded by Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) fighters for three weeks.
Authorities imposed curfews in at least five provinces, police fired tear gas and water cannon to disperse demonstrators who burnt cars and tyres, whilst groups linked to the terrorist Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) clashed with ISIL sympathizers, authorities said.
Eight people died in Diyabakır, the largest Kurdish city in the southeast, DHA News agency reported, citing a senior police officer. Several others died in the eastern provinces of Muş, Siirt and Batman in clashes between police and protesters.
İstanbul Govenor's Office said 98 people were detained in "illegal protests" across the country's biggest city, and 30 people were wounded, including eight police officers.
UN's Syria envoy calls for international action to defend Kobane
Harriyetdailynews.com, October 08, 2014,https://www.
The international community should immediately act to defend the besieged Syrian town of Kobane from the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) militants, the U.N.'s envoy to Syria said on Oct. 8.
"The world, all of us, will regret deeply if ISIS (another name for the ISIL) is able to take over a city which has defended itself with courage but is close to not being able to do so. We need to act now," Staffan de Mistura said in a statement.
"The international community needs to defend them. The international community cannot sustain another city falling under ISIS," he insisted.
His comments came as Turkey and analysts warned ISIL was on the verge of seizing control of the strategic town near the border with Turkey, after a desperate weeks-long defence by Kurdish fighters.
News from Azerbaijani Sources
Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry: Marlen Murie’s visit to Azerbaijan’s occupied territories runs contrary to French mediation
Apa.az, October 08, 2014, https://en.apa.az/xeber_
“Such illegal action on the eve of presidents’ meeting in Paris is a provocation against the French government”
Azerbaijan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has commented on Mayor of France’s Burg-Le-Valance city Marlen Murie’s visit to the occupied territories of Azerbaijan and signing the “Declaration of Friendship” between occupied Shusha town and Burg-Le-Valance. Acting spokesman for Azerbaijan's Foreign Ministry Hikmat Hajiyev stated that Marlen Murie’s visit to the occupied territories of Azerbaijan without consent of the Republic of Azerbaijan is illegal, APA reports.
“This is a violation of the law of the Republic of Azerbaijan on “State border”