Misinformation regarding ties between Armenia and Kurdistan Workers Party is possible prelude to aggression

26 Dec. 2007
Regnum
By Armen Ayvazyan

Recently, the Azeri mass media disseminated information claiming that “Armenia is settling Armenians and Kurds, emigrants from Syria and Iraq, in Nagorno Karabakh and now it also plans to host terrorists from the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK).” REGNUM asks Armen Ayvazyan, political scientist and Director of the “Ararat” Center for Strategic Research, to comment on this.

The new Turkish deliberations regarding ties between the PKK and Armenia that were voiced in recent weeks and the immediate joining-in of the official Baku should be considered in several aspects: first, in the context of Turkey’s consistently hostile policy towards independent Armenia; second, in the light of the acceleration in the pace of Azerbaijan’s preparation for a large-scale war of aggression against Artsakh and Armenia; and third, in the context of the continued passive information policy of Armenia.

The Turkish propaganda campaign alleging that Armenia supports and even provides bases for the PKK was first launched in 1993 and continued at varying degrees of intensity up to 2000, when the PKK temporarily extinguished the insurgency. The following headlines from the Turkish press convey an idea of the scale of the initial campaign: “Syria Flies PKK Militants to Armenia;” “PKK Will Attack with ASALA in the Spring;” “Intelligence Report Details Armenia-PKK ties;” “PKK Reportedly Moving to Iran, Armenia.” (1) Moreover, the Turkish Daily News article published on April 16, 1998, asserted without any proof that purportedly the PKK has 7 bases in Armenia, 11 in Iran, 4 in Russia and 1 in Cyprus. At the time Azerbaijan joined in this Turkish propaganda campaign when its defence minister declared that supposedly "200 Kurdish terrorists are being trained in the Lachin region, occupied by the Armenian aggressors, and another 457 Kurdish fighters are receiving full military training in Armenia, to be later deployed in the territory of Turkey. (2)

A number of high-ranking Turkish officials, including the Chief of Staff of the Turkish army, have made statements regarding ties between the PKK and Armenia. On October 11, 1998, Turkey’s Secretary of State Metin Gurderen openly threatened Armenia with war: “If Armenia supports separatists, then we have made our decision, the button has been pressed. A war might break out any moment.” (3)

Many suggest that the Turkish allegations regarding Armenia-PKK ties are intended only for “domestic consumption”, that they are put forth to explain the prolonged nature of the Kurdish armed resistance and to satisfy the hostile sentiments of the Turkish public towards Armenia. However, the reality is even more dangerous. The true purpose of this continuous and well planned false propaganda, coordinated with Azerbaijan, regarding Armenia-PKK ties is to create new and additional causes for exerting constant pressure on Armenia, to demonise Armenia and NKR in the eyes of the international community and to prepare the information front for the planned military aggression by Azerbaijan, with a possible direct intervention of Turkey. Let’s not forget that using the pretext of pursuing PKK, Turkey has periodically been invading Northern Iraq. Within the period of 1991 and the beginning of 1999 Turkey carried out 55 incursions into Northern Iraq, which the international community although did not authorize, but neither did it condemn. Four of them were large-scale operations with the participation of over 20,000 Turkish soldiers. (4)

Recently, new information was published revealing that Turkey planned an incursion into Armenia in October 1993, using the very same Kurdish bases as a pretext. (5) Leonidas Khrisantopolos, the Greek Ambassador to Armenia in 1993-1994, stated that the then Turkish Prime Minister Tancu Chiller had come to an agreement with the speaker of the Russian parliament Ruslan Khasbulatov on launching a few “surgical” strikes against Armenia. This information was indirectly confirmed by RA Foreign Minister Vardan Oskanyan in his interview to “Azg” daily (October 4, 2001), as well as by the former head of the National Security of Armenia Eduard Simonyan. (6)

Before that Western sources had reported that twice in 1993, in April and September, Turkey deployed its tank, mechanized and other units on the border with Armenia, the Turkish armed forces were brought to high state of combat readiness and Prime Minister Tancu Chiller warned she would ask the parliament for authorization to start military action, if Armenia touched any part of Nakhijevan. (7) Consequently, it is no accident that reports about PKK bases allegedly located in Armenia started to appear in the Turkish press as of Fall 1993. It is even less of an accident that in the above-mentioned reports the Turks indicated a number of locations in Armenia for supposed PKK bases (including the surrounding areas of the Armenian Atomic Power Plant and the Lachin region). (8)

Well affected by the Turkish propaganda some Western information agencies and think tanks presented the non-existent ties between Armenia and the PKK as a widely known fact. (9) Thus, in 1999, after the declaration of cease-fire by the PKK, one of the most famous American institutions of geopolitical research, Stratfor, apparently at the bidding of the Turks, trumpeted twice (on August 23 and November 23, 1999) to the whole world that the PKK squads were supposedly retreating to Armenia, for rearming and retraining in bases prepared for them beforehand. (10)

The halting of the Kurdish guerrilla war since 2000 (formalized only in 2002 (11)), to some extent deprived Turkey of the possibility to play the Kurdish card against Armenia. That is why the Chief of Staff of the Turkish armed forces Hussein Kivrikoghlu made a new false statement in the beginning of 2002, which alleged that Armenia possesses weapons of mass destruction, and, consequently, the same measures of punishment should be applied against Armenia as those against Iraq. (12)

On June 1, 2004, the PKK, now operating under the name CONGRA-GEL, terminated its 5-year old unilateral truce, (13) thus confirming that the Kurdish insurgents in Turkey are a long-term strategic factor in the region.

The latest insinuations coincided almost to the date with the intensification of Baku’s war rhetoric and particularly with the statement made by the Azeri Defence Minister Safar Abiyev that “as long as the Azeri territories remain occupied by Armenia, the probability of war is almost 100 percent.” Mr Abiyev’s statement was made on November 27 at the closing press conference of the Meeting of the CIS Defence Ministers Council in Astana. On November 30, with a direct reference to the Turkish intelligence, the Turkish pro-government newspaper “Zaman” disseminated misinformation about talks between Armenia and the PKK and alleged about the installation of bases for Kurds in NKR, in the towns of Shushi, Lachin and Fizuli. (14) This bait was immediately caught and circulated by the American United Press International. (15) On December 10, Araz Azimov, the Deputy Foreign Minister of Azerbaijan and Azerbaijani President’s Special Representative on Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, stated about “readiness of Baku to launch anti-terrorist operations against the PKK’s military detachments stationed in Nagorno-Karabakh.” (16) It is exactly the coordination of activities between Baku and Ankara with respect to the timing and target of information attack that should be cause for concern. All these could be a prelude to not so virtual attacks.

The corresponding government bodies of Armenia should treat this newly unleashed campaign of Turkish-Azerbaijani propaganda in all seriousness. The brief refutations voiced by the Armenian MFA in this case are not at all effective. A well-supported clarification and condemnation of all the underpinnings of this old/new anti-Armenian row is necessary, including an exposition of all the dimensions, of its true purpose and possible consequences for the peace and stability in the region. Otherwise, it is impossible to expect the understanding and support of the international community for Armenia’s foreign policy positions, including for the resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

(1) Sezai Sengun, “Syria Flies PKK Militants to Armenia,” Hurriyet, 10 November, 1993, in Foreign Broadcast Information Service Daily Report (further in FBIS Daily Report): West Europe, 15 Nov. 1993, p. 72; Gorsel Polat, “PKK Will Attach with ASALA in the Spring,” Cumhuriyet, 27 December 1993, in FBIS Daily Report: West Europe, 5 January 1994, p. 29; Sinan Onus, “Intelligence Report Details Armenia-PKK ties,” Aydinlik, 29 January 1994, in FBIS Daily Report: West Europe, 3 February 1994, p. 36; “PKK Reportedly Moving to Iran, Armenia,” Turkish Daily News, 1 February 1994, in FBIS Daily Report: West Europe, 7 February 1994, p. 44.

(2) Elmira Akhundova, "Defense Minister Abiyev: “We are keen on privileged partnership with NATO,” Azernews/Azerkhabar 2/17/99 — 2/23/99.

(3) RFE/RL Newsline Vol. 2, № 197, Part I, 12 Oct. 1998, Transcaucasus and Central Asia.

(4) Ed Blanche, “Terrorism: Turkey seizes PKK commander,” Jane's Intelligence Review-Pointer, 1 June, 1998. The same source notes that since the start of the Kurdish rebellion in 1984 through 1998 Turkey destroyed or deported 3000 Kurdish villages. According to data of the Turkish army, 39900 PKK fighters were taken out of action. The losses of the Turkish army amounted to 4600 deaths.

(5) См. Leonidas T. Chryzantopoulos, Caucasus Chronicles: Nation-Building and Diplomacy in Armenia, 1993-1994 (Princeton & London: Gomidas Institute Books, 2002), pp. 76-78, 155. “The Sensational Announcement of Leonidas Chryzantopoulos”, Golos Armenii, 19 September 2002 (in Russian).

(6) “'Turkey Really Was Going To Attack Armenia in Autumn 1993', Former Head of State Department of National Security, Major General Eduard Simoniants Says,” Noyan Tapan News Agency, Yerevan, September 23, 2002.

(7) R. Ernest Dupuis and Trevor N. Dupuis, World History of Wars. Book Four: 1925 – 1997 Saint Petersburg — Moscow: Polygon – Ast., 1998), pg. 754 (in Russian).

(8) Rouben Paul Adalian, “Armenia's Foreign Policy: Defining Priorities and Coping with Conflict,” in Adeed Dawisha and Karen Dawisha, eds., The Making of Foreign Policy in Russia and the New States of Eurasia (Armonk, New York: M. E. Sharpe, Inc., 1995), p. 318.

(9) For example, see Ed Blanche, “Terrorism: Turkey seizes PKK commander,” op. cit..

(10) Stratfor.com: “Where, oh where, has the PKK gone?” 1999.08.27; “PKK Wields Pipeline Leverage,” 1999.11.23.

(11) Officially the temporary halt in the armed resistance was announced after the regular 5th assembly of the PKK. It became known on February 6th, 2002, from the announcement of MED TV (see Akop Chakryan, “PKK decided to halt armed resistance in Turkey”, Azg, February 8th, 2002, #24, in Armenian).

(12) Here is an excerpt from the announcement distributed by PanARMENIAN.net on that occasion: “Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Turkey Hussein Kivrikoghlu stated the other day that Armenia possessed mass destruction weapons … This statement is included in the list of the six ‘apprehensions’ of Turkey that Kivrikoghlu had presented to Turkish Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit before the latter's visit to the U.S.A. Speaking about the negative response of Turkey to the possible U.S. strikes on Iraq, Kivrikoghlu stated not only Saddam Huseyn regime, but also Armenia, Syria, Iran and some other countries possessed weapons of mass extermination. In the words of the chief of the general staff of Turkey, sanctions like those used against Iraq, should be applied to Armenia.” See also. “Azeri ex-military men on threat if Armenia has weapons of mass destruction,” Azerbaijan News Service TV January 8, 2002; “Does Armenia Possess a Mass Destruction Weapon?” Azerbaijan News Service, January 9, 2002; “Armenian Defence Ministry spokesman calls Turkish general's statement 'absurd',” Arminfo, January 7, 2002.

(13) Selcan Hacaoglu, “Turkey's Kurdish Rebels End 5-Year Truce”, Associated Press News, 1 June 2004.

(14) Ercan Yavuz, “PKK looks into relocating to Karabakh,” 30.11.2007 http://www.todayszaman.com/tz-web/detaylar.do?load=detay&link=128340. It must be noted that even a month before this, on October 29 the same “Zaman” newspaper published an article titled “Relations between Armenian and PKK terrorism”, full of myths about Armenian-Kurdish relations during the 1980’s and 90’s, with an indication of dates and locations, intended to give the “information” semblance of veracity. That article seemed to prepare ground for the subsequent direct accusations.

(15) “PKK reportedly planning move to Azerbaijan,” United Press International, Published: Dec. 1, 2007 at 1:49 AM.

(16) Araz Azimov: Azerbaijan is ready to launch operations against the Kurdish guerrillas in Nagorno-Karabakh, REGNUM News Agency, 10:22 11.12.2007 (in Russian).

Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.

Yerevan School Kicks Off ‘Days Of Azerbaijan’

Monday 17, December 2007
Armenialiberty.org, Armenia
By Astghik Bedevian

A public school in Yerevan began on Monday a four-day series of events designed to promote Armenian-Azerbaijani reconciliation by enabling its students and teachers to hold discussions with visiting public figures from Azerbaijan.

The Days of Azerbaijan at the Mkhitar Sebastatsi Educational Complex will also feature presentations by the visiting Azerbaijanis and their Armenian partners as well as an arts exhibition and the screening of a documentary film on the conflict between the two South Caucasus nations. The events are sponsored by the British Embassy in Armenia and the Armenian Center for Peace Initiatives, a non-governmental organization.

The Azerbaijani delegation that arrived in Yerevan on the occasion includes three human rights campaigners, a journalist, a writer and an NGO activist.

“This is just an attempt to give our students and teachers a better idea of our neighbors and to discuss our outstanding problems in the process,” Ashot Bleyan, the Mkhitar Sebastatsi director, told RFE/RL. He expressed hope that such initiatives will make Armenian society “more tolerant.”

A former education minister and prominent critic of the current Armenian government, Bleyan has long been championing Armenian-Azerbaijani dialogue. He went as far as to pay a high-profile visit to Baku in 1992 at the height of the war in Nagorno-Karabakh. The trip was condemned as high treason by Armenian nationalist groups who continue to accuse Bleyan of favoring Karabakh’s “sellout.”

Seymur Bayjan, an Azerbaijani writer who will lecture Mkhitar Sebastatsi students on his country’s contemporary literature on Tuesday, complained that despite occasional contacts between small groups of Armenians and Azerbaijanis the two nations as a whole are still not prepared for peace. “A single cannon shell can reverse all these peace initiatives,” he told RFE/RL.

The Armenian Foreign Ministry, meanwhile, welcomed the Mkhitar Sebastatsi initiative, saying that it will have a positive impact on the long-running Karabakh peace talks. “We believe that this initiative is vivid proof of our commitment to peace and dialogue,” said the ministry spokesman, Vladimir Karapetian. “Such events … should have a continuation in all the countries included in the program.”

It was an apparent reference to the fact the holding of similar Armenian-Azerbaijani contacts in Baku has been practically impossible in recent years due to a government policy that considers the very presence of Armenian citizens on Azerbaijani soil an affront to Azerbaijan’s honor and territorial integrity.

Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.

80% of Azerbaijani population speaking for peaceful settlement of Azerbaijan-Armenia conflict

17 December 2007
Today.Az

Sahib Babayev, human rights activist and chairman of the Ganja affiliate of the Helsinki Civil Assembly of Azerbaijan, visiting Yerevan, announced that nearly 80% of the population of Azerbaijan is against war with Armenia.

"Ordinary people want peace and we should change our stereotypic idea about the enemy. We should understand that we are neighbors". S.Babayev said.

According to the Azerbaijani human rights activist, the unification of Azerbaijan, Armenia and Georgia may lead to creation of a more perfect union than EU.

"Our peoples are brought up under common traditions. We should not walk with guns in our hands and from my part I am ready to do my best to establish peace between our nations", Babayev noted.

The Days of Azerbaijan, within the framework of the program "Armenia-Azerbaijan-Turkey-a step to a dialogue" started in Yerevan, Monday. A delegation from Azerbaijan, including human rights activists, publicists, political scientists and experts are visiting the capital of Armenia for participation in the event by an invitation of the Caucasus Center of Peacekeeping Initiatives.

The Azerbaijani human rights activists and experts will take part in the activity of the school educational and research campus in the Mkhitar Sebastatsi educational complex of Yerevan

/Day.Az/

URL: http://www.today.az/news/politics/41900.html

Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.

Armenia Threatens To Quit Key Arms Treaty

Friday 14, December 2007
Armenialiberty.org, Armenia

By Ruzanna Khachatrian

Armenia could pull out of a key arms control pact if arch-rival Azerbaijan continues its military build-up in the coming years, Defense Minister Mikael Harutiunian warned on Friday.

Harutiunian claimed that Azerbaijan is already failing to comply with the 1990 Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE) treaty, which places specific limits on the deployment of troops and heavy weapons from the Atlantic coast to Russia's Ural mountains.

“The Republic of Armenia has made no such decision yet,” he said. “But if Azerbaijan does not stop buying and brining in large quantities of weapons in contravention of that treaty, Armenia could make such a decision.”

The CFE, which helped to end the Cold War, sets equal weapons quotas for Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia. All three South Caucasus states signed up to the treaty following the Soviet collapse. Earlier this week, Russia officially suspended its participation in the treaty in protest against failure by all NATO member states to ratify its revised 1999 version.

The treaty has clearly not prevented an intensifying arms race between Armenia and Azerbaijan. The latter is increasingly using its soaring oil revenues for a military build-up which Baku hopes will eventually enable it to win back Nagorno-Karabakh.

The two countries have long been accusing each other of exceeding their CFE ceilings. In particular, Azerbaijan says that Armenia has keeps a large part of its weaponry in Nagorno-Karabakh to imitate its compliance with the pact. Armenian officials, for their part, accuse Baku of obstructing international inspections of its military facilities.

Harutiunian issued the warning after hearings on Armenia’s defense doctrine organized by the National Assembly committee on defense and security. Artur Aghabekian, a retired army general heading the panel, likewise said that Yerevan should be prepared for such an option.

“Pulling out of the CFE does not stem from Armenia’s national interests,” said Aghabekian. “But if the treaty becomes non-existent, we should not regard that as a tragedy. Armenia would have to draw conclusions.”

Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.

Azeri Defence Spending Under Fire

Institute for War and Peace Reporting, UK
By Rashid Suleimanov in Baku (CRS No. 421 29-Nov-07)

Big increase in defence expenditure allegedly failed to lift soldiers out of poverty.

For the past nine years, Azerbaijan army captain Elchin Safarov has served with the Baku military garrison. He has long dreamed of having a house of his own, but his salary is only enough to rent a flat in a small village north of Baku for himself, his wife and children.

Safarov gets some state family benefits on top of his army pay, as sole breadwinner, he has been unable to get a mortgage to buy a house. When Azerbaijan celebrates Armed Forces Day on July 26 every year, the whole family waits for news that army salaries have gone up.

Azerbaijan’s state budget for 2007, currently under discussion in parliament, envisages defence spending of 1.3 billion US dollars, an increase of 30 per cent on last year. President Ilham Aliev has said he wants to see his country’s defence budget grow to exceed the entire government budget of neighbouring Armenia, with which relations have been coldly hostile since the Karabakh war of the early Nineties.

Parliamentary deputy Siyavush Novruzov, who sits on the assembly’s defence and security commission, told IWPR that some of the new money would go to support the army, some for the security forces, and the rest on defence research.

Novruzov said living conditions for army personnel were improving thanks to greater spending. “The increase in military funding has had an effect on both the food and the clothing of soldiers,” he said.

Yashar Jafarli, who chairs the Reserve and Retired Officers organisation, told IWPR that salaries doubled in the military last year.

However, there is concern that the influx of money has not had a noticeable effect on the welfare of officers and the other ranks, because rising prices have cancelled out increased pay levels.

Captain Safarov confirmed that there was no shortage of food or uniforms in his unit, and said the canteen fed the men better than it did five years ago. But he said officers were still inadequately provided for.

Eighty to ninety per cent of officers have no homes of their own and are obliged to live in rented premises.

Officers receive a benefit payment of 22.60 manats (just over 26 dollars) a month on top of their salaries, but the sum is only enough to buy a sack of flour. This benefit has remained unchanged since 1992. The government is promising to raise the sum to 80 manats in the 2008 budget, and to review it every year to keep pace with inflation.

Jafarli said that most new defence spending over the last two years had gone on weaponry and equipment, with large sums also spent on infrastructure.

“In recent years, many barracks and headquarters have been built and military colleges and medical facilities have been repaired,” said Jafarli. “A new building at the [military] central hospital has come into use. There’s no lack of uniforms for the military, though we still have unresolved problems with full-dress uniforms.”

In 2006, Azerbaijan bought five MiG-29 fighters from Ukraine. In its annual report to the United Nations Weapons Register, Kiev says it also sold around 60 military vehicles and 22,000 small arms to Azerbaijan last year. Azerbaijan is currently negotiating with Pakistan for the purchase of 24 Chinese-made JF-17 Thunder combat planes, worth between 16 and 18 million dollars each.

Some experts say that the defence money is being misspent, and complain that the budget is not open to scrutiny.

Alekper Mamedov, who heads Azerbaijan’s Centre for Democratic Civil Control of the Armed Forces, said fundamental problems in the army are not being resolved, and increases in salaries and benefit payments have little effect when the cost of living is going up so fast.

He said funds that should have gone on the wages of junior officers had been spent on repairing buildings.

“The changes in the army are cosmetic in nature.” said Mamedov. “Compared with previous years, military units in rear positions are somewhat better provided with food and clothing, but those that are stationed in outlying areas are still in lamentable condition.”

Mamedov said cases of food poisoning were frequent. “The public is well aware that the army receives poor-quality food,” he said. “And this is a result of defence spending not being transparent.”

The Reserve and Retired Officers group has produced which says that officers had found it impossible to get the financial compensation they were entitled to claim in lieu of food and leave allowances, while those serving on the front line close to Karabakh were not getting the extra pay they are due on time.

Major Ilgar Verdiev of the defence ministry’s press service said the defence budget could not be scrutinised in detail because Azerbaijan was still “at war” with Armenia.

He insisted there were no problems with nutritional and clothing supplies, and the food supply system was getting better every year.

Major Verdiev said the government was doing its best to solve outstanding problems. Two apartment blocks containing a total of 165 flats in Baku would soon be handed over to military families and blocks of flats were also being built in the towns of Shemkir, Ganja and Geitep, he said.

Captain Safarov does not expect to receive a flat in the near future. The army is still full of officers who cannot afford to own property, he said. In January, he will make another attempt to get a mortgage from the bank.

Rashid Suleimanov is head of Manoeuvre, a military think-tank, and a correspondent with the APA news agency in Baku.

Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.

Azerbaijan Defense Minister Hints at War

27 Nov. 2007

ASTANA, Kazakhstan (AP) — The long-standing dispute over the Armenian-controlled territory of Nagorno-Karabakh could spark a new war if it remains unresolved, Azerbaijan's defense minister said Tuesday.

"As long as Azerbaijani territory is occupied by Armenia, the chance of war is close to 100 percent," Safar Abiyev said during a meeting in Kazakhstan of defense chiefs from ex-Soviet republics.

His startlingly worded remark was a reminder that Azerbaijan has not ruled out use of force in recapturing Nagorno-Karabakh and surrounding areas.

Nagorno-Karabakh and surrounding territory that is also part of Azerbaijan have been controlled by Armenian and ethnic Armenian forces since a shaky 1994 cease-fire ended one of the bloodiest conflicts that followed the collapse of the Soviet Union. The six-year war killed 30,000 people and drove more than 1 million from their homes, including many of the region's ethnic Azeris.

Azerbaijan and Armenia remain locked in a dispute over Nagorno-Karabakh despite more than a decade of coaxing from international mediators led by the United States, Russia and France to resolve the region's status.

Gunfire breaks out regularly along the border between Azerbaijan and Armenia and in the regions near Nagorno-Karabakh.

Armenian Defense Minister Mikhail Arutyunian said he sees no alternative to a peaceful settlement, the RIA-Novosti news agency reported.

Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.

Agonising Scenes at Razed Baku Cemetery

Institute for War and Peace Reporting, UK - Sep 20, 2007

Relatives distraught as bodies exhumed to make way for new highway.

By Leila Amirova in Baku (CRS No. 411, 20-Sept-07)

The Montin cemetery in the north of Baku is an appalling sight today. It is disappearing fast. The graves are ravaged, gravestones ruined and metal railings have been removed and sold for scrap. There’s a terrible stench from scattered black plastic bags containing exhumed remains.

Just four days after officials announced that graves would be transferred to cemeteries in the Govsany and Karadag districts of the city, mechanical diggers descended on the place and started pulling out the railings and crushing the headstones.

The cemetery, which dates back to the end of the 19th century, used to be called “Armenian”, as many Armenians were buried there. Many graves also belonged to Russians, Georgians, Ukrainians, as well as Moluccans and Cossacks. Azerbaijanis took to bringing there dead here after Armenians and Russians had fled the country in the 1990s.

The arrival of demolition teams so soon after the August 27 announcement that the cemetery would be transferred, meant that many had no time to rebury the remains of their loved ones and are now trying to find them in a place where there are no longer any graves and the ground has been levelled by the diggers.

“Bulldozers have destroyed everything here, making it very difficult to identify anything,” said Galina Kalugina, whose parents are buried in Montin. “We found their headstone, but the grave turned out to be empty.”

“May God spare anyone from going through such an experience,” said Tatyana Kolosovskaya, who managed to rebury her father before the mechanical diggers moved in.

The cemetery is being moved to make way for a new highway to relieve traffic congestion in the area. Only a small part of the burial ground will be left intact, though it may be levelled in future too, according to director of the cemetery Kyamran Mamedov.

There are currently agonising scenes here every day, as people wait for their turn to have their dead taken by lorry to Govsany. There isn’t enough manpower to attend to everyone and conflicts between the mourning relatives and the management of the cemetery occur frequently.

Officials say the reburial procedure costs nothing. “We provide everything that is needed,” said Mamedov. “The dead are buried in the presence of their relatives and friends in the Govsany or Karadag cemeteries. If the relatives disagree, they are free to have them reburied - at their own expense - in any cemetery they choose.”

But an Azerbaijani man, who had come to rebury the parents of distant ethnic Armenian relatives living in America, insists that he had to pay to have their remains transferred.

“Initially, we were asked for 300 dollars, but later we agreed on 50 dollars with the workers,” he said.

Mamedov said the remains of Armenians were reburied in the presence of their acquaintances or relatives living in Azerbaijan, but in most cases the authorities simply move the graves to Govsany.

Eldar Zeinalov, the director of Azerbaijan’s Human Rights Centre, says that relatives of the dead were not given sufficient warning of the decision to transfer the cemetery.

“It was absolutely clear that none of them had been notified properly,” he said. “As for the Armenian graves, there was the problem of the relatives coming [to Azerbaijan] to attend the reburial. As a result, a number of graves were pronounced ‘derelict’ and just bulldozed.”

Zeinalov believes that since Azerbaijanis have been affected by the destruction of the cemetery, the move is unlikely to have been linked to the Karabakh conflict. “It is the usual commercial cynicism of those who are now running the show in the construction of Baku,” he said.

International organisations have so refrained from commenting on the destruction of the cemetery, although the Russian ambassador to Azerbaijan, Valery Istratov, has expressed concern.

As the relatives of dead struggle to get the remains of their loved ones transferred to the new cemetery, vagrants and several refugee families, who have sheltered in Montin for years, wander what fate awaits them.

“We have nowhere to go, the dead will be reburied, but what’s going to happen to us, the living?” complained one refugee woman.

Leila Amirova is a freelance journalist based in Baku.

Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.

Armenia: Sad Fate of Azeri Graves

Institute for War and Peace Reporting, UK - Sep 20, 2007

Government won’t fund restoration of Azerbaijani cemeteries, saying they do not have any intrinsic cultural value.

By Naira Bulghadarian in Saral (CRS No. 411, 20-Sept-07)

In a forgotten cemetery in the village of Saral, in the Lori region of Armenia, lies the grave of Anagiz Alieva, who died at the age of 104. Her headstone reads “Alieva Anagiz Mammad Gizi 1880-1984”.

The old Azerbaijani woman had the good fortune to die four years before the Armenian-Azerbaijani dispute over Nagorny Karabakh engulfed the Caucasus, as a result of which almost all Azerbaijanis fled Armenia and almost all Armenians fled Azerbaijan.

As the conflict escalated, monuments - principally graveyards - suffered in both countries. The two Azerbaijani cemeteries of Saral - one of 20 Azerbaijani villages in Lori region - are now abandoned, with many of the headstones broken.

Last year, the Armenian non-governmental organisation the Helsinki Citizens’ Assembly did a study of the Azerbaijani cemeteries in the region. It showed that they were mostly in a state of ruin and a decision was made to use grant money from the organisation to restore them.

The Armenians who now live in Saral came here from the village of Gushchi in the Khanlar region of Azerbaijan, at the same time as the Azerbaijanis of Saral fled to the former Armenian village of Chardakhlu. The incoming Armenians renamed the village Nor Khachakal. They insist that they did not destroy the graves and the cemetery had already been ruined by the time they arrived.

The head of Nor Khachakal village administration, Surik Truzian, recalls that people arrived from other parts of Armenia, loaded Azerbaijani gravestones into a vehicle and took them away to re-work or re-sell them. He also says that he saw someone taking photographs of the cemetery last autumn - probably at the request of the former villagers.

The Armenian villagers say they welcomed the idea of the restoration of the cemetery, remembering the village they had left behind.

“On the place where our graves are they now sow potatoes,” said 70-year-old Seda Pruzian. Azerbaijani acquaintances had sent a video-cassette showing that headstones had been broken and graves had disappeared in the old cemetery in Gushchi.

Despite the restoration work in Saral, there are still vandals about. Truzian promised that the graveyard would be restored but was dismayed to come back to find a year later that the sign announcing the restoration at the entrance to the cemetery had been broken and two headstones had been cast aside. “What scoundrel did this?” he asked indignantly.

Up to two hundred thousand Azerbaijanis left Armenia in the years 1988-90, with an even larger number of Armenians leaving Azerbaijan in the same period.

Every Azerbaijani cemetery in Armenia has suffered a different fate. In another village in the same region, Arjut, there used to be three Azerbaijani cemeteries. One of them is in relatively good condition, but sheep-pens had been built on another one and many of the gravestones had fallen down.

Last year, Armenia’s ministry of culture was allocated two million drams (about six thousand US dollars) of government money to study and photograph Azerbaijani cemeteries and cultural monuments in Armenia. A total of 69 cemeteries were identified in Armenia and a further 52 in Nagorny Karabakh and the seven territories under Armenian control outside Karabakh.

The ministry concluded that more of the cemeteries had been preserved than had been destroyed and that the older graveyards were in a better condition.

The government then decided that the graveyards did not have any intrinsic cultural value and chose not to allocate money for their restoration.

Eighty-year-old Dmitry Babakhanian, from the village of Kursali, near Saral, who fled Getaashen in Azerbaijan, leaving behind his family’s graves, has one dream - “to go, see my graves and come home again”. He is convinced that his Azerbaijani neighbours did not destroy the graves.

“Do you know what we left behind there?” he asked. “Our grandfathers, grandmothers, fathers.”

Babakhanian is also proud that the thousand or so Azerbaijani graves, some of them made of basalt and tufa, in the cemetery in Kursali have not been touched. “That would be inhuman,” he said.

Babakhanian says that two or three years ago, he was riding his donkey and noticed some strangers in the Azerbaijani cemetery who had slaughtered a sheep and were eating and drinking. He heard them speak Azeri and was convinced that they had somehow come to visit their old graveyard.

The head of the village, Lalik Bayadian, says he does not necessarily believe stories like this but that once he did see fresh flowers in the cemetery, “They came, put fresh lilac on the grave of their relatives and left again.”

Naira Bulghadarian is a reporter with Civic Initiative newspaper in Vanadzor. She is a member of IWPR’s Cross Caucasus Journalism Network.

Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.

U.S.: Azerbaijan and Armenia should have more contacts

29.06.2007
PanARMENIAN.Net

“The United States appraises the exchange of visit by Azerbaijani and Armenian intellectuals. We regard that there should be more contact between these two countries,” the U.S. Embassy Public Affairs Officer Jonathan Henick said.

“We regard that such visits, relations between the journalists would reduce the tension over the conflict. That is a good step, such visits would help to reach a peaceful resolution to the Nagorno Karabakh conflict,” the Embassy officer said.

The diplomat saying that mutual visits of Azerbaijani and Armenian intellectuals were not held on the initiative of OSCE Minsk Group stated that such steps should be approved in any case.

“Since the Presidents and Foreign Ministers negotiate why not representatives of other strata of the society maintain contact?” he concluded, APA reports.

Yesterday the Azeri delegation led by Polad Bul-Bul-ogly, Azerbaijani Ambassador to Russia, crossed the mine-free sector of the contact line between the Nagorno Karabakh and Azerbaijani armed forced, on Mardakert-Terter (Mir Bashir) road. The delegation was accompanied to Stepanakert by representatives of the Karabakhi side. A delegation of Armenian intelligentsia led by Armen Smbatian, RA Ambassador to Russia also arrived in the NKR capital. Afterwards, the delegations made for Yerevan to meet Armenian President Robert Kocharian.

The visit was organized by initiative of both Ambassadors.

! Reproduction in full or in part is prohibited without reference to «PanARMENIAN.Net».

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Azerbaijani president receives Azeri and Armenian intellectuals

Jun 28, 2007
Azeri Press Agency, Azerbaijan

A group of Azerbaijani and Armenian intellectuals on the initiative of Azerbaijani and Armenian ambassadors to Russia visited Khankendi, Shusha and Armenia and met with President Robert Kocharian through OSCE, APA reports quoting to AzerTAC State Information Agency.

The intellectuals yesterday arrived in Baku and President Ilham Aliyev received them.

The group includes Armenian extraordinary and plenipotentiary ambassador to Russia, professor Armen Smbatyan, rector of Yerevan State Conservatoire, professor Sergey Sarajyan, president of Armenian National Academy of Sciences, academician Radik Martirosyan, Armenian national artist, head of Russian Drama Theater, professor Alexander Grigoryan, chief of therapy department of Armenian Hospital Ludmila Grigoryan, Azerbaijani extraordinary and plenipotentiary ambassador to Russia Polad Bulbuloglu, rector of Baku Music Academy Farhad Badalbayli, rector of Baku Slavic University, correspondent member of Azerbaijan National Academy of Sciences Kamal Abdulla, chief of Azerbaijan Theater Figures Union Azerpasha Nematov and businessman Ilham Fataliyev. President Ilham Aliyev expressed his position on Armenia-Azerbaijan, Nagorno Karabakh conflict and underlined that this conflict can only be solved on the principles of Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity and inviolability of borders with granting higher authority to Nagorno Karabakh. /APA/

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Caucasian Enemies Engage in Unofficial Trade

Karabakh conflict doesn’t stop Armenians and Azeris buying each others’ goods.
By Sabuhi Mammedli in Baku, Lusine Musaelian in Stepanakert and Naira Melkumian in Yerevan (CRS No. 396 14-Jun-07)

Armenia and Azerbaijan have no official ties but goods from the two neighbours manage to slip round the closed borders and into each others’ shops despite official efforts to keep them out.

Even shops in Nagorno-Karabakh, where ethnic Armenians broke free of Azeri control in a war that ended in 1994 but still poisons relations between Baku and Yerevan, stock Azeri tea. It is, residents say, too good to miss out on.

“I have Azeri tea in my shop, and it is much in demand here,” said shop assistant Ashot Hayrapetian.

“We buy this tea in Yerevan and sell it in great quantities. The tea is very popular with old people, who say that once you’ve tasted it, you will want no other tea.”

Across the border, which is still patrolled by troops and bristling with weapons, Azeri shops occasionally stock Armenian brandy, the country’s most famous export.

Azerbaijani Salekh Mamedov, 52, who is a lover of wine and port, told IWPR he didn’t mind drinking good cognac, even if it was Armenian.

“I still remember how Ararat tasted,” he said, referring to the most famous Armenian brand of brandy. “Of course, we can’t forget about the lost lands, but goods don’t matter, do they?”

But many people on both sides of the border think they do matter, saying buying such products amounts to giving support to the enemy.

“Armenian goods are mostly smuggled in through markets on the border between Georgia and Armenia,” said Eyub Husseinov, chairman of Azerbaijan’s Free Consumers Association.

“Trains for Baku and Yerevan depart from the railway station in Tbilisi every 40 minutes. In that time, many Azerbaijanis and Armenians communicate and even trade with each other. I have seen this with my own eyes more than once.”

Azerbaijan’s state customs department said such unofficial trade was the only real source of Armenian goods in Azerbaijan.

“The few Armenian goods that emerge on the local counters now and then are mainly brought in from Georgia by individuals and in allowable quantities,” said a spokesman.

“These may be confined to two or three boxes of cigarettes or a couple of bottles of cognac. What can the customs do in such cases? Citizens themselves should have enough patriotic spirit to stop them buying goods made in the enemy country.”

Occasionally, shops are found selling Armenian goods. A shop in Baku was caught selling Armenian coffee wholesale last year. The whole stock was confiscated and destroyed.

“Just the other day, our agents found napkins made by a ‘Markarian AE’ on the shelves of a shop in the Khachmaz district,” said Husseinov. Markarian is a typical Armenian name.

“The owner of the shop said he had brought them from Georgia, that when buying them he did not pay attention to the label.”

He said Jubilee brandy, Areni wines and Cigarone cigarettes were among the most popular Armenian goods in Azerbaijan.

“The bottle of the Areni wine bears a label that shows a map of Armenia embracing Nagorny Karabakh - our lands! - as part of it,” he said angrily. “How dare citizens of Azerbaijan buy these goods and - what’s worse - bring them into the country?”

One 47-year-old owner of a wine shop in the centre of Baku said that Armenian brandy did appear in his shop now and then.

“My partner in Georgia sends the brandy to me every three or four months,” he said. “Sometimes it is ten bottles a time. I must admit that Armenian cognac has always been in demand here because of its good quality and taste. I have regular clients who favour this cognac.”

Tea is nowadays the only Azeri product to be seen in Karabakh’s shops and markets, although over the years chocolate, sweets and flour have also been sold there.

Valery Simonian, chief of quality control at Nagorny Karabakh’s ministry for territorial management and infrastructure development, said goods that had no Armenian information on their packaging were banned from sale in Karabakh.

“We are entitled to deliver a written warning or ban this or that product from sale,” said Simonian. “But goods are imported by private traders and we are not in a position to control every one of them.”

A saleswoman called Anahit in Stepanakert told IWPR that customers could choose between Azerbaijan’s Azerchai tea and tea imported from Turkey.

“But Azerchai sells better, as it is cheaper and of a higher quality,” said Anahit. “Besides, it is Azeri tea, not Turkish tea that is famous all over the world for its taste and properties.”

Azerchai is also popular in Armenia, especially among Armenians who fled Azerbaijan during the armed conflict.

“I always buy this tea, because its brew is so strong and wonderful,” said Yerevan resident Tatiana Babian, 55, who used to live in Baku. “Baku Armenians are famous tea-drinkers.”

“Most probably, this is contraband, which should not be allowed into trade outlets, but the market is difficult to control,” said Anahit Voskanian, spokesman for Armenia’s economy and trade ministry.

“Even if there were many officers, they wouldn’t be able to monitor the whole of Armenia and Karabakh. The same applies to the trade in Armenian cognac in Azerbaijan.”

Armenian customs officials say no large quantities of Azeri goods had entered the country for three years, and the trade was conducted by individuals.

“Armenia’s laws forbid importation of commodities from a country with which we have no diplomatic ties,” Gagik Kocharian, head of the trade and services department at the trade and economy ministry, told IWPR.

“There’s no avoiding the fact we are neighbours with Armenia,” Novruz Mamedov, chief of the international relations department of the Azeri presidential administration, told the APA news agency.

“Of course, political, economic and cultural relations between our countries will be restored one day. However, so long as our lands remain occupied by Armenia, it’s wrong to bring their goods into our country and thus help them earn money.”

And some residents refuse to even countenance buying goods that originate over the border.

Ashraf Aliev, a 39-year-old resident of Baku, said he could not understand people who sold Armenian goods in Azerbaijan nor those who bought them.

“We have no shortage of any sort of commodities. So why should we use Armenian goods? They would not mind poisoning us and doing harm to us once more,” he said.

Karabakh resident Marina, 42, is equally wary of Azeri products.

“Even in the starving war years, we never used the flour that was brought in from Baku for free, and, all the more, I won’t buy goods from Azerbaijan now,” she said.

“They would profit from my buying their goods. Besides, there’s the risk factor – you never know what these products might contain.”

Sabuhi Mammadli is a correspondent of the newspaper Yeni Musavat, Baku. Lusine Musaelian is a correspondent of the newspaper Demo, Stepanakert. Naira Melkumian is a correspondent of the news agency Arka, Yerevan

This article is a product of IWPR’s Cross Caucasus Journalism Network funded by the European Union and other donors.

Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.

Caucasus: Russian Radar Proposal Could Upset Region

June 8, 2007
RFE/RL
By Jeffrey Donovan

In geopolitics, particularly in a place as strategically important as the South Caucasus, even the smallest shift can unleash major consequences.

What would the impact be on that volatile region -- a crossroads for the competing interests of Russia, the United States, and Iran -- if Washington accepted Russian President Vladimir Putin's offer to jointly use a Russian-leased radar base in Azerbaijan as part of an antimissile shield?

In a word: profound.

After all, Azerbaijan and Armenia, which fought a war in the early 1990s, are still locked in a bitter dispute. And Iran, meanwhile, is unlikely to view favorably more U.S. military moves on its border. Iranian state radio said today that Putin's proposal could have "serious regional implications in the domain of security."

Radio Farda acting Director Mosaddegh Katouzian notes that Tehran and Baku's good relations could be affected, and that the issue is likely to be discussed in two weeks during Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad's scheduled visit to Baku

"Definitely Iran would be concerned about having those types of bases in Azerbaijan because of its own security," Katouzian says. "So probably in the next talks between President Mahmud Ahmadinejad and Baku officials, this is going to come up as a big concern."

Frozen Conflict

Then there's Armenia and Azerbaijan, who fought a war in 1991-94 in which 25,000 died. They have since been locked in a bitter dispute over the object of that conflict: Azerbaijan's predominantly ethnic-Armenian-populated region of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Ironically, Putin's offer comes as Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Armenian President Robert Kocharian, himself a former Karabakh leader, are to meet in St. Petersburg on June 9 to discuss the standoff over the enclave.

International mediators have hoped that the two presidents can agree on small steps to improve life for people in Nagorno-Karabakh. But they also fear if dialogue fails, violence could resume, destabilizing an area that is emerging as a key energy producer and transport route between the Caspian Sea region and Europe.

Putin's missile-defense proposal, however, appears to risk tipping the balancing act on Nagorno-Karabakh toward Azerbaijan.

Upsetting Regional Balance

Rasim Musabekov, a political analyst based in Baku, suggests Azerbaijan could parlay any pivotal role in Washington's missile-defense shield into obtaining concessions from Armenian in the standoff over Nagorno-Karabakh.

"The discussion of this issue alone is raising Azerbaijan's strategic importance. This is a win for Azerbaijan. If we are taken as partners of the United States of America and Russia, this would give us certain security guarantees and would lead to obligations [on the part of Russia and the United States] to settle problems that Azerbaijan is concerned about," Musabekov says.

Click image to enlarge"In the first place, this means restoring Azerbaijan's territorial integrity, which was violated by Armenian aggression against 20 percent of Azerbaijan's territory," he adds.

So far, Azerbaijani authorities have refrained from offering a full reaction to Russia's proposal.

However, Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov has told RFE/RL's Azerbaijani Service that Baku is ready to negotiate "bilaterally, or we can do it in the trilateral format" with the United States and Russia, which currently leases the radar base from Azerbaijan.

Armenia, meanwhile, would appear to be concerned about that prospect.

Armenian Foreign Ministry spokesman Vladimir Karapetian tells RFE/RL that both Russia and the United States should "take into account the balance of the power in the region before making such a decision."

Armenia Nervous

But for weeks now, even before Putin made his surprise proposal at the Group of Eight (G8) summit in Germany, that balance has already appeared to be tilting away from Armenia.

Yerevan is traditionally a close ally of Russia. But Harry Tamrazian, head of RFE/RL's Armenian Service, says that in recent weeks there's been a flood of Russian officials visiting Baku, including a visit by Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.

"Now, it appears that [the] Russians are talking to [the] Azeris. Russian high-level officials are frequently in Baku. You can see them almost every week in Baku, talking to Azeri leaders," he says. "And this makes Armenian leaders nervous. Obviously, there is a clear rapprochement between Moscow and Baku."

Together with France, the United States and Russia are co-chairs of the Minsk Group, the body set up by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe to seek solutions to the Nagorno-Karabakh crisis.

Yerevan's chief concern now, says Tamrazian, is that if Russia and U.S. interests converge in Baku, Armenia could pay the price.

Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.

Appeal court confirms 30-month jail term for detained newspaper editor

8 June 2007
Reporters without borders (press release), France

"Fatullayev was convicted over online posts attributed to him that said the Azerbaijani armed forces shared responsibility with their Armenian counterparts for the deaths of hundreds of civilians during an attack by Armenian troops in 1992 on the village of Khojali in the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region."

Reporters Without Borders voiced alarm today at an appeal court’s decision on 6 June to uphold a two-and-a-half-year prison sentence for Eynulla Fatullayev, founder and editor of the daily newspapers Realny Azerbaijan and Gundelik Azerbaijan, for defaming and insulting Azerbaijanis under article 147.2 of the criminal code. He has been held ever since the sentence was passed on 20 April.

“This decision confirms an exceptionally disproportionate sentence,” the press freedom organisation said. “At the same time, Fatullayev has been notified of new, terrorism-related charges against him, without being given any details of these charges. The two newspapers he edited have been closed illegally and his conditions of detention are cause for concern about his health and safety.”

Reporters Without Borders added: “We support Fatullayev’s appeal to the authorities to guarantee his safety and provide him with acceptable conditions of detention.”

Fatullayev has reported that guards threatened him and pointed a gun at his head when he was transferred on 29 May from Bail prison to the national security ministry detention centre. Since the transfer, he has been given hardly any food and water and has been forced to sleep on his bed’s metal frame, with no mattress or blanket. He has written several letters to national security minister Eldar Mahmudov to demand normal conditions of detention, without getting a reply.

Fatullayev was convicted over online posts attributed to him that said the Azerbaijani armed forces shared responsibility with their Armenian counterparts for the deaths of hundreds of civilians during an attack by Armenian troops in 1992 on the village of Khojali in the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region.

A respected journalist, Fatullayev used to work for the Monitor, whose editor, Elmar Huseynov, was murdered in March 2005. With a daily print run of 30,000 copies, Realny Azerbaijan is well-known for criticising the government.

Serious fighting broke out between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the Nagorno-Karabakh region in 1992. A cease-fire has been in effect since 1994 but no peace accord has ever been reached.

Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.

David Simonyan: Surrender of territories to Azerbaijan: strategic consequences for Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh

07/27/2006

REGNUM publishes the article of security expert David Simonyan (Yerevan), which reflects his vision of the future of the Karabakh conflict. The article is published in the author’s wording.

In the light of the continuing discourse on how to preserve the “favorable window of opportunities” in the Karabakh peace process, people in Armenia keep actively talking about the settlement principles that have reportedly been presented to the Armenian and Azeri presidents for discussion and possible signing. These principles stipulate that Armenian troops be withdrawn from the liberated territories and the territories, except for the Lachin corridor, be given back to Azerbaijan.

The article is about the importance the liberated territory has for ensuring the key element of Armenia’s national security – its military component. When speaking about Armenia, you should keep in mind two states, the Republic of Armenia and the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic (NKR), who are fully integrated in military and economic terms. As you may know, military security is a condition of a state that allows it to exclude any damage to its vital interests that can be caused by threat or practical armed violence.

The given analysis is based on an axiom that is generally accepted among experts: for ensuring national security one should be ready for the worst scenario. And now, let’s more thoroughly consider the significance the liberated territory has for ensuring the military security of Armenia (RA and NKR).

The military conflict of 1991-1994 has improved the quality of the following elements of the military-strategic position of the Armenian states:

1. Frontline configuration

The present configuration of the frontline is optimal for the Armenian side. The southern flank of the Artsakh front is shielded by the Iranian border, the northern flank – by the hard-to-access Mrav mountain range. In the east – from the mountains of Mrav to the river Arax – the Armenian side has a well-fortified multi-echelon defense line.

Should the Armenian side give back the territories of six districts and keep only Lachin, the total frontline of the two Armenian states with Azerbaijan, including Nakhichevan, will get 450 km longer to 1,100 km. The frontline between Artsakh and Azerbaijan will lengthen by 150 km to 360 km. For you to have the full picture of how long a border Armenia will have with its conflicting neighbors, we should remind you that Armenia also has a poorly protected 268 km border with Turkey.

In order to effectively fortify the extended frontline the Armenian side will have to mobilize substantial human and financial resources.

First, the Armenian side will have to increase its army personnel (the Armed Forces of Armenia and the Defense Army of Artsakh (Karabakh)) and, therefore, to prolong the compulsory service term for privates and to enroll contract officers.

Second, after withdrawing troops, the Armenian side will have to undertake big expenses to create new defense lines. To carry out the above measures, the Armenian side will have to augment its military budget, but to do this, it will have to further curtail its scarce social financing and to face the ensuing negative consequences.

2. Depth of defense

The liberated territories have allowed the Armenian side to ensure the minimum defense depth and to solve several important strategic problems:

First, the present depth of defense has allowed the Armenian side to form a multi-echelon defense line. Should the first line be broken, the Armenian side will be able to resist on the following ones and to keep the enemy outside Artsakh until additional troops come from Armenia.

Second, the central densely-populated areas of Artsakh, including its capital, Stepanakert, as well as the settlements of the Goris, Kapan and Meghri districts of Armenia have become inaccessible for shelling by Azeri artillery and multiple rocket launching systems (BM-21 “Grad”).

Third, by liberating the Zangelan, Jebrail and Fizuli districts and moving the frontline over 100 km eastward, the Armenian side has liquidated the threat to the vulnerable, just 40 km wide Meghri district of the Republic of Armenia.

If the six districts are given back to the enemy and the frontline is moved back to the former administrative border of Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Region, the Armenian side will lose the necessary depth for effective defense and will face bigger difficulties in defending Artsakh should a new war begin.

The new frontline will run just 5 km away from the district centers of Mardakert, Askeran and Hadrut and 18 km away from Stepanakert. If the Armenian side gives back the Karvachar (formerly Kelbajar) district too, the Martakert district will get vulnerable to possible military attacks from three sides.

Even fortified to the maximum, the new defense line will not be a reliable guarantor of Artsakh’s military security. As we know from military history, any well-fortified defense line (Mannerheim line, Siegfried line, Bar-Lev line) can be broken by the attacker, and only sufficient depth of defense can allow the defender to organize new resistance lines and by wearing the enemy out to stop his attack. For example, during the Yom Kippur War (1973), when the Egyptian troops overran the 157.5 km long and 15 km deep Bar-Lev line in Sinai in just six hours, it was exactly the depth of the line that allowed Israel to stop the Egyptian troops, to prevent them from going deep into its territory, to mobilize new forces and to turn around the situation.

Besides, if the border is moved, most of the settlements of Artsakh and the Sunik region of Armenia, first of all, Stepanakert, Kapan and Goris, will find themselves unprotected in the face of possible massive shelling by the enemy. If a new war starts, a sudden massive bombing of towns, district centers and villages by artillery and “Grads” will cause big casualties among civilians and heavy in destruction in Artsakh and Sunik. This may result in a mass exodus of people from the area.

3. Military communications

Efficient military communications, well-trained and equipped mobile troops, timely supply of arms, hardware, ammunition, fuel and other stuff and quick evacuation are really crucial in modern war. For the Armenian side, regular military communications would be really indispensable, should the enemy get big superiority during the first days of the war.

Let’s see in detail what military communications each side has:

Azerbaijan

The densely-populated areas of Azerbaijan are connected with the Artsakh front by two railroads: Baku-Yevlakh and Baku-Horadiz station and several motor roads: Baku-Shemakha-Yevlakh, Baku-Kurdamir-Yevlakh and Baku-Birmai-Bailakan (Zhdanovsk) as well as belt road Yevlakh-Barda-Agjabedy-Bailakan – quite a convenient road running along the frontline. All running via steppe, these roads will allow the enemy to quickly send mobilized troops to the Artsakh front and to get multiple superiority in personnel and hardware before the approach of the Armenian troops.

Artsakh

With the present frontline configuration, there are four motor roads connecting Armenia with Artsakh and the frontline: Vardenis-Mardakert, Goris-Stepanakert-Askeran-Agdam, Kapan-Zangelan-Jebrail and Meghri-Mijavan-Horadiz. If the war resumes, these roads will allow the Armenian sides to bring up quite big troops from Armenia to the Artsakh front in just a few days.

So-called belt roads – communications running along the frontline – are crucial for the frontline resistive capacity. They allow to quickly redeploy troops to wherever there is a danger of breach. At present the Artsakh Defense Army has two belt roads: Mardakert-Agdam-Fizuli-Jebrail and the North-South highway project to connect Mardakert-Stepanakert-Red Bazar-Hadrut.

If the six liberated districts are surrendered, the Armenian armed forces will control only one belt road – Mardakert-Hadrut and only one road connecting mainland Armenia with Sunik and Artsakh – Yerevan-Goris-Stepanakert. This road runs through a highly mountainous area with many passes.

If a new war starts, the Armenians will find it extremely difficult to keep the narrow Lachin corridor from the enemy’s two-side strikes, but even if they retain Lachin, the enemy will use its artillery and aviation to make it as hard as possible for Armenia to quickly transfer big military forces and material and medical assistance to Artsakh.

Meanwhile, the fate of Artsakh will depend exactly on how quickly Armenia will supply it with troops as the Defense Army of Artsakh may prove not strong enough to resist the onslaught of the greatly prevalent enemy.

Thus, you clearly see that the liberated territory is extremely important for keeping the military balance between the conflicting sides, while its surrender by the Armenian side will break it to Azerbaijan’s advantage and will strongly aggravate the military-strategic situation of the Armenian states – something neither peace agreements nor international peacekeepers will compensate for. This is especially dangerous as Azerbaijan is heavily swelling its military potential, particularly, by redoubling its military budget in 2006 — from $300 mln to $600 mln – while Armenia will hardly be able to keep pace in the coming years for the following reasons:

1. The state budget of Armenia is 3.5 times smaller than the state budget of Azerbaijan ($1 bln against $3.5bln) and this gap will continue to grow as Azerbaijan will increase its oil exports. Meanwhile, Armenia’s economic potential will not allow this country to allot as much money to the military as to keep the military parity with Azerbaijan.

2. Armenia can no longer hope for the big free military hardware supplies that it got from Russia in the mid 1990s and that helped it to keep military balance with Azerbaijan for the last decade. The key military partner of Armenia, Russia has begun to show more pragmatic policy in the last years, with no political or economic preferences.

Hence, only by retaining the liberated territory, carrying out military reforms and improving the state administration system as a whole will the Armenian side be able to offset the growing military potential of the enemy and, thereby, to keep the Azeri side from temptation to resume military actions.

Given the continuing variance of the sides concerning the status of Artsakh, any change in the present configuration of the contact line will not stop the conflict but will simply create another, much more conflict-prone situation in the sphere of security.

Should Azerbaijan, whose leadership keeps saying that it will never put up with the loss of Karabakh, agree to sign peace agreements, but will later prove not content with the return of just six districts and will make up its mind to get back the whole Artsakh by war, Armenia will get in a serious danger.

Turning to advantage the change in the military balance and the consequent vulnerability of Artsakh’s whole defense system, Azerbaijan may use some convenient political moment to launch a blitzkrieg attack and to occupy Artsakh. In order to break the frontline, the Azeris will quickly concentrate strongly prevalent forces for one main blow – not a hard thing to do for them given the big quantitative and technical prevalence of the Azeri Army over the Defense Army of Artsakh and the facts that 70% of Azeri troops are deployed near the frontline and that Azerbaijan has better capacities for quickly deploying mobilized troops to the Artsakh front. The outcome of the war will greatly depend on its very first days, particularly, on the ability of the Defense Army of Artsakh to keep the frontline intact, which may prove quite a hard job.

Armenia will have very limited capacities to help Artsakh: it will not be able to use the vulnerable Lachin corridor for transferring big military contingents. If the frontline is broken and the Armenian troops fail to stop the enemy at Stepanakert, the Armenian side may lose not only Artsakh but also Sunik. If Azerbaijan occupies Artsakh, Turkey will certainly encourage it to try to make true the Pan-Turkic dream: to seize the Meghri district, thereby, linking Azerbaijan with Turkey and cutting Armenia from Iran. To this end, the enemy may strike from two sides – from Zangelan and Nakhichevan. After losing Artsakh, it will be extremely hard for the Armenian side to keep Meghri: the district is very narrow and lacks the necessary defense depth, while the motor roads connecting it with the rest of Armenia are quite vulnerable.

The liquidation of Serbian Krajina in Croatia in 1995 is one example of how real this scenario can be: Croatia broke earlier cease-fire agreements, mobilized its armed forces and suddenly attacked Serbian Krajina. In some few days they broke the frontline and occupied the region. As a result, Serbian Krajina stopped to exist and half million of Serbs were forced to leave their homeland and become refugees. This tragedy happened in the center of Europe in the presence of thousands-strong UN peacekeeping contingent and led to no sanctions against the aggressor side.

Conclusions:

1. One of the key factors keeping the military balance between Armenia and Artsakh, from the one side, and Azerbaijan, from the other, and compensating for Azerbaijan’s personnel and hardware superiority and capacity to increase its military potential is the present optimal configuration of the Artsakh frontline.

2. The existing military balance rather than the cease-fire agreement of 1994 is keeping Azerbaijan back from resuming large-scale military actions.

3. By giving back any part of the liberated territory, the Armenian side will give Azerbaijan a military advantage and will reduce its own military security. This may inspire the enemy – should there be convenient moment — to solve the Karabakh problem by war. That’s why it is absolutely inadmissible to surrender the liberated territory to the enemy.

4. Given the aggressive and genocide-prone Azeri-Turkish alliance, with its overwhelming military prevalence and open desire to destroy the Armenian statehood, the key security guarantee for Armenia and Artsakh must be the Armenian Army and the present territory of the Armenian states (42,000 sq. km.)

Permanent news address: www.regnum.ru/english/679147.html


Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.

Armenia cannot constantly “bluff” in the regional geopolitical game: Armen Ayvazyan interview

06/04/2007
Regnum

Interview of Armen Ayvazyan, PhD in Political Science, Director of the “Ararat” Center for Strategic Research

REGNUM: After the May elections in Armenia the authorities have succeeded to further strengthen their positions internally and, it seems, to gain a free hand in the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. How would you then explain the unprecedented harsh statement of 28 May 2007 by the leading Armenian internet-resources, who represent a rather serious contingent of active and professional part of the Armenian society?

AA: During the pre-election campaign the problem of Artsakh (Nagorno Karabakh) and the liberated territory of Armenia (the regions around Nagorno Karabakh currently under Armenian control are implied ) were practically left out from the discourse. Almost all parties side-stepped this question, at best offering banal, declarative and vague formulas about the necessity of achieving the conflict's settlement by the way of “mutual concessions” and the like and so on. Meanwhile, during a brief period after the elections the rhetoric about the surrender of the liberated territory to Azerbaijan has sharply galvanized. The announcements have been made on the level of the co-chairmen of the OSCE's Minsk Group, to leave aside the victorious proclamations by Azerbaijan’s highest dignitaries, about reaching agreements on factual capitulation of Yerevan and its readiness to surrender six or even all seven districts of the former Azerbaijani SSR. Rather than being categorically and unequivocally refuted by official Yerevan, at times these discussions have been receiving direct and indirect approval in the statements by Foreign and Defense Ministers of Armenia about the inevitability of “painful concessions” as well as in Yerevan's frequent speechlessness, which many interpret as tacit consent. All of this compounded with the secrecy of the negotiations is generating great concern in Armenian society about the fate of the liberated territory, that is – about their very own security.

REGNUM : What is the value of these territories for the Armenian society?

AA: The liberation of Armenian territories around the former Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast has been generally viewed as a military necessity – the only means of suppressing the Azerbaijani launching points in 1991-1994. This explanation, reflecting the field situation during the Artsakh war, is absolutely correct in a military sense; nevertheless, it is not comprehensive and, consequently, is deficient in several aspects.

Chronologically, this lone explanation corresponds to the strategic thinking of the Armenian leaders in the early 1990s. They refused to recognize several other components of the Karabakh conflict, in particular, they were ignoring the incompatibility of Armenian-Turkish-Azerbaijani strategic interests in the foreseeable future; believing that the role of history in international politics is anachronistic (an outdated reality); naively perceiving the developed countries of the West as unbiased mediators and omnipotent guarantors of security, at the same time perceiving the development of the international political system as a unilinear progressive movement in the direction of 'general well-being and freedom'.

This worldview was in many aspects erroneous and vulnerable, because it viewed the problem of the liberated territory as alien to and in isolation from the Armenian Question. While the essence of the Armenian Question has been and remains in the creation of viable political and territorial conditions for the Armenian people to live freely and independently on their native soil of the Armenian Highland. There is only one solution to the Armenian Question – to restore Armenian statehood if not in the entirety of Armenia (350,000 sq/km), then at least on a substantial piece of it, such that safe and long term existence and development of Armenian civilization can be secured. In other words, the Armenian Question is about the security of the Armenian nation, and it requires the provision of two prerequisites: The first is the creation of comprehensive and strong statehood, and the second is the territorial guarantees fortifying the security and viability of that statehood.

The experience of independent existence in the last decade and a half proves that Armenia has managed to survive only thanks to establishing of its control over the 42,000 sq/km of native Armenian land. This territory is that minimally necessary area with fairly natural boundaries which provides for the security of modern Armenia (including the Republic of Armenia and the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic). Armenian statehood will hardly be capable to survive, let alone develop successfully, on a smaller territory.

Hence, the liberated territory is a guarantee of geopolitical weight and international authority of modern Armenia. It is a precondition for its military, water, food, energy, psychological, and, in the near future, demographic security. It is a part of the Armenian homeland in terms of history, cultural heritage and physical geography. The liberated territory is the means for restoring the historically traumatized psyche of the Armenians. It is a medium for the true meaning of Armenia. Finally, the liberated territory is a just, though minimal, compensation for the Armenian territorial, cultural, material and human losses and sufferings caused by the Turkish and Azerbaijani genocides, a compensation which has been attained by Armenian blood.

REGNUM: So, what is the formula of the settlement? And why is it so unacceptable for the Armenian public?

AA: The available information suggests that Armenia and Azerbaijan, upon the mediation of the co-chairmen of the Minsk Group, work over a one or two page document on the main principles of settlement. These principles include the following: during the first phase of the “settlement” the Armenian forces withdraw from the liberated territory, except for the Kashatagh region (the Lachin corridor); a multi-national peacekeeping force enters the conflict region, then its re-settlement by the Azerbaijanis is organized. During the second stage, the Kashatagh region is being gradually passed over to the control of peacekeepers, and, then, according to official Baku, Kashatagh and also Shushi are to be re-inhabited by the Azerbaijani population. In 10-15 years a referendum is held on the future status of Artsakh, which, as Baku states, will be held on the whole territory of Azerbaijan and will in any case respect the “territorial integrity” of Azerbaijan in the traditional meaning of this concept held by Baku.

Obviously, these principles are so far off from the legitimate demands of the Armenian side that they can effectively never be accepted. They had been already rejected once in 1996-1997. However, the aforementioned document on the principles of the settlement may be drawn up by using as blurred and ambiguous terms as to allow Yerevan and Baku to interpret it each in their own ways.

Here is precisely the major menace for the Armenian side, since the single clearly defined provision in this document will demand the withdrawal of Armenian troops.

There also exists a widely held opinion that the Armenian authorities, in an attempt to outmaneuver their adversaries, create a favorable image in the eyes of the mediators and escape international isolation, imitate the seriousness of their intentions in the negotiations and play 'diplomatic poker' with Baku, hoping or being confident that Baku itself will reject the proposed portfolio of settlement, as it has happened more than once.

REGNUM: But perhaps imitation in the negotiations is a successful tactic by Armenia? So far, Azerbaijan has adopted a principle of “everything or nothing”, thereby affording Armenia the chance to preserve the status quo.

AA: Even if we consider this an imitation of negotiations (unfortunately we don't have enough evidence to be sure here), such imitation seriously undermines Armenian interests.

First of all, the constant propaganda by the first political dignitaries of the Republic of Armenia about the inevitability of making territorial concessions infects the Armenian public with defeatism, undermines the national victorious spirit among the Armenians and the Armenian army, and does so on the threshold of possible Azerbaijani further aggression. In the meantime, a significant portion of the Armenian bureaucracy, as well as those young people who aspire for careers in public service, in the absence of any other official position, fully trust the rhetoric uttered by those at the top of the bureaucratic pyramid regarding the proposed settlement of the conflict, and they themselves take on the baton of propagating the concessions, thus reinforcing the defeatist moods even further.

Second, the prolonged imitation of negotiations by Yerevan about the readiness to make concessions on the one hand, and Baku's uncompromising stance on the other, involuntarily condition and persuade the Azeri public opinion as well as the international community that the only possible option for resolution is the withdrawal of the Armenian armed forces from the liberated territory – i.e., the capitulation of the Armenian side.

Third, suchlike imitation sends out incorrect signals to the big international actors engaged in the conflict (in the capacity of third parties or mediators) about the true positions and demands of the Armenian side. Armenia cannot constantly bluff in the regional geopolitical game with such big players as the U.S., Russia and the EU. Such diplomatic gambles are rather transparent and doomed to be revealed, which could bring extremely unpleasant consequences for the gambler himself.

Fourth, such a game weakens the negotiating positions of the Armenian side, debilitating one’s own position while, conversely, elevating the expectations and demands of the opponent. We faced an identical situation in 1996-1997. A passage I wrote about that period fully corresponds to today's unfavorable situation: "The latest studies on the theory and practice of negotiations have demonstrated that if one of the negotiating parties (in our case – Armenia) adopts a soft and compromising stance, conducting a so-called “friendly bargaining”, while the other party (in this case – Azerbaijan) takes an extremely hard stance or “hard bargaining”, then initiative and advantage always lies with the latter. At the end, some agreements may be reached but these will undoubtedly be in favor of the hard bargainer. But the most important consequence is that such agreements do not solve the problem, often leading to the resumption of the conflict.

REGNUM: And what can be said about the implementation of the document about the principles of settlement?

AA: Even if such a document is signed, it cannot be implemented as long as a “Big Treaty”, which should elaborate all the details, is not concluded. But the latter cannot be concluded and ratified for a long period to come, because the settlement of the Karabakh conflict depends on specific details, rather than on clarification of the general principles. In conflicts of this type, each and every single seemingly miniscule detail is of the utmost importance.

For example, where the Armenian or the Azeri post will be stationed – on this or that side of the hill – can play the same role in the conflict as, say, the proclamation of the most important legal fact – the future political status of Artsakh. Moreover, it is my strong belief that in the Karabakh conflict the real power factors are far more important than the pure legal elements. No legal document can provide the Armenian side with the security guarantees equivalent to land and territory. Even if, in the best case scenario, Azerbaijan does recognize the independence of Artsakh (though Baku doesn't want to even hear about it), such recognition will be merely a “paper” element. The moment after conceding the liberated territory to the enemy, Artsakh, as well as Syunik (the southernmost region of the Republic of Armenia ) will, in military sense, find themselves in an undefendable situation and could be destroyed by a short-term Azerbaijani military offensive (here it is apt to recall the fall of Serbian Krajina). The conceding of territory will not exclude the probability of war but, enticing Baku's appetite, will rather create conditions for Azerbaijan to resume the war from the most favorable positions. Let us also remember that Azerbaijan, with the disguised encouragement and support of its ally Turkey, is yearning for and planning the destruction of Armenia in its entirety.

In any case, both the signing and implementation of the “Big Treaty” will be hindered not only by the difficulties in finding compromises in the details, but also by the internal political problems in Armenia and Azerbaijan, the interference by great and regional powers, various possible provocations, as well as the resistance by the people and leadership of Artsakh and the patriotic constituency within the Armenian public.

Thus, the question of the “Big Treaty” will remain unresolved, but a document on the principles of the settlement, if signed, will legitimize Baku's demands in the international arena and will hang upon Armenia's security as a “sword of Damocles”. Consequently, the signing of a document on the principles of the settlement requiring the withdrawal of the Armenian forces from the liberated territory in itself immediately jeopardizes Armenia's national security in a short-term context.

In the long run, the Karabakh conflict will be resolved in favour of Armenia or Azerbaijan not at the negotiating table but as a result of relative successes of these rival states in their respective state-building processes. It is precisely this paramount challenge – building a militarily and economically viable Armenian state – that predetermines the fate of the liberated territory as an absolute and inalienable strategic asset for Armenia and all Armenians.


Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.

Foreigners are shocked by Azerbaijan

May 25, 2007
Yerkir, Armenia
By Gayane MOVSESSIAN

They cannot understand how one can say something but do something completely different.

Another drama between the Azeri government and the media is underway in Azerbaijan. The Azeri National Security Service and the Ministry of Emergency Situations searched the offices of the opposition newspapers “Realni Azerbaijan” and “Gundeliq Azerbaijan” and confiscated the equipment. The apartment of the chief editor of Realni Azerbaijan newspaper Eynuli Fatulayev was also searched, the editor was arrested with charges of calls for terrorism.

The Azeri journalists are asking – how can it happen that in their country that is a member of the Council of Europe and has undertaken commitments for democratic development and freedom of speech journalists are arrested, bitten and even shot in front of the eyes of foreign diplomats, international organizations and law enforcemene agencies?

The media in Azerbaijan are writing that the Azeri authorities are completely ignoring the opinions of any international organizations. And this happens in all spheres, not only with the media, leader of the public forum For Azerbaijan, one of the opposition leaders Eldar Namazov says. “We can observe the same situation in our economic policies when the government is trying to convince us that the economy is developing only at the expense of the oil industry.

Meanwhile, the existing oil processing contracts show that the oil industry is going to decline in 2011. Linking the country’s economy only to the oil industry is a suicide for any country. We have stagnation, if not a regress in many other sectors. There is not a single sector in Azerbaijan where the situation would be positive.

Corruption is eroding the entire public administration system. The judicial system is fully controlled by the government. We have political prisoners. Media are constantly under pressure from the government. I do not think it will be possible to achieve any positive results by improving the situation in any particular sector.

The government does not need independent media because they do not need fair trials and free elections. They do not want public control of the state because that would eliminate corruption. This is a government crisis,” Namazov says.

He believes the Azeri government is violating both its international commitments and treaties and the Azeri legislation. Europe is not happy with this situation. The international organizations do not have a clue that the Azeri government deserves sanctions. At the same time Strasburg is worried that the Azeri authorities “are trying to get rid of the Council of Europe monitoring which will result in greater pressure and more violence against the independent media and the political opposition.”

Namazov points out that the Azeri government is making the most unexpected, sometimes even ridiculous decisions right before the CoE Parliamentary Assembly sessions as if trying to push this organizations to apply sanctions against Azerbaijan.

“The same thing happened on the eve of the last Parliamentary Assembly session and the other international events where the issue of Azerbaijan was discussed. This is the Azeri authorities’ strategy which causes serious concerns in the West.”

The Azeri authorities are trying to build their relations with other countries based on oil – we give you oil, you give us a carte blanche for repressive domestic policies. And they succeed in this. “The government is saying that it is fulfilling its Council of Europe commitments while the situation is completely the opposite,” Namazov says.

The international and European organizations have been ignoring the arbitrary actions in Baku’s domestic and foreign policy front for the sake of oil. Namazov says he is aware of dozens of cases when representatives of authoritative international organizations have stated that an issue has been settled and agreed with the Azeri government while in a couple of days the government did something completely opposite. “It was a pain for me to look at these foreigners faces. They simply could not understand how one can say one thing but do something completely different”.

Meanwhile, the same foreigners are trying to convince us, Armenia and the Republic of Nagorno Karabagh, to come to an agreement with the government of Azerbaijan that has been cheating the international community for so long. Moreover, they are trying to convince us of the Azeri government’s “peace loving” nature and its “goodwill”. Let us remind our respected European colleagues that we, the Armenians have already passed through this as opposed to Europe.

Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.

US extradites Armenian committed massacres against Azerbaijanis

21 May 2007
Azeri Press Agency, Azerbaijan

The US Immigration and Customs Enforcement has extradited Vigen Patatanyan, who committed crimes against Azerbaijanis in Nagorno Karabakh, to Armenia, APA’s US bureau reports.

Former lieutenant of Armenian army was detained in the city of San Diego on America-Mexico border. Patatanyan said during the interrogation in Migration and Customs Service that he closely participated in delivering soldiers and weapons to fight against Azerbaijanis during the first Karabakh war. The lieutenant confessed that the soldiers whom he supplied with weapons committed terrible massacres against the local residents in Shusha, Lachin, Khankendi, Kalbajar, Fuzuli and other regions of Azerbaijan.

Officer of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement Alan Rabinovich stated that they will not allow the criminals committed terrible massacres against civilians during conflicts to hide in the US.

It is the second time that 38-year old Armenian criminal tries to enter the US with forged migrant documents.

US Immigration and Customs Enforcement appealed to the people to inform about the men entering the country and suspected of committing crimes. /APA/

Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.

Memorial sought for Mountain Jews

May 7, 2007
Jewish Telegraphy Agency

Is the Azeri propaganda machine working overtime to blacken the Armenians, specially in the eyes of Jewish Americans in order to get them to side against the resolutions recognizing the Armenian genocide in both the Congress and Senate? How much support and encouragement is Azerbaijan receiving from Turkey? And why is JTA publishing this story? Wouldn't Jews know about other Jews? Why do they need to wait and so long for Azerbaijan to tell them?

Azerbaijan's Jewish leaders sought permission to put up a memorial for the several thousand Mountain Jews they say were murdered by Armenians in 1918. The Baku Sun reported that the Jewish leaders made the request to President Ilham Aliyev at a gathering last month at the Human Rights Institute of the National Academy of Sciences of Azerbaijan.

The Jewish leaders cited research saying that some 3,000 Mountain Jews, along with tens of thousands of Azeris, were murdered in the region of Guba by Armenian bandits and nationalists -- an incident marked March 31 by the Azeris as genocide. Historians are still investigating the killings, which they say where were covered up by for decades by the communist regime.

Perhaps 40,000 Mountain Jews remain scattered about the remote passes of the mostly Muslim Caucasus.

Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.

OSCE mission concludes dry and hot weather caused fire in contact line

27 Mar 2007
APA

“The fires occurred along the contact line around Nagorno Karabakh and other regions from June till September of 2006. Heavy rainfalls in winter followed by dry and hot weather caused fires.

Fires caused economic-ecological damage and posed threat to people’s safety and health. Sometimes lack of corresponding equipment and practice on fire fighting did not allow local people and fire fighting services’ localizing fires. Subterranean mines and unexploded ordnances as well as length of the contact line caused difficulties,��? reads the report drawn up by the OSCE mission, coordinator of OSCE Economic and Environmental Activities Bernard Snoy told the APA.

The mission’s mandate was determined on the consensus of Azerbaijan and Armenia on September 25, 2006 was approved after the letter exchange between the Foreign Minister of the two countries and OSCE Chairman-in-Office Karel de Gucht. The mission is to estimate long-term and short-term ecological consequences of fires, prepare recommendations on preventing negative results of fires and on carrying out ecological operation envisaged in the UN General Assembly’s resolution # 60/285. The UN resolution stresses the importance of carrying out extraordinary ecological operation for extinguishing fires and removing heavy consequences. The Assembly called on the relevant bodies and programs of the UN to assist OSCE in this sphere. The resolution says that OSCE Chairman-in-Office is to submit a report on this problem by April 30, 2007.

Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.

President Ilham Aliyev appeals to Azerbaijani people on Khojaly genocide anniversary

23 Feb 2007
APA

Events in Khojaly According to Azerbaijani Sources: An Armenian Response

During a discussion of the issue "On the Violation of Human Rights and Main Freedoms throughout the World" at the 57th session of the UN Commission on Human Rights, the Azerbaijani delegation made a statement about the events in Khojaly from 1992. The Armenian delegation submitted to the Chairman of the UN Commission on Human Rights information on the actual events of February 1992, which was presented as an official document.

The following is the text of the document:
For nine years after the events in Khojaly, official Baku has been obstinately fanning anti-Armenian hysteria with the aim of falsifying real events and discrediting the Armenian people in the eyes of the international community.

The events in Khojaly, which led to the deaths of civilians, were solely the result of political intrigue and a struggle for power in Azerbaijan.

The real reasons are most convincingly reflected in the accounts of the Azerbaijanis themselves--as participants in and eyewitnesses of what happened--as well as of those who know the entire story of the internal politics in Baku.

According to the Azerbaijani journalist M. Safarogly, "Khojaly occupied an important strategic position. The loss of Khojaly was a political fiasco for Mutalibov" (Nezavisimaya Gazeta, February 1993).

Khojaly, along with Shushi and Aghdam, was one of the main strongholds from which Stepanakert, the capital of the Nagorno Karabagh Republic, was shelled continuously and mercilessly for three winter months with artillery, missiles, and launchers used for targeting cities. Disabling the weapons based in Khojaly and freeing the airport were the only way for the inhabitants of the Nagorno Karabagh Republic to ensure the physical survival of a population condemned by Azerbaijan to complete annihilation. The daily shelling of Stepanakert from nearby Khojaly took the lives of many peaceful Armenian civilians--including women, children, and elderly inhabitants of the city.

The former President of Azerbaijan, Ayaz Mutalibov, emphasized that "the assault on Khojaly was not a surprise attack" (Ogonek, No. 14-15, 1992). In an interview he stated that "a corridor was kept open by the Armenians for people to leave" (Nezavisimaya Gazeta, April 1992). However, a column of civilians was fired upon by armed units of the Popular Front of Azerbaijan on the border of the Aghdam district. This fact was later confirmed by Mutalibov, who linked this criminal act to attempts by the opposition to remove him from power, and he blamed the Azerbaijani opposition entirely for this action. In a recent interview, Mutalibov confirmed his statement of nine years ago, that "the shooting of the Khojaly residents was obviously organized by someone to take control in Azerbaijan" (Novoye Vremya, March 6, 2001).

Similar comments and views concerning the events in Khojaly were also made by several other highly-placed Azerbaijani officials and journalists.

There is, moreover, the conclusion of the Azerbaijani journalist Arif Yunusov, who wrote, "The town and its inhabitants were deliberately sacrificed for a political purpose--to prevent the Popular Front of Azerbaijan from coming to power" (Zerkalo, July 1992). In this case, the Azerbaijanis themselves are named as the perpetrators of the tragedy.

What resulted from the betrayal of the inhabitants of Khojaly by their own highly-placed countrymen is well known. Nevertheless, Azerbaijani propaganda has announced the "atrocities of the Armenians" to the world, supplying television stations with horrendous pictures of a field strewn with mutilated bodies. Khojaly is claimed to have been the "Armenians' revenge" for the Sumgait pogroms.
Tamerlan Karayev, a former Chairman of the Supreme Council of the Azerbaijan Republic, said "The tragedy was committed by the authorities of Azerbaijan," and specifically by "someone highly-placed" (Mukhalifat, April 28, 1992).

The Czech journalist Jana Mazalova, who by an oversight of the Azerbaijanis was included in two groups of press representatives to be shown the "bodies mutilated by the Armenians," noted a substantial difference during her two visits. When she went to the scene immediately after the events, Mazalova did not see any traces of barbarous treatment of the bodies. Yet a couple of days later the journalists were shown disfigured bodies "prepared" for photographs.

Who killed the peaceful inhabitants of Khojaly and then mutilated their bodies, if the tragedy occurred not in a village taken by Armenians or on the route of the humanitarian corridor, but on the approaches to the town of Aghdam, on territory fully controlled by the Popular Front of Azerbaijan? The independent Azerbaijani cameraman Chingiz Mustafayev, who took pictures on February 28 and March 2, 1992, had doubts about the official Azerbaijani version and began his own inquiry. The journalist's very first report to the Moscow news agency D-Press on the possible complicity of the Azerbaijani side in the crimes cost Mustafayev his life. He was killed not far from Aghdam, under circumstances that are still unexplained.

The current President of Azerbaijan, Heydar Aliyev, himself recognized that Azerbaijan's "former leadership was also guilty" of the events in Khojaly. According to the Bilik-Dunyasy news agency, in April 1992 he commented, "The bloodshed will be to our advantage. We should not interfere in the course of events." To whose "advantage" was the bloodshed is clear. Megapolis-Express wrote, "It cannot be denied that if the Popular Front of Azerbaijan actually set far-reaching objectives, they have been achieved. Mutalibov has been compromised and overthrown, public opinion worldwide has been shaken, and the Azerbaijanis and their Turkish brethren have believed in the so-called 'genocide of the Azerbaijani people in Khojaly'" (Megapolis-Express, No. 17, 1992).

One other tragic detail is worth noting. It has become known since then that 47 Armenian hostages were being held on February 26 in Khojaly, a fact that the Azerbaijani mass media covering the tragedy failed to mention. After the liberation of Khojaly, only 13 hostages--including six women and one child--were found there, the other 34 having been taken away by the Azerbaijanis to an unknown location. The only thing known about them is that they were led from the village on the night of the operation, but never reached Aghdam. There is still no information concerning what eventually happened to them or any confirmation that they continued to be held captive by the Azerbaijanis.

Therefore, it is obvious that those who wanted to create the impression that bodies had been mutilated by the Armenians disfigured the bodies of these Armenian hostages in order to make it impossible to identify them. Precisely for that purpose, the clothing was removed from the bodies and the bodies of the unfortunate victims were so badly disfigured that they were unrecognizable.

In the light of the above facts, it may confidently be said that the killing of the peaceful inhabitants of the village of Khojaly and of the Armenian hostages being held there was the work of the Azerbaijani side, which committed this crime against its own people in the name of political intrigue and the struggle for power.

President Ilham Aliyev appealed to the Azerbaijani people on the 15th anniversary of the Khojaly genocide, President’s press service told the APA.

The President noted that Azerbaijan’s town of Khojaly was destroyed in 1992 on February 26, Armenians committed massacre against civilians and killed hundreds of people children, women, old, insulted their dead bodies. President said that this massacre was committed not only against Azerbaijanis but the whole humanity.

Armenia’s territorial claims against Azerbaijan led to a large-scale armed conflict in the 80s of the 21st century. He stated that thousands of people died and wounded, hundreds of others were exiled, and became refugees and displaced. He noted Khojaly tragedy is the indicator of how dangerous and tragic consequences were brought to the country by the internal struggle for power. President stressed that state officials, political powers and other responsible authorities of that time displayed negligence and indifference to the destiny of the people.

“Only after the return of nationwide leader Haydar Aliyev to the power Khojaly tragedy gained its real political and legal assessment, influential measures were taken to deliver truth about the tragedy to the world governments and international community. Azerbaijani government works purposefully and regularly to deliver truth about crimes against Azerbaijanis by Armenian chauvinists, including the Khojaly genocide to the international community and its recognition as a genocide. We aim to achieve the restoration of historical justice, to expose perpetrators and bring them to the judgment of world community. This is our duty as a citizen and human before Khojaly martyrs,” he underlined.

President stated that official institutions of the country as well as all citizens, compatriots should widen their activity in order to deliver broad information about the facts and arguments of the genocide policy against Azerbaijanis, Armenian-Azerbaijani, Nagorno-Karabakh conflict to world parliaments, international community.

“The newly founded union of Azerbaijani and Turkish Diasporas can have great importance for coordination of activities. We rely on our power, potential, international law, solidarity of world Azerbaijanis. I offer my condolence to martyrs’ families and their relatives,” the president said. /APA/


Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.