cease-fire violations by azeris

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Newsweek

Oct 12 2020

It's Time for Trump to Soberly Confront the Rising Turkish Threat | Opinion

CAROLINE GLICK , AUTHOR AND SENIOR COLUMNIST, ISRAEL HAYOM

For the past several months, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has busily dispelled any residual doubts about his hostility toward the U.S. and its allies in NATO and the Middle East. He has accomplished this in multiple ways. Erdogan purchased Russia's S-400 surface-to-air missile system and, in a swipe at the U.S. and NATO, announced his intention to test the system next week.

He threatens and seeks to subvert Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates. He has destroyed his nation's longstanding strategic alliance with Israel.

He has cast his lot with the Muslim Brotherhood in the Arab world, and with Iran against his Arab enemies. Indeed, Erdogan has effectively appointed himself the head of the Muslim Brotherhood. An associate of his recently published a map of a new Ottoman Empire, or "Greater Turkey"—with Erdogan as sultan. It included vast territories spanning from northern Greece to the east Aegean islands, half of Bulgaria, Cyprus, most of Armenia and large swaths of Georgia, Iraq and Syria.

Erdogan is fighting on behalf of Sunni jihadists in Syria and in Libya.

On the positive side, Erdogan's fights in Syria and Libya place Turkey in confrontation with Russia, which is siding with the opposite side in both wars. Erdogan started a new fight with Russia over the past couple of months, which now threatens to transform into a major war. Erdogan is fighting with Azerbaijan against Russia's client Armenia for control over the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh area that both Armenia and Azerbaijan claim.

How is the U.S. supposed to deal with Erdogan, the head of NATO member Turkey—a strategically placed ally, traversing two continents, that Washington has long viewed as indispensable?

The Pentagon rejects calls to walk away from Turkey. And a brief look at the map makes clear the generals' reluctance. Perched on Russia's backyard, Turkey's massive landmass provides U.S. forces with easy access to key theaters in Asia, the Middle East and Russia.

To uphold the alliance, the U.S. has consistently bowed its head in the face of Turkish aggression against its allies and partners. In 2019, the U.S. agreed to ditch the Kurdish forces in Syria, despite their central role in assisting U.S. efforts to destroy ISIS's caliphate, in order to avoid a direct confrontation between U.S. and Turkish forces. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo just visited Greece and told its leaders to stand down against Turkey and seek a diplomatic solution to Turkey's aggression.

Owing to Turkey's strategic importance, the U.S. has turned a blind eye to its sponsorship of Hamas. The U.S. has not called Turkey to account in a serious way for its willingness to permit ISIS to use Turkey as its logistics and mobilization base, or economic hub, during the years that the murderous jihadist group controlled large portions of Syria and Iraq.

During Barack Obama's presidency, kowtowing to Erdogan was of a piece with Obama's foreign policy vision. Obama and his vice president, Joe Biden, sought to restructure the U.S. alliance system in the Middle East away from Israel and the U.S.'s traditional Sunni Arab allies and toward Iran and the Muslim Brotherhood. Given its radical thrust, it made sense when Obama told an interviewer in 2012 that he spoke with Erdogan more than any other foreign leader.

The Obama administration was sympathetically inclined toward the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt. It pushed for the overthrow of U.S. ally and long-serving Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak in 2012, and supported the Muslim Brotherhood regime that took power in 2013. Like Erdogan, the Obama-Biden administration was livid when, following mass protests throughout the country and the drying up of Egypt's financial reserves that brought the country of 90 million to the brink of starvation, the Egyptian military ousted the Muslim Brotherhood from power and installed Abdel Fattah el-Sisi as president.

Throughout their second term, Obama and Biden did nothing to stop Erdogan's efforts to destabilize and subvert Sisi's government and return the Muslim Brotherhood to power. Today, some 20,000 members of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood are living in Turkey, which has become their center of operations just as the nation serves as the operational center of Hamas.

The Obama-Biden administration also did not seriously object to Erdogan's efforts on behalf of Iran when he transformed Turkey into a major economic hub for Iranian sanctions busting. Obama's decision to appease Tehran through the nuclear deal that gave Iran an open road to a nuclear arsenal and enriched the mullocracy by abrogating the UN economic sanctions against it made him, by consequence, supportive of Turkey's outreach and support for the Iranian regime.

The Obama-Biden desire to appease Iran precluded their administration from taking effective action against Syrian President, and Iranian and Russian client, Bashar Assad. Obama's unwillingness to confront Iran empowered Russia to deploy forces to Syria for the first time since 1982. Obama's supine policy in Syria also played a role in Erdogan's decision to begin negotiations regarding the purchase of Russia's S-400 system, which drove a stake into the NATO alliance.

Biden has pledged to reinstate Obama's foreign policy in the Middle East and worldwide if he is elected next month.

On the surface, Trump's policies toward Turkey don't appear that different from Obama's. He has not challenged Turkey's membership in NATO. He has bowed to Turkey's demands in Syria. Although he did block the delivery of F-35s to Turkey, he has refused to-date to sanction Turkey for its aggressive behavior toward Greece and Turkey. He hasn't removed U.S. forces and nuclear warheads from Incirlik Air Base in Turkey. And he continues to refer to Erdogan as a leader he respects.

But in practice, Trump's policy is very different from the Obama-Biden policies. Trump is not an ideologue except insofar as "America First" can be considered an ideological position. His commitment to advancing U.S. interests has compelled Trump to set aside traditional policies if they do not conform to realities on the ground. Traditionally, for instance, it has been considered impossible to forge peace between Israel and the Arab states so long as the Palestinian conflict with Israel remains unresolved. Trump saw, however, that Israel and several Gulf Arab states and Egypt were maintaining intense, friendly ties and realized that the traditional perceptions of the Middle East were wrong.

From the time of Ronald Reagan, the prevailing wisdom in Washington was that the U.S. had to cut a deal with the ayatollahs in Iran. Trump realized that no one had succeeded because the Iranian regime seeks to destroy the U.S.—not make peace with it. The Iranians even refused to sign their nuclear deal with Obama, lest they be perceived as making peace with "the Great Satan."

The consistent themes of Trump's foreign policies in the Middle East and throughout the world are that he has insisted on judging leaders by their deeds, and not their words; judging policies by their success in making the U.S. and its allies better off, and not by the support they receive from the foreign policy establishment; and basing U.S. partnerships with foreign states on the presence of shared interests, rather than relying on formal alliance structures to advance American interests and goals.

All of these aspects of Trump's foreign policies are vital for developing and maintaining a successful U.S. policy toward Erdogan's Turkey, as Erdogan exposes himself as a foe interested in pitting all sides against one another to enable his efforts to construct a new Ottoman Empire. Many commentators advocate expelling Turkey from NATO. But it isn't clear that a head-on confrontation with Erdogan would neutralize him. It could well empower him by helping him to rally the Turkish public behind him at a time when Turkey's economy stands on the brink of collapse.

Given Erdogan's multipronged aggression, the first goal of a realistic policy would be to diminish his power by severely weakening Turkey economically. This may mean imposing economic sanctions on Turkey for its aggression against Greece and Cyprus. Or it may mean simply giving Turkey a gentle push over the economic cliff.

Without raising the issue of removing Turkey from NATO, the U.S. can simply not sell Turkey advanced platforms while demonstrating its support for Greece and Cyprus, as well as Israel and its Arab partners.

True, China is already seeking to supplant the U.S. in sponsoring the Turkish economy and selling Turkey arms—but by keeping Turkey in NATO, the U.S. still has more leverage over Turkey than China.

A passive-aggressive policy for diminishing Erdogan's power and the threat he can mount is right up Trump's alley. Trump doesn't often directly attack his opponents. He embraced North Korean leader Kim Jong-un even as he imposed the harshest economic sanctions ever on North Korea and redesignated it a state sponsor of terrorism. He has acted similarly with Putin and with Erdogan himself.

Erdogan's belief that he can rebuild the Ottoman Empire while attacking EU and NATO members, the U.S., its key allies in the Middle East as well as Russia, owes to his narcissism that Obama and Biden did so much to feed.

With Erdogan now openly threatening multiple U.S. allies, it is increasingly apparent that the largest and fastest rising threat to stability and peace in the Middle East is Turkey—and the victor in next month's U.S. presidential election will have no lead time to deal with it.

Trump's reality-based foreign policy, his preference for indirect confrontations and empowerment of U.S. partners to defend themselves from aggression, rather than dictating their actions or fighting their battles for them, give the president the flexibility to diminish Erdogan's maneuver room, his economic independence and his popularity at home—while also empowering U.S. allies directly affected by the strongman's aggression to stand up to him effectively, with or without direct U.S. involvement.

Caroline B. Glick is a senior columnist at Israel Hayom and the author of The Israeli Solution: A One-State Plan for Peace in the Middle East, (Crown Forum, 2014). From 1994 to 1996, she served as a core member of Israel's negotiating team with the Palestine Liberation Organization.

The views expressed in this article are the writer's own.

https://www.newsweek.com/its-time-trump-soberly-confront-rising-turkish-threat-opinion-1536864?fbclid=IwAR3znx8zhO8JYNfdk8bum4soiwTWkfBdFMIx0NWpYePrGpUAQFnufYJjEr0

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National Review

Oct 13 2020

It’s Time to Get Real About U.S. Interests in the South Caucasus

By HAGOP TOGHRAMADJIAN & KATHLEEN BAILEY

October 13, 2020 6:30 AM

A pragmatic case for supporting Armenia

Coverage of the decades-long Armenia–Azerbaijan conflict often focuses on regional implications, repeating customary lines about potential tensions between Russia and Turkey and mentioning the proximity of Iran. But the scale of the fighting since September 27 is striking enough to justify attention on its own. As of October 12, at least 500 Armenian soldiers have been killed in nonstop firefights along a 100-mile front (Azerbaijan does not release casualty information). Azerbaijan has unleashed a campaign of indiscriminate cluster bombing against Armenian civilian centers; Stepanakert (population 55,000) is reduced to rubble. In Armenia, where thousands of volunteers have streamed to the front, the battle is grimly referred to as the goyamart: a fight for survival. In just two weeks, the clashes have already developed into one of the largest conventional military engagements of the 21st century .

In the name of hard-headed “realism,” important voices in the D.C. foreign-policy establishment are pressing a dangerously simplistic view of the conflict. To them, there is nothing much to discuss: Azerbaijan is “on our team” against Iran and Russia, so we should cheer for its success against the outnumbered Armenians. It’s irrefutable “geopolitical math.”

The assumptions underlying this simplistic interpretation are faulty. As we discuss below, Azerbaijan is in fact deceptively close to Iran and Russia. Meanwhile, Armenia’s fundamental social and political orientations promise to make it a much more sincere and durable partner of the United States.

U.S. support for Azerbaijan has high stakes and real consequences. For fiscal year 2020, in response to rising tensions with Iran, the Trump administration allocated over $100 million in military aid to Azerbaijan — significantly more than to any other country in the region. This massive windfall was entrusted to Azerbaijan’s notoriously corrupt Aliyev regime, which has maintained power for nearly three decades by hoarding oil riches, stoking anti-Armenian chauvinism, eliminating press freedom, and perfecting brutally repressive techniques. While President Ilham Aliyev charms Western interlocutors with his cosmetic friendliness and lavish hospitality, at home he strikes a markedly different tone. As Azerbaijani political scientist Altay Goyushov has documented, high-ranking members of the Aliyev regime routinely and publicly accuse the United States of supporting terrorism and pursuing colonialism , “portraying pro-democracy activists as subversives and traitors who serve the interests of Western imperialists.”

The regime, which Freedom House classifies as “paranoid authoritarian,” enforces a nearly religious reverence for Ilham’s father, Heydar, a longtime KGB chief who ruled until his death in 2003. The elder Aliyev is listed on official government materials as the “national leader” of Azerbaijan and the “eternal architect” of the state, and statues of him tower over hundreds of towns and cities across the country. The National Academy of Sciences operates a special department dedicated to “Alievshunasliq,” or “Aliyev Science,” whose mission is to study the former president’s life and work. According to the department’s director, Adalet Qasimov, “There is nothing you could criticize him for. During our investigations we came across nothing of the sort.”

Given these Qaddafi-esque delusions, it should come as little surprise that the Aliyev regime readily resorts to tactics that would make tyrants everywhere proud. International media have confirmed that Azerbaijan has deployed ISIS-linked jihadists and impoverished mercenaries from Syria in the current offensive against the Christian Armenians. According to the Guardian, recruitment of Syrians began a month ago — one of many indications that the current escalation was preplanned by Azerbaijan.

https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/10/its-time-to-get-real-about-u-s-interests-in-the-south-caucasus/?fbclid=IwAR3XEULrMdFyzAm2SnuiycLRNjn-pwm5h8CdjUF9awjhto_FMlBk7BIi3w8

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AHVAL News

Oct 13 2020

Turkey, U.S. disagreement over the Caucasus

• Edward G. Stafford
• Oct 13 2020 08:20 Gmt+3
• Last Updated On: Oct 13 2020 10:20 Gmt+3

The re-ignition of the tensions between Azerbaijan and Armenia over Nagorno-Karabakh into violence puts the United States and Turkey on opposite sides of a dispute, but not as most observers would see it. This is not a case of Turkey under President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan supporting one nation-state and the United States under President Donald Trump supporting another, but of Erdoğan supporting the stated goals of one party and Trump supporting a multi-lateral negotiated resolution of the conflict. Regardless of the appeals from the influential Armenian lobby in the United States, the White House has eschewed choosing the Armenian side and instead has joined with Russia and France calling for negotiations. This is not as strange as it seems.

The situation of Nagorno-Karabakh (NK) as a de facto exclave of Armenia, akin to Kaliningrad as part of Russia, has gone on for decades. Negotiations, almost certain to attach much weight to the years-long status quo as well as the ethnic composition of NK, do not favor a resolution of the issue by the restoration of complete Azerbaijan sovereignty. With United States, Russian, and French advocates of negotiations enjoying historic links to Armenia, and the presence of many citizens of the Armenian diaspora within their borders and involved in their domestic politics, it is little surprise that Azerbaijan's President Ilham Aliyev decided to shake things up, though he risks reaping the whirlwind after sowing the seeds of violence. President Erdoğan also likely realizes that though Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov proclaims an unbiased approach to the two former Soviet republics, the linguistic, religious, and cultural ties between Moscow and Yerevan are likely perceived in Ankara and Baku as tilting the playing field towards Armenia.

President Erdoğan saw the opportunity to counter the perceived or real tilt by Moscow towards Yerevan by lending support to Aliyev's claims and by reportedly supplying him with weapons, in particular drones, and irregular fighters drawn from Syria and elsewhere. Erdoğan also sees a chance to reduce Russia's influence in Azerbaijan, possibly reducing Turkey's dependence on Russian oil. Having multiple options for the importation of oil would be to Turkey's advantage.

Erdoğan's support for Azerbaijan also fits nicely into his self-image as the pre-eminent voice for all Muslims suffering at the hands of non-Muslims. And though this is muted when there is little benefit to speaking out (Uigurs in China, for example), Erdoğan likes to portray himself to his supporters as the Muslim political leaders speaking out and acting against the Islamaphobic Westerners. Though Christianity was born in the Middle East as was Islam, Erdoğan has shown that he considers Christianity in general and many predominantly Christian nations in particular as expressions of Western Imperialism, not unlike his attitude towards the Jewish state of Israel.

The Turkish president's support for Alivev's efforts also fits nicely into Erdoğan's efforts to present Turkey as the protecting big brother to all the other Turkic nations. Ironically, much of the previous work in forging ties between Turkic-speaking nations was a partnership of Erdoğan/Davutoğlu's Ministry of Foreign Affairs in support of educational and cultural work of Fethullah Gülen's followers. Though such partnership was definitively ended following the July 2015 coup attempt, and its previous existence even denied, Turkey's efforts to instill a sense of Turkic-ness in several former Soviet republics has had some success. Moscow should take note, though it likely already has.

For the United States, President Erdoğan's approach to the outbreak of violence in Nagorno-Karabakh is another irritant in the ongoing and increasingly difficult relationship with its fellow de jure NATO ally that behaves like a rival if not an adversary. Of course, several stridently anti-Turkey voices have declared that Turkey's actions in the Caucasus conflict proves, again, that it is an adversary and the US must treat it as such. Fortunately, neither President Trump nor Secretary of State Mike Pompeo identifies Turkey and the people of Turkey with President Erdoğan.

With little leverage in the Caucasus or in Ankara, and with a powerful Armenian lobby in the United States, including several pro-Armenia Congressmen, and no pro-Azerbaijan Congressmen who come to mind, the White House can do little more than advocate for negotiations in partnership with the Kremlin and the Elysee Palace. The implementation of a cease-fire, or rather its enforcement if the two parties refuse to abide by it and external actors insist on its enforcement under a U.N. mandate, will depend largely on the attitude of Russia and Turkey. Both the United States and France have largely secondary roles.

For now, it appears that President Erdoğan will say he is for a cease-fire and negotiations but continue backing Aliyev regardless of the latter's actions, exacerbating Turkey's isolation from its Atlantic Alliance allies as well as demonstrating his independence of action to his domestic supporters. And, he'll do so with little fear of experiencing harsh consequences. Russia needs markets for its oil and gas, so cutting off deliveries to Turkey, as long as it pays, is out of the question. Russian will not strike the first military blow against Turkey nor allow Armenia to do so as long as Turkey remains within NATO. No, if the Russian bear bares its fangs and unsheathes its claws, it is the Azerbaijanis or some other client or proxy of the AK Saray's chief that will bleed. As for economic sanctions by the United States or others, they would only allow Erdoğan to shift the blame for Turkey's financial crisis under his tutelage from himself to outsiders.

https://ahvalnews-com.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/ahvalnews.com/turkey-us/turkey-us-disagreement-over-caucasus?amp&fbclid=IwAR1WioiFwg_CxzBZ2p5zFe-OkbMfmWs8aIX53qUggw2j_de8Q99i5rjJb0g

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Public Radio of Armenia

Oct 13 2020

Hadrut and Talish under full control of Armenian forces

The city of Hadrut and the village of Talish in Artsakh are under the full control of the Armenian forces, official representative of the Armenian Ministry of Defense Artsrun Hovhannisyan confirmed at a daily briefing today.

Hovhannisyan said the Azerbaijani forces resumed military actions early in the morning today in breach of the agreement on ceasefire reached in Moscow.

He said during the day the Azerbaijani air force, under the guidance and protection of the Turkish air command carried out 36 military flights. One of the Su-25 fighters was shot down by Artsakh air defense forces in the northern direction, Hovhannisyan added.

He said subversive and reconnaissance actions in the direction of Hadrut were prevented, the rival was thrown back and the city is under the full control of the Armenian forces.

As for Talish, Hovhannisyan said the Azerbaijani force are at the outskirts of the village, but the settlement is controlled by Armenian forces.

Hadrut under full control of Armenian forces

Hadrut under full control of Armenian forces (video with English voice over)

Gepostet von Public Radio of Armenia News am Montag, 12. Oktober 2020

https://en.armradio.am/2020/10/13/hadrut-and-talish-under-full-control-of-armenian-forces/

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News.am, Armenia

Oct 13 2020

Karabakh President to fellow Armenians: Your involvement is important to push enemy back from our borders

13:04, 13.10.2020

Region:Armenia, Karabakh, Azerbaijan
Theme: Politics

Dear compatriots, I have just signed the bill on making amendments to the Law on Defense, which was unanimously adopted by the Parliament today. Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) President Arayik Haroutyunyan on Tuesday wrote this on Facebook.

"It [the bill] was submitted to the National Assembly on my initiative, and it will regulate the militia’s participation—on a voluntary basis—in the armed defense of our Republic.

The need for the adoption of the law stems from the current war situation and aims to further strengthen, together with the Defense Army, the protection of our borders. Both Turkey as well as thousands of mercenary terrorists are taking part in the war unleashed against us by the enemy [Azerbaijan].

At this crucial moment of the Holy Patriotic War, I once again appeal to our people to unite and make every effort to achieve a final victory. The individual involvement of each of you is important to crush the backbone of the enemy and push [it] back from our borders.

We will win, and we will ensure a future of peaceful and secure living on our own land and homeland for future generations.

Let’s get working!" Haroutyunyan added.

https://news.am/eng/news/607692.html

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Armenpress.am

Azerbaijan continues ignoring humanitarian truce and launches massive bombardment attack in Artsakh

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09:22, 13 October, 2020

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 13, ARMENPRESS. The Azerbaijani armed forces continue to ignore the humanitarian cessation of hostilities agreement and have launched rocket-artillery attacks from the southern, northern, north-eastern and eastern directions at Artsakh, Armenian Defense Ministry spokesperson Shushan Stepanyan said.

She said that the overnight situation was relatively stable but tense.

“In the morning the Azerbaijani armed forces resumed attacking actions paired with active rocket-artillery fire in the southern, northern, north-eastern and eastern directions,” Stepanyan said on October 13, noting that the Azeri attacks are most intense at the north-eastern front.

“In order to suppress the Azeri fire and thwart their plans, the Artsakh Defense Army units are taking appropriate countermeasures in all directions, by keeping the tactical situation under control.”

Editing and Translating by Stepan Kocharyan

 

 

https://armenpress.am/eng/news/1031419.html?fbclid=IwAR0Sd_Ow6Xu96OCWpwKwfg9ZCbdYtpKNt0--Yu6fWrWc6k1JI-EW3DQCxIQ

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Armenpress.am

Azerbaijan launches renewed massive attack with thousands of mercenary-terrorists against Artsakh

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12:04, 13 October, 2020

STEPANAKERT, OCTOBER 13, ARMENPRESS. The Azerbaijani military continues grossly violating the humanitarian ceasefire and has launched a renewed massive attack from the morning of October 13 at the entire length of the frontline, Artsakh presidential spokesperson Vahram Poghosyan said.

“The Azerbaijani military are also shelling peaceful settlements with artillery fire. Several thousands of mercenary-terrorists are fighting together with the Azerbaijani army in their offensive operations. The Artsakh Defense Army is waging fierce battles, attempting to neutralize the enemy attack. We must make all efforts to inflict heavy losses to the enemy that is armed to the teeth and to secure victory in this patriotic war,” Poghosyan said.

Editing and Translating by Stepan Kocharyan

 

 

https://armenpress.am/eng/news/1031433.html?fbclid=IwAR1WSKukOLKI2KlMnrt-GFHkKvU9v6K4j20Ib8x34YTRjtSLyeHtj2pDT5Y

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Armenpress.am

Apartment ablaze as Azerbaijan continues indiscriminate shelling of towns in Artsakh

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11:29, 13 October, 2020

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 13, ARMENPRESS. The Azerbaijani military continued targeting peaceful settlements of Artsakh and shelled the towns of Askeran, Martuni and Martakert overnight October 12-13, Artsakh presidential spokesperson Vahram Poghosyan said.

“The night was restless in the towns of Askeran, Martuni and Martakert. Azerbaijan continued bombarding Artsakh’s settlements, violating the humanitarian truce declared on October 10. Civilian facilities came under Azerbaijani fire during the night. An apartment was ablaze in Martakert,” Poghosyan said, adding that this attack did not lead to casualties.

A total of 31 civilians, including children, have been killed in Artsakh amid Azeri indiscriminate bombardments since September 27.

Editing and Translating by Stepan Kocharyan

 

 

https://armenpress.am/eng/news/1031428.html?fbclid=IwAR0Sd_Ow6Xu96OCWpwKwfg9ZCbdYtpKNt0--Yu6fWrWc6k1JI-EW3DQCxIQ

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Armenpress.am

Life of 2-year-old child wounded from Azerbaijani bombardment of Martuni is not under danger

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15:50, 13 October, 2020

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 13, ARMENPRESS. 2-year-old Artsvik, who was wounded from the bombardment of Artsakh’s Martuni town by the Azerbaijani armed forces, has undergone a surgery in the St. Mary hospital in Yerevan, assistant to the director of the medical center on public affairs Gevorg Derdzyan said on Facebook.

“The surgery around head has passed well, the life of the child is not under danger”, he said, adding that the 2-year-old child is under the control of doctors.

However, the child’s 9-year-old sister has died from the Azerbaijani bombardment.

Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan

 

 

https://armenpress.am/eng/news/1031461.html?fbclid=IwAR34crCZMR3Bp9PDklDX4Kad7esK0TTpccXaGa0hdaq0xeEbgKyiDEefDb0

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Public Radio of Armenia

Oct 13 2020

Armenian side restores the mosque, Azerbaijan shells the church in Shushi – President Sarkissian tells foreign journalists

Today, President Armen Sarkissian met with a group of European journalists who have been in Artsakh in recent days. The President answered their questions about the military aggression unleashed by Azerbaijan against Artsakh and the subsequent situation.

In response to the question how he feels seeing all this as the country’s President, Armen Sarkissian noted that the pain is terrible. “It’s double, triple painful because we are losing young, bright, patriotic young people who are fighting for the homeland, who are sacrificing their lives for the homeland.”

“There are no words to express the pain you feel. This war is also inhumane, because from the very first day Azerbaijan started firing rockets at the civilian population and settlements,” the President said.

The President told reporters in detail what the war means to each side. If Azerbaijan declares the liberation of the territories, the territories where Armenians have lived for millennia, which are their historical homeland, as the goal of the war, then, according to the President, there is another international wording to describe it – ethnic cleansing.

According to the President, Turkey’s goal is to show Azerbaijan that they are ethnic brothers, that they have similar brothers in many other countries, but the main goal is to have a more dominant position in the Caucasus. Furthermore, he said, Turkey, most likely, intends to stay in Azerbaijan, to manage the international pipelines.

“What are the people of Artsakh fighting for? They are fighting for their lives, their honor, their heritage, their faith, their families, their history, their home. At the same time, the small people of Nagorno Karabakh are fighting for the security of the region, and also for the security of Europe, I mean, for example, energy security. They are fighting for the security of the Middle East. Let us note that Turkey is involved in the conflicts in Syria, Libya and Iraq without thinking about the territorial integrity of those countries,” the President stated.

President Sarkissian once again stressed that the only way to return to the negotiation process and establish peace is for Turkey to withdraw from this conflict, otherwise the situation will pose a great danger to the whole region.

Answering the question on the possible recognition of Artsakh by Armenia, the President spoke about several differences between the approaches of the Armenian and Azerbaijani sides.

“Over the years, Armenia has not recognized the independence of Artsakh for the simple reason that it would allow the status of Nagorno Karabakh to be resolved through negotiations. We wanted the independence of Nagorno Karabakh to be recognized as a result of the negotiations. At the same time, if this war continues, there will be no opportunity to return to negotiations, of course, Armenia, in all probability, will have no choice but to recognize it. However, at the moment there is hope for a ceasefire and a return to negotiations. That is why Armenia does not do that even today,” the President said

“Our approach is that there is no military solution to this problem. Have you been to Shushi, have you seen the church, have you seen the mosque? The mosque was restored with the help and efforts of the Armenian side. The church was restored. And what happened these days? Azerbaijan fired a rocket at the church. This clearly shows the difference in our approaches,” he added.

The other difference is the deployment of military units. They are not in settlements in Artsakh. Here they try to keep the military presence and operations as far away from the civilian population as possible. “On the contrary, in Azerbaijan, military facilities are located in settlements, making the population a target.”

In response to a question about France’s efforts, President Sarkissian praised the activity and efforts of French President Emanuel Macron’s government. “France represents Europe in the OSCE Minsk Group co-chairmanship format, but we hear the voice of France more than the voice of Europe. The voice of NATO is not heard, the voice of the European Union is not heard enough. We also appreciate Russia’s efforts and mediation capabilities. “

The President also thanked Russian President Vladimir Putin and Foreign Minister Lavrov, expressing hope that greater efforts will be made to achieve and maintain the ceasefire.

Thanking the journalists for their courage and professional work, President Sarkissian stressed the need for media representatives to visit the region, to be in Artsakh and to present the situation objectively.

 

https://en.armradio.am/2020/10/13/armenian-side-restores-the-mosque-azerbaijan-shells-the-church-in-shushi-president-sarkissian-tells-foreign-journalists/

[Yervant1]

National Interest

Oct 13 2020

Critical Junction: Why America Should Explore a Relationship With Artsakh

The West might recognize Artsakh and guarantee that it remains its own country. Such a U.S. diplomatic gesture would be the right response and would also send a diplomatic signal to Turkey that its regional aggression will backfire.

by Michael Rubin

Both Armenia and Azerbaijan have accused each other of violating a ceasefire deal brokered by Russia. The flare-up of the long-simmering conflict between the two neighbors and former Soviet states last month has already cost dozens of lives and sent thousands of people fleeing.

United States policy is confused. On the day violence erupted, a State Department spokesman issued a statement infused with moral equivalency. She did, however, state that “the United States believes participation in the escalating violence by external parties would be deeply unhelpful and only exacerbate regional tensions.” And, yet, that is exactly what Azerbaijan did when it welcomed an intervention by Turkey which reportedly sent both F-16 fighter jets and Syrian mercenaries to reinforce Azeri forces attacking their Armenian counterparts in Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh).

U.S. diplomats—and many of their Western counterparts—look at the Caucasus as a quagmire cursed by history. Armenia, of course, has a millennia-old history. Azerbaijan was briefly independent after the collapse of imperial Russia in 1918. Nagorno-Karabakh was historically populated by Armenians—and the area remains dotted by Armenian churches (some of which Turkey and Azerbaijan now seek to destroy)—but, in 1923, Joseph Stalin, general secretary of the Soviet Communist Party, awarded the region to Azerbaijan. The irony of subsequent U.S. policy is that for decades during the Cold War, both Republicans and Democrats worked to counter the Soviet threat but since Armenia and Azerbaijan regained their independence in 1991, the State Department has committed itself to continuing Stalin’s legacy.

Congress has been more clear-eyed. In 1992, it adopted the Freedom Support Act, section 907 of which banned U.S. assistance to Azerbaijan. In October 2001, the Senate amended the Freedom Support Act to waive its restrictions on Azerbaijan. The logic was that Azerbaijan, although a dictatorship, was a U.S. ally in the Global War on Terrorism. Azerbaijan deliberately courted the West—especially pro-Israel groups—highlighting Baku’s own antagonism toward Tehran. In hindsight, that was a mistake (which, full disclosure, was my mistake as well). Armenia was also a dictatorship and largely pro-Russian, making its case in Washington more difficult.

That has changed. In 2018, Armenians ousted their long-time dictator and embraced democracy. There has never been a problem with the cultural aspects of Yerevan’s pro-Russian orientation, but any continued diplomatic orientation is less the result of popular desire and more necessity given the Trump administration’s disinterest in engaging and cultivating Armenia’s pro-Western turn.

Azerbaijan’s dictatorship, meanwhile, has only become more repressive. In July, protestors stormed the foreign ministry, shaking dictator Ilham Aliyev’s confidence. Just as Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan uses ethnic conflict and international aggression to distract from his own domestic failings, so too has Aliyev. This is playing out now.

Certainly, the White House should end its waivers of Section 907 and, if it does not, Congress should work to roll back its earlier amendment that allowed such a waiver. Much more is needed, however. Rather than simply defer to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and the so-called “Minsk Group,” perhaps a better response from Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and his team would be to embrace the Kosovo model. Like Artsakh, Kosovo had a long history. Like Artsarkh, dictators forced it technically into unsatisfactory unions where it experienced conflict and repression. The West stood up to Serbia’s dictatorship and history of ethnic cleansing, however and, in 2008, Kosovo became Europe’s newest member. Part of the negotiated agreement, of course, was that it remains independent and not join neighboring Albania. The West might recognize Artsakh and guarantee that it remains its own country. Artsakh has a longer history and greater claim to independence than many other states today. Not only would such a U.S. diplomatic response be the moral and ethical response, but it would also send a diplomatic signal to Turkey that its regional aggression and use of Syrian mercenaries, some of whom are Islamic State veterans, will always backfire.

Michael Rubin is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute.

https://nationalinterest.org/blog/middle-east-watch/critical-junction-why-america-should-explore-relationship-artsakh-170627?fbclid=IwAR0TGI7-qivptq5H94qyfnszt3st7k1TfC0-TUetPNUCjNOKd7WOxAdiNKM

[Yervant1]

Greek City Times

Oct 13 2020

U.S. State Department “deplores” Turkey’s “calculated provocation” in the East Mediterranean
by PAUL ANTONOPOULOS

With the U.S. elections less than a month away and American-Greek and American-Armenian communities making their frustrations heard, Washington has made its most harshest comments towards Turkey to date.

The Armenian National Committee of America wrote on Twitter that “the Trump Administration is outraging millions of voters by abandoning Christian Armenian civilians to Turkish/ISIS slaughter.”

This was retweeted by Hellenic Leaders, a national network of Greek American community leaders who have distinguished themselves in American civic life to encourage an active form of citizenship, with their own comment that “Greek-Americans are outraged as well.”

The combined communities of Greeks and Armenians in the U.S. account for over three million people, a powerful voting bloc.

The “bromance” that U.S. President Donald Trump has with Turkish dictator Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is well documented. Trump openly calls Erdoğan a “very good person,” among many other complimentary comments, and the American president’s personal business dealings in Turkey is well known.

However, with Turkey orchestrating a war against Armenians in Artsakh, partially opening the ghost town of Varosha in Cyprus, and once again violating Greece’s continental shelf in the East Mediterranean, it appears that election priorities are now overtaking Trump’s personal friendship with Erdoğan and his business deals.

“The U.S. deplores Turkey’s announcement of renewed Turkish survey activity in areas where Greece also asserts jurisdiction in the Eastern Mediterranean. We strongly urge Turkey to end this calculated provocation and allow exploratory talks with Greece,” U.S. State Department spokesperson, Morgan Ortagus said on Twitter, the first so-called strong response this administration has given against Turkey.

In the official statement, the U.S. State Department wrote “the United States deplores Turkey’s October 11 announcement of renewed Turkish survey activity in areas over which Greece asserts jurisdiction in the Eastern Mediterranean.”

“Turkey’s announcement unilaterally raises tensions in the region and deliberately complicates the resumption of crucial exploratory talks between our NATO Allies Greece and Turkey,” the statement continued.

“Coercion, threats, intimidation, and military activity will not resolve tensions in the Eastern Mediterranean. We urge Turkey to end this calculated provocation and immediately begin exploratory talks with Greece. Unilateral actions cannot build trust and will not produce enduring solutions,” the statement concluded.

Despite the strongly worded statement against Turkey, it is unlikely that Erdoğan will recall the Turkish Oruç Reis research vessel and the warships escorting it out of Greece’s maritime waters and continental shelf.

It remains to be seen how the U.S. will progress forward in dealing with Turkey if it refuses to de-escalate tensions.

It also begs the question, with Trump dodging denouncements of Turkish aggression against Greece, as well as his refusal to recognize the Greek genocide, is this strongly worded statement against Turkey just weeks before the election come to little to late?

https://greekcitytimes.com/2020/10/14/u-s-state-department-deplores-turkeys-calculated-provocation-in-the-east-mediterranean/

[Yervant1]

Don't see any difference between both parties. They say all kind of things and end up doing the same at the end, US always sided with turkey!

 

Asbarez.com

Biden and Harris Issue Statements on Karabakh

October 13, 2020

http://asbarez.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/gettyimages-1165420734.jpg

Joe Biden and Kamala Harris

Vice-President Joe Biden, the Democratic nominee for president, on Tuesday issued another announcement on the escalating military conflict in Karabakh—his third since Azerbaijan began indiscriminately attacking Artsakh on September 27. Sen. Kamala Harris, the Democratic vice-presidential candidate, issued a separate, but similar statement, her first since the war broke out. Neither mentions Armenians being attacked.

Below is the complete texts of the statements.

Joe Biden

I am deeply concerned by the collapse of the October 10 ceasefire and the resumption of fighting in and around Nagorno-Karabakh. Drones, mortars and long-range artillery are claiming hundreds of lives on both sides of the line of contact and displacing thousands of civilians.

Inexplicably, the Trump Administration has been largely passive, and disengaged, throughout this recent period of escalation. Since the outbreak of hostilities on September 27, neither President Trump nor Secretary of State Pompeo has placed a single phone call to the leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan, even as the region goes up in flames. Rather than delegating the diplomacy to Moscow, the administration must get more involved, at the highest levels, by working with our European partners to de-escalate the fighting and return the two sides to negotiations.

The Trump Administration must tell Azerbaijan that it will not tolerate its efforts to impose a military solution to this conflict. It must make clear to Armenia that regions surrounding Nagorno-Karabakh cannot be occupied indefinitely and that credible negotiations on a lasting resolution of the conflict must commence immediately once a ceasefire is concluded.

Finally, it must stop coddling Ankara and tell both Turkey and Iran to stay out of this conflict. Turkey’s provision of arms to Azerbaijan and bellicose rhetoric encouraging a military solution are irresponsible. A diplomatic resolution will not be easy to achieve, but the Trump Administration has an obligation to try. It should do so urgently before more lives are lost and the conflict expands.

Kamala Harris

I am extremely alarmed by reports of continued aggression in Nagorno-Karabakh. My heart is with those who have lost loved ones.

There can be no military solution to this conflict. The Trump Administration must do more to bring about a ceasefire, end Turkey and Iran’s involvement, put monitors on the ground, and resume talks on a lasting diplomatic resolution. Immediate action is necessary to save lives.

http://asbarez.com/197546/biden-and-harris-issue-statements-on-karabakh/?fbclid=IwAR3KxkcVvj_2bKEU3IMpHB5jmtw06kP_OKFfI_n7x0l7g__3UQ20p2zV6NA

 

[Yervant1]

[Yervant1]

[Yervant1]

This is a common practice in turkey if it does this to Turks, what do you think they do to minorities I'll leave that to the readers imaginations. And yet the West gives only lip service to these human rights abuses. NATO bombed Christian Serbia (Yugoslavia) to smithereens when fights erupted there between Muslims and Christians to protect the innocent, but today Muslim turkey and azerbaijan bombs Christian Armenia and Artsakh for the same reasons killing innocents the whole world is not only silent but provides weapons to the killers. What a disjointed and immoral world we live in!

Dissidents of the Turkish government are living in fear in Canada

Mehmet Bastug, Lecturer, Criminology, Lakehead University and Davut Akca, Researcher, Forensic Behavioural Science and Justice Studies, University of Saskatchewan

The Conversation Canada October 14, 2020

More

Turkey’s long arm and espionage activities against dissidents living in exile in Canada has become a growing concern. As revealed in a startling recent news report, 15 Turkish-Canadians have been targeted by the Turkish government within the scope of a “terrorism” investigation.

Needless to say, the term “terrorist” has become a commonly applied label in Turkey describing almost all opponents of the Turkish government, in and out of the country. Turkey’s operations in Canada have an impact that goes beyond its immediate targets. Such planned and organized espionage activities could pose a danger to public safety.

In the last several years, the Turkish state engaged in a three-phase campaign abroad to silence its own citizens who are critical of the government:

1. Propaganda activities through Turkish state entities and pro-government civil society organizations to discredit opposition groups;

2. Intelligence-gathering and espionage activities;

3. Intimidation, threats and abduction.

Defaming dissidents

Turkish authorities have been organizing defamatory propaganda activities against the dissidents.

The Telegraph in the U.K., for example, recently reported that mosques and community centres with links to Turkey in Britain are used to disperse anti-Kurdish propaganda. Similarly, as posted on the Facebook page of the Turkish Canadian Religious Foundation, the religious affairs office of the Turkish Consulate General in Toronto organized a mosque visit and delivered booklets against opposition groups, apparently to demonize them in the eyes of other Islamic groups in greater Toronto area.

In the last several years, Turkey has been aggressively gathering intelligence about its citizens living in exile. It’s also been using certain organizations and communities as its eyes and ears to spy on dissidents.

An example of this is DITIB, a state-funded Turkish-Islamic union that runs more than 900 mosques in Germany. Imams of DITIB were accused by German authorities of gathering intelligence about regime critics on behalf of the Turkish government.

View photos

More

Such activities are being watched by authorities with concern and are believed to pose “a danger to the internal peace.”

Threats, disappearances, torture

Many opponents have been the victims of enforced disappearance. As reported by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, dissidents on Turkey have been forcibly disappeared and tortured by government agents. There are also cases where they were abducted abroad, particularly in countries ruled by corrupt and authoritarian regimes.

 

 

[Yervant1]

My News Los Angeles

Oct 14 2020

L.A. County Board Condemns Azerbaijan’s Military Ops in Armenia

POSTED BY CONTRIBUTING EDITOR ON OCTOBER 13, 2020 IN HOLLYWOOD

The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted Tuesday to support a U.S. House of Representatives resolution condemning Azerbaijan’s military operation in Nagorno-Karabakh against the Armenian community and denouncing Turkey’s interference in the conflict.

Supervisors Kathryn Barger and Janice Hahn recommended sending a letter in support of the bipartisan House Resolution 1165, sponsored by Rep. Jackie Speier, D-San Mateo.

“The atrocities in Armenia at the hands of Azerbaijan and Turkey feel too familiar, and we will not stand by while innocent lives are taken and property is destroyed,” Barger said. “Armenians deserved peace a century ago — and they deserve it today.”

Barger acknowledged that exact numbers are not available, but cited reports of 300 to 1,000 civilian and military deaths on the Armenia side.

Los Angeles County is home to the nation’s largest population of Armenian immigrants, and multiple demonstrations have taken place over the past week against what many call Azerbaijan’s aggression against Armenia and Nagorno-Karaabakh, also known as Artsakh.

The mountainous region is controlled by ethnic Armenians but is inside Azerbaijani territory.

Armenia and Azerbaijan have been engaged in conflicts for years, but the situation escalated in July when Azerbaijan threatened to blow up a nuclear power plant in Armenia.

Azerbaijan officials have accused Armenia of illegally invading and occupying Azerbaijan’s sovereign territory.

A temporary ceasefire brokered by Russia last weekend has failed to hold, and more fighting Tuesday resulted in deaths on both sides.

Hahn said the board was required to speak out.

“We have a moral obligation to use our platforms to speak out for the people of the Republic of Artsakh and Armenia and support the Armenian Americans who call Los Angeles County home,” Hahn said. “We cannot sit idly by as human rights are violated and we will continue to condemn the attacks by the Azerbaijani government, denounce Turkey’s reported participation, support a ceasefire and peaceful solutions, while looking at how to support this region as they rebuild when there is peace.”

The House Resolution, co-sponsored by multiple members of the Los Angeles County Congressional Delegation:

— condemns Azerbaijan’s continued military operations in Nagorno-Karabakh and breaches of the cease-fire agreement;

— denounces Turkey’s reported participation in and escalation of the conflict under President Tayyip Erdogan;

— supports an immediate return to the cease-fire agreement along the line of contact between Nagorno-Karabakh and Azerbaijan and a peaceful solution which protects all parties’ human rights and joins with other countries supporting the same goals; and

— reaffirms U.S. support of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe Minsk Group efforts to secure an agreement from Azerbaijan to cease offensive military operations against Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenia and to accept independent third-party monitoring along the line of contact.

An estimated 20,000 or more people marched Sunday from Pan Pacific Park to the Turkish Consulate in Beverly Hills in support of Armenia. The peaceful demonstration drew the support of Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti.

“We stand with our brothers and sisters in Armenia and Artsakh and the diaspora in L.A.” Garcetti tweeted Sunday afternoon. “We welcome the ceasefire and it must be respected. We need our national leadership to step up and help bring peace to the region. Turkey must disengage.”

Nasimi Aghayev, Azerbaijan’s consul general to the Western United States, issued a statement Sunday that read in part: “Armenia is bombing our major cities, using even the banned cluster bombs. As a result, 41 Azerbaijani civilians, including three children, have been killed and over 200 Azerbaijani civilians have been injured. Azerbaijan defends itself, its civilians. All the fighting takes place within the borders of Azerbaijan.

“In the early 1990s, Armenia illegally invaded and occupied 20% of Azerbaijan’s sovereign territory, expelling 800,000 Azerbaijanis from the occupied regions, including Nagorno-Karabakh and seven adjacent districts.

“The United Nations and the United States condemned this illegal occupation and demanded that the Armenian forces withdraw from Azerbaijan. Armenia refused to comply and has kept the territories of Azerbaijan under its illegal military occupation, not allowing 800,000 Azerbaijanis to return to their homes.

“Azerbaijan wants peace. For peace to happen, Armenia must withdraw its armed forces from the occupied territories of Azerbaijan, as demanded by UN, and allow forcibly displaced Azerbaijanis to return to their homes.”

In addition to the ongoing pro-Armenian protests in Los Angeles, the Armenian community has been on the street raising millions of dollars to send back to Armenia and Artsakh as humanitarian aid, according to Maria Mehranian, president of the Glendale-based Armenian Fund. The money includes a $1 million donation to the fund by reality television personality Kim Kardashian West.

 

https://mynewsla.com/hollywood/2020/10/13/l-a-county-board-condemns-azerbaijans-military-ops-in-armenia/?fbclid=IwAR3U3-2dKznP8-gUxk3aJeZ7JNx3rLDfCl_NvkukFz1ot08FKx3AqYxSP2I

[Yervant1]

Reuters

Oct 14 2020

Russia disagrees with Turkey's position on Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, Russian foreign minister says

By Reuters Staff

1 MIN READ

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Wednesday that Moscow disagreed with Turkey’s position on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and that a military solution was unacceptable.

“We do not agree with the position voiced by Turkey, that was also expressed several times by (Azeri) President Aliyev,” Lavrov said in an interview with local radio stations. “It is not a secret that we cannot agree with a statement that a military solution to the conflict is permissible.”

Lavrov added that it would be right to deploy Russian military observers on the line of contact in Nagorno-Karabakh, but that it was up to Azerbaijan and Armenia to decide.

Since coming into force on Saturday, a Russian-brokered truce has frayed, with ethnic Armenian and Azeri forces accusing each other of violations and attacks on civilians.

Reporting by Tom Balmforth and Maria Kiselyova; Writing by Gabrielle Tétrault-Farber; Editing by Alex Richardson

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-armenia-azerbaijan-russia-lavrov/russia-disagrees-with-turkeys-position-on-nagorno-karabakh-conflict-russian-foreign-minister-says-idUSKBN26Z132?fbclid=IwAR0viWiSuIjbWDRWlic0nFj9QJXI0ep7ntcW8NYbFFIQZwxXKv03L-m_csc

[Yervant1]

Pinocchio erDOGan!!!!!!!!!!!

RT - Russia Today

Oct 14 2020

No Syrian militants going to Nagorno-Karabakh: They ‘have things to do’ in their country, says Turkey’s Erdogan

Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan has rebuked allegations that Syrian militants were deployed to aid Azerbaijan’s war effort in contested Nagorno-Karabakh, saying those foot soldiers are too busy fighting at home.

“We don't have any such agenda,” Erdogan told a gathering of the ruling Justice and Development (AK) Party on Wednesday. In saying this, he was apparently taking a swipe at “those who call us to say ‘you sent the mujahideen from Syria’ [into Nagorno-Karabakh].”

“They have a job to do on their own lands, they wouldn’t go there,” the Turkish president insisted.

Previously, France’s President Emmanuel Macron said there is “reliable information” indicating that “Syrian jihadists” are making it into the violence-plagued region using the Turkish city of Gaziantep as a transit point. Subsequently, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov expressed “grave concern” over the presence of foreign fighters in “the hotspot”; however, Peskov was less specific when delivering the news.

To Erdogan, both Russia and France are in no position to castigate Turkey. “There are so many weapons coming from Russia, in the same way, so many weapons coming from France, why don’t you talk about them?” he argued.

Armenia heavily relied on arms deliveries from Russia, its long-standing ally within the Collective Security Treaty Organization of six post-Soviet nations. Moscow also has a military base on Armenian soil as part of mutual security arrangements. France has supplied a number of small arms and anti-tank weapons to Armenia over the past years.

Turkey has denied ferrying Syrian militants into the combat zone, as has its close South Caucasus

ally Azerbaijan. Baku insists its armed forces engaged in the fighting against Armenian forces in the enclave are fully staffed and don’t need to source manpower abroad.

Ankara pledged unwavering support to “brotherly” Baku since the very beginning of the conflict on September 27. Turkish officials have also repeatedly signaled that the decades-old conflict would only end when Armenia vacates the “occupied” lands of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Mostly populated by ethnic Armenians, the disputed region seceded from Azerbaijan following the breakup of the Soviet Union. Nagorno-Karabakh had fought a three-year war with Azerbaijan in the early 1990s, until a major ceasefire agreement between the warring parties was inked in 1994 in Moscow.

https://www.rt.com/russia/503470-erdogan-denies-syrian-militants-karabakh/?fbclid=IwAR03gtkA1TCF2hp4BJQZP6pzUrSvYLStmpKA1V1SLlmYiokIwMh4PufZlaU

 

[Yervant1]

Deutsche Welle, Germany

Oct 14 2020

Azerbaijan strikes Armenian missile site amid shaky Nagorno-Karabakh cease-fire

The warring countries had agreed to pause hostilities over the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region just days ago. Russia is calling for both sides to heed the terms of the cease-fire.

Azerbaijan on Wednesday claimed that it hit two missile launch sites in Armenia, amid a bout of fighting over the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh regions.

Azerbaijan claimed that a ballistic missile system and a rocket system at the sites were targeting civilian areas.

Armenia's defense ministry confirmed that sites within Armenia had been struck.

It said it "reserves the right to target any military installations and combat movements on the territory of Azerbaijan."

A cease-fire between the warring neighbors was agreed on Saturday after 10 hours of talks, brokered by Russia.

Both sides have since claimed the other has violated the agreement.

Fighting broke out on September 27. Since then, more than 400 people have been killed in fighting over the contested region. Nagorno-Karabakh is officially part of Azerbaijan, but under control of ethnic Armenian forces backed by Armenia since the end of a separatist war in 1994.

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu appealed for the Azeri and Armenian defense ministers to "fully meet the commitments" of the humanitarian ceasefire.

Targeting civilian areas?

The missile launch systems were deployed in areas of Armenia bordering the Kalbajar district of Azerbaijan in the Nagorno-Karabakh region.

The first launch site was aiming at the Azerbaijani cities of Ganja, Mingachevir and other populated areas, according to claims from the Azerbaijani defense ministry.

However, Armenia denied that was targeting civilians. "The attack was carried out based on the mere assumption that the subject equipment was allegedly going to strike at Azerbaijan's civilian settlements," defense ministry spokeswoman Shushan Stepanyan said on Twitter.

Clashes continue

Throughout Wednesday, both Azerbaijan and Armenia claimed the other side was violating cease-fire terms and engaging in provocations.

Azeri President Ilham Aliyev Wednesday said that Azerbaijan was continuing a military operation to free territory in Nagorno-Karabakh, Russian news agency Interfax reported. Aliyev also accused Armenia of trying to attack its gas and oil pipelines, in an interview with Turkish broadcaster Haberturk. He warned of a "severe" response.

Armenia's Prime Minister Nikol Vovayi Pashinyan gave an address to the nation, calling for Azerbaijan and its supporter, Turkey, "to stop their aggression."

The Nagorno-Karabakh defense ministry accused Azeri forces of launching artillery and rocket attacks in several areas.

Defense officials in the enclave said their forces had shot down an Azeri Su-25 fighter jet, a claim Azerbaijan has rejected.

Turkey arms sales

Meanwhile, details have emerged regarding an upsurge in Turkey's military exports to Azerbaijan in recent months.

Arms sales from Ankara to its ally have risen six-fold this year, with sales of drones and other military equipment rising to $77 million (€65.5 million) last month alone, prior to the outbreak of conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh.

The data compiled by the Turkish Exporters' Assembly, which groups more than 95,000 exporting firms across 61 sectors, shows Azerbaijan bought $123 million worth of defense and aviation equipment from Turkey during the first nine months of 2020.

kmm, jsi/aw (AFP, Reuters)

https://www.dw.com/en/azerbaijan-strikes-armenian-missile-site-amid-shaky-nagorno-karabakh-cease-fire/a-55270695?fbclid=IwAR0Rld0xuHjSs4JNcxq4KsABXJGT5v1LkMH9Hue0nSvWy6mpyD0P9qHf7x0

[Yervant1]

Asia Times

Oct 14 2020

Winter could force resolution of Karabakh row

While a snowbound stalemate is possible, so is the realization on both sides that a lasting peace deal makes sense

by Neil Hauer October 14, 2020October 14, 2020

STEPANAKERT – Since September 27, Armenia’s and Azerbaijan’s forces have slugged it out over the contested territory of Nagorno-Karabakh, the de facto independent region that remains de jure a part of Azerbaijan. The losses inflicted have been heavy. Winter, too, is on its way.

And it is particularly the latter that may offer a glimpse at Azerbaijan’s reason for starting the war, with help and perhaps prompting by Turkey. But it could also present an opportunity for a long-term solution to this dispute.

First, the casualties. Armenia and its ethnic compatriots in Karabakh have announced more than 500 combat deaths so far, a staggering number given their combined population of barely 3 million. Azerbaijan has refused to release statistics, although videos of Azeri soldiers’ bodies piled together after various battles suggest they are also high.

Most significant are the Armenian/Karabakhti armored losses from the deadly Turkish Bayraktar TB2 drones: Independent analysis of video evidence shows Yerevan and Stepanakert have lost no fewer than 80 tanks, 50 conventional and rocket artillery pieces and 170 trucks and transports.

But while these losses are devastating, the military reality on the ground does not match them. Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev has repeatedly declared that this will be the final battle for Karabakh, intoning that “the time has finally come to liberate all of our occupied territories.”

His October 3 announcement that Azerbaijani forces had captured their first village of the war, the settlement of Madaghis in Karabakh’s extreme northeast, was met with unrestrained jubilation on the streets of Baku. Since then, Azerbaijani forces have taken the village of Talish (also in the northeast) and a number of abandoned villages in the southeast.

And that is it. Despite complete domination of the skies and severe degradation of the Armenian and Karabakhti armies’ equipment, the Azerbaijani advance has stalled. A recent analysis of the amount of Karabakh territory captured by Azeris since the start of the war estimated it to be a paltry 2.8% of the total.

Were it earlier in the year, this would not seem to be a discouraging prognosis. Given time, Azerbaijani forces could likely continue to claw forward into the settled areas of Karabakh, taking advantage of their drones’ ability to degrade enemy formations and materiel. Late September, however, is an inauspicious time to have begun an offensive in the Caucasus. Now, in mid-October Karabakh, winter is coming.

Within the next two weeks, snow will fall. In a month, the land will be covered. Offensive operations will bog down, movement of troops and vehicles will become difficult. Logistics and supply lines will experience additional strain. Severe storms will impact the operation of drones, periodically removing the greatest advantage on the Azerbaijani side.

This is to say nothing of the terrain. To date, Azeri forces have advanced through the lowlands, taking advantage of the few areas where the difference in elevation between their positions and those of their enemies being only a few meters. Now, they will have to go up. Up into the mountains, toward the positions from which Armenian troops will be able to pick their targets. It is not for nothing that the Russians named this land “Mountainous Karabakh.”

Azerbaijan’s soldiers have also just begun to fight their first urban battles. To date, they have largely seized just empty ground or long-abandoned settlements; even Talish and Madaghis consisted only of a few dozen houses.

 

 

 

 

Now, Azeri troops have encountered their first real settlement, the town of Hadrut with its peacetime population of 4,000. Fighting has been ongoing there since Azeri special forces managed to enter the town, eventually being pushed out in fierce house-to-house combat. Drones can intercept reinforcements, but they can’t enter a building and kill enemy soldiers entrenched inside.

Winter offensives are difficult enough for well-trained armies fighting on even ground. Azerbaijan’s armed forces enjoy neither of these advantages. While the infantry’s performance has been acceptable, military experts have not judged it to be exemplary, as it would likely need to be to advance uphill, through snowdrifts, into enemy-held urban towns.

The Azerbaijan Armed Forces are thus on a clock. They have just a few weeks to advance as much as possible before weather conditions alone make further progress all but impossible. Judging by the rhetoric from Aliyev, it does not seem that Baku is planning to back down any time soon. With no cessation of hostilities likely, and no opportunity to advance, the war could settle into a stalemate of attrition.

 

Azeri forces could dig in, awaiting spring weather to resume their advance, while their Armenian opponents ferry in fresh equipment and do the same. In the meantime, Stepanakert and other settlements in Karabakh, already nearly emptied of their civilian populations, will remain largely bereft of inhabitants, subjected to regular, senseless shelling for its own sake.

But the change of seasons could also bring hope: hope that the realities on the ground will force Aliyev to resume negotiations based on Azerbaijan’s improved territorial position.

In many ways, he has made his point. Armenia’s political leadership cannot have failed to realize that their long-term military position in Karabakh is untenable – losing 10 tanks and even more other vehicles a day to drones they have not been able to counter is not a rate of loss they, or Armenia’s population, can sustain.

 

With international guarantors and mediators, they should come to the table prepared finally to accept that they will need to hand over some of the occupied regions surrounding Nagorno-Karabakh “proper” truly to resolve this decades-long conflict.

None of this is set in stone, but it is a reasonable approximation of two paths the conflict could take as October turns to November. As winter inhibits conflict, so does it also offer to enable peace.

This article was provided by Syndication Bureau, which holds copyright.

 

Usually based in Tbilisi, Georgia, Neil Hauer is currently in Stepanakert, Nagorno-Karabakh, where he is observing the war between Armenia and Azerbaijan.

https://asiatimes.com/2020/10/winter-could-force-resolution-of-karabakh-row/

[Yervant1]

Azeri lies, using old pictures as new. They did the same thing before using earthquake victims as Armenian atrocities.

India Today

Oct 14 2020

Fact Check: Old, unrelated images linked to Nagorno-Karabakh conflict

The three-decade-old conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia over the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region erupted once again last month.

Jyoti Dwivedi New Delhi October 14, 2020

The three-decade-old conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia over the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region erupted once again last month. Both the countries accuse each other of violating ceasefire and shelling civilian areas.

Amid this, some netizens are sharing two pictures of heavily damaged defence equipment and claiming that they are the Russian-made S-300 air defence system of Armenia which was destroyed during attacks by Azerbaijan.

The caption along with the pictures says, "#BREAKING. AZERBAIJAN. Picture shows DESTROYED Russian Made S-300 Air Defence Systems of Armenia. Israeli made Harop Drones proved very effective against Russian Air Defence Systems."

India Today Anti Fake News War Room (AFWA) has found that the pictures are at least four years old and not related to the recent Azerbaijan-Armenia clash. The weapons were destroyed in an accident in Russia.

The claim is being widely circulated on Facebook. The archived version can be seen here.

 

AFWA probe

As per media reports, the viral pictures are old and related to an S-300 air defence system that was damaged in Russia in an accident. Reverse-searching the images, we found them in a Greek news article published on December 5, 2016. The report also has a YouTube video link of the incident that can be seen below.

 

According to another report published in science and tech website "Popular Mechanics", a Russian surface-to-air missile had crashed after its motor failed to ignite. It says that the incident took place at Ashuluk Firing Range, a missile base in southwestern Russia.

A Turkish website had also reported the incident.

Earlier, AFP had debunked a similar claim. Thus, it is clear that the viral images are old and not related to the ongoing fight between Azerbaijan and Armenia.

 

 

https://www.indiatoday.in/fact-check/story/fact-check-old-unrelated-images-linked-to-nagorno-karabakh-conflict-1731491-2020-10-14

 

[Yervant1]

Doesn't this hit at Armenia makes it a war? Where is Russia?

Public Radio of Armenia

Oct 14 2020

Azerbaijan targets military equipment in Armenia, Yerevan vows to retaliate

On October 14, the Azerbaijani armed forces targeted military equipment on duty in the territory of the Republic of Armenia, in the border area with Karvachar, based only on the assumption that the equipment was ready to strike the peaceful settlements of Azerbaijan, the Armenian Ministry of defense said in a statement.

“Needless to say, this assertion of the Ministry of Defense of Azerbaijan can not be substantiated. In fact, the military-political leadership of that country allows itself to target the military equipment on the territory of the Republic of Armenia carrying out normal combat duty, only on the basis of assumptions,” the Armenian Ministry stated.

Reaffirming that no rocket, shell or bullet has been fired from the territory of the Republic of Armenia in the direction of Azerbaijan so far, the Ministry at the same time declares that from now on the Armed Forces of the Republic of Armenia reserve the right to target any military object or military movement in Azerbaijan.

“The military-political leadership of Azerbaijan bears all the responsibility for changing the logic and the zone of the conflict,” the Ministry state.

It said no casualties were reported.

https://en.armradio.am/2020/10/14/azerbaijan-targets-military-equipment-in-armenia-yerevan-vows-to-retaliate/

 

[Yervant1]

Voice of America

Oct 14 2020

Turkish Drone Power Displayed in Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict

By Dorian Jones

October 13, 2020 06:08 PM

ISTANBUL - Turkish-made drones are playing a role in Azerbaijan's offensive in the breakaway enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh. Drones have become an integral part of Turkey's foreign policy, but Turkey's drone industry is facing scrutiny from the international community.

Turkish-made drones operated by Azerbaijani forces are in the forefront in Azerbaijan’s fight to reclaim the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh enclave from ethnic Armenian control. Armenian separatists took Nagorno-Karabakh from Azerbaijan in a bloody 1990s war that killed an estimated 30,000 people.

Turkey has vowed support for Azerbaijan in the escalating conflict.

Defense analyst Arda Mevlutoglu said the conflict underscores Turkey’s growing reputation as a major drone player.

“Turkey has accumulated a large amount of experience infrastructure to integrate design and manufacture such advanced drones. Not maybe as sophisticated as United States, but surely being able to compete with Chinese drones. Turkish drones are rapidly gaining technology advantage,” he said.

Armenia has condemned the use of the Turkish-made drones. Recent reports cite Armenia’s military as saying its rockets shot down an Azerbaijani drone near the capital, Yerevan.

The remains of an unmanned aerial vehicle are pictured on the outskirts of Stepanakert during the military conflict over the breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region, Oct. 11, 2020.

Ankara has confirmed using drones in support of Syrian rebels, and in Iraq against Kurdish insurgents.

Turkish-made drones also helped to turn the tide in favor of Ankara-backed forces of the Government of National Accord in the Libyan civil war.

Drones are now an integral part of what analysts call Ankara's hard power diplomacy, according to Sinan Ulgen of the Istanbul-based Center for Economics and Foreign Policy Studies.

“Armed drones electronic war systems have helped Turkey to carry out a more hard power-oriented foreign and security policy. Because what it did is it essentially allowed Turkey to rely on its technological edge - which is now allowing Turkey to engage in this cross-border power projection, and reliance on hard power much more than in the past,” he said.

But the growing deadly civilian toll in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, blamed in part on Turkish drones, is drawing an international backlash. Canada has frozen the sale of critical components, a move that political consultant Atilla Yesilada of consulting firm Global Source Partners said could expose a vulnerability of the Turkish drone program.

“We still can't produce engines, and obviously, we don't have a chip factory, so all the smart ware, software in these drones, or whatever weapons we are talking about, must be imported from the West or from China,” he said.

Ankara has criticized Canada’s decision.

But technology could yet be on the side of the Turkish drone industry, said defense analyst Mevlutoglu.

“It's more than easy to create alternatives, that is the key thing or the magic thing about drone technology, the technology itself to develop sophisticated drones has becoming, even more cheaper and more accessible by the day, to many more other countries,” he said.

In a glitzy video, Turkey recently unveiled what it claims is its most powerful drone to date. Drones appear set to remain not only a vital military asset but also a key foreign policy tool.

 

 

https://www.voanews.com/middle-east/turkish-drone-power-displayed-nagorno-karabakh-conflict

[Yervant1]

Public Radio of Armenia

Oct 13 2020

Italian Senator Matteo Salvini joins Armenian rally, calls on EU to take action

We must not forget the suffering and destruction experienced by a people close to us, Italian Senator, leader of the Lega Party Matteo Salvini said in a Facebook post.

The Senator joined an Armenian rally in Rome to express his support for “Armenians’ rights to existence and peace.”

“They were the first to feel the horror of genocide, and now being persecuted in Nagorno Karabakh.

“If the EU makes sense, defend these brothers, an outpost of European civilization in the Middle East and the Caucasus,” Senator Salvini said.

https://en.armradio.am/2020/10/13/italian-senator-matteo-salvini-joins-armenian-rally-calls-on-eu-to-take-action/