Buzzfeed: Thousands of Ukrainians and foreigners were left stranded in the freezing cold at Kyiv’s central railway station on Tuesday, wondering whether they would be lucky enough to secure passage on some of the last trains out of the capital before Russian forces encircled the city.

Nobody knew when trains would arrive or depart or who would be let on or be turned away. Just two hours after BuzzFeed News’ visit to the station, Russian missiles struck the Kyiv TV tower, killing five civilians and wounding five others.

Emmanuel and Sylvester, IT professionals from Nigeria, said they were heartbroken to leave Kyiv, a city they’ve come to love during the last four years. They chose to try to reach Hungary, after reading reports that Ukrainian police and border guards have harassed Nigerian citizens trying to flee, and that Polish authorities are denying entry to people like them.

“My mother told me she would kill me before [Putin] if I didn’t leave,” Emmanuel said.

Nearby, Molvina, a mother of two daughters, ages 10 and 5, wept on the train station floor and said she hoped they would be able to make it to Poland.

“We don’t know what to do after that,” she said. “Everything we have is here now.”

Russian FM Sergey Lavrov said that the third world war would have become a nuclear one.

“World War III will be a devastating nuclear war,” the minister said.

Lavrov also drew attention to the words of US President Joe Biden, who said that an alternative to the tough sanctions that Washington imposed on Moscow would be a third world war, TASS reports.

Elected Officials in California marked the 34th anniversary of the Sumgait Massacres by Azerbaijan and urged the Biden Administration to end U.S. military assistance to Azerbaijan, in a series of statements and posts on their social media pages, reported the Armenian National Committee of America – Western Region (ANCA-WR). 
“On this solemn day of remembrance, we reflect on what the state-sponsored incitement of racist violence can lead to when left unchecked – and deplore the Azerbaijani government’s ongoing institutionalized dehumanization of the Armenian people,” said Nora Hovsepian, Esq, ANCA-WR Chair. “We join with friends of Armenia and advocates of human rights in thanking our elected officials for marking the 34th anniversary of the pogroms and call on the U.S. Government to stop providing military aid to the tyrannical regime in Baku and materially empowering them to continue invading and occupying Artsakh and Armenia,” she continued. 

Congressional Armenian Caucus Vice-Chair Adam Schiff (D-CA) released a statement, where he honored the victims of the pogroms by stating “These are the horrific consequences when aggression and hatred grow unchecked – and it is why, whether these crimes against humanity occurred one year, thirty years, or a hundred years ago, we can never allow them to go unrecognized.” “More than that, it is why the United States must fully step into its role as a defender of democracy and peace around the world. We must not relent in our calls for the safe and unconditional release of the remaining Armenian prisoners of war and captured civilians, for the end of U.S. assistance to the Aliyev regime, and for stronger efforts to support democracy in Armenia and a free, independent Artsakh. So let us pause to remember those who suffered in the atrocities of the Sumgait and Baku pogroms. But let us also recommit ourselves and our nation to doing everything we can, today, to bring liberation to our Armenian brothers and sisters abroad, once and for all,” he continued. 
Fellow Congressmember Brad Sherman and Caucus member also released a statement, honoring the memories of the victims of the Sumgait Pogroms by stating “This stark reminder remains evident today as the government of Azerbaijan continues its state-sponsored policy of aggression against Armenia and Artsakh. The world witnessed the consequences of Azerbaijan’s unchecked hatred against Armenians during the invasion of Artsakh in 2020 as Azeri forces committed horrendous war crimes against Armenian civilians, including women and the elderly, and illegally imprisoned Armenian POWs after the cessation of hostilities. Many POWs are still held by Azerbaijan.” 

“Today marks the 34th anniversary of the Sumgait Pogroms when innocent Armenian civilians were tortured and massacred,” stated CA Congressmember Tony Cárdenas and member of the CA Congressional Armenian Caucus. “As we honor their memory, we continue to call for the safe and unconditional release of all Armenian POWs illegally detained by the Aliyev regime in Azerbaijan,” he continued.
Senator Anthony Portantino who became the first elected official from the U.S. to visit  Artsakh since the end of the 44-day war, in November of 2021, shared a photo from his trip in a destroyed residential home and stated “Today we commemorate the tragic pogroms against Armenians in Sumgait/Baku & call attention to decades-long persecution that continues. Unprovoked invasion/aggression against Artsakh by Azerbaijan is state-sponsored hostility against Armenians. It is critical we condemn/speak out.” 
Fellow Senator Melissa Melendez, tweeted “Today marks the 34th anniversary of the first of several government-encouraged massacres to eradicate the Armenian population and cultural influence from Azerbaijan. Injustice should concern everyone. As human hatred destroys life, human charity has the power to preserve it”
Assemblymember Chris Holden, who authored ACR-105 and led the effort to connect California and the Syunik Province as sister states, stated “On February 27, 1988, and for three days to follow, Azerbaijani mobs assaulted and killed Armenians living in Azerbaijan. The pogroms shattered and devastated the Armenian community. This was an eruption of the the years of racist anti-Armenian propaganda by Azerbaijani government, dehumanizing the Armenian residents of Azerbaijan and creating an explosion of mass violence. In 2020, the Azerbaijani authorities incited violence and trauma once again for Armenians living in Armenia and their diaspora. This is why ACR-105 Sister State with Syunik is so important to me. We set precedent for the future with our action or inaction and today, we are creating long-lasting ties to thread forward a better tomorrow. There is power in our solidarity and there is even more so, when we acknowledge the wrongs committed and human rights violations and urge for justice today. I ask the Biden Administration to Zero-out U.S. military assistance to Azerbaijan and strengthen Section 907 of the Freedom Support Act restrictions on U.S. military assistance to Azerbaijan until their ongoing aggression ends.”
LA City Councilmember Kevin De Leon and ANCA-WR endorsed candidate for the 2022 Los Angeles Mayor honored the victims by stating “February 27 marks the somber anniversary of the pogroms committed against Armenians in Sumgait, Baku, Kirovabad, and Maragha by Azerbaijan. I wish to extend my voice to honor the victims of these pogroms. Acts of Armenophobia, however, have continued over the past two decades, including the invasion against the Republic of Artsakh in late 2020, threatening to destroy the very culture of Armenians. I urge the Biden Administration to take swift and decisive action to end ongoing aggressions by Azerbaijan against the Republic of Artsakh, especially in the face of security threats by Russia that aim to destabilize the region.”
Fellow LA City Councilmember, Mitch O’Farrell who represents the Little Armenia neighborhood, stated “Today we pause to remember the gruesome anti-Armenian pogroms that were carried out with unspeakable cruelty in Soviet Azerbaijan. Over several days in 1988, ethnic Armenians in Soviet Azerbaijan were chased down, brutally attacked and killed by violent mobs in the industrial city of Sumgait. People were killed in public places and even in their own homes. These events were the first in a series of additional violent pogroms and clashes that resulted in a mass exodus of Armenians from Soviet Azerbaijan, and eventually a full-scale war in the region. While these events took place in the waning years of the Soviet Union, they reverberate to this day and were matched in cruelty during the recent violent and unprovoked invasion against the Republic of Artsakh. I am deeply proud to represent Little Armenia and so many in the Armenian community. Today, I join the Armenian-American community in calling on the Biden Administration to end U.S. military assistance to Azerbaijan and strengthen Section 907 of the Freedom Support Act restrictions on U.S. military assistance to that country.”

The Armenian community, which had been instrumental to the social, economic, and cultural fabric of the society, was subjected to the most violent massacres deportation, leaving behind their ancestral homes and property from 1988-1992. The anti-Armenian pogroms were the culmination of decades-long discrimination, harassment, and persecution. The first anti-Armenian massacre was carried out in the industrial city of Sumgait, not far from the capital city of Baku. Although the official Soviet tally listed 26 victims, according to unofficial sources and eyewitness accounts, the death toll was significantly higher and exceeded several hundreds. During the course of three days, from February 26-29, 1988, Azerbaijani mobs, assisted and encouraged by the country’s authorities, massacred, burned, raped, mutilated and harassed ethnic Armenians whose personal information were provided beforehand.
Armenian homes were looted and destroyed, while the large-scale killing of Armenians were carried out indiscriminately, without regard to age or gender. Following the Sumgait tragedy, the pogroms in Kirovabad (Gandzak), Shamakhi, Shamkhor and other cities resumed in November of 1988, culminating with the heinous pogrom against Armenians in Baku in January 1990, leaving an estimated 500+ Armenians dead. The Baku Pogrom marked the final exodus of Armenians in Azerbaijan.

The Armenian National Committee of America – Western Region is the largest and most influential nonpartisan Armenian American grassroots advocacy organization in the Western United States. Working in coordination with a network of offices, chapters, and supporters throughout the Western United States and affiliated organizations around the country, the ANCA-WR advances the concerns of the Armenian American community on a broad range of issues in pursuit of the Armenian Cause.

PRESS RELEASE
March 1, 2022
For Immediate Release
Contact: Verginie Touloumian
Tel: (818) 720-0085

Armenian society has become indifferent, which is best evidenced by the high emigration rates, MP Artur Vanetsyan, head of the opposition With Honor faction and Homeland Party, told a panel hosted by the Alternative Projects Group in Yerevan’s Congress Hotel on Tuesday.

The lawmaker lamented that the 2021 statistics show a huge number of people emigrated from Armenia, which is a direct threat to Armenia and its future.

“Before presenting my formula for the Armenian agenda, I would like to speak about the risks that prevent us from shaping the Armenian dream. I have to address security risks over and over again. I can’t help but point out that the incumbent authorities must leave so that the chain of defeats around us can be broken, Afterwards, we will be able to form our agenda,” he noted.

Listing the problems in the security sphere, Vanetsyan underlined that the Artsakh issue is not resolved, the Azerbaijani troops have been stationed on Armenia’s sovereign territory since May 2021, the borders are not determined, Armenia’s relations with its allies are unclear and there are problems in relations with its international partners.

“All these problems must be addressed. They also need to be considered in the context of global security, which is not done today. As a result of the actions or rather the inaction of the current authorities, we have lost the support of the international community. Except for France and Russia, no other country issued a statement condemning the war [unleashed by Azerbaijan in 2020],” he stated.

According to the opposition MP, first of all, the country needs a professional government, which would end the practice of dividing the society into groups.

He stressed the need for a dialogue with society as well as between “sober” forces regardless of their political views to calm down the situation and form a national agenda.

Vanetsyan believes the Armenian Diaspora, whose representatives are skilled and successful professionals who can offer pro-Armenian solutions to pending issues, must also be engaged in shaping the Armenian agenda.

By Harut Sassounian,

What is happening right now in Ukraine is the worst possible scenario for both sides, in fact, all sides.

First of all, this is an enormous tragedy for the people of Ukraine who have fallen victim to the Russian invasion which should have been avoided at all costs. No one can justify the destruction of a country and the killing of innocent people. We should support the peace, common sense, and safety of all human beings.

Let us ignore the unrelenting propaganda, misinformation disinformation, and hypocrisy that have inundated the media before and during the war. No need to play politics or partisanship with people’s lives.

Let us now move from emotional statements to the real world which can only be ignored at our own peril. Since the beginning of the world, the powerful have always imposed their will on the weak. There is no escape from this. It has always been this way and will continue to be this way. All those who believe in truth and justice are sadly mistaken. They live in a make-believe world.

Russia, as a powerful country, felt that it was being threatened by Western powers encroaching on its sphere of influence and wanted to protect its national interests. Whether we agree or disagree with the Russian view is immaterial. This is how the Russians perceive the situation. And when you are a powerful country, right or wrong, you try to impose your will on others, one way or another. The precedent for this situation is the Russian invasion of the Republic of Georgia in 2008 when the latter flirted with the idea of joining NATO. Russia occupies large parts of Georgia to this day.

Those in the West who have been making sanctimonious statements about big bad Russia attacking an innocent country are conveniently forgetting how the western countries themselves behaved for decades, even centuries. The imperial powers of the United Kingdom, France, Spain, Germany, and Italy went around the world conquering dozens of smaller, poorer and weaker countries, subjugated them, plundered their natural resources, killed and wounded hundreds of thousands of natives, until they rose up and tossed the aggressors out.

The United States, the self-declared paragon of democracy and human rights, has attacked and occupied several countries in the past imposing its will around the world. The U.S. government has overthrown many leaders who have refused to toe its line and submit to America’s wishes. There are dozens of such examples, the latest of which is Iraq. Who can forget the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, when the Soviet Union deployed nuclear missiles in Cuba, just 90 miles away from the United States? The two countries came to the brink of nuclear war on that occasion. There is also the long-standing U.S. policy of the Monroe Doctrine which states that any intervention in the political affairs of the Americas by foreign powers is considered a hostile act against the United States. How is this different from Putin’s interpretation of Russia’s sphere of influence in Eastern Europe, including Ukraine? Finally, Pres. Biden’s actions against Russia are partially prompted by his intent to raise his record low rating of 37%. The latest Washington Post/ABC News poll showed that only 33% of Americans approve Biden’s handling of the Russia-Ukraine crisis, while 47% disapprove.

It would have been preferable to engage in direct negotiations between Russia and Ukraine to find a peaceful solution to the crisis. As it is often said, “war is diplomacy by other means.” The more outside powers such as the United States, France and the United Kingdom meddled in this dispute, the worst it got, since each of these countries, pretending to defend Ukraine, were in fact pursuing their own interests. The crux of the issue is the disagreement between Russia and the West about an alleged pledge made by the West after the collapse of the Soviet Union that NATO will not expand to Eastern Europe, threatening Russia’s security. Nevertheless, NATO did expand to several Eastern European countries, which Russia viewed as a hostile act.

Russia decided to impose its will on Ukraine, fearing that if it did not act promptly, Ukraine would join NATO, after which it would be impossible to neutralize the perceived danger, due to the NATO policy of “attack on one member country is deemed an attack on all.”

There should have been a compromise found on both sides to avoid war. Most people thought that there would be no war and that Russia was amassing troops on Ukraine’s border to pressure it to reach a compromise solution. Regrettably, the Russian attempt to influence Ukraine ended in a full scale invasion destroying large parts of the country’s infrastructure and causing untold casualties. It could be that Ukraine refused to compromise relying on Western assurances that it would come to its aid militarily and economically, if it resisted Russian demands not to join NATO. In addition to providing military hardware and economic assistance, Western countries tried to block Russia’s actions by issuing a series of draconian sanctions, which failed to alter its decision. The hopeful news is that Russian and Ukrainian delegations held their first direct talks on Monday and agreed to meet again.

Turning to the effects on Armenia of the war and sanctions on Russia, Armenia is caught in the middle of its alliance with and reliance on Russia and its standing with the rest of the world. As they say, when two elephants jostle, the ant gets stomped on, regardless of which elephant wins.

The biggest problem that Armenia has is the absence of a competent leader who would be able to come up with a skillful solution to extricate itself from this extremely complicated situation. Since the start of the war, Armenia’s Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has not made an official declaration. Nevertheless, on three separate occasions, Armenia has taken sides and made statements regarding this conflict.

The most problematic action Armenia took was last Friday when the Council of Europe voted to suspend Russia’s membership in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe and the Committee of Ministers. Armenia was the only country that voted with Russia against the measure. Forty two countries voted yes. Turkey shrewdly abstained and Azerbaijan did not vote at all. Western countries will not look too kindly at Armenia’s support for Russia. Likewise, Russia will not look too kindly at Azerbaijan’s and Turkey’s votes. The war in Ukraine is sure to limit Turkey’s ability to walk on a tightrope between NATO and Russia. Azerbaijan’s similar tightrope walk will also be curtailed by not voting with Russia in the Council of Europe, thus undermining the declaration of “allied cooperation” signed on Feb. 22 by Russia and Azerbaijan.

Secondly, when Armenia’s Foreign Ministry spokesman, Vahan Hunanyan, was asked if Armenia will join Russia in recognizing the “independence” of the Ukrainian regions of Donesk and Lugnask, he replied: “There is no such issue on [Armenia’s] agenda.” Putin will not be pleased with that answer. He has many ways to pressure Pashinyan to toe the Russian line in this crisis.

Finally, speaking at a meeting of the Eurasian Intergovernmental Council in Kazakhstan on February 25, Pashinyan suggested that prompt measures be taken “to minimize or circumvent” the anti-Russia sanctions approved by the West following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The anti-Russia sanctions are sure to have a major impact on Armenia’s frail economy as Russia is Armenia’s largest trading partner. As they say, when Russia sneezes, Armenia catches a cold. The $861 million remitted in 2021 by Armenian workers in Russia to their families in Armenia will be sharply curtailed due to the collapsing ruble and increased unemployment.

There is also a long-standing controversy between Armenia and Ukraine. Both sides accuse each other of betraying their trust and siding with their enemies.  In 2014, Armenia, along with nine other countries, voted with Russia against a UN General Assembly resolution which declared the pro-Russian Crimean referendum invalid. Armenians respond by recalling that Ukraine voted in the General Assembly in 2008, for a resolution demanding the withdrawal of “Armenian forces” from Nagorno Karabagh. President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine announced during the 2020 Artsakh war: “We support Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity and sovereignty just as Azerbaijan always supports our territorial integrity and sovereignty.” Furthermore, Ukraine sold lethal weapons to Azerbaijan prior to the 2020 war.

One should not forget that there are around 500,000 Armenians who live in Ukraine. When other countries shut down their embassies in Ukraine and withdrew their nationals, the Armenian Embassy continued functioning and Armenian nationals remained in Ukraine risking their lives.

With each passing day, more innocent civilians are being killed in Ukraine, more sanctions are being imposed on Russia and more ominous threats are being issued. Common sense should prevail before the world reaches a doomsday scenario.

The only solution is reaching a compromise through peaceful negotiations. Eye for an eye and tooth for a tooth will leave everyone blind and toothless.

Valerie Pecresse, a right-wing candidate running in France’s upcoming presidential election said that she would end Turkey’s bid to join the European Union if elected. The candidate made this promise in an interview with the Greek daily Ekathimerini on Monday.

“I am unimpressed by the intimidation of the Turkish government. I will oppose Turkey’s accession to the EU, the process of which has only been suspended,” said Percresse, the candidate for the right-wing Les Republicans. 

Pecresse, who is trailing in the polls behind incumbent President Emmanuel Macron, said that any “pre-accession assistance” provided to Turkey should be called into doubt. As president, Pecresse said that she would position France at the “forefront of the fight against Islamism and the protection of women’s rights.”

France and Turkey have maintained strained relations since the election of Macron in May 2017. While initially cordial, ties worsened after Macron began to criticize what he perceived as militant Islamism that threatened to undermine French secularism. 

On foreign policy, France and Turkey clashed in the Eastern Mediterranean and in Libya where they each backed separate sides. Under Macron, relations deepened with Turkey’s rivals like Greece and the United Arab Emirates through their shared distrust of Turkish ambitions and aggression. 

In turn, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan lashed out at Macron repeatedly in recent years. After the gruesome murder of French school teacher Samuel Paty by an Islamic extremist in October 2020, Erdoğan called for a boycott of French goods by Muslim countries after Macron declared it his intent to battle radical Islamism in defence of secularism. Relations grew so poor that Erdoğan at one point openly said he hoped Macron would not be re-elected in 2022. 

Relations soon began to stabilise by 2021. After Erdoğan declared a desire to mend fences with the European Union amidst a declining economy and increasing isolation, he met with Macron in June 2021 on the sidelines of a NATO summit where they discussed ways to de-escalate tensions. Since then, few major flare-ups have emerged between France and Turkey.

The Russian Ambassador to Cyprus, Stanislav Osadchiy, said during a media interview that countries like the Republic of Cyprus who have imposed sanctions on his country over its invasion of Ukraine have ‘shot themselves in the foot,’ reported Kathimerini.

According to the news outlet, Osadchiy said that Russian tourists ‘will not show up in Cyprus in the summer and that they will go to Turkey instead.’

“If you ask me personally, (economic sanctions) do not worry us. Unfortunately, I think Europeans are shooting themselves in the foot. Where will they find natural gas, oil, wheat, how will Cyprus get Russian tourists? Russian tourists will not come. Where will these tourists go? They’ll go to Turkey, you want that? They’ll spend money there. Summer is coming. You have shut down Cyprus’ airspace? You have shot yourselves in the foot,” Osadchiy says, in fluent Greek, in a clip from the interview posted on twitter by Yiota Hadjicosta, a journalist with Cyprus’ Politis newspaper.

“#Russian Ambassador to Cyprus openly threatened #Cyprus in an interview with a local media outlet. Unbelievable! #Ukraine #Russia,” Hadjicosta tweeted.Meanwhile in Greece, the president of the Hotel Chamber of Greece, Alexandros Vasilikos, advised the tourism and hospitality sector to stay calm following the  developments in Ukraine. At the moment he said , there are no cancellations of tourist packages for Greece, but the current situation could potentially become a problem.“Obviously the situation in Ukraine frightens everyone, as it happens in any difficult situation.”  said Vasilikos.

With Russian forces besieging Mariupol, in which 120,000+ ethnic Greeks live, SKAI News spoke with a Mr Kiouranas who lives in the city and exposed that Ukrainian “fascists” are killing people for trying to leave the city.

When asked by SKAI news if he planned to leave the city, Kiouranas responded “how can I leave? When you try to leave the Ukrainian fascists, the Azov Battalion, will stop you and kill you.”

Who are the Azov Battalion?

Azov Special Operations Detachment (Ukrainian: Окремий загін спеціального призначення «Азов»), or Azov Battalion, is a right-wing extremist and neo-Nazi unit of the National Guard of Ukraine, based in Mariupol, in the Azov Sea coastal region.

In 2014, the regiment gained notoriety after allegations emerged of torture and war crimes, as well as neo-Nazi sympathies and usage of associated symbols by the regiment itself, as seen in their logo featuring the Wolfsangel, one of the original symbols used by the 2nd SS Panzer Division Das Reich.

Representatives of the Azov Battalion say that the symbol is an abbreviation for the slogan Ідея Нації (Ukrainian for “National Idea”) and deny connection with Nazism.

In 2014, a spokesman for the regiment said around 10–20% of the unit were neo-Nazis.

In 2018, a provision in an appropriations bill passed by the U.S. Congress blocked military aid to Azov on the grounds of its white supremacist ideology; in 2015, a similar ban on aid to the group was overturned by Congress.

Members of the regiment come from 22 countries and are of various backgrounds.

More than half of the regiment’s members speak Russian and come from eastern Ukraine, including cities of Donetsk and Luhansk.

The unit’s first commander was far-right nationalist Andriy Biletsky, who led the neo-Nazi Social-National Assembly and Patriot of Ukraine.

In its early days, Azov was a special police company of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, led by Volodymyr Shpara, the leader of the Vasylkiv, Kyiv, branch of Patriot of Ukraine and Right Sector.

In 2018, the U.S. House of Representatives also passed a provision blocking any training of Azov members by American forces, citing its neo-Nazi connections.

The House had previously passed amendments banning support of Azov between 2014 and 2017, but due to pressure from The Pentagon, the amendments were quietly lifted.

This was protested by the Simon Wiesenthal Center which stated that lifting the ban highlighted the danger of Holocaust distortion in Ukraine.

MOSCOW, Feb 28 (Reuters) – Russian President Vladimir Putin called the West an “Empire of Lies” as he discussed the economy with top officials on Monday following the imposition of sweeping sanctions against Moscow, the Kremlin said.

“(Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin) and I discussed this topic, naturally bearing in mind the sanctions that the so-called Western community – as I called it in my speech, the ’empire of lies’ – is now trying to implement against our country,” a transcript of the meeting quoted Putin as saying.

It comes as Ukrainian intelligence has learned from within Belarus that “special ops” troops have been spotted loading up planes for a major attack

Russian President Vladimir Putin has put Russian nuclear deterrent forces on high alert amid tensions with the West over Ukraine.

Putin told state TV that NATO powers have made “aggressive statements” along with the West imposing hard-hitting financial sanctions against Russia, including the president himself.

He ordered the Russian defense minister and the chief of the military’s General Staff to put the nuclear deterrent forces in a “special regime of combat duty”.

The US Ambassador to the United Nations says Putin’s order shows the Russian leader is “escalating conflict in a manner that is unacceptable”.

Linda Thomas-Greenfield said: “It means that President Putin is continuing to escalate this war in a manner that is totally unacceptable. “We have to continue to stem his actions in the strongest possible way.”

Putin is said to becoming increasingly frustrated at the slower-than-expected pace of the invasion as Russian troops have so far failed to capture the capital of Kyiv.