Gagrule.net

Gagrule.net News, Views, Interviews worldwide

The Center for Truth and Justice Highlights its Groundbreaking Achievements and Features the Extraordinary Garo Paylan.

By

Documenting Atrocities and Saluting Heroes,

By Vic Gerami,

If you think that no one is keeping a record of Azerbaijan’s crimes against humanity, violations of international law, and war crimes, then you are in for a surprise.

The Center for Truth and Justice was established in November 2020 in response to the invasion of Artsakh (formerly Nagorno-Karabakh) to do just that. They are a group of lawyers overseeing the collection of firsthand testimonial evidence from war survivors via in-depth, recorded interviews. The attorneys run two law clinics, one in Armenia and one in Artsakh, which are the first of their kind. Through their clinics, they train Armenian law students and young lawyers to interview survivors of the war and record their testimonies. They have conducted hundreds of interviews and trained nearly one-hundred current or future lawyers. By being a permanent home for the testimonials, CFTJ is a resource for academic and legal practitioners who seek to use the evidence for education and/or legal action.

On October 13, 2023, the Center for Truth and Justice (CFTJ) will hold its third annual gala titled ‘Raise Their Voices: Break the Blockade’ in Los Angeles, with guest of honor Garo Paylan. In no uncertain terms, the CFTJ and Paylan do God’s work, making this union and the event much more significant.

The recognition of the Armenian Genocide of 1915 was possible due to the overwhelming evidence collected by experts, including testimonies, photographs, interviews, and other sources. Given Azerbaijan’s track record of practicing revisionist history, disinformation, and propaganda, the evidence that the CFTJ collects is invaluable.

The mission of the CFTJ is to be a living memorial to crimes against humanity. By being a permanent home for testimonials, the Center makes eyewitness accounts available for study, education, and legal action to foster education, empathy, justice, and change. They preserve evidence and make it accessible for current or future proceedings in Armenia or abroad.

Garo Paylan, An Armenian born in Turkey, was among the few Armenians elected to the Grand National Assembly of Turkey and served for two consecutive terms in 2015-2018 and 2018-2023, representing Istanbul and Diyarbakir. Though a politician, Paylan is also a leading democracy activist in Turkey. He is a founding member of the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) and, since 2016, was the first Armenian in the history of the Republic of Turkey to publicly discuss the Armenian genocide of 1915 from the podium of the Turkish parliament. Paylan is recognized for his activism on human rights and minority rights in Turkey. He has received several awards, including the Grand Vermeil Medal, and has twice been nominated for the Nobel peace prize.

Artsakh is finally getting some attention after nearly three years of deafening silence from the international community and the media, following the report by the founding prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, Luis Moreno Ocampo, who classified the situation in Artsakh as Genocide. Meanwhile, Armenia requested an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council to address the ‘deterioration of the humanitarian situation’ in Artsakh due to Azerbaijan’s illegal blockade of the Lachin Corridor, the only road connecting the Republic of Artsakh to Armenia and the rest of the world.

The attendance of Paylan at the CFTJ’s event is significant and a rare occurrence for a public servant who isn’t about self-promotion and rarely travels to the United States. In addition to Paylan’s speech and the Center presenting their last year’s achievements, their new initiatives will be announced at the gala. The event aims to collect funds for the CFTJ’s initiatives of collecting evidence of war crimes, preparing public reports and confidential filings, and offering the facts that international law experts need to hold Azerbaijan accountable.

To learn more about the gala and the CFTJ and to purchase tickets, please visit cftjustice.org

BIO: Vic Gerami

Vic Gerami is an award-winning journalist and the editor + publisher of The Blunt Post. Gerami is also the host and co-producer of the national headline news + politics program, THE BLUNT POST with VIC on KPFK 90.7 FM (Pacifica Network). 

Pan Armenian Council of Western USA Calls Upon the Biden Administration to Take All Measures to End Azerbaijan’s Illegal Blockade of Artsakh

By

Sarkis Balkhian,

WHAT:

The Pan Armenian Council of Western USA is organizing a press conference featuring Congressman Adam Schiff, Congressman Brad Sherman, LA City Council President Paul Krekorian, Mayor of Glendale Dan Brotman, and other public officials to launch a 24-Hour nationwide hunger strike to demonstrate unity with the 120,000 residents of Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh) victimized by a dire humanitarian catastrophe caused by the 8-month ongoing illegal blockade of the Lachin Corridor by Azerbaijan.

WHO:

Pan Armenian Council of Western USA (PAC WUSA)

Congressman Adam Schiff

Congressman Brad Sherman

LA City Council President Paul Krekorian

Mayor of Glendale Dan Brotman

WHEN:

Wednesday, August 23, 2023

Starting at 5:00 P.M. PST

WHERE:

Consulate of Azerbaijan in Los Angeles

11766 Wilshire Blvd,

Los Angeles, CA 90025

WHY:

The Pan Armenian Council of Western USA (PAC WUSA) will launch a 24-hour nationwide hunger strike at a press conference featuring public officials, including Rep. Adam Schiff, Rep. Brad Sherman, LA City Council President Paul Krekorian, Mayor of Glendale Dan Brotman and other public officials to demand tangible action by President Biden’s Administration to end the illegal blockade of the Lachin Corridor by Azerbaijan’s tyrannical regime, ensuring security and stability for Artsakh, as well as invigorating a recommitment for its right to self-determination. The strike, themed “Unity With Artsakh, End the Blockade” especially aims to raise national awareness about the rapidly unfolding humanitarian crisis in the region, which has left 120,000 civilians on the brink of starvation and genocide.

Pan Armenian Council of Western USA Calls Upon the Biden Administration to Take All Measures to End Azerbaijan’s Illegal Blockade of Artsakh

With the lives of 30,000 Armenian Children, 20,000 elderly, and 9,000 persons with disabilities hanging in the balance, we demand affirmative action by President Biden and the U.S. Department of State, to prevent a new Armenian Genocide at the hands of the Aliyev regime by:

  1. Ensuring the immediate re-opening of the Lachin Corridor by introducing and facilitating the passage of a UN Security Council Resolution requiring Azerbaijan to adhere to the February 22, 2023, preliminary measure of the ICJ ordering Azerbaijan to open the Lachin Corridor;
  2. Immediately halting all U.S. military assistance to Azerbaijan in light of the illegal humanitarian blockade imposed on the Armenians of Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh), consistent with Section 907 of the FREEDOM Support Act;
  3. Sanctioning members of the Aliyev regime under the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act for ongoing war crimes and crimes against humanity perpetrated by individual members of the Aliyev regime;
  4. Delivering $100 million in USAID humanitarian assistance to Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) through the Lachin Corridor to ensure the survival of the 120,000 civilians who have been completely blockaded since June 15, 2023;
  5. Introducing a UN Security Council resolution to establish a United Nations Mission in Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) [UNMINK] consisting of 5,000 international military personnel to ensure the physical security of the population.

PAC-WUSA will use the following hashtags for promotional purposes–

#selfdetermination #security #endtheblockade

India Shows Caucasus Diplomacy Isn’t Just For Russia And Turkey Anymore

By

By Michael Rubin,

After the fall of the Soviet Union, the Caucasus became a playground for Russian, Turkish, and Iranian intrigue. Russia sought to regain the influence it enjoyed when Azerbaijan, Armenia, and Georgia were Soviet republics. Turkey embraced Azerbaijan as an extension of itself under the mantra of “one nation, two states.” Iranian nationalists considered influence over the entire region as a birthright since they had controlled it centuries earlier. Decisions about war or peace in the region often originated less in Yerevan, Baku, or Tbilisi, and more in Moscow, Ankara, and Tehran.

Changing Priorities

Over the past five years, each Caucasian country has flipped its geopolitical orientation, and now India senses opportunity. As it solidifies ties with Yerevan, New Delhi is set to become a new diplomatic heavyweight in the region.

Consider how much the Caucasus region has changed. In the wake of the September 11, 2001 terror attacks, Azerbaijani President Heydar Aliyev, a former local KGB chief and Moscow-based politburo member, embraced the West. At that time, just 18 months before Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s rise, the United States and Europe saw Turkey as an ally and accepted at face value that Azerbaijan would be secular and Western-oriented. Under Aliyev’s son Ilham, however, Azerbaijan is erratic. Baku is willing to work fist-in-glove with Islamist terrorists and to pivot closer to Russia, for whom it is now a money-laundering lifeline.

Iran’s regional role is similar. For Armenia, Iran is less an ally of choice than one of necessity, a lifeline through which to export goods impossible to ship elsewhere because of Turkish and Azerbaijani blockades. For Azerbaijan, the opposite is true. Behind its recent antagonistic rhetoric toward Tehran, Azerbaijan helps Iran evade sanctions for the right price. 

Perhaps no country has changed as much as Armenia. Armenians are frustrated with Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, but they show no desire to return to the Russia-dominated status quo that prevailed before the large-scale protests of 2018. Georgia and Armenia have traded places. Georgia is backsliding into Russia’s orbit while Armenia breaks away.

The Ally Democracies Need

The 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh War confirmed this reorientation. Armenians turned on Russia for the failure of its peacekeepers to enforce the ceasefire. Armenians will never forgive the fact that, as Azerbaijan starves 120,000 Christians in Nagorno-Karabakh, Russian forces stand less than 50 metersfrom an illegal Azerbaijani checkpoint that blocks relief supplies. America, meanwhile, confuses statements with substance and disqualifies itself with bothsiderism against the backdrop of genocide.

Enter India, the world’s most populous country. Whereas India once focused its diplomatic efforts regionally or into the Non-Aligned Movement, today it is a diplomatic heavyweight farther afield.  

In 2019, Pashinyan met Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly. Both promised greater ties, and they meant it. Pashinyan declared Armenia would side unequivocally with India on the Kashmir question. Law is on India’s side, but diplomatically Pakistan has no one to blame but itself. Out of religious animus and a desire to ingratiate itself to Turkey and Azerbaijan, Pakistan refuses even to recognize Armenia’s existence. India, meanwhile, accepts the nuances and complexities of the Nagorno-Karabakh problem.

As Armenia untangles its legacy military ties to Russia, India fills the gap. In March 2020, Yerevan signed a $40 million deal with India for four SWATHI radars to track incoming artillery, mortars, and rockets and pinpoint their launch sites. In June 2022, India agreed to sell Armenia drones. The U.S. should celebrate such purchases as Armenia bypasses Iran. 

Negotiations meanwhile continue for Pinaka multi-barrel rocket launchers, Nag anti-tank missiles, and anti-tank guided missiles. Armenian Defense Minister Suren Papikyan also visited his Indian counterpart Shri Rajnath Singh on the sidelines of India’s DefExpo 2022. 

The relationship is symbiotic, and extends beyond the military realm. Armenia provides India with a commercial hub from which India can ship goods through Georgia west to Europe or into Russia, and then eastward into Central Asia. Access to that region had been interrupted by the Taliban’s conquest of Afghanistan. Both countries have become IT powerhouses, and Armenia’s investment in its pharmaceutical sector increasingly interests India’s investors. 

A common lamentation among democrats in the region is why the United States is effectively absent. Washington makes excuses, and remains absent when it counts. India’s presence now provides a new option for the region, one that Washington should encourage. A choice between Russia, Turkey, and Iran is akin to choosing between a heart attack, stroke, or cancer. India provides an antidote to dictatorship, rentierism, and extremism. The Caucasus are in flux. India could be the ally its democrats need.

Now a 19FortyFive Contributing Editor, Dr. Michael Rubin is a Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI). Dr. Rubin is the author, coauthor, and coeditor of several books exploring diplomacy, Iranian history, Arab culture, Kurdish studies, and Shi’ite politics, including “Seven Pillars: What Really Causes Instability in the Middle East?” (AEI Press, 2019); “Kurdistan Rising” (AEI Press, 2016); “Dancing with the Devil: The Perils of Engaging Rogue Regimes” (Encounter Books, 2014); and “Eternal Iran: Continuity and Chaos” (Palgrave, 2005).

Surprisingly few people know these two Aliev sixes in Armenia.

By

By Aleksander Lapshin,

Surprisingly few people know these two Aliev sixes in Armenia.

Meanwhile, all the evil that Ilhamostan is doing against Armenia and Artsakh comes from these two. On the left head of the SGB, General Ali Nagiev, and on the right head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, General Vilayat Evazov. All abductions, murders, blockades, gunfire, and provocation at the border are planned and executed by these two. By the way, it was these two, Nagiyev and Eyvazov who organized my kidnapping in Minsk and delivery to Baku, who organized an attack on me in the Baku prison to compromise Ilham Aliyev. Are you surprised? No surprise, this is a fight between the ruling clans in Ilkhamostan, they hate each other there more than you Armenians. They did a great job of setting the fool Aliyev up with my arrest for visiting Artsakh, and my victory at the ECHR in Strasbourg and at the UN (when the Baku regime was found guilty of unlawful arrest, torture and attempted murder) brought them joy.

It was these two slaps, first of all General Nagiyev, who were behind the organization of an unsuccessful attempt on me in Riga in December 2020. And it is these two right now that are waiting for the moment to get me (and not only me, there is a whole target list) in Yerevan and it will also fail.

Looking at these two faces, you can see that they are somewhat alike. Both have virtually no neck, grown into shoulders and closely planted eyes, which give a nomadic genotype. Both of them, judging by the type, shave the overgrown eyebrows. I wondered where they came from? It turned out that both are from Nakhichevan, one from the Bebek intestine, and the other from the Abragunis intestine. Practically neighboring intestines, they are relatives there in many ways and close marriages are the norm to this day.

Righteous Jews Appeal to Israel To Help Open the Lachin Corridor

By

By Harut Sassounian,

There are pro and anti-Armenian individuals of every nationality. Jews are no exception. There are Jews who support us and those who oppose us. We should not generalize and paint everyone with the same brush. Armenians should not treat every Jew as an opponent just because the Israeli government denies the Armenian Genocide and sells billions of dollars of arms to Azerbaijan.

Armenians have the right to criticize the Israeli government and Jews who are anti-Armenian. I severely condemned Israel’s denial of the Armenian Genocide in my 2015 lecture at an Israeli University. After the lecture, I met with the President of Israel Reuven Rivlin and told him that the government of Israel, whose own people were victims of genocide, should have been the first country to recognize the Armenian Genocide, not the last. Pres. Rivlin told me that he recognized the Armenian Genocide and blamed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for denying it.

I just received copies of two letters sent by a group of righteous Israelis to their country’s top officials, requesting that they intervene with Azerbaijan to unblock the Lachin Corridor.

The first letter was sent to Israel’s Foreign Minister Eli Cohen on January 15, 2023, asking for his assistance to prevent “a grave humanitarian crisis and loss of life” due to Azerbaijan’s blockade of the Lachin Corridor. The 17 prominent Jewish signers of the letter, including Rabbis, journalists and scholars, wrote: “We believe that you, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Israel, through your ties with your counterparts in Azerbaijan and Russia, can help to avoid this grave humanitarian crisis. Therefore we ask that you approach them urgently to work for the lifting of the blockade of the Lachin Corridor.”

The second letter was sent on August 11, 2023, to Israel’s President Isaac Herzog who had recently visited Azerbaijan. The letter-writers requested him “to make a personal appeal to your counterparts in Azerbaijan and demand their immediate removal of the blockade of the Lachin Corridor.” The 35 prominent Jewish signers of the letter, including Rabbis, scholars, journalists, a former Cabinet Minister and Member of Knesset, architects and scientists, wrote: “The State of Israel enjoys close ties with Azerbaijan, the state which is responsible for this crisis, and has the ability to resolve it. These ties obligate the State of Israel to take a clear stand, and not to stand idly by…. The aid that we [Israel] provided [to Azerbaijan] means that we have a special responsibility not to be a bystander, and also gives us an important opportunity to have a positive impact. We cannot remain silent, especially in light of our historic and multilayered connection with the Armenian people.”

Beyond these letters, hundreds of Jews and Armenians in Israel held several protests during and after the 2020 Artsakh War. One of the protests was in front of the Ministry of Defense in Tel Aviv, criticizing the sale of Israeli arms to Azerbaijan. Some of the protesters held models of drones with blood stains painted on them with the words ‘Made in Israel.’

Avidan Freedman, one of the founders of Yanshoof, an organization dedicated to stopping Israeli arms sales to human rights violators, published an article in The Times of Israel on August 13, 2023, titled: “The Artsakh humanitarian crisis is our responsibility. Here’s why.” He wrote: “Israel provided Azerbaijan with 69% of its arms in the period between 2016 and 2020. During the 2020 Artsakh War, a senior Israeli military source asserted that ‘Azerbaijan would not have been able to continue its operation at this level without our support.’” Freedman concluded: “the current humanitarian crisis in Nagorno-Karabakh was enabled by Israeli support…. The emerging humanitarian crisis, Israel’s military support of Azerbaijan, and the Jewish people’s historic and moral connection to the Armenian people combine to create a clear moral responsibility. Israel must take a moral stance and call on Azerbaijan to immediately lift its blockade of the Lachin Corridor.”

To illustrate the depth of pro-Armenian sympathies among some Jews, I would like to quote Dr. Israel Charny, one of the signers of the above mentioned two letters. He is the Executive Director of the Jerusalem-based Institute on the Holocaust and Genocide and author of “Israel’s Failed Response to the Armenian Genocide.” In 2009, Charny and I were invited to speak at the UK Parliament. Since he could not attend due to illness, he submitted his speech in writing. Here is an excerpt: “No less than the arch fighter for peace in the Israel-Palestinian conflict, Shimon Peres, now President of Israel, then serving as Israel’s Foreign Minister, twice went notably out of his way to insult the history and memory of the Armenian Genocide.”

In 2001, Charny sent a scathing letter to Peres: “You have gone beyond a moral boundary that no Jew should allow himself to trespass…. As a Jew and an Israeli, I am ashamed of the extent to which you have now entered into the range of actual denial of the Armenian Genocide, comparable to denials of the Holocaust.”

In response to an “especially insulting” denial by Peres in 2002, Dr. Charny sent him one of my editorials in The California Courier, with the following note: “I am enclosing with great concern for your attention an editorial in a leading US-Armenian newspaper calling on Armenia to expel the Israeli Ambassador [Rivka Cohen, after she denied the Armenian Genocide]. For your further information, the author of this editorial, who is the head of the United Armenian Fund in the US — comparable to our United Jewish Appeal — was for many years a delegate to the UN Human Rights Commission in Geneva.”

Armenians should support their friends and criticize their opponents regardless of their nationality.

It Takes a Jewish Blogger to Expose Armenia Road Accident. Instead of Pro-Government Media

By

Aleksander Lapshin, Blogger writes on His Facebook Page:

Armenia has witnessed the tragic loss of 3,266 of its citizens due to road accidents, with an additional 10,000 individuals sustaining injuries. Furthermore, during the Second Artsakh War, Armenia suffered the loss of 4,000 soldiers and saw 10,000 soldiers injured.

I read in the news that in 10 years, starting from 2012, Armenia has lost 3266 citizens killed on the roads of the country. Another 10 thousand were injured. These are terrible numbers for a small country whose population is a little larger than Novosibirsk and four smaller than Paris or London. Losses are comparable to combat. In the Second Artsakh War, 4000 soldiers were killed. But if the country mourns the heroes who died defending their country, then hardly anyone remembers the victims of idiocy on the roads.

We are not surprised when a kind-hearted taxi driver at the Zvartnots airport recommends not to buckle up. Why? Police do not fine passengers, taxi driver says. He seriously believes that the belt is invented exclusively for the police, not for safety. We are not surprised that a minibus from Yerevan to Vanadzor is overspeeding on a slippery road, coming head-on with a lorry on the oncoming lane, hoping that the lorry will give in. Father trusts his 10-year-old son so much that he gives his “Jiguli” to go to the neighboring village for shopping. Gas cylinders are installed by experts without proper education and certificate, which causes regular car fires. Roads are not lit at night, which is why motorists constantly fall into pits or fly sideways.

This sad list could go on and on. But if in the event of war, not everything is up to you, then it is up to you to repair the roads, fasten the belt and not break the rules.

Turkey MFA appeals to their Turkish Agent in Armenia

By

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) of Turkey issued a statement in the context of the developments related to the Lachin corridor.

Turkey’s MFA called on Armenia to back off from provocative moves, to recognize Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity, to support the use of the Aghdam-Stepanakert and other roads for the needs of Karabakh’s Armenian population, and to support efforts to integrate Karabakh Armenians into Azerbaijan, according to IHA news agency.

Also, the Turkish MFA claimed that the world is unjustly accusing Azerbaijan on the Lachin corridor issue, and stresses that Lachin is part of Azerbaijan and the latter can use it as it pleases.

Armenia: The head of the community of Aparan, his wife, and his mother, are targeted by the department in cases of confiscation of illegal property

By

hetq.am Aparan community leader Karen Yeghiazaryan and his family members are involved in the “illegal property” case. The head of the community, his wife, and his mother were invited to the Department of Illegal Property Confiscation of the General Prosecutor’s Office. A study is being conducted regarding the property they own. Until August 18, they should appear at the prosecutor’s office to familiarize themselves with the case materials and present a position.

Karen Yeghiazaryan in 2017 was elected to the post of Aparan community head, re-elected in 2021. on December 5. 2012-2015 was the organizer of garbage collection in Aparan municipality. According to biographical information, he is non-partisan.

Karen Yeghiazaryan was the owner of “Gntunik” LLC. The company was founded in 2005. But in 2023 on April 12, his mother, Liana Yeghiazaryan, became the sole owner of the company. 2020 since September, individual entrepreneur Liana Yeghiazaryan was also the trust manager of “Gntuniq”. His son entrusted him with the management of the company, as the latter could not manage the company personally. It is obvious that it was more of a formality, because before that, the fiduciary administrator was the father of the community head.

A few days ago, on August 9, through the enforcement service, Liana Yeghiazaryan was forbidden “to perform any action related to the management of 100% of the shares in the company”.

The mayor of Aparan is now a defendant. In particular, Karen Yeghiazaryan’s case of engaging in illegal business activities has been under investigation in the court of general jurisdiction of Aragatsotn region for 3 years now.

4 persons were charged with abuse in Aparan municipality
Karen Yeghiazaryan was charged with the fact that, being the head of the Aparan community, an official, constantly performing organizational-managerial and administrative-economic functions, he illegally participated in entrepreneurial activities, due to selfish and other personal interests, with the help of other persons, and abused his official position. using his powers, his official position, embezzled significant amounts of property entrusted to him, and also committed official forgeries.

It should be noted that at this stage the prosecutor’s office does not publish the list of property subject to confiscation, taking into account the fact that this list may be changed after explanations or presented evidence.

Property of Karen Yeghiazaryan

Karen Yeghiazaryan is an official submitting a declaration of assets, income, expenses and interests. 2022 submitted to the Corruption Prevention Commission. according to the annual declaration, the mayor of Aparan owns 11 units of real estate, 10 of which he has exclusive ownership rights to. He owns houses, buildings and plots of land both in Aparan community and in Yerevan.

In addition, he declared two cars: “FORD” 1998. production truck and 1997 production passenger car “VOLKSWAGEN”.

As for money, K. Yeghiazaryan in 2022 he had about 37 million drams and 468 thousand cash in his last bank accounts. AMD

The income of the given year was 3 million 359 thousand received from the municipality. AMD salary and loans received from “Akba Bank” – 2 million 293 thousand. AMD and 24 thousand. 128 euros. In 2022, only 17 million 469 thousand. made expenses aimed at repaying loans in the amount of drams.

According to the woman’s statement, in 2022 had 5 million 517 thousand. deposit in the amount of drams. He had about 255 thousand in his bank accounts. AMD, and 150 thousand in cash. AMD

The only income of the year was the interest received on the deposit, about 49 thousand. AMD