The Artsian,

One of the first things Nikol did when he came to power was to try to replace the Armenia Fund with the “My Step Fund”. He immediately arrested the director of the fund on charges of misappropriating $250k ($250k out of $220million).

5 years have passed and Ara still hasn’t been convicted of a crime. Then in 2020, his administration decided to transfer $105 million dollars from the Armenia fund to the government budget. This was something unprecedented. Interestingly, the members of the government and the parliament received substantial bonuses shortly after. Now with Artsakh being completely under Azeri occupation, the Armenia fund has literally lost everything that it. Has worked since the day of its inception. Everything we donated and built is gone. Literally everything. Today, the Armenia Fund has become somewhat obsolete, which is exactly what Nikol as well as Aliyev, and Erdogan always wanted. Armenia fund is partly to be blamed for this. After all, throughout the past 5 years they either promoted Nikol or stayed silent when Ara Vardanyan was spending time in prison for an allegation that was never proven, they were silent on Nikol’s organized efforts to undermine the organization. Most importantly i haven’t heard anything from the Armenia Fund in regard to how this government handled the wars and gave away every inch of Artsakh. So i think its time for us to create a new organization. With Artsakh gone, Armenia Fund has lost its meaning.

I will fight to restore my right to return to Armenia

Member of the ARF Bureau, co-chairman of the Co-ordinating Council of Armenian Organizations of France (CCAF) Murad Papazyan has appealed to the justice system of Armenia to assume its responsibilities, rejecting the decision of the National Security Service. He has issued a statement about this.

“On July 14, 2022, when I was leaving for Armenia, the National Security Service barred my entry and ordered my deportation, saying I was “persona non grata.”

13 months after the incidents, on August 21, 2023, during the preliminary court hearing the judge demanded the NSS to present the reasons for my ban on entry to Armenia. 13 months after the events, they could not present the slightest reasons… The judge gave Security Service 14 days to present the reasons for my dismissal, September 4. My attorneys asked me to attend the next hearing, but the judge declined, instead, offered to attend remotely. Security Service of course never presented the required elements. I learned in October that the judge was changed, and on November 23rd, At 14:30, a new preliminary court hearing should be held. The reason for the change of the judge is not mentioned.

I apply to the justice system of Armenia to obtain the reasons for my dismissal and to give me the right to participate in this trial. And if the Security Service still does not present the reasons for my removal, I expect this decision to be questioned. And if we witness the simple formality of justice, I will not hesitate to pass it on to the European Human Rights Council court to annul this baseless decision. I will fight to restore my right to return to Armenia. a country for which I have fought for more than 40 years”.

Murad Papazyan

Member of the ARF Bureau, Co-chair of the Coordinating Council of Armenian Organizations of France

Paris, November 21, 2023

Yerevan /Mediamax/. President of Turkey Recep Tayyip Erdogan said “Gaza has the same place in our hearts as Karabakh”

At a press conference following the presidential cabinet meeting, Erdogan said, in particular:

“Any incident taking place around us, from the Balkans to the Caucasus, from the Black Sea to the eastern coasts of the Mediterranean, is of direct concern to us. Gaza has the same place in our hearts as Karabakh. We do not discriminate between Bosnia and Aleppo, or Tripoli and Balkh, or Thessaloniki and Mosul.”

“Those who for years emboldened Armenia and profited from the suffering, troubles and fights of the people living in the region actually caused the biggest harm to Armenia itself. By fanning the flames of unrealistic pipedreams, they manipulated and exploited the Armenians, condemning them to insecurity. Armenia needs to realize and accept this reality. The Armenian people and their rulers had better seek their security in establishing peace with their neighbors, not thousands of miles away.

No weapon or ammunition sent by Western countries can substitute for the tranquility to be enabled by an environment of permanent peace. It is our biggest desire that the Armenians shall not waste, once again, the peace opportunity,” Erdogan said.

The Parliament of Azerbaijan adopted a statement in response to the Act for the Protection of Armenians adopted by the US Senate. “The Milli Majlis resolutely rejects it as an act against Azerbaijan adopted in the US Senate and considers it a serious blow to relations between the two countries.

This poses a serious obstacle to efforts to bring peace to the region. The act passed by the US Senate is a clear example of double standards and a selective approach. When Armenia expanded its occupation against Azerbaijan, the “Khojaly genocide” and massacres of the Azerbaijani population were committed; the United States, as a permanent member of the UN Security Council, did not try to prevent these actions but, on the contrary, adopted the 907th Amendment against Azerbaijan. The United States supported the separatist regime created on the territory of Azerbaijan. The current actions of the United States as a mediator have led to a loss of authority in Azerbaijan. US foreign policy has suffered a complete collapse in recent years. In this regard, special mention should be made of the policies in the Middle East and Afghanistan. The Milli Majlis of Azerbaijan once again declares that Azerbaijan, based on the norms and principles of international law, will always react firmly to all negative steps.”

By Harut Sassounian,

Three weeks ago, when I first wrote about the FBI’s investigation of New York City Mayor Eric Adams’ campaign links to Turkey, I did not realize that this would be the opening of Pandora’s box.

Last week, Adams created a defense fund to raise money to pay the legal expenses for the expanding federal probe into his 2021 election campaign. The law permits Adams to receive donations up to $5,000. However, he must disclose the names and addresses of all donors.

According to the New York Post, “Federal authorities are investigating whether the Turkish government or Turkish citizens illegally funneled donations to Adams’ campaign by using ‘straw donors’ — a scheme where contributors listed in official records aren’t the actual source of funding — and whether Adams did quid-pro-quo favors.”

Multiple sources told the New York Post: “the Adams administration staffer who was found to have allegedly ‘acted improperly’ amid the federal corruption probe into his campaign fundraising worked in the city’s Office for International Affairs before abruptly being placed on leave.” The Mayor’s office confirmed the information.

That person is Rana Abbasova who was the Mayor’s Director of Protocol. Originally from Azerbaijan, she performed advanced planning and logistics for mayoral events and traveled with him. Her annual salary is $80,651. The Post was told that she lied to federal investigators.

Abbasova previously served as community coordinator and advisor to Adams when he was Brooklyn borough President. Her biography states that: “She was responsible for international relations and maintaining relationships between the Borough President and stakeholders, including the Middle East and Central Asian countries, Muslim and Russian-speaking communities, and Non-profit organizations. She also worked with Embassies and Consulates to build relationships between countries and the Office of the Brooklyn Borough President to help overcome language barriers and cultural differences. She also organized Turkic Heritage events and assisted with Sister Cities agreements. Abbasova was also an administrative assistant for Adams’ One Brooklyn Fund, Inc. when he was still borough President.”

The City news website reported that in April 2017, Abbasova arranged a meeting between borough President Adams and the Turken Foundation, founded by Pres. Erdogan’s son, Bilal. Three of Turken’s board members contributed a total of $6,000 to the Mayor’s campaign. His schedule shows that he attended four Turken events. Turken is registered as a foreign agent with the Department of Justice.

Abbasova arranged for Adams at least three “meetings and events related to Turkey when he was borough president, a review of his schedule shows. Among them was a 2015 grand opening celebration for a Turkish restaurant in Brooklyn, which she marked as ‘important.’”

POLITICO reported that as Brooklyn borough President, Adams “attended nearly 80 events over eight years celebrating Turkey — including a flag-raising in 2015, a charity ball in 2018 and a Zoom meeting with the Turkish consul in 2020.”

After reviewing thousands of Adams’ public schedules and many social media posts, POLITICO revealed his “unusually strong relationship with Turkey, which has drawn scrutiny from federal investigators.” In 2019, as Adams “was embarking on a run for New York City mayor, he joined Martha Stewart at a gala celebrating Turkish Airlines — a company now caught up in an ongoing FBI probe into Adams’ campaign finances. At the event, Adams was photographed holding hands with two company officials over a sheet cake; after winning the mayor’s race, he appointed one of those officials — Cenk Ocal — to his transition team.” The CNN reported that on Nov. 2, the home of a Turkish Airlines executive was among the locations raided by the FBI.

POLITICO’s analysis of Adams’ Brooklyn Borough schedules turned up three mentions of the Turkish airlines: Two planned banquets celebrating the carrier in 2019 and 2020, and a cryptic entry on Oct. 2, 2015 that simply read: “Reschedule 4 p.m. Turkish airline. Rana [Abbasova] my gifts.”

Daniel Nigro, then New York City Fire Commissioner, was pressured by Adams to permit, despite safety concerns, the opening of a high-rise building that housed the Turkish consulate, just in time for the arrival of Pres. Erdogan. Nigro received a grand jury subpoena and spoke to FBI agents.

After becoming Mayor last year, Adams made virtual remarks at a real estate conference in Istanbul, which was attended by two top city officials. However, the Mayor’s participation was left out of his daily public schedule and not reported.

In addition to the home of the fundraiser for the Mayor’s campaign, the FBI raided or conducted interviews at a dozen locations as part of its investigations of campaign contributions from Turkish sources, CNN reported.

In 2022, “Adams took two trips to Turkey — one in August funded by multiple entities including the Turkish consulate, according to a financial disclosure obtained by POLITICO. Local news outlet THE CITY recently reported Turkish Airlines also chipped in for that trip, but that was omitted from the required annual disclosure. Four months later, the financial disclosure shows, an organization called the Association of Young Tourism Leaders funded another trip to Turkey for Adams. The junkets were among a half-dozen trips the mayor has said he made to the country, including a 2017 sojourn with his son, Jordan,” according to POLITICO.

While visiting Turkey as Brooklyn Borough President, Adams said that he was interested in buying a house in Istanbul, according to the Turkish Sabah newspaper. Adams also said that he is so satisfied with Turkish Airlines that he not only uses that carrier to fly to Turkey, but also to other parts of the world, like India.

After Surrendering Artsakh the Armenian Surrender Map next

Open borders, unlocked infrastructures, and active economic, political, and cultural ties – these are the conditions necessary to establish long-term peace in our region.

The “Crossroads of Peace” project is about creating new infrastructures or improving the scope and quality of the existing ones. Armenia is ready to establish five checkpoints on the Armenia-Azerbaijan borders for road infrastructures, including Kayan, Sotk, near Karahunj, near Angeghakot and Yaraskh, also to establish two checkpoints on the Armenia-Turkey border in Akhurik and Margara for road infrastructures.

Armenia is prepared to ensure communications between Armenia, Azerbaijan and Turkey by restoring four railway sections in the territory of the Republic of Armenia.

Armenia is ready to restore the Nrnadzor-Agarak railway section and establish checkpoints near the borders, to restore the railway section from Yeraskh to the border of Nakhichevan and establish a checkpoint in Yeraskh, to restore the depleted parts of the railway from Gyumri to the border of Turkey and establish a checkpoint in Akhurik. Also, Armenia is prepared to restore the depleted parts of the railway from Hrazdan to Kayan and establish a checkpoint in Kayan. This will create new links between all the countries of the region.

The principles of the “Crossroads of Peace” are [that] all infrastructures, including roads, railways, airways, pipelines, cables, and power lines, operate under the sovereignty and jurisdiction of the countries through which they pass. Each country, through its state institutions in its territory, ensures border, customs control and security of all the infrastructures, including the passage through its territory of vehicles, cargo and people.

All infrastructures can be used for both international and domestic transportation. Countries use all the infrastructures on the basis of reciprocity and equality. In accordance with these principles, border and customs controls can be facilitated through mutual consent and agreement.

As missing sections of railways and roads are restored and infrastructure is unlocked, it will become possible to establish a seamless connection between the Persian Gulf, the Gulf of Oman, the Black Sea, the Caspian Sea, and the Mediterranean Sea via a consolidated regional railway network and via north, south, and east, west roads.

The government of the Republic of Armenia reaffirms its commitment to contribute its share to the region’s peace and stability and to make practical measures to build the crossroads of peace.

Presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy

It’s shameful that the US taxpayer has been used to fund the persecution of Armenian Christians by Azerbaijan. Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, who has nominated his candidacy in the next US presidential elections, noted this on X—former Twitter.    

“I’m astounded that not a single presidential candidate has even acknowledged the atrocity. Blocking military aid to Azerbaijan is the right step,” Ramaswamy added.

by James Carden

YEREVAN – Over the past month, legacy and social media have been saturated with reports of the Netanyahu regime’s war on Gaza, which is being met with growing calls from the international community to invoke the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.

Less known, however, is the role the Israeli government has played in another genocide that took place in West Asia only a month and a half ago. This genocide, little noted in the Western press, involved the ancient Christian community of Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh, known within Armenia as the Republic of Artsakh, that was ethnically cleansed by the Ilham Aliyev, the Shia dictator of Azerbaijan, in late September and early October. The muted response to Azerbaijan’s crime might plausibly be chalked up to the strength of its well-funded and influential lobby in Washington which profits off of the oil and gas revenue generated by SOCAR, the State Oil Company of the Azerbaijan Republic. SOCAR has links to the Podesta Group (co-founder John Podesta currently serves as a senior adviser to President Biden), lobbying powerhouse BGR Government Affairs, LLC, as well as numerous think tanks and academics associated with, among others, The Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) and the American Foreign Policy Council.

Yet another reason for the subdued response by Washington is the well documented ‘special relationship’ between the 51st US state, Israel, and Azerbaijan. A discussion I had last week with the Armenian academic Dr. Benyamin Poghosyan, who serves as Chairman of the Center for Political and Economic Strategic Studies and Senior Research Fellow on Foreign Policy at the Applied Policy Research Institute (APRI) of Armenia, shed some light on the role the Israeli government and its defense industry has played in enabling Azerbaijan – and why.

The relationship between the two countries began to deepen around 15 years ago when Azerbaijan, flush with revenue from its oil and gas deposits in the Caspian basin, began looking to purchase advanced weapons systems.

According to Poghosyan, “as late as September 2023, just before the most recent Azerbaijani attackseveral cargo planes went to Israel and came back to Azerbaijan full of weapons. And there is even information that Israel continued to supply weapons to Azerbaijan even after October 7th.”

The AP reports that it is estimated that Israel has supplied Azerbaijan with “nearly 70% of its arsenal between 2016 and 2020.”And just this week it was reported that Azerbaijan inked a $1.2 billion dollar deal with Israel Aerospace Industries to purchase the Barak MX air defense system, described as “a modular air defense system… designed to address missile and aircraft threats.”

The question then arises: Why is Israel, which claims to be under a near constant threat of missile attacks from the south in Gaza and potentially from the north by Hezbollah, doing this?

Poghosyan notes that he doesn’t think money is the reason, after all, fully 20 percent of the Israeli defense budget is covered by the American taxpayer.

The real reason has to do with Iran.

According to Poghosyan, Azerbaijan has agreed “to allow Israel to use their territory for anti-Iranian activities. And we are speaking about covert activities, foreign intelligence… Azerbaijan gave the green light to Israeli special services, especially its foreign intelligence service, to do whatever they want in Azerbaijan. Of course now they have access to that security zone around Nagorno-Karabakh, which borders Iran.”

Poghosyan notes that in recent years (in the aftermath of its earlier attempt to subjugate Nagorno Karabakh in 2020) Azerbaijan constructed two airports in the territory it gained around Nagorno Karabakh. “They are,” says Poghosyan “supposedly civilian airports, yet they are located very close to Azerbaijani-Iranian border – a distance of 30, 40 kilometers from the border. There are a lot of reports that Israeli military intelligence or foreign intelligence operatives are using these airports for operations against Iran.”

Israel’s role in assisting Azerbaijan’s ethnic cleansing of Nagorno-Karabakh is well known inside Israel, which it must be said, conducts a far more robust debate over Israel’s foreign policy than is allowed here in the United States.

The estimable Israeli newspaper Haaretz recently editorialized that Israel has, in their words, “its fingerprints” all over Azerbaijan’s ethnic cleansing in Nagorno-Karabakh. Haaretz also contends that “Israel hasn’t just supplied Azerbaijan with arms. It has also helped it distort history” by its refusal to recognize the Armenian genocide, which the Israeli regime merely defines as a “tragedy.”

Meanwhile, the situation in Armenia grows more ominous by the day, as Azerbaijan escalates its rhetoric (last week accusing Armenia of, among other things, illegally “occupying” eight villages on the Azerbaijan-Armenia border) and stands ready, with the eager help of Tel Aviv, to once again make a mockery of both international law and common decency.

James W. Carden is a columnist and former adviser to the US-Russia Bilateral Presidential Commission at the U.S. Department of State. His articles and essays have appeared in a wide variety of publications including The Nation, The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, The Spectator, UnHerd, The National Interest, Quartz, The Los Angeles Times, and American Affairs.

During the National Assembly-Government question-and-answer session, Lilit Galstyan, deputy of the Armenia faction, referred to the statement of Minister of Education and Culture Zhanna Andreasyan that the management councils of universities are not politicized.

“Today, in response to the question of the politicization of universities, Minister of Education and Culture, Zhanna Andreasyan first urged me, as before, not to talk about it or to bring at least one fact. Please, let me give you the facts: Suren Papikyan is the chairman of the YSU Management Board, Tigran Avinyan is the chairman of the Polytechnic Management Board, Vahagn Khachaturyan is the Chairman of the Economics Board, and you, Mrs. Andreasyan, are the Chairman of the Pedagogical Board. I would also like to add that there are screenings for political views in universities. Try to justify that these are not political purges or they are not talking about the politicization of universities,” said Lilit Galstyan. In response, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said:

“I have touched on that topic several times and said that when we say that there should be no party affiliation in universities, it does not mean that some parties and political groups should create secret cells there and make universities part of the political apparatus. I was listening to your speech, I want to pay attention to your wording. You said that they did not give me lessons at the university because of my political behavior. You did not say about my views or party affiliation. You answered your question. And who said that this opportunity should be abused, we gave that opportunity. We have given that opportunity to other sectors and groups, but, sorry, when that opportunity is misused and used against the goal, it does not mean that the government should just keep watching silently. Universities are all bodies founded by the government, and the government has the greatest authority in RA for these universities today and tomorrow.” Nikol Pashinyan also referred to the noise created around textbooks. “We are not saying that everything in the textbooks is perfect, we are saying that a new system has been created, which should enable us and RA to have more and more quality textbooks on the table of our students.”

Source: https://www.aravot.am/2023/11/15/1382720/?fbclid=IwAR2_agZ-0g9D9ve4rvYFj9gN58Q_z9_NF6lBSlLMumQ3CTnUkgm9aBGPJLs

During the question-and-answer session with the members of the government, Levon Kocharyan, who received the powers of a deputy yesterday, asked the Minister of Internal Affairs Vahe Ghazaryan a question related to “atrocities of the policemen”. According to him, the policemen beat people in front of the cameras, then the policemen give false testimony that the citizens used violence against them, and arrest people because there are no brave judges.

Deputy Kocharyan inquired that official investigations of a formal nature are being carried out, but in the end it does not cause any consequences. Levon Kocharyan mentioned that these policemen are being put under attack, because if these authorities detain them, it will not be like that later, they will be held criminally liable.

Minister of Internal Affairs Vahe Ghazaryan, answering the question, said that he has worked in the police for many years, about 20 years, and the police have never worked in such a patient and competent manner as they are serving now.

Levon Kocharyan mentioned that it is necessary to be original, not to make quotes related to the present and the former, because people are tired of all that. The deputy noted that the policemen tried to strangle the minor, hit the fallen person, etc. on video.

Vahe Ghazaryan mentioned again that today’s behavior of the police is restrained, no one had a nosebleed during the rallies, which is thanks to the police. The opponents immediately complained about the answer.