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@ArmeniaUN PR has sent an ltr to the #UNSC prez @USAmbUN requesting an urgent Council mtg concerning the #LachinCorridor blockade by Azerbaijan and the resulting “deteriorating humanitarian situation”. @SCProcedure @SCRtweets @UN_Spokesperson
Armenia’s disengagement from Russia and Entanglement with Turkey resulted in Escalating Numbers of Political Detainees. Armenia Adopts Aspects of Turkey’s Political System, Leading to the Establishment of a Controversial Law Enforcement System Resembling Turkey’s.
By Luis Moreno Ocampo,
There is an ongoing Genocide against 120,000 Armenians
The blockade of the Lachin Corridor by the Azerbaijani security forces impeding access to any food, medical supplies, and other essentials to Nagorno-Karabakh is in the media since December 2022 and it is discussed by political leaders.
My contribution is to explain why it should be considered a Genocide against the ethnic Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh under Article II, (c) of the Genocide Convention: “Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction.”
There are no crematories, and there are no machete attacks. Starvation is the invisible Genocide weapon. Without immediate dramatic change, this group of Armenians will be destroyed in a few weeks.
In many respects, the starvation of the ethnic Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh represents the archetype of genocide through the imposition of conditions of life designed to bring about a group’s destruction.¹ It closes a tragic circle because “[t]he treatment of the Armenians by the Turkish rulers in 1915 provides the paradigm for the Genocide provision dealing with imposition of conditions of life.”²
As an individual with some experience in the field, I was honored to make my contribution providing an impartial report and I am ready to assist any party committed to preventing the destruction of the Armenian group in Nagorno-Karabakh.
¹ Guénaël Mettraux, International Crimes and the Ad Hoc Tribunals (Oxford University Press 2006) 239–40.
² Schabas (n 24) 19. “These crimes have often been described as ‘deportations.’ But they went far beyond mere expulsion or transfer because the deportation itself involved deprivation of fundamental human needs with the result that large numbers died of disease, malnutrition, and exhaustion.” Ibid. (emphasis added).
Source: https://luismorenoocampo.com/lmo_en/report-armenia/
Heart-wrenching Circumstance
In the wake of NikolPashinyan’s acknowledgment of Artsakh as a Part of Azerbaijan and the ensuing Artsakh Blockade implemented by Azerbaijan, we find ourselves in a deeply poignant situation.
Meet Karo, an innocent and gentle soul afflicted with diabetes, epilepsy, and a multitude of other ailments. Tragically, Karo’s supply of essential medications is dwindling rapidly, and within a matter of days, he will be left without access to the vital treatments he desperately requires.
Your voice can save his life…
SOSEH HOVASAPIAN, ANI ARZOUMANIAN, AND SHARON ANOUSH CHEKIJIAN , CORNELL UNIVERSITY; COLGATE UNIVERSITY; YALE SCHOOL OF MEDICINE
For over 230 days, a humanitarian crisis has loomed over Artsakh, or Nagorno-Karabakh, an autonomous, ethnically Armenian region within the internationally recognized borders of Azerbaijan. The world has yet to take notice, and why should it? This seemingly unimportant area in the South Caucasus is the current lynchpin of geopolitics dividing East and West, NATO and Central Asia, Israel from monitoring Iran, and Russia from controlling its former republics. A peaceful, democratic populace including 30,000 children is in the crosshairs.
Since Dec. 12, 2022, the Berdzor (Lachin) Corridor, the only road connecting Artsakh to Armenia, has been under blockade by Azerbaijan in an escalation of tensions following the 44-day war of 2020. Now in its eighth month, the blockade is accompanied by increased threats and acts of violence against Artsakh and increasingly the Republic of Armenia.
Initial claims that the blockade was due to protests of “eco-activists” quickly proved to be a ruse to cover up Azerbaijan’s campaign of aggression against the region’s Indigenous Christians. The blockade has two immediate goals. First, to force assimilation into Azerbaijan; Second, to pressure Armenia to allow Azerbaijan to forge a road across its sovereign territory, uniting Turkey with its “brothers” in Azerbaijan, heralding Turkish domination across Central Asia. The intention is to make Armenia into a “rump state,” further isolated and its borders redrawn and diminished. Azerbaijan’s petro-dictator Ilham Aliyev and Turkish leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s pursuit of geopolitical gain comes at the cost of 120,000 lives.
The implications are disturbingly clear. Erdogan and Aliyev intend to continue the genocide of 1915 and wipe Armenians off the map. Referring to the Armenian genocide, Erdogan said they will “continue to fulfill this mission, which our grandfathers have carried out for centuries in the Caucasus region.” Aliyev has chided Armenians to “behave yourselves” or suffer renewed attacks. Their intended ethnic cleansing has precedents in Turkey during the 1915 genocide, the 1988 and 1990 pogroms of Baku and Sumgait, and the forced depopulation of ethnic Armenians from Nakhichevan, Azerbaijan.
Regarding the right to self-determination of Artsakh’s Armenians, Aliyev made his stance clear with an ultimatum presented to Artsakh authorities: “Disband your government or prepare for the consequences.” This rhetoric is expounded by pro-regime media in Azerbaijan with calls to integrate Artsakh into Azerbaijan. This offers an easy solution for powers who do not understand the history of Armenian persecution. Would the world suggest that the Jewish people assimilate quietly under a Nazi regime? This is what is being laid out—further marginalization and a sure death for the Armenians of Artsakh.
Activists block a road from Stepanakert, the capital of the self-proclaimed Nagorno-Karabakh region of Azerbaijan, to Azerbaijani Aghdam offered by the Azeri officials as a way for humanitarian aid to the region demanding the reopening of the blockaded Lachin Corridor linking Karabakh to Armenia and to decry crisis conditions in the region, in Askeran on July 18, 2023. ANI BALAYAN/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES
The ongoing blockade of the Lachin Corridor is in direct violation of international law, the 2020 Trilateral Agreement, and the International Court of Justice’s (IJC) ruling on Feb. 22. Emboldened by the lack of repercussions, Aliyev ignored these agreements and rulings. Azerbaijan’s installation of a military checkpoint at the entrance to the Lachin Corridor in April has led to a complete blockade, including the International Committee of the Red Cross’ (ICRC) aid efforts. Shortages of food, fuel, and medical supplies are currently critical. The de-facto attack on health care is further destabilizing Artsakh already targeted by Azerbaijan during the 44-day war of 2020. Miscarriages have tripled under the blockade. The complete blockade has prompted statements warning of impending genocide by Genocide Watch and the Lemkin Institute.
Comparable crises have received far more attention and assistance. Russia’s blockade of Ukrainian grain met with swift sanctions by the U.S., U.N., and EU. Humanitarian aid by the U.N. for the blockade of Gaza totaled over $5 billion. Azerbaijan’s blockade of Artsakh has gone unanswered. The inability to respond comes in large part from a lack of recognition of the sovereignty of the Republic of Artsakh, rendering international aid impossible.
Azerbaijan’s actions have undermined one international law after the other, but it seems that dictators don’t care about humanitarian law. Expressions of “deep concern” have not and will not bear fruit. We need to speak the language of dictators. and send a clear message to those who seek to obliterate the Armenians.
First, recognition of the right to self-determination and recognition of Artsakh is vital. Second, immediate personal sanctions against Aliyev and embargoes on oil exports by Europe are critical to pressure the Aliyev regime to end Azerbaijan and Turkey’s tireless efforts to ethnically cleanse Artsakh and the world of Armenians. Third, the U.N. Security Council should uphold the ICJ ruling and send peacekeepers to the region to end the blockade. To not do so is equal to being complicit in the impending genocide of the people of Artsakh.
Soseh Hovasapian is a student at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York
Source: https://www.newsweek.com/azerbaijans-blockade-nagorno-karabakh-artsakh-should-concern-everyone-opinion-1818966
By Michael Rubin,
Speaking at the United Nations last week, Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke out about famine, quoting President Biden’s declaration, “If parents cannot feed their children, nothing else matters.” It was unfortunate, but symptomatic of his cynicism, that Blinken ignored the famine underway in Nagorno-Karabakh caused exclusively by Azerbaijan’s illegal blockade.
Rather than stand on principle, Biden and Blinken fund Azerbaijan as it perpetrates ethnic cleansing. Such funding is illegal. Azerbaijan neither meets the terms of a waiver on Section 907 of the Freedom Support Act to allow American aid due to President Ilham Aliyev’s open calls for a military solution, nor does the Humanitarian Aid Corridors Act allow the United States to provide assistance to any country that interferes with the delivery of American assistance to any other territory or entity. Azerbaijan’s illegal blockade of the Lachin corridor does just that. Unlike with Section 907, there is no waiver.
Aliyev argues Nagorno-Karabakh is Azerbaijani territory, and that its residents must subordinate to his rule, one of the world’s most authoritarian dictatorships. For too long, the State Department has deferred to Aliyev’s claim of sovereignty. US recognition of Azerbaijani sovereignty over Nagorno-Karabakh upon Azerbaijan’s renewed independence was never cut-and-dry; rather, recognition of sovereignty over the region depended upon Azerbaijan’s agreement to peaceful resolution of the dispute and balancing principles of territorial integrity and self-determination. Even if Blinken bullies Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan into renouncing Armenian claims over the region, Pashinyan has neither the right nor the ability to forfeit residents’ legal rights to self-determination.
Not everyone ignores the crisis. On August 7, 2023, Luis Moreno Ocampo, the former prosecutor for the International Criminal Court, issued an opinion labeling the deliberate starvation of Nagorno-Karabakh’s 120,000 Christians to be an act of genocide.
Aliyev believes that he is absolute sovereign over the territory; this exposes his sense of impunity. If Nagorno-Karabakh’s Armenians are Azerbaijani citizens as he insists, then his deliberate starvation of the community suggests parallels at play between Aliyev and Omar al-Bashir, the former dictator of Sudan, who targeted for genocide the inhabitants of Darfur. That they were Sudanese citizens did not mean open season for slaughter. Sudan, like Azerbaijan, is not party to the Rome Statute, and thus does not place itself under the International Criminal Court’s jurisdiction. Still, the UN Security Council passed a resolution to extend ICC jurisdiction over Sudan for crimes in Darfur enabling Bashir’s indictment.
It is unlikely the UN Security Council treat Azerbaijan the same way. While the United States, France, and Russia might hold Aliyev to account, China is a wildcard and the United Kingdom would veto due to BP’s multibillion dollar partnership with Aliyev. Even if London stood on principle, Azerbaijan would buy the votes of non-permanent Security Council members to hamper any resolution.
There is another path to an Aliyev indictment, however, as Azerbaijan has ratified the Convention Against Genocide.
For too long, the State Department has believed balance the key to successful diplomacy. This is wrong, as Aliyev only stakes out more extreme positions figuring Blinken will simply meet him in the middle. The latest example are arguments Azerbaijan voiced yesterday that Armenia is to blame for starvation in Artsakh. This is akin to a judge privileging a child who murders his parents because he is an orphan.
It is time instead for USAID to send trucks flying the American flag to the Lachin corridor under the observation of US diplomats stationed in both Armenia and Azerbaijan. If Azerbaijan impedes diplomats’ movement, it is time to send its ambassador home. If it refuses to allow the flow of relief supplies or, worse, threatens to kill Western observers as Azerbaijan’s ambassador in Brussels recently did, then it is time for sanctions. There is no shortage of options. Biden can put an end to the Section 907 waiver, enforce of the Humanitarian Assistance Corridors Act, designate under the Magnitsky Act, and even support Aliyev’s indictment under the Genocide Convention.
Africans are right to argue that near-exclusive indictment of Africans by international courts and tribunals is unseemly if not racist. Bashir is still a fugitive, but Liberia’s Charles Taylor could use a roommate. Aliyev could be just that man.
Learn more: Biden’s Decision to Station US Marines On Commercial Ships In Persian Gulf Is Bizarre | Australia Takes Step Backwards on Middle East Peace, Encourages Terror | Don’t Allow Turkey to Extort Its Way to Visa-Free Travel | Instigators of Anti-Christian Persecution Cry Wolf to Distract from Their Own Guilt
TRIBUNE. L’historien et essayiste Marc Knobel s’indigne de la prochaine tenue de la conférence des rabbins européens en Azerbaïdjan, pays en conflit avec l’Arménie.
Il est comme cela des effets d’annonce et des informations qui glacent le sang, et mon sang n’a fait qu’un tour. Sur un site Internet, il est annoncé qu’une conférence prochaine de rabbins européens doit se tenir en Azerbaïdjan, en novembre 2023. Que cette nouvelle est consternante, triste et désespérante, et j’ai honte. Oui, j’ai honte et il est de mon devoir en tant que juif de dénoncer l’imminence d’une telle conférence.
Expliquons. Le 1er août 2023, l’agence de presse Jewish News Syndicate (JNS), qui fournit des actualités sur Israël et le monde juif, annonce que la prochaine réunion biennale de la conférence des rabbins européens doit avoir lieu à Bakou, du 12 au 15 novembre 2023, à l’invitation de Ilham Aliyev, le président de l’Azerbaïdjan.
Environ 500 rabbins européens devraient assister à cet événement, et Pinchas Goldschmidt a rencontré le dictateur d’Azerbaïdjan, plus tôt cette année, pour en parler. Il est pourtant un homme courageux qui a critiqué la guerre atroce que mène la Russie contre l’Ukraine. Grand rabbin de Moscou pendant près de trois décennies (1993 à 2022), il a quitté la Russie, après l’invasion de l’Ukraine, puis il a démissionné de son poste.
Aujourd’hui, Pinchas Goldschmidt préside la conférence des rabbins européens, la principale alliance rabbinique orthodoxe en Europe, réunissant plus de 700 chefs religieux des principales communautés synagogales d’Europe. Interrogé par le JNS, Pinchas Goldschmidt déclare sans sourciller que « l’Azerbaïdjan est un pays avec une mémoire spéciale pour le peuple juif et abrite l’une des communautés juives les plus uniques au monde ». Il ajoute que « le développement des relations entre Israël et l’Azerbaïdjan est d’une grande importance dans le Moyen-Orient d’aujourd’hui ». Ce faisant, Pinchas Goldschmidt s’aligne maladroitement sur Israël, ses choix stratégiques et politiques.
Expliquons encore. Depuis de nombreuses années, les Israéliens estiment que l’Azerbaïdjan – dont 96 % de la population est musulmane et dont 75 % sont des chiites – est un allié stratégique majeur contre l’Iran. Il est vrai que les relations entre l’Iran et l’Azerbaïdjan sont assez tendues, les deux pays se considérant mutuellement comme un danger pour leur souveraineté nationale respective. Par ailleurs, la longueur totale de la frontière irano-azerbaïdjanaise est de 689 kilomètres. Or, l’Azerbaïdjan aurait autorisé le Mossad à mettre en place une branche avancée pour surveiller ce qui se passe en Iran, voisin au sud de l’Azerbaïdjan et a même préparé un aérodrome destiné à aider Israël au cas où il déciderait d’attaquer les sites nucléaires iraniens.
Dernièrement (mai 2023), Isaac Herzog, le président israélien, s’est rendu en visite d’État à Bakou, pour vanter l’excellence des relations entre les deux pays. Et, depuis 2005, Israël vend des armes parmi les plus sophistiquées et les plus meurtrières à l’armée Azéris, ce qui lui donne une supériorité militaire contre l’Arménie et les Arméniens du Haut-Karabakh (drones kamikazes, canons automoteurs, mortiers, systèmes radar avancés, système de missiles Skype, missiles guidés antichars, missiles antiaériens…).
Mais, si les choix d’Israël sont ce qu’ils sont (hélas) et si Israël se satisfait de l’excellence de ses relations bilatérales avec l’Azerbaïdjan, en quoi et pourquoi une conférence rabbinique et des autorités religieuses devraient-elles forcément et sans s’interroger plus en avant s’aligner sur les calculs géostratégiques d’Israël et leur raison d’État, pour caresser ainsi le poil du dictateur de Bakou ?
Je veux alors dire ceci. Et, je veux le dire avec d’autant plus de force que je suis juif.
Messieurs les rabbins, chers amis, vous rappelez-vous des affres de l’Histoire ? Entendez-vous encore le cri de ce petit peuple, le peuple arménien, qui a été décimé par un horrible génocide impuni en 1915 ? Et qui, tout au long de son histoire, a dû défendre sa religion (chrétienne), sa culture et sa langue devant l’adversité, la méchanceté et la haine ?
À LIRE AUSSI108 ans après le génocide, les Arméniens toujours menacés de disparition
Source: https://www.lepoint.fr/invites-du-point/messieurs-les-rabbins-j-ai-honte-et-je-suis-juif-08-08-2023-2530905_420.php?at_medium=Community%20Management&at_campaign=Compte%20Twitter%20Le%20Point#11
Since 2008, when Nikol Pashinyan was unleashed upon the Armenian nation we believe by Turkey, and other foreign power a relentless wave of death and destruction has swept over Armenia and Artsakh.
Pashinyan’s Turkish Dream began with a massive attack on the Armenian government, leading to the massacre of ten people, including a policeman, and causing hundreds of injuries. After six months in hiding, he was captured and sentenced to seven years in prison, but disappointingly, he was granted amnesty by the president and released after just two years. In 2018, Pashinyan returned with a thirst for revenge and continued his harmful actions against Armenia and Artsakh, collaborating with Turkey and Azerbaijan, traditional foes of Armenia.
Today, Armenia grapples with governance challenges brought on by corrupt traitors who have failed to safeguard the nation and Artsakh. As a former defense minister, now under arrest, pointed out, Armenia faced numerous setbacks during the 1992-1994 war period but refused to surrender. Under strong leadership, Armenians regrouped and achieved victory in the first Artsakh war. However, the corrupt government in 2020 chose to capitulate, leaving 120,000 Armenians in Artsakh under siege, facing starvation, and the threat of genocide. These rulers colluded with the enemy, exposing the entire Armenian nation to vulnerability, echoing the tragic events of 1915, now with Artsakh facing a similar fate.
During the 2020 war, Pashinyan not only secretly surrendered but also failed to consult with the president, parliament, defense minister, or minister of foreign affairs, keeping his actions shrouded in secrecy.
Pashinyan has placed Armenia in an exceedingly difficult situation, with no Armenians willing to take up the responsibility of governance. Not a single political party in Armenia dares to challenge Pashinyan’s position. Anyone considering a leadership role faces a daunting dilemma: they must either risk potential warfare to protect Armenia and Artsakh or choose the arduous path of surrender.
An epoch-defining juncture in Armenian history emerged when a single individual, backed by foreign forces, succeeded in fracturing, and demoralizing the entire nation. With no viable political organization or civilian effort to counter this threat, only Armenia’s military remains entrusted with the responsibility of safeguarding the nation’s survival. Consequently, it falls upon the Armenian people to exert every possible effort to persuade the military to intervene and remove this malefactor from power, for failure to do so could spell the extinction of Armenia itself.
Starting point: St. Leon Armenian Cathedral at 3:00 PM 3325 N. Glenoaks Blvd, Burbank, CA 91504
Rally For Life…
Sunday, August 6, at 3:00 p.m., show up to this in enormous numbers for it’s impactful, attracts the media, and sends a message to the Biden Administration to stop the resumption of the Armenian Genocide.
Where: St. Leon Armenian Cathedral, 3325 N Glenoaks Blvd, Burbank, 91504.
Please join this, is it? The people of Artsakh have endured enough. We MUST make tomorrow a significant turning point in this struggle.
Please share this email and the attached (and below) flyer with your circles and on social media.
By Yossi Lempkowicz,
By Etgar Lefkovits, JNS
Hundreds of European rabbis from across the continent will be gathering in Azerbaijan this fall to discuss Jewish affairs in the first such convention in a Muslim nation.
The planned event comes amid burgeoning relations between Israel and Azerbaijan that developed from a centuries-long affinity between the two nations into an unprecedented strategic partnership.
The biennial convention of the Conference of European Rabbis is scheduled to take place in Baku between Nov. 12-15 at the invitation of Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev, who will serve as the honorary host, with about 500 rabbis expected to attend the event.
The primary Orthodox rabbinical alliance in Europe, the organization unites more than 700 religious leaders from communities across Europe. Founded in 1956, it works to defend the rights of Jews in Europe, with freedom of religion and matters related to the Jewish communities expected to be front and center at the conference.
“Azerbaijan is a place with a special memory for the Jewish people, and is home to one of the most unique Jewish communities in the world,” said Rabbi Pinchas Goldschmidt, president of the Conference of European Rabbis who met with Aliyev earlier this year.
“The developing ties between Israel and Azerbaijan are of great importance in today’s Middle East,” he added.
The Zurich-born Goldschmidt, who served as chief rabbi of Moscow for nearly three decades, left Russia last year following the invasion of Ukraine and then resigned from his position. His subsequent public criticism of the war led him to be branded by Russia as a “foreign agent.”