The “Cows’ Garden” in the Armenian Quarter of Jerusalem has been detained. Vigen Demirchyan, a Jerusalem Armenian community member, said.

Two Armenians were detained,

Demirchyan believes that this attack was organized by the company’s security service, which has been trying to occupy the area of the “Cows’ Garden” for a long time.

The Armenian Patriarch of Jerusalem reports that a lawsuit it filed was met less than 24 hours later by “over 30 armed provocateurs in ski masks with lethal and less-than-lethal weaponry.” This was in Israeli-occupied East Jerusalem.

As we already informed, a group of terrorists in black clothes and masks, numbering about 30 people, armed with sticks, tear gas grenades, and some other means on Thursday attacked the Armenians in the “Cows’ Garden” area of the Armenian Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem to harm them, take them out of the area, and intimidate them. Also, these terrorists started throwing stones at Armenians.

The Armenian youth and the surprised Armenian clerics started a real battle against them, adequately responding and holding the area until the police officers—located 200 meters away—arrived late at the scene.

The attack has been stopped.

Two Armenians, however, were taken to the police.

The Armenian Patriarchate of Jerusalem informs that several priests, deacons, and students of the Armenian Theological Academy, as well as some local Armenians, were seriously injured.

“This is the criminal response we have received for filing a lawsuit with the Jerusalem District Court regarding the ‘Cows’ Garden’ issue, which was officially received by the court 24 hours ago,” the patriarchate added, in particular.

By Harut Sassounian,

This week’s commentary is a lesson for all those who naively believe what they hear or read and then pass on unsubstantiated stories to others. By doing so, they are actually helping to spread fake news. When someone gives you a piece of ‘news’, you should always ask, ‘what is your source’? When the answer is: ‘I heard it from someone else,’ immediately dismiss what was said to you. It is critical to verify what you are told in order not to disseminate baseless rumors to others.

Those of us who are in the news business have a bigger responsibility to be vigilant because if we do not double-check what is being reported to us, then we become guilty of spreading fake news to thousands of readers or viewers.

Here is an example of a news item we just heard about. A 57-year-old entertainment producer, Armen Grigoryan, who had died in Armenia, was found guilty by a judge in Armenia last week, a year and five months after his death. Not having heard that a dead man can be tried and convicted, I wondered if such a thing really happened.

Since I have had long years of experience hearing all sorts of baseless reports, I immediately contacted the late defendant’s lawyer in Armenia, Ruben Melikian, who was kind enough to explain the circumstances of this strange story.

Armen Grigoryan, during a street protest against the authorities in Armenia in May 2022, shortly before the parliamentary elections, told a reporter that he stood by his earlier statement of April 2021 that half of Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s supporters in certain parts of the country have Turkish blood. Naturally, this was a disparaging remark, but if a country is truly democratic, citizens have the right to use unpleasant, even offensive words. Nevertheless, Grigoryan had not said anything threatening, which would have been against the law.

In May 2022, Grigoryan, a vocal critic of the regime, was arrested and jailed for the statement he had made a year before his arrest. He was charged with “inciting ethnic hostility.” Those accused of such a charge in the past, had made offensive or degrading comments about other ethnic groups living in Armenia. However, no Armenian had been charged before with incitement after making such remarks about fellow Armenians. For example, Pashinyan supporters, who had made insulting comments against Artsakh Armenian refugees, have not been charged with incitement.

On July 15, 2022, two months after his arrest, Grigoryan was brought to court from jail to stand trial. Regrettably, in the midst of the trial, he collapsed and died in the courtroom from a brain aneurism or stroke.

In Armenia, when a defendant dies, his trial is discontinued. However, in this case, according to Armenian law, the defendant’s family has the right to ask that the trial be continued until a verdict is reached. Grigoryan’s lawyer explained that his family wanted to see that he is exonerated, even though, due to the presumption of innocence (innocent until proven guilty), he was merely charged, but not convicted prior to his death. The family insisted that Grigoryan’s name be cleared since they believe that he should have never been arrested, charged and jailed.

The attorney told me that during the trial, after Gregorian’s death, a government witness testified in court that he had not written the testimony that was submitted in his name to the court. This witness said that a government investigator had written the testimony and had told him to sign it.

Also, a government expert, who testified in court, admitted that Grigoryan’s words could not be considered an incitement to inter-ethnic hostility, which means targeting members of another ethnic group. Grigoryan had only used offensive words about his fellow Armenians, members of his own ethnic group.

Nevertheless, last week, a year and five months after Grigoryan’s death, the judge declared him guilty of the charge filed against him. His lawyer told me that after the verdict is received in writing, the family has one month to file an appeal, which they intend to do. If they lose in the court of appeal, they will then appeal to the Court of Cassation which is a Court that hears appeals against decisions of courts of appeal. If they fail there too, they will then go to the European Court of Human Rights.

Having investigated the circumstances of a court in Armenia holding a trial and finding a dead man guilty, I wanted to know if such trials had also taken place in other countries. Surprisingly, I found several cases in ancient and recent history when other countries held posthumous trials of defendants and found them guilty after their death.

On December 19, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan spoke about the current policy of the Armenian government on the issue of Nagorno Karabakh in an interview with “First Channel”.

Turning to the question “Is the Karabakh issue closed? What do we want now?”, Pashinyan answered: “We want the sovereignty, territorial integrity, independence, statehood, and democracy of Armenia because I said in 2018 that I am the Prime Minister of Armenia and the state interests of Armenia should guide us. All of us, starting with me, and ending with my predecessors, 70-80 percent of Armenia’s resources, or not putting them in a mathematical calculation, the lion’s share was put on the Nagorno Karabakh issue. Armenia did not have a foreign policy, it had a Nagorno Karabakh policy, Armenia did not have a security agenda, it had a Nagorno Karabakh security agenda, etc.,

and so on. The resources that we should have invested in creating RA, we have invested in creating NKR. We have not taken into account the creation of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic according to the 1993 resolutions of the UN Security Council, the Lisbon summit, I can list again, I’m just saying briefly, according to the results of the 1999 Istanbul summit, according to the Madrid principles, 2016. with negotiation packages, it is impossible.

Do you understand, we have set a problem, we have spent our resources on solving a problem, the solution of which, from the beginning, the entire international community has prevented,” he said. According to Pashinyan, in the negotiation process of the settlement of the Nagorno Karabakh problem, there was never such an option that would offer a solution to the Nagorno Karabakh problem. “All options that were on the table assumed non-resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh issue. There was an option [that was resolved] in 1999, it was the exchange of Meghri and Nagorno-Karabakh.”

The Prime Minister notes that the Armenian government’s approach to the problem of Nagorno-Karabakh Armenians is as follows: if they do not have the opportunity to return, they should stay, live and work in Armenia. “What does Azerbaijan say? They say: do you want the return of the people of Nagorno-Karabakh, rights, security, etc., no problem, let’s also record the rights of Azerbaijanis who emigrated from Armenia in the peace agreement.

Of course, we can call it the right of return of the Armenians of Nakhichevan, Baku, Sumgait, and Kirovabad, again the right of return of Armenians from many places, but here the topic is in the following, what logic are we following, are we now gathering resources to go to a new conflict? or are we gathering resources to go to peace and use those resources to establish a state in Armenia? In my opinion, this is the right way,” said Nikol Pashinyan.

The presence of foreign-funded lobbying against Armenia has been consistently noteworthy.

A special report for 301

Since Armenia’s independence in 1991, there has been no shortage of foreign-funded anti-Armenian lobbying firms operating in the United States. It is now common knowledge that both Turkey and Azerbaijan have invested millions of dollars to prop up these firms. What is, however, astounding information that has heretofore gone unnoticed among Armenians, is a peculiar connection between one such anti-Armenian lobby–The Livingston Group–representing a registered Armenian opposition political party. The National Democratic Alliance (formerly Axis) or NDA, also affiliated with “Sasna Tsrer,” is being represented by The Livingston Group, an outright anti-Armenian lobbying firm with known ties and millions in contributions from the Turkish and Azerbaijani governments.

Many are familiar with the insidiously anti-Armenian lobbying efforts of The Livingston Group because its founding partner, Robert (Bob) Livingston, is a former US Congressman, who hastily left Congress in disgrace on March 1, 1999 after his multiple extramarital affairs were exposed by Hustler magazine publisher Larry Flint.

While in Congress, Livingston was a loyal supporter of Turkey and Azerbaijan. When Section 907, which sought to ban any kind of direct aid by the United States to the Azerbaijani government, was introduced and passed, Livingston was the legislation’s loudest opponent.

After leaving Congress in 1999, Livingston entered private practice as a lobbyist and represented Armenia’s enemies on many different issues. Both Turkey and Azerbaijan have hired The Livingston Group to lobby their interests in the US Congress for several years and have spent millions of dollars towards this end. 

The Livingston Group acts as a mouthpiece for the Turkish government, promoting its agenda of denying the Armenian Genocide and severely undermining efforts for recognition and justice for the victims of the Armenian Genocide. In addition, the Livingston Group’s portrayal of Azerbaijan as a democratic and friendly neighbor disregards the country’s long history of human rights abuses, including political repression, media censorship, and discrimination against ethnic minorities. 

According to an article in “The New Republic,” Bob Livingston is described as the kingpin of Turkish advocacy due to his lobbying firm, the Livingston Group, having received approximately $13 million in Turkish funds since 2000. Livingston, best known for his brief and controversial tenure as House Speaker-elect during the Clinton impeachment scandal (before resigning from Congress after admitting his own extramarital affair), has lobbied on various issues aligned with Turkey’s interests. However, it is his relentless efforts against the Armenian Genocide resolution that earned him hero status in Ankara. In 2000, Livingston’s team personally contacted 141 members of Congress in the lead-up to the vote on the resolution, and on October 19, the day the vote was canceled. His mission was accomplished. 

Recently published documents from the US State Department indicate that The Livingston Group is now representing National Democratic Alliance (NDA), an alliance affiliated with Sasna Tsrer—a political opposition party in Armenia, which organized and executed a terrorist attack referred to as the “2016 Hostage Crisis” that resulted in the murder of 3 Armenian police officers. Following the attack, the political party has remained active in Armenia, garnering 1.82% of the vote in the 2018 election, and 1.49% more recently in the 2021 snap elections. 

Sasna Tsrer,  while widely unpopular in Armenia as an opposition party, mustered a show of support in September 2022 when then-US speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi visited Armenia. Sasna Tsrer is a vehement proponent of US/Western intervention in Armenia. 

Among the US State Department documents is a statement circulated by the Livingston Group, which mentions that the purpose of NDA is to establish relations with relevant officials in the Administration, Congress, and think-tank community, and explore how the NDA can help strengthen relations between the United States and Armenia, and counter the influence of Russia in Armenia.

The statement also notes that the National Democratic Alliance of Armenia is interested in strengthening ties with US allies and the European Union.

Stated in the Livingston Group and NDA’s documentation with FARA, “Pashinyan is highly unpopular in Armenia and any attempts by the US and its allies to prop him up and entice him to change his allegiances will undoubtedly backfire. He needs to be replaced by a truly pro-Western and reformist government with the capacity to carry reform. NDA is the political movement that has the potential and credibility to make this happen. With the help of Armenia’s Western partners, NDA will spearhead this shift and prevent the further takeover of Armenian territory by Azerbaijan and Turkey, along with launching a massive economic reform effort capitalizing on the financial and human capital of the Diaspora.”

Wally Sarkeesian: Most Armenian people in Armenia and the Diaspora are by now aware that Pashinyan ascended to power in 2018 with the support of Turkey and Azerbaijan, with the sole aim of dismantling Artsakh and aligning with Turks.

Putine: Addressing the future of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) in light of Armenia and Moldova’s positions, Russian President Vladimir Putin clarified that it was not Russia that abandoned Karabakh; rather, it was Armenia that independently acknowledged Karabakh as part of Azerbaijan. Putin emphasized the complexity of internal political processes in Armenia, noting that the decision was made without extensive prior communication with Russia. He acknowledged both positive and negative aspects of this development, recognizing the intricate nature of the situation.

By Wally Sarkeesian,

Boris Avedesian, Bedig Giragossian, Hagop Jernazian, Kegham Balian, Saro Nalbandian, and other Armenians have tirelessly collaborated day and night alongside their fellow Armenians. Their collective goal is to safeguard the Armenian quarter from the encroachment of Israeli extremists.

With unwavering resolve and a swift response, the Armenian community in Jerusalem has united to resist Israeli attempts to seize significant Armenian communal property, crucial to their history and vitality.

Jerusalem Story has covered various accounts of the ongoing standoff between Israel and the Armenian community, particularly concerning the control of Armenian church property. Since the initial reporting in November, heightened aggression from Israeli entities has compelled the Armenian community to swiftly and cohesively defend their rights. This struggle not only impacts the Armenian community’s rights but also poses a threat to the very presence of the Christian community in Jerusalem. With such spirit and determination, the liberation of Artsakh will soon reemerge on the horizon.

The father of the pregnant woman Pashinyan’s convoy ran over and left to die last year says the courts are covering up the case. He says most of the witnesses are cops who were not at the scene, while actual eyewitnesses are not being called to testify.

Yesterday, NA Speaker Alen Simonyan assured that those responsible for the death of 28-year-old Sona Mnatsakanyan, who died as a result of being hit by Police Major Aram Navasardyan at the intersection of Paronyan-Leo streets on April 26, 2022, will be held accountable. Meanwhile, Sona’s father has concerns that attempts are being made to acquit the accused.

“90 percent of the witnesses in Sona’s death case were police officers, people who had nothing to do with the specific case, relatives of the accused, relatives of the accused, police officers who were standing one or three intersections away from the incident. How their testimony should have helped the case, they could have called the woman walking in front of my daughter, who was one meter away, who managed to run past, they could have called the residents living in that area, who were very angry, as witnesses. According to the regulatory inspector, he warned the driver that if he went back, the people were so angry that they might retaliate. I am concerned because during the last interrogation they invited an expert who gave a conclusion on the driver’s guilt, we got the impression that he was afraid to answer questions about his own written testimony, we had the impression that there was a fear of losing his job. Not to mention that it is not excluded that the court decides to appoint an expert examination for a double and groundless reason, at the request of the defense side, and the purpose of the double examination is one thing: to hide the driver’s guilt. If the court approves their petition and re-examination is appointed, I have nothing to lose, my wife was fired after the incident, my desire to work is not great, there is nothing to keep me here either, I will do everything, until the ECHR, so that the final result is fair. Finally, do they have to pull something or not, or do they seem to be the most capable, suspicious of the behavior of the staff accompanying the Prime Minister? They continue to drive fast cars in the same way, drive over pedestrians, who gave them that right? When the prime minister was elected or re-elected, he made other promises. I want to remind you, maybe that person will understand that he came to power through the people, is he protecting the interests of that people or is his policeman important? The policeman is ours, now I understand that expression in a different way, he is ours, he does not protect the interests of the people, but theirs,” said Sona’s father, Mnatsakan Mnatsakanyan. Arpine SIMONYAN