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After Turkey turn Syria to No man land and Lost the war want cease-fire with Russia

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Turkey and Russia have agreed on a plan for the warring parties in Syria to declare a nationwide cease-fire, Anadolu Agency reported, citing its confidential source..

The plan is expected to be carried out in all areas where the Assad government and the opposition are fighting, said the source, who asked not to be named due to restrictions on talking to the media.

The source detailed that under the plan, Ankara and Moscow will work for the cease-fire to come into force at midnight on Wednesday. It added that terrorist organizations will be excluded from the deal.

The source also said that if the cease-fire succeeds, political negotiations will start in the capital of Kazakhstan under Turkey and Russia’s guidance.

Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev earlier expressed his “readiness” to provide a platform for talks in Astana to solve the long-standing crisis.

Source Panorama.am

Russia’s Defense Ministry plane crashes over Black Sea

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A Russian defence ministry Tu-154 aircraft has disappeared from radar with 91 people on board after taking off from the Black Sea resort of Sochi, Reuters reports citing Russian news agencies’ reports on Sunday.

Russia’s RIA news agency, citing an unidentified security source, said preliminary data indicated the plane had crashed because of a technical malfunction. It was not immediately possible to verify that report.

Those on board included Russian servicemen and artists from a musical ensemble who were on their way to celebrate the upcoming New Year with the Russian air force at the Hmeimin air base in Syria, RIA also quoted the Defence Ministry as saying.

Nine Russian journalists were also on board, it said.

According to the latest reports the TU-154 plane has crashed.

A rescue team had found the crash site in the Black Sea near the coast of the Sochi.

Turkey blocks access to Facebook, Twitter and WhatsApp following ambassador’s assassination

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By Cara McGoogan

Turkey appears to have blocked access to major social media sites following the assassination of the Russian Ambassador to Turkey Andrei Karlov.

People in Turkey found themselves unable to access popular services such as Facebook, Twitter and WhatsApp the day after the attack  in what appeared to be a crack down on internet communications. It follows the imposition of a national broadcast ban in the wake of the attack. 

Turkey Blocks, a site that monitors internet access within the country, said some users were experiencing “sever slowdowns” on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. It also reported problems with WhatsApp, but said the country’s most popular internet service provider TTNet had not yet been affected.  

Russia ratifies Unified Air Defense System agreement with Armenia

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Today Russia’s State Duma has ratified an agreement between Armenia and Russia on the creation of   Unified Regional Air Defense System in the Caucasian region of the collective security. TASS Russian news agency reports.

As the source reports, the main issues of the unified system are to organize and maintain air defense combat duty in the Caucasian region of the collective security, to support the combat management system, as well as to keep the weaponry and the military hardware of the Unified Air Defense System on alert in order to use them.

The joint activities of the troops of the forces included in the Unified Regional Air Defense System and the other regional air defense systems will be coordinated by the commander in chief of the Russian Aerospace Forces and the general management will be carried out by the commander of the troops of the southern military district of Russia.

 

Source Panorama.am

Obama is doing his best to muddy the water between Russia and U.S. before he leaves.

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US President Barack Obama has ordered American intelligence agencies to investigate Russian cyber attacks as the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) concluded that Russia moved deliberately to help elect Donald Trump as president, not just to undermine the US political process more generally.

Obama requested that the intelligence agencies issue a report before he leaves office next month, White House Homeland Security and Counterterrorism Adviser Lisa Monaco told reporters Friday.

“The President has directed the Intelligence Community to conduct a full review of what happened during the 2016 election process. It is to capture lessons learned from that and to report to a range of stakeholders,” Monaco said.

Obama issued the order shortly before The Washington Post reported that US intelligence agencies have identified individuals with connections to the Russian government who were part of a wider Russian operation to boost Trump and reduce Hillary Clinton’s chances of winning the election.

Apparently, before publishing the report, the Post informed the White House about the content of its story, as this is standard practice with some American newspapers.

Citing unnamed US officials briefed on the matter, the Post said individuals connected to Moscow provided thousands of hacked emails from the Democratic National Committee and others, including the chairman of Clinton’s presidential campaign, to WikiLeaks.

The hacked emails provided to WikiLeaks were a regular source of embarrassment to the Clinton campaign during the presidential race.

“It is the assessment of the intelligence community that Russia’s goal here was to favor one candidate over the other, to help Trump get elected,” the Post quoted a senior US official as saying. “That’s the consensus view.”

It was now “quite clear” that electing Trump was Russia’s goal, the Post quoted officials as saying on condition of anonymity.

However, the CIA’s conclusion was not based on a formal assessment by all 17 US intelligence agencies, the Post said. There are still minor disagreements among intelligence officials about the assessment because some questions are unanswered.

Intelligence agencies did not have specific information showing Moscow directed the individuals to pass the hacked emails to WikiLeaks and those individuals were “one step” removed from the Russian government rather than government employees, another senior official told the Post.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has said in a television interview that the Russian government was not the source of the emails, the Post said.

In October, the US government formally accused Russia of a campaign of cyber attacks against Democratic Party organizations ahead of the Nov. 8 presidential election.

Trump has repeatedly rejected reports that Russian hackers were working to help his campaign and says the reports were politically motivated.

Trump’s transition office issued a statement Friday questioning the credibility of the CIA in response to the report. “These are the same people that said Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction,” the statement said. “The election ended a long time ago in one of the biggest Electoral College victories in history. It’s now time to move on and ‘Make America Great Again.'”

Russian Defense Ministry: Half of East Aleppo cleared of militants

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east-aleppo-clearedThe Syrian government forces have cleared practically half of Aleppo from militant strongholds, liberating some 80,000 residents, tens of thousands of them children, the Russian Defense Ministry said on Tuesday in a released statement.

“In fact, half of the territory in parts of eastern Aleppo occupied by militants in recent years has been completely freed,” spokesman Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov said, as reported by Sputnik Agency.

“Most importantly, more than 80,000 Syrians have been liberated, tens of thousands children. Many received for the first time water, food, medical care from Russian humanitarian centers,” he stressed, as quoted by the source.

 

Source Panorama.am

‘Islamic State’ militant killed in North Caucasus, Russian security forces report

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is-leader-killedRussian security forces have killed a regional leader of the so-called “Islamic State” (IS) terrorist group. Several other militants were also killed in the raid.

The leader of IS’ North Caucasus branch was killed on Saturday along with four other militants, Russia’s Federal Security Service, the FSB, said in a statement.

Rustam Asildarov, an “emir” who swore allegiance to IS in 2014, was killed in a raid in Makhachkala, the capital of Dagestan, after he and his fellow militants refused to surrender.

Police stormed the single-family home where the militants were hiding after they opened fire on the police during the negotiation process. The FSB said that Asildarov was behind several attacks, and some plots that were never carried out, such as one meant to target New Year’s Eve revelers in Moscow in 2010.

IS named Asildarov the governor of a newly declared Caucasus province and has claimed responsibility for attacks in Dagestan. When he was declared the group’s leader in the region, the US State Department officially labeled him a “foreign terrorist fighter.”

Many foreign jihadist fighters in Syria and Iraq are known to come from the region.

blc/jlw (dpa, AFP)

Armenian-Russian agreement on joint force to enable Armenia to improve supervision of Russian military base – Hrant Melik Shahnazaryan

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armenia-russia-agreementBy signing an Armenian-Russian agreement on joint armed force Armenia will not face any sovereignty-related problems, political scientist Hrant Melik-Shahnazaryan told Tert.am.

In fact, the armed force has operated for a long period, and the new agreement will give new impetus to bilateral cooperation.
“I think by signing the agreement Armenia attempts to tighten its supervision of the Russian military base in Armenia. I think there was a need to resolve technical problems by means of such an agreement. We find ourselves in some controversial situations involving the military base, and the Armenian side cannot be properly involved in the process,” Mr Melik-Shahnazaryan said.

The agreement will not cause any problems to Armenia’s sovereignty unless any border tension occurs. Nor any problems are expected in terms of aid to Nagorno-Karabakh.

“Given the previous experience, especially the air-defense system, Armenia’s politico-military leadership did not allow similar agreements to restrict our troops from accomplishing their military and tactical tasks. I am sure that it is going to be so this time as well. There are ever mechanisms to utilize the potential of agreements in the Nagorno-Karabakh problem. Armenia officially stated it is a guarantor of Nagorno-Karabakh’s security and I am sure it will honor its commitments,” Mr Melik-Shahnazaryan said.

On the other hand, however many agreements are signed, Armenia relies on its own strength, without request any aid, which was the case this April.

“Agreements envisage deployment of additional forces, but not the main forces,” Mr Melik-Shahnazaryan said.

Turkey rebranding al-Nusra terrorist to new name so-called “Army of Aleppo”

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armey-of-aleppoRussia says the formation of the so-called Army of Aleppo in the east of the Syrian city is an attempt to disguise and shield the al-Nusra Front terrorist group.

“I do not rule out that this is just another attempt to rebrand al-Nusra Front and shield it from righteous retaliation,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said in Rome on Friday.

Lavrov stressed that nearly all the militant groups in the eastern part of the flashpoint Syrian city, where the “Army of Aleppo” was recently formed, are under the control of al-Nusra Front.

“As I have already mentioned, according to our intelligence,… practically all armed opposition groups in eastern Aleppo report to al-Nusra Front. Nusra has some 1,500 militants there, while other groups under its command have up to 6,000 militants,” he said.

Al-Nusra Front is an affiliate of al-Qaeda that has recently renamed itself Jabhat Fateh al-Sham and has claimed to have broken up with al-Qaeda in what has largely been interpreted as a decoy attempt.

Russia has long been pressing for the designation of al-Nusra as a terrorist group at the United Nations Security Council. Such attempts have, however, been hindered by the United States.

Lavrov also said his country had supported  an initiative by UN Special Envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura on the exit of militants from eastern Aleppo.

“De Mistura proposed allowing all terrorists to leave eastern Aleppo, we, despite the idea’s controversy, supported it and were ready to cooperate with it,” he said, adding the proposal “was blocked by those who, we are convinced, are interested in eastern Aleppo remaining under the control of terrorists.” He did not elaborate.

The Syrian government holds and defends the city’s western side and has been purging its east of militants.

Meanwhile, a monitoring group said on Friday that Syrian troops had taken control of half of the militant-held areas in eastern Aleppo.

Rami Abdel-Rahman, the head of the so-called Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said the government forces “consolidated their control” over two eastern districts on Friday, adding they are now “comfortably in control of half” of the militant-controlled areas in Aleppo’s east.

He added the Syrian forces were advancing toward the recapture of the rest of the areas under the militants’ control in the east of the city.

The Russian Defense Ministry had already announced on Tuesday that the Syrian army had extended its control to half of those areas.

Russia has been offering military support to the Syrian government.

Elsewhere in his Friday remarks, Lavrov blamed the foreign-backed opposition for the stall of the intra-Syrian peace talks for more than six months, saying they “put forward ultimatums in the form of an absolute precondition to oust President [Bashar] Assad.”

The conflict in Syria, which flared up in March 2011, has claimed the lives of more than 400,000 people, according to an estimate by UN Special Envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura.

Armenia: ArmPhone handsets to go on sale in Russia

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armphone-handsetPresentation and launch of sales of the latest accomplishment of Armenian engineers – ArmPhone handsets – will be held on Saturday, December 3 at the Exhibition of Achievements of National Economy (VDNKh) in Moscow.

The launch of the smartphones is organized as part of the opening of the center of Armenia’s Institute of High Information Technologies, where Armenian IT products will be displayed.

According to VDNKh’s official website,the point of sale will offer flagship ArmPhones with two 2G and 4G SIM cards, as well as a 5,2 ” Full HD screen, 32 GB of internal storage, 3 GB of RAM and a fingerprint sensor.

The ArmPhone runs Android operating system.

The Institute of High Technologies was created with the support of Armenia’s trade mission in Russia.