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Armenians, Greeks and Kurds stage protest in Washington against Turkey’s Erdoğan

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Stop turkish agresionA diverse group of Armenians, Kurds, Greeks, Cypriots, Yezidis, human rights groups, and even various opposition Turkish political factions protested outside Brookings Institution in Washington D.C., where Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan was delivering a lecture, reported the Armenian National Committee of America.

The picketers held banners calling out Turkey’s ongoing Armenian Genocide denial, crackdown on the country’s Kurdish community, and support for ISIS forces in Syria. Among the protesters’ chants was: “Long live Kurdistan; long live Armenia.”

Pro-Turkish counter-protesters wearing “We love Erdogan” T-shirts and holding “We Heart Erdogan” signs, however, chanted their praise for the Turkish president.

Erdoğan security personnel were seen attacking protesters and needed to be subdued by the police. At least one Turkish reporter was pushed and another forced to the ground and beaten by Erdoğan’s security team. Another reporter was forced out of Brookings Institution venue, prior to Erdoğan’s arrival.

 

Washington: Demonstrations ‘Out of Control’ Outside Erdogan Speech in DC

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1037213765As Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was set to deliver a speech at the Brookings Institution in Washington DC, protests erupted, resulting in violence.

As demonstrators gathered in the US capital to protest Erdogan’s authoritarian policies, Turkish security personnel reportedly kicked one protestor, a woman was thrown to the sidewalk, and one journalist was physically removed from the site.

Gathered on the sidewalks, protesters chanted “Erdogan, terrorist.”

“The situation is a bit out of control,” a US Secret Service agent told Foreign Policy.

https://twitter.com/BrianNReeves/status/715603884073361408

Bush-Saudi Dynasty: Masochistic Alliance: Why Does Saudi Regime Appeal to Washington?

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Bush and Saudis

Bush and Saudi Dynasty

The US alliance with Saudi Arabia should appeal only to masochists, American scholar Ted Galen Carpenter notes, adding that if Washington is really interested in defeating Daesh, simultaneously trying to undermine Iran makes little strategic sense.

There is something masochistic about Washington’s longstanding friendship with Saudi Arabia — America’s impulsive Middle Eastern partner, Daesh’s sponsor and a “chronic and horrific” abuser of human rights, Ted Galen Carpenter, a US author and senior fellow at the Cato Institute, emphasizes.

“US officials and prominent political figures from both parties routinely describe Saudi Arabia and its Sunni Gulf clients as ‘friends’ of the United States. But Americans should take a closer look at the nature of their Saudi ‘friends,'” Carpenter writes in his article for The National Interest.

While the White House and the international community have repeatedly condemned the notorious Daesh terror group for beheadings of their victims, America’s Mideast head-chopping ally Saudi Arabia executed more than 150 people in the same very fashion in 2015.

Furthermore, in early January 2016 Riyadh decapitated some of 47 men (others were executed by firing squad) including peaceful cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr.

“Many of the victims, such as the prominent Shiite cleric Nimr al-Nimr, had apparently done nothing more than demonstrate against or publicly criticize the regime,” the US scholar remarks.

In addition to Saudi Arabia’s human rights abuse record, Riyadh “has consistently engaged in actions that undermine America’s security,” Carpenter continues, referring to the monarchy’s involvement in funding, teaching, training and funding of Islamic extremists since the early 1980s.

“Given the pervasive program of Saudi-sponsored radicalism, it is no coincidence that sixteen of the nineteen hijackers on 9-11 were Saudi nationals,” he stresses.

Incredible as it may seem, Washington not only turns a blind eye to Riyadh’s misdeeds, but assists its Mideast partner in its controversial military operations.

In 2011, the White House tacitly endorsed the Saudi-led military intervention in Bahrain. Then Washington agreed to provide intelligence and logistical support for Riyadh’s invasion of Yemen.

And now, the Obama administration is “flirting with endorsing” of the Saudi-Turkish plan to deploy their ground troops in Syria.

“US leaders exhibit a curious myopia if they do not see the underlying problems,” Carpenter underscores.

The situation is complicated by the fact that Saudi Arabia has long been funding and arming Daesh and other Sunni Islamists in the region. However, some US policymakers are much more concerned about the emergence of Iran, the state that remains the “principal barrier” to Daesh and its expansion.

“The alliance with Saudi Arabia should appeal only to masochists,” the US scholar believes.

Still, according to some experts there are clear signs that the pillars of the US-Saudi friendship are trembling.

“The US-Iran nuke deal and the consequent partial change of heart of the US over the Syrian crisis have certainly greatly ‘flooded’ the otherwise strongly built ship of the US-Saudi alliance, putting it in a position where its sinking is not altogether impossible,” Salman Rafi Sheikh, research-analyst of International Relations and Pakistan’s foreign and domestic affairs, wrote in his article for New Eastern Outlook.

At the same time, American researcher, historian and author F. William Engdahl has repeatedly noted that Washington has apparently set a trap for the House of Saud in Syria and Iraq.

“The trap will likely see the map of the entire Middle East redrawn fundamentally for the first time since the secret… Sykes-Picot Plan,” the historian stresses in his analysis for New Eastern Outlook.

Remarkably, American columnist and foreign correspondent in the Middle East Doyle McManus echoed Engdahl’s stance in his January article for Los Angeles Times. The journalist assumed that the White House purportedly has had enough of Riyadh.

“The fracture in US-Saudi relations isn’t going away, because the foundations of the relationship — the interests the two countries had in common — are no longer as strong,” he wrote, citing former US ambassador to Riyadh, Charles W. Freeman Jr., who added that in the recent years Washington and Riyadh “have increasingly seen their interests diverge.”

From Peace to Hit-Piece: Turkey’s New Lobbying Strategy Against Armenian Americans

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Turkish lobbyist washington

Illustration by gagrulenet

By Taniel Koushakjian

Armenian Agenda Editor

Hit Piece

On February 22, the Turkish Institute of Progress retained Mercury Public Affairs, LLC to lobby on its behalf in Washington, D.C. According to the filing, Mercury will lobby specifically on “Turkish-US relations.” Two days later, Mercury’s Vice Chairman, Adam Ereli, a former U.S. Ambassador and Deputy Spokesperson at the State Department, penned a hit-piece on Armenia entitled “Putin’s Newest Satellite State,” on Forbes’ opinion page. However, Forbes neglects to mention the fact that Ereli’s firm is under contract with the anti-Armenian lobby group. It is not yet clear whether or not Ereli disclosed to Forbes his business relationship behind the story.

It appears that either the Turkish lobby planted this story with the full knowledge and support of Forbes , or that Mercury’s connection with Forbes was used as a pawn in the Turkish lobby’s anti-Armenian campaign.

This is not the first time a high-priced Washington lobbyist has used the stroke of the pen to attack Armenian Americans. In 2014, Brenda Shaffer wrote a piece in the New York Times opinion page entitled “Russia’s next land grab.” The title sounds familiar. The story’s byline for Shaffer states that she “is a professor of political science at the University of Haifa and a visiting researcher at Georgetown.” However, Shaffer did not disclose her role as a paid consultant to Azerbaijan’s state-run oil company SOCAR. After the Times realized they had been duped, the editor’s rightly appended the story with the following statement: “This Op-Ed, about tensions between Armenia and Azerbaijan, did not disclose that the writer has been an adviser to Azerbaijan’s state-run oil company. Like other Op-Ed contributors, the writer, Brenda Shaffer, signed a contract obliging her to disclose conflicts of interest, actual or potential. Had editors been aware of her ties to the company, they would have insisted on disclosure.”

Peace?

The Turkish Institute of Progress (TIP), a New York based Turkish lobby group is the latest player trying to prop up Turkey by putting down Armenian Americans. The group was established months prior the centennial anniversary of the Armenian Genocide to “provide a forum for dialogue in pursuit of peace and cooperation between Turkey and the international community,” according to its website.

Instead of outright opposing Armenian Genocide recognition efforts by American human rights activists, the Turkish lobby’s genocide denial strategy shifted its approach to the issue on the centennial anniversary. TIP’s other hired public relations firm, Levick, tried to get a counter genocide resolution introduced that “focused on the next 100 years” by Rep. Curt Clawson (R-FL) who had been recruited to introduce the bill by Clawson’s predecessor, Congressman Connie Mack (R-FL), now a lobbyist for Levick.

A pushback from Clawson’s own constituency thwarted the TIP’s efforts, and the resolution, H. Res. 226, was instead introduced by Rep. Jeff Sessions (R-TX). The bill currently has two cosponsors.

I am personally aware of the Turkish government’s coordinated anti-Armenian effort with TIP, Levick, and now Mercury, as I was in Clawson’s district on April 12, 2015. I was invited to give a presentation on the Armenian Genocide at the Holocaust Museum and Education Center of Southwest Florida in Naples. Upon my arrival to the Holocaust Museum, I was shown an intimidating letter by Ozgur Kivanc Altan, Consul General of the Republic of Turkey in Miami addressed to the Holocaust Museum demanding that they cancel my presentation.

From Peace to Hit-Piece

The Turkish lobby’s strategy of genocide denial cloaked as peace has now turned to attacking the Republic of Armenia itself in order to mask Azerbaijan’s $4 billion dollar arms purchase from Russia, not to mention Azerbaijan’s gross abuse of human rights, corruption scandals, jailing of journalists, and drift away from democracy and towards authoritarian rule.

Mr. Ereli’s anti-Armenian hit-piece in Forbes should be appended, as the New York Times did, so that its readership is fully aware of his firm’s financial benefit from the published story. Their readers deserve no less.

*UPDATE: As of 4:00 PM on 2/26/16, Forbes corrected Ereli’s byline, stating he is “the vice chairman of Mercury, a public affairs and strategy firm whose clients include the Turkish Institute for Progress.”

Source: MassisPost

‘Mafia State’: Washington Turns Blind Eye to Organized Crime in Turkish Kosovo

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1034107569By carving Kosovo out of Yugoslavia Washington sowed a whirlwind for Europe to reap: Kosovo has turned into a de facto “mafia state,” American author Justin Raimondo writes, citing German intelligence agency BND.

Libya, Syria, Iraq and Kosovo have become grotesque monuments to Washington’s controversial “regime change” operations, which “have wreaked havoc everywhere they’ve been successful,” Justin Raimondo, an American author and the editorial director of Antiwar.com underscores.

“Twenty or so years after the American ‘liberation’ of Kosovo forcibly separated it from the former Yugoslavia, the country is a mess. Unemployment is massive: crime is pandemic; and an ultra-nationalist movement, Vetevendosje, is on the rise. Vetevendosje wants to achieve the dream of the old Kosovo Liberation Army: a ‘Greater Albania’,” Raimondo notes in his article for Antiwar.com.

Furthermore, the ultra-nationalists who gained 13.59 percent of the vote in the 2014 Kosovan parliamentary election are calling for unification with Albania.

The idea of Greater Albania is not a new one: it emerged after the defeat of the Ottoman Empire in the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-78. A group of Albanian nationalist leaders met in a Prizren mosque on June 10, 1878 and declared the creation of a “Greater Albania,” which aimed to bring together all vilayets (provinces) of the Ottoman Empire inhabited by Albanian nationals.

The concept caught a second wind when Adolf Hitler came to power in Germany. Hitler and his Italian ally Benito Mussolini jumped at the opportunity to engage Albanian nationalists into their political fold.

“Hitler and Mussolini realized the Greater Albania ideology established by the 1878 League of Prizren. Albanian-settled areas of the Balkans — Kosovo-Metohija, western Macedonia, southern Montenegro — were incorporated in a Greater Albania,” Carl Kosta Savich, Serbian American historian and journalist, wrote in his op-ed for Serbianna.com.

During the Second World War Albanian nationalists of the 21st Waffen Mountain Division of the SS Skanderbeg unleashed ethnic cleansing of Serbs and Jews on a massive scale, particularly in Kosovo and Bosnia-Hercegovina.

Remarkably, half a century later, in 1998-1999, Washington took the side of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) which was until 1998 on the US State Department’s “terrorist organization” list.

While branding Serbs as ruthless “butchers,” the White House turned a blind eye to numerous atrocities and crimes committed by Albanian ultra-nationalists in the course of the Kosovo war and after NATO’s bombing of Yugoslavia.

Washington would have given the green light for Turkey to send troops to Iraq

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Biden securing lobbying job for Turkey

Biden securing lobbying job
for Turkey

Turkey would have received the green light from Washington to send troops into northern Iraq in late 2015, according to the Arabic-language newspaper published in London Al Arab, near Riyadh. “The insistence of Turkey to justify its military presence in northern Iraq on behalf of the lute against Islamic terrorists and the failure of efforts by the Iraqi authorities to push the Turkish troops from Iraqi territory show that Ankara took the initiative under the orders of Washington, “the newspaper reported in its edition of January 29.

Speaking on background the acute crisis between Turkey and Russia, sending fresh Turkish troops in northern Iraq, Ankara had provoked strong criticism from the Iraqi government controlled by Shiites and close to Iran . Turkey had argued a simple rotation of its troops present in the vicinity of Mosul and aspiring to train local Sunni tribes to the recovery of this city fell to Daech in June 2014. But the argument did not Baghdad convinced, especially since shortly after the Turkish President Erdogan received the President of the Autonomous Province of Iraqi Kurdistan, Massoud Barzani in Ankara, raising fears the Iraqi authorities an alliance between Turks and Iraqi Kurds would reduce to none Mosul regaining their hopes.

The Al Arab newspaper adds that the recent statements by Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu under which the Turkish military presence in northern Iraq had the support of the international community betray the existence of a secret agreement between Ankara and Washington on sending the Turkish troops in the region. The newspaper points out that these troops are still in northern Iraq, near Mosul, which remains under the control of the jihadist Islamic state, despite repeated calls by Baghdad authorities in order to a withdrawal of the Turkish troops. On December 8, the Arab League condemned the deployment of Turkish troops in northern Iraq, referred to as a “intervention”.

Echoing the criticism raised by the Turkish decision to send troops into northern Iraq without the approval of Baghdad under the pretext of mentor Kurdish fighters and Sunni Arab, Nabil Elaraby, Secretary-General of the Arab League, called the Turkish initiative of “clear response”. In an interview with the newspaper El Youm Al Sabe, it stated that if the Arab League could take direct action against Turkey, it gave itself the right to publish a statement in which it condemned Ankara for violating national sovereignty of Iraq. Mr. Elaraby also warned Turkey, stressing that if she continued to work on the territory of Iraq without the approval of authorities in Baghdad, while the Arab League would have no choice but to appeal the UN Security Council to address the issue. It is sending some 130 Turkish soldiers, equipped with blinds and heavy artillery in areas of northern Iraq controlled by Kurdish Peshmerga that sparked this new crisis between Ankara and its neighbors.

The Islamist Turkish authorities attempted to ease tensions by stating that the deployment was part of the framework of a routine training exercise to assist Kurdish forces in their offensive against Daech and in their efforts to take control of Mosul, whose fate is another contentious issue between the Baghdad government and the autonomous Iraqi Kurdistan. But the Iraqi authorities rejected the arguments of Ankara, denouncing a “serious violation of the sovereignty” of Iraq.

Against the backdrop of growing tensions, Baghdad Sunday, January 31 threatened to bring the matter before the Security Council of the United Nations if Turkey did not withdraw its forces within 48 hours. “Iraq has the right to use all available options, including an appeal to the UN Security Council if these forces are not withdrawn within 48 hours,” said Iraqi Prime Minister al-Haider Abadi, whose ultimatum comes as laboriously begin at Geneva talks on Syria, in the absence of significant components of the Syrian opposition, like the Kurds, yet direct allies of the West in its attacks against Daech, but dedicated to public obloquy by Turkey because of their links with the PKK.

The Iraqi defense minister Khaled al-Obeidi, echoing the Prime Minister said for his part that Turkey had to consult the Iraqi government, whatever may be the reasons for its action and even though it would target jihadist forces in the region. “No matter how many soldiers entering Iraq, they will be repulsed. It was possible to provide a kind of coordination that would have avoided the current crisis between the two countries, “added al-Obeidi.

Tuesday, February 2, 2016,
Gari © armenews.com

Washington is considering retaliatory measures after accusations of fraud in the Armenian referendum

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arton119869-480x271Addressing an unprecedented warning to Armenia, the United States have indicated to Monday, December 14 Yerevan authorities they could take sanctions against those who would be found guilty of fraud and irregularities in the constitutional referendum of 6 December.

This unexpected reaction, which comes as the Armenian authorities sent a plea in the demands of the Armenian opposition regarding verification of election results is in terms of lack of interest in Washington seemed to have sparked this Returning transforming the Armenian presidential system into a parliamentary system. But while the opposition is still furious, claiming the invalidity of a consultation that would have led to unprecedented irregularities, the US has probably wanted to remind Armenia’s democratic commitments, particularly in terms of elections.

The accusations of the opposition, confirmed by numerous observers who challenged the validity of the results and feel that power has revised up turnout to pass its reform, indeed Armenia return to a past that she had claimed ward, striving to improve its electoral processes over the polls. In a statement the same night of the referendum, the US Embassy in Yerevan called the Armenian authorities to conduct the fastest investigations of “credible allegations” of fraud that were made by opposition activists as by observers without partisan labels.

“We reiterate our call for the results of the investigation and prosecution of those responsible for any irregularities are transparent and public, so that the Armenian people have confidence in the integrity of the electoral process,” the statement said, including adding ” full and transparent investigations, and the publication of the minutes, even if it does not lead to prosecution, can only help the Electoral Commission, the National Assembly and civil society to improve the current electoral procedures. “ “According to the US commitment to fighting corruption worldwide, the Embassy of the United States can also rely on the information contained in such reports to help determine whether a particular individual who directly compromise the integrity the electoral process of December 6 is able to attend the Embassy of programs or activities, “the text of the statement.

In terms diplomatic least, the United States seem willing to register blacklisted Armenian officials that contributed to distort the results of the referendum. The embassy, ​​however, did not specify the scope of such registration and whether such individuals could be denied entrance to the US territory or have their accounts frozen. The United States had not denied criticizing the conduct of the various elections in Armenia in the past. But this is the first time that Washington openly agitates the threat of sanctions against the Armenian officials suspected of electoral fraud.

Richard Giragosian, a political scientist Yerevan from the United States, sees’ the first step towards the “US sanctions against Armenian officials. He does not hesitate to compare this initiative to visa bans and the freezing of assets imposed on Russian officials involved in the concealment of the circumstances of the death of Sergei Magnitsky, a lawyer who died in prison in 2009 after revealing a vast scandal Corruption in Russia. The US diplomatic mission issued a statement three days after the press conference Attorney General Gevorg Kostanian on ongoing investigations into alleged cases of fraud and irregularities during the referendum.

G. Kostanian indicated that 14 criminal proceedings were engaged, but had resulted in no arrests. G.Kostanian added that the Armenian police had received more than 460 complaints about the conduct of the referendum, stating that a “fraud claim is not necessarily synonymous with crime.” The deputy director of the Commission of Inquiry, Aram Tamazian, made a similar statement at a press conference on December 14. “The number of reports [of fraud] does not necessarily reflect the number of violations”, he had said, adding that 92% of polling stations had no complaints addressed to the authorities concerned. M.Tamazian stressed that the authorities are doing everything possible to identify and punish those responsible for such violations, against which proceedings could be initiated in the coming days.
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Turkey: ‘Blindsided Washington While Trying to Separate Good, Bad Terrorists’

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1016011146Washington’s anti-ISIL campaign is not working for two major reasons: there is no such thing as moderate rebels and some members of the US coalition are essentially “exporting jihad” by supporting radical groups the US is intent on tackling, Dr. Christina Lin wrote for Asia Times.

US officials still maintain that some rebels do not adhere to radical ideology and are in fact quite moderate in their views, although there is no evidence to support this assertion.

“Distracted by an alphabet soup of various Salafist jihadi groups … and trying to separate ‘good terrorists’ from ‘bad terrorists,’ Washington is blindsided by the fact that ultimately they share the same end of establishing a global caliphate under Sharia, only differing in the means and speed of that goal,” the former director for China policy at the US Department of Defense noted.

Washington’s strategy is also complicated by the fact that several members of the counterterrorism coalition once helped the self-styled Islamic State gain strength and are still tacitly supporting other radical groups in the Middle Easy, she added.
After a year of the US-led efforts, “the Islamic caliphate is getting stronger and on the march, destroying the old world order and establishing a new one with the implicit backing of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and especially Turkey’s Erdogan,” she observed. Essentially, some US allies are apparently “exporting jihad.”
Interesting fact: those rebels fighting in Syria, who receive aid from Riyadh, Doha and Ankara, are not Syrians. Some 95 percent of them are mercenaries, Lin said, citing data released by German intelligence agency, BND.
Russia, China and India see the rise of ISIL as a direct challenge to their security. This prompted Moscow to launch an aerial campaign to tackle Islamic radicals in Syria. The main goal is to prevent them from spreading to Eurasia.
Tackling ISIL is therefore a priority for these countries but it should also be the key objective of the US policy in the Middle East. Assad is not the problem, radical Islam is.

“Given combating IS is the unifier of great powers while Syrian regime change is the divider that allows IS to get stronger, US should recalibrate its Sunni Wahhabi-driven strategy and start working with other legitimate Mideast stakeholders to counter Islamic extremism. Absent this, it may behoove the Eurasian powers outside of US-led coalition to take Kissinger’s advice, and begin forging their own coalition via SCO and CSTO to counter terrorism in Syria,” Lin concluded.

Source: sputniknews.com

WASHINGTON, DC: 85 US representatives issue bipartisian call for Karabakh peace

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US repWASHINGTON, DC – Senior Members of the U.S. House Armed Services, Appropriations and Intelligence committees joined Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce (R-CA) and Ranking Democrat Eliot Engel (D-NY) and over 80 of their colleagues in calling upon the Obama Administration to support the implementation of concrete, pro-peace measures to de-escalate aggression along the borders between Armenia, Artsakh, and Azerbaijan, reported the Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA).

“ Violence along the line of contact in Nagorno-Karabakh has increased dramatically, and the Administration policy of non-attribution when condemning violations isn’t working,”  explained Chairman Royce.  “ It must change.  In our letter, we propose a few common sense steps for the U.S. and the Minsk Group to take to deter further violence.  Specifically, the call for all parties to withdraw snipers, and the proposal to deploy OSCE monitors and equip them with gunfire locator systems, provides tools to increase transparency and accountability for each and every cross-boundary violation.  Ambassador Warlick should support these proposals, and press for their adoption by other Minsk Group partners,”  concluded Royce.

“We commend Chairman Royce, Ranking Member Engel and more than 80 of their House colleagues for proposing common-sense steps to stop the killings, and, more broadly, for promoting an accountability-based approach to peace,” said ANCA Chairman Ken Hachikian.

The Royce-Engel letter, addressed to Ambassador Warlick – the U.S. representative to the OSCE’s Minsk Group tasked with reaching a resolution of Nagorno Karabakh-related security and status issues – specifically calls for the U.S. and OSCE to abandon their failed policy of false parity in responding to acts of aggression, noting that: “The longstanding U.S. and OSCE practice of responding to each new attack with generic calls upon all parties to refrain from violence has failed to de-escalate the situation. Instead, this policy of artificial evenhandedness has dangerously increased tensions. There will be no peace absent responsibility.”

The letter proposes three concrete pro-peace steps that would, “in the short-term, save lives and help to avert war.  Over the longer term,”  the letter notes, “these steps could contribute to a comprehensive and enduring peace for all the citizens of the region:”

—  An agreement from all sides not to deploy snipers along the line of contact.

— The placement of OSCE-monitored, advanced gunfire-locator systems and sound-ranging equipment to determine the source of attacks along the line of contact.

— The deployment of additional OSCE observers along the line of contact to better monitor cease-fire violations.

Armenia and Nagorno Karabakh have both expressed support for these life-saving initiatives; Azerbaijan has not.