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Armenpress.am
1 June, 2019
Artsakh soldier killed by Azerbaijani shooting
The defense ministry of the Republic of Artsakh told Armenpress that on June 1, at 07:30, soldier of the Defense Army Sipan Melkonyan, born in 2000, received a fatal gunshot wound by the shot fired from the Azerbaijani side at a military unit located in the south-eastern (Martuni) direction of the Defense Army.
Investigation is underway to clarify the details of the incident.
The defense ministry of Artsakh shares the grief of the loss and extends condolences to the family, relatives and co-servicemen of the soldier.
Edited and translated by Aneta Harutyunyan
June 3 2019
Fatal frontline shootings heighten tensions between Armenia and Azerbaijan
Armenia accused Azerbaijan of faking its officer’s death, and an Azerbaijani MP called for Armenia’s leader to be assassinated.
In recent days one Armenian and one Azerbaijani soldier were killed on the Nagorno-Karabakh line of contact, a rare outburst of deadly violence since the two sides began a new round of negotiations over ending their decades-long conflict.
The Azerbaijan Ministry of Defense announced on May 30 that an officer, Major Agil Omarov, was killed by sniper fire in the Aghdam district. On June 2 members of his family, including two young sons, were awarded medals for valor at a ceremony in his home village of Lelepasha.
A statement from the Azerbaijan Ministry of Foreign Affairs noted that the killing took place during a visit to the region by the co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group, the group of diplomats mediating the talks between the two sides, and called it “yet another provocation and serves the purpose of disrupting the negotiations on the settlement of the conflict.”
The armed forces of the Armenia-backed, de facto Nagorno-Karabakh government denied that they had killed Omarov, saying in a statement that the Azerbaijani claim had “nothing to do with the reality.” The statement called on Azerbaijan to “refrain from nonsense steps aimed at artificially escalating the situation with provocative disinformation.”
The Armenian Foreign Ministry also connected the incident to the visit by the OSCE co-chairs but backed the Karabakh authorities’ claims that it was disinformation on Azerbaijan’s part. “This is an attempt to undermine the negotiation process,” said Anna Naghdalyan, the MFA spokesperson.
“Thus Baku attempts to shift the blame for its counterproductive stance on the other negotiating parties – Armenia and Artsakh,” Naghdalyan added. (Artsakh is the Armenian word for Nagorno-Karabakh.)
A Western diplomat in Baku who had been briefed on the incident said there was no reason to question the Azerbaijan MoD’s version of events. Omarov’s killing “is not fake news but real, I do not doubt the Azerbaijani account,” the diplomat told Eurasianet on condition of anonymity. A spokesperson for the de facto Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Nagorno-Karabakh declined to elaborate to Eurasianet on the allegations of disinformation.
Omarov’s death came on the day that the OSCE co-chairs met with Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev. Earlier the co-chairs – senior diplomats from the United States, France, and Russia – also traveled to Yerevan and Stepanakert. In Azerbaijan, they also met with representatives of internally displaced people from Nagorno-Karabakh, angering some officials in Nagorno-Karabakh.
Two days after Omarov’s shooting, an Armenian conscript, 19-year-old Sipan Melkonyan, was killed by Azerbaijani fire. The de facto government awarded him with a “For Service in Battle” honor.
Before these two deaths, only two soldiers – one on each side – had been killed by enemy fire in 2019. The relative peace along the front lines had come as the leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan have revitalized talks aimed at resolving the conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh, a territory internationally recognized as part of Azerbaijan but which has been controlled by Armenian forces since the two sides signed a ceasefire in 1994.
But the deaths and the recriminations that followed threaten to set back the tentative progress that had been made in the talks, and by the two sides’ promise to “prepare [their respective] populations for peace.”
On May 31, a member of the Azerbaijani parliament, Aydin Mirzazade, called on his country’s armed forces to assassinate Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan. "I ask our snipers, please shoot Pashinyan. Armenia can find a new prime minister. If their minister of defense steps on occupied Azerbaijani lands, please shoot him too. Don't let our officer's blood dry." Mirzazade later claimed his words were “distorted” by journalists. News stories that had reported his original comments were deleted, suggesting a high-level interest in tamping down anti-Armenian rhetoric.
A former de facto minister of foreign affairs for Nagorno-Karabakh, Arman Melikyan, said that the return to negotiations in which the return of Armenian-held territories appears to be on the table has emboldened Azerbaijan, leading to the death of the young conscript. “Baku has already gotten what it wanted at the negotiating table and now its hands are untied,” he said in an interview with the news site 1in.am.
Nevertheless, the negotiation process continues. In the OSCE co-chairs’ statement, they noted that “as requested” they had “provided proposals for concrete next steps in the settlement process, including on humanitarian and security measures.” And the foreign ministers of Armenia and Azerbaijan will meet “soon,” the statement said.
Joshua Kucera is the Turkey/Caucasus editor at Eurasianet, and author of The Bug Pit.
AYSOR, Armenia
June 1 2019
Under no circumstances the security of Nagorno-Karabakh and its people will be compromised: MFA
Armenia resolutely deplores deliberate steps by Azerbaijan in the past three days to increase tension, which manifest in dissemination of false information about its own casualties, direct calls for physical threats to the leadership of Armenia, publicly voiced by representatives of the ruling party in Azerbaijan’s parliament, and significant increase in ceasefire violations, which resulted today in a killing of private Sipan Melkonyan of the Defence Army of Nagorno-Karabakh, Armenia's Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a released statement.
"Azerbaijan’s recent actions take place against the background of the appeal of 30 May from the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs to exercise maximum restraint to avoid escalation.
These latest developments defy the efforts of Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh, under the auspices of the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs to take constructive efforts towards the peaceful resolution of the conflict, to establish a conducive environment to this end, and represent a serious setback for all the efforts taken over the past months. Azerbaijan violates its own commitments undertaken in the latest Joint Statements in Milano (December, 2018), in Vienna (March, 2019) and in Moscow (April, 2019).
The deplorable actions of Azerbaijan, if not urgently addressed, may represent a serious obstacle to next steps in the settlement process. They also question the credibility of Azerbaijan and their capacity to remain faithful to commitments, as agreed in Dushanbe in September 2018 and reaffirmed in Vienna in March 2019, to observe and strengthen the ceasefire. Armenia strongly urges Azerbaijan to demonstrate genuine political will expressed in concrete and effective measures to observe the ceasefire. Azerbaijan will bear full responsibility for the risks of further escalation.
Azerbaijan’s latest confrontational and dangerous actions prompt their past violence, atrocities and attempts to aggression and stand proof of the existential physical security risks to the people of Nagorno-Karabakh.
Armenia reiterates that there is no alternative to the peaceful resolution of the conflict, for which strict observance of the ceasefire is an essential condition. Under no circumstances the security of Nagorno-Karabakh and its people will be compromised.
The latest incident underlines the urgency to finalize in the shortest possible time an OSCE investigative mechanism of ceasefire violations and to expand the Office of the Personal Representative of the OSCE Chairperson in Office, in accordance with the commitment taken by Azerbaijan in Vienna and St. Petersburg in 2016.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Armenia expresses its profound and most sincere condolences to the family and friends of private Sipan Melkonyan of the Defence Army of Nagorno-Karabakh," the statement runs.
[it appears that the Turkish FM is the parrot spokesman for the Azeri government]
Trend.az
1 June 2019
Turkish FM: Karabakh conflict can be resolved only within territorial integrity of Azerbaijan
By Rufiz Hafizoglu
Nagorno-Karabakh conflict can be resolved only within the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan and in accordance with the relevant UN resolutions, said Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu, Trend reports referring to the Turkish media.
According to Cavusoglu, double standards are still being applied to Azerbaijan, despite the fact that 20 percent of Azerbaijan's territory is under Armenian occupation.
The conflict between the two South Caucasus countries began in 1988 when Armenia made territorial claims against Azerbaijan. As a result of the ensuing war, in 1992 Armenian armed forces occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan, including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding districts.
The 1994 ceasefire agreement was followed by peace negotiations. Armenia has not yet implemented four UN Security Council resolutions on withdrawal of its armed forces from Nagorno Karabakh and the surrounding districts.
AHVAL News
May 31 2019
Turkish Airlines stops giving out Turkish-Armenian weekly Agos
Turkish Airlines announced that it unilaterally ended a contract with the Turkish-Armenian weekly newspaper Agos and would not give out the newspaper on its stands and airplanes, independent news site Bianet reported on Friday.
Turkish Airlines, which started distributing Agos in 2013, decided last week to end the contract. Turkey’s flagship carrier announced the decision in a written statement without explaining its reasons, Bianet said.
Agos, which was founded in 1996 by journalist Hrant Dink and a group of his friends, to raise awareness on the problems of the Armenians in Turkey, was the first newspaper published in Turkish and Armenian since the Republic of Turkey was founded in 1923.
Dink, the former, editor-in-chief of the newspaper, was assassinated in 2007 in front of Agos office in Istanbul’s Şişli district.
Turkey’s sovereign wealth fund, established in 2016, oversees the operation of the country’s largest state-controlled businesses, including Turkish Airlines. In September, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan appointed himself chairman of the fund and his son-in-law, Treasury Finance Minister Berat Albayrak, as his deputy.
Turkish Airlines in recent years have been criticised for stopping giving out opposition newspapers and just distributing pro-government ones.
Cyprus News Agency
May 31, 2019 Friday
Nicosia to host on June 4 first trilateral meeting among FMs of Cyprus, Greece and Armenia
Nicosia will host on June 4 the first trilateral meeting among the Foreign Ministers of Cyprus, Greece and Armenia.
CNA has learned that Nikos Christodoulides, George Katrougalos and ?ohrab Mnatsakanyan will discuss, among others, about Energy issues and Turkish provocations in the Cypriot EEZ, the Cyprus problem, EU - Armenia relations and regional issues. The meeting will take place at the Presidential Palace, where Katrougalos and Mnatsakanyan will be received, prior to the trilateral meeting, by Cyprus President Nicos Anastasiades, accompanied by Minister Christodoulides.
Earlier Christodoulides will hold bilateral meetings, at the Foreign Ministry, first with his Armenian counterpart and later on with Katrougalos. Christodoulides and Katrougalos are expected to discuss, among others, about developments regarding the Turkish illegal actions in the Cypriot EEZ, in the framework of the coordination between Nicosia and Athens with a view to address them, and the Cyprus problem.
After the trilateral meeting the Ministers of Cyprus, Greece and Armenia are expected to make statements to the press.
Cyprus has been divided since 1974, when Turkish troops invaded and occupied 37% of its territory.
Ankara has issued a navigational telex, announcing its intention to start drilling off Cyprus until September 3. The Turkish drill ship 'Fatih' has been located west of the Akamas peninsula, in an area which falls within the EEZ and continental shelf of the Republic of Cyprus.
Arminfo, Armenia
June 1 2019
A single source of light for the whole village
The village of Sers has been included in the eco-village development network
The network of settlements having energy-saving systems of illumination expands. The network includes villages, where the problem of outdoor illumination perseveres, despite their old histories. Sers, one of the borderland villages in Vayots Dzor, has appeared in the focus of attention of the partner organizations, VivaCell-MTS and the Foundation for the Preservation of Wildlife and Cultural Assets (FPWC).
Anyone unfamiliar with Sers shall be guided by the only source of light if he or she happens to get to the village at night. The only light is installed on the façade of the building of village administration. Villagers share the old history of their settlement: they say the first inhabitants have settled in the village arriving from Salmast, a province in historic Armenia. Today’s residents spare no effort to keep the pace with time, despite the development trends seem to have bypassed the village, they say.
With the support of the partner organizations, VivaCell-MTS and the Foundation for the Preservation of Wildlife and Cultural Assets (FPWC), the much anticipated works will start this year. The village will be provided with an energy-saving outdoor illumination system; its economic and environmental efficiency is well-known to the residents. According to the plan around 1400 meter-long section of the village’s central streets will be provided with outdoor illumination; it will require installation of lamp-posts with 39 LED-bulbs. The modern infrastructure in the village is expected to boost the village life. This will also help solve the traffic and private safety issues. Savings that are expected after the launch of the system will be yet another achievement: the system envisioned for the village is believed to be one of the most energy-saving ones worldwide.
News.am, Armenia
June 3 2019
Armenia, UK military bands perform at Liberty Square in Yerevan
The Salamanca Band and Bugles of The Rifles band of the UK Ministry of Defense and the special military band of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Republic of Armenia gave today an outdoor concert at Liberty Square in Yerevan (PHOTOS).
The concert was organized by the Ministries of Defense of the Republic of Armenia and the United Kingdom as a sign of the Armenian-British relations.
Among the attendees were UK Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to Armenia Judith Farnworth, Deputy Minister of Defense of Armenia Gabriel Balayan and other guests.
This is the fourth concert that The Salamanca is performing in Armenia.
News.am, Armenia
June 3 2019
Armenian church on sale in Ankara
A historic building located in the premises of the historic Ankara
Castle is on sale.
According to Hurriyet, the building is on sale for 12 million Liras
($2,000,000) and is remembered as an Armenian church dating back to
1555. It is registered as a church, and the buyer must use it only for
tourism.
The Northern Echo , UK
June 2, 2019 Sunday
Why are so many County Durham places named after foreign towns?
by Chris Lloyd
NACKSHIVAN is the curious name of a farm to the north-west of Willington. We mentioned it last week as a 2,000-year-old Bronze Age axe was once found there.
"Nakhchivan is also a town and province in Azerbaijan," says Emeritus Professor Alan Townsend of Durham university who lives in those parts. "The province today is one of the detached pieces of Azerbaijan wedged between parts of Armenia and Iran.
"I noticed this when travelling with a 1:1 million map in the area."
Indeed, Nakhchivan is on the disputed border between Armenia and Azerbaijan - tensions between the two countries are such that Arsenal's Armenian footballer Henrikh Mkhitaryan has pulled out of the Europa League final which his club are playing in the Azerbaijan capital of Baku over fears for his safety.
Tensions in Nakhchivan are long standing. For a few months in 1919 after the end of the First World War, a British commissioner and some British troops tried to bring peace to the civil war - but then the Russian army swept in and the British were forced out.
But even before this brush with the headlines, the corner of County Durham countryside near Crook already bore the name from the Azerbaijan border. It appears on an 1890s Ordnance Survey map, spelled as "Nackshavan".
Perhaps the derivations of some of our other foreign place names can help explain its presence.
There's Inkerman at Tow Law named after a battle in the Crimean War in the 1850s; there's Philadelphia near Houghton-le-Spring named after a battle during the American War of Independence in the 1770s.
There's Quebec near Langley Park where the fields were enclosed in 1759 just as the British had captured Quebec in Canada; there's Toronto near Bishop Auckland named in 1859 as the landowner WC Stobart was in the Canadian city when he heard coal had been found on his estate. There's Canada and Nova Scotia in Chester-le-Street, which must have similar derivations (there's also a Durham in Nova Scotia which was named after Lord Durham who was Governor General of Canada in the 1830s).
For good measure, there's California in Eston and there's New York in North Shields, but none of this has shed any light on why there should be an Azerbaijanian farm between Crook and Willington. Can you help - are there any other foreign place names we've left out.
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