Andrew Cuomo, Governor of New York, announced 24 April 2016 as Armenian Genocide Commemoration Day. The Governor’s Press Service informs that Cuomo pays tribute to the Armenian Genocide victims, as well as to the survivors who resettled in New York after the massacres. Residents of New York join the Armenian community to remind the events of the past and the lessons learned.
“Let’s call things by their proper names. Ilham Aliyev and his regime have committed true crime against our people. I’m not afraid to state this. Maybe such human losses would be justified, if our flag today wove in Khankendi (Stepanakert), Shushi, or at least Azerbaijani territories near Karabakh were liberated, which is called a security zone. This isn’t available, isn’t it?”
In his turn, Edward Nalbandyan, RA MFA, enumerated proposals made by the Azerbaijani side in Moscow before Sochi. “This way we may go back even to ten years and reach Paris negotiations,” Nalbandyan said.
He announced that a parliamentary commission needs to be set up to investigate the 1915 massacre of the Armenian members of the then Ottoman parliament. He demanded to locate their corpses and properly bury them. Paylan compared Talaat, Enver and Djemal Pashas with Hitler.
In 1997 RA law on the title of the “National Hero of Armenia” hasn’t been changed yet. Accordingly, Nikolai Ryzhkov wasn’t a RA National Hero yet. That was to follow. Our tankers were to participate in “Tank biathlon” international competition, initiated by RF Ministry of Defense. They’d participate being leaders of the competitions, and would slow down in the last minutes. They’d slow down, so that Russian tankers were the winners. And RF Ministry of Defense would award a prize—T-90 tank, to our tankers for holding the second place. It’d promise, but wouldn’t give. Such a sound military-technical cooperation.
Nagorno Karabakh Republic (Artsakh Republic) Human Rights Defender (Ombudsman) has published a report on atrocities committed by Azerbaijani Armed Forces against the civilian population of the NKR and the servicemen of the NKR Defense Army during the period of 2-5April 2016. As 168.am was informed from the press service of NKR Ombudsman, the announcement reads as follows,,
It’s noteworthy, that Lavrov himself has repeatedly denied existence of such a document. This was also denied by Igor Popov, OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chair (Russia), stating no Russian plans are available at the negotiation table, moreover, he added, “There are proposals by the Co-chairs, which have been discussed throughout recent years in this or that form. A few variants are available, however, they’re based on three principles and six elements of the conflict settlement, which have repeatedly been stated by the Co-chairs. Let me remind about these principles: the right to self-determination, exclusion of the use of force, territorial integrity, and most important among the six basic elements are the return of the territories and the status settlement of NKR.
Russian media outlets are silent on why Russia intends to settle a conflict, unsettlement of which is a crucial component of Russia-led foreign policy. They are silent that its main purpose is Azerbaijan’s membership to EEU. Russian media outlets are silent that for that membership the Russian side was obliged to exert pressure over Armenia to redeem those territories to Azerbaijan.
“Not accidentally, the news was released by the Azerbaijani side. I want to attach your attention to another circumstance as well: they speak of the forthcoming meeting under the umbrella of RF president, and RA presidential spokesman speaks of not having an accord within OSCE MG. Accordingly, Armenia seems to hint, that it anticipates development of negotiations within OSCE, and, probably, this is a precise and right approach by Armenia.”
“Russia’s mediation efforts aren’t so convincing to me under current state of affairs, Russia’s role is very contrastive, as Russia has a military base in Armenia, and is considered Armenia’s main partner in the field of security, Armenia is a CSTO member, Russia is Armenia’s security guarantor, however, it sells arms to Azerbaijan. Although Russia’s officials are also able to ground it, it may be considered as a conflict participant, who openly supports Azerbaijani president’s steps, whatever they might be,” Uwe Halbach said.
