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Re: Military Recognition: Armenia and Artsakh
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Re: Nagorno-Karabagh: Military Balance Between Armenia & Azerbaijan
Azerbaijan, Armenian-Backed Separatists Agree Karabakh Cease–Fire
April 5, 2016 - 11:11am Armenia Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh
A EurasiaNet Partner Post from: RFE/RL
Azerbaijan and Armenian-backed separatists in its breakaway region of Nagorno-Karabakh say they have reached a cease-fire to halt the deadliest flare-up over that mountainous South Caucasus enclave in decades.
The apparent breakthrough comes with increasingly strident international calls for restraint between forces loyal to regional archenemies Azerbaijan and Armenia, which have been locked in conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh since the waning years of the Soviet Union.
A spokesman for the Armenian-backed Nagorno-Karabakh separatist forces, Senor Hasratyan, told RFE/RL's Armenian Service on April 5 that the mutual agreement called for an end to fighting from 12 p.m. local time (0800 GMT).
The Azerbaijani Defense Ministry then confirmed that military operations had been stopped along the "line of contact" that effectively serves as a front line separating the combatant sides.
The latest outbreak of violence -- the worst since the mid-1990s -- began early on April 2 and involved tanks, helicopters, and artillery.
In a statement, representatives of the so-called Minsk Group of mediators in the conflict -- France, Russia, and the United States -- urged the sides to stop fighting, saying there is no military solution to the conflict. They also called for "an immediate negotiation" on a comprehensive settlement.
"The negotiations have brought no results, but we are still prepared for the negotiating process," Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev said.
Earlier in Paris, French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said the co-chairs of the Minsk Group -- France, Russia, and the United States -- would send envoys to Azerbaijan, Armenia, and to Nagorno-Karabakh in a bid to resolve the crisis.
Ayrault was speaking after talks with his German counterpart, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, who said the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) would send a fact-finding mission to Azerbaijan, Armenia, and Nagorno-Karabakh.
Populated mainly by ethnic Armenians and with many ethnic Azerbaijanis having already fled, the territory declared independence from Azerbaijan in a 1988-94 war that claimed an estimated 30,000 lives and displaced hundreds of thousands of people.
Each side reported new casualties on April 5 as the death toll from four days of fighting rose above 40, with one estimate as high as 64 killed.
Azerbaijan has reported 16 combat deaths, while the Karabakh military said 20 of its servicemen had died.
The Armenian Defense Ministry later announced that seven people were killed in an Azerbaijani drone attack on a bus carrying volunteers to the disputed region.
Azerbaijan also reported civilian deaths, including at least four overnight.
The destruction of heavy military equipment has been claimed by both sides.
Each side accused the other of escalating the violence as the West, Russia, and neighbor Iran appealed to all sides for restraint.
On April 4, Azerbaijani Defense Minister Zakir Hasanov warned that Baku's forces would begin an artillery barrage on Stepanakert, which has around 50,000 residents, if Armenian forces did "not stop shelling our settlements."
The defense forces of the unrecognized Nagorno-Karabakh republic promised a "very painful" response.
They also said Azerbaijan "had been increasing the caliber of its weapons day by day," and had used Smerch multiple-launch rocket systems to shell civilian settlements and military targets.
Azerbaijan's Defense Ministry on April 5 denied having targeted civilians and a spokesman said that while Baku's forces had Smerches, they hadn't used them "so far."
Baku also said the Armenians were using large-caliber machine guns and 120-millimeter mortars overnight.
Armenian President Serzh Sarkisian warned on April 4 that a further escalation of the fighting would be fraught with "unpredictable and irreversible consequences, including a full-scale war."
Armenian foe and NATO member Turkey waded in on April 5 to say it was "standing side-by-side with our brothers in Azerbaijan."
"This persecution will not continue forever," Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said. "Karabakh will one day return to its original owner. It will be Azerbaijan's."
Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu condemned what he described as Armenian attacks in the Nagorno-Karabakh region and vowed Ankara would stand by Azerbaijan.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov expressed serious concern over an escalation in the standoff and called for a swift cessation in fighting.
U.S. Vice President Joe Biden said via Twitter he had told Sarkisian and the president of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev, that "a comprehensive settlement in Nagorno-Karabakh is critical for their stability, security, prosperity."
With reporting by RFE/RL's Armenian and Azerbaijani services, AFP, AP, Interfax, and Reuters.
Editor's note: Copyright (c) 2016. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.
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Re: Military Recognition: Armenia and Artsakh
Ինչպես են ԼՂՀ ՊԲ զինծառայողները խոցել թշնամու ԱԹՍ-ն ու տանկերը
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Re: Nagorno-Karabagh: Military Balance Between Armenia & Azerbaijan
Originally posted by argin View Post
What makes you think that those letters are not fake?Comment
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Re: Nagorno-Karabagh: Military Balance Between Armenia & Azerbaijan
lol 27:30Originally posted by Joseph View Post
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Re: Nagorno-Karabagh: Military Balance Between Armenia & Azerbaijan
Excellent analysis by Paul Antonopoulos
Understanding the fight in Artaskh between Armenia and Azerbaijan By Paul Antonopoulos - 05/04/2016 1 The following article has links to graphic footage. The 2nd of April 2016 marks the thawing of an unofficial ceasefire that followed the Nagorno-Karabakh War in 1994. Following the 1994 ceasefire, the separatist Republic of Nagorno-Karabkh remained internationally recognized as a part of Azerbaijan despite Baku having no control over the region. What separates this war however from its 1994 predecessor, is that Baku has had over two decades to invest its vast oil wealth into modernizing and building its military. This is a luxury that Armenia, a small landlocked and resourceless state, has not had.
However, why is this small region so important geopolitically, culturally and historically? Optimized by Komoona Nagorno-Karabkh is a small enclave within Azerbaijan, however, since the end of the war in 1994, Armenian paramilitaries and the government of the Republic of Nagorno-Karabkh hold other lands in Azerbaijan proper creating an unhinged border between Armenia and the unrecognized Republic. The embarrassing defeat to the demographically and militarily inferior Armenian forces accelerated nationalist sentiment in Azerbaijan. This led to the destruction of ancient Armenian sites in a systematic manner in an attempt to remove all cultural and historical legacies of the Armenian people in Azerbaijan and to falsify history, particularly in the Nakhichevan enclave. This is in the same manner in which Turkey had attempted to remove all Armenian cultural and historical legacy in its land that eventually culminated into the Armenian genocide. The Azeri’s as ethnic and linguistic brethren to the Turks have continued this policy of eliminating any Armenian connection to the land. Nationalists in Turkey and Azerbaijan, particular the far-right terrorist group the Grey Wolves who also have a chapter in Azerbaijan, advocate for a union between the two countries. Therefore the same anti-Armenian sentiment found in Turkey is also found in Azerbaijan.
The latest destabilization by Azerbaijan has prompted Turkish President Erdogan to announce that Turkey stands with Azerbaijan ‘to the end.’ This is unsurprising when one realizes that the Azeris and Turks are one and the same in its Armenia policy. Just as the Turks killed over 1.5 million Armenians in a genocide it has yet to recognize, the Azeris engaged in a violent pogrom against Armenians within its territory and engaged in a systematic destruction of Armenian sites. Turkey’s open support for Azerbaijan comes despite the Azeri’s starting this latest bout of conflict. Therefore, what else did Nagorno-Karabakh have but to defend itself against a discriminatory dictatorship in Baku? The role of Russia cannot be overlooked though.
A 2015 report found that Azerbaijan bought 85% of its weapons in the previous 5 years from Russia. This accounted for over $4 billion worth of arms trade. These trade deals come as Armenia hosts two Russian bases. It seems Moscow is walking a fine line between economic gain through Azerbaijan and having positive relations with its traditional ally in Armenia. Although Russia cannot intervene directly in the Nagorno-Karabkh conflict as it would lose international political and military standing whilst its fighting terrorists in Syria, it can hold great influence over both warring parties. With Turkey downing a Russian jet in Syria late last year, and Russia having a significant presence in Armenia, it is difficult to fathom a Turkish intervention against Armenia despite the rhetoric coming from Ankara. Armenian memories of a genocide committed by the Turks, and pogroms along with destruction of historical sites by their Azeri kin, would resonate on why Nagorno-Karabkh cannot be lost. With Azerbaijan following the line that it is only attempting to liberate the land it lost in in the last war, it cannot explain why its soldiers cut off the ears of its victims, a Turkish tradition dating back to the Ottoman era.
Footage also emerged of Azeri soldiers parading the head of a Yezidi fighting for Nagorno-Karabkh in scenes that would resemble something from an ISIS video. A professional standing arming that is mostly armed by Russia had beheaded a person, yet little international condemnation can be heard. There’s also the indiscriminate shelling of civilian areas of Nagorno-Karabakh by Azeri forces that has led to the death of an innocent 12 year old boy. The mutilations of dead bodies, beheadings and indiscriminate shelling of civilians has led to no international condemnation with media towing the line of being ‘neutral’ despite the Azeri initiating the conflict. Meanwhile prominent Russia Today reporter, Murad Gazdiev, is in the conflict zone dismissing that Azerbaijan are adhering to a ceasefire it announced. He has also reported on Azeri forces using illegal cluster bombs. Again, there was no condemnation to the use of these weapons by Azeri forces.
The struggle in Nagorno-Karabkh is one for the very survival of its Armenian history and population. Armenian’s have seen what happened to its people and history in the Nakhichevan enclave and do not want a repeat of it. Azeri dictator Aliyev admitted in an interview in 2002 that he ‘tried to increase the number of Azeris and to reduce the number of Armenians’ in Nagorno-Karabkh. This was coupled during the Soviet times of incentives for Azeri’s to migrate to the predominately Armenian region to engage in a demographic shift as had happened in Nakhichevan. This also goes hand in hand with Azeri falsification of history to lay claims to a land that they are recent to whilst downplaying the rich connection Armenians have to the land. However, with the near collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989, Armenians still remained the majority in the region at 76.4% to the Azeris 22.4%.
With the Azeri failure in demographic change, and the memories fresh in Armenian minds of the atrocities the Azeri’s and their Turkish kin have committed against them, it was no surprise they chose to fight from the grapples of its oppressors. It is yet to be seen how the international community will respond to this conflict, but its eyes must be peeled carefully on Azerbaijan so that it does not descend into another radical Islamist hotspot. The first war saw around 1500 Afghani and Arab mujihadeen’s fight, along with thousands of Turkish volunteers including the Grey Wolves, and hundreds of Islamist Chechens. If Azerbaijan are to follow the same policy in recruiting Islamists, Azerbaijan has the potential to descend into chaos that is now seen in Syria and Iraq, all the whilst Armenian’s continue to defend their historical homeland in Nagorno-Karabakh. Therefore the fight in Nagorno-Karabakh is not one of Azerbaijan reclaiming its internationally recognized land, but rather one of the Armenian’s fighting for its very survival in its ancestral lands.
As emphasized, the memory of Nakhichevan in which the Armenian population were killed and driven away, and its historical sites destroyed, resonate deeply. A repeat of that is now being avoided in Nagorno-Karabakh so long as the Armenian fighters resist the Azeri aggression. Although as of writing a new ceasefire has been agreed, it remains to be seen how long this will last. Azerbaijan have already embarrassingly lost countless tanks, aircraft and personnel to a supposedly inferior force.
https://www.almasdarnews.com/article...ia-azerbaijan/ | Al-Masdar NewsGeneral Antranik (1865-1927): “I am not a nationalist. I recognize only one nation, the nation of the oppressed.”Comment
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Re: Nagorno-Karabagh: Military Balance Between Armenia & Azerbaijan
In this video it's claiming Armenia has Iskanders. I stopped listening to bullxxxx death till figures. I went to sleep at a death toll close to 300 to wake up 7 hours later to 2000. If that was true they would already stop fighting as such losses are devastating.Comment
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Re: Nagorno-Karabagh: Military Balance Between Armenia & Azerbaijan
Azerbaijan still shelling Armenians
General Antranik (1865-1927): “I am not a nationalist. I recognize only one nation, the nation of the oppressed.”Comment
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Re: Nagorno-Karabagh: Military Balance Between Armenia & Azerbaijan
while war is ugly, during these times, it brings together people. no matter if it's a dirty oligarch, a farmer in a remote village, or a spyurkahay, ,we're all armos. Because when the turk comes, he comes for all of us, no matter where we live on this planet, an attack on artsakh is felt everywhere where we live. Unfortunately, the enemy knows no mercy or sanity. It's the way of the world. Always have been. Always will be. All we can do is persevere and look into the future. This is our destiny. </rant>Comment
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