For many years, the Armenian-American community has been dissatisfied with U.S. policy on Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabagh).
Under the guise of neutrality, Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) Minsk Group Co-Chair James Warlick and his predecessors have put the blame on both sides of the conflict each time that Azerbaijan has opened fire on Armenia and Artsakh. Such an unfair approach has encouraged Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to escalate his attacks.
To eliminate or at least minimize such bloody aggression, 85 members of Congress recently signed a joint letter urging the Obama Administration to implement the following three steps regarding the border between the two countries: 1) withdraw the snipers; 2) increase the number of international monitors; and 3) deploy gunfire locators. Not surprisingly, Azerbaijan has rejected all three proposals, while Armenia, Artsakh, and the Minsk Group of mediators (France, Russia, and United States) have accepted them.
Last week, House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce (R-Calif.) held a classified briefing with Warlick concerning the implementation of the proposals which he and Congressman Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.) had initiated. Before the closed-door meeting, the Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA) had circulated a set of 10 suggested questions for Warlick. While it is unknown if these questions were raised during the congressional briefing, the Obama Administration should be asked to respond publicly to the 10 questions so that everyone becomes aware of its position on the Artsakh conflict.
To ensure that an official answer is received, I suggest the posting of these questions on the White House website, under the “Petitions” section. The website states that the Obama Administration will issue a formal response in 60 days to any petition that gathers over 100,000 signatures within 30 days of its posting. The Azeris have already taken advantage of this unique opportunity by posting on the White House website 2 anti-Armenian petitions that gathered 105,686 and 126,828 signatures, respectively. As expected, the White House did issue a statement in response to the two Azeri petitions.
Below are the 10 ANCA questions that should be posted as a petition on the White House website:
1) What specific steps, if any, has the U.S. government taken to ensure the implementation of the Royce-Engel peace proposals, specifically with regard to an agreement on the non-deployment of snipers, the addition of observers, and the deployment of gunfire locator systems along the Line of Contact?
2) The State Department has been both very vocal and highly specific about what it believes the Armenian side must concede. Is the U.S. government willing to match this public diplomacy with equally high-profile and similarly concrete demands upon Azerbaijan?
3) What are the specific facts, legal arguments, and policy considerations that led our government to officially recognize Kosovo but not Nagorno-Karabagh?
4) Does the Azerbaijani government’s record of domestic repression and corruption in any way impact how our government views Azerbaijan’s claim to extend its governance over Nagorno-Karabagh?
5) Why has Azerbaijan’s well-documented (and video-taped) destruction of the medieval Armenian cemetery in Djulfa never been mentioned in either the State Department’s Human Rights or Religious Freedom reports?
6) What is the U.S. government’s current request, if any, regarding the re-incarceration of admitted and still unrepentant axe-murderer Ramil Safarov?
7) What is the U.S. policy concerning the Azerbaijani government’s travel restrictions related to U.S. citizens of Armenian heritage?
8) What is the U.S. policy regarding NATO member states, notably Turkey, making sales or transfers of advanced, offensive weaponry to Azerbaijan?
9) What specific restrictions exist regarding travel and communication between the citizens and officials of the United States and Nagorno-Karabagh? What are the justifications for any such restrictions of these freedoms? What, if any, are the perceived benefits of such restrictions?
10) What interests do you believe have been served, if any, by official U.S. public restraint in challenging Azerbaijan’s high-profile anti-Armenian incitements, threats, and cross-border aggression?
I believe that a well-publicized petition can gather much more than 100,000 signatures within 30 days of its posting on the White House website, particularly if prominent individuals with a large number of followers endorse the petition.
Harut Sassounian
Artsakh ha been an Armenian country for many years. They are happy and content as such. Leave them alone.
Your wasting your time. Our real enemy is the US State Department. In fact tell me one time the US State Department has been pro Armenian? Even in the 1930’s when 40 Days of Musadagh was to be filmed, the US State Department, like clockwork killed, that movie. This was just 15 years after “the crime against humanity” was coined from the Armenian Genocide. Even Condi Rice was taped gloating how she thwarted the Armenian Genocide resolution as if she is proud of it. The US State Department will never be our friend Mr. Sassounian. Not Baker,Cohen,Albright or Kerry and therefore neither will the White House..
What we need as Armenians is:
1. A new universal Armenian ideology of “ONE GREATER ARMENIA”. No more splinters. Lets go to ALL and every Armenian organization from all over the world and basically instill an ideology and agree upon the idea of ONE GREATER -UNIFIED- ARMENIA. One clear powerful unified central Armenia policy to be reckoned with.
2. Continue the activism of our friends in congress for sure. They will continue to do our work and be thorn in the side of the useless State Department.
3. Work on advancing the military technology and potency of the Armenian Army. Its the ONLY TRUE guarantee of our future. Why not enlist diaspora youth to volunteer in Armenian Army. I have always advocated this. It would be huge for Armenia. Also any Muslim Azeri provocation need to be responded with deadly force. Its the only thing they understand. Unfortunately we must also prepare Armenian for the possibility of all out war. However Armenia won the war. We need to give non of our liberated lands back and make that clear..
4. The idea that the Armenian side is to relinquish “Azeri lands” and then a future referendum on Karabakh… blah blah blah. Only the US State Department would come up with pro Muslim Turkish stance like that. What idiot would agree to that. The winning side, Armenia needs to relinquish NOTHING. In fact the Armenian side needs to start educating how these land are historically Armenian and therefore can NEVER go back: regardless of war.
Tell there Ambassador to go home !!
I’ll sign the petition!
And many other Armenians.