EINSKALDIR

🇨🇦 Oilers-McJesus all day. Hockey and poutine, with a side of humanitarianism.

[EINSKALDIR @EINSKALDIR2]

THIS MUST STOP!
@JustinTrudeau @melaniejoly Canada must help these people! We continue to send all the help Ukraine needs. Why have we abandoned the Armenians? The first Christian state is facing yet another genocide. Your silence is deafening. Act NOW!!!!!
#SanctionAzerbaijan

[Marut Vanyan @marutvanian]

Visited Rose grandma to say hello… yesterday I met her in the Stepanakert church.

She displaced from her home in Stepanakert. Says can’t stay at the basements here because no enough air to breathe.

[ANCA Western Region @ANCA_WR]

Erdogan is reportedly headed to Southern California for the June 25 World Cup match — and ANCA-WR is calling on LA and California leaders to deny him any official welcome.

This is a man who leads Turkey’s campaign to deny the Armenian Genocide and armed Azerbaijan’s ethnic cleansing of Artsakh — then called the result a matter of “pride.” He doesn’t get to use LA as a backdrop for his rehabilitation tour.

We’re calling on elected officials to:
Issue public statements confirming no official welcome
Refuse any ceremonial engagement with the Turkish delegation
Decline any photo opportunity tied to his visit
Affirm solidarity with the Armenian-American community

California is home to over 1 million Armenian Americans. Our leaders must stand with their constituents—not provide a platform to a regime built on denial and aggression.

Read the full release on https://t.co/B5m97awc6v

[Dr. Anzhela Mnatsakanyan @ANZHELA_YAN]

Today, on World Refugee Day, remember the 120,000 Armenians of Artsakh/Nagorno-Karabakh forcibly displaced and ethnically cleansed by Azerbaijan in Sept 2023.

Their right to return, to self-determination, & to live in their homeland is being silenced. This cannot be normalized.

[Stephan Pechdimaldji @spechdimaldji]

@LemkinInstitute Condemning the destruction of cultural and religious heritage abroad while denying or downplaying the erasure of Armenian heritage in Artsakh is a glaring double standard. The protection of churches, monasteries, cemeteries, and cultural identity cannot depend on politics or whose heritage is at stake. International norms should be universal, not selective.
#Artsakh #CulturalHeritage #HumanRights #ArmenianHeritage #ReligiousFreedom #ArmenianGenocide

[Thomas Massie @RepThomasMassie]

Can we just quit giving Americans’ hard earned money to this blood thirsty war criminal? Peace in the Middle East would follow quickly.

[Christian Solidarity International (CSI) @CSI_humanrights]

Mothers, fathers, children, brothers and sisters...

Fleeing civil war.

2 million Sudanese people had to abandon their homes looking for safety in the Nuba Mountains.

Resources across 15 camps are stretching to a breaking point.

They need food, medicines, shelter.

They need your help.

Pray for them 🙏

And if you can, please donate today.

Find out more: https://t.co/9B00FrW26F

👉 Donate here: https://t.co/NLjG515CHi

#GiveFoodSaveLives

[Avi Lewis @avilewis]

Prime Minister Carney says the war in Iran was "worth it".

I want to know who he thinks it was worth it for.

[Zartonk Media @ZartonkMedia]

Europe's Top Human Rights Court Rules Against Azerbaijan for Torture and Killing of Armenian Officer in First April 2016 War Ruling
➖➖➖
The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has found Azerbaijan responsible for the torture and unlawful killing of 30-year-old Armenian officer Major Hayk Toroyan during the April 2016 Four-Day War in and around Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh), where Azerbaijani soldiers killed him after he had been wounded and could no longer defend himself, in the first ruling the Court has issued among the cases of that war, reports Zartonk Media.

The significance of the ruling extends far beyond this single case. By holding that Azerbaijan exercised jurisdiction over Toroyan through its soldiers' authority and control over him, the Court rejected the kind of evasion Baku has long relied on to escape accountability, and established a legal foundation that Armenian advocates can now invoke in the 21 related April 2016 cases still pending before it. The precedent reaches further still, offering a basis for future claims arising from Azerbaijan's wider pattern of violence against Armenians, from the 2020 war to the September 2023 ethnic cleansing of Artsakh.

In its judgment in V.T. and Others v. Azerbaijan, delivered on June 18, the Court ruled against Azerbaijan, finding violations of Article 2 (right to life) and Article 3 (prohibition of torture and inhuman or degrading treatment) of the European Convention on Human Rights.

The case concerns Major Hayk Toroyan, born in Yerevan in 1985, who served in the armed forces of the then Artsakh Republic as head of the rocket and artillery armament service of his unit in Mataghis. The Court anonymized the proceedings, referring to him by his initials and withholding the names of the applicants, his parents and sister. The Court found that Azerbaijani forces captured him during the four-day clashes, tortured him, severed his hands, and beheaded him while he was still alive.

According to the case file, Toroyan and his driver left their unit on the morning of April 2, 2016, to deliver ammunition to a post north of the village of Talish when their truck was ambushed and came under heavy fire. At 11.25 that morning, Toroyan sent a text message to a fellow soldier that read, "They shot me." His driver was found decapitated near the vehicle. A forensic examination concluded that Toroyan remained conscious for up to two hours, that his hands were severed seconds before his death, and that he was beheaded while still alive. His head and hands have never been returned, and he was buried without them.

The Court found that Azerbaijan had jurisdiction over the killing through its soldiers' "State agent authority and control" over the victim, rejecting Azerbaijan's argument that it bore no responsibility because the events occurred on territory outside its control. The Court held that Toroyan was killed after he had been wounded and could no longer defend himself or move on his own, conduct it found incompatible with international humanitarian law, and that the severe violence inflicted on him amounted to torture.

The Court also found a separate violation of Article 3 in relation to the suffering of his family, noting that they were unable to recover his remains or carry out a proper burial, which caused them profound and continuous distress.

Although Azerbaijan denied responsibility, the Court drew on evidence originating from Azerbaijani sources. A photograph of Toroyan's severed head was posted to a Facebook page by a soldier presumed to be Azerbaijani, alongside the caption "I have got one"; an Armenian forensic bureau later matched the face in the image to Toroyan. The Court found that this and other material publicized by Azerbaijani officials corroborated the family's account.

A ceasefire ended the fighting at noon on April 5, 2016, four days after it began. In its aftermath, the bodies of fallen servicemen were returned, some mutilated and missing heads, hands, or ears.

Anna Melikyan, a lawyer who worked on the case, said the ruling came at last, nearly ten years after the April War, in the matter of one of the Armenian servicemen killed and beheaded during the fighting. She noted that the Armenian government had not filed an interstate complaint over these cases, which were instead pursued by a group of human rights advocates, among them her colleagues Ara Ghazaryan, Haykuhi Harutyunyan, Hasmik Harutyunyan, and Araks Melkonyan. Armenia did intervene in the proceedings as a third party in support of the family.

The Court ordered Azerbaijan to pay €60,000 jointly to Toroyan's parents and €30,000 to his sister in non-pecuniary damages, along with €14,210 in costs and expenses to be paid to the Yerevan-based NGO Rule of Law, which represented the family.

Toroyan had been due to be presented for promotion to lieutenant colonel that month. He was posthumously awarded Armenia's Combat Cross, First Degree.

[ANCA @ANCA_DC]

“There is no community closer to the Armenian heart than the Hellenic community. There is no cause dearer to the Armenian soul than the cause of #Cyprus. Justice. Freedom. Reunification. An end to Turkish occupation.”

ANCA’s Hamparian Strengthens Armenian-Hellenic Alliance at National Pro-Cyprus Conference:
https://t.co/YdLbqE3VPX

#TurkishTroopsOutOfCyprus

[The Uncivilised One @Sea2Sea1Way]

azerbaijan🇦🇿 has destroyed more Christian Churches and Christian ✝️ monuments than ISIS

[ANCA @ANCA_DC]

Arizona @RepAbeHamadeh just praised Azerbaijan for sharing American values of “liberty and self-determination” - knowing full well that Azerbaijan's Aliyev dictatorship just violently deprived the 150,000 Armenian Christians of Artsakh of their "liberty and self-determination."

Call his DC office: [phone]
Tweet him: @RepAbeHamadeh

[֍ ♰ @LucyluvsMoon1]

The Armenian, Greek, and Assyrian genocides

[301🇦🇲 @301arm]

Azerbaijan continues its systematic destruction of Armenian cultural heritage in occupied Artsakh. The latest documented case involves the demolition of two memorials in Astghashen village in the Askeran region, according to the Artsakh Monuments monitoring initiative.

One of the destroyed monuments was dedicated to local fighters who gave their lives during the Artsakh Liberation War and had stood in the village since 2012. The second honored Astghashen residents who died during World War II and had stood there since the 1970s.

The destruction of the memorials is part of Azerbaijan's ongoing effort to erase the Armenian historical and cultural presence from occupied Artsakh. The demolition of churches, cemeteries, khachkars, memorials, and other heritage sites has become a recurring feature of Azerbaijan's rule over the region.

[Stephan Pechdimaldji @spechdimaldji]

@AuroraPrize_ President Zelensky rightly condemned Russia’s strike on Kyiv’s historic Dormition Cathedral as an attack on Christian culture and national identity. Yet where was that moral clarity when his key ally Azerbaijan ethnically cleansed Artsakh, emptied its ancient Armenian Christian homeland, and systematically erased its cultural heritage? If the destruction of churches and cultural identity in Ukraine is called cultural genocide, then the same standard should apply to Armenians in Artsakh. Human rights lose credibility when outrage is selective. https://t.co/Fvu51rU1Ys #ArmenianGenocide #Ukraine #Azerbaijan #Russia #HumanRights

[301🇦🇲 @301arm]

Just days after the June 7 parliamentary elections, Pashinyan’s Ruling Party moves to introduce a bill that would prevent many Armenian citizens from voting in future parliamentary elections and national referendums unless they spend at least half the year in Armenia.

Under the proposal, citizens would be required to spend at least 183 days in Armenia during the year preceding an election in order to cast a ballot.

If adopted, the measure would affect labor migrants, seasonal workers, Armenians employed abroad, and tens of thousands of the Armenian diaspora who retain Armenian citizenship but spend much of the year outside Armenia.

The initiative comes in the immediate aftermath of an election campaign during which the ruling party failed to secure constitutional majority and its supporters repeatedly highlighted the participation of Armenian citizens traveling from Russia to vote.

Critics note that the same electoral framework has been in place for years and was never portrayed as a concern when it benefited the current political establishment, raising questions about the timing of the proposal.

The bill was introduced by ruling party MPs Arusyak Manavazyan and Alkhas Ghazaryan, who argue that citizenship alone should not be sufficient to participate in national elections and that voters should maintain a meaningful connection to Armenia through physical presence in the country.

While some countries impose residency or physical-presence requirements for voting, many democracies allow citizens living outside the country to participate in national elections regardless of where they reside.

#ArmVote26

[EINSKALDIR @EINSKALDIR2]

@ThePatriotOasis "He's not a boyscout" is code for "he's not the world's most prominent head chopper".
#Jolani

[Marjorie Taylor Greene 🇺🇸 @mtgreenee]

$300 BILLION DOLLARS TO IRAN??!!!

Trump agreed to give Iran $300 BILLION dollars for reconstruction cost after Trump bombed Iran.

Are you kidding me? What an embarrassment!

Americans are getting screwed again!!

[Acyn @Acyn]

De Niro: I hate to say it, but loving our country is starting to sound like an abused spouse saying they love their abuser.

I can’t love a country that starts stupid and inhumane wars, killing thousands of innocents and indirectly causing the deaths and suffering of millions more.

I can’t love a country that takes healthcare away from millions of people and uses that money to enrich their pals in the Trump-Epstein class.

I can’t love a country that sends out masked militias to shoot citizens in the streets, torture our neighbors, and separate families.

I can’t love a country that’s led by a racist, misogynist, xenophobic tyrant.

And let me just say it: I can’t love a country that’s led by Donald Trump and his sycophant Congress.

[François DEVEDJIAN @fdevedjian]

La dictature Aliyev 🇦🇿 prétend défendre le droit et la paix mais après avoir pratiqué l’épuration ethnique de l’#Artsakh (#NagornoKarabakh) en 2023, elle célèbre plus de 50 d occupation militaire turque illégale à Chypre 🇨🇾

#StopAliyevDictatorship

[The Genocide Report @GenocideReport]

“. . . the mass murder of over 1,000,000 Armenians in Turkey in 1915 is a case of genocide which conforms to the statutes of the UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide.”

13 June 1997 (Montreal): The Association of Genocide Scholars (n/k/a IAGS) unanimously passes Armenian Genocide Resolution; condemns genocide denial by Turkey and its agents and supporters.

[301🇦🇲 @301arm]

Yerevan State University has decided to dissolve its Department of Foreign Literature, one of the university's oldest academic units, according to department head Anush Sedrakyan.

Sedrakyan, a political scientist who ran in the recent elections on the list of the "Wings of Unity" Party and has been a vocal critic of Nikol Pashinyan and his government, said the decision is part of a broader state policy directed from the center.

"This is centralized authoritarianism," Sedrakyan said, adding that when it becomes difficult to target an individual through professional, corruption-related, or personal allegations, authorities instead move against the institution associated with that person.

According to Sedrakyan, the university administration informed the acting dean of YSU's Faculty of European Languages and Communication that the department would be dissolved.

The decision comes despite the fact that YSU currently operates a master's degree program in Foreign Literature and has students actively enrolled in the program.

The development comes amid years of increasing government involvement in Armenia's higher education system. Under Pashinyan's government, university governance structures have been reshaped, government representatives have been placed on university governing bodies, and disputes over university leadership, academic independence, and alleged political influence have repeatedly generated controversy.