Become an OC Media member and receive exclusive access to:
Support independent journalism in Caucasus
Become an OC Media memberAlready a member?
Regional * Zelimkhan Murtazov, a native of Chechnya who spent around four months in the transit zone of Astana International Airport in Kazakhstan, has been able to fly to Armenia. In Russia, he faced possible prosecution for leaving military service or forced return to the front. Murtazov signed a three-year contract with the Akhmat unit in August 2022 — according to him, under pressure from Chechen security forces, who allegedly threatened to send his younger brothers to war otherwise. * Ar
Regional * Armenian Parliamentary Speaker Alen Simonyan told Armenian media in Turkey that Turkey’s decision not to open the land border with Armenia, despite having agreed to do so in 2022, had been impacted by ‘Azerbaijan, through its lobbying and influence’. * Today, 16 freight wagons of diesel fuel will be shipped from Azerbaijan to Armenia. * The Foreign Ministry has summoned Belgium and the Netherlands’ ambassadors over resolutions adopted by their parliaments calling for the release o
Regional * Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyi said Kyiv had finalised agreements to provide drone interceptors and technology with three countries, and that Ukraine has ‘requests from 11 countries — the Middle East and the Gulf, plus we’re also gradually turning our attention to the Caucasus’. Zelenskyi did not specify which country he was referring to in the Caucasus. Armenia * The house arrest of Strong Armenia party leader Samvel Karapetyan has been extended for another three month
Regional * Armenian Parliamentary Speaker Alen Simonyan said in his speech at the Assembly of the Inter-Parliamentary Union in Turkey that the release of 19 Armenian detainees held in Azerbaijan and clarification of the fate of missing people should be achieved in order to ‘achieve genuine reconciliation’. * A meeting between Simonyan and his Azerbaijani counterpart Sahiba Gafarova has begun in Istanbul. APA wrote that the meeting is taking place within the framework of the 152nd session of t
