Armenian News - NEWS.am presents the daily digest of Armenia-related top news as of 15.02.22:

  • The situation in Ukraine remains tense amid fears over Russian invasions.

Several sources, including Ukraine's president Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said that Russia will invade Ukraine on February 16.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy signed a decree according to which February 16 was declared the Day of Unity in Ukraine.

In a new video message, Zelenskyy noted that some people are sowing panic among Ukrainians and scaring off investors from the country noting that Russia will invade Ukraine on Wednesday.

“They scare us with a big war and for the umpteenth time set the date for a military invasion. This is not the first time. We are systematically waging war on all fronts. However, the Ukrainian authorities see no signs of preparations for a full-scale Russian invasion in the coming days, said Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine Oleksiy Danilo.

Russian President Vladimir Putin sometimes even jokes when reading messages about the date of Russia's "attack" on Ukraine, since it is impossible to treat this with understanding, Dmitry Peskov, press secretary of the head of state noted.

In the meantime, the United States is set to close the US embassy in Kyiv and temporarily relocate the small number of remaining diplomatic staff in the country to Lviv, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said.

Meanwhile, British PM Boris Johnson said there is "pretty clear" evidence that Russia is planning an invasion of Ukraine, with some reports saying US intelligence believes military action could begin as early as this Wednesday.

Countries globally are now providing aid to Ukraine.

Canada will provide Ukraine with a $500 million loan and $7.8 million worth of lethal weapons, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said.

He said the loan is in addition to the previously announced $120 million loan and non-lethal weapons that Canada has already provided to Ukraine.

Ukraine has already received weapons from the United States, Great Britain, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, the Netherlands, and Poland.

  • The State Duma of Russia voted for the immediate sending of an appeal to Russian President Vladimir Putin on the recognition of eastern Ukraine's Lugansk and Donetsk regions as independent.

The corresponding decision was made by voting. State Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin earlier said that "Washington is escalating tensions, supplying weapons to Ukraine together with European countries, Kyiv doesn't comply with the Minsk agreements." "All this poses threats and risks to the lives of our citizens and compatriots living in the Donetsk and Lugansk People's Republics," Volodin added.

The respective article, which is by no means the first in terms of various attacks on the UN recently, describes the "misdeeds" of the Armenian employees of this organization.

Of course, one could ignore this article with blunt expressions against a high-ranking UN representative, considering it the opinion of solely one media outlet. But being close to the Aliyev administration already directly indicates that the idea of discrediting Ekaterina Paniklova comes from there.

"Arayik Harutyunyan, the leader of the so-called 'Nagorno-Karabakh,' will be arrested and interrogated in the near future," said Nemat Avazov, head of the investigation department of the Prosecutor General's Office of Azerbaijan, the Azerbaijani media reported.

Harutyunyan is reportedly accused of "four terrorist acts committed in October 2020 against civilians in Ganja."

The matter is about the military operations which were provoked in the fall of 2020—and due to the military aggression of Azerbaijan and Turkey against Artsakh and Armenia.

  • The parliamentary forces of Artsakh propose to give legal status to the territories occupied in Nagorno-Karabakh following the military aggression carried out by Azerbaijan in September 2020.

The law stipulates that the occupied territories are an integral part of the Artsakh Republic, to which the legislation of Artsakh applies.

The authors suggest allowing foreigners to enter, leave and move in the occupied territories of Artsakh only in accordance with the legislation of the Artsakh Republic, violators of this requirement will be held accountable, and the order and responsibility will be established after the adoption of the law.

From 2010 to 2021, Azerbaijani citizens have carried out six transactions of state registration of real estate rights in Armenia, the Cadastre Committee of Armenia told Armenia Sputnik. 

According to them, these persons are Azerbaijani citizens, and not necessarily Azerbaijani by nationality.

The Cadastre Committee added that from 2010 to 2021, Turkish citizens acquired 71 real estates in Armenia. 

The UNESCO press office referred to the alarms about the cases of continuous desecration, mutilation, and destruction of the Armenian historical and cultural heritage in the territories under the control of the Azerbaijani armed forces

The United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization hopes that a fact-finding mission will be launched in the near future.

Azerbaijani Culture Minister Anar Kerimov has announced that a working group of historians and architects had been formed in Azerbaijan to remove 'false traces' left by Armenians.

The Artsakh Republic MFA strongly condemned the decision of Azerbaijan to establish a special commission.

The Armenian MFA, in turn, noted that the statement of the Minister of Culture of Azerbaijan is an open challenge to the decision of the Hague Tribunal.

President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov’s statement that the country should be directed by younger people appeared to suggest that his son Serdar would succeed him;

And on Monday, Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedow's son has been nominated as a presidential candidate in Turkmenistan.

The snap presidential election in Turkmenistan will be held on March 12, 2022.

The region of 53 countries, which stretches from the former Soviet republics to Central Asia, now has more than 165 million confirmed coronavirus cases and 1.8 million pandemic-related deaths, said WHO Regional Director for Europe Hans Kluge.

Over the past two weeks, cases of COVID-19 have more than doubled in six countries in this part of the region - Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Russia, and Ukraine, Kluge noted.

Meanwhile, the World Health Organization (WHO) still cannot give a final date for the Russian Sputnik V vaccine to be included in the Emergency Use Listing (EUL).

According to them, the vaccine registration process is the same for everyone and goes along the road map.

There are a total of 408,381 COVID-19 cases in Armenia, with a death toll of 8,201.

Now he intends to achieve a "symbiosis" between the human brain and artificial intelligence.

Neuralink is Musk's neural interface technology company. The company is building a device that could be embedded in a person's brain, where it could both record brain activity and potentially stimulate it.

  • Beijing 2022 Olympics are in full swing now!

Over 300 medals will be awarded to Olympians participating in the 2022 Winter Games. With 15 sports and 109 events, ranging from skiing to bobsledding to figure skating, world-class athletes will go for gold during a two-week global competition on the grandest stage.

And Norway tops the medal standings with 17 medals, leaving behind Germany, Austria, ROC, and Canada.

The U.S. is in sixth with five golds, five silver medals, and one bronze.