User:John Vandenberg/AA involvement

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This page contains further detail on my involvement in Azerbaijan-Armenia related topics. I had believed these to be addressed in my questions, and I had pledged to recuse utterly from all Azeri-Armenian topics due to that involvement.

Despite this commitment, concerns have been raised and there is evidence of a campaign centered on this issue. I would ask that users maintain the decorum of the election. Hopefully the following will be of use in assessing it.

In order to assist with my recollection, I am building an complete list of related edits at User:Jayvdb/Middle East-Caucasus edit history - the scope there is wider in order to assist see why I ended up in the topical area of AA.

Azeri interaction[edit]

Offwiki[edit]

As disclosed a year ago, I have been in dialog with various Azeri editors in this dispute since around April 2007, notably User:Grandmaster and User:AdilBaguirov. This was for a long time almost exclusively regarding sources and Wikisource, the other main Wikimedia project I am involved in, however I now classify my dialog with User:Grandmaster as a friendship, since over that time we have discussed wider topics and personal family lives.

I have always answered questions asked about this accurately. Here are two examples of answers I have given:

02:26, 29 December 2007
16:20, 6 January 2008

Most editors have one or two topics they become close to. I have recognized that this is one such for me, and have fully disclosed and pledged to formally recuse on all matters related to it.

Topical edits[edit]

New articles[edit]

I have created many new articles, and a reasonable percent are related to topics in this region, and of those, a few are Azeri because I have spent more time working on Azeri topics. A voter has suggested that this list indicates I might have a conflict of interest.

I take that as a compliment. No other editor assisted me at all in the creation of any of those. They are mostly topics to do with educational institutions, which is my topic of interest. I have never had any association with any of those education institutions. Each of these is related to wiki editing I was doing at the time; my contribution history clearly shows what I was doing, however my Wikipedia contributions also often revolve around my Wikisource contributions.

fwiw, I also created Postage stamps and postal history of Azerbaijan and let it be deleted due to time constraints. If I was employed to write about these topics, my employer would have been mighty mad I did not fight for that one, especially since I have a near perfect record of retaining any article that I vote "keep" on.

Deletion discussion[edit]

AFD is an area where I have spent a lot of my time, especially prior to being an admin. One AFD that has been used as an example of bais is Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Caucasian Albanians.

User:Hajji Piruz created this article, and like many other articles to do with regions, it was moved back and forth without no consensus. Admin User:El C eventually protected it. I had been involved in the discussion before hand at Talk:Caucasian_Albanians, with User:Pejman47 eventually suggesting an AFD might be the solution. The AFD lasted 8 days, and only User:Hajji Piruz wanted to keep it as a separate article. There is still very little sourced information provided; not enough to warrant a separate article.

Khachkar destruction[edit]

Aivazovsky (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Khachkar destruction
Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Khachkar_destruction_(second_nomination)

IIRC, I came into contact with this due to AFD, which is an area I worked quite heavily at the time (see 5000 contrib list - need a better linky)

  1. 10:03, 15 March 2007 - AFD-Khachkar_destruction_(second_nomination) "Keep Afd is not for content disputes. The previous nomination was less than a month ago, and many people thought the article should be kept as informative."
  1. 21:40, 19 March 2007 - Khachkar destruction - Undid revision 116338609 by Aivazovsky (talk) : the Afd is ongoing
  2. 21:41, 19 March 2007 - Julfa,_Azerbaijan_(city)
  3. 21:43, 19 March 2007 - Talk:Julfa, Azerbaijan (city)
  4. 05:21, 20 March 2007 - Julfa, Azerbaijan (city)
  5. 05:55, 20 March 2007 - Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard - explanation for why I reverted the redirect
  6. 22:54, 24 March 2007 - User_talk:Jayvdb/Archive_1#Khachkar_destruction
  7. 01:27, 13 April 2007 - my first comment on Talk:Khachkar/Endangered_khachkars_Archive
  8. 12:46, 15 April 2007 - Julfa,_Azerbaijan_(city)
  9. 12:49, 15 April 2007 - Julfa, Azerbaijan (city)
  10. 13:00, 15 April 2007 - Julfa, Azerbaijan (city)
  11. 13:30, 16 April 2007 - Julfa,_Azerbaijan_(city)

Mammed_Amin_Rasulzade[edit]

Azerbaijani (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
AdilBaguirov (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
  1. 13:42, 25 March 2007 Jayvdb - m (Reverted 1 edit by User:Azerbaijani to last revision by CeeGee. using TW) [1]
  2. 13:48, 25 March 2007 Azerbaijani asks me to revert: User_talk:Jayvdb/Archive_1#Rasulzade
  3. 13:56, 25 March 2007 - I post to talk page[2] : "I've been asked to revert my revert; feedback requested"
  4. ...

Andranikpasha[edit]

Andranikpasha (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
Summary
I requested steward review via checkuser in a December 2007 case. There were concerns related to crosswiki harassment which appeared to be retaliation against multiple users, for admin actions against this person. Although a month prior (November 2007) the seriousness of harassment and multiple targets meant that there was a possibility of ongoing problems elsewhere. There was also a significant language barrier which meant there might have been issues I was not aware of, and the user had already been previously banned. I posted the formal request at Meta. A checkuser on a different project, also known to Lar, helped confirmed part of the data. The English Wikipedia community concluded by placing the user under the existing Azeri-Armenian editing restrictions. A part of this case was handled privately with the guidance of Lar as steward, due to the serious harassment/retaliation issues documented.
User:Lar has himself commented on it recently.

Andranikpasha vs Grandmaster[edit]

Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Arbitration_enforcement/Archive8
#User:Andranikpasha
#User:Grandmaster
#User:Andranikpasha_2

I was informed offwiki on September 12 2007 that Grandmaster and Andranikpasha had reported each other to WP:AE.

The reporting admin was User:Orderinchaos who I have known in the real world for many years; this was disclosed during my RFA and repeated whenever appropriate. Orderinchaos is uninvolved in the area, knew I had an interest in Azerbaijan-Armenian topics, and thought (in a "mentoring" way) that I would find it useful to be aware of an AA matter at Arbitration Enforcement. This was during my own RFA (+sysop September 13 2007). I took no part in those actual discussion, as they were way over my head at the time. (So far as I can see, the only time I hit a noticeboard prior to this was in pursuit of more librarian work to do)

I had not had much interaction with Andranikpasha onwiki (I have yet to confirm how much; probably none), so I started to take an interest. English was obviously not his first language, and a search for accounts on other projects called "Andranikpasha" site:wikipedia.org quickly drew me to his Russian userpage of the same name ru:User:Andranikpasha and the June checkuser where he was banned a day after account creation for sock-puppetry. This was my first encounter with User:Andranikpasha, and because of it I was vaguely aware of his ban and checkuser record in December.

Page move of Armenian-Tartar massacres 1905-1907[edit]

On 6th of December, Andranikpasha did a copy/paste move instead of using the move button. I fixed the problem quickly to prevent the edit history ending up messy, and left a note at User_talk:Andranikpasha#Armenian-Tartar_massacres_1905-1907 telling the user to use the move button if they want to rename a page, but also mentioned that the move button shouldnt be used unless there is "100% consensus", as renames of these AA pages is always a very touchy subject. The talk page looked like this at that time.

It was clear that the principle person who was opposing it was Folantin who had moved it from Armenian-Tartar to Armenian-Azeri back in October, had no idea of the AA battles, and was actively discussing the new name with Andranikpasha. Grandmaster had posted the most recent comment, also opposing the rename. There was clearly no consensus for rename.

After fixing the copy/paste on the article, I then did some analysis on the name "Armenian-Tatar War" (a capital "W" was being used to indicate it was a proper name - the sources didnt appear to support that part of the intro). In fact as I noted on the talk page, this was an error: De Waal actually used "war". See here where Andranikpasha attributes "War" to De Waal. Following talk page discussion, I rewrote the intro to remove the unattributed proper name but not making any other significant changes.

Meta CU request[edit]

Initial CU request: 20 December 2007 07:19
Final version of my CU request: 21 December 2007 10:18
Last comment by Lar: 7 January 2008 22:13
Closure: 14 February 2008 09:22

Unrelated to "Andranikpasha", Grandmaster and I chat for 2 1/2 hours on the 15th of December tossing back and forth a few IP ranges that seem related to the attacks on admins. I was convinced there is something nasty going on with these IPs, so I started doing some analysis, and looking for more attacks on the same people.

On the 17th, Grandmaster mentions the Russian CU of "Andranikpasha", and my ears prick up of course. I did further and on the 18th I email Lar with a truckload of evidence that is concerning me, but this is my first CU request and it affected many Wikisource and Wikipedia projects, so I was asking for advice - the same day he told me that those types of requests go on meta. I do some more digging, and on the 20th I raise the request, and continue to build it for an additional day - my edit history over on meta is "live", recording each additional piece of information that was a reasonable suspicion. This was all collated by myself. Also on the 20th, I let Grandmaster know about the meta request and the rest of a short conversation is about Christmas. All hell breaks loose some time around here, Grandmaster and I quickly say hi offline, but we are both too busy with family and friends to do much more than a few edits. At no time does Grandmaster give me any assistance other than the two times when we were tossing around a few possibilities on the 15th and 17th. I stitched it all together - it is my name on the request.

Investigation details[edit]

The data in the meta CU request was compiled by looking at all articles created/edited by the IP ranges, and all the named accounts. There was significant overlap in topics, and in the users that were being attacked. The attacks were usually in regards to administrative interaction on the same topics.

English Wikipedia[edit]

  1. User:Andranikpasha account created 26 August 2007
  2. User:Moreschi blocked Andranikpasha 11 September 2007 indefinite ‎: Disruption only: single-purpose account engaging in disruptive editing followed by time-wasting
  3. User:El C unblocked Andranikpasha 17 September 2007 with consent of blocking admin consulted, subject to mentorship (now in effect)), mentorship by User:VartanM
  4. The meta Checkuser details are brought onto English Wikipedia due to an AE section about Andranikpasha. Resolved AE regarding Andranikpasha (history)
  5. User:Moreschi blocked Andranikpasha 9 January 2008 for 24 hours for undiscussed revert at Thomas de Waal. This was also dealt with at AE - Resolved AE regarding Andranikpasha

Fedayee[edit]

Fedayee (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
Summary
User:Fedayee was accusing User:Ehud Lesar of being a sock of a banned user, and had been doing so for a long time without evidence. Fedayee was asked to produce evidence at AE, and the user did compile some, however no admin at this time could see the link between the two accounts. I promised to look into it more closely and was very clear that it would take a few weeks and that in the meantime the accusations should be put on hold. Instead, the user continued to post this accusation at AE, so I blocked the user for 24 hours.


  1. 22 December 2007, TigranTheGreat initiates an AE section against User:Ehud Lesar (need better diff: [3]
  2. 23 December 2007, I comment "Ehud Lesar was baited here, and consequently sunk his teeth in a little. Please stop baiting him; if you believe Ehud Lesar is a banned user, compile your evidence and submit it to be investigated further. Don't make accusations about sock puppetry until it has been proven otherwise you have unclean hands."
  3. Moreschi "Agreed. Correct accusations of abusive sockpuppetry are normally fairly easy to prove. I suggest collecting evidence at either Wikipedia:Suspected sockpuppets or Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser. Until then, please follow John V's advice."
  4. Fedayee creates User:Fedayee/LesarBaguirov_Evidence as his collection of evidence that Ehud is Adil. He announces it at AE at 02:48, 24 December 2007, and on my talk page at 03:04, 24 December 2007 User_talk:Jayvdb/Archive_3#Evidence on Adil's sockpuppetry. I agreed to investigate it and advised him that until he hears from me, he should assume that Ehud is not Adil. Before Christmas Day, we started working on this together[4]
  5. [5] Fedayee answers my query about the evidence
  6. 25 December 2007: Picaroon tells Fedayee that besides the assertions that only can be proven about Adil, "I want more evidence of behavioral similarity than just making similar reverts. The Geycha and Zangezur stuff does not make sense to me"
  7. 05:02, 26 December 2007 - Ehud promises whatever assistance is needed to clear him of this. He credibly says he doesnt know how this Adil even is.
  8. 26 December 2007, Fedayee makes the accusation again
  9. Jayvdb blocked Fedayee on 27 December 2007 for 24 hours ‎for attempting to harass other users: accussing Ehud of being Adil; in spite of having been told not to on AN/AE and also a condition of my own choice to investigate this matter
  10. 06:06, 27 December 2007 - User_talk:Fedayee/Archive_2#Ehud - block notice
  11. 06:10, 27 December 2007 I notify AE. [6]
  12. Discussion/Abuse breaks out at User_talk:Fedayee/Archive_2#Ehud and User_talk:Jayvdb/Archive_3#Fedayee
  13. 07:42, 27 December 2007 TigranTheGreat attacks me at AE and threatening desysop [7], [8][9][10]
  14. 11:37, 27 December 2007 - I then ask for review at Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Archive118#Block on Fedayee; please review - consensus is that the block is fine in the circumstances.
  15. 17:21, 27 December 2007 - Eupator pings me about the evidence page.
  16. 17:32, 27 December 2007 - I respond on my talk "I have started looking into this."
  17. 17:54, 27 December 2007 - I also respond on the talk page of the evidence, repeating that I am looking at it

Nishkid64 and I spoke on IRC about this; IIRC this was mentioned when the Ehud Lesar block erupted on ANI.

Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia[edit]

Summary
User:White Cat wishes to use a non-neutral source, the Turkish Government, on the subject of ASALA. I strongly oppose and revive the article.
My archive: User talk:Jayvdb/Archive 3#Armenia-Azerbaijan thing
  1. 22:34, 10 November 2007 - VartanM removes a source[11]
  2. 03:14, 14 November 2007 - Denizz partially reverts[12]
  3. 12:36, 8 December 2007 - White Cat fully reverts[13]
  4. 17:54, 8 December 2007 - VartanM reverts[14]
  5. 00:03, 25 December 2007 - White Cat reverts[15]
  6. 23:16, 25 December 2007 - Andranikpasha reverts[16]
  7. 02:16, 26 December 2007 - Bjweeks reverts[17]
  8. 12:24, 26 December 2007 - Andranikpasha reverts[18]
  9. 23:34, 27 December 2007 - White Cat reverts[19]
  10. 23:49, 27 December 2007 - Andranikpasha reverts[20]
  11. 17:37, 29 December 2007 - White Cat reverts[21]
  12. (more edits by White Cat)
  13. 22:19, 29 December 2007 - Folantin edits[22]
  14. 22:32, 29 December 2007 - VartanM reverts[23]
  15. 22:45, 29 December 2007 - Moreschi reverts[24]
  16. 02:37, 30 December 2007 - White Cat reverts[25]
  17. 03:04, 30 December 2007 - White Cat does someting[26]
  18. 21:09, 30 December 2007 - Andranikpasha reverts[27]
  19. 14:22, 26 December 2007 - White Cat asks Penwhale for help[28]
  20. 14:27, 26 December 2007 - White Cat tweaks his last post [29]
  21. 14:28, 26 December 2007 - White Cat tells Penwhale that user:Andranikpasha could be a sockpuppet [30]
  22. 21:36, 26 December 2007 - Penwhale defers to Picaroon [31]
  23. 22:55, 28 December 2007 - [32] User:White Cat leaves me a new note section "Armenia-Azerbaijan thing", letting me know about two AE sections, both on Archive 11
    List of attacks by the Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia
    Turkics in Armenia <-> Azerbaijanis in Armenia
  24. 00:36, 29 December 2007 - [33] - follow up comment
  25. 02:19, 29 December 2007 - VartanM starts a section about White Cat on my talk [34]
    Wikipedia:Images_and_media_for_deletion/2007_December_28#Image:Tsitser_flame.JPG
  26. 02:56, 29 December 2007 - I go and vote "Strong keep" of course [35]
  27. 20:29, 29 December 2007 - White Cat lets us about copyright[36]
  28. 20:40, 29 December 2007 - VartanM replies to White Cat. [37]
  29. 21:25, 29 December 2007 - White Cat lets us more about copyright[38]
  30. 22:41, 29 December 2007 - White Cat makes his section a level two section [39]
  31. 22:46, 29 December 2007 - VantanM reverts[40]
  32. 00:26, 30 December 2007 - VartanM points me over to Penwhale [41]
  33. 01:29, 30 December 2007 - I post to White Cat's user talk[42] a new section archived at "User talk:White_Cat/Archive/2007/12#Andranikpasha_and_ASALA"
    This is counter-productive; I did block Fedayee for repeating accusations of sockpuppetry. It is quite likely that there is offwiki canvassing going on here, but the article is on the noticeboards, so it will sort itself out in due course. John Vandenberg (talk) 01:29, 30 December 2007 (UTC)
  34. 01:33, 30 December 2007 - I reply to VartanM at "I've reminded White Cat that accusations are counter-productive"[43] (User talk:Jayvdb/Archive 3#Fedayee)
  35. 01:39, 30 December 2007 - VartanM tells me to save my emails as they may be required for evidence[44]
  36. 02:12, 30 December 2007 - another new section, this time "Andranikpasha and ASALA", with White Cat saying "I dealt with sockpuppets from the Armenia-Azerbaijan nonsense for quite sometime.." [45]
  37. 02:21, 30 December 2007 - VartanM calling White Cat on his "POV pushing" [46]
  38. 17:41, 4 January 2008 - RFAR Initiated by White Cat RFAR - declined
  39. 23:50, 4 January 2008 - I reply to White Cat comment e/s "way too bold" Talk:List of attacks by the Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia#Founding date
    As Folantin said in the edit summary of 08:19, 30 December 2007, 20 January was the date of the first attack. Logically, the ASALA would almost certainly have to have been founded before then. ... so that fact had already been refuted, and using kultur.gov.tr as the source was already advised against. What sources do you have besides the Turkish Government? I'm about to make a few changes to the article; I'll comment again once done. John Vandenberg (talk) 23:50, 4 January 2008 (UTC)
  40. 00:03, 5 January 2008 - remove disputed founding date[47]
  41. 00:09, 5 January 2008 - fix cite broken due to hidden text[48]
  42. 00:14, 5 January 2008 - move the tkb.org source that lists attacks to an external link; go back to using "{{reflist}}"[49]
  43. 00:25, 5 January 2008 - move source "Tr MoC" to external links; it is not a scholarly source, and it was being used to cite facts that are not stated in that webpage[50]
  44. 00:57, 5 January 2008 - remove MIPT list link as a source - it's a list that doesnt attest to be complete so it cant be used as a source for definitive numbers[51]
  45. 01:06, 5 January 2008 - remove "English" and shorten MIPT in every reference[52]
  46. 06:18, 5 January 2008 - My Statement
    I agree with Thatcher and VartanM that the existing remedies could use tweaking to help prevent people who insist on being difficult while being (barely) civil, but the issue of sources on ASALA is being blown out of proportion by White Cat, who is the only one wanting to include a Turkish government source on the article. On close inspection, that Turkish government webpage was being used as a source for attacks that are not even mentioned on the webpage, and for attacks that the website doesnt attribute to ASALA. If there is a case here, it is that White Cat was edit warring and is now looking to spark off a third round of an unrelated dispute because prior attempts at gaining wider support, on user talk pages, AN/AE and AN/I, didnt have the desired result. John Vandenberg (talk) 06:18, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
  47. 01:12, 5 January 2008 - After a lot of improvement to the article I comment[53]
    Ok, I am done for the moment. Note that there are now a few [citation needed] tags now on the article where previously "Tr MoC" was being used as a source -- the "Tr MoC" page does not say those attacks were performed by ASALA. The worst example is the 12 March 1981 attack which is not even mentioned on the Turkish Government website. John Vandenberg (talk) 01:12, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
    And User:Folantin says:
    Good work, John. It's been a real struggle to keep this one on the straight and narrow. At least we don't have the ASALA committing attacks in 1968 (!) any more. This is a dry, factual list which has little to do with "points of view". Accuracy is what counts. This is an encyclopaedia, after all. --Folantin (talk) 09:03, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Ehud Lesar[edit]

Ehud Lesar (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
Ehud Lesar arbitration case (t) (ev / t) (w / t) (pd / t)
Summary
Only two administrators (User:Nishkid64 and User:Khoikhoi) acted on the evidence collated at LesarBaguirov evidence as credible to support a block, and many users opposed. A subsequent RFAR case overturned their repeated blocks of this user, but found no misconduct.


  1. Khoikhoi blocks Ehud Lesar after being inactive for a long time.
  2. I think Grandmaster took this to ANI, and there was much discussion
  3. Jennavecia unblocks
  4. Nishkid64 reblocks
  5. Newyorkbrad unblocks "to allow participation in arbitration case; please edit only arbitration-related pages until the case is resolved"
    Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_arbitration/Ehud_Lesar/Proposed_decision#User_misconduct_in_raising_concerns - I post that I also thought there was misconduct
  6. RFAR finds that there was insufficient reason for a block.
  7. FayssalF adjusts the block log to say "the Arbitration Committee found insufficient evidence of sockpuppetry to sustain the block"
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