DEMOCRATS WILL SET HARDER STIPULATIONS

Lragir, Armenia
Nov 16 2006

The Hay Dat Committee of America backed 198 congressional candidates,
and the majority are Democrats. 93 percent of these candidates
were elected to the House and the Senate. The Hay Dat Committee of
America expects that the Democrats they backed will live up to the
expectations of the Armenian lobby connected with the international
recognition of the genocide.

It is not clear, however, why this time the Democrats should justify
the expectations of the Armenian lobby, if formerly they were majority
in the Congress and the White House but the hopes of the Armenians
of America did not come true. Why are the Armenians of the United
States and namely the Hay Dat Committee hopeful that this time the
Democrats will not disappoint them? On November 16 the news reporters
asked this question to Kiro Manoyan in charge of Hay Dat and political
issues ARF Bureau, hosted at the National Press Club.

He thinks the situation today is different.

"It is different because the elections are new, and all this time
the Democrats or an important part of the Democrats made promises,
and acted besides making promises. Second, a parliamentary election
will be held in two years, and both political parties will hardly want
a politically organized community like the Armenian community to work
against them because it is clear that the community has considerable
political possibilities and strength, and despite controversies
over certain issues they agree on the issue of the genocide," says
Kiro Manoyan.

For the change or reconsideration of the Armenian and American
relations after the victory of the Democrats, Kiro Manoyan says the
main issue is the U.S. attitude towards Iran and the Russian-American
relation.

"There is already an opinion that there is attitude, which is not final
and formal, which will undergo certain changes, Iran may become engaged
in building peace, stability and security in Iran, which will mean
that Iran and the United States agree on this question, the stance
of Iran on the United States, not suddenly, but will become milder,"
says Kiro Manoyan. According to him, this change will affect our
region because tensions between these two are against the Armenian
interest. Kiro Manoyan says it is possible to expect changes in terms
of the Russian-Armenian relations.

"Although the Russian-Armenian relations may be tenser because the
Democrats may have a harder stance on Russia," says Kiro Manoyan.

With regard to the U.S.-Armenian relation Kiro Manoyan says that the
Congress will keep the U.S. assistance to Armenia on the same level.

But Kiro Manoyan thinks that the Democrats will be harder in terms
of the stipulations for this assistance: civil rights, democracy. The
representative of the ARF Dashnaktsutyun thinks that in reality this
favors Armenia, because Armenia needs this for progress rather than
for meeting the demands of the great powers.