ARMENIAN YEZIDIS WANT TV CHANNEL IN THEIR LANGUAGE
Arminfo
14 Mar 07
Yerevan, 14 March: Representatives of Armenia’s Yezidi community are
currently working towards opening a special TV channel in Armenia to
broadcast in the Yezidi language, Aziz Tamoyan, head of the National
Union of Armenian Yezidis, has told Arminfo.
Tamoyan said the Yezidi community, numbering 40,620 people, is grateful
to the Armenian president’s aide on ethnic issues, Sergo Yeritsyan,
for his support in solving problems the community faces. In some of
the schools in Kotayk, Armavir and Aragatsotn regions, the Yezidi
language is taught in junior forms. A textbook of the Yezidi language
for the first to third grades has been published. A newspaper called
Yezidikhana with a circulation of 500 copies is published in Armenia
five times a year. A programme on Armenian National Radio in the
Yezidi language is broadcast daily from 0800 to 0830 [0400-0430 gmt],
Tamoyan said.
He also said that apart from a special TV channel, the community
insists on the publication of textbooks in the Yezidi language
for the fourth to tenth forms. Another task is to get the genocide
of the Yezidi people in Ottoman Turkey in 1915-18 internationally
recognized. Over 500,000 Yezidis were killed at the time.
"We have no territorial claims, but we demand decent compensation
for the damage inflicted on our people," Tamoyan said.