CROSS TURKEY WITH 44 WOLVES

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14:12:57 – 07/10/2009

As the debate over the closed border between Turkey and Armenia
intensifies with the recent talk of normalizing relations, an
Italian-Armenian also waits for a green light from the Turkish
authorities to enter Turkey.

Ararad Khatchikan is not interested in visiting his distant kinsmen in
any Turkish village, nor in making small-scale trade agreements with
Turkish vendors. Instead, his sole aim is to carry a peace message
to the peoples on both sides of the Turkish-Armenian border with 44
Siberian wolves that he has trained for sleigh races.

Each wolf will carry a white flag as a symbol of peace, the Armenian
peace activist told the Hurriyet Daily News & Economic Review for
the third Postcard from Armenia.

Khatchikan said his biggest dream is to reach the outskirts of
Mt. Aðrý, or Ararad in Armenian, after getting a visa from Turkey.

Khatchikan said he had made the first official application for his
peace project through the Turkish Embassy in Rome in 2007, but then
decided to delay it. "[Armenian daily] Agos Editor-in-Chief Hrant Dink
fell victim to an assassination in Istanbul while my negations were
ongoing with the Turkish authorities. I got confused, so I shelved it."