news.am, Armenia
Feb 20 2010
Yerevan cools Baku’s passions, rekindles Ankara’s: weekly review
11:22 / 02/20/2010
Domestic policy
The 2nd anniversary of the tragic events in Yerevan on March 1 is
drawing nearer. According to the official information, the dispersal
of the Opposition rally protesting against violations in the
presidential election claimed ten lives. The Yerevan Municipality has
accepted the Armenian National Congress’ (ANC) application for
permission to hold a republican rally and procession in the center of
Yerevan, where the tragic events occurred two years ago. The
Opposition has stated that the ANC leader Levon Ter-Petrosyan will
make a policy speech, which will deal with both further actions in the
domestic political arena, Armenian-Turkish reconciliation and
Nagorno-Karabakh peace process.
The RA Prosecutor General’s Office rejected a claim lodged by the
relatives of the March 1 victims. The relatives of nine of the ten
victims put their signatures to the claim. The complainants appeal
against the Special Investigation Group, which did not register any
progress in identifying and punishing those responsible for the death
of people during the post-election processes in 2008. The RA
Prosecutor General’s Office rejected the claim for `lack of grounds.’
The Prosecution was not contented with the verdict returned by the
minor court of the Center and Nork Marash communities. The court
sentenced one of the prominent opposition representatives,
Editor-in-Chief of the Haykakan Zhamanak newspaper Nikol Pashinyan to
7 years’ imprisonment for organizing riots on March 1, 2008. The
Prosecution applied to the RA Criminal Court of Appeal for a verdict
of guilty on a charge of violence against a public agent. The court
had returned a verdict of not guilty, but the Prosecution demands that
the verdict be set aside.
The confrontation between the Sukiasyan family and Armenian
law-enforcers does not seem to be over. The law-enforcers have decided
to `deal with’ Saribek Sukiasyan, Chairman of the Armeconombank Board
of Directors. After being kept in the police department for almost
three days, he was released on his own recognizance.
Late this week, a charge was brought against him. Without going into
details, we would like to note that, even if Saribek Sukiasyan did
commit the crime he is charged with, law-enforcers’ actions gave the
Opposition grounds to claim the charges have been trumped up and the
businessman is being subjected to political persecutions. The
Opposition has serious grounds for the claims, as the prosperous
Sukiasyan family encountered problems after the former MP, oligarch
Khachatur Sukiasyan openly supported the Opposition leader Levon
Ter-Petrosyan in the 2008 presidential election. After the March 1
tragic events he `was underground’ for a year and a half. Later, he
transferred most of his businesses to Germany, left Armenia and
actually terminated his political activities. In this context, we can
suppose that the authorities are now trying to oust Saribek Sukiasyan
and his business from Armenia. On the other hand, we cannot deny his
illegal actions as well.
This week, the Yerkparah union of volunteers has finally joined the
government camp. The union’s belated congress once more showed that
Yerkrtapah is actually `a throwback’ in Armenia’s life, which is in
the worst traditions of political culture: besides regular butchering
of the literary Armenian language, the notorious General Manvel
Grigoryan , who was unanimously re-elected Yerkrapah Chairman,
recently went beyond all bounds and rounded on the journalists with a
torrent of abusive language. In any case, the expulsion of supporters
of the Opposition from the Yerkrapah leadership closed the period when
the largest union of Karabakh war veterans was rumored to support the
opponents of the Armenian authorities. General Grigoryan must have
finally made up his mind and made a switch to the government camp.
Chairman of the Republic Party, one of the ANC leaders Aram Sargsyan,
made a surprisingly conciliatory speech at the Yerkrapah congress.
Against all expectations of his supporters, he did not even name the
active participants in the Karabakh war arrested after the
post-election processes in 2008 and imprisoned since.
Nagorno-Karabakh peace process and region
Official Baku’s policy of refusing to make reciprocal concessions on
the Nagorno-Karabakh peace process makes the Armenian authorities lay
much heavier emphasis on the aspects that have always been center of
attention.
RA Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian, who commented on his
Azerbaijani counterpart’s latest statements on an urgent need for
eliminating the consequences of the conflict, pointed out a number of
aspects Yerevan had not by that time placed emphasis on. `As regards
the elimination of the consequences, we have to consider the necessity
for resolving the problems of Martakert, Martuni and Shahumyan, the
regions occupied by Azerbaijanis, as well as the problem of refugees’
return to the regions. And, of course, the problem of consequences has
to be resolved along with that of causes of the conflict. All the
problems must be resolved by means of negotiations and mutual
agreements,’ Minister Nalbandian said. Thus Minister Nalbandian
finally pointed out to Azerbaijan the facts of its occupation of part
of the former Nagorno-Karabakh autonomous region, ethnic cleansing in
the Shahumyan region of Azerbaijan. Let us hope that the Armenian
authorities will continue pointing out the problems official Yerevan
has so far been silent over. Otherwise, Ilham Aliyev and his clique
would constantly be crying about Azerbaijani refugees that `must
return to their places of residence,’ without even mentioning the
200,000 Armenians that fled from `glorious and multinational Baku.’
The Armenian FM once again stated that no agreement is possible to
reach without Nagorno-Karabakh’s immediate participation in the
negotiations. Nalbandian stated that Azerbaijan’s objecting to
Nagorno-Karabakh’s participation in the negotiations is an impediment
to the peace process. `Of importance is not who sees and how he sees,
but who is to decide. It is the Nagorno-Karabakh people that have to
make a decision. This principle is incorporated in certain points of
the Madrid documents, which were published in l’Aquila immediately
after the Russia, U.S. and French Presidents made their statement. If
Azerbaijan objects to this fundamental approach, it is actually
impeding the settlement process,’ the Minister said.
As regards Elmar Mammadyarov’s statements in response to his Armenian
counterpart, one gets a mixed impression of them. Their content is,
however, clear. Referring to official Baku’s consent to what is known
as revised Madrid Principles, the Azeri FM once more tried to thwart
the Nagorno-Karabakh peace process by setting inherently unacceptable
conditions to the Armenian side. Mammadyarov stressed that official
Baku agrees to the highest-level autonomy for Nagorno-Karabakh as part
of Azerbaijan, with `co-existence of the Armenian and Azerbaijani
communities.’ The statement was actually a response to RA President
Serzh Sargsyan’s speech in London. The Armenian leader flatly ruled
out the possibility of Nagorno-Karabakh being part of Azerbaijan. He
underlined the fact that Azerbaijan had repeatedly proved unable to
guarantee the Armenian population’s security.
The following question remains: if the negotiators hold antipodal
positions, what are they negotiating and what is the point of
negotiations?
The international community is still making efforts aimed at a
peaceful settlement of the conflict. A visit paid to the region by
OSCE Chairman-in-Office, Kazakh Foreign Minister Kanat Saudabayev
proved to be a significant event. His visits to Armenia and Azerbaijan
produced tangible results at a joint sitting of the OSCE Parliamentary
Assembly Committees in Vienna, where the Kazakh FM delivered a speech.
Saudabayev laid his cards on the table in Austria. As OSCE
Chairman-in-Office he plans to elaborate a `roadmap’ aimed at a
peaceful settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. So we can
witness most interesting developments in the Nagorno-Karabakh peace
process soon.
This week has seen some changes in the process of ratification of the
Armenian-Turkish protocols by the Armenian Parliament. As the
Parliamentary Standing Committee for Foreign Relations started
preliminary discussions of the documents, the ruling Republican Party
of Armenia (RPA) has shown a serious change in its position. Despite
earlier unequivocal statements that the Armenian Parliament would
ratify the document only after the Turkish Grand National Assembly did
it, RPA representatives began voicing a different opinion. Some of
them are for ratifying the documents before Turkey does to show the
world Armenia’s willingness to normalize its relations with Turkey.
The following two reasons might account for the change in the ruling
party’s position: the Armenian authorities’ decided to lay the blame
for a possible failure of the Armenian-Turkish process on Ankara
thereby showing the world its willingness to normalize relations
without any preconditions, or they are probing into public opinion.
The two principal political forces objecting to the Armenian-Turkish
protocols, Armenian Revolutionary Federation (Dashnaktsutyun) (ARFD)
and Heritage Party, are continuing their desperate efforts to prevent
the Parliament from ratifying the documents. The ARFD still
desperately hopes to introduce reservations into the documents, while
the Heritage Party promised to hold a national rally of protest. As
regards the Heritage Party’s voters, they have never been `rally
mongers.’
Economy and social life
This week the RA Statistical Service has published economic data for
this January. The situation is a little better as compared with last
January, but Armenia needs much time to overcome the crisis.
A 2.4% increase in GDP was registered in Armenia this January as
compared with last January. Also, industrial output increased by 6.5%,
electric energy output by 3.7%, gross agricultural output by 3.1%. It
should be noted, however, that the growth was registered as compared
with last January, when the crisis reached its peak in Armenia. On the
other hand, the construction sector registered a 10.7% decrease.
We get quite a different picture if we compare this January with
January 2008. Specifically, the GDP decreased by 60.5%, industrial
output by 29%, electric energy output by 3.2%, gross agricultural
output by 64.4%, and construction by 83.2%. One of the reasons for
this decrease is that the economy is normally `frozen’ is January, but
the Government is supposed to be concerned over this in any case.
This January, Armenia’s exports increased by 1.8% whereas imports
decreased by 4.4%. On the other hand, this January exports increased
by 57.5%, and imports by 8.3% as compared with December 2009.
At its sitting the RA Government approved the order of appointing
taxpayers and tax officers at large economic entities. The Government
ordered the Head of the RA State Revenue Committee to submit a 2010
list of taxpayers that meet the relevant requirements to the
Government before March 1, 2010. As regards the oligarch-businessmen,
they are not at all enthusiastic about the prospective appointment of
tax officers at their economic entities.
Yerevan jewelry market traders have gone on strike. They held a number
of actions of protest in front of the RA Government. Their only demand
is the removal of cash registers. The protestors claim the cash
registers cause serious damage to their business. On January 24, RA
Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan, accompanied by a number of
high-ranking officials, visited the jewelry market owned by the
Vagharsh & Sons Ltd. in Khorenatsi St. to get acquainted with the
traders’ working conditions and problems. The Premier held a meeting
and ordered the problems to be resolved. The traders, however, say
that the situation has not changed since.
Armenia is far behind its neighbors with respect to Internet
availability. Internetworldstats reported that only 191,000 Internet
users are registered in Armenia ` 6.4% of the population. Eighteen per
cent of population are Internet users in Azerbaijan, and 22% in
Georgia. According to the source, over the last nine years, Internet
availability showed a 536.7% decrease in Armenia, 12,275.8% in
Azerbaijan and 5,020% in Georgia.
T.P.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress