Author: Boshkezenian Garik

SABAH: ARMENIA NOT TO RENOUNCE INTERNATIONAL GENOCIDE RECOGNITION PROCESS

/PanARMENIAN.Net/
25.01.2010 19:50 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ The problems in Armenian-Turkish normalization
process come to show that the year 2010 will mark a crisis in
U.S.-Turkish dialogue from the viewpoint of U.S. Congress’ position
on Armenian Genocide resolution , Turkish Sabah newspaper says in
an article.

The author of the publication disapproves official Ankara’s statement
on RA Constitutional Court’s recent decision over Armenia-Turkey
Protocols.

"It is very naive to think that Armenia will renounce the international
genocide recognition process without proposing Armenian Genocide
issue as a precondition. Yerevan is making certain steps towards
the ratification of Protocols while Ankara has taken an evasive
stance. Crisis in U.S.-Turkey relations prior to April 24 is
inevitable, hence Turkish Government should be prepared for
that. The Armenian lobby is looking forward to such moment while
Turkey contributes to that by its inaction. Armenians in United States
consider the current year a favorable period for passing a resolution,
given the European lobby’s negative attitude to Turkey. Not receiving
Ankara’s support over the issue, the U.S. President will find himself
in a very complicated situation," the newspaper writes.

The Protocols aimed at normalization of bilateral ties and opening of
the border between Armenia and Turkey were signed in Zurich by Armenian
Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian and his Turkish counterpart Ahmet
Davutoglu on October 10, 2009, after a series of diplomatic talks
held through Swiss mediation.

On January 12, 2010, the Constitutional Court of the Republic of
Armenia found the protocols conformable to the country’s Organic Law.

The Armenian Genocide (1915-23) was the deliberate and systematic
destruction of the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire during
and just after World War I. It was characterized by massacres, and
deportations involving forced marches under conditions designed to
lead to the death of the deportees, with the total number of deaths
reaching 1.5 million.

The date of the onset of the genocide is conventionally held to be
April 24, 1915, the day that Ottoman authorities arrested some 250
Armenian intellectuals and community leaders in Constantinople.

Thereafter, the Ottoman military uprooted Armenians from their homes
and forced them to march for hundreds of miles, depriving them of
food and water, to the desert of what is now Syria. Massacres were
indiscriminate of age or gender, with rape and other sexual abuse
commonplace. The Armenian Genocide is the second most-studied case
of genocide after the Holocaust.

The Republic of Turkey, the successor state of the Ottoman Empire,
denies the word genocide is an accurate description of the events. In
recent years, it has faced repeated calls to accept the events as
genocide.

To date, twenty countries and 44 U.S. states have officially recognized
the events of the period as genocide, and most genocide scholars
and historians accept this view. The Armenian Genocide has been also
recognized by influential media including The New York Times, BBC,
The Washington Post and The Associated Press.

The majority of Armenian Diaspora communities were formed by the
Genocide survivors.

The Armenian lobby of United States seeks to achieve the public
condemnation of Turkey for the 1915 Armenian Genocide. Launched in
1980, the organization’s persistent lobbying campaign took permanent
character. The principle lying behind such resolution receives White
House and U.S. State Department’s support almost every year, but is
never approved considering United States interests.

MOSCOW MAYOR YURI LUZHKOV TO PAY OFFICIAL VISIT TO YEREVAN JAN. 29

/PanARMENIAN.Net/
25.01.2010 18:01 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ By the invitation of Yerevan Mayor Gagik Beglaryan,
a delegation headed by Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov will pay a two-day
official visit to Armenia’s capital on January 29.

Meetings with Yerevan Mayor will focus on the implementation of the
2008-2011 Cooperation Program between Yerevan and Moscow, as well as
other issues of mutual interest.

Besides, an agreement on scientific, technical, trade-economic and
humanitarian cooperation will be signed between Armenian and Russian
Governments.

It is also planned to sign inter-community cooperation agreements in
spheres of culture, sports and charity.

Trend, Azerbaijan
Jan 20 2010

Parliamentary Commission chairman: Protocols Ankara-Yerevan will not
be discussed in Turkish Parliament

Turkey, Istanbul, Jan. 20 / Trend News G. Altinalan /

The protocols signed between Ankara and Yerevan, will not be discussed
in the Turkish Parliament, Turkey’s Grand National Assembly Commission
for Foreign Relations chairman Murad Marjan said.

"The Turkish parliament will not discuss the protocols signed between
Ankara and Yerevan till the Armenian forces are withdrawn from all
occupied territories of Azerbaijan," Marjan told Trend News.

Turkish and Armenian foreign ministers Ahmet Davutoglu and Edward
Nalbandian signed the Ankara-Yerevan protocols in Zurich Oct. 10.

Diplomatic relations between Armenia and Turkey were broken due to
Armenian claims of an alleged genocide and its occupation of
Azerbaijani lands. Their border closed in 1993.

Despite some people see no connection between the normalization of
relations between Turkey and Armenia and resolving the
Nagorno-Karabakh problem, this process is directly related to the
settlement of the conflict, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip
Erdogan said earlier in an interview after hid official visit to
Moscow.

Marjan said the relations between Turkey and Azerbaijan based on the
principles of friendship and brotherhood, have significance for
Ankara.

"The Turkish Grand National Assembly represents the Turkish nation. It
was always in solidarity with the people of Azerbaijan. So, it is
impossible to ratify these protocols in the Turkish parliament without
solving the Armenian-Azerbaijani problem," Marjan said.

United Press International UPI
Jan 22 2010

Medvedev to discuss Nagorno-Karabakh clash

MOSCOW, Jan. 22

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev will meet with the leaders of
Armenia and Azerbaijan to discuss the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, the
Kremlin says.

The Kremlin press service confirmed Thursday Medvedev will hold talks
with Azerbaijan President Ilkham Aliyev and Armenian President Serzh
Sargsyan about the lengthy conflict between the two Transcaucasian
republics, ITAR-Tass reported.

The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict began in 1988 when leaders in the
landlocked region attempted to secede from the Azerbaijan Soviet
Socialist Republic.

Those seeking Nagorno-Karabakh autonomy wanted instead to incorporate
with Armenia, triggering an armed conflict that lasted from 1991 to
1994.

Talks first began in 1993 with Russia, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan and
Armenia all taking part.

The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe Minsk Group
helped bring about a gradual settlement and Armenia and Azerbaijan
continued to communicate regarding the conflict.

The new meeting aimed at settling the conflict is to take place Monday
in Sochi, Russia, with representatives from Russia, Armenia and
Azerbaijan taking part, ITAR-Tass reported.

Church of Tigran Honetsi to be restored in Ani

Panorama.am
17:31 22/01/2010

Today a news conference was held related to Turkey’s Culture
Minister’s statement that cross would be put on top of St Cross of
Akhtamar Island. Samvel Karapetyan, the president of NGO studying
Armenian architecture and Raffi Qortulyan, the member of that NGO
hosted the conference.

Raffi Qortulyan said though those events coincided with Armenia’s
Constitutional Court’s, he didn’t like to link them with each other.
Armenian diplomat said it was pure Turkish answer rejecting to put the
cross, as they had announced that the old cross was lost and that it’s
useless to make a new one. Hence the fate of Armenian churches is
seriously alarming. It was said that another church – the church of
Tigran Honetsi is being restored in Ani.

NAGORNO-KARABAKH: RUSSIA TO HOST SUMMIT

EurAsiaNet
Jan 21 2010
NY

Presidents of Armenia, Azerbaijan and Russia will meet in the Russian
city of Sochi for talks on the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh enclave,
Armenia’s presidential press service announced January 21.

Envoys of the Minsk Group, the Organization for Security and
Cooperation in Europe’s mechanism for mediating Karabakh talks,
visited Armenia and Azerbaijan on January 20 and 21 respectively
to prepare the ground for the first meeting of the Armenian and
Azerbaijan leaders in 2010, the APA news agency reported. The Minsk
Group is co-chaired by the US, France and Russia. [For background
see the Eurasia Insight archive].

The Sochi summit is scheduled to take place on January 25, the
Itar-Tass news agency reported.

TURKEY MUST REFRAIN FROM MEASURES AIMED AT FAILING PROTOCOLS PROCESS: ABRAHAMYAN TO SEMNEBY

Tert.am
11:18 ~U 22.01.10

On January 21, RA National Assembly Chair Hovik Abrahamyan met with
EU Special Representative for the South Caucasus Peter Semneby. The
two parties discussed the importance of establishing Armenian-Turkish
relations with preconditions.

According to a press release issued by the RA National Assembly
public affairs department, the chair of Armenia’s parliament expressed
hope that Turkey will remain loyal to the spirit and essence of the
Protocols that were signed in Zurich on October 10, 2009. Continuing,
Abrahamyan described his meeting with Turkey’s Grand National Assembly
Chair Mehmet Ali Sahin, which took place on November 23, 2009, in
Moscow, during the Parliamentary Assembly of the Black Sea Economic
Cooperation (PABSEC) General Assembly.

Upon Semneby’s request, the RA National Assembly Chair presented
the process of Protocols ratification in Armenia, which is taking
place according to the established norms and without unnecessary
delay, said Abrahamyan, stating that Turkey should proceed with the
ratification of the Protocols, as well as their implementation, and
to refrain from measures that might cause the process to fail. The
parliamentary chair stated that in any case, Armenia is prepared to
initiate appropriate equivalent steps.

FILM "BAKU, JANUARY 1990; ORDINARY GENOCIDE" BROADCASTED

Aysor
Jan 22 2010
Armenia

Today at 22:30 on Armenian Public TV channel will be broadcasted the
documentary film called "Baku, January 1990: Ordinary Genocide". The
first night of the film took place on January 19 in the conference
organized by the RA National Academy of Science on the 20th anniversary
of the Armenian Massacres in Baku.

This film is the first one in the series of the "Ordinary Genocide"
which tells the truth about the events of 1988-1992, during which the
Armenian population of Azerbaijan and Nagorno Karabakh has repeatedly
been subjected to ethnic cleansing and genocide.

The project is realized by the support of the Information and Public
Relations Center (IPRC) of the RA President’s Administration.

The project is supervised by Marina Grigoryan.

The film "Baku, January 1990: Ordinary Genocide" is already translated
into English and Russian. In the nearest future the film will be
demonstrated in different countries. It will be spread also by the
internet and by the CDs.

THE RA MINISTER OF DEFENCE RECEIVES THE AMBASSADOR OF INDIA TO ARMENIA

p;p=0&id=1140&y=2010&m=01&d=21
21. 01.10

On the 20th of January, 2010 the RA Minister of Defence Seyran
Ohanyan received the newly appointed ambassador of India to Armenia
Mr. Achal Kumar Malhotra. Congratulating the ambassador on the high
and responsible post, Seyran Ohanyan hoped that during his office
the Armenian-Indian relations, including those in the defence sphere,
will develop and strengthen even more, and that the cooperation will
enter a new stage

During the meeting they also discussed matters regarding the
present state of bilateral relations in the military sphere and the
perspectives of strengthening them.

RA MoD Department of Information and Public Affairs

ARMENIAN NATIONAL CONGRESS: THE COURT VERDICT TO NIKOL PASHINYAN HAS BECOME THE PICK OF THE UNBRIDLED AND CRIMINAL POLICY OF THE AUTHORITIES

ArmInfo
2010-01-20 14:34:00

Arminfo. The court verdict to Nikol Pashinyan has become the pick
of the unbridled and criminal policy of the ruling regime of Armenia
being held since the 1 March battue, Armenian National Congress made
such a statement.

To recall, yesterday the court of the Kentron and Nork Marash Yerevan
districts sentences editor-in-chief if Haykakan Zhamanak newspaper,
Nikol Pashinyan, to 7 years of imprisonment for organization of the
mass disorders on 1-2 March 2008 in Yerevan.

The statement also says that over the long-lasting court process the
court did not manage to disclose any evidence so that to ground at
least one accusation brought against the political prisoner Pashinyan.

‘On the contrary, many documents, facts and evidences, which disprove
the accusation, were presented to the court. Neither the measure
of punishment put forward by the state prosecutor nor the verdict
issued by the judge had something in common with the course of
the court process. These two circumstances became an epilogue for
the scenario written in advance, which was given to the prosecutor
and judge as an order. The latter, in fact, came forward not like
independent officials, which have the needed authorities and limited
rights foreseen by the law and implement the state public justice,
but like simple medieval executors, which immediately implement the
charged order like a trained animal.

The court charged by the regime and personally by Serzh Sargsyan, has
ignored the requirement fixed in the PACE resolutions, according to
which one must not punish the people which personally did not implement
violation and did not call to violation. Such an impudent confidence
of the regime is also based on the fact that earlier another point
of the PACE resolutions was also broken regarding Nikol Pashinyan,
which mentions a demand not to arrest the men, which are wanted and
come to the law-enforcement agencies of their own free will.

Armenian National Congress assesses the court verdict issued by the
regime regarding Nikol Pashinyan like expression of fear, time trouble
and panic of the authorities. The Pan-national Movement will find
the way to free Armenia of the hooligan regime for restoration of
the constitutional order so that to bring to responsibility all the
guilty persons including on the case’, – the statement of Armenian
National Congress says.