MEMBER OF ANC YOUTH BRANCH DETAINED
/PanARMENIAN.Net/
06.07.2009 13:32 GMT+04:00
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Member of Armenian National Congress
youth branch Tigran Arakelyan was arrested on July
5. The ANC described the action as a crime against
the youth and demanded immediate release of Arakelyan
Final election results: Levon Ananyan is elected as RA Writers’ Union
Chairman
04.07.2009 19:17 GMT+04:00
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ According to final election results, Levon Ananyan,
receiving 199 votes, was re-elected as RA Writers’ Union Chairman.
Another candidate, Razmik Davoyan received the votes of 29 colleagues.
According to preliminary data, writer Razmik Davoyan received 29
colleagues’ votes, Levon Ananyan – 267. Later, 70 voting papers were
found void.
RUSSIA TRIES TO EXTEND ARMENIAN RAILWAYS
Messenger.ge
Friday, July 3, 2009
The Armenian railways, which are now managed by Russia and consequently
called South Caucasus Railways, are today connected with no other
railway system but the Georgian one. The Russians now want to expand
the South Caucasus Railways’ capacity and connect it with the rest
of the world, suggesting that it could connect with Iran Railways
and via Iran the Caspian Sea.
Making this link would enable Armenia to become part of north-south
corridor connecting Russia and other CIS countries with Pakistan,
India, China and so on. If the railway link is established Armenia
could export agricultural products, chemical fertilisers and
construction materials, promote tourism and so on.
PRESS RELEASE
Catholicosate of Cilicia
Communication and Information Department
Contact: V.Rev.Fr.Krikor Chiftjian, Communications Officer
Tel: (04) 410001, 410003
Fax: (04) 419724
E- mail: [email protected]
Web:
PO Box 70 317
Antelias-Lebanon
H.E. CARDINAL ANDRÉ VINGT-TROIS
THE REPRESENTATIVE OF POPE BENEDICT XVI VISITS HIS HOLINESS ARAM I
On Monday 29 June 2009, Cardinal André Vingt-Trois visited Catholicos Aram I
after a visit to the President of Lebanon, General Michel Suleiman.
A high-level delegation, including the personal representative of the
Maronite Patriarch Cardinal Nasrallah Boutros Sfeir, accompanied the
Cardinal. The meeting, which lasted for more than an hour, was also attended
by Archbishop Komitas Ohanian, Bishop Norayr Ashekian and Very Rev. Krikor
Chiftjian.
The Cardinal and his delegation discussed the evolution of the political
situation in Lebanon and relations between the Vatican and the Armenian
Orthodox Church, particularly the Catholicosate of Cilicia. The Cardinal
also asked for an update on the visit of His Holiness Aram I to the Vatican
in 2008.
##
View the photos here:
tos/Photos388.htm#5
*****
The Armenian Catholicosate of Cilicia is one of the two Catholicosates of
the Armenian Orthodox Church. For detailed information about the Ecumenical
activities of the Cilician Catholicosate, you may refer to the web page of
the Catholicosate, The Cilician
Catholicosate, the administrative center of the church is located in
Antelias, Lebanon.
COOPERATION BETWEEN THE HOLY SEE AND THE ARMENIAN APOSTOLIC CHURCH EXEMPLARY
armradio.am
29.06.2009 18:02
President Serzh Sargsyan today received His Excellency Archbishop
Claudio Gugerotti, Nuncio for Armenia (seat in Tbilisi).
Greeting Archbishop Claudio Gugerotti, the President said that
throughout his service as Nuncio of the Holy See for Armenia, His
Excellency has used his knowledge and experience to contribute to
the development and intensification of relations between Armenia
and Vatican.
The President ranked high the role of Vatican not only as a religious
center, but also as a defender of human rights and moral norms.
According to President Sargsyan, Armenia is interested in establishment
of stability, security and peace in the region and considers that
the existing issues should be solved through dialogue.
President Sargsyan and His Excellency Archbishop Claudio Gugerotti
referred to the relations between Armenia and Vatican. President
Sargsyan welcomed the cooperation established between the Holy See and
the Armenian Apostolic Church. Archbishop Claudio Gugerotti described
this cooperation as exemplary.
Agence France Presse
June 27 2009
Hariri named Lebanon PM
By Natacha Yazbeck ` 8 hours ago
BEIRUT (AFP) ‘ Saad Hariri, son of slain billionaire ex-premier Rafiq
Hariri, pledged to form a cabinet that would unite rival political
camps after he was named Lebanon’s new prime minister on Saturday.
"We will begin consultations with all parliamentary blocs based on our
commitment to a national unity government in which all main blocs are
represented and which is harmonious, functional, and free of
obstruction and paralysis," Hariri said.
Under the current unity government, headed by Fuad Siniora, militant
group Hezbollah and its allies have veto power over major decisions.
The government was formed in May 2008, ending a political crisis that
had brought Lebanon to the brink of civil war.
The crisis left more than 100 people dead and was defused following a
Qatari-brokered deal that led to the election of army commander Michel
Sleiman as president and the formation of a unity government.
But Siniora, elected to parliament in a general election three weeks
ago, was unable to form a cabinet that satisfied Lebanon’s feuding
political camps until July 2008.
While Hezbollah and its allies want to maintain the status quo in the
new cabinet, Hariri said ahead of his nomination that he would only
accept another unity government if the Hezbollah alliance surrenders
its veto powers.
The Lebanese government was effectively paralysed in November 2006
when five Shiite ministers backed by Hezbollah and and its ally Amal
resigned, leaving the community unrepresented in government.
Pro-Syrian speaker Nabih Berri, who heads Amal and was re-elected to a
fifth consecutive term on Thursday, refused to convene parliament for
18 months as he said the government was illegitimate and
unconstitutional.
Hariri’s US-backed March 14 alliance won 71 of parliament’s 128 seats
in the June 7 election while the rival March 8 alliance, led by
Hezbollah and backed by Syria and Iran, secured 57.
Hariri was nominated for the premiership by 86 of Lebanon’s 128 MPs —
the 71 from his own majority alliance, plus Berri and his bloc of 12
MPs and two Armenians, the various groups said.
Berri’s allies in the Hezbollah-led alliance, including retired
general Michel Aoun’s Christian bloc, said they abstained from naming
anyone for the top post, reserved for a Sunni Muslim under Lebanon’s
complex system of sectarian power-sharing.
Hariri now faces the task of forming a cabinet that satisfies both his
allies and rivals.
Berri said he had nominated Hariri on condition he form another unity
government.
"I would like to see a government in which March 14 and March 8 are
melded together," Berri told AFP.
On Thursday, Hariri and Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah met for the
first time since October to discuss the composition of the new
government.
"Designating a prime minister and agreeing on the shape of the cabinet
are inseparable parts of the same task," Hezbollah deputy chief Sheikh
Naim Qassem told AFP.
Hariri, who heads the Sunni Future Movement, had urged his supporters
to refrain from celebratory gunfire after his expected nomination but
the news was greeted by fireworks across parts of the capital Beirut.
The prime minister-designate is a business graduate of Georgetown
University in Washington and heads his late father’s Saudi-based
construction firm, Saudi Oger. One of the largest companies in the
Middle East, it employs around 35,000 people.
Hariri’s father, Rafiq, a billionaire who served five times as prime
minister, was assassinated by a truck bomb in Beirut in 2005.
The killing, which was widely blamed on former power-broker Syria,
sparked mass protests and eventually forced the withdrawal of Syrian
troops from Lebanon after a 29-year presence.
Damascus has roundly denied the accusations and a UN tribunal set up
to try the case has still not charged anyone with the crime.
316 PEOPLE RECEIVE WINNINGS IN 5TH DRAWING OF CASH REGISTER RECEIPT LOTTERY IN ARMENIA
ARKA
June 26, 2009
YEREVAN, June 26. /ARKA/. 316 people received their winnings in
the fifth drawing of cash register receipt lottery held on June
5. Winnings totaled about 2mln 200,000 Drams, reports the official
website of the country’s State Revenues Committee.
According to the report, by June 25 five people won 50,000Drams each.
The lottery is held to reduce the "shadow" turnover and make entities
pay taxes.
There are about 45,000 cash registers installed in sales outlets in
Armenia, over 7,200 of them at fairs. ($1=360.09Drams).
Tuncboyajyan joins voices with Kardes Turkuler
Today’s Zaman
June 26 2009
Turkey
Kardes Turkuler, a well-known folk music ensemble praised for its
wide repertoire of ethnic music compiled from throughout Anatolia,
is readying itself for a major concert next week in Istanbul.
The ensemble will be joined by internationally acclaimed
Turkish-Armenian avant-garde folk musician Arto Tuncboyacıyan and
famous Palestinian-British musician-radio broadcaster-activist Reem
Kelani in the Turkcell KuruceÅ~_me Arena next Tuesday.
Singer Fehmiye Celik and dancer Banu Acıkdeniz of KardeÅ~_ Turkuler,
joined by Tuncboyacıyan, shared their goals and intentions about the
concert in a news conference this week. "We want to send the message
that we want to live altogether with all our differences and that we
want freedom and peace," said Celik, pointing out that the concert
comes at a time of high expectations of a solution to the Kurdish
issue in Turkey. Noting the importance of bringing Tuncboyacıyan and
Kelani together on the same stage, Celik said: "We all know that the
Middle East needs peace. There’s no difference between Arab hostility
and anti-Semitism; both are dreadful. We wanted to create an occasion
to perform Arabic and Hebrew songs together on the same stage."
The first part of the concert will be called "Ä°stanbul with KardeÅ~_
Turkuler" in which the various aspects of city will be depicted
through songs, such as the many "identities, cultures and beliefs"
it houses, explained Celik. The second part will feature a selection
of songs from the wide-ranging repertoire of KardeÅ~_ Turkuler.
The June 30 concert will come just days after the release of two
new albums by the ensemble on Friday: one of them, "Kajar" (City),
is a collection of songs depicting the transformations in the lives
of Kurds and the second is "Gayrı İstanbul," a compilation of
Balkan songs. The ensemble, which has a history of over 15 years,
is set to start work on its upcoming album during the summer.
Living as a human being "They make me say that I’m an Armenian because
they leave me no other choice; they don’t see me as [solely] a human
being," complains Tuncboyacıyan about the imposing of ethnicities
in Turkey. Tuncboyacıyan, who launched his musical career in the US,
has many friends who are musicians in Turkey, but next week’s concert
with KardeÅ~_ Turkuler was the first offer of collaboration he had
received from Turkey, and the percussionist-singer says he is very
glad to work with the ensemble. "Nobody should look for a grudge and
hate inside me. It’s nonsense. I wasn’t brought up like that; I won’t
die like that either," says Tuncboyacıyan about his feelings toward
Turkish society as an Anatolian Armenian. "If I leave Turkey, I’ll
have to leave myself, too," says the 52-year-old Tuncboyacıyan during
an interview with Today’s Zaman following Wednesday’s news conference.
One of your albums was banned in Turkey. Why?
That was the album "Turkce Sözlu Hafif Anadolu Muzigi" (Soft Anatolian
Music) I released in 2000. The lyrics were promising lyrics. There
are so many issues [in Turkey], you know. … Nobody cares about your
heart, about your humanity, but they evaluate each other according to
what they wear, their headscarves or their religions or races. It’s
always us who create these. We attribute some features to God according
to ourselves. Religions have become business sectors; they have been
estranged from their essential meanings. That’s why, for me, my belief
has no difference to yours. Love, honesty, respect — these words all
have the same meanings in English, Turkish or in Arabic. My songs were
about all these. There is paranoia here: "Will people unite?" That’s
why there was a great pressure. Later on, they released my album. One
song was about humanity, another was about senectitude and one song
was about the black clouds — representing ideas — over Anatolia. I
can’t comprehend the reason why people prefer to live suffering. As
human beings, we create something, we attribute some values to that
and then we quarrel over it with each other.
How do you feel when people talk about your identity and the issues
between Turkey and Armenia?
If people are talking about these issues all the time, this shows how
underdeveloped they are. But someone has to speak out against these
so that the quarrel ends. I’m [seen as an] infidel here, a Turkish
fink in Armenia and a terrorist in the United States. I can’t live
merely as a human being. We are all born as human beings, then we
are all tagged, but those children are not born with tags. Why are
children born in Turkey, Armenia, Palestine and Israel enemies of
each other? Because we create the hostilities since we have interests
in it. Now that I’m here, journalists ask me about Armenia, Turkey,
about sensational issues. But I’m not living as an Armenian or a Turk;
I’m living as a human being. The other [aspects] are flavors. It’s
the same with girls who wear a headscarf. They are always excluded
because of their clothes. … Today, for example, people who damage
Islam the most are Muslims themselves because they are not sincere
with each other, they don’t have purity in themselves and they exploit
Islam. And other people use these people who damage Islam.
Maybe people need time to get over these kinds of ideas?
One day! The mentality has to change. What’s essential here [is that]
you have to accept the thing that you don’t like with respect. Because
quarrelling about land issues, like which place is ours, which
is yours, I’m not that kind of a person. We are not the owners of
these lands; these lands own us. … What I’m fighting against is the
mentality. In this Armenia-Turkey issue, when the mentality changes,
all these debates about borders, etc., will become irrational. That’s a
shame, isn’t it? It is as if we don’t have anything else to talk about;
everything has been solved, but the only problem is the headscarf. It’s
an opprobrium for me, evaluating people according to their clothes. I
even wrote a song about that.
So, this is why you are in this project with KardeÅ~_ Turkuler…
Yes, the message that they [KardeÅ~_ Turkuler] want to give to
humanity, their love, attracted me a lot because there’s no difference
among us. But if you are excluded, how will you be able to have the
feeling of belonging?
What are your future plans for this project?
This is not a project for me; it’s a beginning. This project in fact
interests all of us [citizens of Turkey] because it’s something that
all of us dream of. They [KardeÅ~_ Turkuler] started it. But I don’t
believe in coincidences; everything has a meaning. This is a beginning,
and I don’t want it to end.
OSCE CIO DORA BAKOYANNIS TO VISIT ARMENIA ON JULY 2-3
ArmInfo
2009-06-25 11:00:00
ArmInfo. OSCE Chairperson-in-Office, Foreign Minister of Greece Dora
Bakoyannis will visit Armenia within the frames of her visit to the
region on July 2-3, OSCE Yerevan Office told ArmInfo.
OSCE CIO is expected to meet with the leadership of Armenia. Dora
Bakyannis will arrive in Yerevan from Baku. Before that, on June
27-28 OSCE Ministerial Meeting is scheduled on Corfu.
GEORGIAN PRESIDENT DUE IN ARMENIA ON JUNE 24
armradio.am
23.06.2009 13:40
At the invitation of the Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan, the
President of Georgia, Mikhail Saakashvili, will arrive in Armenia on
June 24 for a two-day official visit.
Following the welcome ceremony the Presidents of the two countries
will have a face-to-face meeting, after which the consultations will
continue in an extended format. Presidents Serzh Sargsyan and Mikhail
Saakashvili will give a joint press conference.
In the evening of June 24 President Serzh Sargsyan and Mrs. Rita
Sargsyan will give a dinner in honor of Mikhail Saakashvili and
Mrs. Sandra Roulovs.
Within the framework of the official visit the Georgian President
will visit Tsitsernakaberd and lay a wreath at the Memorial to the
Armenian Genocide victims. Mikhail Saakashvili will meet the faculty
and staffAt the Yerevan State University .