Author: Chmshkian Vicken

"SNOW", A NOVEL BY ORHAN PAMUK, WAS TRANSLATED INTO ARMENIAN

PanARMENIAN.Net
07.05.2009 20:15 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ A novel having the greatest demand in Europe, Orhan
Pamuk’s "Snow" is now available to the Armenian reader thanks to Hakob
Soghomonyan who spent two years for translating the book. Knowing
about it beforehand, the author refused honorary payments.

As mentioned by Lilit Grigoryan, Head of Armenian National and Cultural
Society, the novel published in 1000 copies was translated from
Russian, as there are no Turkish literature translators in Armenia.

During the presentation ceremony, Rouben Hovsepyan, writer and editor
of "Droshak" newspaper noted, "With his novel, Orhan Pamuk revealed
the callous Armenian trace seen from behind the snow covering the
historical Armenian town no longer populated by Armenians."

"Apart from its cognitive value, the novel also reveals realities
never described by any Turkish writer so far," Lilit Galstyan added.

The developments take place in Kars. A young Turkish poet permanently
residing in Germany arrives there to investigate suicides of young
women who ended their lives as sign of protest against constraint
on Muslim headscarves. The sudden snowfall brings the author face to
face with popular uprising caused by Turkish government’s unrestrained
desire to Europeanize the Muslim state. In addition to the 1000 copies
published in Eastern Armenian language, the Western Armenian version
of the book will be published in Lebanon in 500 examples.

A contemporary Turkish writer and laureate of several national and
international awards, Ferit Orhan Pamuk was awarded a Nobel Prize
in Literature in 2006. In 2005, the Turkish Government sued him for
making the following statement in an interview with the Swiss Das
Magazin periodical (February 2005), "One million Armenians and thirty
thousand Kurds were murdered in Turkey. Nobody voices the fact, and
I am hated because I speak about it." The writer currently resides
in New York. His works are available in more than 40 languages.

PRESIDENTS OF ARMENIA, AZERBAIJAN AND TURKEY WILL NOT MEET IN PRAGUE

PanARMENIAN.Net
06.05.2009 17:26 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Information on meeting between Presidents of Armenia,
Azerbaijan and Turkey, circulated by APA Azeri agency is untrue,
RA President Press Secretary Samvel Farmanyan stated. "The meeting
has not been scheduled and is, consequently, impossible," he said.

"NKR conflict settlement issue was never on Armenian-Turkish
negotiations agenda.

Its time that reports issued by unreliable or anonymous sources were
not taken seriously," RA President Press Secretary emphasized.

NYT: TURKEY’S AND RUSSIA’S POSITIONS WILL FURTHER STRENGTHEN IN SOUTH CAUCASUS IN CASE OF NORMALIZATION OF ARMENIAN-TURKISH RELATIONS

NOYAN TAPAN
MAY 5, 2009
NEW YORK

If the Armenian-Turkish relations are normalized, the South Caucasus
will turn into a stable region, the New York Times newspaper writes.

"However, in that case, not the positions of the U.S. and EU having
made much less contribution to the peaceful process, but of the
two former empires rich in gas and oil, being an important transit
way for Europe, wishing to again strengthen their positions in the
region, namely, Russia and Turkey, will strengthen in the region,"
the periodical writes.

COMMUNIST PARTY OF ARMENIA MARKS MAY 1

NOYAN TAPAN
MAY 4, 2009
YEREVAN

The May 1 march and rally organized by the Communist Party of Armenia
proceeded without incidents. Though, as party Central Committee
First Secretary Ruben Tovmasian said in his speech near the monument
to Stepan Shahumian, till the last moment the authorities tried to
hinder the holding of Communist Party’s May 1 actions, nevertheless
ordinary communists and even activists from remote regions came to
the rally in an organized way.

Speaking about the meaning of May 1, R. Tovmasian emphasized that
Workers’ Day was solemnly marked in the Soviet Union and in Soviet
Armenia. In his words, under USSR the state really appreciated work
and worker, while at present, when May 1 is again considered a state
holiday, the authorities do not celebrate it. R. Tovmasian added that
the communists will be only glad if not the Communist Party of Armenia
but state officials organize the May 1 march and if they walk ahead
of the people.

AssA-Irada, Azerbaijan
April 30, 2009 Thursday

ARMENIAN MINISTER CITES PROGRESS IN TIES WITH TURKEY

Armenian Foreign Minister Eduard Nalbandian has said there was
progress in the normalization of relations between Armenia and Turkey,
which have been marred by tensions for many years. Nalbandian dodged a
question whether or not the two countries intended to sign an
agreement on re-opening their shared border, which has been shut since
1993. He only said that improvement of bilateral ties, the border
opening and restoration of relations between the Armenian and Turkish
people was a matter of time. Turkey closed its border with Armenia due
to the neighboring countrys policy of occupation against Azerbaijan
and Armenian claims regarding the alleged World War I-era
genocide. However, there have been signs of normalization in
Ankara-Yerevan ties of late.

World Markets Research Centre
Global Insight
May 1 2009

Rapid Rise of Service Prices Drives Accelerating Armenian Inflation in
April

by Venla Sipila

Service and consumer prices in Armenia increased by 3.2%
month-on-month (m/m) in April, in a significant acceleration compared
with the inflation rate of 1.4% m/m seen in March. Different price
categories displayed very varied developments. Specifically, food
prices increased by 2.1% m/m and non-food good prices gained 2.8%
m/m. Meanwhile, reaching 5.6% m/m, the growth of service tariffs
clearly exceeded headline inflation. Annual inflation also accelerated
significantly in April, reaching 3.1% after standing at just 1.0%
year-on-year (y/y) in March. Service prices posted by far the most
rapid gain also in annual comparison; their surge of 11.7% y/y,
comparing to growth of 2.8% y/y in non-food prices, and an annual fall
of 1.6% in food prices. April data brought the cumulative gain in
Armenian consumer prices since the beginning of the year to 3.9%,
while annual inflation for the January-April period came in at 2.3%.

Significance:April inflation developments continue the renewed
intensification in Armenian price pressures. The acceleration seen in
March inflation had mainly been the result of the devaluation of the
dram exchange rate seen earlier in the month, while the April jump in
inflation is mainly attributed to the increase in import prices of
Russian gas. The Russian gas giant Gazprom increased the price of gas
sold to Armenia from $110US/1,000 cubic metres (cm) last year to
$154US/1,000 cm from the beginning of April, and this is reflected in
the rapid acceleration in service tariff growth. While this increase
is lower than initially sought by Gazprom, a previous agreement sees
Armenian gas prices rising to $200US/1,000 cm next year and up to
European market prices in 2011. Service price growth will push
Armenian inflation up in annual terms in the coming months, but the
overall sharp cooling in economic activity will have the opposite
effect. Average monthly inflation still remains clearly below its
year-ago level, and given downward economic momentum, the Central Bank
of Armenia (CBA) may consider further interest rate cuts in the coming
months (see Armenia: 9 April 2009: ). Then again, the potential of
even sharp renewed upward price pressures certainly exist, given the
vulnerability of the dram exchange rate amid Armenia’s high external
financing requirement.

PanARMENIAN.Net

Turkish journalist may be sentenced to 17 years in prison for writing
book about Hrant Dink
02.05.2009 14:47 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Nedim Shener, journalist of Turkish Milliyet
periodical, may be sentenced to 17 years in prison for writing a book
entitled `Dink’s Murder and the Falsehood of Secret Services’.

The book describes how Turkish security forces failed to prevent
Dink’s murder. Several lawsuits have been filed against Shener. The
first hearing is due on June 26. The lawsuits have been filed by
police officers Mukhitin Zenit, Head of Police Investigative
Department Ramazan Akurek and Head of Istanbul Police Investigative
Bureau Ali Fuat Yulmazar.

`I am alone with murderers in Istanbul Criminal Court. The officers
who filed a case against me failed to conduct a proper investigation
into the reports containing information about plans for assassinating
Dink. They targeted me because I wrote the truth,’ the journalist
said.

According to Mr. Shener, the investigators forged documents for
concealing false information. `The false document issued by the Prime
Minister’s Investigative Committee revealed that falsehood. In
particular, it says that Ataturk and Ilmazar failed to perform their
duties. The report was undersigned by the Prime Minister. And I wrote
about that. This is the only crime I committed.’

Hrant Dink, Editor-in-Chief of Agos Armenian periodical, was killed
near his office by nationalist Ogun Samast on January 19,
2007. However, Turkish media recently reported the name of a different
killer.

RA PRESIDENT CONGRATULATED HIS FELLOW CITIZENS ON INTERNATIONAL LABOR DAY

PanARMENIAN.Net
01.05.2009 17:59 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Both entrepreneurs and laborers have suffered from
financial crisis consequences, but laborers in Armenia, as in the
whole world, are bearing the pressure, RA President Serzh Sargsyan
said in his May Day address.

"We’ll take our best efforts to create jobs and salaries Armenian
citizens deserve," RA President’s address ran.

RUSSIAN LIBERAL CLAIMS KGB ORGANIZED GENOCIDE OF ARMENIANS

MosNews
/2009/04/28/1362/
April 28 2009
Russia

Former world chess champion and opposition activist Gary Kasparov has
condemned Soviet Russia for supporting Turkey during the years of the
Armenian Genocide, the New York Times reports. "The authorities are
the source of problems," the chess player said during a commemoration
event for the Genocide victims.

The ceremony commemorating the Armenian genocide during World War I
was held on Friday in a village near Sochi, the Winter Olympics-2014
city. Newly elected Mayor, Anatoly Pakhomov attended the ceremony,
a crucial gesture to the city’s large Armenian population, the New
York Times says. He delivered a short, respectful address and then
stepped back to polite clapping, making room for a row of schoolgirls
to recite verses.

Gary Kasparov, born to an Armenian mother, spoke after two hours of
waiting. Beginning innocently enough, he made an offhand mention of
Boris Nemtsov, Pakhomov’s rival at the recent election whom Kasparov
had supported. Then he began a tirade against Moscow, saying Soviet
Russia had supported Turkey at the time of the massacres.

Kasparov said that "genocide was not conducted by chance and
the government made little efforts to stop the nationalistic
activities." Two and a half minutes into the chess player’s speech,
a local official tried to stop Kasparov, but the crowd showed support
for him. "The KGB was behind the Armenian pogroms in Baku. The KGB
set nations against each other. We should never give in to these
provocations," Kasparov said.

The Armenian Genocide, also known as the Great Calamity by Armenians,
refers to the deliberate and systematic destruction of the Armenian
population of the Ottoman Empire during and just after World War
I. The Russian Empire and afterwards Soviet Russia were among the
Ottoman Empire’s (Turkey’s) enemies.

ARF DASHNAKTSUTYUN’S LEAVING THE RULING COALITION IS A WISH TO DISTANCE ITSELF FROM RA AUTHORITIES

PanARMENIAN.Net
27.04.2009 17:26 GMT+04:00

"Position of our ARF Dashnaktsutyn colleagues, or rather ex-colleagues
is explained by three main points: Pressure from Diaspora, doubts
about recent developments in Armenian -Turkish relations and a wish
to distance themselves from RA authorities," RA NA Republican Party
MP Armen Ashotyan told a news conference in Yerevan.

"ARF Dashnaktsutyun did throw some hints about their intention to
leave coalition. Though I believe the true reason for this step is
shortage of governmental positions, Dashnaktsutyun chose government’s
"neglect of national interests" as an excuse for their leaving," he
said. Ashotyan is confident that by this act Dashnaktsutyun wishes
to shed their image of ruling party, and run as an oppositional force
at next parliamentary elections.

"Summing it all up, recent developments in Armenian-Turkish relations
served as a pretext for Dashnaktytyun to announce their leaving the
coalition. Nevertheless I can assure that RA foreign policy line
remains unchanged, and recent events are another manifestation of
complementary and multivector policy Armenia conducts," Armen Ahotyan
emphasized.