Author: Diana Dabaghian

 – DeputyNilda Garre submitted a bill to criminalize denialism in Argentina this week, a project that would include the Armenian Genocide denial. Garre confirmed the news  in an with Prensa Armenia.

The project, which is based on the legislation of a number of European countries, plans to include in the Criminal Code the criminalization to anyone who “publicly denied, minimized, justified and/or approved any form of genocide or crimes against humanity.”

The proposal claims to be compatible with freedom of expression “when justified in protecting the rights of victims, in maintaining public order or national security, or to prohibit the apology of hatred and violence.”

Nilda Garre is a Deputy of the Front for Victory party. She was Minister of Defense during the term of late PresidentNestor Kirchner and was later appointed Minister of Security under the mandate of President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner. Garre is currently the Argentine Representative for the Organization of American States.

The project arose in the context of statements of two officials of the current government, who issued denial statements about the genocide committed by the last Argentine military dictatorship, and that the country’s judiciary has already determined that those were crimes against humanity.

“The National Congress passed Law 26,199 in 2006 recognizing the genocide of which the Armenian people were victims. Consequently it is clear that this is included in the project we propose,” said Nilda Garre in an interview with Prensa Armenia.

When asked about the recent visit of Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu to Argentina, she said that “I am not clear how Turkey could react. What I do know is that the Argentine Republic is a sovereign nation and the National Congress is the representation of one of its powers.”

Armenia is placed 113th in the Corruption Perceptions index 2016 released by the Transparency International today.

Other countries in the region are placed as follows: Georgia 44th, Turkey – 75th, Azerbaijan 123rd, Iran – 131st.

Armenia’s partners in the Eurasian Economic Union Russia and Kazakhstan share the 131st place with Iran, Belarus is 79th, Kyrgyzstan is 136th.

According to the report, more countries declined than improved in this year’s results, showing the urgent need for committed action to thwart corruption.

The Corruption Perceptions Index aggregates data from a number of different sources that provide perceptions of business people and country experts of the level of corruption in the public sector.
The methodology follows 4 basic steps: selection of source data, rescaling source data, aggregating the rescaled data and then reporting a measure for uncertainty.

Each source is then standardized to be compatible with other available sources, for aggregation to the CPI scale. The standardization converts all the data sources to a scale of 0-100 where a 0 = highest level of perceived corruption, and 100 = lowest level of perceived corruption.

Each country’s CPI score is calculated as a simple average of all the available rescaled scores for that country (note, we do not use any of the imputed values as a score for the aggregated CPI). A country will only be given a score if there are at least three data sources available from which to calculate this average.

The CPI score is reported alongside a standard error and 90% confidence interval which reflects the variance in the value of the source data that comprises the CPI score. The standard error term is calculated as the standard deviation of the rescaled source data, divided by the square root of the number of sources. Using this standard error, we can calculate the 90% confidence interval, assuming a normal distribution.

Photo: AFP

 

Military action has ended in eastern Aleppo, Russia’s ambassador to the UN, Vitaly Churkin, has said, the BBC reports.

He said Syrian government troops had re-established control over the last areas of the city held by rebels.

He said an arrangement had been made for rebel fighters to leave.

“According to the latest information that we received in the last hour, military actions in eastern Aleppo are over,” Mr Churkin told an emergency session of the UN Security Council.

Earlier he had spoken of the deal allowing the rebels to leave, saying it would take place within hours.

“The civilians, they can stay, they can go to safe places, they can take advantage of the humanitarian arrangements that are on the ground. Nobody is going to harm the civilians,” Mr Churkin said.

Rebel groups suggested that civilians would be included in the exodus.

About 80,000 people have been told to evacuate their homes as wildfires swept into Israel’s third largest city of Haifa, the BBC reports.

The fires follow a two-month drought and are being fanned by strong winds in the north of the city.

Wildfires are also threatening homes near Jerusalem and in the West Bank.

Israel’s police chief said arson was suspected in some cases and PM Benjamin Netanyahu said any such attacks would amount to “terror”.

“Every fire that was the result of arson or incitement to arson is terror in every way and we’ll treat it as such,” he was quoted by Haaretz newspaper as saying.

“Anyone who tries to burn parts of the state of Israel will be severely punished,” he said.

On November 17, NATO Deputy Assistant Secretary General for Emerging Security Challenges Dr. Jamie Shea and Responsible Representative for Armenia in NATO International Staff Gwen Vamos visited the National Defense Research University (NDRU) of the Armenian Ministry of Defense within the framework of “NATO Week” events. They were accompanied by Gagik Hovhannisyan, PhD in Political Science, Head of the Arms Control and International Security Department (ACISD) of the Armenian Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA), Karen Israyelyan, PhD in Philology, Head of NATO Division of the ACISD, MFA, and Serob Bejanyan, Deputy Head of Permanent Mission of the RA in NATO.

The guests were hosted by the Head of the NDRU, Doctor of Political Science, Professor, LTG Hayk S. Kotanjian.

NDRU’s Deputy Head for Research – Head of the Institute for National Strategic Studies (INSS), PhD in History Beniamin Poghosyan, Head of the Center for Regional Strategic Analysis of the INSS, PhD in History Davit Manasyan, and NDRU Research Fellows also attended the meeting.

LTG Hayk S. Kotanjian introduced to the guests the mission, goals and primary tasks of the NDRU. During conversation, Dr. Kotanjian and NDRU Research Fellows presented in detail the research and educational programs of the NDRU. They noted that significant attention is paid to the fields of cybersecurity and information resources’ management. The program of establishing the Institute of Cybersecurity and Information Resources Strategy (ICIRS) on the basis of the NDRU’s Center for National Security Policy and Information-Communication Technologies (CNSPICT) is focused on these fields. Head of the CNSPICT Arman Grigoryan presented the programs aimed at the development of the sphere.

Dr. Shea praised research and educational programs at the NDRU and expressed confidence that they would significantly contribute to the modernization of Armenia’s defense security system.

At least 239 migrants have died in two shipwrecks off Libya, the United Nations said on Thursday, Reuters reports.

Carlotta Sami, a spokeswoman for the U.N. refugee agency UNHCR, said the information was confirmed by two survivors brought ashore on the Italian island of Lampedusa.

Leonard Doyle, chief spokesman for the International Organization for Migration, said 4,220 lives had now been lost in the Mediterranean so far this year.

Jose Mourinho has suggested Henrikh Mkhitaryan needs time to adapt to English football, but the Manchester United manager has backed his signing to become a “top player” for the Reds.

The Armenian has not featured since the Manchester derby in the Premier League on 10 September and that is partly due to him suffering an injury just prior to the recent international break in October.

Mourinho confirmed during Friday’s press conference at the Aon Training Complex that Mkhitaryan is no longer injured, telling reporters that he is working hard on his fitness behind the scenes.

“He is not injured,” the manager said. “Sometimes I confuse the word ‘fit’ in the English language. Sometimes you can say that it is ‘not injured’, but you could also say that you are in great condition and ready to compete. That is different for me as we use different words in Portuguese for the different situations. Mkhitaryan is not injured, he is training with the team 100 per cent.

Asked if it takes some players longer to adapt to the English game, Mourinho continued: “I think so, yes. Some players find it very easy whereas others need more time. They need time to feel the intensity, the aggression, the game without the ball and the competitiveness.

“The realities are often different, particularly in terms of the competitiveness. It doesn’t matter who you are against, you have to play at the highest level otherwise you will not be able to do it. Micki needs time to become the top player he knows he can be.”

Mourinho expressed his confidence in Mkhitaryan when expanding on the topic that dominated Friday’s press conference, pointing to two of his former players at Chelsea and Real Madrid who required time to blossom in their new surroundings. “I think Micki will work here for sure,” he said.

“I don’t like to speak about players from other clubs because I don’t want to be misinterpreted, but I don’t think he’ll mind. A player who had a problem to play when he first arrived was Willian. He went through a process and then, after a few months, he became a top player. Then, when we won the championship, he was phenomenal and still is. That is just an example.

“Similarly, Di Maria had to learn a lot about his game when he came into Madrid from Portugal. Sometimes this is what happens. It happens with defenders, but it is often easier for them to adapt than attackers. Some go straight to success and others it takes more time.

“In Micki’s case the process was interrupted by injury, which does not help the process of evolution. Being out for a month meant he has had to go through the process of getting match-fit, then once he has that he needs the competitive level to do it. We believe him and, sooner or later, there will be no problem.”

According to a decree signed by President Serzh Sargsyan, Armenia’s Ambassador to Lithuania Tigran Mkrtchyan has been appointed as Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to Estonia and Latvia, President’s Press Office reports.

At least 29 people, most of them rebel fighters, have been killed in a bombing near Syria’s border with Turkey, activists say, the BBC reports.

The attack reportedly occurred during a change of guard at the rebel-controlled Atmeh crossing, in Idlib province.

It was not immediately clear whether the blast was caused by a suicide bomber or a remote-controlled device.

A news agency linked to so-called Islamic State (IS) said a suicide car bombing had targeted a rebel convoy.

But an opposition activist network, the Local Co-ordination Committees, reported that a suitcase filled with explosives had been planted at the scene.

In mid-August, 32 rebels were killed in a suicide attack claimed by IS at the Atmeh crossing, which they use to travel from Idlib, via Turkey, to battle the jihadist group in other parts of north-eastern Syria.

Having designed many architectural artworks ordered by Ottoman Empire between the 18th and 19th century, the Balyan Family, a dynasty of famous Ottoman imperial architects, is getting its own mausoleum years after the deaths of its most prominent members. Built in the Balyan Family Graveyard in Üsküdar Surp Haç Armenian Cemetery, the Balyan Family Mausoleum was constructed by the Hraç and Hagop Kırmızıyan brothers, reports.

Designed with inspiration from the altar section of the Armenian Church in Besiktas, the mausoleum project was constructed with three-meter-long one-piece marble pillars and a tomb and arch placed on top of them. The block marbles in the background feature the names of the prominent family members as well as an Ottoman tughra.

Completed and carried out in two years, the project covers the clean-up and restoration of all of the sarcophagi belonging to the Balyan family, and the creation of a mausoleum befitting the creations of a dynasty that crowned Istanbul’s skyline with their artworks.

Among their buildings that grace today’s silhouette of Istanbul are the Dolmabahce Palace and the Ortakoy Mosque.