Author: Garnik Zakarian

Manchester United released pictures showing Bastian Schweinsteiger and Henrikh Mkhitaryan in first-team training on Monday.

Schweinsteiger, signed by Louis van Gaal in 2015, had not been training with the first team following Jose Mourinho’s arrival in the summer.

However, United published a picture on Monday showing the pair in training alongside midfielder Marouane Fellaini and assistant manager Rui Faria.

Schweinsteiger said in August that he “will be ready if the team needs me” but United subsequently wrote the former Germany international off as an asset in the club’s accounts.

Photo: AFP    

Iraqi forces are “ahead of schedule”, the Pentagon says, as they begin the second day of the battle to retake Mosul from so-called IS fighters, the BBC eports.

But Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook warned it “could take some time” as it remained to be seen whether Islamic State (IS) would “stand and fight”.

Fighting continued overnight, with IS militants attacking Iraqi army tanks.

IS seized Mosul, then Iraq’s second-largest city, in June 2014.

The extremists’ leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi then chose Mosul as the place to announce the forming of a caliphate, so retaking the city would be “symbolic”, according to Mr Cook.

Mr Cook told reporters in Washington: “Early indications are that Iraqi forces have met their objectives so far, and that they are ahead of schedule for this first day. This is going according to the Iraqi plan – but again, it’s early, and the enemy gets a vote here. We will see whether ISIL [IS] stands and fights.

“We are confident no matter what, however, that the Iraqis have the capabilities to get this job done, and we stand ready to support them, along with the rest of the coalition.”

A coalition of 30,000 Iraqi and Kurdish Peshmerga forces and Sunni tribal fighters began their advance on lS’s last major stronghold in the country after months of planning on Monday.

The delegation headed by the Director of the Belarussian GPS/GLONASS navigation satellite system will visit Armenia on September 19.

During a three-day visit the delegation will hold negtoiations at the Armenian Ministry of Defense and participate in the testing of the system.

On 1 September in the frameworks of the festive events devoted to the 25^th anniversary of the Artsakh Republic’s proclamation President Bako Sahakyan attended the mass cross race of the youth started in the Stepanakert Renaissance square, NKR President’s Press Office reports.

The Head of the State highlighted holding such events in the republic from the viewpoint of physical and patriotic upbringing of the younger generation.

NKR National Assembly chairman Ashot Ghoulyan, prime-minister Arayik Haroutyunyan, other officials, representatives from Armenia and the Diaspora were present at the event.

On 26 August Artsakh Republic President Bako Sahakyan visited the Alashan site of the Martakert region and met with the Talish residents who had left their houses and settled there in the aftermath of the war unleashed by Azerbaijan from 2 to 5 April of the current year, NKR President’s Press Office reports.

Issues related to improving the social and living conditions of the Talish residents were discussed during the meeting.

The President underlined that the state would do everything possible for proper solution of the existing issues giving appropriate instructions to the heads of the concerned structures.

Prime-minister Arayik Haroutyunyan and other officials accompanied the President.

Henrikh Mkhitaryan will travel to China with Manchester United for Tour 2016 as preparations for the new campaign continue.

According to United’s official website, the Reds kicked off the pre-season fixtures on Saturday with a useful 2-0 away win over Wigan Athletic in Mourinho’s first game in charge.

Next up for United are two International Champions Cup matches against Borussia Dortmund in Shanghai (22 July) and Manchester City in Beijing (25 July). A further tour match will follow the week-long excursion to China – the Reds will face Galatasaray, in Gothenburg, Sweden on 30 July.

Jose Mourinho has announced the 25-man travelling squad for Tour 2016: David De Gea, Sergio Romero, Sam Johnstone, Eric Bailly, Daley Blind, Timothy Fosu-Mensah, Phil Jones, Paddy McNair, Marcos Rojo, Luke Shaw, Chris Smalling, Axel Tuanzebe, Antonio Valencia, Michael Carrick, Ander Herrera, Adnan Januzaj, Jesse Lingard, Juan Mata, Memphis Depay, Henrikh Mkhitaryan, Andreas Pereira, Ashley Young, Will Keane, Marcus Rashford, Wayne Rooney.

Armenian Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian will visit Sochi on July 1st at the invitation of Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.

Minister Nalbandian will participate in the 34^th sitting of the Foreign Ministers of the member countries of the Black Sea Economic Cooperation Organization.

Pope serves Holy Mass at Gyumri’s Vardanants Square

Turkey has blocked a high-level German delegation from visiting troops at an airbase taking part in the US-led mission against “Islamic State.” The spat appears to be over Germany’s Armenia genocide resolution, reports. 

Turkey has denied permission for a senior German defense official and several members of parliament to visit Incirlik airbase in July, a spokesperson from the German defense ministry said Wednesday, as tensions mount between the NATO allies.

Germany has about 250 troops, six Tornado reconnaissance planes and a refueling aircraft at the airbase in southern Turkey as part of the international coalition fighting the so-called “Islamic State” in Syria.

Ralf Brauksiepe, the undersecretary for defense, planned to visit German troops in July with a parliamentary delegation, but has so far been blocked due to tensions between Berlin and Ankara over a Bundestag resolution earlier this month calling the 1915 massacre of Armenians a genocide.

“The Turkish authorities at the amoment are not approving the travel plans,” a German defense ministry spokesperson said, confirming a report in news magazine “Der Spiegel.”

“There is no written statement on the reason,” he said, adding the delegation still hoped to visit.

“Der Spiegel” reported that permission was denied in retaliation for the Armenian genocide vote.

Ties between Turkey and Germany were already strained before the genocide vote, in particular over President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s crackdown on the press and human rights abuses tied to ongoing military operations against Kurdish rebels.

 

 

 

Azeri aggression should be stopped, American –Armenian writer, Pulitzer Prize winner Peter Balakian told reporters in Yerevan today.

“The more people are informed about the history of Artsakh, the better the world will perceive the Armenian historic presence there. I hope this will contribute to finding a right diplomatic solution to the Karabakh issue,” the writer said.

By a presidential decree, Peter Balakian has been awarded RA Presidential Prize for Year 2015 for the significant contribution to the process of recognition of the Armenian Genocide.

Author Peter Balakian won the 2016 Pulitzer Prize in Poetry for Ozone Journal. Balakian’s Ozone Journal (poems) was published by the University of Chicago Press.

“In the book I’ve tried to present the world it its diversity and explain all that’s happening in the reality surrounding us through an Armenian experience,” Balakian said about the book.

Balakian’s Ozone Journal (poems) was published by the University of Chicago Press. The long poem in Balakian’s new book is a sequel to his acclaimed “A-Train/Ziggurat/Elegy” (2010). While excavating the remains of Armenian Genocide survivors in the Syrian desert with a TV crew, the persona navigates his own memory of New York City in a decade (the 1980’s) of crisis—as AIDS and climate change make a context for his personal struggles and his pursuit of meaning in the face of loss and catastrophe. Whether his poems explore Native American villages of New Mexico, the slums of Nairobi, or the Armenian-Turkish borderland, Balakian’s poems continue to engage the harshness and beauty of contemporary life in a language that is layered, sensual, elliptical, and defined by wired phrases and shifting tempos. Ozone Journal creates inventive lyrical insight in a global age of danger and uncertainty.