Author: Jidarian Alex

FM: ARMENIA DEALS TO BE RATIFIED WHEN CONDITIONS RIPE

Today’s Zaman
April 27 2010
Turkey

Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu on Monday defended the government’s
efforts to normalize relations with neighboring Armenia and warned
that Turkey had the right to take necessary measures should Armenia
distort two protocols on restoring the ties.

Davutoglu and his Armenian counterpart, Edward Nalbandian, signed
the two protocols in October but they are yet to be ratified in the
national parliaments — a necessary condition for their implementation
— amid mutual accusations of belatedly added preconditions. Turkey
says a decision of the Constitutional Court of Armenia on the protocols
interprets them in a way that misrepresent their objectives.

Armenia, on the other hand, says Turkey has linked the process to the
Nagorno-Karabakh dispute between Armenia and Azerbaijan although this
contravenes the text of the protocols.

Davutoglu, speaking at a parliamentary session, gave assurances to the
opposition that the protocols will go into force only on the condition
that they are implemented without any alteration. "We will make sure
that there will be no confusion or grey area in the implementation of
the protocols," he told deputies. "We have the right to take necessary
measures if the protocols are interpreted in a way that contradicts
their letter and spirit. … Our parliaments will ratify the protocols
when political conditions are ripe."

The opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) and the Nationalist
Movement Party (MHP) object to the protocols, saying they harm
Turkey’s relations with Azerbaijan, an ethnic and regional ally of
Turkey and a key gas supplier. Deniz BölukbaÅ~_ı, a deputy from the
MHP, said after Davutoglu’s speech that the signing of the protocols
with Armenia was a "historical mistake" as Armenia still refuses to
formally recognize its borders with Turkey and keeps Nagorno-Karabakh
and adjacent territory in Azerbaijani land under occupation.

CHP Deputy Chairman Onur Oymen criticized the government’s pledges
to continue with the normalization process with Armenia despite
the ruling of the Armenian Constitutional Court. "This decision is
irreversible. How can you say you will ratify the protocols despite
this decision?" Oymen asked in Parliament.

Davutoglu, on the other hand, said normal ties with neighbors are a
key element for peace in the Caucasus and that the government would
continue with its initiative for normal ties with Armenia despite
obstacles raised in Armenia and in other parts of the world by the
Armenian diaspora. "We can opt for preserving the status quo and we
can live happily and comfortably for a while as a result. But we will
end up leaving a troubled Caucasus to our grandchildren," he said.

"The status quo in the Caucasus is not in the interests of Turkey
or Azerbaijan or Armenia or Russia but so far no brave step has been
taken to change it. Now, what we want is to change it."

The foreign minister also said Turkey was acting in full coordination
with Azerbaijan. "No development can harm the friendship between
Turkey and Azerbaijan," he said.

AN EPIPHANY ON GENOCIDE RECOGNITION
By Gary Huerta

Glendale News Press
April 27 2010
CA

I’ve lived in Glendale since 2001. In all that time, I never paid
much attention to April 24 and what it means to so many others who
call this home.

I’ve seen the flags on cars. I’ve watched large groups walking in
solidarity. And I’ve felt the frustration of being stuck in traffic
as cars jammed Los Feliz Boulevard, headed for Little Armenia to
commemorate the significance of the day.

What I’ve been doing these past nine years is living under the
impression that April 24 wasn’t my concern. I believed that because
I wasn’t Armenian, it wasn’t a matter of significance. But I’ve come
to realize that I was wrong, and that my ignorance had been part of
the problem.

I recently took some time to learn about April 24. Having done so,
I think it’s time this country officially recognize it as a day to
remember the Armenian Genocide. I know I’m very late coming to this
realization, but perhaps writing about it will help others see why
an official recognition of this date means so much to the Armenian
community.

Consider the sheer numbers of this atrocity. Imagine the Rose Bowl
filled to capacity on New Year’s Day. Multiply that by 15 and you’d
have about 1.5 million people. That’s how many Armenians were murdered
by the Ottoman Turks between 1915 and 1918.

When I think about that number, I appreciate why many Armenians
have been disappointed that our government has neglected to pass a
nonbinding resolution recognizing what happened in Turkey as genocide.

And now that I understand a little more about why we’ve failed to
give it recognition, my own regret that it took me so long to take
notice is only compounded by the reasons our government is dragging
its feet to do the same.

The primary reason why the Armenian Genocide receives no official
recognition is political. Because the Turkish government does not
recognize the genocide, we can’t either.

Why? Because, in our government’s opinion, it is more important not to
offend Turkey than it is to respect the atrocities suffered by a race.

Why? Because our government is trying to amass support for sanctions
against Iran, and we need the support of Turkey in the United Nations.

And because we also need the air bases on Turkish soil as a supply
route for our war efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan.

I suppose I can understand why Turkey would not want to recognize
the genocide. Even though it is impossible to ignore the fact that
1.5 million humans were murdered, denial is a much easier path to
tread than accountability.

But I am perplexed why we feel the use of an airport is justification
for condoning the Turkish government. Hypothetically speaking, I wonder
how the Jewish community would feel if our government decided to no
longer acknowledge the Holocaust as genocide because it didn’t suit
our current political agenda? I mean, if we can ignore the mass murder
and brutalization of 1.5 million, why not 6 million? Aside from the
number, is there a real difference between genocides? I don’t think so.

I want to think our country stands for more than political posturing.

I want to believe that our agenda includes having a backbone. I
want to believe that our government is willing to be witness to all
atrocities — not because it’s the politically correct thing to do,
but because it is the morally right thing to do.

Maybe my belief in what our country should do will be realized when
more people outside of the Armenian community know exactly what took
place 95 years ago in Turkey. The hurt goes deeper than an annual day
of flag waving, hunger strikes and memorial ceremonies can cure. An
incredible timeline documenting the genocide in Turkey may be found
at For those interested, it is a more
convincing document of man’s inhumanity to man than anything I could
ever write in this column.

It took me nine years to understand what April 24 is all about. For
my own failure to recognize its significance, forgive me. I hope that
by shedding more light on the matter, I can make amends and in my
own small way facilitate our government to shift its attitude more
swiftly than I did.

ARMENIAN YOUNG RESEARCHERS RECEIVE $188,000 IN GRANTS

April 2010

ECSP – the 2009 Early Career Support Program is an innovative program,
originally suggested by NFSAT. The main goal of this initiative is to
support the most promising young researchers to stay in Armenia and
establish careers in research that will contribute to the development
of Armenias knowledge-based economy. The NFSAT initiative supported
by the U.S. Civilian Research & Development Foundation (CRDF) and the
State Committee of Science of the Ministry of Education and Science
of the Republic of Armenia (SCS MES RA). As a result of the national
merit based competition a total of nineteen grants have been awarded
to early-career researchers in Armenia. Eleven one-year grants of
$4,000 have been awarded in the framework of Category A competition
to support Armenian full-time graduate students, as well as eight
two-year grants of $18,000 have been awarded in the framework of
Category B competition to support recent Ph.D. recipients.

For the 2009 ECSP program, NFSAT received funds from CRDF, which
equally cost shared with SCS MES RA. CRDF funds were made available
via funding from the U.S. Department of State.

LE FIGARO: ‘THIS IS THE FIRST TIME THE GENOCIDE IS COMMEMORATED IN TURKEY’

ARMENPRESS
APRIL 26, 2010
YEREVAN

YEREVAN, APRIL 26, ARMENPRESS: On the occasion of the commemoration
ceremonies, dedicated to the Armenian Genocide victims, held in Turkey
April 24, the French ‘Le Figaro’ daily wrote that ‘This is the first
time the Genocide is commemorated in Turkey’.

In the editorial with the same title the daily writes that more than
100 people, gathered at HaydarpaÅ~_a station- the place from where over
220 Armenian intellectuals were sent into exile- paid tribute to the
memory of the Armenians killed by the Ottoman Turks from 1915 to 1917.

The French ‘Le Monde’ writes: ‘This is the first time in Turkey:
Turkish human rights defenders, intellectuals and artists commemorated
the massacres of the Armenians’.

As to the American press, some dailies wrote on the address of Obama
that ‘the US does not want tension in the relations with Turkey’.

The New York Times mentioned in the article entitled ‘Obama Cites
‘Devastating Chapter’ in Armenia Past" that tending to manage one of
the most emotional challenges of the foreign policy, ‘the President
Obama commemorated the Armenian Remembrance Day on Saturday, called
the deaths of 1.5 million Armenians during World War I "one of the
worst atrocities" of the 20th century and "a devastating chapter"
in history. But he did not call it genocide’ not to lose its NATO ally.

In the article entitled ‘Obama again stops short of calling slaughter
of Armenians a genocide’ Los Angeles Times reported that ‘the United
States relies on Turkey as a transit point for equipment for U.S.

troops in the region. Turkey is also currently a rotating member of
the United Nations Security Council, and the Obama administration
badly wants its vote of support for a pending resolution to impose
additional sanctions on Iran to limit its nuclear activities’.

Obama says Meds Yeghern, avoids term Genocide

21:30 – 24.04.10

U.S. President Barack Obama addressed the Armenian community on April
24 with the following statement:

`On this solemn day of remembrance, we pause to recall that
ninety-five years ago one of the worst atrocities of the 20th century
began. In that dark moment of history, 1.5 million Armenians were
massacred or marched to their death in the final days of the Ottoman
Empire.

Today is a day to reflect upon and draw lessons from these terrible
events. I have consistently stated my own view of what occurred in
1915, and my view of that history has not changed. It is in all of our
interest to see the achievement a full, frank and just acknowledgment
of the facts. The Meds Yeghern is a devastating chapter in the history
of the Armenian people, and we must keep its memory alive in honor of
those who were murdered and so that we do not repeat the grave
mistakes of the past. I salute the Turks who saved Armenians in 1915
and am encouraged by the dialogue among Turks and Armenians, and
within Turkey itself, regarding this painful history. Together, the
Turkish and Armenian people will be stronger as they acknowledge their
common history and recognize their common humanity.

Even as we confront the inhumanity of 1915, we also are inspired by
the remarkable spirit of the Armenian people. While nothing can bring
back those who were killed in the Meds Yeghern, the contributions that
Armenians have made around the world over the last ninety-five years
stand as a testament to the strength, tenacity and courage of the
Armenian people. The indomitable spirit of the Armenian people is a
lasting triumph over those who set out to destroy them. Many Armenians
came to the United States as survivors of the horrors of 1915. Over
the generations Americans of Armenian descent have richened our
communities, spurred our economy, and strengthened our democracy. The
strong traditions and culture of Armenians also became the foundation
of a new republic which has become a part of the community of nations,
partnering with the world community to build a better future.

Today, we pause with them and with Armenians everywhere to remember
the awful events of 1915 with deep admiration for their contributions
which transcend this dark past and give us hope for the future.’

Tert.am

U.S.-backed Armenian-Turkish pact falls apart after neither side moves
to ratify treaty aimed at resolving disputes

2010-04-24 13:39:00

ArmInfo. Armenia said it is abandoning a U.S.-backed agreement with
Turkey to reopen the border between the two countries, until Ankara
drops preconditions and ratifies the deal, Marc Champion says in his
article in Wall Street Journal.

He says that in a televised statement to the nation, Armenian
President Serzh Sargsyan accused Ankara of stalling ratification of
the agreement, which was signed in October. He said Turkey was
treating the process as "an end in itself," whose main goal was to
prevent the U.S. from acknowledging the Ottoman Empire’s 1915 massacre
of Armenians as genocide.

"For a whole year, Turkey has done everything to protract time and
fail the process," said Sargsyan. "Reasonable time frames have, in our
opinion, elapsed. The Turkish practice of passing the 24th of April at
any cost is simply unacceptable."

The Armenian decision came just days before President Barack Obama is
due to make the White House’s annual statement on the April 24
anniversary of the massacres, in which up to 1.5 million people were
killed. The Obama administration has repeatedly argued against a
genocide declaration on grounds that it would torpedo efforts to
secure the border deal between Turkey and Armenia.

The agreement signed in October was designed to cut through a range of
disputes between Turkey and Armenia. Relations were poisoned by the
1915 massacres, the scale of which Turkey has never acknowledged.

In the 1990s, relations suffered further, when Armenia fought a war
over the enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh in Azerbaijan, a close Turkish
ally, leaving Armenia in control of a swathe of Azeri territory.
Turkey closed the border in protest, in 1993. Armenia and Turkey began
secret talks two years ago to secure a deal that would reopen the
border, establish diplomatic relations, and set up a joint commission
to discuss problems of history, such as the 1915 killings.

A year ago Thursday, the two sides set out a road map for the deal,
and in October, they signed it. Neither side, however, has ratified
the agreement. Armenia has waited for Ankara to move first, while
Ankara – under heavy pressure from Azerbaijan – insisted there should
first be progress on resolving the Nagorno-Karabakh dispute, an issue
not mentioned in the agreement.

"It is up to them to decide how they want to move with the
ratification process," Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan
told reporters in Ankara on Thursday. "I have expressed our loyalty to
the protocols on numerous occasions. We will press ahead with the
process on the principle that treaties are binding."

Both sides stand to gain if the border opens. For Armenia, it could
reduce the landlocked nation’s economic isolation. For Turkey, it
could remove an irritant in relations with the U.S. and in its
accession talks with the European Union.

Turkey strongly denies that genocide took place in 1915, describing
the deaths – the number of which it disputes – as the tragic result of a
civil war in which all sides suffered.

Most historians in the field say the Ottoman state committed what
today would be called genocide.

As the Armenian side grew increasingly frustrated, Armenia’s
parliament this year passed legislation that would allow Sargsyan to
withdraw his country’s signature from treaties, but the president said
Thursday he would leave October’s agreement intact, out of respect for
the U.S., Russia and France, which back the deal.

"This was the less bad of two options," said Thomas de Waal, Caucasus
expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, a Washington
think tank. "Armenia was never going to continue with the status quo,
the question was how it left the process – leaving the door ajar, or
slamming it shut."

Thursday’s decision left the door open to diplomacy, but also
responded to Sargsyan’s critics at home and among Armenia’s large
diaspora, says de Waal. These critics say Sargsyan has been duped by
Turkey into providing Obama with an excuse not to call the 1915
massacres genocide, as he pledged to do in his presidential election
campaign.

Since a U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee voted last month to
recognize the genocide, the White House has lobbied against a full
vote on the House floor, saying it would kill the border agreement
between Turkey and Armenia. Ankara reacted furiously to the March
vote, recalling its ambassador.

Obama pledged during his election campaign to recognize the Armenian
genocide, but, like several presidents before him, has balked once in
office, faced with angering Turkey – a member of the North Atlantic
Treaty Organization and an important player in the Middle East. Obama
isn’t expected to use the term genocide in his statement Saturday,
analysts say.

Prospects for ratifying the Turkey-Armenia deal have long looked poor,
but analysts say progress is now unlikely at least until after Turkish
elections, which must be held by mid-2011. A meeting in Washington
this month between Sargsyan and Erdogan went poorly, according to
people familiar with the matter.

TendersInfo
April 22, 2010 Thursday

Armenia Inaugurates New Power Plant

The state-of-the-art plant was built in Yerevan in place of an
obsolete facility with a $247 million loan provided by the Japanese
government through the Japan Bank of International Cooperation (JBIC).
The long-term loan was disbursed to the Armenian government on
concessional terms in 2007.

With a capacity of 242 megawatts, its gas-powered turbine will be able
to generate approximately one-quarter of Armenia s current electricity
output. Officials said it will also be twice as efficient as the plant
s decommissioned unit and four other Soviet-era facilities of its kind
functioning in the central Armenian town of Hrazdan.
According to Energy and Natural Resources Minister Armen Movsisian,
this is the main reason why the domestic price of electricity will not
increase this year despite the recent 17 percent rise in the cost of
gas imported from Russia. Thermal power plants currently meet roughly
one-third of Armenia s electricity needs.
It was possible to keep electricity tariffs unchanged in 2010 because
of the fact that this new plant will go into service on April 21,
Movsisian told journalists during the opening ceremony that was also
attended by President Serzh Sarkisian.
Movsisian described the new plant as the first major energy facility
built in the country since independence. He said it will not only
enable Armenia to economize on natural gas but also cut carbon
emissions.
Armenia s energy sector will expand further after the ongoing
construction of the Hrazdan plant s new and even more powerful Fifth
Unit. Russia s Gazprom monopoly acquired the incomplete facility in
2006 as part of a complex agreement with the Yerevan government that
raised its controlling stake in the Armenian gas distribution network
to a commanding 80 percent. The Russian giant pledged to spend more
than $200 million on finishing its protracted construction by 2011.
The new Yerevan and Hrazdan facilities will pave the way for
large-scale Armenian imports of natural gas from neighboring Iran
through a pipeline constructed in late 2008. Armenia began receiving
modest amounts of Iranian gas in May last year. With Russian gas
essentially meeting its domestic needs, it is expected that the bulk
of that gas will be converted into electricity and exported to the
Islamic Republic.
Movsisian revealed on Wednesday that his government would like to
construct yet another thermal power plant in the coming years. I hope
that we will be able to build another plant of this kind which will
boost the capacity of our energy system and have a greater effect on
our economy, he said.

Armenia has had an electricity surplus ever since overcoming a severe
energy crisis in the early and mid-1990s by reopening its Soviet-built
nuclear power station at Metsamor nearly 15 years ago.
Ltd.

news24, UK
April 24 2010

Armenia marks ‘genocide’
2010-04-24 22:32

Yerevan – Hundreds of thousands of people on Saturday marked the 95th
anniversary of the mass slaughter of Armenians in Ottoman Turkey, just
days after Armenia halted a historic reconciliation deal with Turkey.

The 1915 murders of hundreds of thousands of Armenians has become an
insurmountable obstacle for relations between the two countries.
Armenia insists that Turkey recognise the slaughter as genocide.

On Saturday Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan laid flowers at a
memorial for the victims in the capital Yerevan and thanked those
countries which supported "our struggle for justice".

The slaughter and "annihilation of an ancient culture" was a
deliberate policy of the Ottoman Turk government, Sargsyan said. "The
instigators of this appalling crime expected that those who survived
would lose their national identity, scattering across the globe," he
continued.

The Armenian parliament unexpectedly halted the ratification process
of normalisation accords signed with Turkey in October 2009. The
accords were expected to restore diplomatic relations between the two
countries.

Sore point

But the protocols were still awaiting ratification by the parliaments
in Ankara and Yerevan, each side accusing the other of adding new
conditions after the agreement was struck.

Armenia said that Turkey was delaying its ratification of the accords,
rendering its own ratification process "pointless".

The killings have also remained a sore point between the two sides as
international debate continues about their definition as genocide.
Armenia traditionally commemorates the murders on April 24, the day
when the execution of intellectuals began.

Estimates of the number of those killed range from between 200 000 and
1.5 million.

Turkey has always denied that the killings constituted genocide,
arguing that the Armenians had sided with the Russians against the
Turks in the First World War.

– SAPA

ks-genocide-20100424

iLoubnan.info, Lebanon
April 24 2010

Armenians in Lebanon mark mass killings
BEIRUT | – April 24, 2010

Tens of thousands of Lebanese-Armenians took to the streets of Beirut
on Saturday in a peaceful demonstration to mark the 95th anniversary
of the mass killings of Armenians under the Ottoman empire.

"Our demands today are the same as they have been for the past 95
years: international and Turkish acknowledgment of the genocide,"
Lebanese-Armenian State Minister Jean Ogassapian told AFP. "We demand
our rights."

Amid tight security, demonstrators including MPs of Armenian origin
blocked a main highway leading into Beirut, waving Armenian flags and
carrying banners that read: "1,500,000 Armenians massacred, but we
survived. We’ll tell you the history of Turkey’s atrocities."

Other banners read: "Run, Turkey, run, but you can’t hide," and
"Impunity nurtures culture devoid of ethics." Armenians say up to 1.5
million of their kin were systematically killed between 1915 and 1917
as the Ottoman Empire, the predecessor of modern Turkey, was falling
apart.

The events are marked every year on April 24, the date in 1915 when
Ottoman authorities rounded up and arrested more than 200 Armenian
intellectuals and community leaders in Constantinople.

Turkey fiercely rejects the genocide label, arguing instead that
between 300,000 and 500,000 Armenians and at least as many Turks died
in civil strife when Armenians took up arms in eastern Anatolia and
sided with invading Russian troops.

The dispute has poisoned relations between the two neighbours for
decades, and reconciliation efforts launched last year remain frozen.
Hundreds of thousands of Armenian Christians are believed to have fled
to Lebanon after the mass killings. Lebanon today hosts the Arab
world’s largest Armenian community, estimated at around 140,000
people.

RAFFI HOVANNISIAN: SUSPENSION OF TURKEY PROTOCOLS RATIFICATION WAS A GOOD TACTICIAN’S STEP
Siranuysh Gevorgyan

ArmeniaNow reporter
vannisian_comments
News | 23.04.10 | 15:00

Raffi Hovannisian

Raffi Hovannisian: Suspension of Turkey protocols ratification was
a good tactician’s step Everything he is saying is out of spite. As
much as I dislike our president, I am happy he ‘experimented’. He
took a risk, tried to mend the tension, it didn’t work, he showed
the world that we tried. It’s so easy for Mr. Raffi to mock him now….

Founder of the opposition Heritage party and its leading member
in parliament Raffi Hovannisian has described President Serzh
Sargsyan’s announcement on the suspension of the ratification of the
Armenian-Turkish normalization agreements in the legislature as a good
tactician’s step, but said, however, that a good strategist should
not have allowed the appearance of such a situation in the first place.

Hovannisian, who served as independent Armenia’s first foreign
minister in 1992, says that the preconditions in the Armenian-Turkish
normalization process existed from the outset, and the step taken
by the Armenian president should be viewed as admission that his
initiative was baseless.

"It was an experiment, and that experiment has failed," Hovannisian
said, speaking at a press conference on Friday, adding that currently
Armenia is in an emergency situation.

"We can overcome this emergency situation in the coming months either
by means of new elections or by essentially new changes, which presume
the presence of political will that is not visible till now either
among the authorities nor in some parts of the opposition," Hovannisian
said, adding that these changes must happen at least before September.

According to him, after the president’s address, Armenia should without
protocols exchange with Turkey diplomatic notes and ambassadors, who
will work on settling issues of both countries; and Turkey must open
the closed border. And if Turkey keeps on imposing preconditions,
Armenia should advance its own preconditions, too.

"Armenia must accept the challenge, that is to say, it must remind
not only about the Genocide, but also about the occupation of Western
Armenia," said Hovannisian.