Author: Kajoyan Gevork

UNITE IN PRAYER TO STOP ATROCITIES IN DARFUR

Salt Lake Tribune,UTAH
Dec 9 2006

This weekend more than 1,000 faith communities and organizations
across the nation will unite for a "weekend of prayer for Darfur."

The Save Darfur Coalition is organizing the event to help raise
awareness of the worsening humanitarian crisis.

"When faith communities join together towards a common goal, it sends
a message that transcends not just faith but all of humanity," said
David Rubenstein, executive director of the Save Darfur Coalition.

Rev. Dr. Bob Edgar, general secretary of the National Council of
Churches of Christ said, "I’m reminded of an African proverb, ‘If
you want to walk fast, walk alone; if you want to walk far, walk
together.’ This weekend we’re going to walk far together and we’re
going to walk urgently together in prayer, hoping for the violence
to stop."

Darfur, Sudan, has been since 2003 the setting of the world’s most
recent genocide. According to Africa Action, a U.S.-based advocacy
and activism organization, more than 450,000 people have died and 2.5
million have been displaced. But as the human catastrophe intensifies,
our attention remains divided, and not enough is being done to end
the violence.

Conflict began when rebel groups accused the Arab-dominated government
of discriminating against black Africans in the region, reports the UN
Chronicle. When fighting erupted, Janjaweed, the government-supported
Arab militias, began committing widespread atrocities against ethnic
Africans. The Sudanese government restricted humanitarian workers
from accessing the affected regions.

Non-Arab residents of Darfur continue to be subjected to horrendous
abuses including brutal killings of babies, mass rapes and burning
of homes and religious buildings.

In the 20th century we witnessed ethnic cleansing and the ongoing
impunity for crimes against humanity in Armenia, Cambodia, Bosnia
and Rwanda and during the Holocaust. Whether Darfur is comparable is
not for me to judge, but the crisis is clearly a violation of human
rights that should offend the sensibilities of every person of faith.

"If there’s one issue that we’re united on, it’s the issue of trying
to stop this horrible genocide in Darfur," said Rabbi Gutow, executive
director of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs. "We are all opening
our hearts and our lips to try to bring God into this discussion and
into this work."

The Hebrew scriptures in Proverbs 24:11-12 instruct us to take action:
"Rescue those being led away to death; hold back those staggering
toward slaughter. If you say, ‘But we knew nothing about this,’
does not he who weighs the heart perceive it? Does not he who guards
your life know it? Will he not repay each person according to what
he has done?"

Tomorrow our church will celebrate the four African nations represented
in our congregation. We will pause and pray for the people of Darfur. I
implore every Christian to join us in prayer.

— * COREY J. HODGES writes about current events and ideas
from a moral perspective. Hodges, the senior pastor of the New
Pilgrim Baptist Church in Taylorsville, welcomes comments at
coreyjhodges@ comcast.net. You may also comment by e-mailing
[email protected].

* For more information about the Save Darfur Coalition, go to

RESCUING RELIEF IN ARMENIA: OTHER COUNTRIES HELPED OUT IN RESCUING

ABC News
SHOW: TIME TUNNEL 9:03 AM EST ABC
December 8, 2006 Friday

Anchors: Rob Simmelkjaer
Reporters: Jerry King (Moscow, Russia)

PETER JENNINGS (ABC NEWS)

(Off-camera) For the Soviet bureaucracy, the challenge is now is
rescue and relief. The region hit is mountainous making it just that
much tougher. Here’s our man in Moscow, Jerry King.

GRAPHICS: MOSCOW

JERRY KING (ABC NEWS)

(Voiceover) At a communist youth league office in Moscow, people
brought in shopping bags with whatever they could donate, canned
goods and clothing. The International Red Cross and the Muslim were
present. Organized blood donations across the country, and this one
at the Moscow University. This was in the Republic of Georgia.

Tonight’s television news broadcast appeals for more blood. Even
though, an official admitted they could not cope with the number
of donors they had. Special accounts have been set up in banks for
donations of money. For the first time, that included an account for
hard currency, from foreigners here. Workers in Minsk announced they
would send a whole trainload of construction workers and equipment.

JERRY KING (ABC NEWS)

(Off-camera) Officials say the prime task is the search for a survivors
who may still be beneath the rubble, that and to find them and bury the
dead. Another head ache, to find a way around the logistical problems.

JERRY KING (ABC NEWS)

(Voiceover) The Soviet military, which has been trying to stem ethnic
violence between Armenia and neighboring Azerbaijani, is sending in
additional units to care for the homeless, to help rebuild. Said the
Azerbaijani minister of health, ‘Pain and suffering bring our people
together." Jerry King, ABC News, Moscow.

BY ESTIMATES OF FORMER ARMENIAN PRIME MINISTER, 45 FAMILIES CONTROL OVER 50% OF ARMENIAN GDP

Noyan Tapan
Dec 08 2006

YEREVAN, DECEMBER 8, NOYAN TAPAN. The two-digit rates of Armenia’s
economic growth are exaggerated at least 2-2.5 times, former prime
minister of Armenia Hrant Bagratian said during a meeting with
reporters on December 8. By his estimates, 45 families in Armenia
control over 50% of the country’s GDP, while the Armenian economy is
trying to feed the 3-million population. "Any serious development is
just out of question," H. Bagratian stated, expressing an opinion
that over the past 10 years there has been a change of values and
all home political developments lead not to an economic growth but to
redistribution of influence in the economic, political and cultural
spheres. Moreover, in his opinion, the current situation does not
allow healthy competition to form in the country.

HEADS OF COMMUNITIES DO NOT ABIDE BY THE DECISIONS OF THE PRIME MINISTER

A1+
[08:25 pm] 08 December, 2006

Today the special session of the Lori regional council took place
which was convened by the heads of the communities. Although they had
invited RA Prime Minister Andranik Margaryan to the session too, deputy
Minister of Regional Government Vache Terteryan attended it instead.

The heads of the communities had three main issues in the agenda:
the assessment of the work of former governor of Lori region Henrik
Kochinyan, the reasons for resigning him from work and making a
statement.

At the beginning of the session the community heads voted and decided
to have a closed session without the presence of the journalists. They
decided to protect their rights, but head of the village of Odzun
Meliq Ayvazyan who is famous by the name "Alabash" attacked them
himself. According to the journalists, he was drunk.

Nevertheless, the journalists waited till the end of the session. After
the session deputy Minister of Regional Government Vache Terteryan
informed that "Henrik Kochinyan did not resign himself. It was a
political decision". The journalists weren’t told anything about the
two-hour session.

According to the information of "A1+", some of the community heads
threatened to gather signatures in order to quit the Republican party.

GREECE TOUGHENED STAND ON TURKEY

PanARMENIAN.Net
08.12.2006 17:29 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Greece said Thursday that Turkey must open all its
ports and harbors to the Greek Cypriots as part of the agreement it
made with the European Union to begin membership talks, and called
on the EU to sanction Ankara for failing to meet its obligations. As
reported by The New Anatolian, Greek Foreign Ministry spokesperson
Giorgos Koumoutsakos said the customs agreement Turkey signed in July
2005, known as the Ankara protocol, requires Turkey to open its entire
territory to trade from all member states, including Greek Cyprus, not
just some ports. In an apparent hardening of Greece’s stand on Turkish
membership talks, Koumoutsakos said the EU must send Ankara a "strong
message" by suspending talks on more than the eight of 35 policy areas
the European Commission has recommended freezing. He would not provide
a number, but it was the first time that Greece was asking for such
a tough action. He added that in this "strong message, we don’t think
eight chapters are enough." "If you are sanctioning someone, then you
have to see if they are working" to meet their obligations, he said.

GRIGOR GHONJEYAN: ULP WILL MANAGE AT LEAST TO KEEP ITS PRESENCE AT NA OF NEXT CONVOCATION

Noyan Tapan
Dec 07 2006

YEREVAN, DECEMBER 7, NOYAN TAPAN. The United Labor Party pretends
on at least keeping and if possible extending its "presence and
according to it, also its role," at the parliament as a result of
the 2007 parliamentary elections.

Grigor Ghonjeyan, member of RA NA United Labor Party (ULP) faction,
said this at the December 8 press briefing. He said that the party
is going to run for the elections independently, without making
alliance with any political force. Summing up the results of the
parliament autumn session that finished the day before, G.Ghonjeyan
gave assurance that with several special sittings to be convened by the
end of the year the parliament will succeed to fill in the legislative
gaps. Among the latters he attached importance to amendments to the
Electoral Code and the law "On RA National Anthem."

KARABAKH COMPLAINS OF LOSING MONEY ON RELATIONSHIP WITH ARMENIA
by Anna Israelyan

Aravot, Armenia
Nov 22 2006

"The NKR gives more money to Armenia than gets"

The speaker of Nagornyy Karabakh’s parliament, Ashot Gulyan, is not
happy with the size of the credit allocated from the Armenian budget
to the Nagornyy Karabakh republic [NKR]. When Robert Kocharyan, former
NKR president, became the president of Armenia in 1998, an office
of the State Customs Committee which had been working on the border
between the NKR and Armenia for seven years was closed. The decision
was logical from the political standpoint, for states which aspire
to unite should not have points that separate them. But whether or
not the move was economically justified remains at least disputable,
at least in terms of the interests of the NKR.

All the goods that enter Nagornyy Karabakh have passed through
Armenian customs and Armenia has kept sizable funds which should
be given to the NKR. According to estimates of the NKR government,
the customs fees transferred to the Armenian budget amount to some
5bn drams [more than 13m dollars] a year. For this reason the NKR
officials have repeatedly said that this sum should really be passed
on to Nagornyy Karabakh immediately and could form the bulk of the
money given [by Armenia] to the NKR.

The leader of the parliamentary commission on finance, budget and
economic issues, Gagik Minasyan, told us that 4.4 per cent of the
Armenian budget is given to Karabakh through the inter-state credit
every year. And he confirmed the current state of affairs. "I can say
that if any other state includes customs fees in its state funds,
then Karabakh does not have such an opportunity, I think that this
money fully compensates the inter-state credit which we give to the
NKR," Minasyan said.

Let us note that by means of the inter-state credit Armenia supplies
about 65 per cent of the NKR budget. People in Karabakh think that
it is necessary to specify that the sums of the inter-state credit do
not come 100 per cent from Armenia and its state budget. One top NKR
official even told us that actually they leave bigger sums in Armenia
when performing customs clearing than the Armenian budget allocates
to them. Asked about this, NKR parliament speaker Ashot Gulyan smiled
and replied in a diplomatic way: "There are various calculations. I
cannot say if these sums are really bigger than those given to us.

But I think they need to be specified. Anyway, it is more correct to
have bigger demand as in the economic development sense today the NKR
needs more investment, and this applies to foreign investment as well
as to the inter-state credit."

For several years now the NKR has proposed establishing finance and
economic specifications between Armenia and Karabakh. The dignity
of proud Karabakh residents will not be insulted and they will be
pleased if it becomes a fact that they acquire the [customs] sums
that should have reached them anyway. They want a separate line [in
the budget accounts] to say how much NKR money from the inter-state
credit is left at customs points [in Armenia].

"MERHA-BAREV" EXHIBITION OPENS IN ISTANBUL

Noyan Tapan
Armenians Today
Dec 07 2006

ISTANBUL, DECEMBER 7, NOYAN TAPAN – ARMENIANS TODAY. The exhibition
entitled "Merha-Barev," where works of 5 Armenian and 5 Turk
photographers are presented, opened in Istanbul. To recap, the
exhibition with the same title was held in autumn in Yerevan as
well. According to Marmara, the goal of the exhibition is to present
everyday life of one another to the Armenian and Turkish society.

OMBUDSMAN’S OFFICE DRAWS ATTENTION TO SCHOOLS FOR CHILDREN WITH SPECIAL NEEDS

Armenpress
Dec 06 2006

YEREVAN, DECEMBER 6, ARMENPRESS: The monitoring and rapid reaction
group of the Armenian office of human rights defender has found that
a school in a Yerevan district for children with hearing problems
lacked sanitary facilities and needed urgent repair.

Silva Markosian, an aide to the Armenian ombudsman, said virtually alls
schools for children with special needs in the country face serious
problems, aggravated by instances of violation of children’s rights.

She said the group pays regular inspection visits to military units,
special schools, prisons and old people’s homes. She said conditions
in prisons have improved a little and the bulk of complaints of the
convicts was about ‘unjust court verdicts.’

UNIVERSITY SUSPENDS TURKISH PROFESSOR
Suzan Fraser

Associated Press
Dec 5 2006

ANKARA, Turkey – A university has suspended one of its professors for
remarks he made about Turkey’s revered founder, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk,
an official said Monday.

The suspension of professor Atilla Yayla has brought into sharp
focus the country’s ambivalence toward freedom of speech even as it
intensifies its campaign to join the European Union.

Ankara’s Gazi University suspended Yayla last week after the political
scientist criticized Ataturk at a conference in the Aegean coastal city
of Izmir, an official at the state-run university said on condition of
anonymity because civil servants are barred from speaking to reporters
without prior authorization.

News reports said the professor was suspended after he referred to
the late soldier-statesman as "that man," criticized the statues
and pictures of Ataturk adorning government offices, and said an
era of one-party rule under Ataturk had led to "regression rather
than progress."

Turkey’s European Union membership bid looks increasingly troubled over
what European officials say is a slowdown in reforms, including in free
speech, and on Turkey’s refusal to open up its ports and airports to
EU member Cyprus. The European Commission recommended last week that
the EU freeze negotiations on eight of 35 policy areas in Turkey’s
membership talks, which began in October 2005.

Earlier this year, novelist Orhan Pamuk was forced to stand trial,
after a group of ultra-nationalist lawyers accused him of "insulting
Turkishness" for telling a Swiss newspaper that 1 million Armenians
were killed on Turkish territory. The trial was dropped on a
technicality under heavy pressure from the European Union. Pamuk
later won the Nobel Prize for Literature.

Ataturk founded secular and Westward-looking Turkey from the ashes
of the Ottoman Empire in 1923, after saving the country from invading
Western powers.

Regulations require that his portraits hang in government offices and
schools, but the affection of Turks is so great toward their founder
that many also hang his picture in their homes, shops and offices.

At the same time, more and more Turks are questioning his legacy and
the rigid way some of his followers – hard-liners inside the military,
the bureaucracy and the judiciary – are interpreting his principles
to oppose liberal reforms and change.

The university’s chancellor on Monday defended his decision to
temporarily suspend Yayla until an investigation is completed.

A professor "does not have to like Ataturk but I cannot allow a person
who is opposed to the Republic’s main principles to educate students,"
Yamac told Vatan newspaper in an interview published Monday.

Yayla’s comments have divided Turkey. A group of protesters sent
Yamac a parcel containing sticky tape over the weekend, so that he
may "gag professors." Others petitioned the university saying Yayla
should not be allowed to teach.