29.36% turnout fixed as of 2 pm
31.05.2009 15:16 GMT+04:00
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ 29.36% turnout was fixed in the election to the city
council as of 2 pm. 226 487 out of 771 477 voters have attended
polling stations.
The republic’s top leaders have already voted.
Turkey’s membership in EU cold bring to a clash between France and Sweden
30.05.2009 12:52 GMT+04:00
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ French President Nicolas Sarkozy has canceled a
visit to Sweden reportedly because he wanted to avoid a clash with
Swedish leaders over their support of Turkey’s membership in the
European Union.
Sarkozy’s office said the visit was canceled due to scheduling
problems, but French newspaper Le Figaro said on Thursday that the
French leader, an outspoken opponent of Turkish accession to the EU,
did not want to publicly highlight disagreements over Turkey when he
meets with Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt.
On Monday, Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt told Le Figaro that the
EU had "a strategic interest" in Turkey’s EU integration and warned
against "closing the door" to Ankara, Today’s Zaman reported.
The leaders of Germany and France, Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy
denounced the idea of expanding the European Union indefinitely to
include new members such as Turkey. `A Europe without borders would be
a Europe without identity,’ the French President emphasized.
AZERBAIJAN IS "CONCERNED" ABOUT ARMENIA’S PARTICIPATION IN SINGLE ENERGY SYSTEM PROJECT
/PanARMENIAN.Net/
29.05.2009 21:43 GMT+04:00
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Marlen Askerov, vice president of Azerenerji OJSC
(Azerbaijan’s energy operator), says that last year Russia and Iran
agreed on a scheme of this project but the Azerbaijan party has some
remarks to this work.
"They included Armenia in this scheme. But by signing the environment
route map we have obliged not to pass non-eco-friendly product through
our country. Armenian nuclear power plant, the major power producer
in this country, was built in the 80s and designed in the late 70s –
early 80s. Then a norm for engineering was 8-grade seismicity of the
region and today this level was increased up to 9 grades. Thus, the
Armenian plant does not conform to ecological requirements on seismic
activity. It is potentially ecologically dangerous for Azerbaijan,
Iran, Turkey and Georgia. We offer not to include Armenia in the
project until operation of this plant is stopped," Askerov said.
The issue of uniting of energy systems of Azerbaijan, Russia and Iran
has been under discussion since 2002, abc.az reported.
GEOFFREY GOSHGARIAN HONORED WITH A PEN CLUB AWARD
/PanARMENIAN.Net/
28.05.2009 16:00 GMT+04:00
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Geoffrey Goshgarian’s English version of an extract
from Hagop Oshagan’s The Remnants was one of eight translations honored
with a PEN Club translation fund award at a ceremony in New York.
Mr. Goshgarian, a freelance translator, was educated at Yale and
UCLA. He has to his credit sixteen book-length translations from French
and German, including Louis Althusser’s writings. He is the author of
To Kiss the Chastening Rod. Mr. Goshgarian began englishing Oshagan’s
1,500-page novel cycle in the 1990s. His translation of part of the
first novel in the cycle was originally intended for inclusion in
a projected multivolume work on modern Armenian literature by Marc
Nichanian, then professor of Armenian studies at New York’s Columbia
University. "Except for a short passage published in Ararat in 1998
and another released by the online journal Words without Borders in
December of last year," Mr. Goshgarian said, "my translation would
probably still be moldering in the same closet in which reams of
Armenian prose and poetry that I’ve translated have been languishing
for more than a decade if Nanor Kebranian and Taline Voskeritchian
hadn’t taken an interest in it last year. The fact that Oshagan’s
text has been singled out for an award means that I can now translate
enough of it to bring an English translation of at least one novel in
the cycle into the realm of possibility." While the $3,000 PEN award
cannot cover the costs of translating a full-length work of fiction,
it often attracts publishers or sponsors who can. It remains to be
seen whether a major Anglo-American trade publisher or university press
will now take the risk of putting out an English version of a work by a
novelist who is virtually unknown to Anglophone readers and wrote in an
"exotic" language such as Armenian. Considered the foremost Armenian
novelist by many Armenian literary critics in the Diaspora, Oshagan
(1883-1948) is also a chronicler of Ottoman Armenia’s modern political,
social, and literary history. His life’s story reflects the tragedy of
his people. Born and raised in Bursa, a predominantly Turkish city with
a big Armenian population located not far from Istanbul, he worked,
before the first World War, as a teacher in various Armenian schools
in nearby villages. He managed to elude the April 1915 roundup of
prominent Armenians in the Ottoman capital that marked the beginning
of the Genocide, and lived underground there through the war; arrested
by the Ottoman authorities on at least seven different occasions,
he managed to escape each time.
In the last year of the war, Oshagan escaped to Bulgaria, returning to
Allied-controlled Istanbul at war’s end to teach in various Armenian
schools until 1924. He died suddenly during a visit to Aleppo in 1948,
on the eve of a planned pilgrimage to the killing fields near Der Zor.
AL PACINO IS SET TO PLAY DR. DEATH
/PanARMENIAN.Net/
28.05.2009 16:00 GMT+04:00
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ In Barry Levinson’s film shot for HBO TV channel,
Al Pacino is set to play Jack Kevorkian, better known with the nickname
Doctor Death. The film tells about the period when Kevorkian built the
‘Mercy Machine’ for conducting his first assisted suicide.
Scenario author is Adam Mazer. Project time-limits are not yet
specified. Confirmed proponent of physician assisted death, Jack
Kevorkian had euthanasia legalized. In 1990-98, he assisted in 130
cases of suicide. Patients’ bodies were left in motels, hospital
wards and mortuaries. Charges were brought against him in 1999 when
law enforcers gained access to a video tape portraying the suicide of
Thomas York, 52. Kevorkian was sentenced to 8 years in prison, and was
released in 2007. At the end of 2008, Kevorkian, 80, ran for Congress
elections. He was an independent candidate from one of constituencies
of Detroit. Having received 2.7% of votes, the doctor suffered defeat.
PRESS RELEASE
Black Maria Gallery
Contact: Zara Zeitountsian
323. 660 9393
[email protected] [mailto:[email protected]]
Against the backdrop of gender politics, the ever-evolving roles of
men and women, and particularly the cultural underpinnings that inform
tradition and change, the ‘Knights and Hunters’ exhibition examines
our understanding of what could be described as the gentleman’s ethos
on the one hand, and the Don Juan complex on the other.
Sam Saghatelian and friends in
KNIGHTS AND HUNTERS
Black Maria Gallery: 3137 Glendale Blvd. Los Angeles, CA 90039
Gallery Hours: Tuesday – Saturday, 12pm until 6pm (or by appointment)
Los Angeles-Sam Saghatelian, the chief curator of Black Maria and a
multi-faceted artist, invited his fellow friends, Ken Garduno, Jason
Hernandez, Michael C. Hsiung to explore the complex interconnectedness
of chivalry and machismo. "Knights and Hunters," a new group
exhibition will open on Saturday, June 13, at 7 PM.
"Against the backdrop of gender politics, the ever-evolving roles of
men and women, and particularly the cultural underpinnings that inform
tradition and change, the ‘Knights and Hunters’ exhibition examines
our understanding of what could be described as the gentleman’s ethos
on the one hand, and the Don Juan complex on the other," Saghatelian
explained.
"As the works included in the exhibition shed light on the many
ironies of what it might mean to be a man in the contemporary world,
they reveal the comical, the shocking and not-so-shocking, and
sometimes the downright grotesque," Saghatelian continued. "So it is
that many of the works are tongue-in-cheek and unabashedly over the
top. But perhaps the most important thread running through these works
is that of a certain loving curiosity, and ultimately an insistence on
pointing at a common humanity beyond the politics and stereotypes."
"Knights and Hunters" will remain open through Friday, July 11, 2009.
Sam Saghatelian
Sam Saghatelian was born and raised in Armenia. He worked as an
architect until in 1988. At the brink of the collapse of the USSR and
Armenia’s independence, Saghatelian began his journey as an artist. He
exhibited in the Armenian Pavilion at the 2001 Venice Biennale and his
works are part of the permanent collection of the Armenian Museum of
Contemporary Art. In 2003, Saghatelian moved to Los Angeles to
continue his journey as an artist. Since relocating in LA, he has
exhibited at APG Gallery in Atlanta, Black Maria Gallery in Los
Angeles, Articultural Gallery in Los Angeles, Harvest Gallery in Los
Angeles and will be showing at La Luz De Jesus in May of 2008.
Sam Saghatelian about his ON BLACK series
My habitat is in the land of memories and it is constructed of paper
and canvas.
The walls of my mental domicile are made of photos from my family
albums, letters, sketches, erotic cutouts and scribbles. I live in a
land of haze and fog, where it is impossible to separate fact from
fiction and reality from imagination. The moment my present takes form
on the canvas, it belongs to the past, and anything that is committed
to memory tends to age, disintegrate and morphe into an imagined,
often idealized reality.
My world is the world of silent movies. The black canvas is the
silence and the action is almost always accompanied by writing, yet
none of it is coherent, because my unconscious is merely trying to
find a composition for the chaotic flow of information and emotion.
Here, in this black and white world of mine, almost everything appears
out of context; my father, his friends, the pin up girl, a quote, the
house I grew up in, a word, the woman I love, my obsessions, my
fears…they all take part in constructing the big picture, and in the
final analysis, I am the big picture. Me, committing my present to the
past, in silence.
ANELIK TRANSFER SYSTEM DROP EXPECTED BY YEAREND
/PanARMENIAN.Net/
27.05.2009 13:53 GMT+04:00
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ By the end of the year a drop in Anelik transfer
system is expected.
"Anelik Bank is a bank with its own money transfer system, which
functions in more than 200 banks in 100 countries," Anelik Bank
President Aram Lazarian said in an interview with PanARMENIAN.Net.
"It’s natural that the crisis affected the bank’s activities," he said.
"Anelik system functions in many former socialist and Western European
countries. Due to the crisis consequences, we expect 10-30% drop by
the end of the current year. Besides, some banking processes were
frozen, as a result of panic-stricken population," Mr. Lazarian said.
"NUCLEAR ENERGY AND ENERGY SECURITY" 4TH CONFERENCE KICKS OFF IN ARMENIA
ARMENPRESS
MAY 26, 2009
YEREVAN
"Nuclear Energy and Energy Security" 4th conference kicked off today
in Armenia within the frameworks of NATO’s "Science for Peace and
Security" program. Representatives of 14 countries – Armenia, USA,
Russia, Estonia, Georgia, Belgium, Japan, Croatia, Belarus, Ukraine,
Kazakhstan, Spain, Turkmenistan, Romania participate in the conference.
The leaders of the conference – representative of the Armenia’s
"Progressive Science and Technology" center Samvel Apikyan and US
"Brookhaven National Laboratory" member David Diamond noted that this
conference is a new thing in the processes organized by NATO.
S. Apikyan said that the 21st century is a period of energy
challenges. In the recent decades the usage of energy in the world
essentially increased which once again shows that nuclear energy does
not have alternative.
The increase of the usage of energy in the world Apikyan tied with
several factors – development of global economy, unprecedented
growth of the number of population, essential growth of the life
quality. S. Apikyan underscored the organization of the conference,
noting that it has serious importance for Armenia which in that
respect has lack of resources.
According to D. Diamond, the usage of nuclear energy demands solution
of a number of serious issues. Among them he singled out the relative
high price, environment protection, non-dissemination of radioactive
materials, solution of issue of wastes. In case of the solution
of these issues the nuclear energy sphere will have unprecedented
development.
D. Diamond noted that they also discuss the issue of construction
of new nuclear unit in Armenia and a great attention will be paid to
its accordance to international standards. According to D. Diamond,
the ensuring of secure activity of the new unit demands systemic steps.
Armenian deputy energy and natural resources minister Areg Galstyan
noted that after the energy crisis, Armenia has carried out a number
of reforms in this sphere and now it has opportunities of exporting
electricity. In a few days a contract will be signed with the winner
company which will start the process of oversight of the construction
of the new nuclear unit.
US ambassador to Armenia Marie Yovanovitch said that US government
pays a great attention to ensuring security of the energy system as
well as to the construction of the nuclear unit.
Among the issues discussed at the conference were the ones connected
with the new models of nuclear units, environment protection, etc.
CEMIL CICEK: TURKEY IS AN OPPORTUNITY FOR EU
/PanARMENIAN.Net/
26.05.2009 14:24 GMT+04:00
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Turkey will not be a burden for the EU, Turkish
Deputy Prime Minister said.
"The EU may be an economic power without Turkey, but it cannot be a
strategic power. Turkey is an opportunity for the EU. They [European
leaders] are first saying this and later that. They should keep their
promises. We stand by our words and expect them to do the same,"
said Cemil Cicek, government spokesman and Deputy Prime Minister.
Cicek said Turkey is pushing forward with new reforms to fulfill its
aspirations for full EU membership.
"We are enacting legislation about the EU. We are working on a plan
to fight corruption. The Justice Ministry will have the final say on
these plans. There may be points lacking in our plans or objections
against them. The union will take the Justice Ministry as an addressee
in these plans," Cicek said, Today’s Zaman reported.
Armenia to receive a stabilization loan from Russia in one tranche
2009-05-23 14:24:00
ArmInfo. Armenia will receive a stabilization loan worth $500 mln from
Russia in one tranche, Armenian Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan said,
Friday, when replying to ArmInfo correspondent’s question.
"We are to submit the agreement to the president, then the agreement
will be considered by the Constitutional Court, afterwards the credit
agreement will be ratified by parliament. Only upon completion of this
procedure Armenia will receive these funds",- stressed the prime
minister.
To recall, on May 20 the finance ministers of Russia and Armenia
Aleksey Kudrin and Tigran Davtyan signed an agreement on provision of
15-year loan worth $500 mln at the rate of LIBOR+3% to support
Armenia’s economy under the crisis conditions. The grace period will be
5 years. To recall, Armenia received the preliminary consent of Russia
on February 9, 2009 during the intergovernmental talks.