Author: Nalchajian Markos

DAVUTOGLU DEPARTING FOR BAKU

Tert.am
19.04.10

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu begins a tour today. He
is expected to visit several countries, among them also Azerbaijan,
Iran, Estonia and Italia. Davutoglu may visit also Kyrgyzstan.

According to Turkish CNNTurk Davutoglu will leave for today Baku
where he is expected to discuss the details of recent meetings in
Washington between Armenian, Turkish and American officials.

Davutoglu is expected to visit Iran immediately after Baku either
this evening or tomorrow morning to present the Iranian administration
Washington’s viewpoint over Tehran’s long-disputed nuclear enrichment
program.

US and Western powers believe Iran is building a nuclear bomb but
Tehran says its program is for peaceful purposes.

To Solve Inter Community Problems by own Means

NKR Government Information and
Public Relations Department

April 16, 2010

The regular out-going session of the NKR Government took place on
April 15, in Martouni. Head of Martouni regional administration
Lyudmila Azizyan delivered an accounting report on the works carried
out in 2009.
In 2009 as compared with 2008, region’s own profit increased by
AMD 8milion 702 thousand.
In the part of community budget implementation, lowest indices
were recorded in Varanda and in Vazgenashen.
In 2009, from the land under crop only 12.977 hectares were
reaped; average harvesting formed 15.1 centners per hectare.
The head of the region explained that low harvesting was caused by
low land cultivation. In some regions land fund is not used
efficiently, sometimes they become pastures and hayfields.
At the session the Prime Minister noted that state programs aimed
at agriculture development are carried out in villagers’ favour .Years
ago the idea of purchasing grain harvester combines seemed
unrealistic. Today 5 combines have been already imported; the number
will soon exceed 20. One part of the combines would be placed under
control of machine and tractor bases and 13 by leasing agreement would
be rendered to the community property or a private owner. Those who
wil,l may purchase engineering at the cost of $55.000 in 10-year
repayment term.
AMD 3 milliard capital investment was made in Martuni; it was
directed to construction, reconstruction, water supply, highway
engineering, gasification, etc. The sum allocated for the capital
construction increased by 436 millions. The same index will be
preserved in 2010 promised the Prime Minister.
It was also mentioned that in a number of communities had already
begun water supply works. The state is ready to provide pipes for
solving water problem temporarily. The Prime Minister appealed the
inhabitants of Martouni not to make demands out of budget means: try
to solve community problems with own efforts.

Mher Karapetyan, David Grigoryan win silver and bronze at European
Sambo Championship

April 17, 2010 – 14:25 AMT 09:25 GMT
PanARMENIAN.Net –

April 13-19 Thessaloniki is hosting Men and Women’s European Youth
Sambo Championship.

On April 16, Armenian sambo wrestler Mher Karapetyan (75 kg weight
category) won a silver medal at the championship; David Grigoryan (82
kg weight category) won championship bronze, Armenian Sambo Federation
press service reported.

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CATHOLICOS OF ALL ARMENIANS TO SERVE THE LAST RITES TO POLISH PRESIDENT ON APRIL 17 IN MOTHER SEE OF HOLY ECHMIADZIN

ArmInfo
2010-04-16 12:26:00

ArmInfo. Catholicos of All Armenians Karekin II will serve the last
rites to Polish president Lech Kaczynski and his wife, as well as
the state figures and representatives of clergy who died in the air
crash under Smolensk, on April 17 in Mother See of Holy Echmiadzin,
press service of Echmiadzin administrative office told ArmInfo.

A plane carrying the Polish president, his wife and the country’s
top officials to the site of a Soviet massacre of Polish officers in
World War II, Katyn, crashed on April 10 in western Russia on Saturday,
killing all 96 people on board.

NATIONAL POST, CANADA

LETTERS
April 14 2010

Re: A Nation In Denial, Christopher Hitchens, April 9.

Christopher Hitchens’ column highlights the perilous situation of
Armenians in Turkey even to this day. The Turkish Prime Minister
recently threatened to deport 100,000 Armenians living in Turkey
today. Ninety-five years have passed since the Genocide of the
Armenians in 1915 and nothing has changed.

Daron Keskinian, Armen Karo Student Association, Toronto.

LEGATE OF ARMENIAN CHURCH, ARMENIAN ASSEMBLY JOIN INTERFAITH COMMUNITY IN CONFRONTING GENOCIDE

PanARMENIAN.Net
April 17, 2010 – 12:31 AMT 07:31 GMT

Last month, representatives of nationwide religious groups appealed
to Congress to re-focus its attention on the genocide in Darfur.

Archbishop Vicken Aykazian, Legate for the Diocese of the Armenian
Church of North America joined fellow members of the Interfaith
Sudan Working Group, a coalition of Jewish, Muslim and Christian
organizations working for lasting peace in the troubled East African
nation. Following a prayer breakfast at the U.S. Capitol, the group
delivered copies of the children’s fairy tale book, Humpty Dumpty, to
all 535 Members of Congress, signifying the fragility of the situation
in Sudan, reported the Armenian Assembly of America (Assembly).

"April is a particularly important month and it is heartening to
know that it has been designated as Genocide Prevention Month in
recognition of the fact that the Holocaust and the start of the
genocidal atrocities that befell the Armenian, Ukrainian, Cambodian,
Rwandan, and Darfurian peoples all took place in April," stated
Archbishop Vicken Aykazian. "It’s a shame that at the beginning of the
21st century genocides are still taking place," continued Archbishop
Aykazian. "If the Armenian Genocide was recognized in the beginning
of the 20th century, maybe those genocides wouldn’t have followed."

The interfaith group met with Senator Russ Feingold (D-MN) a stalwart
for human rights and advocate for anti-genocide policies. Archbishop
Aykazian thanked him for his efforts on Darfur and for his
cosponsorship of S. Res. 316, the Armenian Genocide resolution.

Senator Feingold told the Assembly that "this horrific tragedy took
the lives of 1.5 million Armenians and forced more than 500,000 from
their homeland. I have repeatedly called for the U.S. government to
officially recognize the Armenian Genocide. And as a cosponsor of a
Senate resolution recognizing the genocide, I was pleased last month
when the House Foreign Affairs committee passed a similar resolution."

In addition to their efforts on Capitol Hill, the Interfaith Sudan
Working Group placed a compelling piece in the Roll Call newspaper,
of which the Assembly was listed as a supporter during the same week
of the House Foreign Affairs Committee’s passage of the Armenian
Genocide resolution. The coalition’s anti-genocide activities were
also highlighted in an article in The Hill newspaper.

Sponsored by the American Jewish World Service, faith leaders who
participated in the prayer breakfast and book delivery included: Rabbi
David Saperstein, Director, Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism;
Rev. Gloria White-Hammond, AME Pastor; Co-Founder, My Sister’s Keeper;
Galen Carey, Director of Government Affairs, National Association of
Evangelicals; Archbishop Vicken Aykazian, Diocese of Armenian Church of
America; Bishop David Jones, Episcopal Church; Imam Johari Abdul-Malik,
Director, Community Outreach, Dar Al-Hijrah Islamic Center; Kirk Betts,
Board Chair Emeritus, Lutheran World Relief; Dr.

Steve Colecchi, Director of the Office of International Peace
and Justice for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops; and Ruth
Messinger, President, American Jewish World Service.

"The genocide in Darfur is a vivid reminder of how the consequences of
inaction and genocide denial continue to have profound repercussions,"
stated Taniel Koushakjian, Assembly Grassroots Director who
participated in the coalition’s work on Capitol Hill. "Our continued
efforts also send a powerful message to genocidal regimes – that we
will not be bystanders, but rather upstanders."

BIRTH RATE INCREASES FOR FIRST QUARTER OF 2010

Aysor
April 14 2010
Armenia

According to the Civil Registry Agency of Armenia’s Ministry of
Justice, there were 10,689 babies born in Armenia in January-March
2010, while the 2009’s January-March showed 10,173 births.

There were 4,429 marriages registered in the first quarter of 2010,
in comparison with 4,561 marriages in 2009; and 742 couples divorced
this year, while there were registered 753 divorces for the same
period of 2009.

7,259 people have died from January to March of 2010; last year’s
number was 7,854.

OBAMA’S KARABAKH PLEDGE ‘DOES NOT MEAN SATISFACTION’ FOR TURKEY
Kamala Mammadova

news.az
April 14 2010
Azerbaijan

Manvel Sargsyan News.Az interviews Manvel Sargsyan, an expert at the
Armenian Centre of Strategic and National Studies.

How do you assess the Washington meetings between Erdogan and Sargsyan,
Obama and Sargsyan and Obama and Erdogan?

I suppose this is an important stage on the way to overcoming complex
hindrances in our region. The US role in this process should not be
underestimated, especially since according to US officials, the country
is cooperating with Russia. Considering the fact that the United
States and Russia are Turkey’s main partners, the developments must
play a decisive role with the direct involvement of the United States.

In this sense, the US position on all aspects of the ‘Armenian
issue’ and on the principles of approaches to the normalization of
Armenian-Turkish relations was initially of great importance. I mean
the approach that predicates the normalization of relations without
preconditions, as well as the inexpedience of binding the Karabakh
conflict to the normalization of Armenian-Turkish relations. The
meetings in Washington provide further proof that the United States
sticks to this position. In addition, there has been no clarification
of the US attitude to the recognition of the 1915 Armenian genocide.

Turkey’s desire to take this problem off the agenda has not
received obvious support yet. Neither the US nor Armenia accept any
preconditions for the ratification of the Armenian-Turkish protocols.

I think Turkey’s leadership has only just started to understand
the full complexity of the international situation. The attempts to
begin rapprochement with Armenia from the starting point of demands
to acknowledge the legitimacy of Turkey’s many claims on regional
problems have created great difficulties for Turkey. This approach
by Turkey has not received international support.

The US president has urged the parties to normalize relations. Is the
United States interested in the resolution of the Armenian-Turkish
conflict?

Armenian-Turkish relations are a political phenomenon that goes beyond
the narrow framework of relations between Armenia and Turkey. They have
a significant geopolitical importance. The aforementioned approaches
of the superpowers to the settlement of these relations are connected
with this. The world wants to see new relations between Turkey and
Armenia on the basis of clear prerequisites. That is, there is an
intention to change not only the scheme of political relations in
the region but also Turkey’s philosophy and they are trying to make
Turkey disavow most of its traditional approaches in its policy.

Turkey is not perceived as an appropriate partner in its current
political image. The normalization of Armenian-Turkish relations is
a specific examination for Turkey.

The Turkish prime minister said none of the US leaders had ever used
the word ‘genocide’ and ‘we hope Obama will also not use this word’.

What do you think about this statement and the issue overall?

Turkey sees political sense in the US approach to the problem of the
1915 genocide or, to be more exact, it links this approach to the
nature of the United States’ relations with Turkey. As an important
US partner, Turkey does not consider the accusations of a grave crime
appropriate. Nevertheless, the Turkish leadership is facing a reverse
trend: the parliaments of Western countries continue to discuss and
recognize the Armenian genocide. If the United States takes this step,
Western demands on Turkey will become tougher and will be turned into
deliberately consolidated policy.

As the Turkish leadership has adopted the tactic of rejecting the
1915 genocide and builds its policy on this tactic, the possible
recognition of this historical fact by the United States can frustrate
the important basis of foreign and domestic policy. The resolution
adopted by the US House of Representatives Committee on Foreign
Affairs on 4 March urges the president ‘to ensure the conduct of
a foreign policy that reflects an adequate understanding of issues
connected with human rights, ethnic cleansing and genocide’.

Certainly, if this resolution is adopted by the US Congress, it will
influence the country’s policy towards Turkey.

This very circumstance has made the problem of genocide the leading
issue in Turkey’s policy. Undoubtedly, it has become the main concern
of the Turkish leadership in the current meetings in Washington.

How can the Washington meetings affect the Karabakh conflict
settlement?

US President Barack Obama is reported to have assured Turkish Prime
Minister Erdogan that he will spare no effort for the resolution of the
Karabakh conflict. However, there are no hints that this problem can
be bound to the problem of the normalization of the Armenian-Turkish
relations.

The problem is that Turkey’s understanding of the settlement of the
Karabakh conflict does not mesh with the outlook of most leading
centres of power. Turkey’s willingness to use the Armenian-Turkish
process to transfer Nagorno-Karabakh to Azerbaijan cannot be an
acceptable provision in international affairs. The promise to settle
the Karabakh conflict does not mean the satisfaction of Turkey’s
demands at all.

Possibly, Turkey also agrees to any method to settle the conflict
over Nagorno-Karabakh. The constant pressure by Azerbaijan is also
unacceptable for Turkey in the long term since Turkey’s policy has
been hostage to Azerbaijani demands for two years now. Though the
factor of Azerbaijan may be valuable for Turkey, it cannot paralyse
its policy for long, because it just becomes senseless. Therefore,
Turkey’s interests on Karabakh cannot be completely identical to
those of Azerbaijan. The development of the international situation
over Armenian-Turkish relations makes Turkey more convinced about it.

Most assessments of the Washington meetings between the leaders of
Turkey, Armenia and the United States show a restrained attitude
of the Turkish leadership to the Karabakh issue as a precondition
for Armenian-Turkish rapprochement. Turkey is likely to persuade
Azerbaijan that such a precondition may be harmful to Azerbaijani
interests too. Any unaccepted precondition may cause new waves of
confrontation which will ultimately worsen the state of the region.

NEW INVESTIGATION IN MURDER CASE OF JOURNALIST DINK

BIAnet.org
orities/121309-new-investigation-in-murder-case-of -journalist-dink
April 14 2010
Turkey

Due to a decision taken by the Istanbul Governorship Administrative
Board, a new investigation can be launched related to the murder case
of Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink into five former officials
of the Istanbul Police Directorate who were on duty at the time.

Erol ONDEROÄ~^LU [email protected] Istanbul – BÄ°A News Center14 April
2010, Wednesday The Istanbul Governorship Provincial Administration
Board issued permission to an investigation regarding the assassination
of Turkish Armenian journalist Hrant Dink into alleged flaws and
neglect of five former officials of the Istanbul Police Directorate,
as it was suggested in a preliminary report. The decision came more
than three years after the murder of then chief editor of the Armenian
Agos newspaper Dink on 19 January 2007 in Istanbul. The people under
investigation are former Police Chief Ä°brahim Pala, Chief Inspectors
Volkan Altınbulak and Ä°brahim Å~^evki Eldivan and police officers
Bahadır Tekin and Ozcan Ozkan.

The preliminary investigation had also included former Provincial
Deputy Chief of Police and current Governor of Osmaniye (southern
Turkey) Celalettin Cerrah, former deputy Å~^ammaz DemirtaÅ~_, former
Intelligence Branch Manager Ahmet Ä°lhan Guler and former Deputy Branch
Manager Bulent Köksal. However, the board did not issue permission
to include these four people into the new investigation as well.

Cerrah was not able to follow up everything…

Governor Cerrah was excluded from the investigation for the following
reasons: "He did not have the possibility to follow the entire
procedures closely because of the intensity of his duty considering
the difficulty of execution and since he was following the complex
and various services in the city of Istanbul. He did not neglect his
duties, make any mistake or conducted unlawful actions related to
the subject of the investigation.".

DemirtaÅ~_’s duty: "coordination of services"…

The decision for the new investigation was taken on 12 March 2010 and
approved by Oznur Bolat, President of the Provincial Administration
Board, on 2 April. Istanbul Deputy Chief of Police of the time and
current Chief of Police in Rize, a city on the eastern Black Sea coast,
was excluded from the investigation as well:

"It is impossible to work at the level of following the entire details
and office works in all the branches. It was his duty to coordinate
other units with the Intelligence Branch Directorate and to brief
the Provincial Chief of Police. He was furthermore responsible for
Financial, Narcotics and Organized Crime Branches".

"They pretended to observe Hayal" The decision also mentions Yasin
Hayal, one of the prime suspects in the Dink case as the "abetter" to
the murder. It had previously been put on record that police officers
Bahadır Tekin and Ozcan Ozkan had been sent from the Intelligence
Branch of the Trabzon Police Directorate on 17 February 2006 to take
considerable measures against Hayal. The current decision states though
that they did not go to the address in Umraniye (Istanbul’s Anatolian
side) as given in the according notification after the murder, but that
"they kept a false record pretending that they went there".

The decision claims that the inspectors appointed both police officers
for an observation of a person in Fatih (European side of Istanbul)
on the same day, thus they could not take care of two assignments in
one day.

Inspector Pala and Chief Inspectors Altunbulak and Eldivan are included
into the investigation because they did not take any precautions in
order to protect Dink despite notifications regarding the preparation
of voice records of Hayal related to Dink.

However, the referring officials are expected to file an appeal
against the decision of the investigation. In that case the file
would be transferred to the Administrative Court. EO/VK)

ARMENIAN DIASPORA URGES SARKSYAN TO PROMOTE "GENOCIDE" RECOGNITIONS

APA
April 13 2010
Azerbaijan

Baku – APA. Armenian organizations in United States urge Armenian
President Serzh Sarksyan to announce that "Bilateral talks between
Turkey and Armenia over protocols cannot progress because of Turkey’s
destructive and hostile attitude", APA reports quoting turkishny.com
web-page. Diaspora also called Sarksyan to urge U.S. President Obama
to honor his pledge to recognize so called Armenian genocide.

Armenian organizations in United States urge Sarksyan, who
is in Washington to attend Nuclear Security Summit, to announce
Turkish-Armenian talks over protocols are in stalemate due to Turkey’s
destructive and hostile attitude. Diaspora also calls Armenian
President to urge Obama to honor his pledge to recognize so called
Armenian genocide.

Serzh Sarksyan is under intensified pressure of Armenian diaspora in
Washington where he went to attend Nuclear Security Summit. Sending
a joint letter to Armenian President, Armenian diaspora, lobbying
organizations and NGO’s called Sarksyan to urge Obama to recognize
so called Armenian genocide during his meeting with American president.

The letter, which is reflected by the web sites of Armenian diaspora
read, "And finally, we hope and expect — considering the hardening
and threatening posture of Turkey — that while in Washington, you
will announce that the process between Armenia and Turkey that has
begun with these signed protocols cannot continue because of Turkey’s
destructive and antagonistic posture."