Author: nina hovnanian

NEW ‘THEMATIC’ SEWER MANHOLES MAY APPEAR ON YEREVAN STREETS

YEREVAN, February 4. / ARKA /. New ‘thematic’ sewer manholes may appear
on the streets of Yerevan, Yerevan Productions company’s development
director Gayane Manukyan said today.

Last April this company unveiled a project called “1000 and one sewer
manholes.’ The idea is to install new sewer manholes with unique
thematic designs.

Speaking at a news conference she said 26 sewer manholes can be
installed in the main Republican Square in downtown Yerevan. She said
designers suggested that manholes be decorated as ancient Armenian
coins. Such manholes could be installed in front of Converse Bank,
located in the main square.

“We offer two solutions: the first is to paint the already installed
sewer manholes in special colors and the second is to manufacture
new iron manholes,” Manukyan said.

She said decorated sewer manholes can be found in many countries,
where they became ‘ a perfect complement of urban environment.’

She also said there is a proposal to create special designs for
electricity and water distributors, telecommunications and other
companies.

She said this project is still in the initial stage of discussion,
although it was already approved by the municipality. She said the
project can not be started due to lack of financing.

The “1000 and one sewer manholes’ is developed as part of a larger
project known as ‘Yerevan 2.0.” Its goal is to change Yerevan and show
the difference between what is there today and what should be there.-0-

MKHITARYAN ENVISAGERAIT UN DEPART DE DORTMUND CET ETE SELON SON AGENT

FOOTBALL

Le meneur de jeu armenien du Borussia Dortmund Henrikh Mkhitaryan
souhaiterait quitter l’Allemagne cet ete a la fin de cette saison. Le
joueur star du football armenien, venu en Allemagne en juin 2013
après un transfert de 26 millions d’euros, avait reussi une honorable
première saison ponctuee de 13 buts toutes competitions confondues.

Mais le natif de Yerevan connaît des difficultes a confirmer les
attentes placees en lui cette saison. Mkhitaryan n’a toujours
pas marque le moindre but en championnat cette saison, freine par
plusieurs blessures et par le niveau de jeu de son equipe qui pointe
a la dernière place du classement après 18 journees.

Mino Raiola, agent de Mkhitaryan et connu dans le milieu du football
pour etre l’agent de Zlatan Ibrahimovic ou de Mario Balotelli,
a affirme a des journalistes italiens de Calciomercato que > après avoir nie
un possible transfert cet hiver : >

Selon les informations du meme site italien, le joueur armenien serait
suivi par plusieurs clubs de haut niveau europeen comme la Juventus
Turin, Arsenal et Liverpool.

Arthur Altounian

mercredi 4 fevrier 2015, Ara (c)armenews.com

THOMAS DE WAAL: “GREAT CATASTROPHE” IS A VERY POWERFUL TERM

February 2, 2015 10:56
EXCLUSIVE

Mediamax’s interview with Thomas de Waal, Senior Associate at the
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

– First of all, let me congratulate you with your new book “Great
Catastrophe: Armenians and Turks in the Shadow of Genocide”. What is
the main message of your book and who you consider the main audience:
Turks and Armenians, or the Western world?

– Thank you. The starting-point for all my books is in identifying a
“gap in the literature” that I believe needs to be filled. In the case
of the Armenian Genocide of 1915-16, there has been some very good
writing in recent years by academic historians about what happened and
why. I am thinking of the work of Donald Bloxham, Raymond Kevorkian,
Taner Akcam and others. Ronald Suny is about to publish a new book
which looks excellent. However, much less has been written about the
aftermath and politics of the issue and the way it has changed over the
last 100 years. I am thinking of the struggles in the Armenian diaspora
about the Soviet Union, Stalin’s territorial claims against Turkey
in the 1940s, the terrorism of the 1970s and the Turkish response,
the re-awakening and demonstrations of 1965. In particular, over the
last 12 years an enormous amount has happened in Armenian-Turkish
relations much of it very positive. I write about my trips to Turkey,
the “Armenian opening” in Diyarbakir and the re-discovery of oral
histories and Islamicized Armenians. So I wanted to write a book that
reflects on all those issues.

Who is the book for? Anyone who takes an interest in the whole complex
of Armenian-Turkish relations. Also, anyone who is interested in a
bigger question that cuts across morality and politics, “What do we
owe to the past and those who suffered? What do we need to remember
and honor and when should we let go?”

– Are there any plans to translate the book to Armenian and Turkish?

– A respected Turkish publisher, Iletisim, is working on a Turkish
version of the book. Obviously I would be delighted to see an Armenian
version too, but there are no proposals at the moment. I think there
are a lot of information and episodes in the book which are little
known to both Armenian and Turkish readers.

– When naming the book “Great Catastrophe” you meant “Medz Eghern”
– how the Armenians call the Genocide?

– Yes, that is right. One question I wanted to investigate in the book
was about the naming of the catastrophe that the Armenians suffered
in 1915-16. “Great Catastrophe” seems to me a very powerful term. I
know that there are other Armenian words as well and that Marc
Nichanian likes to use the word “aghed”. The Turkish intellectual
Cengiz Aktar also calls the Armenian Genocide the “Great Catastrophe
of all Anatolia”.

– In your recent piece in the Foreign Affairs you have suggested that
Armenians focus too much on the “G-word”. Do you think that Armenians
could make better use of President Obama’s usage of “Medz Eghern” term?

– When beginning my work, I set myself to answer two research
questions. First, “When, how and why did the catastrophic trauma
that Armenians called ‘Medz Eghern’ come to be called the ‘Armenian
Genocide?'” Second, “How come that usually the first question people
ask when the issue comes up about the destruction of the Ottoman
Armenians is ‘Was it genocide?'” I do find it a bit strange that for
most people this has become the question remind people that there
are other big questions to be asked and answered.

– Don’t you think that there is too much hypocrisy around this issue?

Everybody in the West accepts that more then 1 million Armenians were
killed in 1915 and it obvious that such a massacre was a planned
operation against particular nation. So, everybody agrees that it
was genocide by a definition, but prefers to name it with other terms.

Don’t you think that this hypocrisy makes Armenian angry and unable
to fix their attention on other conceptual issues?

– I understand that Armenians get angry about this. The Turkish
Republic didn’t carry out the killings but it has suppressed the
history of what happened-although that has begun to change. And
most scholars, starting with Raphael Lemkin, who have studied the
history, agree that what the Ottoman state did to the Armenians fit
the category of “genocide,” the word Lemkin invented in 1944. As I
say, I also use the term “Armenian Genocide.” It’s become a standard
scholarly term and I prefer to be on the side of those who use it,
including many Turks, rather than those who do not.

Having said that, I wrote the book and also the Foreign Affairs essay
in part to invite Armenians and others to consider the negative
side of the word “Genocide.” The term has become very politicized
and there are endless legalistic arguments about the meaning of the
definition used in the 1948 United Nations Convention on the Prevention
of Genocide. It is used as a political term of abuse and numerous
ethnic groups aspire to call their historical suffering “genocide.” In
my view all this hullabaloo throws up a barrier to ordinary people
understanding the human story of the Medz Eghern and to ordinary Turks
recognizing it. So, yes, there is a certain logic to the use of the
“genocide” word but it’s also, in view, a rather cold legal ugly term.

It is somewhat equivalent to a man whose grandparents were murdered
going around and telling friends and families and strangers “My
grandparents were the victims of homicide.” Correct, but not so
conducive to getting them to listen to your story.

– What you think – what went wrong with the Turkish-Armenian protocols
process? Armenians miscalculated the situation and were tricked by
the Turks who just wanted to gain time and were not going to normalize
the relations? Or the Turks underestimated the level of Azerbaijan’s
influence on them? Or something else?

– I think everyone miscalculated a little. One part of the worldwide
Armenian community and one part of Turkey – the Armenian government
and one half of the Turkish government-wanted to normalize relations,
open the border and work on the problems from a position of greater
trust. But others were skeptical or fearful–I am thinking of many
Diaspora Armenians, some Turks, and Azerbaijan above all. And the
negative voices prevailed. I talked to most of the people involved
in the negotiations that began in 2007. The Swiss mediators did a
very professional job. The United States government pressed hard,
but I think it’s clear now that the Americans should have devoted
many more resources to persuading the doubters of the value of the
Protocols-and in the first place Azerbaijan, which played the key
role in blocking the deal.

– Armenian President needs to make a tough decision before April
24, 2015. One option is that he calls off the Armenian signature
under the protocols – and this move will be hardly welcomed by the
Western partners and U.S. in particular. Another option – he keeps
the protocols while understanding Turkey will not ratify them for
another 5 years. It seems that Turkey wins in both cases and Armenia
gets nothing. What you think? Or maybe you see some third option?

– I believe that President Sargsyan gains more internationally
by keeping the Armenian signature on the Protocols than he does by
revoking it. But of course he is a politician and he will use the fact
that he can revoke the document to win some leverage. It should not be
forgotten that the 2015 centenary puts pressure on Turkey to take some
constructive steps. I hope we can see some progress on some symbolic
issues – Armenian churches in Anatolia, the renaming of monuments and
street-names-as well as some practical ones, such as the laying of a
fiber-optic cable to the Armenian border. We should not forget that
there are many people in Turkey who still want a normalization of
relations with Armenia–and some of them are still in the government.

If the Armenian-Turkish wall cannot be pulled down all at once,
efforts can at least be made to take it down brick by brick.

– What you think about Russia’s role in Turkish-Armenian process?

Sergey Lavrov was present together Javier Solana, Hillary Clinton
and others during the protocols signing but it seemed that Russian
was not very much involved in the preparation process. And what is
Russia’s position today regarding Turkish-Armenian relations given
the fact of Putin-Erdogan rapprochement.

– I think the Russian government basically played “both sides”
on this issue. They saw benefits from a successful Armenian-Turkish
rapprochement, especially economic ones for the Russian-owned companies
in Armenia. But the failure of the Protocols process also enabled
them to strengthen the military alliance with Armenia.

Ara Tadevosyan talked to Tom de Waal

– See more at:

EXPERT: “MAIDANIZATION” IN ARMENIA WILL PROCEED AMID EXISTENTIAL THREATS

by David Stepanyan

Wednesday, February 4, 02:53

Ukraine is a spectacular example for Armenia that demonstrates how
the oligarchic groups’ fight for the power can lead the country to
a collapse and civil war, Hrachya Arzumanyan, expert in defense and
national security problems, has told ArmInfo.

“The society has allowed the oligarchs to throw Ukraine into chaos and
turn it into a state without strategically important territories. The
oligarchs’ fight for power has caused the death of the country, whose
potential could have enabled it to join the leading powers of Europe
some day. But this will never happen”, he says.

Arzumanyan points out that “maidanization” may proceed in various
forms. It may be as harsh as in Ukraine or it may be mild when the
president’s early resignation happens within the frames of a palace
revolution and becomes known to public on television. Regardless
of the revolution scenario, the results will be disastrous for the
statehood and the remainders of domestic legitimacy.

The expert is convinced that “maidanization” deprives the people of
the opportunity to appeal to the national law. The “administrators”
of the territory are appointed by geopolitical force centers. So,
the oligarchic groups’ fight for the political power ends up in death
of the statehood and oligarchs themselves.

“The critically important point for Armenia, which is missing in the
Ukrainian crisis, is that in Armenia “maidanization” will proceed amid
the existential threats for the people. This considerably complicates
the people’s task to realize the developments and prevent the country’s
collapse and death”, says Arzumanyan. He thinks Armenia should avoid
the scenario of “maidanization”.

CONSTRUCTION OF COMMUNITY CENTER IN KARIN TAK VILLAGE NEARS COMPLETION

14:14, 04 Feb 2015
Siranush Ghazanchyan

The Hayastan All-Armenian Fund will soon complete the construction
of a multifunctional community center in Karin Tak, a village in
Artsakh’s Shushi Region. The project is co-sponsored by the fund’s
Argentinean affiliate — with a donation from the Devejian family —
and the government of Artsakh.

Located in a canyon 2.5 kilometers below Shushi, Karin Tak is built on
steep terrain, with sheer vertical cliffs towering above it. Despite
many difficulties, including a sloping geographical position, this is
a vibrant village, with a population of 660. The two-story community
center being built here is slated to open its doors within a few
months. Consisting of a health clinic, an events hall, a library,
a computer room, and the mayor’s office, the center will be a boon
to the everyday life of the community.

The community-center project will complement other development projects
carried out by the Hayastan All-Armenian Fund in Karin Tak, including
a water network and a renovated school gym.

“The community center, which is being constructed in a neighborhood
at the entryway of Karin Tak, will soon welcome the residents of the
village and visitors,” said Ara Vardanyan, executive director of the
Hayastan All-Armenian Fund.

On January 26, the village celebrated Battle of Karin Tak Day. On that
day in 1992, Azerbaijani troops surrounded and attacked the village,
intent on annihilating the Armenian population and moving on to other
targets. Yet the residents of Karin Tak, despite being outnumbered
and outgunned, mounted a fierce resistance and emerged victorious.

STRATFOR: PERSPECTIVES OF ARMENIA AND BELARUS IN EEU DEPEND ON RESULTS OF RUSSIA-WEST CONFRONTATION

by David Stepanyan

ARMINFO
Tuesday, February 3, 16:27

Perspectives of Russia’s two allies in the post-Soviet area – Armenia
and Belarus – in the Eurasian Economic Union depend on the results of
the Russia-West global confrontation, experts at Stratfor say. In this
light, Stratfor analysts spotlight in their report the recent statement
by Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko of possible withdrawal of
his country from the Moscow-initiated EEU. “Minsk could pull out of
the Moscow-led Eurasian Economic Union if agreements are not kept,
but also emphasized that the country’s integration with Russia is
deep and strong. Meanwhile, Armenia has faced growing difficulties
in its conflict with Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabakh, where Russia
plays a key role.”

Simultaneously, the report says both Yerevan and Minsk are very
likely to continue the strategic course to Moscow given Lukashenko’s
statement that emphasizes “the deep and strong integration of Belarus
and Moscow.”

“Both countries are likely to maintain their strategic orientation
toward Russia, but Belarus and Armenia will continuously re-evaluate
their positions depending on how the broader struggle between Moscow
and the West plays out,” the analysts say.

Recent developments indicate that two of Moscow’s most loyal allies in
the former Soviet periphery, Belarus and Armenia, may be reassessing
their ties with Russia in light of the country’s standoff with the
West, Stratfor analysts say.

DEBT RIDDEN ARMAVIA: IS BAGHDASAROV’S FINANCIAL GAMBIT DOOMED TO FAIL?

Vahe Sarukhanyan

17:14, February 3, 2015

Despite the fact that Armavia Airlines was declared bankrupt by the
court, the company was registered as Armenia’s 11th largest taxpayer
last year.

The company, owned by Mikhail Baghdasarov, paid 7.2 million AMD
(US$15,102).

The bankruptcy ruling was initiated by one of Armavia’s shareholders,
a company called Mika Limited, which, not surprisingly, is also owned
by Baghdasarov.

Mika Limited is not registered in Armenia but in the Jersey Islands;
an offshore zone. Nevertheless, datalex.am lists the company’s offices
at an address in Yerevan (5 Belyakov Street) where two other companies
are located – Mika Corporation and Aviafin.

Mika Ltd. went to court in September 2014, arguing that Armavia owed
it $38,378,000 and that the deadline for payment was April 30, 2014.

Armavia did not dispute the debt.

The court declared Armavia bankrupt on October 6 and appointed a
bankruptcy administrator for the airline. Other creditors appeared
on the scene and the company’s assets were seized.

Preliminary data show a total of 153 creditors waiting in line to be
paid. The bankruptcy administrator drafted an eight stage list for
compensation. Those first in line include Unibank ($6.666 million),
Armenian Development Bank (680.285 million AMD), AmeriaBank ($1.250
million), and Armenian Business Bank ($10.427 million and 17,835
Euros).

Other creditors waiting to be paid include K-Telecom, Karkomavto,
Hayaeronavigatsia, Armenia’s Ministry of Finance and the Electric
Network of Armenia.

Mika Limited, the company that filed the bankruptcy case in the first
place, is at the bottom of the pile; in the eighth stage.

Mika Corporation, another company founded by Baghdasarov, is in the
seventh round of creditors to be paid. It is also in debt – more than
$28 million AMD and $792,014.

When one company owned by Baghdasarov took another to court to be
declared bankrupt, the press in Armenia described it as a move to
transfer money from one pocket to another and that Baghdasarov was
taking his business out of Armenia.

But, if Mika Limited remains in the 8th round of creditors to be paid,
it is difficult to see how Armavia’s assets will be sufficient to
pay the money owed it. 152 creditors are ahead of Mika Ltd. in the
waiting line.

In other words, Baghdasarov’s financial gambit is doomed to fail.

P.S. Hetq will write about the history of Armavia and its unfortunate
demise in upcoming issues.

JAMES WARLICK: WE PLAN TO NEGOTIATE WITH ALIYEV AND SARGSYAN

Vestnik Kavkaza, Russia
Feb 3 2015

3 February 2015 – 2:23pm

The co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group are deeply concerned by the
serious violence which recently occurred on the contact line, the US
co-chair of the OSCE Minsk Group James Warlick said in an interview
to the Voice of America.

According to him, the recent incidents in Nagorno-Karabakh and the
escalating violence directly harm all countries in the region.

“We plan to visit the region soon and to hold talks with all parties,
and also with the presidents,” the co-chair of the OSCE Minsk Group
said.

RUSSIAN SOLDIER ACCUSED OF KILLING ARMENIAN FAMILY TO GO ON TRIAL AT GARRISON COURT IN GYUMRI

13:21, 03 Feb 2015
Siranush Ghazanchyan

Russia and Armenia have agreed that Russian serviceman Valery
Permyakov, who has been accused of murdering a family of seven in
Armenia’s northern city of Gyumri, will go on trial in Armenia on
the premises of Russia’s military base there, sources familiar with
the situation told Interfax on Tuesday.

“The parties reached a final agreement that the trial in this
high-profile case will proceed in Gyumri, at Garrison Military Court
No. 102 of the Russian military base,” one of the sources said.

Such a decision was adopted in accordance with the bilateral agreement
regulating the presence of Russia’s military base in northern Armenia,
he said.

Another source told Interfax that Russia and Armenia had also agreed
to cooperate during a preliminary investigation.

“Since the crime of the Avetisyan family’s murder is being investigated
simultaneously by the Russian and Armenian sides, they are considering
the possibility of adopting a joint, consolidated indictment based
on Russian penal laws,” he said.

Permyakov also faces charges of going absent without leave (AWOL)
in possession of firearms, he said.

“The Russian side will be informed of all circumstances established
by Armenian investigators and will add them to the case files,”
the source said.

WHO WILL BE PRESENT AT THE EVENTS MARKING 100TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE GALLIPOLI BATTLE?

18:29, 03 Feb 2015Siranush Ghazanchyan

The Presidents of Azerbaijan, Albania, Somali, the Prime Ministers of
Australia and New Zealand and Prince Charles have accepted Turkish
President Regep Tayyip Erdogan’s invitation to participate in the
100th anniversary of the Battle of Gallipoli planned for April 24,
canakkaleninrehberi.com reports.

According to the source, another 38 countries have accepted the
invitation, but have not indicated at what level they will be
represented at the event.

Ankara sent out invitations to the leaders of 102 countries, including
Armenia.

Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan rejected the invitation to
participate in the events that coincide with the 100th anniversary
of the Armenian Genocide.