Author: Raffi Khondkarian

President Serzh Sargsyan sent today a congratulatory message to the Chairman of the Government of the Russian Federation, Dmitry Medvedev, on his birthday.

“Dear Dmitry Anatolyevich,

Accept my most sincere congratulations on the occasion of your 50th birthday.

Your statesmanship has earned you the respect of your compatriots, has made a weighty contribution to the development of Russian statehood and to the reinforcement of country’s positions in the international arena.

Armenians hold you in high regard and greatly appreciate your consistency aimed at the development of allied collaboration between Armenia and Russia.

I honestly value our mutual understanding and trust, and I am ready to continue our constructive dialogue to further enrich the Armenian-Russian strategic partnership with new initiatives and mutually beneficial programs in the interests of prosperity of our countries and brotherly peoples.

I cordially wish you good health, happiness, well-being and further success in all of your undertakings,” reads the RA president’s congratulatory message.

At least ten people were killed and dozens wounded when a car bomb exploded in the Syrian city of Latakia on Wednesday, state television said, in a rare attack in a coastal stronghold of President Bashar al-Assad, Reuters reports.

Latakia has so far been largely spared the violence that has ravaged Syria during more than four years of civil war, killing around a quarter of a million people.

The explosion was in a main square, state television said.

The governor of Latakia, Ibrahim Khader al Salem, told pro-government television channels that insurgents sought to strike at the heart of government-held safe areas that had become a refuge for tens of thousands of displaced families in an attempt to sow “destruction and fear”.

State media said a white van filled with at least half a ton of explosives was parked near a school and had created a huge crater in the square that lies at a major crossroad inside the port city.

State media said at least two explosive-laden cars had been discovered in recent days in the city in foiled attempts to blow up heavily populated areas.

Separately, a mortar attack on part of the campus of Damascus University killed at least two students and wounded several, state media said.

Latakia is home to a large Armenian community.

On June 8 Armenian Ambassador to Germany Ashot Smbatyan handed his credentials to Federal President Joachim Gauck.

Congratulating the Ambassador on appointment, President Gauck voiced hope he would make an important contribution to the further deepening and reinforcement of mutually beneficial cooperation between Armenia and Germany.

Amb. Smbatyan briefed the German President on the process of development of Armenia-EU relations.

The interlocutors referred to issues related to political dialogue, trade-economic cooperation, regional developments and peaceful settlement of the Nagorno Karabakh conflict.

The Ambassador expressed gratitude for the continuous support of the German side to Armenia’s development.

Moscow hopes that answers will be found to all the problems in strict compliance with Armenian laws and wishes peace and prosperity to Armenia, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov says, TASS reports.

Kremlin hopes that differences in Armenia will soon be settled and prosperity and peace will be restored, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists on Wednesday.

“We hope that answers will be found to all the problems in strict compliance with Armenian laws. We wish peace and prosperity to Armenia. We also wish it to settle all the differences, ” Peskov said.

Asked whether there had been any contacts with the Armenian leadership, Peskov said that Russia and Yerevan maintained close partnership and jointly participated in integration processes. “These contacts are permanent,” the Kremlin spokesman explained.

Peskov refused to predict how the situation in Armenia could develop further . “We do not make forecasts,” he said.

 

The international auction house Sotheby’s withdrew from auction on Tuesday a painting by Ivan Aivazovsky that Russia’s Interior Ministry said last week had been stolen in 1997 from a private collection in Moscow, Reuters reports.

The auction house said “Evening in Cairo” by Russian artist of Armenian descent Ivan Aivazovsky, had been withdrawn from sale at the request of the consignor, or seller.

Russia’s Interior Ministry had asked that British police block the auction.

Sotheby’s said last week it had found no record of the painting in the databases of stolen art and would proceed with the sale on June 2, with the agreement of the consignor and the family which said it had been stolen.

In an emailed statement on Tuesday, Sotheby’s said: “Ivan Aivazovsky’s Evening in Cairo, Lot 23, in Sotheby’s 2 June 2015 Sale of Russian Pictures has been withdrawn at the request of the consignor.”

It said there was “no further information available”.

Russia’s Interior Ministry declined immediate comment, saying it would make its position clear later on Tuesday.

The Interior Ministry did not name the complainant but Sotheby’s earlier identified them as the Nosenko family, which Russian media said had purchased the painting in the 1940s.

The 1870 painting had been listed as a lot on the website of Sotheby’s, with an estimated value of 1.5-2 million pounds ($2-$3 million), as part of a collection of Russian pictures due to be sold in London on June 2.

The Sotheby’s website had listed the work’s provenance as being in the collection of N.I. Dedov.

Sotheby’s kept the identity of the seller confidential but said that it had acquired the painting in good faith in 2000.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin received today the Personal Representativeof the OSCE Chairman-in-Office for Nagorno Karabakh, Ambassador Andrzej Kasprzyk.

During the meeting the parties discussed urgent issues connected with the situation in the Karabakh conflict zone.

US mathematician John Nash, who inspired the Oscar-winning film A Beautiful Mind, has died in a car crash with his wife, police have said, BBC News reports.

Nash, 86, and his 82-year-old wife Alicia were killed when their taxi crashed in New Jersey, they said.

The mathematician is renowned for his work in game theory, winning the Nobel Prize for Economics in 1994.

His breakthroughs in maths – and his struggles with schizophrenia – were the focus of the 2001 film.

Russell Crowe, who played him, tweeted: “Stunned… My heart goes out to John & Alicia & family. An amazing partnership. Beautiful minds, beautiful hearts.”

The film’s director, Ron Howard, also tweeted his tribute to the “brilliant” John Nash and his “remarkable” wife.

Alicia Nash helped care for her husband, and the two later became prominent mental health advocates.

 

 

 

 

Armenian Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian will visit Syria upon the instruction of Prime Minister Hovik Abrahamyan to learn about the situation on the spot, Diaspora Minister Hranush Hakobyan said at the Government sitting today.

The Diaspora Minister today referred to the situation in Aleppo and the measures the Diaspora organizations take to help the local Armenians.

“Unfortunately, the situation in Aleppo is endangered,” she said, adding that a number of Christian districts have been targeted in the past months.

She said 200 people have arrives in Armenia from Aleppo in the recent period. “The major problem Syrian Armenians face here is the housing, as most of them want to settle in capital Yerevan,” Hranush Hakobyan said. She added, however, that the issue of rents has been solved with the support of the UN Office and benevolent organizations.

“In collaboration with the Ministry of Economy we are working to intensify the support for the organization of small and medium-sized businesses,” Hakobyan said.

Former Real Salt Lake striker Yura Movsisyan wants to come back to Major League Soccer, according to

A return to Major League Soccer is indeed quite enticing to Yura Movsisyan, his agent confirmed to the Salt Lake Tribune this weekend. The 27-year-old forward who spent two and a half seasons at Real Salt Lake is currently in his third season starring at Spartak Moscow in the Russian Premier League.

“He’s very interested in a return to the MLS,” said Patrick McCabe, Movsisyan’s agent. “It would be a number of options I think he would have, but he’s definitely open-minded at this point. If that’s Salt Lake, OK, or another MLS team, he would certainly be open-minded to pursuing. We’ll have to see what shakes out here within the next few weeks between his club and himself and the other teams that are interested.”

McCabe said Movsisyan still has two more years on his contract at Spartak, which ends in 2017. Movsisyan’s rise in Europe, which started at Danish club Randers after leaving RSL upon helping the club win the 2009 MLS Cup title, saw him move from Randers to Russian Premier League club FC Krasnodar in 2011.

After two largely successful seasons there — scoring 23 goals in 50 appearances — Spartak Moscow completed a reported $9.7 million transfer for the Armenian striker in Dec. 2012. He scored 16 goals in 25 league appearances with Spartak during the 2013-2014 campaign.

“For anybody that knows Yura, there’s nothing more important than family,” McCabe said. “For him I think it’s been difficult to be in Europe for as long as he has for. He and his wife Marianna have two young kids and they’d like to obviously raise them closer to Yura’s family and her family in California. That’s a major consideration I think at this point.

“Yura is driven by family. It’s why he went to Europe to try to provide for them and he’s done a good job of that. Europe is obviously a totally different competitive landscape when you’re dealing with clubs, especially when you’re dealing with Russian clubs.”

Asked if a return to MLS is Movsisyan’s No. 1 priority as they figure out his next move, McCabe was straightforward in saying he isn’t optimistic about Movsisyan staying in Russia.

“I’m hopeful that a return to MLS can be worked out, but I’m also realistic in that I know that it may not,” McCabe said. “I have to plan for a bunch of eventualities here, and one of them is that [a return to MLS] doesn’t work out. I think if you asked [Yura], I think that would be his first choice, but we’ve had approaches in the past from other MLS teams, so we know that it may or may not happen.”

Movsisyan’s first two years in MLS were with the Kansas City Wizards where he didn’t see that much time, scoring five goals in 28 appearances. In Sept. 2007, former RSL general managerGarth Lagerwey struck his first deal in his new position by trading for Movsisyan.

While at RSL, Movsisyan flourished. He scored 15 goals in 53 appearances, including having a hand in the equalizing goal in the 2009 MLS Cup final against the L.A. Galaxy at CenturyLink Field in Seattle, Wash. Per MLS roster regulation, RSL still holds Movsisyan’s MLS rights should he choose to return to the league. A club retains the rights to a player indefinitely following the expiration of a contract, provided the club extending a contract offer, which RSL did before Movsisyan left for Europe in 2010.