Author: Tambiyan Samvel

GEORGIAN PARLIAMENT SPEAKER VISITS THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE MEMORIAL

armradio.am
24.02.2009 16:09

Accompanied by the Head of Staff of the National Assembly of Armenia,
Gegham Gharibjanyan, he President of the Georgian Parliament, David
Bakradze, visited Tsitsernakaberd today, laid a wreath at the memorial
to the Armenian Genocide victims, watered the tree planted by the
President of Georgia, Mikheil Saakashvili in the Memory Alley. The
Georgian Parliament Speaker also visited the Armenian Genocide
Museum-Institute where Director of the Museum Hayk Demoyan presented
the history of the genocide.

The Chairman of the Georgian Parliament left a note in the Memory
Book: "The right to live is the most sacred among all the rights. We
should remember the history and do everything to avoid reoccurrence
of genocides and ethnic cleansings nowadays."

David Bakradze told reporters that his country’s Parliament will not
discuss the Armenian Genocide issue in the near future. "I think that
from the moral viewpoint the visit of the Georgian delegation to the
Genocide Museum, the impressions we got here, clearly demonstrate our
attitude towards the issue. First of all, it is the responsibility of
politicians not to allow history repeat, to avoid ethnic cleansings and
genocides. It’s a sensitive topic for the Georgian people, as well,"
he said.

According to David Bakradze, in general, the bilateral parliamentary
ties reflect the partnership relations that exist between Armenia
and Georgia. "No doubt, there are still opportunities for further
improvement, and one of the purposes of my visit is to discuss in
which directions our parliaments could cooperate. We are ready to
develop the relations not only on the level of visits," the Georgian
Parliament Speaker noted.

Athens News Agency, Greece
Feb 22 2009

Τurkish MP, author presents novel in Thessaloniki

Turkish parliamentarian and author Kemal Anadol on Friday evening
presented his historical novel, "The Great Separation" (Büyük
Ayrili) to a Thessaloniki audience at the Macedonian Studies Society.

In the book, Anadol, a high-ranking CHP deputy in the neighbouring
country from the Izmir district, recounts the daily lives of ordinary
Greeks, Turks, Armenians and Jews in the 20 years before the Asia
Minor catastrophe in 1922 in the then Smyrna, Istanbul, Fokaia and
Aivali.

"History is not exclusively comprised of the sounds of canons and
swords, smoke, gunpowder and marches; history is also love stories,
love, hate, music, cuisine and trade between ordinary people," the
author and politician said.

WARMER U.S.-RUSSIA RELATIONS BETTER THAT WOULD BE FOR ARMENIA

PanARMENIAN.Net
20.02.2009 19:42 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ The warmer U.S.-Russia relations are the better
that would be for Armenia, according to former Minister of Foreign
Affairs of Armenia.

"But at this time, such warming is still only a desire on everyone’s
part. There are still a series of very serious problems: NATO
expansion, the American missile defense shield, as well as contentions
over spheres of influence. It is especially the processes having to
do with defining spheres of influence and the possible arrangements
or understandings that they arrive at that will have serious impact
on Armenia," Vartan Oskanian, head of Civilitas Foundation told
PanARMENIAN.Net.

"Thus, we must do everything so that the perception of these two
countries about Armenia be based on Armenia’s compelementarity and not
on specific recent events. Specifically, closer financial cooperation
with Russia or the agreement signed about CSTO rapid deployment forces
can be seen as a deviation from the policy of complementarity, if
of course these steps are not followed by other steps which reaffirm
the balance in Armenia’s foreign policy," he said.

SENATOR BACKS DETENTE

Hurriyet
Feb 20 2009
Turkey

ANKARA – As concerns run high over possible support from U.S Jewish
groups for a resolution on the so-called Armenian genocide, an
American Jewish senator has deemed the government’s "courageous"
policy for normalizing ties with Armenia as praiseworthy.

Robert Wexler, Democratic member of the U.S. Congress and co-chairman
of the Turkey caucus in the U.S. House of Representatives, said the
U.S. Congress should focus on the normalization of relations between
Turkey and Armenia. His remarks came late Wednesday after his meeting
with Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Wexler said the courageous policy pursued by both Erdogan and President
Abdullah Gul toward relations with Yerevan was worth praising and
said informing the U.S. Congress of that was of due importance.

Wexler highlighted the new climate between Turkey and Armenia, which
began with the Turkish president’s landmark visit to Yerevan in
September, and said both countries took steps to start constructive
dialogue. "We should do our best to support the efforts of Turkey
and Armenia," he said.

TURKISH PM ERDOGAN: NO CHANGE IN KARABAKH POLICY

Journal of Turkish Weekly
Feb 19 2009
Turkey

ANKARA – Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan rejected
reports in Azerbaijani media that Turkey has revised its policy on
not normalizing relations with neighboring Armenia unless it ends
its occupation of Azerbaijan’s Nagorno-Karabakh region.

"There is no difference between our position and Azerbaijan’s
position on Nagorno-Karabakh," Erdogan said in response to
a question. "Azerbaijan’s righteousness is established by UN
resolutions."

Erdogan also said he may meet US President Barack Obama in April, on
the occasion of a summit of G-20 countries. Obama phoned ErdoÃ~DŸan on
Monday and Erdogan said they discussed a number of issues, including
the Armenian diaspora’s efforts to win US recognition for Armenian
claims of genocide at the hands of the Ottoman Empire in World War
I. Armenians rioted against Istanbul government during the First
World War and armed Armenian nationalists sided with the occupying
Russian forces. The Ottoman State decided to relocate many Armenians
to another provinces. The civil war and war curcumstances caused
great number of Armenian loses while more than 520.000 Turkish and
Kurdish civilians were massacred by the Armenian terrorists and gangs.

About 20 percent of Azerbaijan has been under Armenian
occupation. Apart from Karabagh many other Azeri towns were also
occupied by the Armenian forces with the Russian support and
encouragement.

Another problem between Turkey and Armenia is the border issue. Yerevan
does not recognise Turkey’s unity and calls the eastern provinces of
Turkey ‘Western Armenia’.

ARMENIA AMONG TOP TEN OF POPULAR DESTINATION POINTS OF PASSENGER TRAFFIC FROM RUSSIA

ArmInfo
2009-02-19 11:53:00

ArmInfo. Armenia has proved among top ten of popular destination points
of the passenger traffic from Russia by the Statistics of the Russian
Federal Agency for Air Transport. Russian media reported that Germany
is the most popular regular destination point for Russian and Turkey
is the most popular destination point of charter flights.

Russian air companies transported over 11.6 million passengers
to other states in 2008. Passenger flow of regular fights totaled
over 6.5 million people, which is by 12% more than in 2007. Over 5
million passengers preferred charter flights, which is by 10% more
than in 2007.

Last year over 735,000 passengers used the regular flights to Germany.

Egypt, Ukraine, China and Tajikistan are less popular among Russian
passengers. Top ten of the most popular regular flights include also
Turkey, Armenia, France, Uzbekistan and Spain.

COUNTER TERRORIST DEPARTMENT ARRESTED CITIZENS OF REPUBLIC OF IRAQ

Interpressnews
Feb 19 2009
Georgia

Counter terrorist department of MIA detained vice president of Pilots’
Association Merab Chelidze, citizen of republic of Armenia Garegin
Kilikian and citizens of republic of Iraq: Arsen Ohanian, Zardan
Auritinian, Hakov Nahapetian, Armenin Iarvandian and Ana Tomasian.

MIA informs that the above mentioned people forged passports in
the republic of Armenia by paying 75 000 US dollars, they received
citizenship of Republic of Armenia and tried to fly to Brazil from
Georgia via Netherlands. Merab Chelidze and Garegin Kilikian demanded 4
000 Euros from citizens of Iraq to cross border of Georgia. The amount
of money was offered to workers of counter terrorist department by
the suspects. MIA informs that there were changes in their passports,
photos of the owners are changed.

EASTERN PARTNERSHIP OFFERS NEW OPPORTUNITIES FOR ARMENIA-EU COOPERATION

PanARMENIAN.Net
20.02.2009 12:11 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Armenian Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian met
Thursday with EU Special representative for the South Caucasus Peter
Semneby to discuss the current stage of the Nagorno Karabakh conflict
settlement process, normalization of the Armenian-Turkish relations
and the Armenia-EU cooperation.

"Relations between Armenia and the European Union are developing both
in bilateral and multilateral formats," Minister Nalbandian said.

Both agreed that the Eastern Partnership offers new opportunities
for development of the Armenia-EU cooperation.

RA PRIME MINISTER TIGRAN SARGSYAN RECEIVED ARISTOMENE VARUDAKIS, HEAD OF THE WORLD BANK ARMENIA OFFICE, AND THE WORLD BANK ECONOMIC TEAM MISSION, LED BY SAMIA MITRA

Monday , 16 February 2009

Discussed were issues relating to the cooperation for the next 4
years under the Country Partnership Strategy, as well as the steps
taken by the Armenian government to counteract the global economic
downturn and eventual joint action aimed at mitigating the impact of
the global financial and economic crisis.

VAT TO BE IMPOSED ON ARMENIAN FARM ENTERPRISES

Noyan Tapan
Feb 16, 2009

YEREVAN, February 16. /ARKA/. The imposition of the value-added tax
(VAT) on farm products this year will involve 200 to 500 enterprises,
Armen Alaverdyan, Vice-Chief of the RA Public Revenues Committee,
told reporters.

Among the prospective VAT payers are large fish, poultry and livestock
farms, as well as large farm enterprises.

"To form a full picture, we started monitoring all the agricultural
organizations of Armenia this January, which will allow us to make
realistic appraisals and carry out work with individual producers,’
Alaverdyan said.

He said that the first results will be available in the first
quarter of this year. Since the industry is seasonally dependent,
the monitoring will last during the whole year, and clearer results
will be available this autumn.

One of Armenia’s commitments to the World Trade Organization is
imposing VAT on farm products from January 2009. To meet farmers’
interest, the Government set the minimum rate for taxation, 58.35bln
AMD of the sales.

According to some estimates, 10 to 20 per cent of the Armenian
agricultural enterprises are to pay VAT from this year.