Price of Russian gas for Armenia will be $165 per 1,000 cubic meters from January 1, 2019 – Gazprom

ITAR-TASS, Russia
Monday 4:44 PM GMT
Price of Russian gas for Armenia will be $165 per 1,000 cubic meters from January 1, 2019 – Gazprom
 
The price of Russian gas at the border of Georgia and Armenia from January 1, 2019 will be $ 165 per 1,000 cubic meters, Russian gas giant Gazprom said in a statement published on Monday.
 
MOSCOW, December 31. /TASS/. The price of Russian gas at the border of Georgia and Armenia from January 1, 2019 will be $ 165 per 1,000 cubic meters, Russian gas giant Gazprom said in a statement published on Monday.
 
Gazprom’s CEO Alexey Miller and Acting Deputy Prime Minister of Armenia Mger Grigoryan held a working meeting in Moscow on Monday.
 
"Under the signed additional agreement to the contract between Gazprom export and Gazprom Armenia, determining the price of gas supplies to Armenia in 2019, the price of Russian gas at the border of Georgia and Armenia from January 1, 2019 will be $ 165 for 1,000 cubic meters," according to the statement.
 
It is noted that Gazprom Armenia will continue working with the relevant state agencies of the republic’s government on the structure of domestic gas tariffs.
 
The Armenian authorities have repeatedly said earlier that they were negotiating a gas price reduction with the Russian side. In 2018, Armenia received gas on the border with Russia at the price of $150 per 1,000 cubic meters, which had been lowered to that level from $165 per 1,000 in 2016. Meanwhile, the fuel price for consumers was $290.
 
Russian gas deliveries to the country stood at 1.87 billion cubic meters in 2016, and at 2 billion cubic meters in 2017.
 
Gazprom Armenia, a subsidiary of the Russian holding, is carrying natural gas deliveries to Armenia. The contract for supply of up to 2.5 bln cubic meters of natural gas is effective until 2019 year-end.

Acting PM Nikol Pashinyan’s New Year address

Public Radio of Armenia
Jan 1 2019
Acting PM Nikol Pashinyan's New Year address 
          
2019-01-01 00:01:34

Acting Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has issued a congratulatory address  on the occasion of New Year and Christmas. The message reads:

My dear people: proud citizens of the Republic of Armenia, proud citizens of the Republic of Artsakh, proud Armenians of the Diaspora.

We left behind the year 2018. It will remain in the history of the world and the Armenian people, in the memory of each Armenian as a year of reinstatement of people’s power, civil dignity, optimism and statehood.

The year 2018 was a year when the Armenian nationals and the Diaspora-based Armenians, adults and children, male and female, rural or urban united around one common goal and forged our common victory, which ultimately became an exceptional achievement of national unity.

At this borderline of 2018-2019, I want to formulate the task that is set in front of us: to make of 2019 just as dear and loved and memorable as the year 2018. And I consider it necessary to record that the passing year was not the summit of our victories, but only the foot, not the end of line of our march, but just the beginning. In 2019 we must achieve new heights, record new achievements first of all in our socio-economic life.

Our main task in 2019 is the economic revolution and making its results more tangible. But next year will not be the climax of our victories, not because our flight will be low, but because our national and state ambitions will be higher and higher.

This is the key point of the non-violent, velvety, popular revolution in Armenia. When people believe in the power of their unity, the power of their past and future. We believe in the creative talent of every citizen, and the year 2019 should become the year of creative talent’s victory when every individual citizen of the Republic of Armenia, every Armenian who have immigrated to Armenia can see themselves not as consumers, but creative individuals, not followers but leaders, not tax-evaders but taxpayers, not unemployed but employed citizens, not in the role of a poor person, but as people fighting against poverty with creative thinking and just work.

2019 should become a year of personal effort, a year of harmonious mind and work. Therefore, on these New Year’s Eve, our mood should be filled with new strength and energy, with new optimism and love for the sake of our homeland.

Dear Compatriots,

On the New Year’s Eve, I would like to send special greetings to all our soldiers, officers and generals who are on the frontline safeguarding our peace.

I welcome the officers of the Armenian Police, the National Security Service, the Ministry of Emergency Situations and the Ministry of Justice who are carrying out their service duties on New Year’s Eve, ensuring the security of our people.

I greet our healthcare workers, energy, telecommunications, transport workers, and all those who are celebrating the New Year while performing their job duties.

Finally, I welcome all the citizens of the Republic of Armenia, all our compatriots in Armenia, Artsakh and the Diaspora.

I love all of you, I am proud of you and I bow before you all. Smile to each other, dear compatriots, because here the New Year is coming.

Happy New Year and Merry Christmas!

So long live freedom, long live the Republic of Armenia, long live our children and we who live and will live in Free and Happy Armenia.

Iran: Fellow Armenian-Iranians devoted themselves for protecting country.

Presidency of The Islamic Republic of Iran
Dec 31 2018
IRAN: FELLOW ARMENIAN-IRANIANS DEVOTED THEMSELVES FOR PROTECTING COUNTRY

President while visiting family of Armenian martyr Alfred Gabri:

Fellow Armenian-Iranians devoted themselves for protecting country

While visiting the family of Armenian martyr Alfred Gabri on New Year’s Eve, President congratulated them the beginning of year 2019.

news id: 107495 –

Mon 31 – December 2018 – 23:12

In the visit that took place late on Monday, Dr Hassan Rouhani wished them a happy new year full of blessings and said, “Your child gave his life for protecting the country and although losing a child is not easy, but your child gave his life for the country and this makes his loss more tolerable”.

 “Our fellow Armenian-Iranians have devoted their lives for the country alongside Muslims and they are ready to do it again today, something which is very admirable,” he continued.

In the visit that Vice-President for Martyrs and Veterans Affairs Hojatoleslam Val-Moslemin Shahidi was attending, a plaque of appreciation was given to the family of the martyr.

Iran: President visits Armenian veteran Hasou Keshish Danilian

Presidency of The Islamic Republic of Iran
Dec 31 2018
IRAN: PRESIDENT VISITS ARMENIAN VETERAN HASOU KESHISH DANILIAN

TEHRAN, Iran

President visits Armenian veteran Hasou Keshish Danilian

On New Year's Eve, President Rouhani visited Armenian wounded war veteran Hasou Keshish Danilian with 70 per cent disability and talked with him and his family in a cordial atmosphere.

In the visit that took place on Monday evening, Dr Hassan Rouhani said, Jesus Christ healed the ill and brought the dead back to life with divine miracles.

He also appreciated the efforts and devotion of the families of wounded war veterans of the Islamic Revolution and the Holy Defence.

In the visit that Vice-President for Martyrs and Veterans Affairs Hojatoleslam Val-Moslemin Shahidi was attending, a plaque of appreciation was given to the veteran.

Iran: Armenian interaction with Muslim compatriots indisputable

Iran Daily
Sunday

Varouj Minasian told IRNA on Sunday evening on the eve of the New Year, "The Iranian government and authorities have paid more attention to the Armenian Christian community after the victory of the Islamic Revolution and the establishment of the Islamic Republic of Iran than they received prior to this."

Referring to negative propaganda by anti-Iran affiliated networks, he said, "The Armenian community of Iran freely participate in their religious ceremonies and even the Iranian Christians have more freedom to hold rituals and celebrations than their Muslim compatriots."

Minasian said, "Foreign radio and television networks aiming to pressure the Islamic Republic are trying to convince their audience that the rights of religious minorities, including Christians in Iran, are not respected."

 
 

Armenian capital honors Holocaust survivor who coined the term ‘genocide’

The Times of Israel
Dec 31 2018


On The Road in Armenia: Pilgrimage Reunion and Orthodox Spirituality at Holy Martyrs Armenian Church

Western Queens Gazette, NY
Dec 31 2018


On The Road in Armenia: Pilgrimage Reunion and Orthodox Spirituality at Holy Martyrs Armenian Church

By Catherine Tsounis

Holy Martyrs Church service. “This holiday gives us another chance to be thankful for all that we have,” said Fr. Abraham during his Thanksgiving weekend homily. “We are thankful for our material gifts, but most importantly we are thankful for our faith, the greatest gift of all. God is not against material goods because these things make us happy. But, we also need to feed our soul. The message of today’s Gospel reading (Luke 12:13-31) is that spirituality must be a priority in our lives.” On Sunday. November 25th, I relived my 2018 Pilgrimage to Armenia, including the unrecognized Armenian Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh) at the Armenian Church of the Holy Martyrs in Bayside.

Armenians ranks second among 34 European countries in having the most religious citizens, according to a survey conducted by the Pew Research Center.1
Romanians, and Georgians occupy the first three places on the survey. The Orthodox service was moving. I noticed the banner of the Virgin Mary and Christ, Byzantine crosses that I see in Greek Orthodox churches, the Nikolaevsky Palace, known as the Vodka Museum in St. Petersburg, Russia. The church interior reminds me of early Christian churches I visited in Acquileia and Ravenna, Northern Italy. I do not know Armenian. I was able to follow the Orthodox service because of its universality in the Orthodox Christian world.

A friend pointed out that parishioners were having confession, before having Holy Communion. This is a common practice in the Russian Orthodox liturgy, that I witnessed in the  Kimisis Tis Theotokou Greek Orthodox Church of the Hamptons, before the October 15th, 2018 Russian Orthodox Church schism with the Patriarchate of Constantinople.

Refreshments followed in the church hall. A slide presentation  of the 2018 parish pilgrimage to Armenia was shared with the church family during Fellowship Hour.  Over 100 pictures were displayed with narration from pilgrimage participants: Fr. Abraham, Aram and Lara Ciamician, and Zarmi Megherian. The thirty three persons attended the 13 day Pilgrimage.

“We saw a young couple preparing for a wedding in Shushi, Artsakh Republic,” said Aram Pilgrimage members. Ciamician, Pilgrimage leader. “In the afternoon, we met the same couple at the All Saviors Church. A few days ago, a Queens newspaper published an article on this same wedding. The couple could never imagine that their wedding in Artsakh could be read about on the other side of the world in the Queens Gazette.” This weekly newspaper, with 32,000 readers a day, has published all my articles on the Greek/Byzantine influence in Sicily, Northern Italy, Russia, Asia Minor in Western Anatolia, Armenia, Albania and Greece. In 2018, the Queens Gazette presents their daily life not seen elsewhere.

“You are joining a group whose families were destroyed by the Armenian Genocide 100 years ago,” said Rev. Father Abraham Malkhasyan. “My family is from Van, Western Armenia (Turkey). My father was a brilliant engineer who went to the top and lost all in 1991, when the Soviet Union was dissolved. My mother was a professor of Modern Russian Language and Literature in Yerevan (Armenia capital). In 1991, during this upheaval, I entered the seminary in Jerusalem at 14 years old. My older brother, Ignatios, joined me in the seminary. He is an archimandrite assisting His Holiness Karekin II, the Supreme Patriarch and Catholicos of All Armenians at Echmiadzin, Armenia.” I have heard similar stories from my University students and persons in Albania and Russia. The slide presentation showed us the major landmarks, culture, religious and business centers of Armenia.

Why did I join this pilgrimage?  The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Hellenic Republic says on its website that “Greece was one of the first countries to recognize Armenia upon independence (21/9/1991). There is a Greek Embassy in Yerevan (since 1993) and an Armenian Embassy in Athens. Relations between Greece and Armenia are very strong both emotionally and historically, due to the co-existence of Greeks and Armenians during the Byzantine period and under the Ottoman Empire.

Rev. Fr. Abraham personally presented this writer with a khachkar in appreciation of her articles on Armenian culture.Greece is one of the countries that officially recognize the Genocide of the Armenians by the Ottomans in 1915. Our country grants development and humanitarian assistance to Armenia and has supported Armenia’s rapprochement with European institutions. Since Armenia’s declaration of independence, the two countries have cooperated within the framework of International Organizations (United Nations, OSCE, Council of Europe, BSEC), while Greece firmly supports the further development EU-Armenian relations.

Due to the Greece's long-standing cultural influence (up until the 5th century A.D., the Armenians were using the Greek alphabet), Armenian interest in Greek culture is strong. Today, the Greek community of Armenia numbers a few thousand people. The dwindling number of Greeks in Armenia of recent years is mainly due to mass migration to Greece and former Soviet Republics.

The Greek language is being taught as a second foreign language at the University of Yerevan, at the Brassov Linguistic University, the Theological School and Military Academy.2  Rev. Fr. Abraham presented this photo/journalist/educator with a Khachkar (Armenian cross-stone) in appreciation of her articles “In the Footsteps of Byzantium: Armenia”.

At the conclusion of the program, Rev. Fr. Abraham personally presented this writer with a khachkar, also known as an Armenian cross-stone, in appreciation of her articles on Armenian culture.
 
References:
1.     https://greece.greekreporter.com/2018/12/09/greeks-are-fourth-most-relig…
2.        https://www.mfa.gr/en/blog/greece-bilateral-relations/armenia/
 
Links:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/43zvKVhfqCYgiwQdA photo album Nov. 25th

Catholicos of All Armenians issues New Year address

Public Radio of Armenia
Dec 31 2018
Catholicos of All Armenians issues New Year address

2019-01-01 00:00:48

His Holiness Karekin II, Supreme Patriarch and Catholicos of All Armenians, has issued the following message on New Year and Christmas: 

Dear Faithful in the Homeland and the Diaspora, It is the festive day of New Year.

We extend Our Pontifical love and blessings from the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin to you dear faithful people of Armenia. With warm feelings, we extend our best wishes to those who carry out their duties at this moment at the place of service; officers and soldiers of our army who keep the borders of their homeland unapproachable; those who are united in the churches for prayer and all our children gathered around the festive tables.

On the New Year’s Eve, we extend our gratitude to God, that he kept our Homeland and worldwide people in peace in the passing year, blessed with the good, righteous earnings and achievements in the national and church life. We also thank God that through the patriotic spirit and reasonableness of our nation the political developments in our country had a peaceful course and we are welcoming 2019 with expectations of positive changes.

Every new year is a new beginning, full of expectations of the new, with the desire for the better and perfect. We are connecting with the New Year what we would like to reform, manage and soon see the fulfillment of our goals. The need for reform and civic zeal that are present in our lives will surely bring good results, more care, more effort and aspiration, to strengthen the foundations of the legal state, the fair and law-abiding society, to prosper our country and our entire national life.

This is our way that we have to keep constant, always remembering that Armenia's development and power is the core and condition of our national aspirations for the security of Artsakh and the viability of the Diaspora. Dear beloved, at this moment, when our intentions with good expectations are addressed to the future and our plans, through our Pontifical message we convey Lord’s message: “This is my command: Love each other” (John 15:17).

Our life becomes meaningful with the existence of the divine love. Where there is love there is strength in faith, there is hope abundant and solidarity is prosperous with righteousness and good deeds. “Love never fails”, (1 Corinthians 13:8), says the Apostle. Yes, it grows like leaven, becomes a curve, a steadily effort, a commitment by which our life will be upheld.

With these thoughts and joyous spirit we command our pious people, to continue live and act by supporting each other and to put dedicated efforts for the strength of our motherland and our spiritual and national life.

We wish peace to the world, peace, to our homeland; steadfastness to our statehood and blessings to our worldwide Armenian nation and the entire people. May the year 2019 bring joy to our families and progress and achievements to our lives. Happy New Year!

The Literary Armenian News – 12/31/2018

Dear Armenian News readers,
The homepage for The Literary Armenian News is at: groong.org/tlg/
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Տէր Իմ
 
Եթէ բառերով փորձեմ սրտիս ու հոգւույս զգացումները արտայայտել քեզի,
Անիմաստ ու անհասկնալի բացատրութիւններու շարադրանք մը պիտի լսուի:
 
Եթէ յուսամ որ աչքերուս խօսածը լսես՝ կամ նայուացքներէս ինչ որ բան հասկնաս 
Յաւիտենական սպասումը՝ վատնուած վարկեաններու կուտակումով պիտի կորսուի:
 
Ներէ ինծի որ այս ճշմարտութիւնը չեմ կարող խօստուանիլ  ոերեւէ մէկի
և այսպէս ես իմ կեանքը կը շարունակեմ միայն խաբելով ես ինծի:
 
Կը շարունակեմ աշխատիլ,  ջանալով  օգտակար դառնալ ըստ կարիքի 
Մաքրամաքուր բարոյականութեամբ նժարը պահել բարութեան կողմին
 
Միայն ես գիտեմ որ իմ իւրաքանչիւր օրս քեզմով կը սկսի
Իմ իւրաքանչիւր երեկոն քեզմով կը մթննայ և կանցնի խոր քունի:
 
2018/10/31
Գէորգ Գալայճեան
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In Search of a Martyred Assyrian Ancestor

AINA – Assyrian International News Agency
Dec 31 2018
All Things Assyrian
In Search of a Martyred Assyrian Ancestor

(BBC) — Eastern Turkey had a large and thriving community of Christians a little over 100 years ago, but since then most have been dispersed or killed. The BBC's Eli Melki went to look for traces of a relative, who was martyred at the age of 33.

One evening in June, I sat in the sunset among the Roman ruins of Zirzawan hill, in south-east Turkey. This is where it's said the remains of one of my ancestors are buried in a mass grave. Leonard Melki was about 33 years old at the beginning of World War One, and his fate was determined by his Christian faith.

At that time, between a fifth and a quarter of the inhabitants of eastern Turkey – then part of the Ottoman Empire – belonged to an array of Eastern denominations of the Christian Church, including the Armenian Apostolic Church, the Syriac Church, the Church of the East (Nestorians) and the Chaldean Church.

All except the Armenians worshipped in Syriac – a dialect of Aramaic, the language of Christ.

They lived among the empire's Muslim majority and, while many prospered, at some times and in some places they were subject to outright persecution; in World War One, it went far, far beyond that.

Leonard, my great-grandfather's cousin, was born a member of one of the Eastern churches – the Maronites – but later became a Capuchin friar, and in his mid-20s he was sent to run the order's school in the city of Mardin, close to what is now the border between Turkey and Syria.

At this point Christians represented between 35% and 40% of Mardin's inhabitants. The Capuchin monastery, where Leonard taught boys the rudiments of the Christian faith, stood alongside a Franciscan monastery in a prominent position in the city centre.

To find out more about Leonard, I spoke to his great-nephew, Fares Melki, who has set up a website dedicated to Leonard and other missionaries from Baabdat, the small town near Beirut where we were both born. As we sat under our family oak tree, he told me that Leonard was born Yusuf (Joseph in Arabic) in about 1881, one of 11 children. As a boy he would have tilled the land around where we were sitting.

Fares showed me some yellowed letters and photographs Leonard sent to relatives and to his superiors. They reveal a young man dedicated to his faith, attached to his sister Tamar, and eager – despite problems with his health – to embark on a mission 1,000km from his picturesque and prosperous home in Mount Lebanon.

In one letter, written in 1912, he wrote about young Muslim men from Mardin being sent to fight in the Balkan Wars.

"Poor souls, I pity them. They are marching like sheep to the slaughter, poorly trained and equipped, but displaying an admirable courage despite of it all. Lacking everything – even bread – they end up by devastating everything and terrorising people wherever they set foot. May God put an end to all this misery, and grant peace and tranquillity to the land."

But not long afterwards, World War One did the opposite, and the nationalist Young Turks then in control of the Ottoman Empire began to fear a possible alliance between the local Christian populations and Russia, which had quickly gone on the offensive.

The decision was taken to deport the Armenian population into the interior provinces – though in practice men were often simply executed, and women and children forced into convoys that morphed into death marches.

While these actions were directed against the Armenians, they had the effect of signalling that all Christians in the region had lost the protection of the state. The result was a wave of pogroms, carried out both by the local Ottoman authorities and some Kurdish tribesmen.

Some Syriac Christian churches are estimated to have lost up to half their congregation in the violence. They call this Seyfo, the Year of the Sword, and Leonard was one of the victims.

Today, almost nothing remains of Mardin's ancient Christian heritage. There is no trace of the Capuchin monastery in Mardin, though by chance I met a local historian – possibly the last Armenian living in the city – who was able to point out the precise location of the neighbouring Franciscan monastery. Using old photographs and the memoirs of her grandmother – once a pupil at the girls' school run by Franciscan nuns – she has been able to pinpoint exactly where each arch of the building stood. Today the site is a busy and noisy car park among the narrow shopping streets of this Turkish city. It's hard to imagine now the sounds of the schoolyards and the monastery bells.

But below ground level, in a former public bath building, my Armenian guide showed me an archway, a remnant of one of the two defunct monasteries. And suddenly in my mind's eye I could see Leonard and his pupils passing by – or being dragged along after his arrest.

Leonard was seized in June 1915, when the authorities rounded up a number of clergymen and other notables of the city on trumped up charges of collaboration with the enemy, usually the French. Christians had widely come to be seen as a fifth column of the Western powers, and the missionaries treated as enemy agents.

We walked along the winding old main street referred to by a Dominican monk, Jacques Rhétoré, in his account of the arrests.

"Father Leonard, a Capuchin, was in front of the convoy of detainees, between two students of Saint Francis's school. As he passed by his convent, he looked upward, in a last salute to the holy house where he lived in the bliss of doing good deeds. There, the soldier flanking him dealt him a blow on the head with a club, yelling at him: 'Walk straight you dirty Fraranji (Frenchman)!'"

The convoy, one of many, was led towards the city of Diyarbakir, where the detainees were to be tried for treason. However, in the middle of the journey, the column of detainees, now in a sorry state, was led to the hill of Zirzawan.

Their final hour was recounted by another Dominican, Hyacinthe Simon.

"They were killed by groups of four, with knives, daggers and scimitars, or clubbed to death, then their bodies were thrown in the wells. The old fortress still holds their bones and the secret of their last moments," he wrote.

Sitting on Zirzawan hill, I wondered what must have gone through Leonard's mind as his life was about to end. Did he remember our peaceful hometown, the family land with its majestic oak tree, his fellow friars, his beloved sister?

For me, Leonard personifies the tragedy of hundreds of thousands of mostly innocent and unarmed people, who were were killed during the fateful spring and summer of 1915 in the eastern part of the Ottoman Empire. It helps me to fathom the enormity of this disaster.

In the distance, I could still see the sprawling new city of Mardin. The old road taken by the death march has now been replaced by a motorway, emblematic of a resurgent Turkey, a country where the two-millennia-old Christian presence has been reduced to the ruins of places of worship. And to about 2,500 Syriac speaking people, who still cling, against all odds, to a handful of towns and villages in the nearby region of Tur Abdin, the "Mountain of the Worshippers".

What was once one of the most ancient and dense Christian presences in the world now stands on the brink of extinction.