Month: December 2008

GALA TO FILE A LAWSUIT WITH EUROPEAN COURT

Aravot
Dec 23 2008
Armenia

The hearing on the dispute over the TV tower between the Gyumri
municipality and GALA TV resumed yesterday [22 December] at Shirak
Region Court of General Jurisdiction.

The Gyumri mayor, under the instruction of the authorities, had decided
to take the TV station off air by taking away the TV tower that had
no owner. The mayor privatized it hastily and then sued the GALA TV,
demanding to vacate the TV tower. Judge Armen Khachatryan ruled
in favour of the municipality. International bodies got engaged;
as a result, the Armenian Court of Cassations on 31 October had to
satisfy GALA’s appeal and send the case back to the Shirak Region
Court of General Jurisdiction. GALA representative Karen Tumanyan
told us yesterday that the Court of Cassations, considering that the
sides were in unequal positions, had instructed the Shirak Region
Court of General Jurisdiction to satisfy GALA’s moves of conducting
constructional-technical tests. "The test will determine whether GALA’s
coverage would be of the same quality and size if the equipment is
removed from the TV tower and installed at a different place. This
time we managed to bring the court processes to a democratic field. At
the past trial sessions, the court was trying to swiftly disconnect
GALA’s cable, there was no justice."

Besides the TV tower problem, GALA had filed an appeal with the
Court of Cassations against the State Tax Service which had "drawn"
a debt of 26,899,955 drams (about 87,000 dollars) for the TV company
before starting an inspection; it was paid by Gyumri residents with
the help of a telethon. We asked GALA’s representative to explain at
what stage is the appeal. It turned out that the Court of Cassations
has returned the appeal without a clear explanation. "We are planning
to file a lawsuit with the European Court on the basis of articles 10
and 6. The mistakes made by the Court of First Instance are already
substantiated because the individuals who had testified against the
TV company were not interrogated, meaning that we were not given an
opportunity to ask questions to the persons who had testified that
they had paid GALA for commercials. I don’t know if such people exist
at all. This is a breach of Article 6 of the Human Rights Convention:
everybody has the right to ask questions to those who had submitted
accusatory information to law enforcement agencies against him,"
Tumanyan says.

The municipality’s attorney did not appear in court today, and the
court recessed until 14 January 2009.

EU: IRAN’S APPROACH TO CAUCASUS PROBLEMS CONSTRUCTIVE

PanARMENIAN.Net
24.12.2008 16:16 GMT+04:00

The EU Special Representative for the South Caucasus, Mr. Peter
Semnebypaid a visit to Iran where he met with Kazem Jalali, head of
the Majlis committee on national security and foreign policy.

"Iran’s policy is based on understanding and peaceful settlement of
crises," Mr. Jalali said.

Mr. Semneby, for his part, referred to the history of Iranian
officials’ talks on the Caucasus and said that Iran’s approach to
Caucasus problems has always been constructive, IRNA reports.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

AZERBAIJAN TO PRODUCE TANKS, AVIATION BOMBS AND PILOTLESS VEHICLES IN 2009

anARMENIAN.Net
24.12.2008 16:39 GMT+04:00

Azerbaijan is going to launch production of tanks, small arms,
armors and noctovision devices next year. The defense potential of
the republic will be considerably increased.

Minister of Defense Industry Yaver Jamalov informed that Azerbaijan
also plans to produce aviation bombs and pilotless vehicles, ANS TV
channel reports.

MARIE YOVANOVITCH: ARMENIA-U.S. TIES STRONG AND BINDING

PanARMENIAN.Net
24.12.2008 16:52 GMT+04:00

U.S. Ambassador to Armenia Marie L. Yovanovitch congratulated Armenian
citizens on coming New Year.

The Ambassador said in her message that the U.S. will help Armenia
strengthen democracy.

"The ties between Armenia and U.S. are strong and binding… The
U.S. will also facilitate normalization of Turkish-Armenian relations
and soonest resolution of the Nagorno Karabakh conflict," the
message says.

NKR ARMY NEVER FIRES AT CIVILIANS

PanARMENIAN.Net
24.12.2008 17:02 GMT+04:00

The NKR Defense Army never fires at civilians, the chief of information
and propaganda division of the NKR Defense Ministry said.

"We observe the international law and human rights norms. Azerbaijan
disseminates misinformation accusing "Armenian snipers" of death of its
citizens," colonel lieutenant Senor Hasratyan told a PanARMENIAN.Net
reporter.

Yesterday, Azeri media reported that a 54-year-old resident of Terter
region was killed by an Armenian sniper.

"The death of Asif Sheldiyev may be the result of a showdown between
locals," Hasratyan said.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

CHP DEPUTY DEMANDS DNA TESTS FOR PRESIDENT GUL

PanARMENIAN.Net
24.12.2008 18:04 GMT+04:00

The dispute between a main opposition deputy and President Abdullah
Gul over the latter’s ethnic origin took on another dimension with
the request of a DNA test from Gul to prove his ethnic background,
Hurriyet reports.

Canan Aritman, the Izmir deputy of the Republican People’s Party,
or CHP, said Gul had Armenian roots, which is why he has not
openly rejected the apology campaign carried out by a group of
intellectuals. In a counter-statement Gul said his family was 100
percent Muslim and Turk and filed a lawsuit against Aritman.

President Gul announced that his mother’s side, the Satoglu family
from Kayseri, and his father’s side, the Gul family also from Kayseri,
are Muslim and Turkish, according to centuries of written genealogy
records.

"I respect the ethnic background, different beliefs and family ties of
all my citizens and see this as a reality and also the wealth of our
country with its imperial history. I also would like to emphasize
that all my citizens are equal to one another regardless of any
differences. No one has any superiority whatsoever over another
one. Everybody has the equal and same rights under the guarantee of
our Constitution," Gul said. "I am proud of our country, which has
reached this level of understanding."

"Today, ethnic origin does not gain legal and scientific validity
through family trees, but through DNA tests," Aritman said in her
written statement late Monday. "Birth records during the Ottomans were
based on declarations and while recording non-Muslims, the state used
to write a Muslim name as the father’s name. Thus, nobody can prove
their ethic identity through a family tree."

Aritman said it was Gul’s prerogative to file a suit against her
and that she was not after anyone’s DNA results, but in the event
of a judicial process, she would have to produce documents and
witnesses. She also said she expected the president to say the Turkish
nation had not committed any crime of genocide. Many nations owe an
apology to our nation, but we do not owe an apology to anybody. "I do
not think I have requested a difficult thing. This is the president’s
constitutional duty. If he does not perform this task, he commits a
crime against the Constitution and he should resign," she said.

OSCE HOPES FOR PROGRESS IN KARABAKH PROCESS IN 2009

PanARMENIAN.Net
24.12.2008 18:28 GMT+04:00

The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) hopes
for progress in settlement of the Nagorno Karabakh conflict next year.

"We hope we will see progress in 2009," new OSCE chairman, Greek
Foreign Minister Dora Bakoyannis said.

The OSCE chairman-in-office and Finnish Foreign Minister Alexander
Stubb officially handed over office of the chairman to his Greek
counterpart Dora Bakoyannis at the meeting of the OSCE Ministerial
Council in Helsinki on Dec. 4.

Greece’s chairmanship in the Organization will start on January
1, 2009.

Bakoyannis said Greece believes that frequent meetings between
representatives of Azerbaijan and Armenia will lead to the
establishment of mutual confidence which is essential to resolve
the conflict.

"Greece fully supports these efforts and encourages constructive
engagement from both parties, in line with the Statement delivered at
the Helsinki Summit earlier this month by the French Foreign Minister
on behalf of the European Union," Bakoyannis said, Trend Azeri news
agency reports.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

LOCAL WARS CANNOT DRAG ON ENDLESSLY AND MAY RESULT IN EXTENSIVE MILITARY OPERATIONS EMBRACING ENTIRE REGIONS

PanARMENIAN.Net
23.12.2008 GMT+04:00

The search of alternative energy supplies and recession may lead to
radical changes in the world political map, including emergence of new
super-states. As a matter of fact, they have already appeared; they are
China and India, and both the USA and RF will have to reckon with them.

The current year marked the beginning of establishing new world
principles and new geopolitical lines that used to seem quite unlikely
till recently. Europe, as well as the rest of the world were in static
position after the World War II, the result of which was the borders
outlined in Potsdam and finally fixed at Helsinki summit in 1975.

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Architects of the present world structure, USSR, USA
and Great Britain, most likely were in no doubt about the stability
of the arbitrarily fixed borders between states, that was why the
principle of territorial integrity was silently accepted by dominant
states, where old conflicts were still smoldering. The world powers,
however, could not have foreseen one nuance – the collapse of the USSR
and emergence of new "independent" republics that quickly became UNO
members in order to consolidate the administrative-territorial borders
of the former Union. However, even the UNO membership could not guard
certain republics against ethnic conflicts and the world against the
approaching perestroika. It is quite natural that the Balkans should
remain the hottest spot, where the conflict among Balkan nations
arose still at the times of the Ottoman Empire. Neither the First
nor the Second World War was able to reconcile the Bosnians, Serbs,
Croats and Albanians. From this point of view the totalitarian regime
was unique in radically wiping out separatist views. It worked in
the USSR and it worked in Yugoslavia. The 21st century, however,
did not bring peace; moreover, it completed the list of conflict
zones with Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and the Pacific states. The
most interesting point here is that in any spot of the world where
the American forces appear with the alleged aim to solve conflicts,
the latter hastily grow even deeper. Of course, struggle against
terrorism and illegal narco-business, possession of oil supplies in
the Middle East are very important but, for some reason, the result
is always the same: collapse of the country, crisis in just another
marionette country, and, consequently, a rapidly growing gap between
developing and backward countries.

Russia’s methods are almost identical with those of the USA. In an
attempt to return the whole Caucasus, Russia revoked the two Chechen
wars, as well as the Georgian-Abkhazian war in 1991 and played a
reprehensible role in the primary stage of the Nagorno-Karabakh
conflict, helping the Azerbaijani Emergency Platoon to conduct the
operation "Ring", the result of which was the cleansing of Armenians
from lowland Karabakh.

However, sooner or later all these conflicts have an effect on the
world powers themselves. And who knows what bred the world crisis? The
means used up by both Russia and the USA on arms and support of puppet
regimes could not but affect the world economy.

Recurring to the Helsinki Act, we should note that in essence its
signing served as a bomb in a delayed action, as it is impossible to
adopt two mutually exclusive principles or give preference to either
of them. The right of nations cannot be secondary, but the problem of
territorial integrity is very often disputed, especially since mother
countries cannot simply eliminate the empire complex and neither
can they imagine part of "their" territory torn away. The danger is
that local wars cannot drag on endlessly and may result in extensive
military operations embracing entire regions, like it is now in the
Middle East or in Central Asia. In 80s there was defined a certain
"arch of instability", which comprised Iraq, Lebanon, Turkey, Iran,
Afghanistan, the republics of Central Asia, Pakistan, India – actually
half of the Islamic World. It should also be noted that world oil and
gas reserves are all concentrated on this ‘arch’ and it is exactly
through it that opium from Afghanistan goes to other countries.

The search of alternative energy supplies and recession may lead to
radical changes in the world political map, including emergence of new
super-states. As a matter of fact, they have already appeared; they are
China and India, which both the USA and RF will have to reckon with.

TRANSPORT ACCIDENT ON YEREVAN GAYI STREET BRIDGE

ARMENPRESS
Dec 24, 2008
YEREVAN

A big transport accident occurred today on the bridge of Gayi
Street. An official from the police department told Armenpress that
approximately at 07:30-08:00 am in the morning "Renault", "Ford"
cars and "Bogdan" passenger bus crashed into each other.

According to the initial information there are no victims, the driver
of "Ford" got injuries and was transported to hospital.

The case is being investigated.

"SHIRAK EXPO 2008" ANNUAL EXHIBITION-SALE HELD IN GYUMRI

ARMENPRESS
Dec 24, 2008
GYUMRI

With the initiative of "Shirak Competition Center" fund the "Shirak
Expo 2008" fifth annual exhibition-sale was organized December 23
in Gyumri "Aragats" sport-culture complex with the participation of
more than 30 enterprises and services from the province as well as
from the capital.

Enterprises of the sphere of chemistry, food industry, IT, stone
industry, honey production as well as arts figures for whom an
opportunity was created to sell their works, took part in "Shirak
Expo 2008". The "Shirak Expo 2008" was also an opportunity for the
businessmen of the province to once more advertise their product.

A member of Armenian parliament Sukias Avetisian, who was also present
at the exhibition told Armenpress that such exhibitions first of all
contribute to the establishment of business relations and acquiring
of new partners.

"There is also an issue of supply and demand in the Shirak
province. Very often the Shirak residents do not know that a product
was produced in their province. Unfortunately many businessmen,
unconscious of the importance of such events and not having culture
of introduction of their programs and product, do not consider
it necessary to take part in such events which is against their
own interests. Here I see real competitive products", S. Avetisian
noted. Head of the Shirak "Competition Center" fund Gayane Avakian
informed that not only this but all the passed four exhibitions
fulfilled their mission: the businessmen found partners and markets.