Month: November 2009

ARFD TO RESPONSE TO LEVON TER-PETROSYAN

Aysor
Nov 13 2009
Armenia

"Armenia’s first-sitting President’s speaking is just a usual
proposal to cooperate with government," said member of the Armenian
Revolutionary Federation Dashnaktsutyun (ARFD), Artsvik Minasyan.

The former Armenian president Levon Ter-Petrosyan said recently, that
"in contradistinction to Armenian National Congress which politically
opposes Armenian-Turkish relation, rest of political forces have moved
the matter towards ideological base, that is, the base of Hay Dat
[Armenian Tribunal, or Armenian Court of Justice] and this has no
single link with real police or interests of Armenia."

ARFD will soon response to Levon Ter-Petrosyan, announced Artsvik
Minasyan stressing that the "serious and comprehensive answer" will be
given. "If you seek for being a national state or a citizen of worth,
you can’t go by cosmopolitanism," said Artsvik Minasyan. He also
pointed that Levon Ter-Petrosyan’s position weakens the opposition.

"It hurts oppositional field which will lead to government’s free
hand negotiating with Turkey," he said.

ARMENIAN BUSINESSMEN ARE NARROW-MINDED: AEPLAC HEAD

news.am
Nov 13 2009
Armenia

Armenia and EU intend to sign an agreement on free trade regime
creation, the leader of Armenian-European AEPLAC advice center Alexei
Sekarev told the journalists. According to him, this procedure will
take 5 years.

AEPLAC is interested in giving Armenian businessmen an idea of the
new regime, Sekarev stated, adding that the accord on opening the
talks is already reached.

He underlined that it particularly concerns the fields of
standardization, protection of rights on intellectual property,
technical obstacles in trade and sanitary control. "Armenian
businessman should first of all be aware of existing regimes
and criteria to conform to while exporting products to Europe,"
Sekarev said. He pointed out that generally Armenian businessmen are
narrow-minded in business planning. "They do not plan for 3-5 years,
hence to get a higher level in relations with EU further, we have to
start thinking over this now," he concluded.

ARMENIANS URGED TO REJECT ANKARA-YEREVAN DEAL

Hurriyet Daily News
nians-urged-to-reject-ankara-yerevan-deal-2009-11- 13
Nov 13 2009
Turkey

The head of the largest and most radical Armenian-American group
has urged Armenians throughout the world to reject a historic
reconciliation process between Ankara and Yerevan, saying the deal
would greatly hurt efforts for the recognition of what he termed the
"Armenian genocide."

The Armenians have "a choice to move forward. A choice, very simply,
between survival and surrender," said Ken Hachikian, chairman of the
Armenian National Committee of America, or ANCA, before a largely
Armenian audience in Pasadena, California, on Thursday.

Turkish and Armenian foreign ministers signed a set of protocols Oct.

10 under which Ankara and Yerevan have planned to establish normal
diplomatic relations and reopen their land border. The deal, if
ratified by the respective countries’ parliaments, would effectively
end decades of hostile relations.

But Armenian-Americans are focusing solely on winning formal U.S.

recognition of the World War I-era killings of their kinsmen in the
Ottoman Empire as "genocide."

"The tavern keepers of our day argue that the path they advocate
[the Ankara-Yerevan normalization process] will lead to peace and
prosperity, when, in reality, it only defers the day when our nation
will pay the full price for surrender," Hachikian said.

Casting doubt on ‘genocide’

"They would have us accept – under foreign pressure – the ‘protocols’
being forced upon the Armenian nation, even though they clearly
threaten Armenia’s security, abandon the rights of all Armenians,
and cast doubt on the Armenian genocide," he said.

"They would have us reduce the Armenian genocide from a crime against
all humanity – one that must be recognized by the American government
and resolved truthfully and justly by the international community and,
of course, by Turkey – to a simple bilateral dispute to be negotiated
between states, states of vastly unequal power," Hachikian said.

He said that the world’s Armenians "must reject retreat. Survival,
not surrender: There is no other choice," he said.

On the occasion of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s upcoming
visit to Washington, the ANCA launched a fresh public campaign to
obtain U.S. recognition of the genocide earlier this week.

Erdogan and U.S. President Barack Obama are scheduled to meet at the
White House on Dec. 7. The Obama administration staunchly supports
the Ankara-Yerevan normalization process.

ARMENIAN ARMED FORCES CARRY OUT MILITARY EXERCISES IN NK AGAIN

APA
Nov 13 2009
Azerbaijan

Aghdam. Teymur Zahidoglu – APA. Armenian Armed Forces have begun
military exercises in the occupied territories of Aghdam again,
APA’s Karabakh bureau reports.

The shots of artillery and armoured vehicle are being heard in
the occupied Shahbulag Mountain. The explosions are heard in all
settlements of the region.

Armenians have been carrying out military exercises in the occupied
Azerbaijani territories for a month.

ARMENIAN SECURITIES MARKET SHOWS SIGNS OF REVIVAL

news.am
Nov 13 2009
Armenia

Numerous Armenian companies are ready to issue shares, but they are not
sure the capital market and public trust securities, Armen Melikyan,
Director General of NASDAQ OMX Armenia told NEWS.am. According to
him, bonds of ten companies and shares of 11 companies are currently
listed on NASDAQ OMX Armenia. Melikyan pointed out a number of reasons
for the underdevelopment of Armenia’s securities market. First, the
capital market and the public do not trust shares. "In 1993, when
the privatization process got under way, people were not informed
of what a share was. Later, securities were bought from them dirt
cheap. Time passed and the same people learnt that a share they sold
at 500 Armenian drams is worth 200 U.S. dollars now," Melikyan said.

Another problem is the lack of money on the capital market. The
companies issuing shares may have doubts about yield because of scanty
demand. Melikyan pointed out some movement on the securities market
from early 2008. "Companies began issuing bonds. That enabled them
to repay high-interest bank credits, and they were thus changing the
credit structure," Melikyan said. Since mid-2008, however, as the
global crisis was developing, the activity has been getting lower.

Melikyan said that the financial crisis made foreign investors, who
are mostly shareholders in the companies issuing shares, suspended
their investments in the Armenian economy.

"We expect activity on the exchange from mid-2010, as economic recovery
is expected in many countries," Melikyan said. He believes pension
reforms will boost the Armenian capital market as well.

CHRISTIAN TEENAGER KILLED IN IRAQ DRIVE-BY SHOOTING (AFP)

Agence France Presse
Nov 13 2009
France

MOSUL, Iraq — Gunmen killed a Christian teenager in a drive-by
shooting outside his family home on Friday in the restive northern
Iraqi city of Mosul, police said.

"Unidentified gunmen opened fire from a speeding black car on the
adolescent before fleeing the scene in Tahrir," a police officer said,
referring to a Christian neighbourhood in eastern Mosul.

A neighbour said 16-year-old Rami Katchik, a member of the minority
Armenian community, had been hosing down the entrance to his family
home when the shooting occurred.

"His father had just gone into the house to get a shovel and ran out
when he heard the gunshots and saw three men in the car," said the
neighbour Girgis Paulos.

It was unclear if he had been targeted because of his faith.

But a local priest, Hazem Girgis, described the killing as part of
"crimes aimed at uprooting Christians and forcing them to flee."

Thousands of Christians fled Mosul last year because of violence that
claimed the lives of 40 people from the community.

A report on Tuesday by Human Rights Watch said Iraqi minorities,
including Christians, in northern Iraq are the collateral victims of
a conflict between Arabs and Kurds over who controls the country’s
disputed provinces.

Iraq’s disputed provinces include Nineveh, of which Mosul is the
capital, the oil-rich province and city of Kirkuk, and Diyala.

Since the US-led invasion of 2003, hundreds of Iraqi Christians have
been killed and a string of churches attacked.

Around 800,000 Christians lived in Iraq at the time of the invasion,
but their number has since shrunk by around a third or more as
members of the minority community have fled the country, according
to Christian leaders.

ARTSVIK MINASYAN: PREMIER PARALYZED ECONOMY

news.am
Nov 13 2009
Armenia

The 2010 draft budget is not in line with the Government-announced
anti-crisis measures, Artsvik Minasyan, a Parliament member of the
Armenian Revolutionary Federation (ARF), told reporters.

The budget "lacks a strategy", lower GDP, a 30% decrease in transfers
and an unfavorable export situation being evidence thereof, he said.

According to Minasyan, the budgeted 2.8% inflation rate is unrealistic,
and Armenia’s foreign debt – 41% of GDP – poses a threat in terms of
"right spending of funds" rather than in terms of the amount.

The situation would not be so grave if the country’s economy were
independent of the Central Bank of Armenia (CBA). Minasyan does not
rule out the Government’s "serious intervention" in the AMD exchange
rate next year – the Government may return to a fixed exchange rate.

"The Armenian economy was paralyzed after Tigran Sargsyan left the
post of CBA Chairman and was appointed Prime Minister," Minasyan said.

He stated that the Premier’s statement on the end of economic decline
is "untrue."

DASHNAK GENOCIDE BILL STALLS IN ARMENIAN PARLIAMENT
Irina Hovannisian

Armenialiberty.org
Nov 13 2009

Armenia — David Harutiunian, chairman of the parliament committee
on legal affairs.

A key committee of the National Assembly effectively rejected on
Friday a proposal by the opposition Armenian Revolutionary Federation
(Dashnaktsutyun) to criminalize public statements denying that the
1915 massacres of Armenians in Ottoman Turkey constituted genocide.

Armenia’s Criminal Code already carries heavy fines and up to four
years’ imprisonment for public denial of genocides and "other crimes
against humanity." An amendment tabled by Dashnaktsutyun last month
would extend the maximum punishment to five years and apply it to
anyone "denying, playing down, approving or justifying the genocide
of Armenians in Ottoman Turkey and Western Armenia."

Dashnaktsutyun leaders acknowledge that the bill is directly connected
with the recent agreements to normalize Armenia’s relations with
Turkey that have been strongly condemned by the nationalist party.

They say it is specifically directed against a Turkish-Armenian
"subcommission" of historians envisaged by one of the agreements.

It would be tasked with studying the extermination of the Ottoman
Empire’s sizable Armenian population. Dashnaktsutyun and other
critics of the deal say the very existence of such a body would
call into question the fact of the genocide, a claim denied by the
Yerevan government.

In a written opinion submitted to the Armenian parliament committee
on legal affairs this week, the Ministry of Justice objected to the
Dashnaktsutyun bill and essentially upheld the existing Criminal Code
clause relating to genocide denial. The committee on Friday postponed
the bill’s consideration by at least two months, meaning that the
proposed amendment will not reach the parliament floor before February.

The committee chairman, David Harutiunian, made no secret of his strong
opposition to the measure, saying that it would create "extremely
serious problems" in the ongoing Turkish-Armenian negotiations. He
said its passage would lead the Turkish authorities to resume heavy
enforcement of a controversial law makes it a crime to "insult the
Turkish nation." The law, watered down last year, has been used in
the prosecution of prominent Turks who have questioned the official
Turkish version of the events of 1915.

Harutiunian also argued that by adopting the amendment drafted by
Dashnaktsutyun the National Assembly would give the impression that
there is now a "serious movement" within Armenian that denies the
genocidal character of those events. "Besides, I believe Armenia’s
position on this issue is so strong that we don’t need any additional
tools of defense in the shape of criminal liability," the former
justice minister said at a committee meeting. "The stronger party
doesn’t need such tools."

"I don’t see that confidence about our strength," Vahan Hovannisian,
the leader of the Dashnaktsutyun faction in the parliament, countered,
referring to President Serzh Sarkisian’s conciliatory policy towards
Turkey. He said the October 10 signing of the Turkish-Armenian
protocols in Zurich was "a sign of weakness" on the part of Yerevan.

TURKISH-ARMENIAN WRITER REPORTS DEATH THREATS
Astghik Bedevian

Armenialiberty.org
Nov 13 2009

Turkey — Sevan Nisanyan, a Turnish-Armenian newspaper columnist.

A Turkish-Armenian newspaper columnist claimed on Friday to have
received hundreds of deaths threats after altering a famous quote from
the founder of modern Turkey to make a case for sweeping reforms in
the country.

The quote was drawn from a 1923 speech by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk in
which he urged the Turkish youth to fight hard for their homeland.

"Your first duty is to preserve and to defend Turkish Independence
and the Turkish Republic forever," declared Ataturk.

"Your first duty is to be a human being," Sevan Nisanyan,
an Istanbul-based ethnic Armenian intellectual, countered in an
October 29 article published by the "Taraf" daily. "This is the very
foundation of your existence and your future. This foundation is your
most precious treasure."

Speaking to RFE/RL by phone, Nisanyan said the appeal infuriated
nationalist Turks and he has since received about 800 e-mails and
letters containing verbal abuse and threats to kill him. "People have
gone mad," he said. "The reaction has been like ‘How dare an Armenian
write such strong and negative things about Ataturk?’"

Some of those letters were reprinted by "Taraf" this week. "We
will make you write the correct version of the ‘Address to Youth’
with your own blood. … I’ll kill you like that Hrant Dink dog,"
one of them read, referring to the Turkish-Armenian editor gunned
down in Istanbul in January 2007.

"I believe that the military is behind this uproar," Nisanyan charged,
adding that he has already appealed to the Turkish police for
protection. "The police have been the more liberal party in recent
years," he said. "The biggest problem is the military. The police
have been very friendly and helped me a lot."

BAKU’S FRUSTRATIONS WITH ANKARA MAY GIVE RUSSIA NEW OPENING IN AZERBAIJAN

news.az
Nov 13 2009
Azerbaijan

Sabina Freizer News.Az interviews Sabina Freizer, director of the
Brussels-based International Crisis Group’s Europe programme.

Official Baku thinks that the normalization of diplomatic
relations between Armenia and Turkey may result in Yerevan taking an
unconstructive position on the negotiations over Karabakh. Why then
did the United States, Russia and the EU work so hard to improve
Armenian-Turkish ties?

While Baku is concerned that the normalization of relations between
Armenia and Turkey will cause Armenia to become more recalcitrant in
the Nagorno-Karabakh talks, the feeling amongst many in the US and
the European Union is that Armenia will actually become more flexible.

Many Armenians say that they are surrounded by hostile Turkic
countries and claim that they need to retain control over the occupied
territories as a security guarantee. Once relations with Turkey are
normalized, this argument will no longer be even remotely credible.

Also within Armenia itself the whole normalization process gives
support to those inside the country who are open to the outside,
to contacts with Turkey, relations with the European Union, the US,
while undermining the arguments of extreme nationalists who continue
to play an important role in the country.

If the protocols are not signed in Turkey, there will once again be
strong pressure in the US next April to recognize the events of 1915
as genocide

Sabina FreizerThe high level involvement of US, French and Russian
officials in the Turkey-Armenia reconciliation process, and especially
at the time of the signing of the protocols, is extremely important
for the South Caucasus. It shows that even though this region rarely
makes it into the news in these countries (with the exception of
Russia perhaps), the South Caucasus can still attract the attention
of major leaders. It is a rare example of cooperation between the
US-EU and Russia.

In one of your previous interviews you said the normalization
of relations with Turkey will make Armenia more flexible in the
negotiation process with Azerbaijan. You also said that Armenia and
Azerbaijan have already agreed on the need to withdraw the armed
forces from the seven occupied districts. Azerbaijani President
Ilham Aliyev said in an interview that the issues concerning the
unconditional withdrawal of Armenian troops from all the occupied
lands around Nagorno Karabakh have been coordinated. Yet, after
signing the Armenia-Turkey protocls in Zurich Armenian President Serzh
Sargsyan dismissed the statement, saying the withdrawal of the Armenian
forces from seven occupied districts had not been discussed with the
Azerbaijani president. Is this not proof of Yerevan’s unconstructive
position after signing the protocols in Zurich?

In June 2005 your foreign minister explained that in the
Nagorno-Karabakh talks the sides are addressing issues one by one,
resolving one before moving to another, "like pearls knotted on a
silk thread". No issue can be resolved on its own, and no agreements
are final until the whole negotiations end. Of course, the withdrawal
and return of all displaced persons are necessary, but based on the
current form of the negotiations this will occur only within the
context of a comprehensive settlement.

The Crisis Group never said that an agreement on withdrawal from all
seven territories was sealed. In our October report Nagorno-Karabakh:
Getting to a Breakthrough, we recommended that "Armenia, together
with the de facto Nagorno-Karabakh authorities and Azerbaijan, should
begin contingency planning on the mechanisms and procedures for the
withdrawal of Armenian forces from the districts of Azerbaijan outside
of Nagorno-Karabakh they continue to occupy."

We also noted that Aliyev and Sargsyan have reportedly inched closer
to agreement on a timetable for Armenian withdrawal from seven
occupied districts adjacent to Nagorno-Karabakh. This claim is based
on statements from former OSCE Minsk Group co-chair Matt Bryza,
according to whom, provided everything else is agreed, Armenian
forces would pull out immediately from five districts adjacent to
Nagorno-Karabakh and then in five years time from Kelbajar and Lachin.

President Sargsyan would be deceiving his public if he is claiming
that within the current OSCE Minsk Group sponsored talks one of
the principles being discussed is not withdrawal from the occupied
territories. But withdrawal is conditional on many other of the
principles under discussion.

The OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs state clearly that there is no
linkage to be made between the Karabakh conflict and Turkey-Armenia
reconciliation. Politicians in Turkey and Azerbaijan who are making
that link and saying that withdrawal is necessary before reconciliation
are also mixing two parallel but separate processes.

There is no mention of withdrawal in the protocols.

What could be the results of Armenian-Turkish rapprochement and how
can Russia and the United States benefit from it?

Russia is now supporting Turkey-Armenia reconciliation, even though
previously, Russian reactions to improvement in the bilateral
relationship were lukewarm at best. The closed border was seen as
helping Russia maintain dominance over Armenia and as securing the old
Cold War border, backed up with a military alliance in which Armenia
was very much the junior partner, a base in Gyumri and Russian guards
on the Turkish border and supervising international entry points like
Yerevan airport.

Moscow also seeks to further isolate, marginalise and surround
Georgia. Baku’s frustrations with Ankara may likewise give Russia a new
opening in Azerbaijan. But Russia can also benefit directly if there
is access to Turkey from Armenia. It needs a transit route to supply
its military base in Gyumri, and its companies now control or own
key parts of Armenian infrastructure, including mobile phone firms,
energy production and distribution, pipelines and railways. An open
border and free trade between Turkey and Armenia would increase the
value of these holdings.

What does Nagorno-Karabakh mean for Russia, the United States, Europe
and even for Turkey now?

Nagorno-Karabakh is not of primary importance to any of the countries
that you mention. In the region, as you well know, even the conflicts
in Georgia get more attention.

Of course if the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict was solved and the regions’
borders were once again entirely open, it could serve as a much more
effective transit corridor for gas, oil, trade and people. But if
the conflict is not resolved, it continues to place a heavy drain
on Azerbaijan which is accommodating very large numbers of displaced
persons. It forces Azerbaijan and Armenia to maintain extremely high
military budgets. Indirectly the non-resolution of the conflict also
blocks democratization and firm establishment of the rule of law. The
possibility of a return to war is a prospect of concern to Russia,
the US and the EU.

Could the recent events in the region be assessed as a crisis that may
form a new situation in the negotiation process over Nagorno Karabakh?

Turkey-Armenia reconciliation can have a positive impact on the
Nagorno-Karabakh talks, as mentioned above, but similarly if the
reconciliation fails, if the protocols are not ratified in the national
parliaments for example, this will have a very negative backlash in
the region. Those who made steps towards reconciliation and supported
the process will be seen as failures, and this will be a victory for
hardline nationalists.

If the protocols are not signed in Turkey, for example, there will
once again be strong pressure in the US next April to recognize the
events of 1915 as genocide. The Justice and Development Party’s foreign
policy and attempts to play a leading role in the region will suffer
a serious blow. Alternatively, if the protocols fail to pass through
the Armenian parliament, this will show the weakness of President
Sargsyan. If he is unable to muster enough domestic support for a
deal with Turkey, it is even less likely that he will successfully
sell a resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict to his people.