Month: February 2015

ANOTHER ALBUM FROM THE GOLDEN COLLECTION PRESENTED TO THE MUSIC-LOVING PUBLIC

16:50 * 10.02.15

The collection of recordings of the Armenian Public Radio has been
enriched with just another digitalized album. As a result of the
cooperation between VivaCell-MTS, the RA Ministry of Culture and the
company “Prolighting”, a set of CDs has been released dedicated to
the 145th anniversary of Komitas Vardapet comprising 7 audio and 1
multimedia CDs in Armenian and English.

The collection includes photographs and drawings of Komitas, recordings
of songs performed by him, as well as recordings of best performances
of Komitas’ songs by the musical troupes in Armenia.

ôhis unique collection is important not only as a cultural value that
will be passed on to the next generations, but also as a call to the
whole world made ahead of the centennial of the Armenian Genocide. The
album is not intended for sale. It will be distributed to the libraries
of the largest universities of the world. The album is a message to
the coming generations is to cherish and to propagate the immense
cultural legacy that has reached our days.

“Komitas did the same for our musical language what Mashtots had
done for our spoken language centuries before”. These are the words
of Paruyr Sevak. It is time to present the musical treasures of this
great Armenian to the world in a thorough and consistent way.

Introducing the rich legacy of Komitas on the occasion of the
100th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide has an enormous moral
significance. We should not only commemorate and honor Komitas but
also follow his example and try to contribute to the unity of our
nation and to the realization of national aims by living as humbly,
consciously and righteously as his legacy and his character dictate”,
noted VivaCell-MTS General Manager Ralph Yirikian.

The “Komitas” album has been issued upon the initiative of the RA
Ministry of Culture. VivaCell-MTS has allocated AMD 25 million for
the realization of the project; the Company has also provided over
AMD 64 million for the program of enriching the golden collection of
the Armenian Public Radio.

NO ACCURATE DATA ON CHILDREN WITH DOWN SYNDROME IN ARMENIA – OFFICIAL

16:38 * 10.02.15

Special schools received 22 children with Down syndrome last year,
Lena Hayrapetyan, Head of the Children’s Affairs Department, Ministry
of Labor and Social Affairs, told reporters on Tuesday.

Children with Down syndrome can even attend comprehensive schools if
their state is not complicated.

“Special boarding schools are well equipped, and wages are three
times as high as in ordinary children’s homes,” she said.

No statistical data on children with Down syndrome are available.

“We do not usually separate such children from the other children with
disabilities, and their number is about 8,000,” Ms Hayrapetyan said.

Varduhi Aramyan, who heads the Armenian Camp NGO and has children
with disabilities, spoke of problems facing parents of children with
special needs.

“Maternity homes must be interested in properly consulting the mothers
of children with Down syndrome.

However, mothers like me know very well whether or not they have
received necessary help. We must break stereotypes in our society –
people must not think that a mother must abandon her child. What are
our social workers doing? Where are those defending children’s rights?”

Telling about her experience in Europe, Ms Aramyan pointed out
high-level work with children with disabilities.

“The task there is to work with them. Our society must love such
people.”

From: Baghdasarian

PARAJANOV’S POMEGRANATE COLOR TO BE SCREENED IN TURKEY

12:33 â~@¢ 10.02.15

Soviet-Armenian film producer Sergey Parajanov’s Pomegranate Color
will go on screen in Turkey as part of the Istanbul independent
film festival.

The cultural event, entitled Ä°f , will run from 26 February to March
1. The films included in the program will be presented in the town
of Izmir and capital Ankara. Mehmet Acar, a publicist of Haberturk,
has strongly recommended watching 10.

In his remarks, the author notes that the movie, produced in 1968,
features the life of Armenian folk musician and poet Sayat Nova. “This
movie, which has become a source of inspiration for many directors,
is considered classical today. Banned in the Soviet Union in 1969,
the film is now accessible to fans entitled by the Film Foundation
under Martin Charles Scorsese’s leadership,” he writes.

From: A. Papazian

TOP IT EXPERTS OF CIS COUNTRIES TO MEET IN YEREVAN IN APRIL

11:42, 10 February, 2015

YEREVAN, 10 FEBRUARY, ARMENPRESS. The top IT experts of Armenia and
several CIS countries will meet in Yerevan on 1-3 April to participate
in the “IT Summit 2015: Meeting with Leaders of the Sector”, which
is organized by the Union of Information Technology Enterprises
(UITE) and the Association for Computer and Information Technology
Enterprises of Russia (APKIT).

As the UITE reports to “Armenpress”, the summit is hosted in any one
of the countries of the CIS region in April every year. This year,
the summit will bring together representatives of nearly 150-200
leading information, telecommunication and high technology enterprises
from Armenia, Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Kazakhstan and several other
countries.

THE INTERNATIONAL STRUCTURES WILL BE INFORMED ABOUT THE CASES OF KIDNAPPING AND BEATING OF THE ACTIVISTS

February 10 2015

Human right activist Artur Sakunts believes that violence in Armenia
has become the only way of expressing the attitude against the
problems and solving them. “The acts of violence as a form of attitude
have become commonplace and are regularly repeated. The political
affiliation, occupation, sex and social status do not matter anymore.

The acts of violence are constantly repeated because the characteristic
feature of the system is the impunity; violence are either not revealed
and are concealed or the persons using violence remain unpunished.

The series of acts of violence against the Pre-parliament members
began since last year, now, it continues against the protesters of
the law on turnover tax. I do not even want to go further to know who
could do it, but interestingly, HRD representatives commenced their
searching operations by the traces of Artak Khachatryan’s violence
through questioning the law enforces, who were the number one possible
suspect structures. Of course, they informed that they are unaware
and have not detained, but the law enforcement actions are not only
limited to detainment. They may not detain, but take to another place,
commit an act of violence, leave helpless and go away like they did
with Artak,” said Arthur Sakunts.

According to him, a person who plans to commit such an act in the
daytime, in a mask and on a car without a license plate, cannot commit
such an act, unless he is sure that he will remain unpunished. “And
only the person sponsored by the government authorities may have the
chance of impunity. I doubt that those responsible for the incident
in Berdzor will be punished and those beating the activists will be
identified. The series of violence, in my opinion, is a terrorism
against the public. The atmosphere of fear is the approach through
which they want to make the situation manageable, because they are
unable to find solutions and give answers to the questions raised
through civil disobedience, and the only way is the violence.”

Mr. Sakunts said that the human rights defenders are going to
raise the recent acts of violence both inside the country and at the
international instances, with whom Armenia shares the membership. “The
concern is not only stating these acts of violence, but the ability
to respond afterwards, both inside the country and beyond. We have
a non-responsible, inadequate and incompetent government, which will
not be able to answer these questions.”

Arpine SIMONYAN

Read more at:

From: Baghdasarian

“NORAT TER-GRIGORYANTS HAS GONE TO RUSSIA, SLEPT AND SEEN DREAMS.” LIEUTENANT-GENERAL GAGIK MELKONYAN

February 10 2015

“When the ceasefire agreement was signed, Norat Ter-Grigoryants was
present there. Why he was not offended then, that question was not
raised then. Or, 20 years elapsed and now it occurred to his mind
that mistakes have been made then. And has he forgotten the conditions
under which we signed the ceasefire, under what condition our country
was,” so responded former Deputy Defense Minister, Lieutenant-General
Gagik Melikyan in the conversation with Aravot.am, in response to
the statement made by Lieutenant-General Norat Ter-Grigoryants that
the disgraceful ceasefire agreement signed in Bishkek is a treachery,
tomfoolery and stupidity.

Note that recently, during the Russian RT TV transmission, Norat
Ter-Grigoryants has told why he had left the country offended. As
reported by 1in.am, the General has mentioned that serious
disagreements have arisen between him and the military-political
leaders of Armenia because of the cease-fire agreement. According
to him, it was not worthy for the winning state to sign such a
disgraceful ceasefire, which was not driven from the interests of the
Armenian people and the state. “This disgraceful agreement was signed
by people who had no clue about the political and military affairs,
they did not know what is meant by a strategy. The Bishkek cease-fire
agreement was an arrangement written on the sand, a thing that does
not represent anything, it was not only a disgraceful agreement, but
also tomfoolery and stupidity. There is no commitment or guarantee,
because the war could restart the very next day. The agreement did
not provide any distinct borderline and Azerbaijan was not compelled
to recognize the independence of Nagorno-Karabakh Republic.”

We clarified from Gagik Melkonyan whether we did not have an
alternative then, and whether we should have signed the agreement,
the General replied, “No, there was no alternative, because at that
time we could not compel anything to anybody. The third state was
reconciling our two states and it was not accepting any condition. As
for Norat, he was Lieutenant-General and Chief of Staff, whom they were
listening to. During those times, if he was bringing his fist down on
the table saying, “You know what?”, and they will listen to him. Why
was he offended? He could have raised the issue and have said what he
wanted to the government authorities. The Army at that time was the
most powerful and dictating structure. Let him strike his hand on the
table saying, it should be so. He was the head of the General Staff,
and could compel Levon Ter-Petrosyan. Why didn’t he do it?

Hence, I do not accept his reasoning that there was a treachery. Some
minor people begin giving assessments from the side. They have not
been in the battle field, nor in the state of war; they were seated
under the walls, and now, they are criticizing the then government. In
those winning years, they are saying that it was dark, there was no
light and it was cold. These were the years of our victory rather
than the years of darkness. Someone, let’s say, was eating meal in
the light of the lamp, but we are the ones who won.”

As for the accusations that Levon Ter-Petrosyan was not aware of the
situation and did not know what was going on in the front, Gagik
Melkonyan said, “I do not want to find fault with, the war passed
away. I do not want to find fault with any commander of the troops,
but I must say that Mr. Norat Ter-Grigoryants was not either aware
of what is going on in the front. We were occupying territories, two
days later only, they were getting to know that these territories are
occupied. Let him not forget that he was the kind of General. At that
time, no one was aware of many questions of how and what. How could
the president of a country be unaware of what is going on? Or, now,
Norat has gone to Russia, slept and seen dreams. Does he recall now of
what had happened 20 years ago? I can sit in front of him, talk to him
vis-a-vis and tell hundred things to him. But it is not good to find
fault with anyone. Once, Commandos was also working in the same way,
and I said a few things about Commandos. It is not good, you have
passed a war, and we have won. Why do you want to stir all over again?

Each of you made a mistake, each of you did something, but most
importantly, we have won a united victory together with the president,
minister, General Staff and the last soldier. We should be proud. And
you know what is bad that our nation, when defeated, always knew
exactly what to do after the defeat. This time that we have won,
we do not know what to do after the victory. This is the trouble.”

According to Gagik Melkonyan, Norat Ter-Grigoryants left Armenia for
another reason. “Let him say the main reason. It was not the reason.”

To our question of whether it is true that the problem was only
with his disagreements to the decisions of Generals Andreasyan and
Dalibaltayan, therefore he has left the country offended when his
words were not considered, Melkonyan replied, “Andreasyan was a very
powerful man. Indeed, we can say that he had clue about everything
– the war, and knew what is what. They did not find common language
with each other to continue their work. And this does not mean that he
had disagreements with the government. Lieutenant-Generals Andreasyan
and Norat Ter-Grigoryants did not understand each other, therefore,
he left. The government authorities did not commit treachery. Our
conditions the then dictated so and we could not bring forward any
other condition. The war was on.”

Hripsime JEBEJYAN

Read more at:

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

RUSSIAN EXPERT: UKRAINE IS AN OBJECT LESSON FOR AZERBAIJAN

by David Stepanyan

Monday, February 9, 14:02

The crisis in Ukraine is an object lesson for Azerbaijan, Head of
the Alte et Certe Analytical Agency Andrey Yepifantsev told ArmInfo
on Monday.

“Kyiv’s years long policy to cultivate Rusophobia among Ukrainians has
resulted in complete dehumanization of ‘dissidents’ in the southeast.

The Kyiv authorities have convinced their people that war is the only
solution to the problems of the southeast. This brainwashing policy
has formed an aggressive Maidan stratum who believe that ‘Donbas
must be either their or nobody’s!’ but it also has made its authors
hostages to those people. Today President Poroshenko would be happy
to make at least some concession but he is afraid of being smitten
by thousands of aggressive zealots standing behind,” Yepifantsev said.

He said that the Azeri authorities have followed a similar policy
concerning Nagorno-Karabakh and the Armenians for years and are facing
a similar atmosphere. “So, very soon President Aliyev will have no
more room for concessions and will have to lead his country to one
more war that will end in one more loss,” Yepifantsev said.

From: A. Papazian

CHINA PROPOSING TO ESTABLISH FREE TRADE ZONE WITH EURASIAN ECONOMIC UNION

18:16, 09 Feb 2015
Siranush Ghazanchyan

China offered to establish a free trade zone with the Eurasian Economic
Union in the future, Russian Ambassador to China Andrei Denisov told
RIA Novosti.

“Chinese partners were very careful in regard to this integration in
the beginning. They simply needed to make sure that it works. Now they
show interest in increasing cooperation not only with the separate
countries – Kazakhstan, Belarus, Russia, Armenia and Kyrgyzstan in
the future, but with the union as such. And as far as I know they even
proposed to us, the members of the union, to think about creation of
a free trade zone in the future,” Denisov said.

Denisov added that both sides are already discussing mechanisms to
cooperate in the future.

The Eurasian Economic Union, which includes Russia, Armenia, Belarus
and Kazakhstan, came into force on January 1. Kyrgyzstan’s membership,
agreed to in December 2014, is expected to come into force in May.

AZERBAIJAN SAYS WON’T ATTEND EURONEST PA SESSION IN YEREVAN

17:45, 09 Feb 2015
Siranush Ghazanchyan

Azerbaijan will not attend the session of the Euronest Parliamentary
Assembly in Yerevan on March 16-18, Elkhan Suleymanov, Chairman of
Azerbaijani Delegation to the Euronest PA, told APA.

“Despite the fact that Armenia signed a Customs Union agreement
and joined the the Eurasian Economic Union, the Euronest PA neither
expressed its attitude towards this fact nor discussed this situation.

On the contrary, the fact that the plenary session of the Euronest PA
will be held in this country in such situation proves the approval
of Armenia’s political decisions to join the above-mentioned
institutions. And this means that Armenia will achieve the adoption
of any decision in favor of its own interests during Yerevan session
of the Euronest PA,” Suleymanov said.

Azerbaijan fears the issue of the Armenian Genocide will be raised
at the Euronest PA session ahead of the 100th anniversary.

UCSD GROUPS COMMEMORATE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE

18:01, 09 Feb 2015
Siranush Ghazanchyan

The Armenian Student Union, in conjunction with several other student
cultural organizations on campus, hosted the Stain of Denial: Silent
Sit-in Protest on Thursday, Feb. 5. The protest, which was meant to
acknowledge the 100th year of denial regarding the Armenian Genocide
by the Ottoman Empire, was held in front of the Silent Tree outside of
Geisel Library from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.

ASU alumni instituted the Stain of Denial protests on the UCSD campus
three years ago. The protests, which were held simultaneously
throughout UC campuses on Feb. 5, aimed to educate students about the
Armenian Genocide and the ensuing campaign of denial by the Ottoman
Empire which is now the state of Turkey.

The event consisted of about 30 student protesters throughout the day
and caught the attention of many individuals who stopped to speak with
representatives from the various organizations.

ASU President Yeraz Kochkarian told the UCSD Guardian that the purpose
of sitting silently in protest was to create a visual representation
of the ongoing denial.

“The silence represents all of the silence around the issue
essentially,” Kochkarian said. “And how politics and governments don’t
talk about it or don’t refer to it as a genocide. This year marks the
100th year commemorating the genocide, so it’s especially important to
make a visual protest demonstrating how this is still important 100
years later.”

Many of the protesters wore red tape over their mouths to further
enhance this visual effect of the protest. They also wore black shirts
to show their solidarity.

Besides being one of the representatives whom those passing by could
question, Kochkarian was also holding a picture of her grandmother, a
survivor of the Armenian Genocide who was rescued by French soldiers
and taken to France before later returning to Syria and sharing her
story. Other protestors held similar photographs and were willing to
share other stories of survivors.

Among the other campus groups that came out to support the event was
the Union of Jewish Students. Vice President of Outreach Yael Kempe, a
senior from Sixth College, shared with the Guardian why it was
important that UJS showed up to the event.

“Our club personally feels a very close connection to the ASU, and we
feel like we need to show our [solidarity] to them as a coalition we
have with them,” Kempe said. “I think also because our cultures are so
similar and we’ve experienced the Holocaust and they’ve experienced
the Genocide, its all one and the same. It’s nondenominational, and
we’re here to show our support with AS[U].”

Other student organizations involved with the protest included the
Armenian cultural Greek organizations Alpha Gamma Alpha, Zeta Chapter
and Alpha Epsilon Omega, Eta Chapter. Also present were members of the
Black Student Union and Kaibigang Pilipino. However, an affiliation
with one of these groups was not necessary to join the protest.

Revelle College junior transfer Asher Alter, who is a member of Alpha
Epsilon Pi, stated that he came out to the event because the genocide
was something that strongly affected him.

“It’s something that resonates deeply,” Alter told the Guardian. “It
was the first genocide of the modern age, and the fact that it’s not
recognized by most countries is a pretty big deal.”