Author: Andres-Papazian

IRAN’S NEW REGIONAL POLICY AGAINST ARMENIA’S INTERESTS

news.am
Nov 9 2010
Armenia

Good relations between the South Caucasus countries and Iran to
counterbalance Russia and Turkey is not in Armenia’s political
interests, Gagik Harutyunyan, Director of the Noravank research
complex, told NEWS.am, commenting on the new tendencies in Iran’s
policy.

Despite the Iranian President’s anti-Russian rhetoric concerning
the failed sale of S-300 complexes, Iran is seeking to maintain the
balance in the South Caucasus to counterbalance Russia and Turkey
to get its “share” in the ongoing political process in the South
Caucasus. Evidence thereof is a visa-free regime with Georgia similar
to that established with Azerbaijan earlier.

“However, all this is against Armenia’s political interests. Any action
against Iran is against Armenia’s interests. Armenia has trade and
economic relations with Armenia. Under the circumstances Armenia must
exert every effort to ease tension surrounding Iran. There exists a
problem not talked about much: a possible war against Iran may be a
nuclear war, as, according to some information, Teheran has nuclear
weapons. Any nuclear war means an ecological disaster for Armenia,”
Harutyunyan said.

From: A. Papazian

ARMENIAN PROFESSIONAL SOCIETY TO HONOR JOHN EVANS AT ANNUAL GALA BANQUET

asbarez
Monday, November 8th, 2010

LOS ANGELES-Former Ambassador to Armenia, John Marshall Evans has
been named 2010 Professional of the Year by the Armenian Professional
Society (APS) for his steadfast adherence to addressing the Armenian
genocide in a forthright manner.

He will be accepting the honor at this year’s annual APS banquet that
will take place on Friday, November 19.

As the U.S. Ambassador to Armenia in 2004-2006, Evans broke with
State Department policy by using the term “Armenian genocide” and was
subsequently released from his duties as ambassador. In Addressing
members of the Armenian community at the time, Evans referred to
the Armenian genocide as “the first genocide of the 20th century,”
pledging to do a better job in addressing the issue.

The Ambassador later told an Armenian newspaper that it was an ethical
issue and that he had no choice but to speak the truth, despite an
established policy of employing euphemisms and circumlocutions. “I
have to say that it is not something that any diplomat does lightly.

It goes against every grain of our being. It goes against every
teaching that we’ve ever had as diplomats, so it was not an easy
decision.”

Commenting on the decision to honor Ambassador Evans as the
Professional of the Year, APS President Stephan Bagboudarian stated
that the ambassador’s bravery was unprecedented. “Ambassador
Evans chose to stand up for the truth, in spite of the possible
consequences. He is a true patriot for upholding historical truth,
human rights and justice.”

Ambassador Evans will be attending the APS Annual Banquet in Los
Angeles to accept the honor, along with his wife Donna Evans, a former
President of the World Affairs Council of Washington, D.C.

From: A. Papazian

BODIES OF TWO AZERI SOLDIERS SWAPPED FOR DEAD ARMENIAN VILLAGER
BY LUSINE MUSAYELIAN

by Asbarez
Monday, November 8th, 2010

STEPANAKERT (RFE/RL)-Military authorities in the Nagorno-Karabakh
Republic handed over the bodies of two Azerbaijani soldiers and
received an Armenian corpse on Saturday, in a fresh swap stemming
from an agreement reached by Armenia’s and Azerbaijan’s president
late last month.

Gavrush Arustamian, an 85-year-old resident of a village in
northeastern Karabakh, went missing earlier this year in unclear
circumstances. Local officials and residents believe that he
drowned in a nearby river, which presumably washed away his body to
Azerbaijani-controlled territory.

The Azerbaijani servicemen, Lieutenant Farid Ahmedov and Ensign
Mubariz Ibrahimov, were buried on Sunday in a funeral attended by
President Ilham Aliyev. The latter bestowed the title of “national
hero” on Ibrahimov in July, shortly after he was killed in fighting
with Karabakh Armenian forces.

In a speech at the funeral service, Aliyev paid tribute to the two
“martyrs” and renewed his threats to resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh
conflict by force. “We can restore the country’s territorial integrity
by military means at any moment,” he said. “The enemy must know and
knows that.”

The June firefight, which also left four Armenian soldiers dead,
heightened tensions along the Armenian-Azerbaijani “line of contact”
on the border of Karabakh and Azerbaijan, especially its northeastern
section. Deadly skirmishes there appear to have been more frequent
in recent months.

Ahmedov, 24, and another Azerbaijani officer were shot dead in early
September in what the Karabakh Armenian military described as a failed
commando raid on its positions in the northern Martakert district.

Ahmedov’s corpse was shown on Karabakh and Armenian television as
proof of that attack.

The Azerbaijani Defense Ministry insisted, however, the two officers
were killed while repelling an Armenian attack. It also says that
Ibrahimov, 22, died in similar circumstances.

Karabakh officials said initially that Ibrahimov was shot dead in
Armenian-controlled territory. But faced with Azerbaijani demands
for his body’s repatriation, they claimed afterwards that it is lying
in no-man’s lands. “If the Azerbaijanis want to retrieve his corpse,
they should go to that neutral territory and retrieve it,” a spokesman
for Karabakh President Bako Sahakian told RFE/RL’s Armenian service
in late September.

In a statement on Saturday, a Karabakh government commission on
prisoners of war and missing persons described the repatriation
of Ahmedov’s and Ibrahimov’s bodies, mediated by the International
Committee of the Red Cross, as a gesture of good will. It made no
mention of an October 27 joint statement issued by Aliyev and Armenia’s
Serzh Sarkisian after their fresh talks hosted by Russian President
Dmitry Medvedev. The two leaders pledged to exchange “without delay”
all POWs and bodies of soldiers and civilians killed in the conflict
zone.

Last Thursday, Armenia freed an Azerbaijani civilian and received
the body of one of its citizens who died in Azerbaijani captivity
last month. That swap was also carried out with the ICRC’s help.

Azerbaijan is currently holding six Armenian POWs. According to the
Defense Ministry in Yerevan, there are presently two Azerbaijani POWs
in Nagorno-Karabakh and none in Armenia proper. It is not yet clear
whether they too will be exchanged soon.

From: A. Papazian

AZERBAIJAN’S PARLIAMENTARY ELECTIONS CRITICIZED BY WEST, OPPOSITION

by Asbarez
Monday, November 8th, 2010

BAKU (Reuters)-The party of President Ilham Aliyev has claimed victory
in a parliamentary election in oil-producing Azerbaijan, but opposition
parties condemned the vote as rigged and western monitors have
criticized as failing to make any “meaningful” democratic progress.

Victory will further consolidate Aliyev’s grip on the ex-Soviet
republic, cushioned against calls for reform by its strategic
importance to the West as an oil and gas exporter and transit route
for US military operations in Afghanistan.

Official preliminary results put the ruling New Azerbaijan Party
ahead in 74 out of 125 constituencies up for grabs.

Independent candidates considered loyal to the government, some
publicly backed by the ruling party, were ahead in dozens of other
seats.

“I am certain of our victory. We are very satisfied with our result,”
New Azerbaijan Party secretary Ali Akhmedov told a news conference
after polls closed. “I can say that voting was free and fair.”

But a Western diplomat who observed voting said: “It was an absolute
sham.”

He cited “egregious irregularities” including ballot stuffing and
intimidation of public sector workers.

The official turnout edged just over 50% after a lackluster campaign
with few public rallies that received only limited media coverage.

Aliyev has steadily firmed up his control over the mainly Muslim
country of 9 million people since succeeding his father, long-serving
leader Heydar Aliyev, in 2003.

He is an ally of the United States in a country valued for its
strategic importance, bordering Iran, Turkey and Russia at the
threshold of Central Asia.

Voters cast ballots under portraits and busts of Heydar, the focus
of a personality cult in the seven years since his death.

Ilham Aliyev’s rule has coincided with an oil-fuelled economic boom,
spawning rapid construction in the capital Baku and the emergence of
an opulent jet set. Critics say the Baku facelift masks a widening gap
between rich and poor, and a steady shrinking of democratic freedoms.

Monitors from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe
(OSCE) will issue their assessment on Monday. Prior to the vote, they
expressed concern over reports of intimidation and the disqualification
of candidates.

The opposition has frequently accused the West of muting its criticism
for fear of losing out to Russia in the battle for Azerbaijan’s oil
and gas in the Caspian Sea, key to Europe’s hopes of reducing its
energy dependence on Moscow.

“It’s unlikely my vote will make any difference,” said 41-year-old
Vladislav Semenov. “The same people with a thirst for profit will
end up in parliament, far removed from the ordinary people.”

Opposition Musavat party leader Isa Gambar said the vote “resembled
the elections of the late Soviet period”. Popular Front leader Ali
Kerimli decried “mass falsification”.

President Aliyev did not speak to media when he voted shortly after
polls opened to the national anthem.

Western diplomats are unnerved by a 90-percent increase in military
spending ordered by Aliyev for 2011. Azerbaijan has been locked for two
decades in a conflict with neighboring Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh.

Speaking at the burial on Sunday of two Azeri soldiers repatriated
from Nagorno-Karabakh, Aliyev repeated a threat to take the region
back by force.

“The army of Azerbaijan waits for the order of the commander-in-chief
and is ready to fulfil it,” he said. “No one wants war, but we do
not want to conduct negotiations for the sake of negotiations.”

From: A. Papazian

WHERE ARE ARMENIA’S PARTNERS FOR PEACE?
by Aram Suren Hamparian

asbarez
Monday, November 8th, 2010

It’s self-evident that peace talks are held between enemies,
not friends. And it’s reasonable to expect that in any serious
negotiations, both sides will need to reconcile some big differences.

That’s OK.

We all want peace.

And peace comes at a cost, and requires compromise.

You know the talk: Search for common ground, conflict-resolution,
mutually-agreeable compromises, bridge-building, etc.

It all comes across sounding very reasonable.

Except…when it’s not.

Especially when only one side has a true interest in peace.

Consider Armenia’s potential partners:

Azerbaijan: Baku is still nominally part of the OSCE Minsk Group peace
talks charged with finding a negotiated settlement of the Karabakh
issue, but every single material action it takes undermines hope
for peace, namely its war threats, cross-border attacks, torture of
prisoners, and multi-billion dollar arms build-up.

The Armenian side has rolled up it’s sleeves and is working for a
lasting peace, but Azerbaijan’s leaders, most likely because they
want to steer domestic attention away from their own failings, seem
intent on continuing their march toward a new Caucasus war.

Turkey: Ankara remains technically engaged in Protocols talks with
Armenia (primarily to defer progress toward universal acknowledgment
of the Armenian Genocide), but, having already criminalized domestic
discussion of this atrocity (the core point of contention), has now
actually started, as a result of its own President’s legal actions,
jailing it’s citizens for the “crime” of calling someone else an
Armenian. (Turkey simply cannot act as a partner for peace with Armenia
while at the same time using its legal system to define Armenians as
the functional equivalent of an obscenity.)

Armenia has taken major, even reckless risks for peace, while Turkey,
as its leaders, laws and legal system so clearly demonstrate, has yet
to give an inch in terms of its hardline Genocide denial, its blockade,
and its other patently anti-Armenian policies.

Sadly, despite all of Yerevan’s good-faith efforts and the highest
hopes of the international community, neither Baku nor Ankara have
shown yet that they are ready to step up as serious partners for
peace with Armenia.

From: A. Papazian

ARMENIAN RESISTANCE STORY INSPIRED WARSAW GHETTO FIGHTERS: NOTES FROM GLENDALE GENOCIDE SYMPOSIUM
Posted By: Editor Politics

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

The 40 Days of Musa Dagh first English-language edition (1934) arrived
on the Sunroom Desk as a treasured personal gift on Sunday. The very
same day, speaking at the Glendale Library’s Genocide Commemoration
symposium, USC history professor Wolf Gruner cited the book as evidence
that knowledge of the Armenian Genocide was widespread in Nazi Germany.

First published in 1933, it was targeted by the Nazi regime for
its book burning campaign. Gruner reported that it was republished
in Austria in 1934 and later provided inspiration to WWII Jewish
resistance leaders in the Warsaw Ghetto. The novel is based on the
true story of an Armenian village’s resistance to and escape from
Turkish forces during the genocide.

Side note: a main character in the book is a young preacher who
organizes the town’s defense; his descendants now live in the Glendale
area (more in an upcoming Bookshelf post).

Insights from the other two lecturers:

“Denial of the Armenian genocide is a political issue, it is not a
historical issue. In Norway, there is no political will.” – Matthias
Bjørnlund, Danish archival historian (speaking about the Scandinavian
countries’ response to the genocide)

“The seizure of Armenian property, both personal and real,
was enormous, and a great impetus for people to participate in
denials…The very perpetrators of the genocide were charged with
writing its history, so of course there was denial.” – Ugur Umit Ungor,
who has studied the ‘desk perpetrators’ of the Armenian Genocide,
the bureaucracy and organization that made it possible

The auditorium was filled to capacity for the Sunday symposium,
which highlighted the determined work of international scholars on
the subject of genocide and Man’s Inhumanity to Man.

From: A. Papazian

ARMENIA OUTSIDE EU PROJECT

news.am
Nov 8 2010
Armenia

Training under the border system management project in the South
Caucasus is to be held in Georgia on Nov. 15-19.

Officers of the Armenian, Georgian and Azerbaijani customs, migration
and frontier services will take part in the training.

The project is implemented by the European Union (EU).

Since Armenia and Azerbaijan are in conflict, only Azerbaijan and
Georgia are currently involved in the project, Georgia on-line reports.

From: A. Papazian

‘ELIA KAZAN COLLECTION’ INDISPENSIBLE FOR FANS OF DIRECTOR’S WORK
By BRUCE DANCIS

Kansas City Star

Nov 8 2010

Elia Kazan reached the highest heights of the Broadway stage and
the Hollywood screen. On stage, after working with the legendary
Group Theatre in the 1930s he directed the premieres of Tennessee
Williams’ “A Streetcar Named Desire” and “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof” and
Arthur Miller’s “All My Sons” and “Death of a Salesman.” On screen,
he won Academy Awards for directing “Gentleman’s Agreement” and
“On the Waterfront” and coaxed some of the greatest performances in
film from Marlon Brando, James Dean, Eva Marie Saint, Julie Harris,
Andy Griffith, Karl Malden and others. Altogether, nine Oscars were
won by actors in Kazan’s films.

The power and impact of Kazan’s work can be seen in “The Elia Kazan
Collection,” an 18-disc box set that includes 15 of Kazan’s most
important movies and a new, personal documentary, “A Letter to Elia,”
from one of his most expressive fans, film director Martin Scorsese,
and Kent Jones (20th Century Fox Home Entertainment, $199.98,
not rated).

But there is another important part of Kazan’s legacy: A member
of the Communist Party for 18 months in the mid-1930s, during the
McCarthy Era he became one of the most famous former communists to
“name names,” or inform, on his one-time friends and allies. In 1952,
Kazan was still a major progressive filmmaker in Hollywood when he was
twice summoned to appear before the House Committee on Un-American
Activities (HUAC), which was looking into left-wing influences in
the motion picture industry. (Many would call such hearings “witch
hunts.”) In his first testimony, Kazan talked about his own involvement
with communism and his subsequent disenchantment and revulsion with
both the American party and the Soviet Union, the United States’
erstwhile ally in the Second World War. But when asked to give the
committee the names of his former comrades, he refused.

Several months later, Kazan apparently had a change of heart, and
named some of his former friends and associates in the Group Theatre,
as well as a few others, as Communist Party members. Unlike other
“friendly witnesses” who cooperated with HUAC, Kazan then took out
a full-page ad in the New York Times defending his current liberal
politics, his view of the Soviet Union as a tyrannical dictatorship and
a threat to world peace, and his decision to implicate others. “It was
because Kazan seemed to take the social content of his art so seriously
that his appearance before HUAC caused such astonished dismay among
many of his friends and colleagues,” wrote Victor Navasky in his book
about the Hollywood blacklist, “Naming Names.”

In subsequent years, Kazan said that he had faced two “evil” choices
when called before HUAC to become an informer, but save his career;
or to refuse to cooperate, which would aid a movement (communism) and
a country (the Soviet Union) he now despised, while also jeopardizing
his career. He went on to make at least two movies that appear to
justify his behavior: “On the Waterfront” (1954), where the hero
(Brando) testifies in court against a murderous, Mob-dominated labor
union, and 1972’s “The Visitor” (not included in the collection), an
anti-Vietnam War film in which the lead character, a former American
G.I. (James Woods), has testified against two platoon mates who had
raped and murdered a Vietnamese woman.

In any event, while those who refused to testify against others
found themselves on a blacklist, their Hollywood careers ruined,
Kazan continued to prosper as a filmmaker and stage director. But
for the rest of his lifetime, Kazan’s testimony remained either a
permanent stain on his honor or a badge of courage, depending on
one’s political perspective.

While “The Elia Kazan Collection” does not ignore Kazan’s actions and
their aftermath, they are dealt with lightly and underplayed. Both
Scorsese’s documentary and an accompanying, photo-filled 100-page book
on Kazan’s films discuss his HUAC testimony and the controversy that
erupted in 1999 when Kazan was given an honorary Academy Award. This
honor garnered enthusiastic support from Robert De Niro, Warren
Beatty and Karl Malden (actors who had worked for Kazan and revered
him, whatever their opinions about his testimony), and Scorsese. The
award generated equally vehement opposition by those who could not
forgive him.

Still, this box set’s packaging of 15 of Kazan’s films, including
the DVD debuts of five of them – “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn,” “Viva
Zapata!,” “Man on a Tightrope,” “Wild River” and “America, America” –
makes “The Elia Kazan Collection” indispensible for viewers interested
in Kazan’s approach to political and social issues and in the triumph
of Method acting on screen. Performances by Brando (in “A Streetcar
Named Desire” and “On the Waterfront”), Dean (in “East of Eden”)
and others changed the landscape of film acting, bringing to the
forefront a new type of emotional realism and psychological depth.

In addition to these masterpieces, as well as “Gentleman’s Agreement,”
one of the first Hollywood movies to deal with anti-Semitism, the
Kazan collection includes many notable films. Two of the director’s
earlier movies, 1947’s “Boomerang” and 1950’s “Panic in the Streets,”
show Kazan’s affinity for on-location filmmaking and his solid grasp
of the kind of naturalism expressed by Italian neo-realists such as
Roberto Rossellini and Vittorio De Sica. His outstanding, prescient
“A Face in the Crowd,” from 1957, was one of the first movies to
examine the manipulative power of modern media (in those days, radio
and television) and the potential for their political abuse.

But 1963’s “America, America,” a deeply personal film (based on Kazan’s
uncle) and the director’s acknowledged favorite among his own movies,
is disappointing. This tale about a Greek immigrant and his difficult
journey to the United States suffers from Kazan’s desire to make
an epic. As gripping as his portrait may be of Greek and Armenian
oppression in late 19th century Turkey and of one man’s desire to
seek freedom and fortune in the United States, the film moves along
far too slowly. A great film is never boring whatever its length,
but at nearly three hours “America America” seems dragged out.

In “Letter to Elia” Scorsese includes some footage of Kazan (who
died in 2003) discussing his craft. “If you can stir up the real
emotions,” Kazan says, “whether anger or love or desire … then you
have something that is unique and unusual. That’s what drama is.”

“Stirring up emotions” was something that Elia Kazan succeeded at
throughout his life and career – on the stage, on the movie screen
and in the highly-charged political atmosphere of America during the
Cold War and beyond.

From: A. Papazian

DENIAL OF AN UGLY PAST IS HOLDING TURKEY BACK
by Colin Tatz

Sydney Morning Herald

Nov 9 2010
Australia

Turkey must acknowledge the Armenian genocide if it wishes to move
forward as a modern. democratic country. Photo: Reuters

The idea that Australia was born as a nation on Gallipoli’s shores
is now deeply cemented in our history books and national psyche. We
are about to see the annual holding of hands by the former combatants
on Armistice Day, when thousands will visit the “sacred site”. Turks
and Australians will join in understandable commemoration but less
comprehensible celebration; and friendship societies will become
tearful and lyrical during this anniversary of the shedding of
brotherly blood.

But intruding on this mourning ritual is the growing world recognition
of the Ottoman (and, later, Kemalist) Turkish genocide committed
between 1915 and 1922. Some 26 nation states and more than 50 regional
governments, including NSW and South Australia, formally recognise
the Turkish attempts to annihilate 3 million Armenians and possibly 1
million Pontian Greeks and Christian Assyrians. At least 1.5 million
Armenians were killed by bayoneting, beheading, bullets, butchering,
crucifixion, drowning, elementary gas chambers, forced death marches,
hanging, hot horseshoes, medical experiments, and other unprintable
atrocities.

Turkey is totally dedicated, at home and abroad, to having every
hint or mention of an Armenian genocide contradicted, countered,
explained, justified, mitigated, rationalised, relativised, removed
or trivialised. The entire apparatus of the Turkish state is tuned to
denial, with officers appointed abroad for that purpose. Their actions
are spectacular, often bizarre, and without distinction between the
serious and the silly, including: pressures to dilute or even remove
any mention of the genocide in the Armenian entry in the Encyclopaedia
Britannica; threats to sever diplomatic relations with France over the
latter’s parliamentary declaration that there was such a genocide;
replacing the Turkish Prime Minister’s Renault with an inferior
Russian limo; Sydney Turks demanding that the broadcaster SBS pulp
its 25th anniversary history for twice making passing reference to
an event they claim “never happened”; and, more recently, frenetic
Turkish efforts to stop a memorial to the dead Assyrians in the
western Sydney district of Fairfield.

Advertisement: Story continues below Explanations abound. One is
that Turkey is the victim of the single greatest conspiracy in world
history, with states such as Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Chile, France,
Germany, Holland, Italy, Northern Ireland, Poland, Russia, Scotland,
Sweden, Switzerland, the Vatican and Wales conniving to falsely brand
Turkey as a genocidaire. Another is that somehow 11 million Armenians
around the globe have subverted the truth, history and dozens of
nations to “frame” innocent Turkey. Yet another is that witnesses
– such as British historians Arnold Toynbee and Viscount Bryce,
German missionary Dr Johannes Lepsius and German medico Armin Wegner,
the American ambassador to Turkey Henry Morgenthau and his Swedish
diplomatic colleagues – invented their sometimes daily conversations
with the major perpetrators, Talaat Pasha and Enver Pasha, and lied to
besmirch Turkish honour. Another is that the dozens of Australian PoWs,
isolated and often grossly maltreated in remote villages rather than
in camps, deliberately faked the photographs and invented the atrocity
stories they brought back home. They assert that the special Turkish
military courts-martial held in Istanbul in 1919 only sentenced several
perpetrators to death in absentia and imprisoned some 30 others for
war crimes only because of duress from the Allies.

The best explanation is that the Turks did precisely what they
were recorded and filmed as doing, for which their own tribunals
convicted them.

We are approaching a serious junction: the path to Gallipoli grows
in scale and traffic each year, but so does the avenue to official
recognition that what occurred was genocide, one in so many ways the
prologue to, and template for, the Holocaust less than 20 years later.

Sooner rather than later the US Congress will find the numbers
for the two-thirds majority needed for recognition. The British
government won’t be far behind. More Australian states will follow
and, inevitably, an unwilling (and very unhappy) federal government
will have to do so. Our dilemma will be profound.

There is, of course, a way forward: an admission of truth about the
events; a genuine opening of all the Ottoman archives to obviate the
old Turkish chestnuts about “awaiting the verdict of historians” and
“Armenian revolutionaries engaged in civil war”; an offer of regret,
or apology, even one leavened by a limitation on reparations. That
way Turkey can more readily enter the European Union and the comity
of nations. But the hysterical and obsessive denialism of the Batak
massacres in Bulgaria in 1876, the 200,000 Armenians dead at the hands
of Sultan Abdul Hamid II between 1894 and 1896, the 1.5 million dead at
the hands of the Young Turks from 1915, will always get in the way of
“normal” relationships.

Even if today’s Turkey decided to become more rather than less secular,
more West-oriented, less cosy with Syria, Iran and Hezbollah in a
jihadist worldview, more willing to address its past in relation to
Christians generally, the juggernaut of the denialism industry is
such that it simply cannot stop.

The machine has developed its own mind, its own convulsive and
reflexive responses. Turks see genocide as a blot on their escutcheon
and honour; they see themselves as decent people, and decent people
don’t commit genocide. Wrong. “Decent people” – like Americans,
Canadians, Belgians, Italians, Germans, Austrians, Spaniards and
Australians – have all done just that.

Colin Tatz is a visiting fellow in the College of Arts & Social
Sciences, Australian National University. He is the author of With
Intent to Destroy: Reflecting on Genocide.

From: A. Papazian

THE PRIME MINISTER ELECTED HONORARY CHAIRMAN OF VOLLEYBALL FEDERATION

gov.am
Nov 8 2010
Armenia

Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan attended today the expanded session
of the presidium of AVF

As suggested by AVF president-elect Surik Khachatryan and federation
members, the head of government was elected to be honorary chairman
of the federation.

Appreciative of the work of Armenian sports unions, the Prime Minister
noted in particular: “Sport should play a key role in public life
as healthy way of life would have been impossible without it. I hope
that the federation will contribute to the development of volleyball
in Armenia. An action plan has to be worked out to this end so that
sports events could be held anywhere nationwide. Volleyball has
serious development potential in our country, and we can promote
interest and thoughtfulness of this game.”

Following approval of statute amendments, the meeting exchanged views
on organizational questions.

From: A. Papazian