Author: Andres-Papazian

NO PERMISSIVENESS FOR ANYONE, ARFD MEMBER SAYS

news.am
Nov 8 2010
Armenia

One of the ways to solve the current problems in the Armenian army
is establishment of a military Ombudsman’s Institute, Chairman of
the Armenian NA Standing Committee on Defense, National Security and
Internal Affairs Hrayr Karapetyan told a press conference on Monday.

According to the parliamentarian, it is impossible to solve all the
problems in a day, as the army is the mirror of the society. Today
there are officers in the Armenian army, who do not deserve their
titles. Karapetyan referred to the corruption as a rooted negative
factor in the army. “There are officers involved in corruption,
humiliating and abusing soldiers. In spite of their performed great
services for their homeland, these officers should be deprived of
their titles. Those, who had struggled for Nagorno-Karabakh, should
not think there is permissiveness for them. On the contrary, their
conduct should serve an example for the servicemen,” the MP said.

Karapetyan stressed today reforms are implemented in the Armenian
army and it is in a recovery stage.

From: A. Papazian

SESSION OF ARMENIAN-RUSSIAN INTER-PARLIAMENTARY COMMITTEE TO BE HELD ON NOV. 11

news.am
Nov 8 2010
Armenia

Regular session of the Armenian-Russian inter-parliamentary committee
on cooperation starts in Yerevan on November 11.

Invitations to the Russian committee members have been sent and
preparations are being conducted, Aram Safaryan, Secretary of the
Prosperous Armenia parliamentary group and committee member, told
NEWS.am. A wide range of issues, from inter-parliamentary cooperation
between the states to military and strategic, as well as political
and economic problems will be discussed.

From: A. Papazian

ARMENIAN POLICE CHIEF LEFT FOR MOSCOW

news.am
Nov 8 2010
Armenia

On November 8, the Armenian police delegation headed by the RA Police
Chief Lieutenant General Alik Sargsyan left for Moscow.

The delegation will participate in the session of Interior Ministers
of CSTO states scheduled for November 9. It will also participate
in the solemn events dedicated to Russia’s police day on Nov. 10,
Armenian police press service reported.

From: A. Papazian

AZERI PRESIDENT BURYING NAGORNO-KARABAKH PEACE PROCESS

news.am
Nov 8 2010
Armenia

The Azerbaijani leader goes on dishonoring his own commitments to
the international community, acting in defiance of the documents he
signed in Meyendorff and Astrakhan. Ilham Aliyev dislikes the history
he taught at Moscow State Institute of International Relations and
invents his own false history. Disregarding modern international law,
he is trying to assume the groundless position of right of force,
RA Deputy Foreign Minister Shavarsh Kocharyan stated, commenting on
provocative statements by President Aliyev yesterday.

~SThe Astrakhan Declaration provides for building up confidence through
exchange of POWs and dead bodies. However, Ilham Aliyev is using the
process to build up tension. The Aliyev regime needs to be fed with
blood, including the blood of its own people. They are not satisfied
with the consequences of their own aggression. Aliyev sends commandoes
to die, and, according to his own words, they are well aware they must
die. He arranges burial ceremonies simultaneously burying the very
possibility of settling the conflict by means of compromise. It is
clear that a new fit of anti-Armenian hysteria occurred on the day of
~Qelecting~R representatives of the Aliyev clan to Parliament to divert
public attention from the new stage of forming a medieval khanate.

Aliyev is facing a choice: either rejecting medieval obscurantism
based on lies and hatred for the neighboring peoples and suicidal
saber-rattling or Azerbaijan~Rs isolation and regress to the Dark Ages,
to an inevitable political, psychological and humanitarian disaster,~T
Shavarsh Kocharyan said.

NEWS.am reminds readers that the Azerbaijani President staged one more
anti-Armenian show at the funeral of the commandoes, whose bodies were
handed over to Azerbaijan by Armenia under the Astrakhan agreements.

From: A. Papazian

PRES OF AZERBAIJAN CONTRADICTS HIS FOREIGN MINISTER ON KARABAKH OPTIMISM
Armen Hareyan

HULIQ.com
Nov 8 2010
SC

The Deputy Foreign Minister of Armenia Shavarsh Kocharyan sharply
critiqued the war rhetoric of the president of Azerbaijan over
Nagorno Karabakh, after the latter said his country will use force,
if necessary, to liberate territorial integrity, without any regard
to people’s right to self-determination. Last week, the foreign
minister of Azerbaijan spoke of optimism after Astrakhan meeting:
an attitude that apparently is not shared by his president.

On October 27th the president of Russian Dmitri Medvedev hosted a
meeting in the southern Russian city of Astrakhan with his Armenian
and Azeri counterparts. After the meeting Medvedev also spoke of
certain optimism saying that “the general principles for settling
the Nagorno-Karabakh problem could be drafted in time for the OSCE
summit that will take place on December 1-2, 2010 in Astana.” The
main agreement in Astrakhan was the exchange of prisoners, which mean
taking steps that would develop mutual trust between the two sides.

Last week the foreign minister of Azerbaijan, Elmar Mammadyarov said
that he expected the summit in Astana to become “a turning point
in the resolution of the Karabakh conflict and all the same he did
not rule out the preparation of the roadmap on the settlement of the
situation in the South Caucasus region.” His optimism is not shared
by his country’s president Ilham Aliyev who yesterday said Azerbaijan
will resort to the military solution if the talks fail.

“The Azerbaijani state will restore its territorial integrity through
war. I do not doubt that we have all the opportunities including
combat readiness, material and technical maintenance, sufficient
arms and ammunition, a professional army, high spirit and the will
of the Azerbaijani people. We are able to restore the territorial
integrity of the country through war. And the enemy must know and
does know this,” Aliyev said yesterday. He also went on to say “the
current Armenian state is formed on historical Azerbaijani land,”
a rhetoric totally contradicting the achievements of the negotiation
process mediated by Russia, France and U.S..

Armenia did not appreciate Azerbaijan’s threat of force Armenian
response to the use of force and the claim on its territory was sharp
and swift. Commenting on the provocative statements by president Aliyev
the deputy foreign minister of Armenia Shavarsh Kocharyan released
the following statement. The statement is the partial translation
from the Russian version sent to Huliq by email from the Armenian
Foreign Ministry.

“Obviously the head of Azerbaijan continues to ignore his country’s
own obligations to the international community and mediators, as
wells as acts cynically contrary to the documents which he himself
had signed in Mayndorfe and Astrakhan. He ignores the contemporary
international law and tries to act from the insolvent position of
the law of force. Astrakhan declaration calls for the strengthening
of confidence building measures through an exchange of prisoners and
dead bodies, but Ilham Aliyev is using this process from exactly the
opposit angle: to inflame tensions.”

Kocharyan also said Aliyev sends death commandos to the line of
conflict “who according to his confession, knew in advance that they
will not come back alive.” He added that Aliyev then buries these
soldiers solemnly in the meanwhile burring his nation’s hopes of
resolving the conflict in Nagorno Karabakh through compromise.

Azerbaijan’s war rhetoric on election day yesterday, certainly do
not contribute to confidence-building measures ahead of the Astana
meeting. Remains to be seen how the presidents of Russia, France and
USA, who have invested so much effort and time to peacefully resolve
the conflict will respond to this war-like rhetoric of Azerbaijan.

From: A. Papazian

KOMITAS VARDAPET’S ‘DIVINE LITURGY’ TO BE PERFORMED IN ISTANBUL

Panorama
Nov 8 2010
Armenia

Komitas Vardapet’s “Divine Liturgy” will be performed in “Yerek Khoran”
Armenian Church in Istanbul’s Beyoglu district on November 11.

The composition will be devoted to the renowned Armenian composer’s
140th birth anniversary and 75 years since his death, Ermenihaber.am
informs.

The composition will be performed by Gusan 2010 choir. The concert,
organized by Hagob Mamigonyan and Edvin Galipoglu, is free.

From: A. Papazian

ARMENIAN EDUCATION AND SCIENCE MINISTER LEFT FOR STRASBURG

news.am
Nov 8 2010
Armenia

On November 10, the Armenian delegation headed by Education and
Science Minister Armen Ashotyan left for Strasburg to participate
in the conference on academic freedom and self-administration of
agencies. The Minister will deliver a speech at the conference as well.

Armen Ashotyan plans to meet with Council of Europe Secretary General
Thorbjørn Jagland, responsible for education at the EU secretariat,
as well as the head of culture, science and education committee at
the PACE, RA education ministry press service informed NEWS.am.

From: A. Papazian

TURKEY NO LONGER FEARS RUSSIAN MILITARY STRENGTH
by Andy Potts

Moscow News

Nov 8 2010

Russia is no longer seen as a threat to Turkey – but debate rages
over whether this is a triumph for Moscow’s diplomacy or a humiliating
comedown for the nation’s armed forces.

Ankara has removed Russia from its so-called “Red Book” of potentially
hostile states, along with neighbours Greece and Armenia and the
Middle East trio of Syria, Iran and Iraq. Meanwhile Israel is added
to the hit list after the storm over the summer “Freedom Flotilla”
which set sail from Turkey but was blocked from landing in Palestine
by Israeli forces.

But it’s Russia’s exclusion which has prompted most conversation.

All friends together

The official view is that Russia’s active role in trying to mediate
the on-going conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan makes Moscow a
valuable ally in promoting stability in the volatile trans-Caucasus.

The document highlights warmer relations under the guidance of Turkish
PM Tayyip Erdogan, which involves closer economic ties as well as
concluding the Nagorno-Karabakh war.

And strategists in Ankara conclude that “the threat of communism has
finally lifted”, according to gzt.ru.

A bear without claws

But a more pragmatic stance offers less cause for Russia to celebrate,
according to military analyst Andrei Areshev, deputy director of the
Strategic Cultural Foundation.

He suggests Turkey is simply no longer all that concerned about the
muscle of its giant historic rival on the other side of the Black Sea.

“Among the expert community it has been assumed that Turkey will
remove Russia from the list of potential threats after a comparative
analysis of the capabilities of the Russian and Turkish armies,”
Areshev told gzt.ru.

“Turkey has a strong military, while the combat capability of
the Russian army is in a permanent state of reform, which raises
questions.”

Future prospects

Whether the latest signals from Turkey represent growing enthusiasm
for Moscow’s interests or dwindling respect for Russia’s military
could be less significant than what happens next.

Both countries have a shared interest in gas and oil transit to
Europe, with Turkey currently signed up to the Nabucco pipeline
scheme which enables the EU to access central Asian resources while
bypassing Russia.

If Russia can use improved relationships with Ankara to slow that
scheme it will boost the prospects of Gazprom’s treasured South
Stream project becoming the market leader in gas transit to the
Balkans and beyond.

Meanwhile Russian strategists may hope that they can use a less hostile
Turkey as a means of easing tensions with NATO in south-eastern Europe.

The western alliance’s efforts to expand in that region have regularly
alarmed Russia, which fears “encirclement” by US and European forces
on its western borders, particularly if the likes of Ukraine and
Georgia join the NATO club.

From: A. Papazian

TWO PLEAD GUILTY OVER NUCLEAR SMUGGLING IN GEORGIA
By Michael Mainville (AFP)

Agence France Presse
Nov 8 2010

TBILISI – Two Armenian men have pleaded guilty during a secret trial
to smuggling highly enriched uranium into Georgia, officials said
on Monday, highlighting concerns over loose nuclear materials in
the ex-USSR.

Sumbat Tonoian and Hrant Ohanian were arrested in a sting operation in
March after they smuggled the 18 grams (0.6 ounces) of uranium from
Armenia into Georgia and tried to sell it to an undercover agent,
Interior Ministry spokesman Shota Utiashvili told AFP.

He said they tried to sell the material for 1.5 million dollars to
an agent they believed represented Islamic radicals.

Utiashvili called the operation “a big success for our nuclear
smuggling unit”, after Georgia in recent years received nearly 50
million dollars in aid from Washington to help it combat trafficking
in nuclear materials.

Media reports said the two men had smuggled the uranium on a train
from the Armenian capital Yerevan to Tbilisi in a cigarette box lined
with lead to fool radiation sensors at the border.

The reports said tests had confirmed that though a small amount,
the uranium was nearly 90 percent enriched and potentially usable in
a nuclear warhead.

Reports said the two men were attempting to sell the uranium as
a sample and had said they were able to obtain more. Tonoian was
described as a failed businessman and Ohanian as a retired physicist.

Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili first informed world leaders of
the case at a nuclear summit in Washington in April, but Utiashvili
said full details could not be released until the men had pleaded
guilty.

The two are facing at least 10 years in prison each, he said, adding
that the trial was held in secret in Georgia to protect the identity
of undercover agents.

The case has highlighted concerns that unsecured nuclear materials
around the former Soviet Union could be smuggled through the region’s
porous borders and used to build nuclear weapons.

Lawrence Sheets, Caucasus project director for the Brussels-based
International Crisis Group, said it was “extremely frightening”
that it was unclear how much nuclear material was unaccounted for in
the region.

“Nuclear proliferation experts will tell you that we don’t know how
much highly enriched uranium actually existed in Soviet stockpiles
and we don’t know how much leaked out in the 1990s,” he said.

It was the third case of smuggling of nuclear materials to be uncovered
in Georgia, an ex-Soviet republic on Russia’s southern border closely
allied to the United States.

In a joint US-Georgia sting operation in 2006, officials arrested
a Russian citizen trying to sell 100 grams (3.5 ounces) of highly
enriched uranium to a Georgian officer posing as a buyer from a
radical Islamic group.

Three years earlier, Georgian border guards intercepted an Armenian
national carrying highly enriched uranium as he tried to cross from
Georgia into Armenia.

Sheets said that despite the arrests in Georgia, it was unfair to label
the country as the worst offender in the region because it was one
of the few actually stopping and revealing cases of nuclear smuggling.

“It looks like a lot of material is coming through Georgia but in
my opinion that’s a sign of the fact that there’s a very competent
effort to combat nuclear smuggling in Georgia,” he said.

From: A. Papazian

TRIBUTE PAID TO HAGOP PIANDARIAN FOR HIS SERVICE TO COMMUNITY
By Kevork Keushkerian

AZG DAILY
09-11-2010

Hagop Piandarian, a longtime community activist, was honored on Sunday,
October 3. His community involvement began almost 60 years ago in
Alexandria, Egypt and later extended to the US, his adopted country.

Karekin II, Catholicos of all the Armenians, bestowed upon him the
medal of St. Mesrob Mashdots with an encyclical, which was read at St.

Gregory the Illuminator Armenian Apostolic Church in Pasadena.

Archbishop Hovnan Derderian, Primate of the Western Diocese of the
Armenian Church of North America, pinned the medal on his chest and
praised him for serving God through the Armenian Church, the Armenian
General Benevolent Union and Tekeyan Cultural Association.

Immediately following the Divine Liturgy, a reception was held at the
Boyadjian Hall of the Manoogian Complex in Pasadena. It was organized
by the Glendale-Pasadena Chapter of the Armenian General Benevolent
Union. Parsegh Kartalian, a longtime acquaintance of the honoree,
served as the master of ceremonies. He invited Rev. Zaven Arzoumanian
for the invocation and the blessing of the food. Arzoumanian was
representing the Primate.

After the meal, Kartalian gave a biographical sketch of the honoree,
depicting him as a humble servant of his community throughout his
life. He then read AGBU President Berge Setrakian’s congratulatory
remarks and well wishes.

A slide presentation of the honoree’s life followed. Among the photos
were some with the late Catholicos of all the Armenians Vazken I,
who had visited Egypt, back in the early 1960s, as well as with the
late Alec Manoogian of the AGBU, who had come to Pasadena for the
inauguration of the new complex.

Shahe Soylemezian, chairman of the Glendale-Pasadena Chapter of AGBU,
delivered the opening remarks. Nanor Babian, a student of Vatche and
Tamar Manougian High School in Pasadena rendered a poetic recitation,
and Khatchig Nahabedian of TCA’s Glendale- Pasadena Chapter sang a
moving song.

George Mandossian, vice chairman of the Central Board of Directors
of Tekeyan Cultural Association, gave his testimony of the honoree,
painting him as a hard working, grateful, happy man who has dedicated
his life to serving his community. He then read Dr. Haroutune
Arzoumanian’s congratulatory remarks, wishing the honoree a continued
legacy of service to the Armenian Community. Arzoumanian is the
chairman of TCA’s Central Board of Directors.

Other heart-felt speeches were delivered by the honoree’s brother,
Bedros Piandarian of New Jersey, who had come to Pasadena with his
wife, Anne, for the occasion, Panos Titizian of the AGBU and Hagop
Mardirossian of Nor Or weekly. The honoree took to the podium and
thanked Catholicos Karekin II, Derderian, the Armenian General
Benevolent Union and everyone in attendance for their support and
appreciation.

Piandarian has been chairman of the Parish Council of St. Sarkis
Armenian Apostolic Church in East Los Angeles for 12 years, chairman
of the Glendale-Pasadena Chapter of AGBU for 16 years and a member of
the TCA Beshgeturian Center’s Board of Directors since its inception
in 1985.

From: A. Papazian