Author: Antonian Lara

A1+

IPs DEMAND THE RETIREMENT OF ROBERT NAZARYAN
[06:46 pm] 29 January, 2007

«Nazaryan+Bleznyuk=unemployment». This was the
formula of the 150 IP companies which held a protest
action in front of the building of the Committee
Regulating Public Relations. A few days ago they
brought a charge against the Committee and «ArmenTel».

This time the providers decided to send a letter to
Robert Kocharyan, the NA Speaker, the RA Prime
Minister, as well as head of the Committee Robert
Nazaryan.

The providers were angry at the reply of Robert
Nazaryan to their request. The IPs demanded to revise
the decision according to which the telephone numbers
of all the IP companies were to be switched off on
January 25. In their letter to Robert Kocharyan the
IPs asked «to interfere and to revise the decision of
the Committee, otherwise we demand the retirement of
Robert Nazaryan».

Reuters, UK
Jan 26 2007

Murders spark soul-searching in sleepy Black Sea town
Fri Jan 26, 2007 10:57 AM GMT

By Gareth Jones

TRABZON, Turkey (Reuters) – Mustafa Coskun fears his once sleepy
Black Sea town has become a byword in Turkey for nationalist violence
after a string of nasty incidents culminating in the murder of a
Turkish-Armenian editor.

"We are all brothers, we have always liked foreigners here. But now,
when I go to other places in Turkey, they point and say ‘Oh, he’s
from Trabzon, they are all crazy there’," said Coskun, 48, sipping
tea at his market stall near the sea.

Trabzon seems an unlikely place for controversy of any kind.

Nearby, fishermen mend their nets. Seagulls skim the water,
snow-capped hills loom up above the town. There is a smell of fish
and pungent Russian tobacco — a reminder that Russia and Georgia are
just a few hundred km (miles) east and northeast.

But this town of 300,000 people — the fabled Trebizond which once
captivated Silk Road explorers such as Marco Polo — is now asking
how it could have raised youngsters capable of murders that have
shocked the world.

An unemployed youth from Trabzon, Ogun Samast, 17, has been charged
with killing Hrant Dink, an ethnic Armenian writer, in Istanbul last
Friday. Dink’s views on Ottoman Turkish massacres of Armenians in
1915 had angered Turkish nationalists.

The murder has reignited debate about hardline nationalism in Turkey,
which wants to join the European Union.

A man who has confessed to inciting Samast, Yasin Hayal, is also from
Trabzon. In 2004 he was behind the bombing of a restaurant in the
town.

Last year, a 16-year-old boy was jailed for shooting dead an Italian
Catholic priest as he prayed in his church in Trabzon. Turkish media
say the boy had fallen under the influence of Islamist,
anti-Christian and ultra-nationalist ideas.

ECONOMIC WOES

Zeynep Erdugrul knows how dangerous it can be in Trabzon to challenge
Turkey’s status quo.

She and four friends were almost lynched two years ago by a
2,000-strong crowd before police intervened. Handing out leaflets
about leftists jailed in Turkey, they were mistaken for supporters of
Kurdish rebel fighters.

"But I do not think Trabzon is more nationalistic than other towns in
Turkey. The problems are economic. There’s no industry, agriculture
is dying, young people turn to drugs," she said.

Asked if she saw any connection between the spate of violent
incidents, she said: "I think the state is responsible. It suits the
state to have clashes, be they between Turks and Kurds or between
secularists and Islamists."

Police have dismissed such suggestions.

Many in Trabzon say those who shot the priest and Dink were tools of
outside forces, possibly with links to the "deep state" — shorthand
in Turkey for shadowy, fiercely nationalistic elements in the
security forces and bureaucracy.

"They can’t have carried out these murders alone. They were
manipulated, brainwashed," Israfil Babaoglu, 18, said in an Internet
cafe similar to those used by the teenage gunmen. Like others, he
would not speculate who the "brainwashers" were.

For Trabzon’s governor, Huseyin Yavuzdemir, the killings are a
symptom of deeper social problems linked to fast urbanisation. People
have been migrating from the country to the town over the past decade
and both parents work to make ends meet, he said.

"Parents leave their kids in Internet cafes while they go shopping.
This is wrong. We have 250 such cafes here," he said.

Yavuzdemir played down economic factors, saying Trabzon is more
prosperous than many eastern provincial towns and its unemployment
level of nine percent is near the national average.

GUNS AND GREEKS

But he cited factors specific to Trabzon that could have contributed
to the violence, including a strong gun culture and the fiery
character of the people, known in Turkey for a quickness to take
offence.

Yavuzdemir also mentioned the view of sociologists that Trabzon
people try to assert their national identity more than many other
Turks because their region traditionally contained large ethnic Greek
and Armenian communities.

Sociologist Adem Solak, of the Black Sea Technical University, said a
big influx of criminals and prostitutes from Russia, Ukraine and
Georgia after the Soviet Union’s demise in 1991 had shocked the
conservative local culture.

"The struggle of values continues now, with the ‘clash of
civilisations’, the Iraq war, the crisis over the cartoons (in
published in Denmark depicting the Prophet Mohammad). All these have
a negative effect on our young people," said Solak.

"And the decline in the fortunes of (once successful local soccer
team) Trabzonspor is also traumatic for the morale of young people in
a soccer-mad city like this," he said.

ERDOGHAN AND GIUL DO EVERYTHING TO DENY ARMENIAN GENOCIDE

Panorama.am
19:59 25/01/2007

"How can we tell the governors of Turkey – Erdoghan and Giul that
genocide happened? They do the impossible to prove that there was
no Armenian genocide," Stepan Stepanyan, a historian, told a press
conference today also saying there is even a monument in Erzrum
commemorating the Turks who fell in genocide by the Armenians. This
is a "shame," the historian said.

In his words, it is unlikely that the Armenian-Turkish relations
change. The more the genocide issue becomes acute, the worse the
relations, he said. Stepanyan welcomed the fact that the Turk society
rose against the murder of Hrant Dink. "But that society have not
developed so that to accept the murder it has committed," he said.

The historian doubts that Turkey may recognize the genocide in a
day or two. However, he said if the world recognizes the Armenian
genocide, Turkey will have nothing to do. "I think, USA may recognize
the genocide this year," Stepanyan hoped.

Source: Panorama.am

Putin hails strong growth in trade with Armenia
17:24 | 24/ 01/ 2007

RIA Novosti, Russia
Jan 24 2007

SOCHI, January 24 (RIA Novosti) – At a meeting with the president
of Armenia in a southern Russian city Wednesday, the Russian leader
praised the strong upward trend in bilateral trade, which gained 70%
in January-November 2006.

At talks in a Russian Black Sea resort of Sochi, Vladimir Putin and
Robert Kocharyan discussed trade and the implementation of agreements
between the former Soviet allies.

"On the whole, we are satisfied with the steady growth in trade over
the past few years," Putin said. "It increased 40% in 2005, and 70%
in the first eleven months of 2006."

"The final figure for the whole last year may reach about $500
million," the president told a news conference following the
negotiations.

Kocharyan said he hoped Russia would reclaim its leading positions
among Armenia’s foreign investors by March.

"Trade is on the increase, and Russian investment in the Armenian
economy has also grown substantially," Kocharyan said.

The Armenian leader said ambitious energy projects had already been
launched, and that the sides were considering Russian participation
in Armenia’s mining industry.

IPI Deplores Callous Murder of Journalist in Istanbul

International Press Institute (press release), Austria
Jan 22 2007

22 January 2007

On Friday, 19 January, the Turkish-Armenian journalist, Hrant Dink,
was murdered outside the offices of the newspaper he founded.

The journalist, who worked for the weekly newspaper Agos, was
apparently shot twice in the head and once in the neck.

Dink was a popular journalist who has faced legal problems for his
articles about the massacre of Armenians during the First World War.

These comments have frequently tested harsh Turkish restrictions on
discussing this topic, which prohibit "insulting Turkishness." In July,
Dink lost an appeal over a suspended six-month prison sentence handed
down for an article discussing the massacre.

Aside from this criminal case, Dink was also facing prosecution for a
second article condemning his conviction. Turkish prosecutors believe
it was an attempt to influence the administration of justice.

The reason for the Turkish government’s desire to prosecute journalists
and writers who discuss the Armenian massacre is related to the
terminology used. Since the event occurred, the Turkish government
has refused to accept the term "genocide," while a number of other
countries have recognised the term in relation to the incident.

On 20 January, Turkish police arrested a young man suspected of
carrying out the murder. According to newspaper reports, he is believed
to belong to the youth wing of a right-wing nationalist party.

Commenting on the murder, IPI Director Johann P. Fritz, said, "This
is a terrible event for Turkish press freedom. It sends the inevitable
signal to all Turkish media that, if you discuss the Armenian massacre
in the same terms as Dink, you face not only constant harassment from
the authorities, but the possibility of assassination."

"In order for Turkey to take its rightful place among other democratic
nations, it must do away with all laws that inhibit discussion and
dialogue about the massacre of Armenians during the First World War."

"While the investigation has yet to be carried out, it seems probable
to me that the continued existence of the dated notion of ‘Turkishness’
encourages others to take the law into their own hands and commit
violence."

"I think the time has now come for the government to realise that
such laws have no place in a modern society. I would also hope that,
following Dink’s murder, there is an open discussion about these
issues leading to an agreement by all sides to consign such laws to
Turkish history," Fritz added.

UNESCO Deplores Killing of Journalists, Media Workers in Turkey, Iraq

NewsBlaze, CA
Jan 22 2007

Condemning the killings of journalists in Iraq and Turkey, the head
of the United Nations body mandated to protect press freedom today
once again stressed the vital role played by the media in establishing
democracy and the rule of law.

Those murdered in recent days included Hrant Dink, editor of the
Turkish Armenian-language weekly Agos, and at least six Iraqi reporters
and media workers.

"Freedom of expression is a fundamental human right and press freedom,
its corollary, is a cornerstone of democracy and rule of law,"
UNESCO Director-General Koiro Matsuura said in a statement
on Mr. Dink’s killing. "I welcome the speed with which the Turkish
authorities investigated this case, proof of their determination not
to let this heinous crime go unpunished," he added.

Mr. Matsuura has repeatedly deplored the murder of Iraqi media
workers in recent months. "I am horrified by the number of Iraqi
journalists who are paying with their lives for their professional
commitment to the fundamental human right of freedom of expression,"
he said in his latest statement.

"Both government officials and media practitioners agree on the
essential role of press freedom in the reconstruction of Iraq,"
he added, recalling the declaration adopted by participants at the
International Conference on Freedom of Expression and Media Development
in Iraq, which UNESCO hosted earlier this month.

"They also agree on the need to investigate and bring to justice those
guilty of crimes against journalists, I now hope that the authorities
on the ground will cooperate in making this wish a reality."

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) reported that Khudr Younis
al-Obaidi, a reporter for the Al-Diuwan newspaper, was killed by
unknown gunmen on 15 January in Mosul, in the north of Iraq.

According to Reporters Without Borders (RSF), several employees of
the governmental daily Al Sabah were killed from 12 to 16 January.
Two, whose names have not been revealed, were kidnapped from the Al
Sabah’s offices in Baghdad on 12 January and found with their throats
cut the next day. Yassin Aid Assef, a correspondent for the daily,
was killed by a bomb on 14 January while covering a story in Baghdad.
The next day journalist Falah Khalaf Al Diyali was shot dead by
unidentified gunmen in Ramadi, west of Baghdad.

According to RSF’s tally, 146 journalists and media assistants have
been killed since the United States-led coalition invaded Iraq in
March 2003.

Source: United Nations

Agence France Presse — English
January 20, 2007 Saturday

Armenian churches to mourn slain journalist

Armenian churches throughout the world will hold special remembrance
services on Sunday for slain Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink,
church authorities said.

"Dink’s untimely death has shocked all of us. We condemn this murder,
which took away a talented and brave son of his people, with profound
indignation," Armenian patriarch Karekin II said in a statement on
Saturday.

The press service of the Armenian Church said a special memorial
service for Dink would be held Sunday in all Armenian churches,
including the main cathedral of Echmiadzin.

Outside of Armenia, there are also many Armenian churches spread
across Europe the Middle East and the United States attended by a
large diaspora of ethnic-Armenians.

Committee to Protect Journalists – CPJ Press Freedom Online, NY
Jan 19 2007

Turkish-Armenian editor murdered in Istanbul

New York, January 19, 2007 – The Committee to Protect Journalists
condemns the murder today of a prominent Turkish-Armenian editor
outside his newspaper’s offices in Istanbul. Hrant Dink, 52, managing
editor of the bilingual Turkish-Armenian weekly Agos, was shot three
times in the neck, according to the Turkish television channel NTV.

Dink had received numerous death threats from nationalist Turks who
viewed his iconoclastic journalism, particularly on the mass killings
of Armenians in the early 20th century, as an act of treachery. In a
January 10 article in Agos, Dink said he had passed along a
particularly threatening letter to Istanbul’s Sisli district
prosecutor, but no action had been taken.

`Through his journalism Hrant Dink sought to shed light on Turkey’s
troubled past and create a better future for Turks and Armenians.
This earned him many enemies, but he vowed to continue writing
despite receiving many threats,’ said CPJ Executive Director Joel
Simon. `An assassin has now silenced one of Turkey’s most courageous
voices. We are profoundly shocked and saddened by this crime, and
send our deepest condolences to Hrant Dink’s family, colleagues, and
friends.’

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan condemned Dink’s death as an
attack against Turkey’s unity and promised to catch those
responsible, according to international news reports. Police
identified the assailant as a young man dressed in a white hat and a
denim jacket, and they detained two people as part of their
investigation, NTV reported.

`This murder must not go unpunished as have previous slayings of
journalists,’ said CPJ’s Simon. `We call on the Turkish authorities
to do all in their power to ensure that those responsible are brought
to justice swiftly.’

In the last 15 years, 18 other Turkish journalists have been killed
for their work, many of them murdered, making it the eighth deadliest
country in the world for journalists, CPJ research shows. The last
killing was in 1999. More recently, journalists, academics, and
others have been subjected to pervasive legal harassment for
statements that allegedly insult the Turkish identity, CPJ research
shows.

Dink, a Turkish citizen of Armenian descent, had been prosecuted
several times in recent years – for writing about the mass killings of
Armenians by Turks at the beginning of the 20th century, for
criticizing lines in the Turkish national anthem that he considered
discriminatory, and even for commenting publicly on the cases against
him. His office had also been the target of protests.

In July 2006, Turkey’s High Court of Appeals upheld a six-month
suspended prison sentence against Dink for violating Article 301 of
the penal code in a case sparked by complaints from nationalist
activists. His prosecution stemmed from a series of articles in early
2004 dealing with the collective memory of the Armenian massacres of
1915-17 under the Ottoman Empire. Armenians call the killings the
first genocide of the 20th century, a term that Turkey rejects.

Ironically, the pieces for which Dink was convicted had appealed to
diaspora Armenians to let go of their anger against the Turks. The
prosecution was sharply criticized by the European Union, which
Turkey is seeking to join. Dink said he would take the case to the
European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, France, to clear his
name.

Dink was one of dozens of writers who have been prosecuted in the
past two years under controversial penal code provisions that
criminalize statements deemed as insulting to the Turkish identity,
particularly in regard to the Armenian killings, CPJ research shows.
The local press freedom group Bia said at least 65 cases have been
launched against journalists, writers and academics. The EU has urged
Turkey to reform its laws to eliminate such prosecutions.

Dink edited Agos for all of the newspaper’s 11-year existence. Agos,
the only Armenian newspaper in Turkey, had a circulation of just
6,000 but its political influence was vast. Dink regularly appeared
on television to express his views.

In a February 2006 interview with CPJ, Dink said Turkish nationalists
had targeted him for legal harassment. `The prosecutions are not a
surprise for me. They want to teach me a lesson because I am
Armenian. They try to keep me quiet.’ Asked who `they’ are, Dink
replied, `the deep state in Turkey’.

He was referring not to the Islamist-based government of Prime
Minister Erdogan, but to the secular nationalist forces supported by
sections of the army, security forces, and parts of the justice and
interior ministries. The nationalists, political heirs of Mustafa
Kemal Ataturk, the founder of modern Turkey, still exert considerable
influence in Turkey.

Dink said in the CPJ interview that he hoped his critical reporting
would pave the way for peace between the two peoples. `I want to
write and ask how we can change this historical conflict into peace,’
he said.

In the interview, Dink said he did not think the tide had yet turned
in favor of critical writers – `the situation in Turkey is tense’ – but
he believed that it ultimately would. `I believe in democracy and
press freedom. I am determined to pursue the struggle.’

Christian Broadcasting Network, VA
Jan 19 2007

Armenian Journalist Killed by Gunman
By Benjamin Harvey
Associated Press Writer
January 19, 2007

CBNNews.com – ISTANBUL, Turkey – A journalist who faced constant
threats and protests as one of the most prominent voices of Turkey’s
shrinking Armenian community was shot to death Friday at the entrance
to his newspaper’s offices, police said.

Hrant Dink, a 53-year-old Turkish citizen of Armenian descent, had
gone on trial numerous times for speaking out about the mass killings
of Armenians by Turks at the beginning of the 20th century. He had
also received threats from nationalists, who viewed him as a traitor.

In October 2005, he was convicted of trying to influence the
judiciary after the bilingual Turkish-Armenian newspaper he edited,
Agos, ran stories criticizing a law making it a crime to insult
Turkey, the Turkish government or the Turkish national character.

He was given a six-month suspended sentence.

The conviction was rare even in a country where trials of
journalists, academics and writers have become common. Most of the
cases, including that of the Nobel Prize-winning novelist Orhan
Pamuk, were either dropped on a technicality or led to acquittals.

Dink cried during an interview with The Associated Press last year as
he talked about some of his countrymen’s hatred for him, saying he
could not stay in a country where he was unwanted.

"I’m living together with Turks in this country," Dink told the AP.
"I don’t think I could live with an identity of having insulted them
in this country. if I am unable to come up with a positive result, it
will be honorable for me to leave this country."

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan condemned Dink’s death as an
attack against Turkey’s unity and promised to catch those
responsible.

Erdogan said two suspects had been arrested, but offered no details.

"Once again, dark hands have chosen our country and spilled blood in
Istanbul to achieve their dark goals," Erdogan said at a news
conference.

The prime minister said he had assigned top officials from the
Justice Ministry to the case and that they were on their way to
Istanbul from the capital, Ankara.

International Herald Tribune, France
Jan 20 2007

Turkish journalist honored as authorities search for his killer
The Associated PressPublished: January 20, 2007

ISTANBUL, Turkey: The killing of prominent journalist Hrant Dink put
Turkey in a mood of shock, shame and self-reflection – and prompted
an emotional outpouring of support for a man whose life was largely
defined by battles with those who saw him as an enemy of his nation.

Dink, an ethnic Armenian newspaper editor who faced numerous trials
and venomous insults for saying the killing of Armenians by Turks in
the last century was genocide, was shot several times Friday
afternoon by an unidentified assassin. He died a violent and public
death in broad daylight on the sidewalk outside his paper’s office on
a busy street in Istanbul.

Though the motives for the killing remained unclear, most Turks
assumed Dink was targeted and killed for his comments on genocide,
which nationalists said were insults to Turkey’s honor and
threatening to its unity.

Dink, a Turkish citizen of Armenian descent, was no stranger to
hatred directed against him.

"Fascists were attacking me with racist curses," he wrote in his last
newspaper column, dated Jan. 10. "They were humiliating me with
banners. Hundreds of threats via e-mail, phone calls and letters were
pouring down and they were increasing day by day in number … I was
in the most embarrassing situation a man can experience."

He said he considered leaving Turkey, but then, "I know myself.
After three days abroad, I miss my country. … We would stay and
resist."

Turkey’s media was unanimous in claiming Dink as one of its own after
the slaying – an irony for a man who constantly struggled to shake
himself of the label of traitor.

"Hrant Dink is Turkey," ran the headline in the daily Milliyet.

"The greatest betrayal," Sabah newspaper said of the killing.

"Armenian journalist Dink slain, Turkey appalled," Zaman’s English
paper said.

Dink was critical of both Turkey and of the Armenian Diaspora’s harsh
stance against it. He said he would stay here in the hopes that cases
he opened at the European Court of Human Rights would be resolved in
his favor, and do something to improve his country.

"When a positive verdict is declared, I will surely be happier, and
then this will mean that I will never have to leave my country," he
wrote.

Turkey’s relationship with its Armenian minority has long been
haunted by memories of a brutal past. Much of Turkey’s
once-influential Armenian population was killed or driven out
beginning around 1915 in what an increasing number of countries are
recognizing as the first genocide of the 20th century.

Turks vehemently deny that their ancestors committed genocide,
however, and saying so is tantamount to treason here.

Photographs of the man believed to be Dink’s killer were broadcast on
television Saturday along with pleas to help track him down. The man
appeared to be thin, in his late teens or early 20s, with an angular
face and a wisp of a mustache. One photograph captured him running,
tucking a gun into his waistband.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan vowed to track the killer down
and to expose the motives and planners behind the crime.

"The bullets aimed at Hrant Dink were shot into all of us," he said
Saturday in one of several televised comments on the killing.

Public sentiment seemed to be one of disgust at the crime, and many
newspapers adopted an ashamed and frustrated tone in talking of the
killing.

"In this era, Turkey is a country where the Rev. Andrea Santoro is
murdered!" wrote columnist Taha Akyol in Milliyet, referring to the
killing last year of a Catholic priest as he prayed in his church in
Turkey. "It’s a country where the moderate Armenian journalist Hrant
Dink is murdered! It’s a country that puts writers on trial!"

"Assassination? What a cold, distant word," wrote Perihan Magden in
an emotional column addressed to Dink in Radikal. "They sacrificed
you, good man."

Ismet Berkan, editor-in-chief of Radikal, complained of a "murderous
nationalist atmosphere" that led to Dink’s death.

"We created this atmosphere knowingly, step-by-step," he wrote. "The
most painful thing is this: to know that Hrant is neither the first
nor the last."

The New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists said Turkey was
the eighth deadliest country in the world for journalists. Turkey’s
Zaman newspaper said 62 journalists had been "assassinated" in the
nation’s 84-year history.

Dink’s funeral is scheduled for Tuesday at the Meryem Ana church,
after which he will be buried at the Balikli Armenian cemetery in
Istanbul.