Author: Antonian Lara

IT IS ENVISAGED TO DEEPEN ARMENIAN-GREEK MILITARY-TECHNICAL COOPERATION

Noyan Tapan
Oct 23, 2007

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 23, NOYAN TAPAN. The current state of
military-technical cooperation was discussed at the October 23 meeting
of RA Defence Minister Mikayel Haroutiunian with the delegation led
by General Dimitrios Grapsas, the Head of the General Headquarters of
Greek National Defence, which has arrived in Armenia on an official
visit. The parties mentioned that they have a possibility and, the
most important, willingness to deepen that cooperation.

General Dimitrios Grapsas expressed satisfaction with the high
professional preparedness of the Armenian peacekeeping platoon carrying
out a peacekeeping mission in Kosovo. In his turn, M. Haroutiunian,
highly evaluating the Greek party’s assistance to the peacekeeping
mission, presented the programs envisaged in the sphere in the future.

According to the report of the RA Defence Ministry’s Press Office,
at the end of the meeting they touched upon reforms being implemented
in our country’s armed forces.

FOLLOWING CONSULTATIONS, AMBASSADOR SENSOY BACK IN WASHINGTON

Turkish Press
Oct 23 2007

PRESS REVIEW

Turkey’s Ambassador to Washington Nabi Sensoy, who was recalled
to Ankara for discussions of an Armenian resolution before the US
House of Representatives, yesterday returned to Washington. Speaking
to reporters in Turkey, Sensoy said that during his contacts in
Washington, he would convey the concerns of both Turkish leaders and
the Turkish people about the issue and urge US officials to block a
possible House vote on the resolution.

FIRST ARMENIAN PRESIDENT’S COMING TO POLITICAL ARENA HAS CAUSED DANGER OF SITUATION’S DESTABILIZATION, RUSSIAN DEPUTY STATES

Noyan Tapan
Oct 22, 2007

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 22, NOYAN TAPAN. Russia is anxious about the
possibility of home political destabilization in connection with
the upcoming presidential elections in Armenia. Konstantin Zatulin,
a Deputy of the RF State Duma, the Director of the CIS Institute,
stated this on October 21 at the National Press Club. According to him,
any destabilization in Armenia will seriously damage the Collective
Security Treaty Organization, the only member of which in the Caucasus
is Armenia.

K. Zatulin said that today the current President’s role is reduced
to ensuring elections, and his companions-in-arms, including the
current Prime Minister, assume the responsibility of ensuring
succession of the current President’s course. However, the first
Armenian President’s coming to the political arena has caused the
danger of situation’s destabilization. K. Zatulin is convinced
that Levon Ter-Petrosian’s running for the elections will result in
collision of the Armenia of unfulfilled hopes with the Armenia, which
was fulfilled not only in power, but also in business in the years
of Robert Kocharian’s tenure. "I would like this argument between
two Armenias not to result in a split between them," the Russian
politician mentioned. In K. Zatulin’s opinion, it is difficult to
say what chances the candidates will have during the elections,
but the chances of the current Prime Minister are preferable.

The Russian Deputy said that the personal acquaintance and ties between
the current authorities of Russia and Armenia play an important role in
Russian-Armenian relations, "but it does not mean that Russia intends
to interfere in the Armenian people’s will." Stating that Armenia will
hardly change its home political course after a new leader’s coming
to power, K. Zatulin expressed the hope that the relations between
the two countries will not depend on the outcome of the presidential
elections in Armenia and Russia.

October 21, 2007

Transcript [Excerpt]

The Republican Debate on Fox News Channel

The following is a transcript [excerpt] of the Republican Presidential
debate in Orlando, Fla., as provided by Congressional Quarterly.

PARTICIPANTS:
REP. DUNCAN HUNTER, R-CALIF.
FORMER GOV. MITT ROMNEY, R-MASS.
SEN. JOHN MCCAIN, R-ARIZ.
REP. TOM TANCREDO, R-COLO.
FORMER MAYOR RUDOLPH W. GIULIANI, R-NEW YORK CITY
REP. RON PAUL, R-TEXAS
FORMER GOV. MIKE HUCKABEE, R-ARK.
FORMER SEN. FRED THOMPSON, R-TENN.

MODERATORS:
BRIT HUME, FOX NEWS
CHRIS WALLACE, FOX NEWS
WENDELL GOLER, FOX NEWS
CARL CAMERON, FOX NEWS

OTHERS:
GOV. CHARLIE CRIST, R-FLA.
JIM GREER, CHAIRMAN, REPUBLICAN PARTY OF FLORIDA

***

CAMERON: Senator Thompson, violence escalated again today on the
Turkish-Iraq border. The terrorist group, PKK, took Turkish soldiers
hostage. If as President Bush says, we are fighting terrorists in Iraq
to protect our homeland, shouldn’t the Turks be able to go into Iraq
to protect their own?

THOMPSON: Well, let’s hope it doesn’t come to that. I think the
underlying point here is that Turkey is a friend of ours. We’ve got an
important base there, actually more than one, but one especially
important as far as our efforts in Iraq are concerned.

THOMPSON: They’ve got a right to defend themselves from acts of
terrorism, and PKK are terrorists.

The Kurds in the northern part of Iraq are our friends, too.

So we’ve got to get these people together. It’s one of those
situations where we’ve got friends on both sides. But militarily and
strategically, we have to understand Turkey’s position. I hope that
they don’t invade.

I think that this is one area where diplomacy could work because you
have two people or two countries — or two areas, I should say — that
we’re used to talking to and used to working with.

But Turkey is a NATO ally, and they have helped us as far as Iraq is
concerned. Not everything they do is pleasing to us, and we have some
issues with them.

Now, Nancy Pelosi has brought up an Armenian genocide proposal which
is totally irresponsible. She’s interjecting partisan politics into a
matter of national security.

(APPLAUSE)

CAMERON: Thank you, Senator.

Congressman Tancredo, I saw that you had your hand up.

TANCREDO: That was it. I just wanted to say that we have to remember
why this is happening in Turkey.

TANCREDO: And that is exactly right. It is because the present
leadership of the House of Representatives brought up this bill,
agreed to bring up a bill, a resolution, that we knew would in fact,
if they did that, would cause Turkey to do exactly what they did.

Now, that goes to show you that pandering for votes, which was what
this was partly based upon, and a complete ignorance of the foreign
policy implications of doing such a thing, are the reasons why we are
here now.

And we should take away from this some very important lessons, not the
least of which is that Nancy Pelosi is not a very good speaker of the
House, and she is an even lousier secretary of state.

(LAUGHTER) (APPLAUSE)

CAMERON: Governor, I saw that you — do you want to weigh in on this, Governor?

HUCKABEE: When, four days ago, the parliament of Turkey indicated that
they would amass those troops, it’s a clear signal — not just
saber-rattling, they’re serious about defending themselves.

It would seem to me that we should dispatch the secretary of state
immediately to do two things. First of all, we need to train and equip
the Kurds to fight the terrorists in their midst.

The PKK is a terrorist organization. Those 3,500 terrorists can best
be dealt with by trained and armed Kurds. We don’t have to put our
military in harm’s way. The Kurds have the capacity to do it against
those in the PKK — but also to try to get Turkey to realize that
there’s nothing to be gained by crossing into that border and creating
yet another hostile situation. None of us need it. None of us want it.

And I would hope that maybe the base in Irbil that was shut down
earlier could become the base in which those operations could be
staged.

(APPLAUSE)

CAMERON: Mr. Paul?

PAUL: This is a — this is a result of a foreign policy of
interventionism. The founders advised non-interventionism. And even
our president won the election in the year 2000 to have a more humble
foreign policy, not to go into nation-building, and not get involved
in the internal affairs of other nations.

And we won an election on that.

But here we are. We’re over there and we’ve invaded this country and
this is just another unintended consequence. The war is spreading, the
war is likely to go into Iran, nobody’s willing to take anything off
the table.

What would it be like if somebody came in here into Mexico and did
some of these things — say, like, putting missiles in Europe? We’re
just looking for trouble. It’s so unnecessary. And we jeopardize
ourselves. And, quite frankly, we’re not able to afford this.

So we don’t need to go looking for trouble. We don’t need another Cold
War. And all we have to do is start talking to people and trading with
people.

We don’t need to assume that the world is going to blow up. Just think of…

(AUDIENCE BOOING)

PAUL: When I was drafted into the military, and I served five years in
the military, the Soviets had 40,000 nuclear weapons.

And here, we’re now learning about agitating and putting missiles in Europe.

PAUL: It’s the Turks’ business. It’s not our business.

(AUDIENCE BOOS)

(APPLAUSE)

HUME: Governor Romney, I assume you’re eager to get into this. Go ahead.

ROMNEY: Yes, we spoke — about Russia, we’ve spoken about what’s
happening in Turkey and, obviously, Iraq. As you look around the
world, you recognize that it’s still a dangerous place.

During the Clinton years, the president said we’re going to take a
peace dividend. We got the dividend. We didn’t get the peace.

He reduced the scale of our military dramatically, took 500,000 troops
out, cut back our Navy by 80 ships, knocked our Air Force down 25
percent. Our aircraft fleet today are 28 years old.

The U.N. is failing in its mission to protect the world and to prevent genocide.

(APPLAUSE)

The strategy for America’s safety is not to live in what Charles
Krauthammer called a holiday from history, but to realize America must
be strong.

ROMNEY: We need a strong military to protect us with more troops, more
equipment and better care when our troops come home.

(APPLAUSE)

We also need a strong economy so we can have a strong military, and we
need strong families and values to teach our kids to build a strong
economy and a strong military.

(APPLAUSE)

HUME: Thank you, Governor.

Source: bate-transcript.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1

DENT, REST OF CONGRESS MUST REVISIT ‘GENOCIDE’ VOTE
Abdullah Bozkurt

Allentown Morning Call, PA
ll-left_col-a.6099834oct21,0,1390206.story
Oct 21 2007

"Turkish people, including Turks in the Lehigh Valley, are very
sensitive on this issue. Their thousands of years of history show
how tolerant they are of other cultures and faith groups."

The headline on Professor Brian Mello’s op-ed column on Oct 16 was
misleading, as it said only Turkey holds the key to the Armenian
issue. As the saying goes, it takes two to tango, and this complex
dispute definitely needs more than two to find a solution.

It is disheartening to follow the developments regarding Congress’s
resolution calling for recognition of Armenian claims that goes back
nine decades. It does great disservice not only to the U.S. vital
interests in the region, but also is counterproductive to dialogue
undertaken by both the Turkish and Armenian governments in recent
years. This highly contested issue does not belong in a political
body whose members are open to influences by special interest groups
and lobbyists.

In the House of Representatives, It is obvious that Speaker Nancy
Pelosi is trying to pay lip-service to her constituency back in
California, with no regard to U.S. security interests in the volatile
region at the expense of only democratic Muslim ally, Turkey. Should
the resolution pass a floor vote, the only party that can claim victory
would be the Armenian diaspora, and it would be a symbolic gesture to
voters of Armenian descent. The diaspora has never allowed the case
to come before a properly constituted and competent international
court. Instead, they prompt parliamentary and other bodies to
"recognize the genocide."

Turkish people, including Turks in the Lehigh Valley, are very
sensitive on this issue. Their thousands of years of history show
how tolerant they are of other cultures and faith groups. When the
Spanish inquisition happened, Turks welcomed Jews. In World War II,
they opened the door to Jewish professors fleeing from Germany. At
the time, Ottoman Turks were issuing decrees granting protected status
to Orthodox churches and other Christian denominations in their domain.

Prominent British historian Professor Norman Stone wrote a great
op-ed piece published in the Chicago Tribune on Oct. 16. He said,
"In 1914, when World War I began in earnest, Armenians living in
what is now Turkey attempted to set up a national state. Armenians
revolted against the Ottoman government, began what we would now call
‘ethnic cleansing’ of the local Turks. Their effort failed and caused
the government to deport most Armenians from the area of the revolt
for security reasons." He also notes that large Armenian populations
of Istanbul, Izmir and Aleppo were not affected by the deportation.

Internal Ottoman documents talk of "deportation" in the context of
widespread Armenian nationalist risings in the early spring of 1915.

The Russians and the French used Armenian regiments and legionnaires.

The Ottomans themselves in 1916 put on trial about 1,300 men for
crimes during the deportation of the Armenians in 1915, convicted
many and executed some, including a governor.

Why don’t we leave the issue to accredited and respected historians
to sort it out rather than politicizing the records? What is it that
we are afraid of finding out? In recent years, the Turkish government
offered to establish a joint historical committee composed of neutral
and independent historians with impeccable records of integrity to
investigate claims and examine records.

Turks even suggested opening all internal state documents preserved
in national achieves for 100 years. But, the Armenian side refused to
take part in that review. The resolution in Congress does not mention
these facts, but rather lays blame on one side only — Turks. I
encourage our congressman Charlie Dent to revisit his vote, as many
of his colleagues did last week. I understand he wants to please the
Armenian community in preparation for his upcoming congressional race
in the 15th District, but his vote would hurt Turkish Americans in
his constituency, and is deemed offensive by many.

Abdullah Bozkurt of Bethlehem is president of the Lehigh Dialogue
Center. Its Web site is

THE ROLE OF CONSTRUCTIVE OPPOSITION TO COMMUNISTS

KarabakhOpen
21-10-2007 18:52:04

Yesterday President Bako Sahakyan met with the members of the Central
Committee of the Communist Party of Artsakh and its leader Hrant
Melkumyan.

The president emphasized the importance of regular political
consultations and contacts with all the political forces, the General
Information Department reported.

The representatives of the party highly appreciated the determination
of the president to "shape a new political culture" and said to take
part in the process as "constructive opposition."

Apparently, considering the absence of opposition, the role of the
"constructive opposition" was decided to hand out to the Communist
Party. It is quite convenient – the ideology of the Communists
is opposition to the liberal policy of the government, besides,
the Communists in Karabakh have neither wish nor possibility for a
"non-constructive" revolution.

PKK PUSHES TURKEY TO BRINK WITH FRESH ATTACKS
Suna Erdem in Istanbul, for Times Online

Times Online
October 21, 2007

The prospect of Turkey invading northern Iraq drew closer today after
Kurdish rebels killed at least 12 soldiers in an ambush, blowing up
a bridge near the Iraqi border as a military convoy crossed.

The Turkish Prime Minister flew back to Ankara for an emergency summit
with military leaders after the attack, in which another 16 troops
were injured in heavy fighting and, according to unconfirmed reports,
a further 10 were missing, believed kidnapped. In a separate incident
in the same province today at least 17 people were injured when a
mine blew up a wedding convoy.

The provocative upsurge in violence comes days after the Turkish
Parliament gave the authorisation to press ahead with a threatened
cross-border military incursion into Iraq, despite warnings from
Washington and Brussels.

Turkey blames US and Iraqi authorities for failing to clamp down on
the activities of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which has been
using its guerilla bases in the mountains of the autonomous Kurdish
region of northern Iraq to mount increasingly intense attacks on
Turkish targets in recent weeks.

"We are determined to respond to these events in a level-headed manner.

What must be done will be done…We are not giving any thought to
what others might say," Mr Erdogan said as he prepared to fly to the
capital, Ankara, to join President Abdullah Gul and senior officials
for the summit.

"We are very angry at the moment."

Turkey’s Government is under strong public and military pressure to
take action against the PKK in northern Iraq. There are reportedly
between 60,000 and 100,000 troops deployed along the border to try
to stop the rebels crossing back into Turkey. Mr Erdogan has already
ordered plans for some sort of cross-border action days after 13
Turkish troops were killed in an overnight ambush earlier this
month. That ambush sparked nationwide condemnation as the soldiers’
funerals turned into marches demanding retaliation.

Turkey’s Nato ally, the United States, and the Baghdad government
are worried about the prospect of Turkish troops destabilising the
only relatively peaceful part of the country. But anger at a recent
US congressional vote to blame Ottoman Turks for genocide against
Armenians in World War One has deafened Turkish ears to calls for
calm from Washington.

Western diplomats and analysts, however, believe Turkey is reluctant
to go ahead with an operation that would cause diplomatic and economic
headaches.

According to Mr Erdogan, Turkey has mounted 24 previous cross-border
incursions with little lasting effect.

The Turkish General staff said in a statement that 23 guerrillas
were killed during the overnight attack on a military convoy in the
border region of Hakkari’s Daglarca district. The statement said 63
‘targets’ were under heavy fire as clashes continued into the day,
and an air-backed military operation was launched in the area.

The PKK claimed that it had had the upper hand in the fighting. "There
were clashes between the two sides. We killed a large number of
them. We took a group of Turkish soldiers as prisoners," said Abdul
Rahman al-Chadirchi, a leading member of the PKK.

Jalal Talabani, the Iraqi President and himself a Kurd, warned
Ankara that it’s demands that Iraq should flush out the PKK were
unrealistic. Iraq’s armed forces would be unable to impose its will
on the Kurdish separatists in the north where the might of the large
and well-equipped Turkish army had failed, he said.

Massoud Barzani, the President of the autonomous Kurdish region of
Iraq, warned meanwhile that if Turkey moved in, the Kurdistan regional
government would be compelled to defend its people.

The Economist
October 20, 2007
U.S. Edition

A resolution too far;
Turkey and Armenia

The fallout in Turkey from a congressional vote in America

A congressional vote in Washington that could jeopardise Turkey’s
path westwards

THE Turks are a proud, prickly people, easily offended by criticism.
That much is clear from the row over a resolution, passed by a
committee of the United States House of Representatives on October
10th, calling the slaughter of Armenians by Ottoman Turks in 1915
genocide. The full House has yet to vote on the resolution. But
Turkey has reacted angrily, recalling its ambassador. It is talking
of cutting military ties and even denying the Americans use of the
Incirlik airbase that is vital for the supply of their troops in Iraq
(see pages 33-35).

As such threats demonstrate, Turkey is not just an angry ally. It is
also a vital one, with a population of 75m and the world’s
19th-biggest economy. It is a strategically important hinge between
Europe and Asia; it has the biggest army in NATO after America’s; it
forms a crucial energy corridor to the West; and it borders on such
awkward places as Iran and Syria as well as Iraq. Moreover, it is a
rare example in the Muslim world of a lively, secular democracy. Yet
internal tensions are exacerbated when clumsy outsiders intervene.

This year has seen a series of clashes between the army and
secularists on one side and the mildly Islamist Justice and
Development (AK) government led by Recep Tayyip Erdogan on the other,
culminating in a big AK win in the election in July. Mr Erdogan is
trying manfully to keep Turkey on the path towards membership of the
European Union, even though many Europeans have become openly
hostile. He also wants to preserve good relations with America
despite renewed fighting with guerrillas of the Kurdistan Workers’
Party (PKK), some based in the Kurdish region of northern Iraq. This
is a bad moment for America to pick a fight over something that
happened 90 years ago, before modern Turkey even existed.

That is not to deny it is a good idea for countries to face up to
their past, especially when it was as violent as that of the Ottomans
in the early 20th century. Germany has been admirably open about
admitting the sins of the Nazi period; Japan has been less candid. It
would be good for modern, democratic Turkey to come to terms with the
terrible treatment of Armenians in the first world war (as also, in
later times, of other minorities, including Greeks, Alevis and
Kurds). In recent years, there have been encouraging signs: a few
historians’ conferences, an attempt to improve relations with
Armenia, growing acceptance of the Kurdish language and occasional
talk of amending Article 301 of the penal code. This makes "insulting
Turkishness" a criminal offence and is used to shut down discussion
of the Armenian genocide.

But the adoption of a highly political resolution in America’s
Congress is the worst possible way to encourage more steps in the
right direction. Rather, it would serve only to fan the flames of
Turkish nationalism and leave liberals within Turkey who want more
open debate about the past even more exposed. Those in Congress who
are pushing this resolution have little interest in Turkey or even
Armenia, but a lot in the wealthy Armenian-American constituents who
are lobbying them. It is telling that many Turkish Armenians, and
even the Patriarch of the Armenian church of Istanbul, have not
welcomed the House resolution.

Recognising the damaging repercussions in Turkey as well as for
Turkish-American relations, the Bush administration has been fighting
to stop the resolution’s passage. It has mustered all eight living
former secretaries of state, both Democrat and Republican, to argue
against it. This is testimony to the strategic importance of Turkey.
But it also reflects the especially sensitive time. This week the
Turkish parliament gave its approval for a possible cross-border
military incursion into northern Iraq to root out PKK terrorists
based there.

That would be another blunder. The Turks’ frustration over northern
Iraq is understandable. In the past two weeks alone, some 20 Turkish
soldiers have been killed by the PKK. Repeated requests to the Iraqis
and local Kurdish authorities to clamp down on the group have been
ignored. Yet an invasion would not only upset the most stable region
of Iraq but also be unlikely to work, as even some Turkish generals
recognise. It would be better for the Americans to do more to counter
the PKK in northern Iraq – and for Turkey to renew its earlier efforts
to improve the lot of Kurds in its south-east.

Keeping Turkey on its pro-Western course is vital, not just for Iraq,
but for the sake of all Turks, including the country’s own big
Kurdish population. Recent rows have helped to turn Turkish public
opinion sharply against both the European Union and the United
States, a situation that countries such as Iran and Russia are all
too ready to exploit. Pressure to scrap Article 301 and allow open
debate in Turkey should continue. But the House resolution is not the
way to do it.

ANTIAMERICAN AMERICAN ARMENIANS

BostonNOW, MA
Oct 17 2007

It really disturbs me that ancient ethnic feuds have to put our troops
at even greater risk in Iraq simply because some Armenians who don’t
seem to have completely gotten off the boat yet insist on condeming
the Turks for something that happened to their ancestors more than 90
years ago. Who are we to make Congess condemn a people for something
that happened then if children in Vietnam and Cambodia now are still
being born with birth defects (thanks to Dow Chemical) and are still
having their limbs blown off from freshly-laid land mines (thanks to
Motorola)? Are there no limits to our smug, arrogant, self righteous
and terminally stupid hypocrisy?

While we’re at it maybe someone should also lobby Congress to hector
Israel for Joshua’s sack of Jericho.

comments at
07/10/17/antiamerican-american-armenians

TIERRAS DE ARMENIA COMPANY INTENDS TO BUILD AGRICULTURAL PROCESSING PLANT IN ARMAVIR MARZ

Noyan Tapan
Oct 17 2007

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 17, NOYAN TAPAN. Tierras de Armenia company
(Argentina) will build an agricultural produce processing plant in
the village of Arevadasht (Armavir marz). The company’s technical
advisor Daniel Tardito said at the October 17 press conference that
20 million dollars is needed for construction of the plant. It is
envisaged putting it into operation in 2009.

Tierras de Armenia company, which is owned by famous
Argentinian-Armenian businessman Eduardo Eurnekian, purchased a
2,300-hectare land plot in the same place three years ago and planted
fruit trees there, making investments of 30 million dollars. The
first crop of grapes has already been harvested.

In the words of D. Tardito, the company currently employs more than
700 local residents, while the operation of the plant will allow to
create new jobs.