Author: Antranik Varosian

Georgia’s opposition United National Movement Party staged a human chain protest against Gazprom on March 6 in Tbilisi after the country’s Energy Minister Kakha Kaladze said on March 5 that Georgia and Russia’s state energy giant Gazprom had agreed in principle to keep the existing gas transit terms and pay Georgia 10% of Russian gas transported to Armenia via Georgia.

“Agreement has been achieved; only signing of the contract is now left,” the Georgian Energy Minister told journalists.

“According to the agreement this year we remain within the scope of the existing contract, which is in force for years already, envisaging receiving as a transit fee 10 percent of natural gas transported [from Russia to Armenia],” he said, adding that the contract will run until the end of 2016.

Kaladze’s remarks came a day after the Georgian Energy Ministry announced about a new deal with Azerbaijan’s state energy company SOCAR, according to which Georgia will receive an additional  500 million cubic meters of gas from Azerbaijan.

Gazprom wanted to monetize transit fee and pay cash, instead of 10% of gas transported to Armenia via Georgia.

If monetized, Georgia would not have receive enough cash to buy the same amount of gas it is now receiving as a transit fee; in such case the country would have required to buy more gas from Gazprom.

But after announcing about additional gas supplies from Azerbaijan, Energy Minister Kaladze said on March 4 that there was “no need for additional volumes of gas” from Russia at this stage.

Georgia’s opposition United National Movement Party staged a human chain protest against Gazprom on March 6 in Tbilisi.

Charles Aznavour has responded to photographer Hayk Barseghyan’s call to raise funds for the homeless families in Gyumri.

Aznavour shared Barseghyan’s video on his Facebook page and added the following inscription: “27 years after the terrible earthquake in Armenia that left 25 000 dead, thousands of families are still homeless and hopeless in what is now the second largest city of the independent Republic of Armenia: Gyumri! This program is meant to help the most disadvantaged families.”

 

 

 

Iran is set to hold parliamentary elections on February 26. The main rivalry is expected between the conservatives and the reformists. Eight Armenian will be running for two seats in the Iranian Parliament.

Expert of Iranian studies Rudik Yaralyan expects no surprises. According to him, the Armenian community has always been conservative. Besides, the candidates previously represented in Majlis are more influential, he told reporters today.

Some of the candidates enjoy the support of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation. However, they fail to follow the ARF policy line. In particular, they could be more active on issues related to Nagorno Karabakh and Armenian Genocide.

“In my opinion, the time has not come for Iran to recognize the Armenian Genocide. Guided by this logic, they [Armenian MPs] refrain from submitting a bill. They see that the Russian-Iranian ‘alliance’ is doing its best to resist Turkey’s growing influence in the region. Therefore, it’s not ruled out that the issue of recognition of the Armenian Genocide may be brought into agenda,” the expert said.

Zhorzhik Abrahamyan and Karen Khanlaryan, both supported by ARF, are the two candidates most likely to be elected.

Speaking exclusively to , Khanlaryan said he is going to deepen and expand the existing political course, if elected. “The Armenia-Iran relations are at the spotlight, especially considering that the lifting of sanctions is opening up new perspectives for cooperation.”

Karen Khanlaryan said they will try to raise the Armenian Genocide issue on higher podiums, and even Majlis, on the eve of April 24.

“Iran has no practice of condemning by law, the declarative approach is more common here,” he said.

It’s worth mentioning that the Armenian community is the only ethnic minority that has been allocated two seats in the Iranian Parliament.

Cargo shipments of the rechargeable lithium batteries used in countless consumer products should no longer be allowed on passenger planes because they can create intense fires capable of destroying an aircraft, a U.N. aviation agency has concluded, the Associated Press reports.

The decision late Monday by the Montreal-based International Civil Aviation Organization’s top-level governing council to ban the shipments isn’t binding, but most countries follow the agency’s standards. The ban is effective on April 1.

“This interim prohibition will continue to be in force as separate work continues through ICAO on a new lithium battery packaging performance standard, currently expected by 2018,” said Olumuyiwa Benard Aliu, the ICAO council’s president.

Lithium-ion batteries are used in a vast array of products from cellphones and laptops to some electric cars. About 5.4 billion lithium-ion cells were manufactured worldwide in 2014. A battery is made up of two or more cells. A majority of batteries are transported on cargo ships, but about 30 percent are shipped by air.

The ban doesn’t apply to batteries packaged inside equipment like a laptop with a battery inside, for example.

PRBA – The Rechargeable Battery Association, which opposed the ban, said in a statement that the industry is preparing to comply with the ban, but there may be “significant disruption in the logistics supply chain,” especially for batteries used in medical devices.

Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan received today Shamshad Akhtar, UN Under-Secretary-General, Executive Secretary of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific.

The interlocutors discussed issues related to the cooperation between Armenia and the Commission. President Sargsyan stressed the importance of the Commission’s activity and reiterated Armenia’s willingness to develop the cooperation.

Noting that the Asian and Asia-Pacific regions are facing a serious challenge hampering the economic development, Serzh Sargsyan attached importance to the effort towards forming a common agenda, working out a comprehensive program to resist the challenges.

President Sargsyan assured that “Armenia is willing to make its modest participation in the process.” Mrs. Akhtar said she’s grateful for Armenia’s readiness to cooperate.

She briefed on the Commission’s future programs towards ensuring steady development in the region and the measures to be taken towards that end. She attached importance to the economic vision and political commitments of the countries of the region.

The parties also stressed the importance of regional integration and development of cooperation.

Amid calls for a boycott of the Academy Awards over its all-white acting nominees and Spike Lee and Jada Pinkett Smith both announcing they would sit out this year’s ceremony, the academy’s president said it was time for major changes and soon, the Associated Press reports.

Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences President Cheryl Boone Isaacs issued a statement promising more diversity, and quickly, after both Lee and Pinkett spoke out on Monday.

In a lengthy Instagram post, Lee said he “cannot support” the “lily white” Oscars. Noting that he was writing on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Lee who in November was given an honorary Oscar at the Governors Awards said he was fed up: “Forty white actors in two years and no flava at all,” he wrote. “We can’t act?!”

In a video message on Facebook, Pinkett Smith also said she wouldn’t attend or watch the Oscars in February. Pinkett Smith, whose husband Will Smith wasn’t nominated for his performance in the NFL head trauma drama “Concussion,” said it was time for people of color to disregard the Academy Awards.

“Begging for acknowledgement, or even asking, diminishes dignity and diminishes power,” she said. “And we are a dignified people and we are powerful.”

She added: “Let’s let the academy do them, with all grace and love. And let’s do us differently.” The video had amassed 4.5 million by mid-Monday afternoon.

Last year’s all-white acting nominees also drew calls for a boycott, though not from such prominent individuals as Lee and Pinkett Smith. Whether it had any impact or not, the audience for the broadcast, hosted by Neil Patrick Harris, was down 16 percent from the year prior, a six-year low.

A total of 3,030 people have signed a petition that has been delivered to the Şişli Municipality in Istanbul on Monday morning demanding that it change street names with Turkish nationalist connotations in the district’s Kurtuluş neighborhood, reports.

The delegation from the HDP that delivered the petition met with Hacı Kuru, the director for culture and society in Şişli Municipality, which is governed by the Republican People’s Party (CHP).

The 159-page petition calls for the changing of name of Ergenekon Avenue to Hrant Dink Avenue, after the Turkish-Armenian journalist who was murdered on the adjacent Halâskârgazi Street, the location of the former headquarters of the Armenian-Turkish language weekly newspaper Agos.

Tuesday’s meeting was held one day before the ninth anniversary of the assassination of Dink, which has been commemorated every year since with a march and demonstration in the district, with hundreds holding black signs that read, “We are all Hrant, we are all Armenian!”

Twelve academics in Turkey have been arrested for denouncing military operations against Kurdish rebels in the south-east, while more than 130 academics face criminal charges just days after President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan slammed the signatories for making “terrorist propaganda,” the Hurrieyt Daily News reports.

Universities and prosecutor’s offices across the country started to launch probes against some of the 1,128 local and international academics and intellectuals that fall within the state’s jurisdiction, arguing the contents of the petition were beyond the limits of academic freedoms.

In a dawn operation in the northwestern province of Kocaeli on Jan. 15, police raided the houses of 19 academics and detained 14 who were at their declared addresses.

Two more will be detained once they arrive in the city while five others are being sought by police, Provincial Police Head Levent Yarımel told the press.

Barcelona and Argentina forward Lionel Messi has won the Ballon d’Or award for the world’s best player for the fifth time, the BBC reports.

The 28-year-old beat club-mate Neymar of Brazil and Real Madrid’s Portugal forward Cristiano Ronaldo.

Either Messi or Ronaldo, who became a three-time winner last year, have won the past eight awards.

United States midfielder Carli Lloyd, who scored a hat-trick in the World Cup final, won the women’s award.

England coach Mark Sampson was beaten to the women’s football coach of the year award by United States boss Jill Ellis.

Barcelona coach Luis Enrique won the world coach of the year award after leading his side to five of the six trophies on offer in 2015, including the Champions League, La Liga and the Copa del Rey.

He beat Bayern Munich boss Pep Guardiola, who was second, and Chile’s Copa America-winning coach Jorge Sampaoli to the award.

Atletico Goianiense’s Wendell Lira won the goal of the year award for a spectacular overhead kick in Brazil’s Goiano state league game against Goianesia.

Barcelona star Lionel Messi’s run from halfway and finish in the Copa del Rey final against Athletic Bilbao finished second, with Roma full-back Alessandro Florenzi’s 55-yard goal against Barca third.

Former Leeds and South Africa captain Lucas Radebe announced the winner of this year’s fair play award – all football clubs and organisations supporting refugees.

There was no shortlist for this award.

A suicide attack at a government office in northwest Pakistan has killed at least 12 people, officials say, the BBC reports.

A bomber on a motorbike reportedly drove into the gate of the National Database and Registration Authority in Mardan.

“The death toll stands at 12 now, many others are injured,” district police chief Faisal Shahzad said.

The attack is one of worst since a security crackdown following the Peshawar school massacre a year ago.