Author: Arsine Chaltikian

President Serzh Sargsyan attended today the opening of the RA Investigative Committee’s new building in Yerevan’s Arabkir Administrative District.

Armenia’s president toured the building, visited offices of different committee subdivisions, talked to some of the employees, familiarized himself with the working conditions provided for the Investigative Committee, including modern IT-based programs, e.g. digitalization of criminal cases, the electronic system of preliminary investigation, aimed at raising investigative officers’ work effectiveness.

Ambassador James Warlick, the lead U.S. negotiator in the Nagorno Karabakh peace process, has voiced the Obama Administration’s support for common-sense measures, advanced by House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce (R-CA) and Ranking Member Eliot Engel (D-NY) and a growing number of their Congressional colleagues, to stop increased cease-fire violations along the Karabakh line of contact.

In a statement issued to H1 Television’s Haykaram Nahapetyan, Ambassador Warlick explained, “We fully support the initiatives proposed by Congressman Royce and Congressman Engel. Confidence building measures and people-to-people programs reduce tensions and lay the basis for a lasting peace. We have raised each of these initiatives with the parties and will continue to pursue all steps that can lead to a negotiated settlement,” concluded Warlick.

“We are pleased to see the Obama Administration joining with key Congressional leaders from both parties in supporting common-sense peacekeeping proposals for Nagorno Karabakh,” said ANCA Executive Director Aram Hamparian. “These U.S.-backed life-saving initiatives have long been endorsed by both Artsakh and Armenia, but – at the cost of lives on both sides – rejected by the increasingly aggressive and isolated Azerbaijani regime of Ilham Aliyev.”

Chairman Royce and Ranking Member Engel are currently collecting Congressional signatures on a letter addressed to Ambassador Warlick – the U.S. representative to the OSCE’s Minsk Group tasked with reaching a resolution of Nagorno Karabakh-related security and status issues – specifically calling for the U.S. and OSCE to abandon their failed policy of false parity in responding to acts of aggression, noting that: “The longstanding U.S. and OSCE practice of responding to each new attack with generic calls upon all parties to refrain from violence has failed to de-escalate the situation. Instead, this policy of artificial evenhandedness has dangerously increased tensions. There will be no peace absent responsibility.”

The letter outlines three concrete pro-peace steps that would, “in the short-term, save lives and help to avert war. Over the longer term,” the letter notes, “these steps could contribute to a comprehensive and enduring peace for all the citizens of the region:”

— An agreement from all sides not to deploy snipers along the line of contact.

— The placement of OSCE-monitored, advanced gunfire-locator systems and sound-ranging equipment to determine the source of attacks along the line of contact.

— The deployment of additional OSCE observers along the line of contact to better monitor cease-fire violations.

Armenia and Nagorno Karabakh have both expressed support for these life-saving initiatives; Azerbaijan has not.

ANCA Chairman Ken Hachikian, Executive Director Aram Hamparian, Government Affairs Director Kate Nahapetian and the ANCA Eastern Region’s Armen Sahakyan met with Ambassador Warlick last week, in the immediate aftermath of the latest fatal Azerbaijani attacks against Armenia and Artsakh, expressing concern about the OSCE negotiators’ reluctance to clearly and unequivocally condemn Azerbaijan’s fatal ceasefire violations.

 

 

 

The recent escalation at the Armenian-Azerbaijani border has revealed new problems on the Armenian media field, information security expert Samvel Martirosyan told a press conference today. This reminds him of a situation leading to the 2013 elections, when a huge number of websites with no owner and no journalists started disseminating misinformation and black PR, but disappeared after the elections.

According to the expert, the main objective is to attract visitors to the website to boost traffic.

“They started by posting ‘innocent’ materials, but started disseminating absurd information, when tensions increased. Those are mostly articles and videos raising panic,” Samvel Martirosyan said.

“Perhaps, the situation forces to implement censorship, which is a negative phenomenon and will work for the benefit of the society for two weeks only. Moreover, officials may use it to bloc anti-corruption materials,” he added.

The expert suggests applying ‘self-regulatory techniques’ to solve the problem. He also recommends to ignore websites, where every second article starts with the word “Urgent.”

Martirosyan warned that Azerbaijanis are creating fake Armenian websites to spread false information.

“More and more Azerbaijanis are ‘migrating’ to Armenian websites, aware that they will not find the truth in their media outlets,” the expert noted.

He concluded that any information published by media leaves a great psychological impact on the society. Therefore, before posting any news, it’s necessary to check the sources.

Liverpool hope to appoint Jurgen Klopp to replace  by the end of the week, the reports.

The former Borussia Dortmund coach is favourite to take over from the Northern Irishman, with ex-Chelsea boss Carlo Ancelotti also a contender.

German Klopp, 48, is understood to be open to the idea of a move.

Talks with his representatives are progressing well and the club want a new manager in place to prepare for a visit to Tottenham on 17 October.

In a statement issued by the League Managers’ Association on his behalf, Rodgers, 42, said he was “incredibly disappointed” his three-and-a-half-year tenure at Anfield was over.

Rodgers, who said he is in no rush to take another job, added the Reds squad was in transition but was showing a “strong sense of togetherness”.

More than 100 people were killed in South Sudan when an oil truck exploded as a crowd tried to gather fuel from the vehicle after it had veered off the road, a regional official said on Thursday, a day after the incident, Reuters reports.

In addition to those killed in Wednesday’s blast, Charles Kisagna, the minister of information in Western Equatoria, said about 50 people were seriously injured.

“We don’t have medical equipment and these people may not survive because we do not have the facilities to treat the highly burnt people,” he told Reuters, adding the truck had been travelling from the capital Juba to the Western Equatoria area.

Such incidents have happened before in the east African region where fuel tankers often have to travel long distances along potholed roads and pass through poor communities.

Five Turkish police officers were killed in two separate bomb attacks staged by the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in the southeastern provinces of Mardin and Hakkari late on Tuesday, Today’s Zaman reports. 

A bomb, planted by persons suspected to be militants linked to the PKK, was detonated when an armored police vehicle was passing by in the Demiryolu-Üçyol neighborhood. Three police officers were killed instantly, while another one was injured in the explosion. The wounded police officer was taken to Nusaybin State Hospital for treatment.

Dozens of police vehicles were dispatched to the area following the incident and the security services have launched a large-scale operation in the district to find the perpetrators.

In the second bomb attack, two police officers were killed and two others were injured after the terrorist PKK detonated explosives that it had planted on the Hakkari-Van Highway, which hit a police vehicle that was passing. The attack occurred in the southeastern province of Hakkari on Tuesday evening.

 

Earlier on Tuesday security sources said 12 Turkish soldiers were wounded when their convoy was hit by a roadside bomb explosion in the province of Mus.

By Harut Sassounian
The California Courier

An unknown assailant threw a Molotov cocktail at the Armenian Consulate in Glendale, California, on August 10, an informed source who wished to remain anonymous told The California Courier.

Surveillance video cameras at the Consulate recorded a car stopping next to the Consulate building around 3 am. A passenger got out of the car and threw a bottle filled with flammable liquid after lighting it. The tossed object left burn marks on a small section of the outside wall of the building and scorched the branches of a nearby tree.

Glendale Police arrived at the Consulate moments after the assailants had fled the scene of the crime.

Both the Glendale Police Department and the U.S. State Department’s Security Office are vigorously investigating the attempted arson.

This is the first time that an Armenian diplomatic building has come under attack in the United States, and probably anywhere else in the world.

A Spokeswoman for the Glendale Police Department told The California Courier that she cannot make any comments as the incident is under ongoing investigation.

Armenian Sargis Parsikian, born in 1954, was killed as Damascus came under heavy rocket attack on Thursday, September 3, Lebanon-based Aztag daily reports.

The funeral will take place today at the Armenian St. Sarkis Church in Damascus.

The attacks on the city over the past few days have left tens dead and wounded.

Kate Winslet is set to play Polish-Armenian Joanna Hoffman — one of Apple’s earliest employees who was known for standing up to Steve Jobs — in the new movie about the legendary Apple cofounder’s life.

The movie, which includes a star-studded cast that features Michael Fassbender as Steve Jobs and Seth Rogen as Steve Wozniak, is set to debut on Oct. 9, according to Business Insider. 

In a recent interview with , Winslet explained how she landed the role. The actress was interested in the role as soon as she heard about the film from her hair-and-makeup artist, who was set to work on the movie after she had finished working with Winslet on “The Dressmaker.” The fact that the film was written by Andrew Sorkin was enough to draw Winslet in, but she was also intrigued by the movie’s three-act format.

Winslet decided to move on the opportunity right away, but there was one hurdle: she looks nothing like Hoffman, the Polish-Armenian immigrant that served as the only marketing person on the original Mac team for more than a year.

So, to audition for the role, she sent her husband out to purchase dark brown wigs in varying lengths. She took photos of herself in the wigs and sent them over to Scott Rudin, the film’s producer.

“I  wanted to please her [Joanna Hoffman] as much as I could. How she sounds, and her accent, is fairly complicated. She grew up largely in Armenia, spent some time in Poland, and has Russians in her family, so she has all three accents, but she’s been in America since she was a teenager, so she had American rhythms,” Winslet said.