Author: Babajanian Karo

IRAN SAYS IT PRODUCED MEDIUM-RANGE MISSILE SYSTEM

Tert.am
11:44 ~U 01.10.11

The Islamic Republic of Iran has delivered a domestically manufactured
medium-range missile system named Mersad (Ambush) to the country’s
air defense units, the Tehran Times reported.

“This missile system is completely domestic [production] and has been
designed and built by the competent experts of [the Islamic Revolution
Guards Corps (IRGC)’s] Khatam al-Anbiya Air Defense Base and the
country’s defense industry,” Brigadier General Alireza Sabahifard,
the deputy commander of the military base, said on Thursday.

The official added that the construction of the missile system by
Iranian experts “proved once again that the country’s enemies have
been left disappointed in their desperate attempts to impose sanctions
on Iran.”

According to the Iranian commander, the apparatus is capable of
identifying and destroying targets at low altitudes.

“The command and control center of this system is completely digital,
sophisticated, and equipped with a simulator” and can receive signals,
while functioning as part of a unified network of air defense to
identify and track targets, Sabahifard further explained.

In recent years, Iran has made great achievements in its defense
sector and attained self-sufficiency in producing essential military
equipment and systems.

The Islamic Republic has, however, repeatedly said that its military
prowess poses no threat to other countries and that its defense
doctrine is based on deterrence.

ZHOGHOVURD: NATIONAL SECURITY OFFICIAL GANG MEMBER?

Tert.am
10:45 ~U 01.10.11

The paper says it has learned from sources that a district court in
Yerevan is conducting a close-door hearing against Armen Ter-Minsasyan,
a deputy head of the Counter-intelligence Department at the National
Security Service (NSS).

Ter-Minasyan is reportedly accused of selling the eavesdropped
conversation of high-ranking officials to different people. He is said
to be a members of the gang recently found and rendered harmless in
the capital city. Citing its sources, the paper says six employees of
the National Security Service were invited to the close-door hearing.

To confirm the report it says it contacted the NSS spokesperson but
the latter reportedly declined to give any comment, asking the paper
to turn to the court or the Special Investigation Service.

LE DEFILE DE L’ARMEE ARMENIENNE A INTERESSE LES MEDIAS DIX FOIS PLUS QUE CELUI DE L’AZERBAIDJAN
Krikor [email protected]

armenews.com
samedi 1er octobre 2011

ARMEE ARMENIENNE

Le defile militaire armenien a l’occasion du 20ème anniversaire de
l’Independance de l’Armenie aurait attire l’attention de très nombreux
sites internet de la planète. Selon l’agence de presse armenienne
Armenpress, la parade militaire de l’armee armenienne aurait ete
traite et commente sur 830 sites etrangers de la planète, alors que
le defile militaire de Bakou n’aurait interesse que 80 sites. Ainsi
le defile de l’armee armenienne aurait donne lieu a dix fois plus
d’articles et reportages sur internet que celui des azeris. Armenpress
se base sur les declarations d’Aharon Adibekian, le directeur du
Centre d’information et d’analyse Sociometre. La majeure partie des
articles parus sur le web auraient ete diffuses en anglais. A.

Adibekian affirme par ailleurs que tous les medias et experts se
sont convenus que l’equilibre des forces armees entre l’Armenie
et l’Azerbaïdjan etait preserve…cela, malgre les declarations
guerrières et surenchères de Bakou. Pourtant depuis près de 10 ans,
l’Azerbaïdjan depense trois a quatre fois plus que l’Armenie en matière
d’armement… ” Cependant, si Bakou desire faire face aux Armeniens
au Haut Karabagh dans un relief montagneux, il doit multiplier
ses forces non pas par un ou deux, mais par huit ! ” dit l’expert
militaire Ardzroun Hovhannissian et d’ajouter que si aujourd’hui les
forces armeniennes et azeries sont equivalentes, l’Armenie et le Haut
Karabagh sont huit fois plus forts que l’Azerbaïdjan.

Krikor Amirzayan

SAINT’S DAY

The Times (London), UK
September 29, 2011 Thursday

Not much is known of the history of St Hripsime, 4th century, who
was martyred with a group of her fellow consecrated virgins in Armenia.

According to legend, she was chosen by Emperor Diocletian as a
bride after he saw a portrait of her. She fled with her companions
to the capital Vagharshapat, where she was brought before the king,
Tiridates. When Hripsime refused his advances, she was roasted alive
and her companions were massacred. They are honoured as the first
martyrs of Armenia.

FAMED ARMENIA LAKE UNDER THREAT: ACTIVISTS

Agence France Presse
September 29, 2011 Thursday 3:38 PM GMT

Environmentalists in Armenia warned on Thursday that the country’s
largest lake was in peril despite government efforts to save the
Caucasus republic’s most important water source.

An alliance of around 50 environmental groups issued a statement
raising concern over the ailing situation at Lake Sevan, which is
important to landlocked Armenia as a source of water for hydro-electric
power.

“The fake activities of official agencies and the improper spending
of budgetary funds, loans and grants are threatening the existence
of Lake Sevan,” the statement said.

The lake is also used for irrigation and fishing, but its level fell
drastically by more than 20 metres (65 feet) from the Soviet era to
the 1990s due to over-exploitation.

Water volume fell by 44 percent and the problem was compounded by
pollution from sewage and industrial waste, turning some parts of
the lake into swamp and causing species of fish and birds to disappear.

The authorities began a programme to restore water levels 10 years
ago and in 2008 imposed limits on irrigation usage and banned the
use of the lake’s water for hydropower production.

“Thanks to these provisions the lake’s water level began to heighten
by 25 to 35 centimetres per year and rose by three metres over the
past 10 years,” Armenian environment protection ministry official
Ashot Avalian told AFP.

But environmentalists warned that serious ecological problems remained
and that water quality was still being affected.

“The water of Lake Sevan is more important than any oil or gas. People
can live without those resources, but not without water,” the head
of Armenia’s Union of Greens Hakob Sanasarian told AFP.

ARMENIA TO HOST DAYS OF EUROPEAN HERITAGE

Mediamax, Armenia
Sept 30 2011

Yerevan/Mediamax/. Armenia will host the sixth Days of European
Heritage on October 1-6.

Deputy Minister of Culture of Armenia Arev Samuelyan said today that
the Days will be held under “Written Heritage” slogan this year,
Mediamax reports.

The choice of the theme was conditioned by 2 events due in 2012:
500th anniversary of Armenian printing and declaring Yerevan “World
Book Capital” by UNESCO.

“The monuments and locations where the Armenian scripts have been
formed over centuries will participate in the events. We tried to
present the whole Armenian script-starting from cuneiform up to SMS”,
said the Deputy Minister.

Head of the EU delegation in Armenia, Ambassador Raul de Luzenberger,
said that Days of European Heritage will include about 30 thousand
cultural centers in 50 participant-countries and the number of visitors
on these Days reaches up to 20mln people.

THE MAESTRO AND THE MUTINY – GORENSTEIN THREATENS LEGAL ACTION

Moscow News, Russia
September 29, 2011 Thursday

High-flying conductor under question Mark Gorenstein is threatening
to go to the law after his orchestra forced him out.

Alexander Avdeyev, culture minister, sacked him on Thursday evening,
almost a month after the fed-up musicians of the Svetlanov orchestra
wrote an open letter calling for his head . Gorestein claims the
letter was provoked by the Culture Ministry.

The instrumentalists wrote their formal complaint after what they
said are falling standards and a hostile atmosphere. They are
calling for Russian stars turned international Valery Gergiyev or
Alexander Lazerev. Orchestra members call Gorenstein’s ousting their
‘Victory Day.’

To the courts

‘Yes, it’s true, they fired me… I spoke to Avdeyev for an hour. I
recorded the whole conversation and tomorrow I will give a press
conference, well I will take it to court, of course,’ Gorenstein told
RIA Novosti soon after his dismissal on Thursday evening.

It comes after a build up of ill-will. ‘I feel I am forced to give
an answer to this provocative company of people,’ he told Ekho Moskvy
on air in August.

And he said that higher forces were at work to give him the boot,
‘It is to the advantage of the ministry, and the musicians, they are
an instrument to this goal,’ he told the radio station.

Like May 9

Be that as it may, the bulk of the orchestra is playing a jollier
tune over Gorenstein’s departure, ‘We are so sick of Gorenstein’s
arbitrary behavior that today is like May 9, 1945 for us,’ violinist
Sergei Girshenko told Interfax as Gorenstein was lamenting his fate
to RIA Novosti.

‘We hope that at last we will be able to play real music and not this
amateurish solfeggio, and that we will finally cease to be humiliated
every second,’ Girshenko said.

Controversial past

Gorenstein has been courting controversy for some time. He has fired
280 musicians since he arrived to take the helm of the orchestra,
foreign tours have now become rarer and many famous soloists no longer
want to play with them.

Fifty of those who fell foul of the maestro faced the sack in May,
after they expressed health concerns about going on one of the few
tours to Japan following the Fukushima nuclear fallout.

In July a video appeared of him on the web, showing him making
xenophobic comments during a Tchaikovsky Competition rehearsal about
Armenian cellist Narek Akhnazaryan. He subsequently withdrew from
the competition’s program, citing health reasons.

ARMENIAN DIRECTOR’S FILM AT BUSAN INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL

news.am, Armenia
Sept 30 2011

A film by Armenian director Mikayel Vatinyan supported by Golden
Apricot Fund for Cinema Development, will have a World Premiere at
Busan International Film Festival.

“Joan and the Voices”, a participant of Golden Apricot’s Directors
Across Borders (DAB) 2007, is selected to have a World Premiere at
Busan International Film Festival, in Flash Forward world cinema
competition.

It’s a film debut by director Mikayel Vatinyan, produced by his
co-writer and lead actress of the film, Armine Anda.

In October 2007 after the participation in DAB, “Joan and the Voices”,
was selected by Asian Project Market (former PPP) to be the 1st
Armenian project to be presented in APM. The project received the
GIFFF&PPP AWARD there.

The key team includes DoP Tammam Hamza (Syria), the production designer
Ivana Krcadinac (Serbia), composer Arthur Manukyan, who also was the
author of the music in the director’s previous short animated film
“Bojo”.

ARAM IER A ERDOGAN : LE PEUPLE ARMENIEN ATTEND TOUJOURS !

L’Orient-Le Jour , Liban
30 Sept 2011

Le catholicos juge insuffisante la restitution par la Turquie des
biens d’Eglise confisques après 1936 et reclame le retour de toutes
les proprietes perdues lors du genocide de 1915.

Le catholicos Aram Ier a adresse au Premier ministre turc, Recep Tayyip
Erdogan, une lettre ouverte dans lequel il a souligne l’insuffisance
d’une mesure recente de son gouvernement prevoyant la restitution
aux minorites religieuses en Turquie de toutes leurs proprietes
confisquees depuis 1936.

Pour le chef de l’Eglise armenienne-orthodoxe, dont le siège se
trouvait jadis dans la province turque de Cilicie, justice sera
rendue au peuple armenien uniquement quand la Turquie reconnaîtra le
genocide de 1915 et restituera tous les biens particuliers confisques
a l’epoque.

Voici, dans une traduction libre, la lettre du catholicos :

” Nous avons appris a travers la presse la decision de votre
gouvernement de restituer aux minorites religieuses les proprietes
qui leur furent confisquees depuis 1936. Cette decision repond,
certainement, aux injonctions recentes du Tribunal europeen pour les
droits de l’homme, d’une part, et aux debats qui se sont produits
au Congrès americain au sujet des pressions turques exercees sur les
minorites chretiennes.

” En ma qualite de chef spirituel et legal du catholicossat des
armeniens-orthodoxes de la Maison de Cilicie, deracinee de son siège
historique et installee au Liban, et en ma qualite de representant
des fils de l’Eglise armenienne expulses de Turquie et dissemines
de par le monde, je considère que votre decision du 27 août 2011 est
partielle et injuste.

Une action planifiee

” Le catholicossat des armeniens-orthodoxes de la Maison de Cilicie
conserve toujours les titres de propriete de nombreux edifices
: eglises, hôpitaux, asiles, orphelinats, cimetières et autres
proprietes appartenant a l’Eglise qui furent confisquees par les
autorites turques lors du genocide armenien de 1915.

” Il en va de meme pour les fils du peuple armenien, qui conservent
toujours les titres de propriete de leurs maisons, commerces,
institutions et autres biens-fonds herites des aïeux, perdus après
le genocide planifie et execute par le gouvernement turc ottoman.

” La decision prise par votre gouvernement peut etre consideree comme
repondant aux critères de l’Union europeenne, mais elle ne peut etre
consideree comme une mesure equitable et juridiquement pertinente.

” Monsieur le Premier ministre, les pas que vous prenez en direction
de la justice, quand ils sont incomplets, sont en realite un deni de
l’histoire et des principes et valeurs democratiques. Certes, les
institutions internationales, a l’instar du Tribunal europeen pour
les droits de l’homme et le Parlement europeen et ses commissions,
sont chargees de defendre ces principes et valeurs democratiques et
a veiller a leur respect, mais la conscience et la memoire de ces
valeurs et principes, c’est le peuple.

” Le haut-commissaire pour les Refugies Fridtjof Nansen, Prix Nobel
de la paix 1922, a ecrit dans son celèbre ouvrage L’Armenie et le
Proche-Orient que “le peuple armenien n’a jamais perdu l’espoir, il
a poursuivi son action et a attendu avec courage ; il attend toujours”.

” Je souhaite ajouter que le peuple armenien n’a cesse de reclamer
de la Turquie qu’elle fasse justice, en ce qui concerne le genocide
armenien, et n’a jamais cesse de chercher a rentrer dans ses droits
humanitaires.

” Monsieur le Premier ministre, l’attachement aux droits de l’homme
et a la justice que vous affichez ne gagnera en credibilite qu’une
fois reconnu le genocide armenien. ”

!.html

AZERBAIJAN CALLS NAGORNO-KARABAKH ELECTIONS ILLEGAL

Today’s Zaman, Turkey
Sept 30 2011

Azerbaijan has denounced the local elections held on Sept. 18 in
Azerbaijan’s breakaway region of Nagorno-Karabakh, calling them
illegal.

Underlining that Armenia’s decision to hold elections on Azerbaijan’s
territory lacks any validity and undermines the negotiations, under
the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE)
Minsk Group, the statement noted that the so-called elections have
no legal effect because they contradict the norms and principles
of international law. Since Armenia has implemented a policy to
homogenize the population through ethnic cleansing and forcing
Azerbaijanis living in the region to migrate, the elections only
represent the illegal structure established by Armenia.

“The so-called ‘elections’ were organized with the aim of concealing
Armenia’s policy of occupation and bolstering the results of the
occupation of Azerbaijan’s internationally recognized territories,”
the statement said.

Commenting on the election in Nagorno-Karabakh, Hasan Kanbolat,
chairman of the Middle East Strategic Research Center (ORSAM), noted
that the elections for the local self-governing bodies that took place
in the occupied Nagorno-Karabakh region of the Republic of Azerbaijan
are illegal.

â~@~These elections will undermine efforts to find a peaceful solution
for the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia,â~@~]
he told Today’s Zaman. Kanbolat argued that Russia and other OSCE
Minsk Group co-chairs, the US and France, do not exert enough of an
effort to put an end to the Armenian occupation of the Azerbaijani
territories and try to legitimize the occupation via endless meetings.

â~@~One-fifth of Azerbaijan’s total territory is under Armenian
occupation. In order to prove its sincerity, Armenia should end the
occupation. Although the two countries signed a cease-fire agreement
in 1994, Armenia continuously violates it and attacks Azerbaijan’s
territory,â~@~] he added.

Speaking to Today’s Zaman, Mehmet Seyfettin Erol, a professor of
international relations at Gazi University in Ankara, noted that
the election has no practical meaning. However, if Azerbaijan moves
slowly to respond to these kinds of developments, these elections will
strengthen the hand of Armenia and Armenians living in Nagorno-Karabakh
in future developments. â~@~For almost two decades almost 20 percent
of Azerbaijan’s territory has been under Armenian occupation and
more than 1 million people have been displaced. When we take into
consideration this number of refugees, the legitimacy of the elections
automatically becomes controversial,â~@~] he said.

Underlining that Nagorno-Karabakh has been Turkic throughout history,
Erol stated that the main cause of this conflict was the USSR’s border
regulations. The USSR intentionally created political instability
in the region to increase its domination over the parties and Russia
also maintains USSR policies for the same purpose as well.

â~@~In this issue Russia is the primary factor in solving the
conflict.

However, instead of settling the issue, Russia wants to use the
Nagorno-Karabakh issue as a trump card in their relations with
Azerbaijan and Armenia. Now is the time for Azerbaijan, which reacted
harshly to the normalization of Turkish-Armenian relations in 2008,
to reconsider Russia’s approach toward Armenia,â~@~] he added.

Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs Spokesman Alexander Lukashevich
also announced that Russia does not recognize the local government
elections held in Nagorno-Karabakh on Sept. 18.

Lukashevich reaffirmed their support for the principles of
territorial integrity and the non-use of force, as well as the other
basic principles and norms of international law. Reiterating that
Russia does not recognize Nagorno-Karabakh as an independent state,
Lukashevich stated that the elections cannot influence the peace
process for Nagorno-Karabakh.

Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) Secretary-General Ekmeleddin
Ä°hsanoÄ~_lu has issued a press release on the issue. While reiterating
that the OIC fully recognizes the sovereignty and territorial integrity
of the Republic of Azerbaijan, the secretary-general stated that the
recent elections in Nagorno-Karabakh gravely violate relevant norms
and principles of international law and therefore have no legal effect.

Ä°hsanoÄ~_lu has also emphasized that the OIC continues to support
Azerbaijan’s efforts to solve the territory dispute on the basis of
relevant international resolutions.

Since the 1988-1994 war, Nagorno-Karabakh has been under Armenian
control. Peace negotiations under the OSCE Minsk Group have been
ongoing for almost two decades.

The two sides are currently negotiating a set of basic principles that
return the territories surrounding Nagorno-Karabakh to Azerbaijani
control; give an interim status to Nagorno-Karabakh, providing
guarantees for security and self-governance; create a corridor linking
Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh; allow for the future determination of
the final legal status of Nagorno-Karabakh with a legally binding
public expression of will through a referendum; give all internally
displaced persons and refugees the right to return to their former
places of residence; and establish international security guarantees
that would include a peacekeeping operation. While Azerbaijan states
that it has accepted the latest version of the basic principles,
Armenia is still hesitating.