Author: Babajanian Karo

ZHAMANAK: KOTAYK AND ARMAVIR GOVERNORS TO RESIGN

10:30 15/01/2014 ” DAILY PRESS

Although sources in the Republican Party of Armenia (RPA) claim that
change of governors is not on the agenda of the party’s upcoming
meeting, rumors circulate that governors of Kotayk and Armavir
provinces, Kovalenko Shahgaldyan and Ashot Ghahramanyan, will soon
resign, Zhamanak writes.

According to Hraparak, Armavir residents say that Etchmiadzin Mayor
Karen Grigoryan may be appointed governor of the province. Armavir
Mayor Ruben Khlghatyan and MP Nahapet Gevorgyan are also mentioned
as likely candidates.

Source: Panorama.am

ARMENIA NEEDS CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT – OPPOSITION PARTY LEADER

January 15, 2014 | 14:40

YEREVAN. – A constitutional amendment should be made in Armenia and
the presidents should be restricted from being elected for more than
two times.

Opposition Christian-People’s Rebirth Party Chairman Sos Gimishyan
noted the aforesaid at a press conference on Wednesday.

Gimishyan noted that Armenia has again appeared at the cycle of the
three presidents.

“Armenia will raise its head, [and] breathe if the three presidents
leave politics. [But] I do not see a figure who will be able to bring
the country out of the created a situation.

“All three of them enjoyed the confidence of the people. I, too, was
a part of those authorities and the opposition. But, unfortunately,
none of them made use of that confidence for the benefit of the people
and the state,” the opposition party leader stated.

Sos Gimishyan added that the return of the former presidents is
unlikely.

News from Armenia – NEWS.am

MORTGAGE LOAN INTEREST RATES VERY HIGH IN ARMENIA – OPPOSITION MP AGREES WITH KOCHARYAN

11:40 ~U 15.01.14

In an interview with Tert.am, Artsvik Minasyan, an opposition MP
from the Armenian Revolutionary Federation Dashnaksutyun, expressed
his agreement with second President Robert Kocharyan’s remarks on
Armenia’s mortgage market (which he had described as very risky).

Minasyan, an economist by profession, said the market in Armenia
offers very high interest rates not affordable to the population.

He first of all stressed the importance of giving a clear definitition
to the concept. Minasyan said he finds the real mortgage interest rate
to be actually higher from the figure indicated on the Central Bank’s
website (53 billion, instead of the 43 billion). According to him,
the subsequent increase to 141 billion does not suggest at all that
Armenia has an affordable system or a developed market of mortgage
loans. Minasyan believes the real increase should have been twice or
three times higher. He said a comparison with other countries clearly
demonstrates the unaffordability of the mortgage loan interest rates
on Armenia’s market.

“The nominal 12 percent increase cannot be considered an interest rate
for a mortgage loan because it does not cover such terms as insurance
policies, property assessment payments and the broker fees which an
individual taking a mortgage loan is obliged to pay. In other words,
anyone applying for a mortgage loan takes it at an interest rate
higher from the established 12 percent limit, as a matter of fact. And
the violation here occurred in the frameworks of the apartment fund
assistance project implemented by the Government. But our judgments
should be based on the amount of the interest ratewhich remains
within the boundaries of 17-18 percent. Such an interest rate will
badly affect the mortgage loan system,” he explained.

LA PISTE D’UN TUEUR D’ETAT SE RENFORCE DANS L’ASSASSINAT DES TROIS MILITANTES KURDES A PARIS

LU DANS LE MONDE

Un an après le triple assassinat de la gare du Nord a Paris, le 9
janvier 2013, dans lequel Sakine Cansiz, Fidan Dogan et Leyla Saylemez,
trois militantes kurdes du PKK (Parti des travailleurs du Kurdistan),
ont ete froidement executees, de nouvelles revelations pourraient
totalement relancer une enquete qui semblait pietiner.

L’enregistrement sonore d’une conversation qui etablirait le lien
entre ces crimes et les services turcs de renseignement (le MIT)
a ainsi ete diffuse sur YouTube avant d’etre repris par plusieurs
sites turcs et kurdes, comme celui du journal Radikal (gauche). La
discussion, anterieure a l’assassinat, se deroule entre un homme,
qui serait Omer Guney, le tueur presume actuellement en detention,
et deux responsables des services turcs. Y sont evoquees les cibles
potentielles du tueur, plusieurs hauts dirigeants europeens de la
guerilla kurde, ainsi que la manière de les approcher et differents
details sur la mission de Guney.

La suite sur le lien plus bas

mercredi 15 janvier 2014, Ara ©armenews.com

FAMILY VISITS SHANT HARUTYUNYAN, WHO URGES PUBLIC TO TAKE TO THE STREETS AND ‘SEIZE FREEDOM’

01.14.2014 23:05 epress.am

Shant Harutyunyan hasn’t lost courage; he’s just gotten a little thin
and lost a bit of color, Harutyunyan’s wife, Ruzanna Badalyan, who,
along with her son, Shahen, saw her husband for the first time since
hisarrest on Nov. 5, 2013, informed Epress.am today.

“His condition was normal. We spoke about a lot of things; some
things he was familiar with, some, he wasn’t. He hasn’t seen much of
what’s been in the press. For a few days now, he’s been listening to
Azatutyun Radio [RFE/RL’s Armenian service] with the radio we gave him,
so he learned a lot of information from us,” she said.

She believes that getting Harutyunyan out of complete isolation was
the first small victory. “Shant urged [people] to fight; to come out
on the street and seize freedom,” she said.

Recall, Harutyunyan and five others arrested with him went on hunger
strike to demand the ban on family visits be lifted. Harutyunyan
stopped his hunger strike on Jan. 10, after being taken to the Hospital
for Detainees due to his worsening health.

JAILED PKK LEADER HONORS MEMORY OF SLAIN TURKISH-ARMENIAN JOURNALIST DINK

Hurriyet Daily News, Turkey
Jan 13 2014

ANKARA

Hrant Dink, the renowned editor-in-chief of Agos, which has been the
voice of the small Armenian community in Istanbul for several years,
was murdered seven years ago.

Abdullah Ocalan, the jailed leader of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party
(PKK), has honored the memory of Hrant Dink, an Armenian-Turkish
journalist killed seven years ago in an ultranationalist plot.

“I greet the memory and the struggle of the precious child of the
Armenian people, our brother Hrant,” Ocalan said in a message which
was conveyed to the public on Jan. 11 following a visit to İmralı
Island by two deputy parliamentary group chairs of the Peace and
Democracy Party (BDP), Ä°dris Baluken and Pervin Buldan, and People’s
Democratic Party (HDP) deputy Sırrı Sureyya Onder.

“I hope to address our Armenian citizens with a comprehensive letter
and have it ready for the anniversary of the massacre of Hrant,”
Ocalan said.

Dink, the renowned editor-in-chief of Agos, which has been the voice
of the small Armenian community in Istanbul for several years, was
shot dead by Ogun Samast in front of his office in Istanbul on Jan.

19, 2007. Samast was sentenced to over 22 years in jail for the murder.

January/13/2014

MOURAD SEBOUH NERSESIAN, 93, CITY COLLEGE OF NEW YORK’S WELTER WEIGHT BOXING CHAMPION

Williamsburg Yorktown Daily
Jan 13 2014

January 13, 2014 By Amanda Thames

WYDaily.com is your source for free news and information in
Williamsburg, James City & York Counties.

Mourad Sebouh Nersesian, a resident of Williamsburg since 1999, died
Saturday, Jan. 11, 2014, at Windsor Meade of Williamsburg. He was 93.

He was born Aug. 8, 1920, in Armenia, the fourth child of a famous
Armenian freedom-fighter, Arshag Nersesian, known among Armenians as
General Sebouh (meaning knight, or noble one). After immigrating in
1922, the family eventually settled in New York City, where he met
and married Anahid Shishmanian, his wife of 65 years.

Mr. Nersesian attended City College of New York where he majored
in chemistry and participated in five college sports: track, cross
country, baseball, horseshoes and boxing. He became the school’s
welter weight boxing champion.

During WWII he served in the Pacific and fought in the Battle of
Leyte Gulf, rising to the rank of Captain. Following the war, he
returned to New York and started Safeguard Chemical Corporation,
a company that produced household cleaning products and insecticides.

Mr. Nersesian was a devoted husband and father of four children and
an active member of St. Sarkis Armenian Church.

He was preceded in death by his wife, Anne, in 2009 and his son-in-law,
Aram Paul, in 2002.

Mr. Nersesian is survived by his sister, Anahid Nersesian; children,
Bill Nersesian (Pam), of Edina, Minn., Aram Nersesian, of Lusby, Md.,
Roxanne Paul, of Vienna and Pamela Dumont (Charles), of Williamsburg;
eight grandchildren; and one great-grandchild.

A memorial service will be held at 1:30 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 2, 2014,
at Newtown United Methodist Church.

Donations may be made in lieu of flowers to the Armenia Fund U.S.A.,
Inc., 80 Maiden Lane, Suite 2205, New York, NY 10038 or to Newtown
United Methodist Church, 5209 Monticello Avenue, Williamsburg,
VA 23188.

Please leave online condolences for the family at Bucktrout of
Williamsburg Funeral Home.

TURKEY: WITH MAINSTREAM MEDIA MUZZLED, ALTERNATIVE OUTLETS PLUG GAPS

EurasiaNet.org
Jan 14 2014

January 14, 2014 – 12:55pm, by By Yigal Schleifer

After working as a respected journalist for 25 years in numerous
capacities, including a stint as a columnist at one of Turkey’s
largest newspapers, Serdar Akinan found himself in early 2013 at
a career crossroads: would he continue working in the mainstream
Turkish media or open up a pizza place?

It would be hard to blame Akinan for wanting to get out of his
profession. Over the last few years, Turkey has become an increasingly
unpleasant place for journalists, with columnists and reporters
regularly getting fired for being too critical of the government. In
Akinan’s case, he found himself out of work two years ago after being
unceremoniously fired by Aksam, a major newspaper, for writing columns
that he believes led to complaints from the office of Prime Minister
Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

After taking some time off, Akinan tried to find work in newspapers
or magazines, but found that he had essentially been blacklisted.

Seemingly unable to return to journalism, he was considering a move
into the pizza business when a friend offered to give him financial
support to launch his own news website, one that would ride on the
strength of Akinan’s reputation and his 220,000 Twitter followers.

The result was Vagus.tv, fortuitously launched only a few days
before last summer’s Gezi Park protests. Although it is struggling
financially, the site has been able to quickly build a loyal audience,
Akinan says. “I realized people needed news they can trust and they
lost their trust in the big media,” he says, speaking in a small
conference room of a shared office space in Istanbul’s waterfront
Karakoy neighborhood.

Akinan’s story is an instructive one. As the mainstream Turkish media
becomes increasingly muzzled by the government – or, more precisely,
by owners worried about angering the government and jeopardizing
other business interests they might have – and a glut of talented
sacked journalists is flooding the market, a new space is emerging
for plucky independent media ventures.

“In this media environment, it’s not about what resources you have,
but what your attitude is,” said Dogan Akin, a veteran journalist and
founder of T24, perhaps the most successful of Turkey’s new online
news ventures. “With all the money they have, the big organizations
can’t report on the news, while independent organizations might not
have a lot of money, but we can report the news.”

“We wouldn’t be able to compete with the big media players unless
the state of the media in Turkey is as it is,” added Akin, whose site
has become a refuge for a number of well-respected writers who have
recently been fired from their positions at other papers.

The state of the Turkish mainstream media certainly appears to be
dire. Along with the axing of critical reporters, there is also the
matter of Turkey being the world’s leading jailer of journalists
(most of them Kurds, imprisoned under harsh terrorism laws). The
media in Turkey has become so averse to crossing the government that
on the first night that the Gezi protests became too large to ignore,
the country’s leading networks did just that, with CNN Turk famously
showing a documentary about penguins rather than the events taking
place in the heart of Istanbul.

“Before the AKP government, it was normal for the army’s chief of
staff to arrange meetings with journalists and editors, and issue
orders on how things should be reported,” says Nadire Mater, who runs
Bianet, a long-running independent media center that supports several
projects, including news sites in Turkish and English. “Now Erdogan
is acting in a similar way to the generals. Here we refer to him as
‘editor-in-chief of the entire media.’ Power is power – armed or
unarmed. He wants a media that only adores him, without criticism.”

“The challenge is how to operate outside of this atmosphere,” she said.

For IMC TV, an upstart national television station launched in 2011,
this means being funded by a sole benefactor, a Kurdish businessman
who made his money in the shoe trade. This arrangement allows the
channel to avoid having to deal with skittish advertisers. IMC, which
could be described as the anti-penguin network, pays particularly
close attention to minority issues, with a show in Armenian and,
on staff, Turkey’s first transgender news reporter. The station also
runs what might be one of the more unique programs anywhere: a debate
show featuring a panel made up entirely of journalists who have been
dismissed from their previous jobs for being too critical.

“The hardest thing in journalism now in Turkey is to define what is
true and what is not, to get through the manipulation and report the
truth. We are trying to do this as much as we can,” said the station’s
news director, Aris Nalci.

For now, the government seems to be keeping its hands off the emerging
independent media outlets, preferring to focus instead on maintaining
discipline within the outlets loyal to it. “What they intend on doing
is controlling what they regard as the mainstream, and what they can’t
allow is for the press that supports them to have doubts or create
doubts in the minds of people. And they seem to be very successful
in doing that,” said Andrew Finkel, a long-time foreign correspondent
in Turkey who has also worked for several Turkish publications.

Still, he added, the Turkish media’s dismal performance during the
Gezi events may have satisfied the government, but it also may have
created an opening for a space in which new independent projects can
thrive. “I see the space for independent media to exist in Turkey,”
said Finkel, who is working with a group of Turkish journalists
on creating a non-profit that will provide support for independent
investigative reporting. “Every generation in Turkey has produced a
press instrument that defines that generation. It seems to me that
the next wave has to be internet-based, with an element of social
media to it.”

The challenge now, says T24’s Akin, is not just filling the vacuum
created by the failure of Turkey’s mainstream media, but filling it
with quality journalism that avoids the bad habits of the past.

“Just because the big media is bad, it doesn’t automatically make
us good. In order to be an alternative, we have to improve our
professional standards,” he said. “If we can improve our standards,
then we can institutionalize the development of an independent media
in Turkey.”

Editor’s note: Yigal Schleifer is a freelance journalist who
specializes in Turkish affairs.

SUICIDE HIGHLIGHTS PLIGHT OF DISABLED AZERI WAR VETS

Institute for War and Peace Reporting, UK
IWPR Caucasus Reporting #718
Jan 13 2014

Government accused of spending too little oil money to improve
their lives.

By Aytan Farhadova – Caucasus CRS Issue 718,

The suicide of a disabled army veteran in Azerbaijan has raised concern
about the inadequate welfare provision for ex-combatants injured in the
Nagorny Karabakh conflict two decades ago and now living in poverty.

Zaur Hasanov set himself on fire outside the headquarters of
Azerbaijan’s Trade Union Confederation on December 25. He was taken
to hospital but died three days later.

While he was still conscious, Hasanov explained his action by accusing
the confederation’s chairman, Sattar Mehbaliyev, of depriving him of
his only source of income, a cafe, back in 1995. Relatives said he
had spent the years since then seeking restitution and surviving on
a tiny pension.

Mehbaliyev denied any wrongdoing, saying it was the courts that ordered
the cafe to be torn down. He met Hasanov’s father and promised that
the Trade Union Confederation would pay the family 100,000 manats
(130,000 US dollars) as compensation for the cafe and 300 manats a
month for each of Hasanov’s five children.

The father, Hasan Hasanov, is calling for the prosecution service to
look into the circumstances of the suicide to see whether there is
evidence that someone drove his son to take his own life.

“We appealed to the president and he promised to look into it. But
there’s been nothing since then. If this continues, I’ll go to the
police,” he told the website

The cause has been taken up by the Alliance for Free Karabakh, an
umbrella group that includes veterans and disabled ex-combatants.

“The state must provide for its sons, who gave their lives and
their health for it. Zaur Hasanov had five under-age children. The
officials to blame for this tragedy must be punished,” the group said
in a statement.

The Karabakh conflict broke out in the late Soviet period and ended
with a ceasefire in 1994. Nagorny Karabakh is still controlled by an
Armenian administration, and little progress has been made towards
a political settlement.

Some 11,000 veterans in Azerbaijan were left disabled by the war and
find it hard to support themselves and their families.

Rey Karimoglu, spokesman for the Karabakh Invalids’ Organisation,
says many veterans live in terrible conditions, and appeals to the
authorities for help go unheeded.

“Although they [the authorities] have provided the basic conditions
of life for the families of invalids and martyrs [war dead], the
problems haven’t ended,” he told IWPR. “We are currently monitoring
more than 20 invalids who are close to killing themselves. We get a
lot of letters from invalids living in the provinces.”

Critics of the government say it could easily afford to help former
combatants.

“If oil revenues were used effectively, the lives of poor and disabled
people would be a lot better,” Samir Aliyev, head of the Centre for
the Support of Economic Initiatives, told IWPR. “In the context of
an expanding budget, the pensions paid to disabled people are just
laughable.”

Disabled ex-combatants are eligible for benefits ranging from 125
to 200 manats a month, depending on the extent of incapacity, plus
a state pension of 75-110 manats and the army pension of 33 manats.

The government says it has distributed new apartments to 5,000
disabled ex-combatants, and President Ilham Aliyev has promised a
flat for everyone in this category as well as for the families of
men killed in the war.

Karimoglu said things were not as rosy as officials liked to think.

“There are many problems with the distribution of apartments. The
state builds housing for the disabled, but then officials demand
bribes to get them,” he said.

Karimoglu said that in his own case and others, income was as much
of a problem as accommodation.

“The president provided me with a flat, but I can’t sit in it going
hungry. In order to eat, I have to rent out the apartment and live in
a shack with my family,” he said. “I have four children and I receive
a pension of just 150 manats.”

Another disabled Karabakh veteran, Namiq Mammadov, described his
desperation at the prospect of losing the workshop he rented.

“The local authorities want to knock down the workshop and widen the
road. How am I going to feed my children now? I’m not asking for
charity from anyone, I just want an opportunity to earn an honest
crust,” he told IWPR. “What am I to do? Should I burn myself too so
as to solve my children’s problems?”

Aytan Farhadova is a journalist with the Bizim Yol newspaper in
Azerbaijan.

ARMENIAN MUSIC PART OF ME – INTERVIEW WITH JAZZ PIANIST MACHA GHARIBYAN – PHOTO AND VIDEO

JANUARY 14, 20:10

By Paruir Siniavsky

Jazz pianist Macha Gharibian has become a discovery of the French
jazz in 2013 by releasing her first album called “Mars”. The daughter
of Dan Gharibian, one of the founders of Bratsch band, Macha is
playing the mixture of Armenia and American music made in Brooklyn,
folk and Komitas. In an exclusive interview with NEWS.am STYLE Macha
told about Armenian roots and her plans.

Tell a little about yourself

I was born in France, I am of Armenian origin. My father is Armenian
and since my childhood Armenian music was in my soul that naturally had
a huge influence on my works. I was brought up as a pianist playing
classics. I was singer and played in a theater. At a certain point
I decided to find something new and went to New York, where I met
with very unusual musicians, and this was how jazz gradually came
into my music.

How did your father and his music influence you?

My father and group Bratsch have affected my works, because they
showed me what incredible music you can create from a mixture of
different music and different styles. Since childhood, I have been
used to that kind of a mixed lifestyle. Different cultures, languages
and styles – all this was something normal for me. You should be open
to the world. This allows each person to share a part of himself, his
culture, and at the same time to learn everything. Armenian music is
a part of me. I played with my father in 2006 when we came to Yerevan,
visited Gyumri, Ijevan.

How did you have an idea to combine New York jazz and Armenian music?

I was playing Armenian folk but at the same time looking for something
more interesting, and it just happen naturally. I was influenced by
the meetings with musicians such as guitarist David Poto – Razel and
drummer Fabrice Moreau. I always create my works instinctively. I do
not think about what style I create or what music I belong to. I do
not create a frame for my works. Prior to creating my first album,
I asked myself how I can combine all my music desire and experiments
in one piece, but in the studio everything went as it goes naturally.

What plans do you have? When will you visit Armenia?

I am on a tour in France with presentation of my album. I have recently
visited a festival in Algeria and hope to visit Armenia with my
band in the near future. I am running several projects that combine
various ethnic sounds with jazz. As to the last concert in Paris,
the audience was just amazing. I had a warm reception. The concert
was broadcasted live on France Musique channel.

NEWS.am STYLE