Author: Babajanian Karo

TURKISH PARLIAMENT SPEAKER MEETS WITH RELIGIOUS LEADERS

Hurriyet, Turkey
July 1 2013

Parliament Speaker Cemil Cicek met with Turkey’s religious leaders
during the 22th Parliamentary Assembly of Organization for Security
and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) held in Istanbul June 30. DHA photo

Parliament Speaker Cemil Cicek met with Turkey’s religious leaders
during the 22th Parliamentary Assembly of Organization for Security
and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) held in Istanbul June 30, using the
occasion to voice his hopes for a more tolerant and respectful world.

“I hope your calls reach to those who should hear and understand,”Cicek
told those present at the gathering, who included Greek Patriarch
Bartholomew, Armenian Patriarch Aram AteÅ~_yan, Chief Rabbi Ä°sak
Haleva, and Mehmet Pacacı from the Religious Affairs Directorate.

The leaders made speeches at a special session promoting dialogue
and cooperation over the issues of racism, intolerance and xenophobia.

“We are supposed to choose dialogue rather than division, tolerance
instead of extremism and consensus rather than discrimination as role
models,” Bartholomew said in his speech.

AteÅ~_yan, for his part, touched on the ongoing humanitarian crisis
in Syria in his address. “We invite the world’s politicians to mercy,
to forget about their countries’ interests and instead pursue the
humanity being destroyed in Syria,” he said.

July/01/2013

SYRIANS TAKE ONE-WAY TICKETS TO ARMENIA?

EurasiaNet.org, NY
July 1 2013

July 1, 2013 – 10:42am, by Giorgi Lomsadze

The exodus of Syria’s ethnic Armenian community to Armenia was seen,
at least in part, as a temporary phenomenon. But it appears that
the thousands of Syrian war migrants have come to Armenia to stay,
Armenian officials say.

“If . . . last year, some 80-90 percent of Syrian Armenians were saying
that they planned on going back to Syria, now they are thinking of
making their home here,” Firdus Zakaryan, a representative of the
Diaspora ministry told the Panorama news site.

Extending a helping hand to ethnic Armenian communities in trouble is
a matter of national honor for the Armenian state, which maintains
close ties with the far-flung Armenian Diaspora. Over the past few
years, Yerevan has been carrying in and making room for thousands of
ethnic Armenians caught in the crossfire between the Syrian government
and rebels.

Yerevan says it is happy to have Armenia’s Syrian relatives over
for as long as they want. But the extended hospitality is a major
humanitarian burden. The Armenian government needs to find housing,
jobs and schools for the endless stream of arrivals, who have spent
generations apart from Armenia, and speak Arabic and/or Western
Armenian, not the official Eastern Armenian of the motherland.

But with the country still struggling to cope with massive labor
migration — disputed government data claims 49,660 citizens emigrated
for good in 2012, EurasiaNet.org’s Marianna Grigoryan has reported —
dealing with an influx of newcomers is a task Armenia is more than
willing to take on, however.

The Yerevan authorities plan to offer instruction in Arabic in one
of the capital city’s schools and are supporting plans to build an
all-Syrian-Armenian residential high-rise. Outside the capital city,
several residential projects are planned to house the arrivals.

Will it be enough to attract still more Syrian-Armenians? With one eye
on Armenia’s allegedly shrinking population — estimated at just under
or over 3 million people — officials may well be hoping that it will.

MAMMADYAROV: ARMENIA SHOULD DEMONSTRATE POLITICAL WILL TO RESOLVE NAGORNO-KARABAKH CONFLICT

Vestnik Kavkaza, Russia
July 1 2013

Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov at a meeting today in
Baku with Filippo Lombardi, the Chairman of the Council of States
of the Federal Parliament of Switzerland, said that Armenia should
demonstrate the political will to resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh
conflict.

Mammadyarov said that Azerbaijan is ready to work on a peace agreement,
as the current status quo is unacceptable.

In addition to the Karabakh issue, the sides discussed prospects of
bilateral cooperation in the energy sphere between Azerbaijan and the
European Union. The Minister stressed the importance of Lombardi’s
visit for the development of relations between the two countries.

The Swiss politician, for his part, thanked the Foreign Minister for
the warm welcome and characterized the decision on the transportation
of Azerbaijani gas to Europe via the Trans-Adriatic Pipeline as
historic.

PRESIDENT OF THE NAGORNO-KARABAKH REPUBLIC : PRESIDENT VISITED A NUMBER OF WORKSHOPS IN STEPANAKERT

4-Traders
July 1 2013

On 1 July Artsakh Republic President Bako Sahakyan visited a number
of workshops to be opened at the site of former Karabagh silk plant.

The Head of the State got acquainted with the preparatory works
carried out in the workshops of processing wool, as well as yarn,
fabric and carpet production.

Bako Sahakyan highlighted the existence of such small enterprises
for boosting local industry, adding that they would also promote the
development of light industry in Artsakh.

Prime-minister Ara Haroutyunyan, vice-premier Artur Aghabekyan and
other officials accompanied the President.

CANDIDATES LINING UP FOR MARKEY’S SEAT IN MASS.

The Associated Press State & Local Wire
July 1, 2013 Monday 9:11 PM GMT

By STEVE LeBLANC, Associated Press
BOSTON

The race for the House seat being vacated by U.S. Sen.-elect Edward
Markey is heating up.

Middlesex Sheriff Peter Koutoujian, in a video posted online and
emailed to supporters, formally announced plans Monday to run in the
anticipated special election in the state’s 5th Congressional District.

Koutoujian, a Democrat, served in the state House of Representatives
before being appointed to fill a vacancy in the sheriff’s office in
2011. He was elected a year later.

Later Monday, state Sen. Karen Spilka of Framingham was scheduled to
formally announce her candidacy. Fellow Democratic state Rep. Carl
Sciortino of Medford declared his candidacy last week.

Two other Democrats state Sens. Katherine Clark of Melrose and William
Brownsberger of Belmont are also campaigning for the seat.

One Republican, attorney Frank Addivinola, also has jumped in the race,
sending out an email to supporters last week announcing his candidacy.

Brownsberger and Sciortino have challenged the other candidates to
take the so-called “People’s Pledge” designed to discourage outside
groups from launching negative campaign ads.

Markey won a special election last week to succeed John Kerry after
Kerry resigned to become secretary of state. Markey is expected to
be sworn in later this month.

Markey’s resignation will start the clock ticking on the special
election to fill his House seat. That election will take place
between 145 and 160 days later. The first hurdle facing candidates
is to collect the signatures of 2,000 Massachusetts voters needed to
get on the ballot.

There’s no shortage of hopefuls for the seat Markey has held for 37
years. The district includes a number of cities and towns to the west
and north of Boston, including Framingham, Waltham, Medford and Malden.

In his video, Koutoujian described himself as “just a kid from
Waltham” whose grandparents on his father’s side fled Turkey during
the Armenian genocide. He worked as a prosecutor in the Middlesex
District Attorney’s office before being elected to the Massachusetts
House in 1997. He later became sheriff.

During his time in the House, Koutoujian said he worked on health care,
public safety and victim’s rights.

“My focus has always been on both the major challenges facing our state
and just as importantly the issues that aren’t being talked about every
day, but touch people in their everyday lives,” he said in the video.

Spilka said in an email to supporters that she “smashed through our
online fundraising goal.”

“I am extremely proud of the campaign team we’ve assembled,” she added.

Addivinola acknowledged the difficulties Republicans face in
Massachusetts and said his goal is “to connect with the voters in the
district and clearly communicate to them that the Republican Party is
the party of working people, that the Republican Party is the party
that will protect the middle class.”

In last year’s U.S. Senate election, Republican Scott Brown and
Democrat Elizabeth Warren agreed to a “People’s Pledge” that
discouraged outside political groups from launching television,
radio and Internet ads.

In the just-completed special U.S. Senate election, Markey and
fellow congressman Stephen Lynch also agreed to the pledge during
the Democratic election. Republican Gabriel Gomez declined to sign
the pledge.

Those running for Markey’s seat should accept the pledge, Brownsberger
said in a statement, adding that “money has become a deeply corrupting
force in politics, when the focus should be on tackling the hard
issues.”

One would-be candidate who’s decided not to run is former Democratic
state Sen. Warren Tolman, who briefly considered jumping into the
campaign.

“I believe in public service, but now’s not the right time for me
and my family,” he said.

Sunday was also the end of the latest fundraising period. The totals,
which have yet to be posted, will help give an early indication of
which candidate has the largest political reach.

Whoever wins the seat will face re-election again next year.

RUSSIA TRYING TO RESTORE PRESENCE IN SOUTH CAUCASUS “AT LEAST PARTIALLY”

Regnum news agency, Russia
June 29 2013

Russia reinforcing its potential in the South Caucasus against the
background of NATO’s expected entry into Georgia

by Gay Borisov

Moscow has recently increased its military and political activeness
in the South Caucasus. Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolay
Patrushev and ODKB [Collective Security Treaty Organization] Secretary
General Nikolay Bordyuzha visited Armenia literally within several
days. An agreement on developing Russian-Armenian military and
technical cooperation was signed as a result. They also discussed the
issues of reinforcing the 102nd Russian [military] base in Armenia and
intensifying joint military exercises, strengthening the Armenian Air
Forces and antiaircraft defence, modernizing border guard detachments
of the FSB [Federal Security Service] of the Russian Federation,
and defending the Turkish and Iranian sectors of the Armenian border
together with their Armenian colleagues. It was also decided to create
a joint structure – ArmRosgosservis [Armenian-Russian state service],
which is of regional importance due to its size.

Parallel to it, Russia started delivering weapons and hardware to
Azerbaijan. The deal is worth 750m-1bn dollars. This sum of money
would be sufficient to fully arm and equip an army division from
scratch. Certainly, the fact aroused questions among Armenian experts.

However, the Russian side hinted that Yerevan had been informed about
the sale of weapons to Baku. It was also said that the “business
project”, which, according to the expert of the Russian Institute for
Strategic Studies (RISS), PhD in Military Science Vladimir Zakharov,
is aimed to restore parity of forces in the region, which changed
to Armenia’s advantage after it became known that Iskander-M guided
missile systems had been located on its territory (it should be noted
though that so far, there has been no official confirmation of the
information).

Russia maintaining military, political presence in South Caucasus

However, the true aim of the deal with Azerbaijan is that by delivering
weapons and military hardware, Russia is trying in some measure
to maintain its military and political presence in the country,
which started to come to naught after Russian specialists left the
Qabala Radar Station. Meanwhile, in view of short-term prospects of
developments in the region, further weakening of Russia’s positions
is rather gravid. The thing is that in a year, the Americans and
their allies will start withdrawing their troops from Afghanistan.

Most of them will go to Europe via Georgian and Azerbaijani
territories. It is not by chance that the construction of the
Baku-Tbilisi-Akhalkalaki-Kars (Turkey) railway line is being carried
out at an accelerated pace. It is evident that the construction,
which quite recently suffered financial problems and was questioned by
the new Georgian leadership, has found a new lease of life. The thing
is that this line is going to be one of the main land routes for the
withdrawal of NATO troops from Afghanistan. Georgian Defence Minister
Irakli Alasania made a direct statement regarding the issue. As
Alasania put it, “the main plan for Georgia’s participation in the
ISAF international mission is the restoration of the railway line
together with Azerbaijan and Turkey”.

NATO to enter Georgia “soon”

It is absolutely clear today that NATO will soon enter Georgia one
way or another. However, it is a big question when it will leave and
whether it will leave at all (the process of shifting troops is going
to be rather long, lasting maybe for years). It was with good reason
that Georgian Prime Minister Bidzina Ivanishvili said that despite
the fact that “Russia disapproves of Georgia’s strive to integrate in
NATO, what matters is that the Georgian people approve of it. It is
their choice. The European and Euro-Atlantic space is our strategy and
we are going to rigorously move in this direction”. Apart from this,
after his meeting with NATO Secretary General [Anders Fogh Rasmussen]
in Tbilisi, Ivanishvili made a slip, saying that Tbilisi will not
even insist on a speedy receipt of a Membership Action Plan [MAP]
for the membership of the alliance. As he put it, this issue is not
fundamental for the Georgian side and what matters is “real steps”, as
there have been cases, when some countries joined NATO without a MAP.

To some extent, it is possible to understand the Georgian leader: The
fact of Georgia’s active participation in evacuating NATO troops from
Afghanistan, as well as its becoming a key transit segment of their
route will make it possible to ensure consolidation of Tbilisi’s
relations with Brussels and turn “formalities” into a factor of
secondary importance. The fact will also give the Georgian side a
chance to reject all the complaints of Moscow, which will by no means
feel happy about the changes to the configuration in the region.

Partial presence in Absheron fitting in Moscow’s plan

Whatever the situation, it is doubtless that in the near future,
immediate physical presence of the North Atlantic alliance in Georgia
and Azerbaijan, not to mention the ideological impact, will start
increasing even without Tbilisi’s formally joining NATO or receiving
a status of an applicant country. And Russia’s current steps aimed at
strengthening defensive and technical structures of its ally Armenia
as well as those of its own stationed in the region, is an attempt
to restore at least partially its presence in Absheron [peninsula,
where Azerbaijan’s capital Baku is situated], which completely fits
in Moscow’s understanding of the prospect.

[Translated from Russian]

SYRIA-HARDENED FIGHTERS BEHIND ATTACKS IN CHINA – REPORT

AFP 2013/ Peter Parks
21:57 01/07/2013

MOSCOW, July 1 (RIA Novosti) – Islamic militants, battle-hardened
in Syria, were behind two terrorist attacks that left dozens dead
in a northwest Chinese province, in which separatists have wanted
to establish a sovereign state of “East Turkestan,” a Chinese news
agency reported Monday.

About a hundred militants associated with the group behind the attacks
went to Syria via Turkey to fight alongside rebel forces battling
the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad, China’s The Global Times
reported, citing an unnamed anti-terrorism official.

They went there “to overcome their fears, improve their fighting
skills and gain experience in carrying out terror attacks,” the
official was quoted as saying.

The two terrorist attacks in China’s Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous
Region, claimed the lives of 35 people, including policemen and
civilians. The province, which borders Central Asia, is home to 10
million Muslim Uighurs.

The attacks came several days ahead of the fourth anniversary of
the July 5 riot in the provincial capital of Urumqi that saw Uighurs
pitted against ethnic Chinese in a deadly clash that left nearly 200
people killed.

China is a permanent member of the UN Security Council, and together
with Russia it has vetoed sanctions against the ruling regime in Syria.

ARMENIA’S ECONOMIC BASIS SHOULD BE STATE-PRIVATE SECTOR PARTNERSHIP – ECONOMIST

July 02, 2013 | 14:23

YEREVAN. – The state-private sector partnership should be the basis for
Armenia’s economy, chairman Vazgen Safaryan of the Union of Domestic
Goods Producers stated during a press conference on Tuesday.

With this model, Armenia’s large enterprises, which are left from
the Soviet times, will cease to overload the economy and they will
transform from monopolies into open joint-stock companies.

“[The] Nairit [rubber plant], which is a monopoly not solely in Armenia
but all through the CIS, is a vivid example. If possessing the assets
of these enterprises is not removed from the community, they would
be of a much larger benefit to the country,” Safaryan concluded.

News from Armenia – NEWS.am

University World News
June 29 2013

Tuition fee hike out of touch with economic reality

Rok Primozic29 June 2013 Issue No:278

Plans to raise tuition fees in Armenia up to 30% could have
devastating consequences for Armenian society, as it would severely
limit students’ chances of gaining access to higher education.

Tuition fees were already increased by 15% on average in May at many
public and private universities. This is out of proportion with the
country’s socioeconomic development given that students have to pay
US$1,048 in tuition fees on average a year when nominal salaries are
only about $260 a month.

Armenian graduates have already been hit hard by the economic crisis
and high unemployment, with students facing a grim image of their
future.

European students are very concerned about the recent developments in
Armenia and have supported the fight of the Armenian National
Students’ Association, or ANSA, against this policy. On 21 June, the
European Students’ Union sent a letter of support for ANSA to all of
the main stakeholders in the higher education field in Armenia.

The union believes that education is a prerequisite for building a
knowledge-based society, where the role of higher education is vital
in developing an active civil society and a stronger economy and
providing equal opportunities for all.

A high level of education results in lower unemployment rates, better
quality of health, lower crime rates, more societal involvement and
higher tax returns.

`Raising tuition fees hinders individuals from accessing higher
education, thus making education a privilege of the elite and for
those that can afford to pay the fees. In the economic situation of
Armenia, where the amount of fees exceeds the average salary by far,
the effects of raising the fees are hazardous both for the individual
and society at large,’ the letter stated.

More than 10,000 national unions of students in Europe have also sent
their letters of support to ANSA to show their solidarity against
increased tuition fees in Armenia. In the past few weeks, the Armenian
students’ association has also actively organised public hearings and
meetings with more than 10 local student unions, and these meetings
have attracted more than 1,000 students.

ANSA has made an official statement on this issue and distributed it
to the main stakeholders in Armenia, at the Council of Europe and the
Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe offices in
Yerevan, the European Union-Armenia office and the Ombudsman in
Armenia. That statement was also sent to the rectors of Armenian
universities who took the decision to raise tuition fees as well as
rectors of other higher education institutions in the country.

The European Students’ Union has given its full support to ANSA’s
efforts and has appealed to the authorities responsible for changing
the fees to reconsider that policy because of the impact it will have.

`Young people are the future of a society, and everyone deserves the
right to receive an education, regardless of their socioeconomic
background and their ability to pay,’ the union’s letter said.

* Rok Primozic is vice-chairperson of the European Students’ Union.

Sydney Morning Herald (Australia)
June 29, 2013 Saturday
First Edition

Unravelling the complex thread of love and conflict
Fiction

Review by Claire Scobie

BONE ASH SKY
Katerina Cosgrove
Hardie Grant
400pp

At the start of Bone Ash Sky, Katerina Cosgrove writes, “The author
does not seek to blame, defame or offend any race … There are no
villains in this story – and no heroes either.” What follows is an
unravelling of four generations of war in the Middle East told through
the multifaceted lens of one family.

The book starts in 1995 with Anoush Pakradounian, who is returning to
Beirut to try to find out the truth about her late father, Selim. Of
Christian Armenian descent, Anoush left the city aged 16, at the
height of the civil war, and was brought up in Boston. Now an aspiring
journalist, she is back to attend a United Nations tribunal accusing
her father, formerly a commander of the Christian Phalangist militia,
of taking part in a massacre of Palestinian Muslims. While Anoush is
singlehandedly trying to right the wrongs of the past, she can never
get away from her own “secret war, lodged deep inside”, that of a
daughter wanting to love her absent father and yet condemn him for his
actions.

As the narrative zigzags back and forth between characters, countries
– Lebanon, Turkey and Syria – and times, the author takes us deep into
the Christian-Muslim conflict that ravages the region. Parallel to
Anoush’s journey is the story of her Armenian Christian grandmother,
Lilit, and Lilit’s brother, Minas, both of whom were forced from their
homes in eastern Turkey in 1915 during the Armenian genocide. The
scenes of massacres, forced marches and Minas’ escape from the death
camp in Deir ez Zor are harrowing.

Every war crime known to man or woman happens in this book. It is a
litany of sadness and trauma, yet within this are the humane details
of ordinary life and love. Some of the most poignant sections are in
Beirut – almost a character in itself. At one point, Cosgrove writes:
“The Israelis are still squeezing the south like an orange, with
Hezbollah fighting them for pips.” Despite everything, Beirut never
loses its soul.

In this novel, in which each character is haunted by the past,
Cosgrove shows how everybody is “a victim or a perpetrator. Or both at
the same time.” We meet the swaggering Selim, Anoush’s father and
Minas’ son, who in the early 1980s is carving a place for himself in
the Phalange headquarters in Beirut. By day Selim schmoozes with
Israeli commanders; by night he crosses to the west of the city to
sleep with his Muslim mistress, Sanaya, whose defiance in the face of
daily airstrikes only adds to her fading beauty.

And Cosgrove, the Australian author of The Glass Heart and Intimate
Distance, doesn’t stop there. There is Issa, a young passionate Shiite
Muslim, and Chaim, a disaffected Israeli, who becomes Anoush’s
partner.

Cosgrove writes poetically about brutality. Her sentences are sparse
and her imagery fierce: “Skeleton bones, shreds of yellow skin,
reddish in places.”

Her attempt to cover all sides of the spectrum, the depth of the
research and fearlessness in writing about subjects such as the 1915
Armenian genocide – still denied by Turkish scholars – is truly
commendable.

However, it is a brave author who switches between first and
third-person point of view with such a cast of characters. The regular
unspooling of the past can intrude upon the narrative; at times the
plot is unwieldy and the prose repetitious. Although Anoush, written
in the present tense and first-person voice, appears to be the main
character, I found her the hardest to engage with. In comparison, the
young Lilit, sold as a slave to a Turk, and the tormented Minas,
shimmer off the page.

As the novel builds to a climax, and the disparate family ties
stretching from past to present are woven together, Cosgrove’s own
agenda becomes more forthright. This can detract from the final
chapters, but ultimately I was left with a sense that this powerful
story is a timely and impassioned plea for a better world, where
cross-cultural and inter-religious divide no longer exists. I can only
hope that is so.

Claire Scobie’s novel will be published in July by Penguin.