Author: Badalian Vardan

CENTER OF WINTER ALPINE TOURISM NEAR THE LAKE SEVAN COSTING 300 MILLION EURO TO BE ESTABLISHED IN ARMENIA

/ARKA/
November 28, 2011
YEREVAN

YEREVAN, November 28. /ARKA/. National Competitiveness Fund of Armenia
developed a new program on the establishment of alpine tourism near
the Lake Sevan, said Executive Director of the Fund Arman Khachatryan.

“In accordance to the preliminary assessments, the cost of the program
is about 300 million euro including all infrastructures. The project
will be implemented in several phases. For the first phase it is
envisaged to allocate 90 million euro”, he said to the journalists
on Monday.

Khachatryan said that development of feasibility study of the program
has been finished. “Discussions of the project with investors will
be organized next year. Broad public discussions will also take place
as the opinions of the beneficiaries are also very important”, he said.

Khachatryan clarified that it will be a sport center calculated for
sportsmen, individual or family tourism.

He said that for the construction of the center some territories
near the Lake Sevan will be selected, but the final selection is not
approved yet.

SERZH SARGSYAN: DESTRUCTION OF HISTORIC AND RELIGIOUS MONUMENTS UNDER THE COVER OF THE CONFLICT IS UNACCEPTABLE
Karen Ghazaryan

“Radiolur”
28.11.2011 17:45

Sitting of the Presidium of the CIS Inter-Religious Council, featuring
the leaders and representatives of the traditional religions of the
CIS, kicked off in Yerevan today.

Speaking at the sitting, President Serzh Sargsyan referred to the
role of the church in the history of the Armenian people.

“The CIS Inter-Religious Council is a unique collective force, which
symbolizes the power of peaceful co-existence of different religions,
their tolerance and reciprocal respect for each other,” President
Sargsyan said.

“The President said “Armenia has made a historic and irreversible
decision to develop in the spirit of cooperation with its neighbors,
friends and all humanity. We consider that all issues should be solved
through negotiations and cooperation, not threats and increase of
tension. We have always been ready to offer our friendship even
not being sure we would get a positive response. No doubt, the
disappointment after such a serious decision can be despairing,”
President Sargsyan stated.

“You know that the conflict of Nagorno Karabakh is our great pain. The
only realistic way is the negotiation process within the framework of
the OSCE Minsk Group. Armenia will steadily move along that path,
since the alternative to it will not benefit either us, or the
neighboring nation,” Serzh Sargsyan said.

According to the President, the negotiations on such a serious and
complex issue require patience and adherence to principles.

“The conflict is not a religious one, and all attempts to ascribe a
religious nature to it are unconstructive. The two great religions –
Christianity and Islam – should not be allowed to confront each other.

Moreover, we consider that the destruction of historic and religious
monuments under the cover of the conflict is unacceptable,” President
Sargsyan stated.

The President welcomed the dialogue between the Catholicos of All
Armenians, His Holiness Karekin II, and the Leader of Caucasian
Muslims Allahshuqyur Pashazade with the mediation of Patriarch Kirill
of Moscow and All Russia.

Leader of Caucasian Muslims Allahshuqyur Pashazade noted in his speech
that “the dialogue should continue, although the efforts of the OSCE
Minsk Group have not produced results.”

“The efforts towards peaceful resolution of the Karabakh conflict
should continue both on regional and international levels. We
fully support the efforts of the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs and
the Presidents of our countries in that direction,” Sheikh-Ul-Islam
Allahshuqyur Pashazade stated.

Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia is confident that the
meeting of the religious leaders will reinforce the friendly ties
between members of the Inter-Religious Council.

HERITAGE ADVISES SERZH SARGSYAN TO SOBER UP

03:06 pm | Today | Politics

The Heritage Party considers Serzh Sargsyan’s response to Heritage
Party leader Raffi Hovannisian’s official letter to be a segmental
attack on Hovannisian’s person and the entire opposition, Armenian
society and its citizens.

“We express bewilderment over the November 26 response of incumbent
Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan to Raffi Hovannisian’s official
letter dating November 21 and assess the response as a segmental and
state-disreputable attack towards Raffi Hovannisian – the person and
first Foreign Minister of Armenia, towards “Heritage” and the entire
opposition, towards Armenian society and common citizen in general,”
the party’s board said in its response.

“If in its statement from November 25 the Republican party had
noted “it’s necessary to refrain from attempts of absolutizing the
authorities’ political commitments, as they have reasonable frames”,
then via his November 26 response the Head of Republican party and
acting president Serzh Sargsyan revealed these “frames”. According
to it the conduct of free, fair and competitive elections or any
demand or offer aimed to its realization breaks the “allowed lines”,
claiming to be assessed as blackening, disparaging, poisoning action
pursuing malice intentions.

While voicing his appraisal the acting president had to acknowledge
at least that Raffi Hovannisian’s letter was a generality of concrete
offers revealed in 15 items and not a statement at all, and that the
offers aimed to bring into real action the commitment of holding free
and fair elections declared by authorities – still Serzh Sargsyan
either hasn’t realized or falsifies it.

That kind of conduct and assessments isn’t compatible with status
of leader of the country. That kind of response shows that Armenian
authorities do not refuse and aren’t going to refrain from vicious
practices of exploiting the administrative resources, establishing
party monopolies towards public and state capabilities, provision of
unequal competing conditions, compelling civil and public officers,
fraud of election process through majoritarian vote, manipulations
with voters’ lists, engaging the army and church into politics.

Exactly these vicious methods of authorities for holding elections
along 16 years continuously had blackened and disparaged the country’s
reputation, led to national revolt and bloodshed. We are deeply
concerned that the president assesses 2008 presidential elections
positively and claims it as mainly meeting the international standards
– that suggests we may have another March 1.

The incumbent president has also to realize that such political
rhetoric escorted with “elections” conducted in said manner opens the
shortest way to new inter-society intolerance. Therefore the instant
of sobriety relates to everyone and foremost to acting president.

If Serzh Sargsyan has made a mistake or omittance or distracted
from presidential style and essence – it could happen as well – he
still may correct the mistake and instead of absurd and meaningless
attacks admit the truthfulness of vast majority of Raffi Hovannisian’s
letter’s items. He must take steps for instant resolving of problems,
for making the elections acceptable to all and securing at last de
jure results of elections in Republic of Armenia,” reads the statement.

ARMENIAN TOURISM SECTOR SEES 13.5% RISE IN JANUARY-SEPTEMBER

/ARKA/
November 28, 2011
YEREVAN

YEREVAN, November 28. /ARKA/. In the first ten months of 2011 the
number of foreign tourists visiting Armenia grew by 13.5% from a
year before to 551,635, Armenian economy minister Tigran Davtian said
today in response to a question from ARKA.

Speaking to journalists on the sidelines of a gathering of local
travel agencies, he said the year-end figure is very likely to make
80,000. According to the minister, if this trend persists the number
will reach the symbolic one million in a couple of years.

According to the minister, the Armenian tourism industry has been
growing steadily for many years and has not been affected by the
latest global economic and financial crisis.

According to the National Statistical Service~Rs data, the number of
tourists visiting Armenia in January-September 2011 increased by 13,1%
from a year before to 551,635, while the number of Armenian citizens
travelling aborad as tourists grew by 15.1% to 546,167 people.

VARTAN OSKANIAN ON AL JAZEERA

679.html

On a current note, the fact that Moody’s lowered Armenia’s outlook
this week and put it on a negative watch, how much do you think that
is a reflection of Armenia’s own economy or its exposure to Europe
and Russia?

I think it’s the latter. Armenia’s economy is exposed to the global
economy. Although we are a small country, if the 2009 recession is
any indication, I think any new slowdown or recession in the global
economy will clearly impact Armenia and since this time it seems
like the origins will be Europe, that impact will be even more
direct on Armenia because the European Union is Armenia’s largest
trading partner. Armenia exports metals, cut diamonds to Germany,
Bulgaria and Belgium. The second conduit is Russia, which is the
second largest trading partner for Armenia, the biggest investor in
Armenia and the source of 75 percent of all remittances that come into
Armenia. Armenia exports mostly agricultural products to Russia, raw
and processed. Any global slowdown clearly will affect Russia and will
change these elements and factors and consequently Armenia’s economy
will be affected. I think Moody’s decision was based on this exposure.

Bearing all of that in mind, is there any way that Armenia can, maybe,
not become more self sufficient but perhaps move away from the types
of things you’ve talked about – mining, agriculture, natural resources,
or is it always going to be almost 100% dependent on the export market?

The 2009 recession of course brought this issue home. Diversification
finally became the government’s priority, not that it was not.

But suddenly the government began to pay more attention because Armenia
was one of the hardest hit economies. Actually we were the second
hardest hit economy in 2009. Our GDP declined 14.5 percent which is
huge for Armenia’s economy, so since then we’ve been questioning
the reasons for this decline, when our neighbors decline was much
less than ours. The answer is among many other things inefficiency in
governance, structural problems, also the issue of diversification. So
along with the traditional industries that we inherited from the
Soviet period such as mining and agriculture, Armenia I believe has
tremendous potential in other areas such as information technology,
we have a well-educated population. Tourism and services, because
the country is beautiful and the people are hospitable and also
putting the emphasis on small and mid-size enterprises, because
Armenians are entrepreneurial. Our neighbors of course have many
other attractions. Georgia is a transit country, has access to the
sea. Azerbaijan has oil and gas. Armenia is a land-locked country,
has no natural resources, it’s small in size and population and
territory. So our only attraction for foreign investment, which is very
necessary to develop those areas so we diversify our economy, requires
further democratization of our society, rule of law, broader justice,
so that those will become Armenia’s attractions. The government
recognizes that, we’ve made a lot of headway in those directions,
but I don’t think we’ve done enough.

I wonder if I can ask you about another issue actually which
doesn’t necessarily fall under the global slowdown. It may affect
you economically. This is Iran. The more that the West seeks to put
sanctions on Iran, the effect that that has on you as one of Iran’s
neighbors and the future of things like the gas pipeline which you’re
building between the two countries.

Sanctions on Iran have so far not affected Armenia. If there’re
any additional sanctions because of these latest developments with
regard to nuclear arms, clearly those sanctions will come to bite
Armenia. There’s no doubt about it. But on the other hand, Armenia
is a member of the international community. And is bound to honor
mandatory sanctions. That’s why Armenia’s position has always been
that this conflict with Iran be resolved through negotiations so
that we can avoid additional sanctions, and also, clearly, so we
can avoid military actions. That will be extremely detrimental to
the region in its entirety. So Armenia’s position is that we need
to have a negotiated settlement because additional sanctions will be
tantamount for Armenia to having a third closed border which Armenia
cannot afford.

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PASHAZADE EXPRESSES READINESS OF NECESSARY ASSISTANCE FOR PEACEFUL SETTLEMENT OF NK CONFLICT

ARMENPRESS
November 28, 2011
YEREVAN

The religious factor must be used for the welfare of our countries and
states, Sheykhulislam Allahshukur Pashazade, Grand Mufti and Chairman
of the Caucasus Muslim Board said at the November 28 sitting of the
CIS Inter-Religious Council. According to him, the conflicts in the
territory of the CIS must be solved in an exclusively peaceful way.

“We must support our political leadership in this issue,” Pashazade
said.

Referring to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, the religious leader of
Azerbaijan said its consequences have become hard burden for Armenian
and Azerbaijani peoples. He said efforts toward the peaceful settlement
of the conflict must continue both on regional and international
levels.

“We fully support the efforts of the Minsk Group member states as well
as the leaders of our countries. We find that peaceful negotiations
must continue and as religious leaders we are ready to assist in not
military but peaceful settlement of the conflict, in accordance with
norms of international right,” Pashazade said.

He stressed that the dialogue under the high patronage of the Russian
Patriarch would not pass in vain.

In this context the religious leader of Azerbaijan considered
remarkable the adoption of decision on mutual protection of cultural
and religious heritage, and the most important – prevention of turning
NK issue into inter-religious conflict.

The Inter-Religious Council of CIS was established in 2004 in Moscow.
The main accents of the activity of the establishment are put on the
implementation of humanitarian programs and settlement of conflicts.
It includes the Armenian Apostolic Church, Russian Orthodox Church,
Georgian Orthodox Church is engaged as an observer, the Caucasus
Muslim Board (Azerbaijan) and other religious organizations.

PRESS RELEASE
Armenian Students’ Association of America, Inc.
333 Warwick Avenue
Warwick, RI 02888
Tel: 401-461-6114
Email: [email protected]
Web:

ASA Searches for Recipients for its Scholarship Programs

For Immediate Release!

WARWICK, RI – The Armenian Students Association of America, Inc. (ASA)
cordially invites students to apply for its available scholarships for
the 2012-2013 academic year. Established in 1910, the ASA is the oldest
major Armenian organization founded in the United States and to this day
is still highly regarded for the financial assistance it gives to
deserving Armenian students in the form of scholarships. In order to
qualify for an ASA Scholarship, potential applicants need to meet the
following three requirements: (1) must be of Armenian descent, (2) must
be enrolled as a full-time student and have completed one full year of
academics at a four-year accredited U.S. college by June 2012 OR must be
enrolled in a two-year college and are transferring to a four-year
college or university as a full time student in the fall 2012, and (3)
must be a U.S. citizen OR must possess the appropriate Visa status in
order to study in the U.S. Students who meet these criteria are
encouraged to download an online application, by going to the following
Web link: Completed
applications must be received at the ASA national office no later than
March 15, 2012. For additional questions, please contact the ASA via
email at [email protected].

###

“GRANDMA’S TATTOOS'” TO BE SCREENED AT GLENDALE LIBRARY

ARMRADIO.AM
29.11.2011 10:34

Director Suzanne Khardalian will discuss her film, Grandma’s Tattoos,
following a screening of the film on Friday December 2 at the Glendale
Public Library Auditorium, Asbarez Daily reports.

Suzanne Khardalian is an independent filmmaker and writer. She studied
journalism in Beirut and Paris and worked as a journalist in Paris
until 1985 when she started to work on films. She also holds a Master’s
Degree in International Law and Diplomacy from the Fletcher School at
Tufts University and contributes articles to different journals. She
has directed more than twenty films that have been shown both in
Europe and the US.

“Grandma was abducted and kept in slavery for many years somewhere in
Turkey. She was also forcibly marked, -tattooed – as a property, the
same way you mark cattle. The discovery of the story has shaken me. I
share the shame, the guilt and anger that infected my grandma’s life.

Grandma Khanoum’s fate was not an aberration. On the contrary tens of
thousands of Armenian children and teenagers were raped and abducted,
kept in slavery,” explained Suzanne Khardalian.

“Grandma’s Tattoos” is a film that lifts the veil of thousands
of forgotten women-survivors of the Genocide-who were forced into
prostitution and were tattooed to distinguish them from the locals.

The program is organized by the Glendale and Burbank chapters of the
Armenian National Committee-Western Region and Asbarez Daily newspaper
and is sponsored by The Glendale Public library.

AMBASSADOR: “WE SUPPORT INITIATIVES TO HOLD MEETING BETWEEN AZERBAIJANI AND ARMENIAN COMMUNITIES OF NAGORNO KARABAKH”

APA
Nov 28 2011
Azerbaijan

“The contacts between Azerbaijanis and Armenians must be intensive,
only in that case it will be possible to find the common language”

Baku. Ali Ahmadov – APA. One of the issues to be discussed during the
OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs’ visit to Baku will be recent incidents
occurred in the frontline, US ambassador to Azerbaijan Matthew Bryza
said, APA reports.

“I don’t expect any special novelty from the visit in addition. But
they can bring additional energy to negotiation process”, the
ambassador noted.

Bryza underlined that he supported initiatives to hold meeting
between Azerbaijani and Armenian communities of Nagorno Karabakh:
“I consider that the contacts between Azerbaijanis and Armenians
must be intensive. Only in that case it will be possible to find the
common language. I know what issues are on the table. I contributed
to this work myself. In my opinion, if there is a confidence between
the sides, it is possible to complete the work on framework agreement.

Then it will be possible to start a work on basic agreement”.

ARCHIVE PRESENTS A HALF-CENTURY OF ISTANBUL’S FACES
Hatice Utkan

Hurriyet Daily News

Nov 28 2011
Turkey

Salt Galata is currently hosting a project by artist and researcher
Tayfun SerttaÅ~_. The artist is aiming to discover the cultural
heritage of Istanbul via the photographic archive of Armenian
photographer Maryam Å~^ahinyan

The photography archive of Maryam Å~^ahinbaÅ~_ features is made up
of approximately 200,000 photos.

A great lover of heritage and history, artist Tayfun SerttaÅ~_ is
shedding light on Istanbul’s demographic past with a new project at
Salt Galata focusing on long-time photographer Maryam Å~^ahinyan.

The project is based on the revisualization of the complete
professional archive of Å~^ahinyan, who was born in the Central
Anatolian province of Sivas in 1911 and died in Istanbul in 1996.

Å~^ahinyan worked as a photographer at her modest studio called Foto
Galatasaray uninterruptedly from 1935 until 1985. The archive is a
unique inventory of the demographic transformations that occurred
in the socio-cultural map of Istanbul after the declaration of
the Republic and the historical period it witnessed; it is also a
chronological record of an Istanbul-based female studio photographer’s
professional career.

SerttaÅ~_ told the Hurriyet Daily News that he did not find Å~^ahinyan,
but that she found him. “I knew that there was an archive like this. I
knew that the person who bought the Studio Galatasaray after Maryam
moved to Uskudar. Then he left the city and left the archive. My
publisher, Yetvart Tomasyan, told me that there was a closed archive.”

The archive waited for a long time before SerttaÅ~_ found it. “I took
the archive in 2009,” he said.

SerttaÅ~_ is also a researcher who works on visual archives. “During
my education, which focused on cultural anthropology, I worked with
lots of archives. My

dissertation was called ‘Photographs and Minorities in Istanbul as
a Means of Cultural Representation in the Process of Modernism,'”
he said.

Making art out of such research and images is SerttaÅ~_’s latest
project. Because there are close to 200,000 images in Å~^ahinyan’s
archive, the task of presenting them is difficult, he said.

Who was Maryam Å~^ahinyan?

Beyond the fact that she was a photographer and owned a studio, there
is little information about Å~^ahinyan. “We know that she went to the
studio every single day, we know that she ate one apple every day at
noon and that she returned home,” SerttaÅ~_ said.

Å~^ahinyan, an Ottoman Armenian, was born in 1911 at Å~^ahinyan Konagı
(Camlı KöÅ~_k), one of the most impressive civil structures in Sivas.

Her grandfather, Agop Å~^ahinyan PaÅ~_a, represented Sivas in the first
Ottoman Parliament (Meclis-i Mebusan), which was established in 1877.

Born with the social privilege inherent to a grandchild of a member
of parliament, Å~^ahinyan’s life took an unexpected turn when, as a
child, she witnessed the historical events of 1915.

Armed with the wooden bellows camera her father originally took over
from a family that immigrated from the Balkans in the aftermath of
World War I and the black-and-white sheet film she continued to use
until 1985, Å~^ahinyan, in a sense, arrested time – both against
the technological advancements photography was experiencing and
contemporary trends. In the end, she created an unparalleled visual
coherence without compromising her technical and aesthetic principles.

Throughout her professional life, Å~^ahinyan wore a white coat and
black over-sleeves to protect her clothing, according to SerttaÅ~_.

“When she retired from the studio in 1985, Å~^ahinyan left behind a
unique visual archive made up of approximately 200,000 images. She
passed away at

her home on Hanımefendi Sokak in Å~^iÅ~_li in 1996 and is buried in
the Å~^iÅ~_li Armenian Cemetery,” said SerttaÅ~_.

Women in the studio

The photography archive features many photographs of women, according
to SerttaÅ~_.

“This was because of Maryam,” said SerttaÅ~_, adding that women went
to her for pictures with their nice dresses or with their swimsuits.

Priests or nuns, meanwhile, went had pictures taken with their crosses.

It is very important to have an archive like Å~^ahinyan’s, said
SerttaÅ~_.

“For example, these photographs also provide a cultural and historical
heritage because we have always had problems in terms of having an
archive in Turkey … on cultural issues.”

Å~^ahiyan’s photographs, however, now provide such an archive, the
artist said. “It shows us the lifestyle of people; we can discover
how these minority people lived during that era.”

Noting that most people always thought Armenians or minorities in
Istanbul lived a rich life, SerttaÅ~_ said, “The photos lead us to
learn more about the lives of minorities; there were lots of people
who had damaged clothes and so on.”

The photographs mostly depict Greeks. “These photos show what we have
lost,” he said.

Discovering Foto Galatasaray

Foto Galatasaray was never as visible as some of the more elite
photography studios that have been famous since the 19th century,
such as Phebus, Andriomenos or Sabah, SerttaÅ~_ said.

The studio, however, survived because it appealed to the lower and
middle classes.

Å~^ahinyan was a devout woman, and her identity created a closely-knit
circle that determined the sociological basis of Foto Galatasaray’s
clientele, setting it apart from Istanbul’s other studios.

Except for four understated passport photos, no photographs exist of
Å~^ahinyan herself, who throughout her life remained behind the camera,
scrupulously taking hundreds of thousands of photographs, retouching
them, and painstakingly numbering and dating each film she developed.

Spanning half a century, her work impartially traces the ethnic,
social, cultural, religious and economic transformations taking place
at the center of the city.

After the present exhibition, the archive will be opened to everyone
via the Internet, said SerttaÅ~_.

A new period will start for the archive. “People will be able to
tell if they know these people, and every photo will assume a [new]
identity,” he added.