Author: Badalian Vardan

PanARMENIAN.Net

Armenia’s Joining GUAM Not Even Discussed
01.12.2006 14:34 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ When commenting on the hearsay of
Armenia’s possible joining the GUAM Armenian Foreign
Minister Vartan Oskanian said that Yerevan has no
intention to join the organization. "We do not even
discuss the issue. The GUAM advocates an ideology that
conflicts with Armenia’s policy. The activities of
this organization hamper Armenia’s development," the
RA FM told a news conference in Yerevan today.

When touching upon the Armenian-Russian relations,
specifically of the killing of 6 Armenians in Russia
in 2006 Minister Oskanian said this fact did not tell
on the relations between the two states. "Murders do
not influence on our relations but they pose new
problems," he said.

1dec01,1,5371804.story?coll=3Dla-headlines-busines s-invest

Investor may have dumped GM stake
Kirk Kerkorian sells a second block of shares. Some speculate he has shed
his entire holding.
By John O’Dell
Times Staff Writer

December 1, 2006

Investor Kirk Kerkorian on Thursday appeared to be cashing in his
chips and exiting his high-stakes poker game with General Motors
Corp. after 19 months.

The Beverly Hills billionaire and casino mogul, who at one point this
year owned 9.9% of GM and had his own representative on the
automaker’s board, disclosed Thursday that he had agreed to sell a
second block of 14 million shares, reducing his stake to 4.95% after a
14-million-share sale Nov. 22.

But there was speculation late Thursday that Kerkorian’s investment
company, Tracinda Corp., had dumped the rest of its holding in a
third, unreported sale. A spokeswoman for Tracinda and Kerkorian said
neither the investor nor his company would comment.

Merrill Lynch & Co. analyst John Murphy said a block of 28 million GM
shares, equivalent to Tracinda’s remaining holding, was sold in a
midafternoon transaction managed by Bank of America Corp. The selling
price, Murphy wrote in a note to investors, was $29.25 a share.

If Tracinda was the seller of the stock that traded late Thursday, the
deal would have given the firm a loss of about $10 million on all 56
million shares, not counting any dividends.

But Kerkorian, who paid an average of $30.24 a share for his GM
holdings- almost $1.7 billion in all – would appear to be getting out
with asmall profit if he has sold only half his holding.

The sale of Tracinda’s second block of 14 million shares is set to
close today at $28.75 apiece; the initial block was sold at $33 a
share. Together, the two sales gave Kerkorian a gross profit of $1.27
a share, or $17.78 million.

Tracinda was required to report the first two sales to regulators
because of the size of its stake, but once its holding fell below 5%,
it would not have had to disclose information about any further sales.

On Thursday, GM shares fell 27 cents to $29.23.

The day’s news led some analysts to speculate that Kerkorian has
pulled out completely after GM’s board rebuffed his push for the
company to enter a three-way alliance with French automaker Renault
and its Japanese partner,Nissan Motor Co.

The board’s vote to support Chairman Rick Wagoner’s position that GM
didn’t need such an alliance to return its ailing North American
automotive operations to profitability told Kerkorian "that his
strategy wouldn’t allow him to do what he wanted," said AMR Research
auto analyst Kevin Reale.

Kerkorian advisor Jerome York quit GM’s board in October in a move
triggered by his fellow directors’ decision to end the alliance
talks. That initially led some analysts to wonder whether Kerkorian,
backed by York, might launch a proxy battle to gain control of the
board and fire Wagoner. But since Tracinda started selling shares,
that talk has dwindled.

"He pulled his levers and not much happened. So why stick around?"
asked analyst Ken Elias, an Arizona-based partner at automotive
research firm Maryann Keller & Associates.

"It appears to me he is exiting," said auto analyst Shelly Lombard of
bond research firm Gimme Credit in New York. "Falling below 5%, if he
still hasany stock, certainly reduces his leverage."

Lombard said she believed that by maintaining a large stake, Kerkorian
"helped keep GM’s management on its toes, so I hate to see him go."

But that’s not a universal sentiment. "He was a major distraction,"
Burnham Securities analyst David Healy said. "I hope he’s all the way
out so people can get back to worrying about what’s best for GM and
not what’s best for Kirk Kerkorian."

If the 28 million shares sold late Thursday were not Tracinda’s,
Kerkorian would remain GM’s largest individual shareholder but would
rank fifth overall. When he held his 9.9% stake, Kerkorian was the
second-largest shareholder.

Separately Thursday, GM said it had completed the $14.1-billion sale
of a 51% stake in its profit-making General Motors Acceptance
Corp. finance unit to an investment group led by Cerberus Capital
Management.

The sale provides GM with cash to help pay for job cuts, plant
closings and development of new models on which it is pinning its
turnaround hopes.

The Detroit automaker will receive $7.4 billion in cash from the
purchasers, plus a $2.7-billion distribution from GMAC this year and
$4 billion more in the next three years.

[email protected]

TREND Information, Azerbaijan
Dec 1 2006

Russian Prime Minister begins talks with Armenia

Source: Trend
Author: Trend

01.12.2006

(Itar-Tass) – – A visit of Armenian Prime Minister Andranik Margaryan
will become a milestone in the development of ties between Russia and
Armenia, Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov said opening talks
with his Armenian counterpart, reports Trend.

`I’m pleased with the opportunity to discuss issues of
Russian-Armenian cooperation,’ Fradkov said. `I know that the chief
aim of your visit is participate in the closing ceremony of the Year
of Armenia in Russia due to held in St. Petersburg. In Moscow, You
also have a saturated programme.’

Fradkov offered to discuss topical problems focussing `first of all
on trade and economic ties.’

For his part, Andranik Margaryan expressed confidence that `the Year
of Armenia has promoted the intensification of the political and
economic dialogue and made it possible to expand bilateral
interaction.’

PRESS RELEASE
Catholicosate of Cilicia
Communication and Information Department
Contact: V.Rev.Father Krikor Chiftjian, Communications Officer
Tel: (04) 410001, 410003
Fax: (04) 419724
E-mail: [email protected]
Web:

PO Box 70 317
Antelias-Lebanon

Armenian version:

THE CATHOLICOSATE OF CILICIA PARTICIPATES IN THE 5TH EXHIBITION OF CHRISTIAN
MEDIA

The International Catholic Media Union and the Middle East Council of
Churches (MECC) organized the presentation of a book entitled "Christianity:
A history in the Middle East" in the "Mar Elias" church on November 25. The
event was organized on the occasion of the fifth exhibition of Christian
Media.

Archbishop Sebouh Sarkissian (Primate of the Diocese of Tehran), who is one
of the editors of the new book, attended the event on behalf of the
Catholicosate of Cilicia.

The event’s purpose was to present the content of the book to the public and
inform people about the four families of Christianity, the religion’s
origins, history and culture in the Middle East.

Archbishop Sarkissian spoke about the contribution of His Holiness Aram I to
the book with an excellent article of scientific depth.

##
The Armenian Catholicosate of Cilicia is one of the two Catholicosates of
the Armenian Orthodox Church. For detailed information about the Ecumenical
activities of the Cilician Catholicosate, you may refer to the web page of
the Catholicosate, The Cilician Catholicosate, the
administrative center of the church is located in Antelias, Lebanon.

ARMENIA RUMINATES OVER NATO MEMBERSHIP
By Ara Tadevosian in Yerevan for IWPR

Institute for War & Peace Reporting, UK
Nov 29 2006

Yerevan seeks to build better relations with Brussels, while not
offending Moscow.

Armenian politicians say that the issue of their country joining NATO
is currently not on the agenda – but they say so far less categorically
than just a few years ago. Relations with the North Atlantic alliance
are deepening and Moscow is no longer Yerevan’s only strategic ally.

Armenian foreign minister Vardan Oskanian told the Rose Roth NATO
parliamentary conference in Yerevan last year that the alliance could
play an important role in providing security in the Caucasus. Defense
minister Serzh Sarkisian was more cautious but said that relations
with the USA and NATO as well as with Russia and Armenia’s membership
of the Collective Security Pact of the Commonwealth of Independent
States (CIS) were the basis of its security.

"Basically last year was a breakthrough," Aris Ghazinian, an expert
with the Caucasus analytical centre in Yerevan, told IWPR. "Two
high-ranking officials made statements that from now on Armenia sees
two vectors when it comes to security issues."

Another leading official, the then parliamentary speaker Artur
Baghdasarian, went further in April this year when he told the German
newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine, "the future of Armenia is the EU
and NATO" and "Russia should not stand in our way towards Europe."

Two days later, President Robert Kocharian corrected his colleague,
saying that Armenia had no intention to join NATO. Baghdasarian
said that he viewed it as a long-term prospect. Not long afterwards,
he resigned and went into opposition.

Public opinion is also shifting in favor of NATO. An opinion poll
conducted in Armenia in August showed that 42 percent of Armenians
favored joining the alliance and the number of strong opponents was
a mere nine percent.

Last year, Armenia and NATO agreed an Individual Partnership Agreement,
or IPAP, under which they agreed to work together to forge a "Strategy
of National Security and a Military Doctrine." This is the basis for
a program of reform of the armed forces of Armenia up until 2015.

This irritated some politicians in Russia, which was presented with
a finished document, despite regarding itself as Armenia’s chief
military ally – and the only country to have its troops stationed on
Armenian territory.

"Russia’s attitude toward cooperation between Armenia and NATO is
one of jealousy," said Ghazinian. "In NATO, the South Caucasus is
perceived as a single whole, despite an individual approach to each
separate country. And the basic feeling of jealousy is linked to the
fact that NATO perceives the region as a single whole."

Under one of Armenia’s commitments in IPAP, an Information Centre on
NATO opened its doors in Yerevan on 13 November. David Alaverdian,
who initiated the project, said that its aim was not for Armenia to
join NATO, but to inform Armenians about the alliance and the benefits
of cooperation with it.

"It is no secret that very many people in Armenia continue to perceive
NATO through the prism of the Cold War," Alaverdian told IWPR.

Many Armenian experts welcome the IPAP on the grounds that it demands
serious reforms of Armenia’s armed forces.

"The IPAP foresees the forging of closer links between the army and
society and the introduction of a mechanism of public control over the
armed forces," said Tevan Poghosian, executive director of the Armenian
Atlantic Association. "As a result of these reforms, the Armenian army
will grow stronger as the public’s trust in our armed forces grows."

Poghosian also noted that Azerbaijan – with whom Armenia is in dispute
over Nagorny Karabakh – had its own IPAP and reform program.

"Today we could say that a parallel process is taking place in
Armenia and Azerbaijan," he said. "I think that it will be extremely
beneficial for NATO to have a situation in which the armed forces
of Armenia and Azerbaijan become more predictable for the alliance
and will operate on the basis of similar standards. In the future,
it could provide the opportunity for collaboration between the armies
of Armenia and Azerbaijan, for example in dealing with the aftermath
of natural disasters."

However, the Armenian political elite is still treading a fine line
in its public comments over cooperation with NATO.

Last year, defense minister – and leading presidential contender in
2008 – Serzh Sarkisian said that Armenia’s armed forces aspired to
reach "international standards" – a phrase that commentators suggested
was carefully chosen to avoid specific mention of NATO.

Sarkisian went out of his way this week to say that there should be
no contradiction between Armenia’s membership of the Moscow-led CIS
Collective Security Pact and good relations with NATO.

"We should understand that military and political blocs are formed
for the sake of something, not in opposition to something," said
Sarkisian. He went on, "The agreement on the Collective Security
Pact was signed not against NATO, but to protect the security of the
countries that are part of it."

This message was repeated by Kurt Volker, the US principal deputy
assistant secretary for European and Eurasian affairs, in a recent
conversation with Armenian journalists.

Other politicians are worried about the implications of closer
relations with NATO, when Turkey, its historical foe, is a member of
the alliance.

"NATO cannot guarantee the security of Armenia, as long as Turkey is a
member of the alliance, with whom Armenia has no diplomatic relations,"
said former prime minister and defense minister Vazgen Manukian.

In any event, the tone of the conversation about Armenia and NATO
has changed, with NATO no longer being perceived as merely a hostile
bloc and relations with the alliance now being a subject of pragmatic
discussion.

Oskanian told IWPR that future plans with regard to NATO depended to
a large degree on developments in the rest of the Caucasus.

"It is quite possible that Georgia will really join NATO within the
next five or six years," he said. "Azerbaijan is not yet talking
about NATO membership. As for Armenia, processes are underway which
we can’t stop. It’s hard to say what the next step will be. I think
that a lot will depend on the time frame of Georgia joining NATO. In
any case there is still time."

ARBITERS OF MORALITY: FRANCE AND THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE
by Vinay Lal

The Daily Star, Bangladesh
d611281502114.htm
Nov 28 2006

The French have long believed in themselves as one of the supreme
arbiters of the moral history of humanity, as exercising a unique
civilizing mission on less fortunate parts of the world, and the
ardor with which they cling to an exalted vision of themselves as
moral legislators has clearly not diminished over the years.

On October 12, the French Assembly approved, by a vote of 106-19,
legislation that would make it a crime in France to deny that the mass
killings of Armenians which took place between 1915-17 in Ottoman
Turkey constitute "genocide." The Senate vote is still awaited,
but following in the wake of legislation from 2001 under which the
mass killings of Armenians are recognized as genocide, the present
legislation seems headed for approval.

France has nearly 500,000 Armenians, more than any other country in
Western Europe, and it would be idle to pretend that politicians do not
court minorities. However, Turks too number over 300,000 in France,
and one can be certain that the recent legislation will aggravate
their mood of discontent. Whatever the appeals to the Armenian-French
constituency, this legislation must clearly be located within the
vortex of a more complex geopolitics.

Among the considerations that weigh most heavily, one must number the
strained relations between Turkey and the European Union, the suspected
alienation of Muslim minorities from the dominant European cultures
amidst which they find themselves, the growing tensions within the
Muslim ummah, and the wave of Islamophobia which has swept European
countries. The bill will doubtless convey to Turks the message that
they have not yet attained that state of enlightenment which might
warrant their admission into the European Union.

Among the critics of the French legislation is the Turkish writer
Orhan Pamuk, who last year admitted in an interview that Turkey
should be held responsible for the genocide. He was put on trial
for, in effect, insulting the nation and denigrating "Turkishness,"
but immense pressure, largely from the European Union, contributed
to his acquittal by the court. It is altogether likely that the
bill may have been partly motivated by the desire to strengthen the
hand of Turkish secularists and "moderate Muslims," such as Pamuk,
who are viewed as being locked in battle with Muslim extremists and
nationalist hard-liners.

Pamuk nonetheless has criticized the French legislation as an
attempt to stifle freedom of speech and as a betrayal of the ideals
championed by France for over two centuries. In Pamuk’s critique,
framed very much by the parameters of Western liberal thought, when
two or more interpretations vie for attention the more sound position
always prevails.

In 1972, France passed a law which makes it a crime to deny the
Holocaust. Though the Holocaust is far from being the only genocide in
a violence-filled century, it occupies in the West a singular status
as furnishing the paradigmatic instance of genocide and crimes against
humanity. The obsession with the Holocaust has, so to speak, obscured
the recognition of other equally horrific atrocities. The Socialist
legislator, Christophe Masse, in his defense of the bill described it
as helping to "ease the unhealthy rivalry that exists among victims
of genocides and that is fueled by their inequality before the law."

Ironically, this, the only defense of the legislation of any merit
that one might invoke, is also the one that will be categorically
rejected in Europe and the Anglo-American world, and even adduced as
an expression of support for anti-Semitism. Whatever else might be
permitted in the West, any interpretation of the Holocaust which merely
questions its canonical status as the ultimate form of victimhood
opens itself to vicious attack and ridicule.

That a genocide of Armenians took place under Ottoman Turks is
beyond question. Succeeding Turkish governments have not only fudged
the numbers, but claim, astoundingly, that Armenians died mainly on
account of war, disease, and hunger. In Turkey, by way of contrast with
France, the admission of an Armenian genocide can lead to criminal
prosecution. However, not only is there overwhelming evidence to
establish that the death of Armenians was the consequence of a policy
of deliberate policy, but the Turkish government at the conclusion of
World War I itself court-martialed, before the world, the Young Turks
(or CUP leaders) by whose orders a genocide was perpetrated.

As Peter Balakian has so amply demonstrated in The Burning
Tigris: The Armenian Genocide and America’s Response (2003), the
government-appointed Commission of Inquiry gathered insurmountable
evidence of the massacres and it became part of the official record.

If the Turkish government of that day set an example to the world
in creating the model for war crimes trials, the present Turkish
government has unfortunately chosen to make a foolish spectacle of
itself by its denial of the genocide.

But what of France? The history of French colonial rule in Algeria,
Indochina, Haiti, the Ivory Coast, Congo Brazzaville, and elsewhere
is littered with corpses of colonized people. The assassinations
of Algerians settled in France remain unpunished more than four
decades after Algeria’s declaration of independence, and it is no
more shocking that the French National Assembly in February 2005
passed a law requiring school children to be taught "the positive
role of the French presence overseas, notably in North Africa."

As the unrest of recent years suggests, France’s treatment of its
own North African minorities leaves much to be desired. If France
wished to be daring, it might consider enacting legislation that
would make it an offence to deny French colonial atrocities. That is
exceedingly unlikely. Colonizing nations can be stripped of their
colonial possessions, but they find it exceedingly difficult to
shed their past and their habits of evasion of responsibility. The
passage of the recent legislation on the Armenian question, far from
signifying any enlightened view, is the most decisive indicator of
France’s inability to own up to its wretched colonial past.

"WHERE ARE YOU, WOMEN?"

A1+
[05:03 pm] 27 November, 2006

On November 25 a number of young people with candles and posters walked
from the Cascade to the Republic Square, towards the Foreign Ministry,
and read an open letter to the RA Foreign Minister. The participants
of the march wanted more women specialists to participate in the
process of settlement of the Karabakh conflict.

"It can play a major role in the settlement of the conflict",
said the members of the women’s coalition "Women for peace in South
Caucasus". They reminded Vardan Oskanyan that in 1991 the RA ratified
the convention eliminating all the forms of discrimination against
women. The participants of the march asked the Foreign Minister to
support the women in having their contribution to the settlement of
the conflict.

By the way, both women and men participated in the march. They
distributed leaflets to the passers-by which said, "The voice of the
women should be heard", "Not only warriors, but peace-keepers are
needed for long-lasting peace", and "Where are you, women?".

Press Release
Catholicosate of Cilicia
Communication and Information Department
Contact: V.Rev.Father Krikor Chiftjian, Communications Officer
Tel: (04) 410001, 410003
Fax: (04) 419724
E-mail: [email protected]
Web:

PO Box 70 317
Antelias-Lebanon

Armenian version:

HIS HOLINESS ARAM I RECEIVES METROPOLITAN SALIBA
OF THE SYRIAN ORTHODOX CHURCH

His Holiness Aram I received the Syrian Orthodox Primate of Beirut and Mount
Lebanon, Bishop George Saliba in Antelias on November 25. The Primate
briefed His Holiness about the results of the annual summit between the
spiritual leaders of the Oriental Orthodox Churches in the Middle East, held
a few days ago in Egypt.

At the last minute, His Holiness had cancelled his scheduled trip to Egypt
due to the recent developments in Lebanon. However, Patriarchs Shnouda III,
the Head of the Syrian Orthodox Church and Zakka Iwas I, the Head of the
Coptic Orthodox Church were in permanent contact with the Catholicos during
their meeting, asking for his views on several issues.

Metropolitan Saliba and His Holiness also discussed various issues related
to the current situation in Lebanon.

Dr. Gerges Saleh, the General Secretary of the Middle East Council of
Churches (MECC), also joined the meeting at a later stage. The discussions
in this second part focused on issues related to MECC.

Archbishop Sebouh Sarkissian, Primate of the Diocese of Tehran, also
attended the meeting.

##
The Armenian Catholicosate of Cilicia is one of the two Catholicosates of
the Armenian Orthodox Church. For detailed information about the Ecumenical
activities of the Cilician Catholicosate, you may refer to the web page of
the Catholicosate, The Cilician Catholicosate, the
administrative center of the church is located in Antelias, Lebanon.

PRESS RELEASE
Catholicosate of Cilicia
Communication and Information Department
Contact: V.Rev.Father Krikor Chiftjian, Communications Officer
Tel: (04) 410001, 410003
Fax: (04) 419724
E-mail: [email protected]
Web:

PO Box 70 317
Antelias-Lebanon

Armenian version:

A DELEGATION FROM THE PONTIFICAL MISSION VISITS ANTELIAS

The representatives of the Pontifical Mission of the Vatican visited His
Holiness Aram I in Antelias on November 20. Pontifical Mission is a Catholic
humanitarian organization based in New York. It carries out projects in the
Middle East, Africa and Asia.

The delegation included the organization’s Assistant General Secretary,
Bishop John Fares and representatives from the United States and Canada.

The representatives briefed the Catholicos on the organization’s activities
during the past year, focusing on the projects it carried out in the Middle
East. His Holiness praised the organization’s humanitarian activities,
emphasizing that they should become more ecumenical and take into account
the necessity of Christian-Muslim coexistence in the region.

Speaking on the necessity of revitalizing the presence of Christianity in
the Middle East, His Holiness advised the delegation to consider this factor
while setting up the organization’s agenda.

##
View the photo here:
25.htm

*****

The Armenian Catholicosate of Cilicia is one of the two Catholicosates of
the Armenian Orthodox Church. For detailed information about the Ecumenical
activities of the Cilician Catholicosate, you may refer to the web page of
the Catholicosate, The Cilician Catholicosate, the
administrative center of the church is located in Antelias, Lebanon.

NEW STAMP DEDICATED TO ARMENIAN GENOCIDE ISSUED IN FRANCE
PanARMENIAN.Net
22.11.2006 16:14 GMT+04:00
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ A stamp dedicated to the Armenian Genocide was
issued in France. According to Chian news agency, the stamp printed
by a French philatelist is not sold in post offices. However people
can buy one for 2.5 euros and use it when sending correspondence.
The agency also informs that a conference dedicated to mutual
cooperation of national minorities in Turkey which were subjected
to annihilation and robberies will be held in Versailles November
25. The conference will focus on the past and future of Armenians,
Assyrians, Greeks and Kurds. Outstanding figures of national minorities
and scientists will attend the conference, reports RFE/RL.