Author: Badalian Vardan

ARMENIAN MP ADVISES CZECH MPS TO SET EUROPEAN VALUES BEFORE ENERGY INTERESTS

ARMINFO
Tuesday, March 12, 19:02

As a member of the European Union, the Czech Republic must set
the European values before some energy interests, Armenian MP Naira
Zohrabyan said during a meeting with a Czech Foreign Ministry official
Eliska Zigova on Tuesday.

According to the press service of the Armenian Parliament, Zohrabyan
expressed indignation at the decision of the Czech Parliament’s Foreign
Relations, Defense and Security Commission to adopt a resolution on
“the Khojalu tragedy.” She regrets that the commissioners allowed
the Turkish-Azeri “oil and caviar” diplomacy to mislead them.

Zohrabyan said that if the Czech MPs asked Czech journalist Dana
Mazalova, she would tell them that the real organizers of the Khojalu
were Azeri troops.

Zohrabyan is aware that 25% of the oil imported into the Czech Republic
comes from Azerbaijan and that the Czechs have certain energy interests
in that country. “But if we want to have a European family, we must
not let anybody adopt such shameful resolutions in the parliament of
an EU country,” the Armenian MP said.

PUTTING A TENT IS NOT PROHIBITED BY LAW

02:45 PM | TODAY | POLITICS

The representatives of the Rapid Response Group of Human Rights
Defender’s Office are regularly visiting the presidential candidate,
“Heritage” party leader Raffi Hovhnnisyan who has announced a hunger
strike in Freedom square.

“They are keeping him in the spotlight”, – told “A1+” defender’s
spokesman Naira Karmirshalyan.

Referring to the prohibition of the police of putting a tent Naira
Karmirshalyan mentioned that still during the previous 2011 hunger
strike of Raffi Hovannisian hunger Human Rights defender Karen
Andreasyan stated that placing a tent was not prohibited by law.

TRADE OUTLETS REMOVED IN CENTRAL YEREVAN: NO WAY OUT FOR BOOKSELLERS, PETTY TRADERS

TERT.AM
18:11 ~U 12.03.13

The underground passage at the crossroads of Abovyan and Isahakyan
streets is in confusion: all the trade outlets are being removed.

A man who has for years been selling books there told Tert.am that
the owner of the underground passage intends to renovate the premises
and all the dealers have to leave.

“They say the renovation will take two years. I have to continue in
another place,” he said.

One of the dealers told Tert.am that the premises are owned by
businessman Karen Baghdasarov, Director of Victoria Trade. The company
is trading in grain in Armenia. The dealer said that she was given
$6,000 for leaving the premises.

“They say they are giving us the money for us not to feel hurt. But
I paid 30,000 to 40,000 dollars for this small outlet,” she says.

“I have not found any job. I have to sit around or leave this country,
the latter is more likely,” the woman says.

65-year-old bookseller Suren Martirosyan, whose monthly pension is
AMD 25,000 (about $60), has no idea of what he is going to do.

“I used to sell books in the streets. Then they told us to leave
and work here. But you can see prostitutes in all the streets, but
they do not prohibit street prostitution. Our parliament members are
struggling for higher salaries, but they never ask how people can
live on 25,000 drams a month!”

FRAUD IS A WIDESPREAD PHENOMENON NOW

06:38 PM | TODAY | POLITICS

“Heritage” party representative Anahit Bakhshyan left a message on
his Facebook page for the Constitutional Court.

“I want to make the justice supreme body -Constitutional Court know
that in five polling stations from 1988, which 10/34, 13/39, 27/10,
29/54, 37/77 voted 100 percent of the registered voters.

In these five polling stations only 195 people were registered but
at least with this percentage the elections were rigged. It’s a
pity that our justice is local and subjective and the fraud is a
widespread phenomenon, which does not want to see and prevent our
country’s justice supreme body “,-she wrote.

ARMENIAN MP POSTPONES CONCERT IN GYUMRI

TERT.AM
18:38 ~U 12.03.13

Shushan Petrosyan, an MP from the ruling Republican Party of Armenia
(RPA), has postponed her concert in Gyumri, Armenia’s second largest
city, scheduled for March 13.

“It is not my problem. I would not like clashes, no matter ten people
or more attend my concerts,” Ms Petrosyan told Tert.am.

“I know 13 people plan a meeting for tomorrow. I think clashes are
inevitable with such public sentiments. So I should postpone the
concert until people are more peaceable,” the singer said.

The Hi, Gyumri civil movement is reportedly going to hold a protest
against Shushan Petrosyan on Wednesday. One of the activists said
that the singer “is going to have a cool reception.”

In a televised interview Ms Petrosyan accused Gyumri residents of
being dishonest. She hinted Gyumri voters took election bribes and
were expected to vote for Serzh Sargsyan, but they actually voted
for Raffi Hovannisian.

GROUP DEMANDS ‘MALE BROTHEL’ IN TURKEY

14:24 12/03/2013 ” SOCIETY

The Turkish anti-poverty association, Å~^EFKAT-DER, filed a petition
to Parliament on March 8 asking for permission to open a brothel for
women that would employ males in protest of brothels where women are
employed, Hurriyet reported.

Å~^EFKAT-DER’s head Hayrettin Bulan said they will hold a protest in
Istanbul’s Taksim Square on March 17 to demand a brothel employing men.

Bulan said they were told that men need access to brothels at all
time. “If men have needs, women have needs too. If they see places
where women are slaves for the men, then the places where men will
work for the women should be opened too,” Bulan said.

Source: Panorama.am

ARE RAFFI HOVHANNISYAN’S STEPS ADEQUATE TO THE CURRENT POLITICAL SITUATION?

March 11 2013

“A clergyman, a preacher could have done so, but not a politician.

This is everything, but politics; it lacks political content,” Ruben
Mehrabyan, an expert of the Center for Political and International
Studies, said during a conversation with , analyzing
the steps of Raffi Hovhannisyan, the Heritage Party leader. Let us
remind that Raffi Hovhannisyan, the Heritage Party leader, is on a
hunger strike in Freedom Square. Mr. Hovhannisyan also informed that
they would form their own Cabinet of national accord. Mr. Mehrabyan
thinks that R. Hovhannisyan’s movement doesn’t pursue any political
goals, but slogans, and those tend not to be realized. As for what
situation the steps that are taken can lead to, it was hard for
R. Mehrabyan to predict, and he stated: “The government hasn’t taken
an adequate attitude toward all this either. It is a fact that there
is social protest, and one should do something about that. As for the
opposition’s hunger strikes etc., I can say that we are dealing with
inadequacy from both sides, and this is dangerous insofar as it clears
the way for nonpolitical, apolitical forces to try to fish in these
troubled waters. Those are forces that don’t conceal that they agree
with Putin’s idea. And it is enslavement of the Republic of Armenia.

That fifth column is offered a great opportunity to take matters
into its own hands, while the inadequacy of the government and the
opposition persists. Therefore, it is time to come to one’s senses.”

Tatul Hakobyan, a journalist and an expert, on the other hand, thinks
that R. Hovhannisyan takes steps appropriate for a politician and in
accordance with the Constitution and legislation of the Republic of
Armenia. Then he adds: “Raffi Hovhannisyan, as well as a large part of
citizens of the Republic of Armenia, are convinced that elections have
been rigged in Armenia once again, as it happened in 1996, 2003, and
2008. And he wants to say probably for the first time, not using force,
going on a hunger strike, which is the most radical way of struggle,
that it is time for the Republic of Armenia to have not a de facto,
but a de jure president. He says that the President of the Republic
of Armenia should not take a false oath on the Constitution and the
Bible. R. Hovhannisyan’s steps are adequate to the current situation;
moreover, I think that what he does, regardless of what mockery,
ridicule, what response it gets, he takes steps appropriate for a
politician and in accordance with the Constitution and the law.”

In response to a question whether R. Hovhannisyan’s steps were
convincing, T. Hakobyan said: “I have wandered around with R.

Hovhannisyan in the past ten days as a journalist. During those
meetings, I noticed what popularity he enjoyed. As opposed to Levon
Ter-Petrossian whom roughly 50 percent of the public loves, the other
50 percent hates, there is an absolutely positive attitude toward R.

Hovhannisyan. He thinks that citizens of the Republic of Armenia
voted for him and says that he is ready to fight to the finish. This
peaceful fight is not Raffi’s fight, it is a fight of Armenian voters
against the government and the incumbent president, and they say that
it is enough, they don’t want to have another rigged election. R.

Hovhannisyan’s steps are honest, understandable, justified, and exactly
political steps.” T. Hakobyan also noted: “Two poles of government can
be noticed in the Republic of Armenia these days; one is 26 Baghramyan
St., and the other is Freedom Square. If the other political forces
– the Prosperous Armenia Party (PAP), the Rule of Law Party (RLP),
the Armenian National Congress (ANC), and the Armenian Revolutionary
Federation (ARF) – state that they stand by the people, one should
note that standing by the people is an unclear formulation.

Those parties should clearly state whether they acknowledge the
results of the February 18 election and whom they are standing by.

Many things will be decided in Freedom Square; the more people there
are, the stronger R. Hovhannsyan’s position in the struggle with the
government will be.” Tatev HARUTYUNYAN

Read more at:

© 1998 – 2013 Aravot – News from Armenia

THE HUNGER STRIKE MAY GIVE RENEWED IMPETUS TO THE STRUGGLE, AN ARMENIAN CENTER FOR NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES (ACNIS) EXPERT SAYS

March 11 2013

In Edgar Vardanyan’s Opinion, it will draw more attention to the
struggle Raffi Hovhannisyan stated during a rally in Freedom Square
yesterday that if Serzh Sargsyan “takes a false oath” on April 9,
he would take that oath on his, Raffi Hovhannisyan’s, corpse.

asked Edgar Vardanyan, an expert and a political
scientist of the ACNIS, whether that radical measure was the last step
or it was a step that could be the beginning of a new process. “Hunger
strike is a really radical step, but it doesn’t mean that the one who
takes this radical step has exhausted all the other steps. It is just
that there is a time limit, because deadlines have been announced. The
inauguration day has been mentioned as the deadline, and society has
expectations till that date. I think that taking that into account,
as well as the fact that the government doesn’t want to meet the
opposition’s demands, and it has already employed certain means of
provocation, under these circumstances, Mr. Hovhannisyan took the most
effective step of influencing the people’s minds,” the ACNIS expert
noted. We asked him whether it was a step to influence the people’s
minds or the government’s mind. “I think the people’s minds, because
in that case, the people will pressure the government; I think one
shouldn’t have any delusions about the government’s conscience or
other feelings. This hunger strike will draw more attention to the
struggle and possibly, give renewed impetus to the struggle. Let me
also say that the struggle’s conception is basically Gandhism; it is
just that it is confined to one person for now. It is possible that
this step will lead various citizens, political and social groups who
have espoused this conception to become more active and society to
overcome the state of passiveness, stop being, as it were, an onlooker
and play a more active role,” Edgar Vardanyan said. Emma GABRIELYAN

Read more at:

© 1998 – 2013 Aravot – News from Armenia

TURKISH POLITICAL PARTY OFFICIAL DEMANDS SOLUTION TO PROBLEMS OF IMMIGRANTS FROM ARMENIA

NEWS.AM
March 12, 2013 | 13:01

ISTANBUL. – Turkey’s main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP)
Vice-Chairman Sezgin Tanrikulu demanded that the country’s parliament
study the problems of Turkey’s immigrants from Armenia and offer
respective solutions.

In the petition, which Tanrikulu and his friends addressed to the
chairmanship of the Turkish parliament, it is noted that the parliament
must offer solutions to the problems of not solely Turkish citizens,
but also of every person in the country, Istanbul’s Agos Armenian
bilingual weekly reports.

“As Mr. Premier had noted, there are close to 100,000 residents of
Armenia in our country. If this many people are living and working in
Turkey, I believe this indicates the hospitality of the country. [And]
in this case, it is the parliament’s duty to study the problems of
these people and to offer solutions,” Sezgin Tanrikulu stated.

43,657 VISITED ANI IN 2012

14:57, March 12, 2013

A Hurriyet news article says that 43,657 visitors travelled to the
ancient Armenian city of Ani, almost double the 23,400 that visited
in 2011.

Kars Culture and Tourism Manager Hakan Doganay said there were a
total of 21 main cultural treasures in Ani. “In fact, we call Ani an
iceberg because we know there is a lot to discover and excavate at
Ani,” he said.

Doganay added that if excavations are completed at the site, it could
become one of Turkey’s top tourism sites.