Author: Baghdasarian Karlen

NO POLITICAL SOLUTION TO NAGORNO-KARABAKH PROBLEM

Tert.am
13:04 08.09.11

The superpowers do not want the Nagorno-Karabakh problem to be
resolved. It is as clear as day, the political scientist Igor Muradyan
told journalists, as he spoke of the Nagorno-Karabakh peace process.

According to him, the states involved in the peace process have
arrived at the conclusion that maintaining status quo is the best
option, which is “good” for the international community as well.

“All of them have come to realize that the problem has no political
solution. Unleashing a war is a real way of settling the problem,
but no one wants it,” Muradyan said. The superpowers will not allow
the conflicting parties to resume hostilities – they have invested
billions of U.S. dollars in oil extraction in the region, he added.

“In Azerbaijan, they all – both generals and the country’s leaders
– are really afraid to resume hostilities. Azerbaijan will resume
hostilities only after it gets permission from Turkey,” Muradyan said.

“It would be right admit the erroneousness of our previous policy
instead of continuing it,” Muradyan said as he spoke of Armenia’
further steps.

From: Baghdasarian

‘WE FIND IT HARD TO BELIEVE…’ US ANALYSIS OF 2009 YEREVAN MAYORAL ELECTION

epress.am
09.08.2011 10:52

On Jun. 18, 2009, then US Charge d’Affaires in Yerevan Joseph
Pennington sent an unclassified cable to the US State Department,
analyzing the results of the May 31 mayoral election in the Armenian
capital. Pennington notes that the election displays a “curious
pattern”:

“Voter turnout was highest in the Territorial Electoral Commissions
(TECs) most ridden with allegations of fraud. This is most apparent in
the results of TECs 7 and 8, which comprise the troubled district of
Malatia-Sebastia… and parts of the adjacent Shengavit and Ajapnyak
districts, [where] over 40 of their combined 66 precincts recorded
voter turnout of over 60 percent, compared to an overall average
turnout of 53.5 percent.”

In the cable released by WikiLeaks late last month, Pennington states
that the Armenian National Congress results show that this opposition
bloc performed best where voter turnout was lowest, “most likely
because these TECs were not the main targets of ballot stuffing and
other forms of electoral fraud.”

“In the end, however, we will never know how many votes the RPA
[the Republican Party of Armenia] won legitimately, and how many were
fraudulent. We nevertheless find it hard to believe that RPA won fair
and square the forty percent of votes it needed to gain a majority
in the city council, and more importantly, the right to elevate its
top candidate to the post of mayor. We also find it hard to believe
that the ANC won only five precincts in the recent election, down from
the 80-plus it won in the 2008 presidential election,” concludes the
US diplomat.

From: Baghdasarian

AZERBAIJANI MINISTER REPEATS POLLUTION CHARGE AGAINST ARMENIA

news.az
Sept 7 2011
Azerbaijan

Ecology Minister Huseyngulu Bagirov has again accused Armenia of
deliberately polluting rivers that rise in its territory and flow
through Azerbaijan.

He told the 11th international forum in Gabala on the disposal of
pesticides that Georgia also polluted the rivers but did not do
so deliberately.

“The Kur, Araz and Samur rivers all rise outside Azerbaijan, and
therefore we cannot control the quality of the water in these rivers,”
Bagirov said.

“They are mainly polluted by our neighbours. For example, industrial
waste is discharged into the Kur River in friendly Georgia. We
understand that Georgia does not yet have the capacity to purify the
river. But, unlike Georgia, Armenia deliberately pollutes the rivers,
which flow to Azerbaijan from its territory. As a result, we face
serious problems and have installed modular cleaning stations in
the villages.”

Oil clean-up

Bagirov went on to say that Azerbaijan was still tackling environmental
problems inherited from the Soviet era.

“Oil used to be produced in Azerbaijan using the most basic industrial
methods and as a result some 35,000 hectares of land on the Absheron
Peninsula were polluted with oil products and now need cleaning up,”
the minister said.

“Hundreds of hectares of land on the peninsula are cleaned up every
year. Three or four years ago you could see oil-polluted land from
the main road into town from the airport, but now that land has been
cleaned up. Work has almost finished there and 100,000 trees have
been planted.”

The forum on the safe use of pesticides is attended by over 120
experts, donors, government and non-governmental organizations,
scientists and entrepreneurs from 40 countries.

The forum is supported by the Ecology and Natural Resources Ministry,
Agriculture Ministry and the International HCH and Pesticides
Association, the Czech-based RECETOX (Research Centre for Toxic
Compounds in the Environment) and Masaryk University and the German
Agency for the Environment (UBA).

From: Baghdasarian

RUSSIAN-ARMENIAN BUSINESSMAN’S GIFT TO GADDAFI WAS A HORSE – NEWSPAPER

news.am
Sept 7 2011
Armenia

YEREVAN. – The triumphant Libyan rebels and NATO forces are searching
for Muammar Gaddafi throughout Libya and even entire Africa. And
as methodical assistance, the Armenian Aravot daily proposes its
hypothesis: “Not Colonel Gaddafi but the Akhaltekin breed of horse
must be searched for, which Russian-Libyan Business Council co-chairman
Ara Abrahamyan had presented to the tyrant a mere 3 years ago.

If the horse is found, it is possible that the animal itself might
lead the searchers to its master,” Aravot writes.

From: Baghdasarian

ARMENIAN STATE LANGUAGE INSPECTORATE REGISTERS 60 VIOLATIONS IN 2011 – INSPECTORATE ACTING HEAD

news.am
Sept 7 2011
Armenia

YEREVAN. – In 2011, the State Language Inspectorate registered, in
Yerevan, 60 violations of the law “On Language,” and 21 of them were
signboard violations. In 7 of those 21 violations the mistake was
corrected, whereas reports were prepared in 14 cases, informed today
Armenian State Language Inspectorate’s acting head, Sergo Yeritsyan.

“The Armenian Prosecutor General’s Office has dealt with this matter,
too, and it also has registered 120 violations by businessmen,
notices are made, and some things have changed,” Yeritsyan added. Ever
since changes in the law “On Language” were put into force in July,
certain clarifications are made in the legislation. In Yeritsyan’s
words, now there is a precise legislative methodology, for example,
toward signboards.

And the fines have doubled, as instead of the former 50-75 thousand
drams ($134-$201 US), now they range between 100 and 300 times of
the minimum wage. And according to Sergo Yeritsyan, literary Armenian
must be foremost in the advertisement.

From: Baghdasarian

19-YEAR-OLD ARMENIAN SOLDIER IS ACCIDENTALLY KILLED BY FELLOW SOLDIER – NKR DEFENSE ARMY

news.am
Sept 7 2011

STEPANAKERT. – On September 7, NKR Defense Army soldier Hayk Lazarian
died from the shots fired by military serviceman Lendrush Nazlukhanyan,
in violation of the rules on handling weapons, NKR Defense Army’s
press service informed Armenian News-NEWS.am.

Investigation Service of the Armenian MOD has launched a criminal
case into the affair, and an inquiry is underway.

The 19-year-old Lazarian, who was recruited from Etchmiadzin, Armenia,
was killed at 7 a.m. at a military unit in Askeran, NKR.

From: Baghdasarian

REPORTERS CONDEMN AZERBAIJANI LOCAL SELF GOVERNMENT BODY’S ATTITUDE TOWARDS MASS MEDIA

ARMENPRESS
19:08, 7 September, 2011

“Reporters without Borders” organization released an official
statement on the expulsion of Azerbaijani reporter Hafez Hasanov
from Nakhichevan.

Armenpress reports citing the organization’s official website that
the statement says Reporters Without Borders ‘is appalled by the
unacceptable escalation in harassment of the media by the authorities
in Nakhchivan, an autonomous Azerbaijani exclave between Armenia and
Iran, especially last week’s expulsion of Yafez Hasanov, Radio Free
Europe / Radio Liberty reporter.

Hasanov was abducted on 31 August by three unidentified men in
plain-clothes using the kind of car that government security officials
normally drive. They drove him to the Iranian border and told him to
return to the Azerbaijani capital of Baku via Iran. If he set foot
in Nakhchivan during the next month, “it will cost you,” they told him.

“After death threats and intimidation, Nakhchivan’s authorities
are displaying exceptional inventiveness in expanding their already
complete repressive arsenal against the media,” Reporters Without
Borders said. “Their latest invention, deporting a journalist
from his own country to one that criminalizes journalism, shows a
complete contempt for legal appearances and a feeling of complete
impunity. How far will they have to go before the central government
and the international community decide to do something to half this
escalation?”

Hasanov had gone to the Julfa district of Nakhchivan to investigate
Turac Zeynalov’s death in detention, a story that the local authorities
are trying at all costs to suppress because it exposes the cruelty
of the methods they use. Hasanov’s abductors told him not to meddle,
took his passport and returned it with an exit stamp when they reached
the border. Once inside Iran, Hasanov managed to return to Baku by
taxi the next day. This entailed a degree of risk as RFE/ RL has been
classified as an “illegal organization” by the Iranian authorities.

From: Baghdasarian

YEREVAN’S 2,793RD ANNIVERSARY TO BE CELEBRATED ON SEPTEMBER 21 ALONG WITH 20TH ANNIVERSARY OF ARMENIA’S INDEPENDENCE

ARKA
Sep 7, 2011

YEREVAN, September 7. /ARKA/. Armenian government will consider
Thursday the Yerevan municipality’s proposal to mark the city day
on September 21, the day of declaration of Armenia’s independence,
this year.

Explaining the city authorities’ proposal on its official website, the
government says that the 20th anniversary of Armenia’s independence
will be celebrated in a big way. Therefore it would be reasonable
to hold the City Day’s festivities along with the Independence Day
celebration.

Yerevan (ancient Urartu kingdom’s Erebuni) was founded in 782 B.C.

Erebuni’s ruins are on Arin-Berd Hill in Yerevan. The city was founded
by Urartian King Argishti I.

In accordance with an appropriate governmental decision, the Day of
Yerevan is celebrated on the second Saturday of October.

From: Baghdasarian

ONLY 10% OF ARMY DEATHS COMBAT-RELATED, CLAIMS NGO HEAD

hetq
18:22, September 7, 2011

At a September 6 press conference, Artur Sakunts, Head of Helsinki
Citizens’ Assembly-Vanadzor, stated that according to RA Ministry of
Defense stats, of the 306 death cases recorded during 2005-2011, only
10 % were due to violations of cease-fire rule, i.e. combat related.

According to Sakunts, 32 out of the 228 death cases during 2007-2011
were only due to violation of truce. By the human rights activists’
words, the Supreme Commander-in-Chief is responsible for the death
cases in the Forced Army, while negligence and inactivity on his part
is inconceivable.

From: Baghdasarian

TRAFFIC IN CENTRAL PARTS OF CAPITAL TO BE STOPPED SEPTEMBER 11

ARMENPRESS
16:56, 7 September, 2011

September 11 from 6.00 am to 11.00 am the traffic in a number of
streets of the capital will be stopped in connection with the rehearsal
of the parade dedicated to the 20th anniversary of independence
of Armenia. Police press service reported that the traffic will be
stopped in Moskovian, Sarian, Amirian streets, Republican Square,
Sayat Nova avenue.

From: Baghdasarian