Author: Basmajian Ani

"LET ALL OF US DO OUR DUTIES"
By Hovik Afyan

AZG DAILY
13-02-2010

Armenia-Turkey

Davutoglu called on the countries of the region

"Ankara has sufficient political will to make peace and provide
stability in the Caucasus", Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmed Davutoglu
said when leaving for Kazakhstan (to recall, this country has taken
the OSCE chairmanship this year – H.A.).

Touching upon the Armenian-Turkish processes, Davutoglu underlined
that "serious steps are anticipated to be taken in the nearest
future". According to him, the international community continues
supporting this process.

"We call on the countries of the region and all of them who are
interested in making peace and stability in the region – let all of
us do our duties. I keep repeating – Turkey has sufficient political
will to do it", Davutoglu said.

Anyway, until now Turkey has shown no visible sign of "sufficient
political will" to ratify the Armenian-Turkish protocols without
preconditions and seeing of other countries’ interests in it.

TURKEY, ARMENIA SHOULD HONOUR COMMITMENTS – GUL

news.az
Feb 11 2010
Azerbaijan

Abdullah Gul Turkey and Armenia will continue to work to take the
normalization process forward, President Abdullah Gul said on Thursday.

The normalization process is based upon the understanding reached
between the two countries last year, Gul said.

"We have to be aware that concluding this historic process will require
honouring our commitments in their entirety as well as displaying
adequate political courage and vision," Gul said in his response to
the message of Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan.

Sargsyan’s plane was able to use Turkish air space to fly to London
last week. The Armenian president sent a courtesy message to Gul
while flying over Turkey.

The normalization process faced difficulties following the Armenian
Constitutional Court’s ruling that the protocols signed between Turkey
and Armenia should not breach Article 11 of the country’s Independence
Declaration which says that Armenia will always stand for the worldwide
recognition of the 1915 incidents as genocide. Though the court found
the protocols compatible with the constitution, this reference caused
deep concern in Ankara.

Gul’s point that the process should move forward based on the
understanding reached between the two countries directly refers to
the ongoing row.

"I also agree with you that responsible governance necessitates both
standing behind words and supporting words with deeds," he said.

"Overcoming the long-established prejudices and nurturing mutual
understanding and trust among our two neighbouring peoples were indeed
our main objectives when endorsing the process of normalization between
our countries. You should have no doubt that our determination to
take these objectives forward is intact, provided that this resolve
and commitment remains reciprocal."

The protocols envisaging the opening of the sealed border and
establishment of the diplomatic relations between the two neighbouring
countries are yet to be ratified by the parliaments and so have not
come into force.

PRESIDENT SERZH SARGSYAN SENT A CONGRATULATORY MESSAGE TO ZORI BALAYAN ON THE OCCASION OF HIS 75TH ANNIVERSARY

president.am
Feb 10 2010
Armenia

The message states:

"Dear Mr. Balayan,

I cordially congratulate you on the occasion of your 75th anniversary.

Our society knows you well – a principled public figure, whose
masterful and prolific writings have been reflecting upon the most
crucial and urgent matters of the Armenian life for decades. You
have not only flagged the most burning issues but also proposed
their solutions.

Fight for Karabakh’s freedom, which you joined from day one, has
been a turning point not only in our nation’s but in your personal
life, and later has been encouraged by your tireless activities. You
also became a pivotal figure on a new battlefield of ideology and
propaganda: Your publications about Artsakh’s fight for freedom have
become a unique chronology of events and can serve as an original
documentary source for the historians.

I greatly appreciate and cherish your personality of an enthusiastic
figure and intellectual, who is feeling deeply for the problems and
concern of our nation. I also admire your dedication and boundless
energy which you manifested throughout the voyages of Cilicia and
Armenia sailboats.

I wish you excellent health, happiness and new achievements that will
undoubtedly come as a results of your restless spirit, talented pen,
and inquisitive mind."

MISHAAL: WASHINGTON STRIVES TO ABORT PALESTINIAN RECONCILIATION

PIC
09/02/2010 – 08:35 AM

MOSCOW, (PIC)– Khaled Mishaal, the head of Hamas’s political bureau,
has accused the United States of trying to foil Palestinian efforts
to achieve the national reconciliation by pressuring Fatah leader
Mahmoud Abbas not to go ahead with it.

In a press conference he held after meeting Sergey Lavrov, the Russian
foreign minister, in Moscow on Monday, Mishaal reaffirmed Hamas’s
readiness to sign the reconciliation paper if its reservations on it
were taken into consideration.

He also welcomed any Russian or international role to back the Egyptian
efforts in this regard in order to end the Palestinian political rift.

Meanwhile, Mishaal hailed the Russian support for Hamas Movement,
adding that it reflected Moscow’s keenness to deal with all essential
players in the region.

He also denied suggestions that Moscow lowered its level of
relationship with Hamas, highlighting that he met with high-ranking
Russian officials including Lavrov and deputy foreign minister
Sultanov, which he said was the third meeting since Hamas won the PA
legislative elections in 2006.

Furthermore, Mishaal called on the international community to carry
out its mandate in rebuilding Gaza Strip, which was devastated by
the brutal Israeli war on it last year, saying that the financing
for the reconstruction was available and needs only international
and Arab mechanisms to facilitate the process.

Lavorv, for his part, pointed out that the meeting with Hamas’s
delegation touched on a number of points including enhancing Egypt’s
efforts to achieve the Palestinian unity.

Mishaal’s visit to Moscow was in response to an official Russian
invitation to the Movement that grabbed broad media attention in that
influential country.

V.HOVHANNISYAN:THE ARMENIAN ADDRESS WAS A RECALL FOR THE TURKISH

Aysor
Feb 10 2010
Armenia

"By the address the RA President Serzh Sargsyan tried to remind his
Turkish counterpart that today it is the turn of Turkey to make a
step", – thinks the RFA member Vahan Hovhannisyan.

Today the politician noted that by the address the Armenian side warns
Turkey that Armenian – Turkish reconciliation process is endangered.

"This type of address can be called an acceptable practice but not
obligatory: it is possible to omit it as well", – V. Hovhannisyan said.

Coming to the statements of Ankara concerning to the decision of the
Constitutional Court the RFA member said that they were not accidental.

"All those who were persuading us that there are no preconditions in
the protocols are caught now", – said Mr. Hovhannisyan and added that
the "nervous reaction" of Turkey towards the Constitutional Court’s
decision shows that Ankara saw the preconditions which they had ptu
forward by themselves.

"When it became clear that the Constitutional Court was trying to
get rid of those preconditions they got into panic", – the speaker
said mentioning that the Turkish side felt bad of it.

"That’s why this bad feeling is expressed by such statements", –
summed up Vahan Hovhannisyan.

6 YEREVAN BUILDINGS TO BE RECONSTRUCTED THIS YEAR FOR EARTHQUAKE SAFETY

Tert.am
10:56 ~U 09.02.10

In 2010, 500 million AMD has been allocated for strengthening and
reconstructing multi-level buildings that have been defined as being
at level three in terms of being an earthquake hazard.

As told to Tert.am by the head of the construction and organization
department at Yerevan City Hall, Frunz Basentsyan, 6 buildings will
be reconstructed during this year in the Armenian capital on the
following streets: Ararat, Gyumri, Komitas, Shopron and two on Kievyan.

January 1 data of this year indicated that there are 82 buildings in
the city that have reached the third-level danger zone in terms of
earthquake safety.

EDMONDS MAN PLEADS GUILTY IN OBAMA-AS-HITLER POSTER SCUFFLE

Seattle Times
ews/2010986711_gasparian5m.html
Feb 5 2010
WA

An Edmonds man who was charged with assault and jailed after he
confronted two supporters of Lyndon LaRouche over their Obama-as-Hitler
poster in September, pleaded guilty to disorderly conduct on Wednesday.

By Lynn Thompson Seattle Times Snohomish County reporter

DEAN RUTZ / THE SEATTLE TIMES

Henry Gasparian said he still believed he had ‘done right.’

An Edmonds man who was charged with assault and jailed after he
confronted two supporters of Lyndon LaRouche over their Obama-as-Hitler
poster in September, pleaded guilty to disorderly conduct on Wednesday.

Henry Gasparian, 71, who witnessed the horrors of Nazi Germany’s
invasion of the Soviet Union as a child, and lost a brother and
two uncles to the war, agreed to a deferred sentence in Edmonds
Municipal Court.

Under the terms of the plea agreement, the case will be dismissed
after one year if Gasparian has no further criminal charges, said
his lawyer Mike Noah, of Puyallup. Noah volunteered to represent
Gasparian after reading an account of his arrest in The Seattle Times.

Gasparian also agreed to pay a $400 fine.

His arrest coincided with the increasingly polarized national debate
over health care and attracted widespread media attention and debate
over the civility of public discourse and the limits of free speech.

An Armenian immigrant and retired salesman, Gasparian appeared on
many radio and TV news broadcasts and said he received letters of
support from around the world.

He said he was deeply offended by the association of Obama with
Hitler when he approached two Lyndon LaRouche campaign workers
at the Edmonds Farmers Market and tried to grab their political
literature. The two activists said he grabbed one of their wrists
and pushed them repeatedly.

In accepting the plea agreement, Edmonds Municipal Court Judge
Douglas Fair told Gasparian that while the Hitler image may have
been upsetting, the U.S. Constitution protects even objectionable
political speech.

After the court hearing, Gasparian said he still believed he had
"done right" in challenging the two LaRouche supporters but was
persuaded that a jury could find him guilty of two counts of assault,
the original charges against him.

He said he also did not want to raise the memories of his parents, who
withstood the hardships of the Nazi occupation, or of the relatives
who had died, before a jury of strangers "who might not care who
Hitler was."

"I think I did the right thing, but maybe I should not have been so
physical," Gasparian said.

ARMENIAN NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL SECRETARY MEETS EU DELEGATION

news.am
Feb 5 2010
Armenia

Chairman of the Interagency Commission for Coordination of Armenia’s
cooperation with European agencies and Secretary of the RA National
Security Council Artur Baghdasaryan held a meeting February 5 with
a delegation led by Ayli Rubulsi, Political and Economic Affairs
Executive, EU Foreign Affairs Directorate Armenia office, as well as
Head of the EU delegation to Armenia Raul de Luzenberger.

The press office of the RA National Security Council told NEWS.am
that the sides discussed the EU-Armenia cooperation.

Baghdasaryan pointed out successful implementation of the EU-Armenia
program of action as part of the European Neighborhood policy and
fundamental reforms in various fields.

Ribulsi presented a new plan of institutional reforms as part of the
European Neighborhood policy. The plan provides for the consolidation
of Armenia’s administrative agencies simultaneously with discussions
of agreements on free trade, security, justice and freedom agreements.

RA FOREIGN MINISTER: CLOSE COOPERATION WITH ALL OIC STATES SHOULD BE ESTABLISHED

PanARMENIAN.Net
03.02.2010 19:25 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Members of Organisation of the Islamic Conference
(OIC) express unilateral agreement, where non-Muslim state is
concerned, Armenian Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian stated at
governmental sitting, in reply to Prosperous Armenia parliamentary
group member Naira Zohrabyan’s question on Khojalu events.

As Edward Nalbandian noted, though RA collaborates with OIC states
hosting Armenian embassies, closer cooperation has to be established
with all members of the organisation to prevent anti-Armenian
resolutions.

The Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC) is an international
organisation with a permanent delegation to the United Nations. It
groups 57 member states, from the Middle East, Africa, Central Asia,
Caucasus, Balkans, Southeast Asia and South Asia. The official
languages of the organisation are Arabic, English and French.

Since the nineteenth century, many Muslims had aspired to uniting the
Muslim ummah to serve their common political, economic, and social
interests. Despite the presence of secularist, nationalist, and
socialist ideologies, in modern Muslim states, they have cooperated
together to form the Organisation of the Islamic Conference. The
formation of the OIC happened in the backdrop of the loss of Muslim
holy sites in Jerusalem. The final cause sufficiently compelled
leaders of Muslim nations to meet in Rabat to establish the OIC on
September 25, 1969.

According to its charter, the OIC aims to preserve Islamic social and
economic values; promote solidarity amongst member states; increase
cooperation in social, economic, cultural, scientific, and political
areas; uphold international peace and security; and advance education,
particularly in the fields of science and technology.

SIX HELD OVER PEOPLE TRAFFICKING

BBC NEWS
/8497941.stm
2010/02/04 11:37:08 GMT

Six people have been arrested on suspicion of people trafficking
after a 15-year-old Armenian girl tried to enter the UK using a
Latvian passport.

Two Armenian men, aged 49 and 25, and two Latvian women, aged 33 and
26, were stopped in North Shields on Friday.

The UK Border Agency said they were headed for Manchester.

Two other Armenian men, aged 30 and 19, were later arrested on
suspicion of people trafficking. All six have been released on bail.

The girl has been taken into the care of the local authority.

Det Insp Graham Brown, of the North East Immigration Crime Team, said:
"The safety and wellbeing of the young girl is of paramount importance
to all the agencies involved in this investigation.

"Trafficking and facilitation are serious offences which often involve
young and vulnerable members from the international community."