Author: Chalian Meline

Today’s Zaman, Turkey
Nov 23 2008

`Turkey’s Caucasus initiative has improved Turkish-Armenian relations’

The tension between Georgia and Russia, which led to war in August,
changed the balance of power in the Caucasus, as well as around the
world, and Turkey and Armenia have benefited from it, according to
specialists who came together for a discussion of Turkish-Armenian
relations in Yerevan.

Turkish-Armenian relations gained momentum after a regional crisis
erupted following a Georgian military offensive in its Russian-backed
breakaway region of South Ossetia and Ankara came up with a proposal
to prevent such disputes in the future. The Turkish government
promoted a platform called the Caucasus Stability and Cooperation Pact
(CSP) supported by visits to Moscow, Tbilisi and Baku. Armenia backed
the idea as well. `The Caucasus stability initiative made Turkey
engage directly with Armenia. Even if the initiative dies, this is the
positive outcome,’ said Sabiha Senyücel from the Turkish
Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV).

She also said the idea did not come out of the blue and that Turkish
and Armenian officials have been negotiating for the past two
years. `But still, the CSP initiative served very well to prepare the
ground for direct talks with Armenia,’ she added. Turkey severed its
ties with Armenia in the early 1990s in protest of the Armenian
occupation of the Azerbaijani territory of Nagorno-Karabakh. Turkish
official policy requires that the normalization of ties depends on
Armenian withdrawal from Nagorno-Karabakh as well as the termination
of Armenia’s support for claims of an Armenian genocide at the hands
of the Ottoman Empire and the official recognition of the current
borders between the two countries by Armenia.

However, a chief Turkish foreign policy adviser signaled recently that
Turkey may modify its stance on the Nagorno-Karabakh issue. Ahmet
DavutoÄ?lu, a major architect of the foreign policies of the
Turkish government, said in Washington in late October that unlike its
unchanged position on the Armenian claims of genocide, the Turkish
government may consider dropping or modifying its preconditions
related to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

Senyücel told Sunday’s Zaman that if this becomes reality, then
a major obstacle before Turkish-Armenian dialogue will be removed.

`For Turkey to have a stronger and freer hand in its initiatives
including the CSP, it needs to continue the rapprochement process with
Armenia. And on this, the resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict
occupies a vital place,’ she said. Sergey Minasyan, the head of the
political studies department at the Caucasus Institute in Yerevan,
said that the main problem between Armenia and Turkey is not the
Nagorno-Karabakh issue. `If Turkey understands that, too, it will be
very good,’ he told Sunday’s Zaman.

He reiterated that both Azerbaijanis and Armenians are concerned about
the increasing Russian influence in the region. So even though they
recently signed a pact with Russia, following the ceremony they paid
visits to their traditional allies. `After signing the pact, the
Armenian president went to Paris, and the Azerbaijani president went
to Ankara for support,’ he said referring to the joint declaration
signed by Armenian President Serzh Sarksyan and Azerbaijani President
Ä°lham Aliyev in Moscow in the presence of Russian President
Dmitry Medvedev at the beginning of November.

Proposed last month by Medvedev, the talks have been interpreted as a
renewed Kremlin effort to strengthen its influence in the energy-rich
Caspian region. Nagorno-Karabakh has been under the control of ethnic
Armenian forces since a six-year conflict that killed about 30,000 and
displaced 1 million people before a truce was reached in 1994. Some
clashes have continued, and international efforts to settle the
conflict have failed. Back in September, the foreign ministers of
Turkey, Armenia and Azerbaijan came together in a trilateral meeting
on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York to discuss
efforts to resolve the bitter territorial dispute.

Masis Mayilian, an independent expert from Nagorno-Karabakh, said that
if Turkey stays neutral as a mediator, it can influence Azerbaijan to
reach a settlement. However, he said Turkey’s `brotherly’ feelings
toward its regional ally, Azerbaijan, harm its neutral role.

The specialists gathered in Yerevan on Friday at the Caucasus
Institute to hold a workshop titled `Turkey-Armenia Dialogue Series:
Breaking the Vicious Cycle.’ It was jointly organized by TESEV and the
Caucasus Institute.

23 November 2008, Sunday
AYÅ?E KARABAT ANKARA

ALI BABACAN: ANKARA AND BAKU STAND A GOOD CHANCE TO NORMALIZE RELATIONS WITH ARMENIA

PanARMENIAN.Net
21.11.2008 12:33 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Turkey and Azerbaijan can normalize relations with
Armenia, according to the Turkish Foreign Minister.

"We have a good chance to normalize relations and we should not miss
it," Ali Bacacan was quoted by Cihan news agency as saying.

Armenian Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian will be in Istanbul
on November 24 to attend a meeting of the BSEC secretariat and to
present Armenia’s plan of activities in the tenure of its presidency
in the organizations.

The Armenian Genocide will be in focus of talks between Minister Ali
Babacan and his Armenian counterpart, Burak Ozugergin, a spokesman
for the Turkish Foreign Ministry said Thursday.

"Everything is on the table," Ozugergin said. "We are not precluding
anything. The Ministers will take up bilateral issues, including the
1915 events and perhaps regional issues that could include relations
with Azerbaijan."

ACTION AGAINST CONCESSIONS IN KARABAKH ISSUE HELD IN FRONT OF ARMENIAN FOREIGN MINISTRY

Today.Az
cs/49152.html
Nov 21 2008
Azerbaijan

The protest against the territorial concessions was held in front of
the Armenian Foreign Ministry in Yerevan on November 21.

The action participants sent a petition to Armenian Foreign Minister
Edward Nalbandyan with a demand not to cede a single piece of land.

"Possible ceding of any of the liberated lands is a crime against
the Armenian statehood and an inadmissible aggression against the
life of Armenian soldiers", says the petition.

Armenian police officers were deployed near the Foreign Ministry.

No incidents were recorded and after long talks between the organizers
of the action and police the event ended peacefully.

The organizer of the event was Miatsum initiative.

Film director Tigran Khzmalyan, head of the organization "Protection
of liberated lands" Jirayr Sefilyan, participan of the initiative
Alexander Kakanyan and others got involved into the meeting,.

The participants had stands with slogans "Artsakh-Armenia-unification",
"Tho se who cede land are betrayers" and so on.

According to deputy of the Heritage parliamentary faction Heritage
Zarui Postandjan told reporters that the action ended under police
pressure, which stated that the event is not sanctioned.

The deputy noted that the protest also involved representatives
of Armenian ombudsman, who fixed the fact of creating obstacles in
holding the action.

Postandjan promised that she will raise the issue in the Armenian
parliament about the lawfulness of such actions of the police,
especially because the action participants raised such an important
issue for the Armenian statehood.

IT IS NO COINCIDENCE THAT SONY ERICSSON’S OFFICIAL DEALER IN ARMENIA DECIDED TO ‘AMAZE’ THE MARKET WITH NEW SERVICE

ArmInfo
2008-11-19 17:37:00

ArmInfo. Sony Ericsson’s official dealer in Armenia decided to "amaze"
the market with new "unprecedented" service. The company store of
cellular telephones offered the population extremely unprofitable
conditions of service by banking cards. If a mobile telephone and
accessories are bought by cards of the Armenian Card national payment
system, the seller adds 2% of the goods value to the price, and 3%
in case of purchase by cards of Visa and Master Card international
systems. The store didn’t specify what marketing solutions made Sony
Ericsson representatives choose work principles running counter to
international standards, however, the store said that the issue of
levying the commission fee in case of cashless settlement by cards
was discussed with INECOBANK which secures transactions through its
own POS-terminal.

Meanwhile, David Makaryan, the head of INECOBANK plastic cards
department, denied pointblank any agreements with Sony Ericsson on
levying commission fees, and this contradicts both the regulations
of the bank’s work and basic principles of securing payment
operations. According to him, levied commission fees are the initiative
of the store itself, and unfortunately, it is impossible to see whether
the merchant partner observes the terms of the contract with the bank.

However, in a conversation with ArmInfo correspondent, the financial
director of a large merchant network which has been operating in the
Armenian market for over 3 years and has acquired no POS-terminals
yet, complained of extremely unprofitable terms of acquiring. The
director, who preferred to remain anonymous, said that banks want to
levy high commission fees from transactions – up to 3% of the deal,
in extremis – up to 2.75%.

Moreover, he thinks that banks have a quite jealous attitude
to possible installation of one more POS- terminal of a
bank-competitor. The banks demand exclusive rights for themselves
even despite the fact that in the overwhelming majority of cases
terminals are capable to serve the cards of only one international
payment system in addition to the national one. "As a famous brand,
eventually we’ll have to launch POS- terminals in our network,
however, the terms we are offered may affect our price policy", –
the interlocutor said explaining the reason of Sony Ericsson dealers’
behavior in the quite competitive market.

To note, the Armenian government has prepared a new draft law on
acquiring development. The legislative decision implies compulsory
installation of POS-terminals for merchant enterprises occupying a
trade area from 100 sq.m.

since 2009; from 50 sq.m. since 2010, from 15 sq.m. since
2011. According to experts, the law provisions may seriously change
the volume of installed terminal equipment and abruptly increase the
cashless payments in economy.

Experts think this decision may cause a slight growth in prices of
certain kinds of goods.

AZERBAIJAN’S TERRITORIAL INTEGRITY MUST NOT BE DAMAGED – AZERI OFFICIAL

Interfax
Nov 18 2008
Russia

BAKU. Nov 17 (Interfax-Azerbaijan) – Azerbaijan is ready to grant
"a broad status" to Nagorno Karabakh within Azerbaijan’s territorial
integrity, said Novruz Mamedov, the head of the presidential staff’s
foreign relations department on Monday.

"Baku has always been ready to grant any status to Nagorno Karabakh
within the framework of Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity. We could
grant Nagorno Karabakh the broadest possible status only in the
framework of sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity of
Azerbaijan," Mamedov said.

Azerbaijan’s position is based on the current world practice, he
also said.

"The country’s territorial integrity must not be violated. This is
not being discussed so far. Concerning national self- determination,
Armenians did decide on this once already. The world will never
accept the emergence of Armenian states whenever Armenians live. No
one will accept this. Azerbaijan will never recognize this, either,"
Mamedov said.

CEMETERIES PROFANED

Hayots Ashkhar Daily
18 Nov 08
Armenia

There was an attempt to profane cemeteries in Tbilisy.

On November 16, at 01.00 p.m. some tried to profane two famous
cemeteries of Mikhael Ivanovich and Lydia Petrovna, belonging to
Tamamshevs, located in the territory of Surb Norashen church.

RUSSIAN CO-CHAIR OF OSCE MINSK GROUP: IT IS HARD TO EXPECT INTERPRETATION OF MOSCOW DECLARATION IN ARMENIA TO COMPLETELY COINCIDE WITH THAT IN AZERBAIJAN

ArmInfo
2008-11-17 15:45:00

ArmInfo. "It is hard to expect interpretation of the Moscow Declaration
in Azerbaijan to completely coincide with that in Armenia, Russian
Co-chairman of OSCE Minsk Group Yuri Merzlyakov said during a
press-conference, Monday.

"It is also hard to imagine complete unanimity on this issue in both
countries", – he said.

He also added it is difficult for him to comment on the statements made
in Azerbaijan. "We are judging by what we heard from President Aliyev
when meeting him three days ago. His assessments were quite positive.

Particularly, he said signing of the Declaration is the direct evidence
of the fact that each party sees positive things in this document,
and this is quite natural", Merzlyakov said.

"The document says nothing about certain possible settlement. It
only says that settlement must be political, peaceful, which is not
insignificant by itself, and that the talks must be continued on the
basis of International Law principles and standards. In addition,
the document says that the settlement will be based on the proposals
handed over to the parties to the conflict by the co-chairmen in Madrid
last year (the so-called Madrid principles), and finally, the document
contains instruction to both countries’ foreign ministers to activate
their efforts to complete the coordination on the basic settlement
principles on the above-mentioned basis through the mediation of the
MG co-chairmen", Merzlyakov said in conclusion.

EXPECTATIONS HIGH FROM DA PLATFORM FOR RECONCILIATION

Today’s Zaman
Nov 17 2008
Turkey

An Azerbaijani deputy has expressed hope that the Dialogue Eurasia
(DA) Platform may manage to smooth out relations between Azerbaijan
and Armenia, which have been at odds for many years over the
Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

"The DA Platform has significant influence on Caucasian nations. I
believe this influence may be used to give an end to the 15-year-old
grief in the region," stated Professor Nizami Caferov, adding that
the platform may help find a solution to the Nagorno-Karabakh
issue over which Azerbaijan and Armenia have been at odds for
years. Nagorno-Karabakh’s mostly ethnic Armenian population broke
away from Azerbaijan in a war in the early 1990s as the Soviet Union
collapsed. It now runs its own affairs, with support from Armenia.

"As an Azerbaijani who is closely interested in the Nagorno-Karabakh
conflict, I wish Armenian intellectuals had participated in today’s
conference. I wish they had expressed their opinions to contribute to
the peace process [between Azerbaijan and Armenia]. It is possible
to search for solutions to such issues as Nagorno-Karabakh in such
platforms," Caferov said. His remarks came during a conference titled
"Tolerance and Discrimination in Education," held last Friday in the
southern city of Antalya by the DA Platform.

"Conflicts do not provide benefits to any nation. Humanity wants
peace. Turkish President Abdullah Gul recently held talks with Armenian
officials. This was a step taken for regional peace," Caferov went
on to say. He also stated that the Azerbaijanis were ready for the
solution of problems with Armenia and added: "The Azerbaijani and
Armenian heads of state had a meeting in Moscow. This is a very
serious development."

Journalists and Writers Association (GYV) President Harun Tokak
stressed he hopes the DA Platform creates an atmosphere of peace
among the nations. "We find work by the DA Platform in the field of
tolerance and dialogue to be sincere. I hope this platform will take
concrete steps in these fields. I believe it will become Eurasia’s
conscience," he stated.

TURKEY CANNOT BE A MEDIATOR
SHOUSHAN MATEVOSYAN

Hayots Ashkhar Daily
15 Nov 08
Armenia

`Turkey may offer its assistance, but it cannot be a mediator. And the
only form of assistance, in my understanding, is to influence
Azerbaijan,’ AGHVAN VARDANYAN, member of the ARFD Bureau announced
yesterday in a press conference, speaking about Turkey’s possible role
in the settlement of the NKR conflict.

Assessing the policy conducted by Turkey over the recent months, the
speaker considered it very flexible not only on the regional but also
on the global level. `Turkey is trying to raise its role, and uses all
kinds of tools to protect its interests both in the region and in the
world.’ The examples are quite obvious. `Following the war in South
Ossetia, Ankara immediately made a proposal on initiating peace and
stability processes in the Caucasus. Now, after the presidential
elections in the United States, Turkey offers its role as a mediator in
establishing new kinds of relations between Tehran and Washington.’

Viewing the foreign policy conducted by Armenia over the recent months,
A. Vardanyan considers it interesting and at the same time full of
controversial interpretations. `Some people welcome it, others are
critical, while another group of people expresses concerns. But we will
have a more comprehensive picture of the situation if we combine and
analyze all the events and statements.’

As regards the options of settling the Karabakh conflict, Aghvan
Vardanyan finds that a solution `will be found as a result of long and
goal-oriented activities. There mustn’t be hasty decisions.’

A. Vardanyan is convinced that there are many issues arousing concern.
He believes that Armenia currently adheres to the policy that has
existed for several years continuously and is sure that the political
forces, leadership and people of Armenia will share similar opinions
with regard to the most serious matters concerning the country’s
security. The activist of Dashnaktsutyun does not see any hazard in
this respect.

Touching upon the Moscow Declaration, the member of the ARFD Bureau
noted that `the signature of the Declaration gave us an extra
opportunity to discuss the issue of the Karabakh conflict and underline
Russia’s role in its settlement.’

Khaleej Times, United Arab Emirates
Nov 16 2008

Better Assessment System¨for Students Required

by Dhanusha Gokulan
16 November 2008

DUBAI – The UAE educational system has been shifting away from the
traditional ways of assessment which involves students memorising
study material.

On these grounds a promise was made for providing world class higher
education and a more comprehensive assessment technique in the UAE by
Dr Tayeb A. Kamali, Vice- Chancellor of the Higher College of
Technology.

Dr Kamali made this commitment at the introductory speech of the 12th
Annual Current Trends in English Language Testing (CTELT) Conference,
at the Dubai Men’s.The highlight for this year’s CTELT is the
presentation of the the topic `Developing Assessment Literacy’.

Dr Kamali said: `The progress of students must be measured accurately
and consistently and it is important to improve the effectiveness of
teaching and learning practices in the region.’

He added that the Higher College of Technology emphasised on a
continuous learning process and there was a need to modernise methods
of assessment which is often coined as complicated by teachers and
educators.

Plenary speakers of the symposium included Natalie Kuhlman, San Diego
State University, California, US, Ali Shehadeh, United Arab Emirates
University, Al Ain, UAE, Annie Brown, National Admissions and
Placement Office, Abu Dhabi, UAE and Hossein Farhady, American
University of Armenia, Yerevan, Armenia.

On speaking to the teachers who were participating in the symposium,
Khaleej Times found that most educators were content with the current
assessment technique in educational institutes but teachers voiced
their concern on how many Emirati students were required to perform
better at competitive examinations like the TOEFL and IELTS.

Jeff Verbeem, a teacher at the College of North Atlantic, Qatar said
that proper training has to be provided to Emirati students right from
the kindergarten level.

`The students here need to be exposed to English language training
right from a very young age. As compared to other GCC countries, the
training given to students for competitive exams are commendable but
there is always room for improvement.’

Kiya Murman, a teacher at the Emirates College, Abu Dhabi agreed
saying that the Emirati students can do better if they are provided
with the correct cultural exposure right from a very young age.

Saad Hafez, the English Language Supervisor at the Ministry of
Education, Ras Al Khaimah said: `The ministry has been doing its part
to improve the status of language studies in the country like
introducing the CEPA (Common Educational Proficiency Assessment) for
better performance but more time and effort were required to provide
quality assessment to students.’