ARMENIA’S DEPUTY FM LEAVING FOR WARSAW
Armradio.am
10.02.2010 11:17
Armenian Deputy Foreign Minister Karine Ghazinyan is leaving for
Warsaw today to participate in the political consultations between
the ministries of Foreign Affairs of Armenia and Poland, Press and
Information Department of the Armenian Minister of Foreign Affairs
reported.
ARMENIAN PRESIDENT’S ADDRESS WASN’T JUST HOMAGE TO ETHICS
PanARMENIAN.Net
10.02.2010 16:03 GMT+04:00
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Some tend to view Armenian President’s address
to his Turkish counterpart as pure homage to ethics, yet this is
not exactly so, ARF Dashnaktsutyun parliamentary group leader Vahan
Hovhannesyan said.
"President Sargsyan reminded it is Turkey’s turn to undertake steps
towards ratification of Protocols," he told a news conference in
Yerevan. "The President also sought to express apprehensions over
possible failure of rapprochement process, absolving Armenia of
responsibility for it."
The Protocols aimed at normalization of bilateral ties and opening of
the border between Armenia and Turkey were signed in Zurich by Armenian
Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian and his Turkish counterpart Ahmet
Davutoglu on October 10, 2009, after a series of diplomatic talks
held through Swiss mediation.
On January 12, 2010, the Constitutional Court of the Republic of
Armenia found the protocols conformable to the country’s Organic Law.
IRAN-ARMENIA NEW COMMUNICATIONS ISSUE IN "ARMEX -20"
By Ara Martirosyan
AZG DAILY
11-02-2010
International
Armenian Transport and Communications Minister Gurgen Sargsyan
delivered a speech during international conference "Investment and
trade opportunities in Armenia" held February 9-10 in the Islamic
Republic of Iran, press secretary of the ministry Susanna Tonoyan told
"Azg" daily.
In his speech, the Minister spoke of North-South road and Iran-Armenia
railway construction projects. The Minister underlined that the
construction of the railway will not only contribute to the bilateral
trade turnover between the two friendly countries but also communicate
the ports of the Black Sea and Persian Gulf increasing the transit
opportunities of Iran and Armenia.
The Minister said that the construction of North-South road would
improve the quality of the road from Meghri (contiguous to Iran)
to the Georgian ports Poti and Batumi.
Gurgen Sargsyan expressed readiness to discuss participation of
Iranian companies in all stages of the projects’ implementation.
‘SHOW ME THE MONEY!’ – THE CRITICAL CATALYST TO FUELING DEVELOPMENT OF INNOVATIVE SMES
Arminfo
2010-02-09 11:08:00
Interview of Dr. Francis J. Skrobiszewski to ArmInfo News Agency
Dr. Francis J. Skrobiszewski has over 30 years of experience in
investment fund management and strategy development in United States,
Central and Eastern Europe, Africa, Asia and the Middle East. In 1990,
he drafted the business plan for the Polish-American Enterprise Fund
(PAEF). PAEF started in 1990 with a USAID grant of $240 mln, and
its privatized investment team has since raised over $1.7 billion
in non-U.S. Government capital for investment in Poland and the CEE
Region. Over the next 15 years, Skrobiszewski served initially as an
officer of the PAEF and later its sister Enterprise Fund in Hungary
(HAEF), where he also conceived and managed the latter’s cutting-edge
high-tech VC fund. He was also director of portfolio management in
a Polish Mass Privatization Fund, advised on the establishment of
the Eurasian Development Bank and serves today on the Investment
Committee of the Polish National Capital Fund (KFK) capitalizing new
high-tech VC funds. KFK has completed tenders of ~$125 million, which
must be matched by private capital, and with more tenders to follow,
its capital is a critical catalyst to stimulating the development of
innovative SMEs in Poland with upward of $500 million in financing.
Beyond the CEE, Skrobiszewski has provided advice on venture
funds and other intermediaries financing indigenous businesses in
Africa, Central Asia and West Bank/Gaza. He is leading a working
group on establishing an SME development fund for Afghanistan as
well as advising a London-based group promoting an SME investment
Fund in Iraq. In 2004, Skrobiszewski led creation of a Booz Allen
Hamilton service to facilitate trade and investment of major MNCs
in newly-emerging countries, and while there, advised the Millennium
Challenge Corporation on structuring its Georgia Regional Development
Fund. He serves on the Boards of Directors of the US-Polish Trade
Council (in Silicon Valley) and of the Afghan-American Chamber of
Commerce. Through USAID’s Competitive Armenian Private Sector Program
(CAPS), Skrobiszewski has been working closely with Armenian IT
entrepreneurs and assisting them to access opportunities in Silicon
Valley and advising the Government on structuring a VC fund tailored
to Armenia’s needs.
What needs to be done to fulfill the potential of human capital
in Armenia?
>>From what I’ve seen, Armenians have a high degree of capability
and intellectual capital. To stimulate it, several things can be done.
Overall, when you have a market economy, entrepreneurs and innovators
begin to see the opportunity to capitalize on their creativity. They
begin to see what happens in the Silicon Valley and similar places,
and they say "we can do that as well as they do". One of the critical
things is having access to the information about the market. The
initiative to construct a broadband network in Armenia on a broader
basis contributes to that goal. Having this kind of network, you
can spread your creativity better, and more Armenian entrepreneurs
will be able to see the opportunities to apply their potential. The
other though relates to how do you grow that potential, and what
do you do with it? That’s another thing, and that’s why "capital"
is so critically important, particularly "professionally-deployed"
venture capital. A Venture Capital fund brings more than just money,
it’s the skills that professional investors bring along with their
capital that makes the critical difference. This is the management and
other help that the small companies funded by venture capitalists need
to develop. With access to capital and larger markets, some of those
opportunities in Armenia will have a better chance to become reality.
Even small Armenian entrepreneurs, who went to the Silicon Valley on
CAPS-sponsored study tours, saw these kinds of market opportunities
as they used the internet. Then through CAPS’ support, they made
direct, personal contacts, and now, they are selling their software
and products of Armenia intellectual capital to larger companies
in Silicon Valley and elsewhere. It’s very impressive what can be
done with a creative mind and a little professional help – but still
capital is the essential "fuel" to grow a business anyplace in the
world, Armenia included.
How can connections with Armenian Diaspora in the US and elsewhere
help to find new opportunities?
The Diaspora can definitely play an important role – they have an
affinity to their ancestral home country, whether they were born in
Armenia or outside. I see that among Armenians living abroad, there
is strong interest in other Armenians, Armenian things, etc. In that
respect, the Diaspora can play an important role, if Armenians on
both sides put to use their energy to make linkages. Whenever I’ve
been with Armenian entrepreneurs traveling to Silicon Valley, they met
with people from the local Diaspora interested in what they were doing.
There’s always that strong interest. When you form a connection, other
things will follow, but physical presence is critically important to
that connection. Mutual presence makes it easier to connect and to
talk. Two years ago, I discussed the value of the "presence" in my
article in the CAPS news bulletin. When Armenian IT entrepreneurs came
to Silicon Valley for the first ArmTech Congress in 2007, CAPS took
them on a study tour during which they made a series of connections,
out of which has flowed continuous business for some. Business success
can more easily follow when you are connected both with people from
the Diaspora as well as people from your industry.
How can the educational system of the country be improved to reach
that?
First, you need to ensure that your curricula are designed for the
marketplace. It’s very good to learn basic knowledge, but you have to
also be able to apply it in the real world. If you are talking about
technical disciplines, you need to have a bridge between academia
and employers. I know a number of individuals in Armenia who have
been active in that arena. You have Hovhannes Avoyan from Sourcio
who has had a program at the technical universities in Armenia,
where he was bridging that gap and in the process identifying top
students who have gone to work for him. There has also been a program
at Information Technology Center in Gyumri (GITC), where they take
people who have an education, and then strengthen their skills to help
them operate more effectively in a business environment. The other
aspect to consider in the educational realm – to speak more broadly,
not just about Armenia – is always the challenge of being able to
commercialize what’s going on in the academic world, whether it’s
R&D or some basic research. The systems and processes we have in the
United States, like at Stanford University or UC Berkeley, are designed
to incentivize their students and professors to take the technology
they develop in their classrooms and university laboratories to the
market. In Poland today, I am involved with the Intellectual Property
Management Institute, which is a consortium of leading universities, at
the rector and vice rector level, and including other institutions like
the Polish Bankers Association. They have been exploring how to develop
an effective intellectual property rights regime for Poland. It’s more
than producing patents, but taking their IP rights to the market in
an effective way. They participated in a 10-day workshop at Stanford
about a year and a half ago and hold regular conferences in Poland. In
a word, there is that kind of action that helps you understand and
explore what kind of models are working in other environments, and
how you can improve on them tailored to your own country.
Is a university less flexible to market requirements if it’s State-run?
I can’t speak for Armenian universities, but it would seem so, because
generally-speaking, a State-run university is primarily reliant on
State support, and therefore, it would not necessarily be as market
driven as private universities, which by their nature have to be more
aggressive in meeting what the market is looking for, in attracting
students, in seeking grants, and finding out what the grant-making
entity seeks to achieve, etc. Of course, State-run universities
are also looking for a bigger piece of the "money-pie," but I’d say
off-hand that private universities have to be more market-oriented
to survive and prosper. That does not diminish the activity of State
universities though, as I went to one — Virginia Tech, which is
well-funded and now working in collaboration with Slavonic University
in Armenia. Face it, State schools also have to be aggressive about
their fundraising and marketing activities. These are skills that
come over time. The transition in Central and Eastern Europe has
only begun about 20 years ago, and that’s a very short period of
time. Last week, I was in Vienna speaking at a Business Council on
International Understanding’s conference on the 20-year anniversary
of transition in Central Europe and on looking to the future of the
Region in innovation, technology and entrepreneurship. If you stay in
your own environment, you think you have not accomplished much, but
when you look at developments from the outside, as I have been doing
for 20 years in Poland and Hungary, I can see a vast transformation
which has occurred over time. It’s done step-by-step in an incremental
sort of way, by government, private sector entrepreneurial entities
and academic institutions. And if you know where you as a society
want to go, you can move faster in getting there.
What is the reason that, despite human capital, venture capital funds
are yet to come to the country?
I think there are a couple of things. Two and a half years ago, when
I helped USAID’s CAPS prepare the Armenian IT entrepreneurs coming
to the Silicon Valley, almost all were looking for investments
from VC funds in their small businesses. When you examine the
Armenian economy as a whole, it offers only a small market for
investment. Venture capitalists are not just looking to build a
nice little operating business that provides the owner-managers a
steady income, they want to build a substantial business, grow it
and sell it for capital appreciation. Their goal is exiting from the
business. On the other hand, the average entrepreneur wants to build
a business to provide a livelihood for his or her family — unless
they are serial entrepreneurs. In Armenia, it’s a small market with
smaller businesses. When a venture capitalist is looking for places
to position and invest, he goes where he finds greater opportunities.
Several years ago while running a fund in Hungary, I was actively
involved in the European Venture Capital Association (EVCA). I
distinctly remember the interest and activity of the larger global
funds in going to China, where a large VC industry was beginning to
emerge. That was because China was a big, hot market, and continues to
be so. And in 1994, I remember when private equity funds were beginning
to deal in Romania, but later withdrew for a time, when they did not
see the opportunities materializing as quickly as they had expected
after their experiences in Poland and Hungary. These decisions
by Venture Capitalists and other investors are market-driven. In
Armenia, you have to build an ecosystem to facilitate fast growth of
companies. In my original proposal to the Ministry of Economy for
an Armenian-focused VC Fund, I suggested that one of the primary
objectives should be in helping Armenian businesses expand out of
Armenia to larger markets. This is because the size of the market
will dictate the size of the company, and since capital can be more
efficiently deployed in such larger growth markets, venture capitalists
will have an Armenian technology business they could invest in where
the market would present a better opportunity to achieve an exit. So
you can use Armenian technology, but have a marketing arm, say, in
Silicon Valley, and that marketing arm is the essence of the company
that might be sold; whereas, the capital from sales and in capital
appreciation when the company is sold flows back to Armenia. where
the intellectual property and parent company are located.
Developing a venture capital fund or a private equity fund is not
a momentary process, it is a long and time-consuming effort. When I
was Senior Vice President of the fund in Hungary – Hungarian-American
Enterprise Fund – and we went out to raise our parallel private fund,
it took us a good three years. It involved a number of people working
full time, because one must structure the right kind of fund that will
be effective in the particular marketplace and which will attract
investors. It is first structuring properly, and then finding the
parallel capital.
In a private equity fund, you can have a governmental investment,
but the fund must be commercially operating. You need a critical mass
of capital so that you can support the operations. That’s the staff
of people to generate the deals, close them, and then actively manage
the investment. There are costs associated with these activities, and
many are essentially the same for large and for small funds. That’s
why small funds traditionally have disproportion operating costs in
comparison to capital under management for larger commercial funds.
One approach is to subsidize a smaller fund with technical assistance
grants provided by development agencies. That is the reason that
in my presentation at the CAPS Armenian IT Competitive Conference,
I suggested that Armenia needed to start with a developmental fund,
like we had in Poland and Hungary with the Enterprise Funds in 1990.
Through that approach, it was capital from the public sector deployed
as a "catalyst" that was used to make the initial investments to
grow local businesses and develop the ecosystem for private equity
investments, but this capital was managed privately by investment
professionals. In this way, you can demonstrate the opportunity and
the real risks in the given emergent market, and when that happens,
you have real success stories that attract other investors.
Do you think that statements of Russian authorities on transition to
innovation-driven economy could result in entering of Russian VC’s
in Armenia?
That could very well be. I did read the Russian President’s remarks,
and during the BCIU Conference on Entrepreneurship and Innovation
for CEE Competitiveness I spoke at in Vienna the week before coming
to Yerevan, those remarks were featured to kick-off one of the panel
discussions. Those views of the President could set a direction, it’s
a vision, but then you need to bring that vision to execution. And
as I mentioned, when you are actually putting in place this kind of
long-term business funding and the professionally-managed vehicle
to deploy equity capital and manage investments, it takes time and
commitment of resources. That could mean over the early period,
investors would be expending money without much to show for it. It
may very well be that Russian VC funds will come into Armenia, but
of course, first someone has to define the risks and demonstrate
the opportunity Armenian technology and other firms offer. Success
stories are what attract investors. In Poland in 1992, the stock market
achieved the highest rate of return in real dollar terms of any other
stock market in world history. When that happened, financial investors
and private equity funds came started taking a closer look at Poland,
and we at the Polish-American Enterprise Fund with a capital base of
$240 million had no trouble raising our first parallel private fund.
Since then, my former colleagues have raised over $1.7 billion in a
series of private funds, and complemented by the assets of competing
private equity funds, there is over $8 billion committed for investment
in Poland. But that was because the market saw the opportunity and the
success stories. In Armenia, for example, you have Hovhannes Avoyan,
who had a startup company that was sold to Brience Inc., and Lycos came
into Armenia by purchasing Brience. Then, he as a serial entrepreneur
started his next company, Sourcio, which EIF had provide support and
capital to develop and has demonstrated success.
Recently, Sourcio won the first prize at a contest in Boston. These
kinds of successful people and ventures begin to attract attention to
the Armenian marketplace and to other promising entrepreneurs. But
Armenian tech firms have to tell their stories outside of Armenia
to attract attention, so if the Armenians begin to show up on
international investments forums, like those in Silicon Valley such
as the Global Technology Symposium at Stanford and ArmTech, then
they will demonstrate the opportunities and attract interest. Again,
physical presence is critically important, as I mentioned earlier
in this interview. Meeting with people face-to-face, giving panel
presentations like those at the CAPS-supported Armenian IT Competitive
Conference, and reaching out in a visible way are all steps in making
business connections and creating the proper image of Armenia as a
source of quality technology.
What are the preferable directions of positioning the country for
possible VC investments (new jobs, software engineering, semiconductor
design, etc)?
I see the strength of Armenia in technology and in the initiatives
that have been underway to begin to present it. Armenia needs a clear
and consistent strategy to "brand" itself as a source of innovative
technology – this involves "image-building" based on the realities.
The government just joined the San Francisco Global Trade Council,
which will help Armenia better position itself in Silicon Valley in
the imaging of Armenia. But again, you’ve got to do the outreach on
your own as well – that is, to tell your story. You also have to
go to Silicon Valley – or wherever else you want to make business
connections – with some regularity. You can’t just show up once and
then go home. And Armenian delegations have been going to Silicon
Valley enough to build a base of connections. CAPS sponsored the
Silicon Valley Study Tour after ArmTech 2007 and a Silicon Valley
Marketing Road Show in 2008. On the latter, Armenian Deputy Minister
of Economy Mushegh Tumasyan participated, and CAPS arranged a meeting
with San Francisco Global Trade Council and others. Then, when the
Prime Minister came to ArmTech 2009, CAPS was able to arrange for him
to speak at the SFGTC Luncheon. He also had a very productive set of
meetings with groups like Plug and Play Tech Center and others which
were enlightening on the business dynamics of Silicon Valley, how
some of the processes could be employed in Armenia and how Armenia
could work with Silicon Valley groups. CAPS had also reached out
in Silicon Valley with the US-Polish Trade Council, of which I am a
Director, the Estonian Government’s Rep Office and the tech center
established by the Danish Government. I know Armenia is planning to
open a Rep Office there as well, and this kind of experience helps
Armenia see how others are doing their promotion and imaging and you
can begin to get a sense of what to concentrate on. Silicon Valley
is definitely a source of quality technology. Armenia is a source of
quality technology and quality products like terrific agricultural
and mineral products. Depending on how you tell that story about your
country, there is a real opportunity to position yourself in Silicon
Valley and other markets.
Are the overall conditions of running businesses in Armenia (including
practices of tax collection, custom procedures, etc) able to attract
foreign investors?
It’s always a consideration how you look at the various economic
indexes. When I spoke at the ECA Innovation Conference with the World
Bank, Enterprise Incubator Foundation and CAPS in September 2007, I
noted that the Heritage Foundation’s Index of Economic Freedom ranked
Armenia the highest of any of the former Soviet Bloc. I don’t know
if that’s still the case, but there are different rankings issued by
different groups – I was at a World Bank program a couple of months
later, and the speakers cited slightly different rankings for Armenia
by the CATO Institute and the World Bank from those of the Heritage
Foundation. Anyway, Armenia ranks up at a relatively good position,
and that tells me something. What the realities are though might be
quite different from rankings, and Armenia might have to actually take
steps to do something that is different from the theoretical aspects.
Legal regimes and policy and business practices contribute to what
you call the ecosystem. How do you create a conducive ecosystem
for Armenian SME growth? What do you do to attract businesses and
capital to Armenia? What do you have to do to make it easier for your
companies to grow so that they can pay their taxes? The Chairman of
my high-tech Fund’s Board of Advisors in Hungary, Zoltan Merszei, was
formerly the Chairman of Dow Chemical Company. He led that company to
the position of the international giant it is today. Zoltan was very
proud of brochures he produced about his company that emphasized,
"We pay our taxes!" And that was what he would publish pamphlets on
in the countries where he opened new Dow offices. He did that because
he wanted to tell the officials and citizens of these countries about
the benefits of making it conducive for Dow Chemical to come there —
because if they let Dow make money, then it could pay more taxes. I
think the smart approach for policy-makers is to look at how you
encourage business growth. If you want to encourage high-technology
development and a knowledge-based economy, you don’t put burdens on
critical technology being imported. You have to figure out what is
the cost-benefit of taxing somebody on a computer, when there might
be greater value produced for society by having more people buying
and using those computers. The same goes for broadband usage – these
kinds of things can be manipulated, so that you can encourage greater
value to society than what you might gain from collecting additional
taxes or imposing regulations.
Are there successful cases in other countries, including neighboring
ones, for Armenia to study?
In Georgia, I helped to structure the Georgian Regional Development
Fund for the Millennium Challenge Corporation’s account a couple of
years ago. It is a $30 million fund to begin to build an investment
ecosystem for that country. Although this Fund is focused on regional
development, it recognizes that small enterprises need equity capital
and that funding must be professionally deployed. The best example
though is the transformation process I have been involved in over
the last 20 years in Poland. Recently, the Polish National Capital
Fund (Krajowy Fundusz Kapitalowy) was created, and I serve on its
Investment Committee. KFK is designed to fill the equity gap for
innovative SME’s in technology. The Polish Government recognized
that generally speaking, the risk was too high for the private
sector to invest in early stage technology ventures. Thus, astute
Polish policy-makers have stimulated such private sector investment
by setting up this "fund-of-funds" to match the capital of private
investors in new Polish venture capital funds. So we at KFK invest not
in high-tech businesses directly, but in VC funds that are investing
in innovative SME businesses. And that way, we can spread the impact
of this money across Poland. KFK issued its first tender in 2007 for
about $25 million, and now with an injection of 180 million Euros in
EU Structural Funds going to Poland to capitalize KFK, it has closed
a $100 million tender and will be issuing another approximately
$100 million tender when the current one is allocated. Since KFK’s
commitment to these funds requires matching private capital, the fund
managers must attract an equal amount or more of private capital. So
in reality, there will in coming years be close to $500 million in
venture capital available to finance development of innovative Polish
SMEs. But this progress didn’t just happen overnight. I gave a speech
in September 2008 at the Economic Forum at Krynica, Poland – a kind of
"mini-Davos" — on the evolution in building this ecosystem in Poland
over a period of 20 years – from when we created the Polish-American
Enterprise Fund in 1990 as the pioneering investment fund there. What
you are doing here in Armenia with institutions like SME DNC or the
Enterprise Incubator Foundation or the proposed Venture Capital Fund
the Armenian Government is evaluating, all contributes to building the
kind of ecosystem Armenia will need to develop its high-tech sector.
Likewise, when you have a properly-designed educational initiative,
when CAPS takes Armenian entrepreneurs to Silicon Valley, when Armenian
institutions and entrepreneurs participate in international forums
on technology, these things help to create a knowledge base on which
Armenia can create the ecosystem its private sector and Government
needs. But if I’m an entrepreneur, an innovator, or an academic
researcher without money to commercialize my inventive idea and
grow my business, it’s all abstract – just a theory. Money is what
makes the world go round, what gives vitality to business. I set up
a high tech fund in Hungary with $5 million dollars, with subsidized
support from my parent fund to manage it, and the availability of our
small capital stimulated Hungarian entrepreneur-innovators to come
forward. Indeed, we generated 400 deals in about 5 years. Of course,
we only invested in six or seven companies, but the reality is that
money stimulates invention and business development. You start with
a couple of deals, and when you have success stories that demonstrate
the opportunities, others are attracted to come into the marketplace
and make their own investments. We attracted other private investment
funds that came into Hungary, because they saw the success of our
high-tech fund – just like large private equity funds came into
Poland when they saw the opportunities that the Polish- American
Enterprise Fund demonstrated. These things go hand-in-hand. I think
it’s difficult to foresee what the volume of deals might be in Armenia
until you put the money on the table to draw out and motivate Armenian
entrepreneur-innovators.
Thank you
Aram Gareginyan, ArmInfo, 09.02.2010
ARMENIA’S DEFENSE MINISTER VISITS FRANCE
armradio.am
08.02.2010 16:08
The delegation headed by the Defense Minister of Armenia, Seyran
Ohanyan, left for France today on a five-day official visit.
Within the framework of the visit Seyran Ohanyan is expected to meet
French Defense Minister, Chief of Defense Staff, General Jean-Louis
Georgelin, Military Joint Chief of Staff to President of French
Republic, Admiral Edouard Guillaud, the Chairman of the Assembly’s
defense and armed forces committee Guy Tessier, the Head of the French
Diocese of the Armenian Apostolic Church, Norvan Archbishop Zakaryan
and representatives of the French Armenian community.
The Armenian Defense Minister is expected to give interviews to the
French Le Monde daily and the Les Nouvelles d’Armenie magazine.
Focus News , Bulgaria
Feb 7 2010
Bodies of six aboard crushed Ethiopian plane were found
7 February 2010 | 18:10 | FOCUS News Agency
Beirut. Bodies of six people aboard the Ethiopian Airlines jet that
crashed in the Mediterranean were found, RIA Novosti informed.
The Boeing 737 crashed on 25 January, moments after take-off from
Beirut airport during a fierce thunderstorm, killing all 90 people on
board.
Lebanon media reported that the bodies of most of the passengers were
found and Armenian divers try to take them out of the sea.
Bodies of only 15 passengers have been taken out of the water so far.
UK BORDER AGENCY ARRESTS SIX PEOPLE OVER SUSPICION OF HUMAN TRAFFICKING
Anna Rowlands
Emigrate.co.uk
/news/990342.html
Feb 5 2010
Reports now show that six people have been arrested on suspicion
of human trafficking in the North East. Officers from the UK Border
Agency North East immigration crime team were called to North Shields
Ferry Terminal last Friday after the staff identified a 15-year-old
Armenian girl who had arrived on the ferry from Holland. She had been
attempting to enter the UK using a Latvian passport.
Traveling with the girl were two Armenian men, age 25 and 49, and
two Latvian women, age 33 and 26. These four adults were bound for
Manchester and were all arrested on suspicion of human trafficking
offenses. Two other Armenian men, age 19 and 30, both from the
Manchester area, were later arrested on suspicion of trafficking
following further investigation.
All of the people who were arrested have now been released on bail.
The girl remains in the care of local authorities for the time being.
Detective Inspector Graham Brown, of the North East immigration crime
team, said that the safety and well being of the young girl is of
paramount importance to all the agencies involved in the investigation.
He went on to say that trafficking and facilitation are serious
offenses in the UK, which often involve young and vulnerable members
of the international community. The UK Border Agency, working with the
North East Police forces, now have a formidable team to investigate
and detect such criminality.
Had these people not been caught, it is not sure what would have
happened to the young 15-year-old Armenia girl. It is likely that
she would have been forced into teen prostitution or forced to
marry. The UK is attempting to crack down on human trafficking and
other emigration offenses.
DEFEATING THE GEOPOLITICAL MINDSET
Sally Bland
The Jordan Times, Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan
February 1, 2010 Monday
Through the Wall of Fire: Armenia-Iraq-Palestine – From Wrath to
Reconciliation Muriel Mirak-Weissbach Frankfurt/Main: edition fischer,
2009 Pp. 380
The parents of Muriel Mirak-Weissbach were both orphaned in the
Armenian genocide of 1915. This set her on a path of discovering how
to survive war and genocide, and go beyond to work for a better world
where peace and social justice would preclude such atrocities. Her
book is the culmination of insight gained from years of journalistic
work and organising support for war victims.
The title, "Through the Wall of Fire", refers to an episode in Dante’s
"Divine Comedy". Only by putting aside his fears and self-obsession,
and reaching out to the other, can the pilgrim pass through the
"Wall of Fire" to enter Paradise. It is Mirak-Weissbach’s belief
that a similar process is required to solve the conflicts of Armenia,
Iraq, Palestine and elsewhere. The fact that her own parents, along
with thousands of Armenian children, were saved by ordinary Turkish
citizens led her to reject the concept of collective guilt, and seek
the real causes of war and genocide in "the geopolitical mind, a mode
of thinking which disposes of peoples and nations as mere objects",
in its pursuit of wealth and power. (p. 15)
Mirak-Weissbach writes extremely well and her account of events
leading up to the Armenian genocide is fascinating. She combines
the machinations of the Great Powers on the eve of World War I,
the rise of the Young Turks and their relations with some Zionist
leaders, such as Vladimir Jabotinsky, with a focus on how these events
impacted on ordinary people, especially children. She also focuses
on children in the sections on Iraq and Palestine, for as she says:
"It is only by grasping the deep psychological impact on the children
that others may understand how prejudices, hatred, and the thirst for
revenge can be passed on from generation to generation, until it may
appear that no solution is in sight." (pp. 9-10)
This vantage point seems relevant to the Armenian-Turkish conflict
where the author sees hope for reconciliation due to the regional
shift that occurred after Georgia’s 2008 move into South Ossetia,
and Ankara’s subsequent initiative to encourage cooperation between
Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Turkey and Russia. "But this will
require that both sides go through the Wall of Fire", and "strive to
overcome the bitterness, fears, and, yes, deeply engrained hatred,
that the events of 1915 engendered". (pp. 90-91)
Despite its desirability, Mirak-Weissbach’s concept of reconciliation
seems less applicable in Iraq and Palestine where war and ethnic
cleansing are not historical events but ongoing. For the Palestinians,
it is not a question of hatred being passed on from generation to
generation, but of daily siege and attacks that keep the conflict
boiling, as the book describes very accurately.
Nonetheless, the sections on Iraq and Palestine are very informative.
The author is merciless in exposing the US and Israeli governments’
false justifications for their genocidal policies. Particularly
interesting is the account of how massive airlifts of humanitarian aid
to Iraq were organised in the wake of the 1991 war, and how injured
Iraqi children were sent to receive medical aid abroad. This was no
small feat for the citizens’ movement initiated by the author that
managed to overcome numerous restrictions imposed by the US, UK and UN
sanctions regime, as well as a host of unexpected logistical problems.
The author’s narration of the suffering of individual Iraqi families
restores humanity to the statistics, while the Iraqi children sent
abroad for medical treatment "turned out to be the most effective
ambassadors for their nation", charming hospital staff in Germany and
America alike. (p. 144) Moreover, this is one of few books published
in English that evaluates Iraqi officials according to their actual
performance instead of dismissing them out-of-hand with stereotyped
labels.
The strength of the section on Palestine lies in its economic
analysis. According to Mirak-Weissman, the Oslo process failed because
"it did not suit the tastes of powerful financial and political
interests situated in the US, UK and Israel, who militantly opposed
the birth of a sovereign Palestinian state with a thriving, advanced
industrial economy". She shows in detail how funding was engineered
via the World Bank so as to make Palestinians "agree to work as slave
labour in South African-style Bantustans". (p. 219) In the ensuing
situation, new outbreaks of violence were inevitable.
This is an outstanding book for the author’s ability to combine
personal narrative with political analysis, to bring out previously
unnoticed historical facts, and show the way forward to a better
future.
TURKO-ARMENIAN TRADE VOLUMES SOAR DESPITE DIPLOMATIC STALEMATE
World Markets Research Center
Global Insight
February 3, 2010
BYLINE: Grace Annan
The Armenian Chamber of Commerce has issued surprisingly high
figures on the trade volume between Armenia and Turkey in 2009. The
volume reached US$300 million, US$200 million higher than what the
Turkish-Armenian Business Development Council (TABDC) had expected, and
still US$100 million above World Bank estimates. On the Turkish side,
this volume was particularly fuelled by activities of businessmen
from Eastern and South-Eastern Anatolia, according to the co-chair
of the TABDC, Kaan Soyak. The figures were not confirmed by either
country’s government officials, as they do not officially record
bilateral trade volumes between Armenia and Turkey, due to the
still-difficult relations between the two countries.
Significance:Turko-Armenian trade volume is seemingly going the
opposite way to Turko-Armenian diplomatic ties. Although the latter
was hailed as having a potential to soar over the coming years,
paving the way for more business ties, it seems like business,
rather than politics, will facilitate the initial dialogue between
Armenians and Turks on medium and lower levels (seeTurkey – Armenia:
12 October 2009:). Arguably, the economic crisis in both countries
may have something to do with the increased interest in forging ties,
but this should not lower the surprising achievement. Yet the stalemate
is a predominantly socio-political one, and it will continue to hamper
business ties between the two countries until it is fully resolved.
SHAKHNAZAROV’S ‘WARD N6’ WINS AGAIN
Tert.am
12:22 ~U 05.02.10
Russian filmmaker of Armenian descent Karen Shakhnazarov’s "Ward N6,"
based on a story of the same name by Anton Chekhov, has been awarded
best foreign film and best actor (Vladimir Ilyin) in Tehran’s 28th
Fajr International Film Festival, reports Vedomosti.
This year, there were more than 80 films vying for the much-coveted
Crystal Simorgh prizes in Tehran’s film fest.