Author: Eduard Nalbandian

Edgar Ghazaryan: Jermuk will lose the status of a health resort city if the Amulsar mine is developed

Eduard Nalbandian
Arminfo, Armenia
Aug 23 2019
Naira Badalian

ArmInfo. In order for Jermuk to  maintain its status as a resort and health city, appropriate  conditions must be provided not only within the city, but also its  circumference.  This opinion was expressed by Edgar Ghazaryan, former  Ambassador of the Republic of Armenia to Poland, now the head of the  apparatus of the Constitutional Court, former  governor of Vayots  Dzor region (2012-2014) in an interview with the Prime Minister of  Armenia Nikol Pashinyan.

According to Ghazaryan, in addition to other negative effects, it  must be understood that the operation of the mine involves about  10-25 explosions daily, which is about 25 tons of dust. In this  context, according to the head of the Constitutional Court’s  apparatus, no matter what the examination would say, this effect on  the resort and health town cannot be ignored. “Jermuk is the only  resort and health resort city of national importance, which means  that within a radius of 50-60 km the heavy metal industry is not  allowed (the Amulsar gold mine is 10 kilometers in a straight line  from Jermuk, Ed. note),” Ghazaryan said.

In addition, as the former governor pointed out, despite the fact  that, perhaps, the company operating the Amulsar mine compares  favorably with others by a higher level of social responsibility, it  must be remembered that initially the same Kajaran was built as a  mine, and only then settlements created around the mine. “In the  meantime, Jermuk was created as a health resort city, and the  development of a mine in the neighborhood will cause permanent damage  to the city,” he said.

To recall, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan visited Jermuk today in  order to ascertain the mood of the people regarding the development  program of the Amulsar gold mine. Residents of the city categorically  told the prime minister that they insisted: “Jermuk should remain a  resort city, Amulsar – without a mine.” Many tourists and guests of  the city, in an interview with the Prime Minister, noted that they  chose the city precisely because of its spa and wellness character,  and if the mine is developed in the immediate vicinity, it is  unlikely that they will visit Jermuk next time.

To recall, on August 14, the Investigative Committee of Armenia  presented an expert opinion on the Amulsar project of the consulting  company Earthlink & Advanced Resources Development (ELARD).  Based on  the conclusion of the examination, the IC of Armenia stated that  there is no direct connection between the underground waters located  on the territory of the Amulsar project and the thermal hot springs  of Jermuk. There is also no connection with the waters of the Sevan  basin. Moreover, as indicated in the IC, during an earthquake, a  certain concentration of acid drainage can penetrate into the basin  of Lake Sevan through the Spandaryan and Ketchut reservoirs. However,  the combination of this concentration will be insignificant on the  scale of Lake Sevan. The third important conclusion: the impact on  the Arpa, Vorotan and Darb rivers can be mitigated if Lydian Armenia  takes 16 environmental mitigation measures proposed by experts. As  the head of the IC Hayk Grigoryan pointed out, Lydian Armenia  representatives have already expressed their readiness to implement  15 of the proposed 16 measures: they are already carrying out 10  measures, 5 will be ready to conduct them in the near future.   Residents of the resort town of Jermuk, environmentalists and  activists opposed to the development of the mine did not agree with  the conclusions and came out to protest.  

On August 21, during the promised “live broadcast,” the Prime  Minister gave approval to the development of the Amulsar mine.  According to him, the Armenian government will conduct constant  monitoring during the development of the Amulsar mine. “Today,  according to our clear data, Amulsar does not harm Sevan.  It will  work according to the highest environmental criteria. If we do not  fulfill the conditions set by us, they will not take us seriously. I  am 99.9% sure that the mine does not pose a threat to the environment  of the RA. Therefore , we must fulfill the conditions that we set,  “he said, concluding by expressing bewilderment by the protest  actions of disobedience arranged by citizens. 

Music: Listen to a new single from Armenian pop singer Brunette

Eduard Nalbandian
The Fader
Aug 22 2019
 
 
Listen to a new single from Armenian pop singer Brunette
 
“Love The Way You Feel” is the first single to be released by Nvak, a music education non-profit working in countries facing social or political turmoil.
 
By THE FADER
August 22, 2019
Tonight at midnight, the music education non-profit Nvak will release its first single. “Love The Way You Feel,” by the 18-year-old Armenian singer, songwriter, and producer Brunette (premiering above) is a humid pop song that wouldn’t sound out of place on FM radio in the United States — and that’s part of the point.

Tamar Kaprelian founded Nvak in 2015 after visiting the country to connect with her roots and representing her country in that year’s Eurovision Song Contest. “While I was there, I noticed a vibrant, talented population who had little to no opportunity or encouragement to create original music and showcase their talent,” Kaprelian says in a press release. “Moreover, due in part to years of political corruption, there was no way for young talent to get their music heard outside of the country’s borders.”

Now Nvak runs year-round mentorship and teaching programs in Armenia and Israel, and the charity is set to launch in Malawi later this year. Professors from schools like Berklee and the Clive Davis school teach classes in songwriting, music production, audio engineering, marketing, and PR, providing a hands-on learning experience for students whose talents might otherwise have gone unrecognized.

“Love The Way You Feel” is one of nine songs that were recorded and produced by Armenian and Israeli artists with the help of Nvak, and a new distribution deal with the Alternative Distribution Alliance will help take the songs across the world.

“I want young girls in Armenia to listen to my songs and to feel confident and empowered that they can also have a free voice,” Brunette says. “There isn’t a huge music business [in Armenia] and there are limited opportunities for young artists to be able to express themselves through their art. Nvak is a space where you can be free to express you.”

Listen to “Love The Way You Feel” at the top of the page, pre-save the single here, and find out more about Nvak here.



MP: Artsakh has never refused the idea of reunification with Armenia

Eduard Nalbandian
News.am, Armenia
Aug 26 2019
MP: Artsakh has never refused the idea of reunification with Armenia MP: Artsakh has never refused the idea of reunification with Armenia

00:08, 27.08.2019
                  

September 2 is a date that represents one of the most brilliant pages in the history of Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh Republic). This is what deputy of the National Assembly of Artsakh Vardges Baghryan told Armenian News-NEWS.am.

The deputy recalled that the movement for the liberation of Artsakh began before 1988, that is, after Karabakh was unlawfully incorporated within the composition of Azerbaijan. However, all Armenians rise to their feet in 1988.

It so happened that on August 30, 1991, the authorities of Soviet Azerbaijan adopted a decision to step out of the USSR. It is obvious that the people of Artsakh couldn’t agree with that. On September 2, the deputies of the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast and Shahumyan region held a joint sitting during which they declared the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic, and the independence referendum was held on December 10. After September 2, Yeltsin and Nazarbayev paid a visit, after which a war broke out in Stepanakert.

“I wasn’t a deputy at the time, but I was attending the session as deputy head of the television and radio committee. Many audio recordings have been preserved. Of course, we didn’t think independence was going to be served for us on a silver platter, and I believe that was the right step back then. However, this doesn’t mean that Artsakh refuses to reunite with Armenia. Reunification has been and remains the ultimate goal of the movement. The Nagorno-Karabakh Republic needs to be internationally recognized, and after that, the Armenian people will make a choice. I personally think there has to be one Armenian state,” the deputy emphasized.

According to Baghryan, nobody should get tired in the fair struggle of the people of Artsakh because he who gets tired will lose.

“However, September 2 is a date that remains one of the most brilliant pages in the history of Artsakh. I am proud that I witnessed the shaping of history,” Baghryan said in closing.

Chess: Sinquefield Cup: Aronyan loses to Aleksandr Nepomnyashi

Eduard Nalbandian
Panorama, Armenia
Aug 26 2019
Sport 16:12 26/08/2019 World

Armenian grandmaster Levon Aronian suffered defeat at the eight round of the Sinquefield Cup underway in Saint Louise, USA. The Armenian lost to Aleksandr Nepomnyashi of Russia.

 After eight rounds played, Fabiano Caruana, Viswanathan Anand, Ding Liren and Sergey Karjakin are leading the table with 4.5 points each. In the ninth round Aronian will face World Champion Magnus Carlsen.

Our goal is for you to make money, get rich and enrich the country – PM tells businessmen

Eduard Nalbandian

Our goal is for you to make money, get rich and enrich the country – PM tells businessmen

Save

Share

17:47,

YEREVAN, AUGUST 17, ARMENPRESS. Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan recapped the My Step For Kotayk Province business forum which was held in the province’s town of Tsakhkadzor.

He noted that certain developments exist in Kotayk in all three priorities which have been declared by the government.

“First is agriculture. And this is what I meant when I was speaking about the industrialization of agriculture. What we saw, particularly regarding the new technology of strawberry production, is the industrialization of agriculture, and fortunately this type of trends exists in Armenia this year and this year strawberry exports increased three times. This is a very serious indicator. It is also an important indicator because this production doesn’t have too much of a dependence from weather conditions. This means that this is already industrial agriculture, which is our direction. In the 21stcentury you can’t wait for the weather: will there be hail or not and so on,” Pashinyan said.

The PM noted that the two other directions are tourism and processed industry.

“Here we saw two aparthotel projects which is a new thing in Armenia and I hope will succeed. We also saw processed industry samples, as well as certain technological activity samples. And our objective is to encourage this,” he said.

PM Pashinyan said that the most important role of this kind of forums is to encourage as many citizens as possible to carry out economic activities.

“Our interest isn’t for us to make money, our interest is for you to make money, and therefore we consider this to be our mission. Of course when we say make money we mean doing so legally and through fair competition. This is perhaps the most important message that I would like to address to businessmen. I say again, our goal isn’t for us to make money, our goal is that you make money and yes, get rich and enrich, and enrich not us but the country, the state, the nation,” Pashinyan said.

Edited and translated by Stepan Kocharyan




Armenian military re-equips arsenal

Eduard Nalbandian

Armenian military re-equips arsenal

Save

Share

14:57, 3 August, 2019

YEREVAN, AUGUST 3, ARMENPRESS. Armenia will continue acquiring “a lot of professional military hardware” this year and during next year, Chief of the General Staff of the Armenian Armed Forces Lt. General Artak Davtyan told reporters.

Not revealing details, he said that the process of acquiring and commissioning “quite much professional military hardware” has begun and will continue next year.

“Moreover, this hardware relates to air defense, anti-missile elements, long-range and precision targeting means. These will also increase the firepower of reconnaissance in our armed forces”.

Davtyan said he visited the Artsakh military two days ago.

He said the Artsakh military has already tested some of its locally manufactured defense equipment prototypes. He said the hardware is mostly sights, air defense and firing engagement measures. Davtyan said they consider buying these equipment from Artsakh since they are rather interesting when comparing the cost with the quality.

Earlier in July, Minister of Defense Davit Tonoyan had said that the Su-30 fighter jets which Armenia is buying from Russia will arrive sometime around year-end of 2019 or the beginning of 2020.

Edited and translated by Stepan Kocharyan




Sports: A year before Tokyo 2020: Armenia is expected to perform better

Eduard Nalbandian
MediaMax, Armenia
 
 
 
 
A year before Tokyo 2020: Armenia is expected to perform better
 
 
Photo: www.theguardian.com
 
 
Summer Olympic Games will kick off in Tokyo a year from today.
 
Secretary General of the Armenian National Olympic Committee Hrachya Rostomyan believes that Armenian athletes will perform well.
 
“I am certain that our performance in Tokyo will be twice as good as in Rio. The committee has also decided to decline quota places provided without qualification. In Tokyo, Armenia will be represented only by athletes who earned their quotas. Just participating is not enough for us, and only good results can satisfy us,” said Rostomyan.
 
Advisor to the President of the National Olympic Committee Armen Grigoryan has announced that the committee will form a commission, which will be tasked with preparations for the Olympics. It is going to hold regular discussions with head coaches and representatives of the teams, as well as experts from medical and anti-doping centers.
 
Tokyo 2020 will be held from July 24 to August 9.
 
 

Army is place where citizens learn art of winning – Pashinyan

Eduard Nalbandian

Army is place where citizens learn art of winning – Pashinyan

Save

Share

19:08,

YEREVAN, JULY 19, ARMENPRESS. Prime Minister of Armenia NIkol Pashinyan accompanied by Defense Minister David Tonoyan and Chief of General Staff of the Armed Forces Artak Davtyan visited a military regiment in Armavir Province and tasted the military food personally, ARMENPRESS was informed from the Office of the Prime Minister of Armenia.

Nikol Pashinyan also talked with the servicemen, noting that military service is one of the most intellectual specializations. “This means that in army our servicemen obtain numerous new knowledge and skills which can accompany you during your whole life, irrespective of the fact if you will continue military service or no”, Pashinyan said.

According to the PM, the Armenian army is the main place where the citizens learn the art and skills of winning. “I am confident that the talent of a winner exists in each of you and the Armed Forces must help you to discover that talent”, he said, emphasizing that the Armenian army must be the most combat ready army in the region. “I see the reaching of this goal the following way – The Armenian army must be the most intellectual army and in order this to happen, the Armenian public must be the most intellectual public in the region and the Republic of Armenia must be the most intellectual country in the region”, PM Pashinyan said.  

Nikol Pashinyan wished the servicemen success in their service, noting that service to motherland is not limited by the two years’ service in army.

Edited and translated by Tigran Sirekanyan




20 hectares of vegetative cover burned up near Armenian Genocide Memorial in Yerevan

Eduard Nalbandian
News.am, Armenia
20 hectares of vegetative cover burned up near Armenian Genocide Memorial in Yerevan 20 hectares of vegetative cover burned up near Armenian Genocide Memorial in Yerevan

10:21, 15.07.2019

The fire that broke out Sunday nearby the Armenian Genocide Memorial in Yerevan, the capital city of Armenia, has been put out.

But 20 hectares of vegetative cover has been burned up as a result of this fire.

Four water trucks and 67 rescuers took part in firefighting, which was led by Emergency Situations Minister Feliks Tsolakyan.

Book Review: Turkey’s Killing Fields

Eduard Nalbandian
The New York Times
Sunday
Turkey’s Killing Fields
 
By BRUCE CLARK.
 
Bruce Clark writes on religion and society for The Economist. He is the author of ”Twice a Stranger,” a study of the Turkish-Greek population exchange.
 
 
Armenian refugees in 1918.CreditCreditLibrary of Congress

 
THE THIRTY-YEAR GENOCIDE Turkey’s Destruction of Its Christian Minorities, 1894-1924
By Benny Morris and Dror Ze’evi
 
Using the word ”genocide” to describe an episode of mass killing has consequences. If the horrors are unfolding now, it invites other countries to intervene and punish the perpetrators. If the unspeakable events are in the past, the word’s use can affect the way they are discussed, by historians or ordinary people. Once the term ”genocide” has been established, it can seem tasteless or morally impossible to talk in much detail about the context in which mass murder occurred. Any speculation about precise motives or catalysts can sound like making excuses.
 
But one merit of “The Thirty-Year Genocide,” about the agonies suffered by Christian subjects of the Ottoman Empire immediately before and after its collapse, is that the authors overcome that problem. Their narrative offers a subtle diagnosis of why, at particular moments over a span of three decades, Ottoman rulers and their successors unleashed torrents of suffering.
 
The book examines three episodes: first, the massacre of perhaps 200,000 Ottoman Armenians that took place between 1894 and 1896; then the much larger deportation and slaughter of Armenians that began in 1915 and has been widely recognized as genocide; and third, the destruction or deportation of the remaining Christians (mostly Greeks) during and after the conflict of 1919-22, which Turks call their War of Independence. The fate of Assyrian Christians, of whom 250,000 or more may have perished, is also examined, in less detail.
 
The authors are distinguished Israeli historians. Benny Morris, a chronicler of the fighting that attended Israel’s birth, has written bluntly about incidents in which Arabs were killed or expelled. He also argues (contentiously) that it would have been better if the result had been total separation between Jew and Arab. His co-author, Dror Ze’evi, is a fellow professor at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev.
 
Each of their chosen episodes occurred at a particular historical moment. The first unfolded in an Ottoman Empire that was at once modernizing and crumbling, while in chronic rivalry with the Russians. The second took place when the Turks were at war with three Christian powers (Britain, France and Russia) and were concerned about being overrun from west and east. During the third, Greek expeditionary forces had occupied the port of Izmir, with approval from their Western allies, and then marched inland.
 
An impressive chapter explains the buildup to the 1894-96 massacres. It describes the strain imposed on rural Anatolia by newcomers fleeing Russia’s march through the Caucasus, and the transformation of the Armenians from a religious minority into a political community feared by the Ottomans.
 
This story is told with a feeling for shading and nuance. Yet there is a paradox about the book. As diligent historians, Morris and Ze’evi acknowledge many differences between the three phases of history they recount. (For example, different regimes were involved: in the first case, the old guard of the empire; in the second, a shadowy clique of autocrats; in the third, a secular republic.)
 
But their self-imposed mission is to emphasize continuity. As they argue, the Armenian death marches of 1915-16 are by now well documented, and their status as a genocidal crime, with one million or more victims, well established. By contrast, they feel, things that happened at the beginning and end of their chosen 30 years need to be better known, so that all the travails of the Ottoman Christians over that time can be seen as a single sequence.
 
Between 1894 and 1924, they write, between 1.5 million and 2.5 million Ottoman Christians perished; greater accuracy is impossible. Whatever the shifts in regime, all these killings were instigated by Muslim Turks who drew in other Muslims and invoked Islamic solidarity. As a result the Christian share of Anatolia’s population fell from 20 percent to 2 percent.
 
Well, all those statements are accurate as far as they go, and they reflect one aspect of the multiple tragedies that attended the region’s lurch toward modernity. Yet it remains difficult to express the authors’ core case in a single true-or-false proposition. Are they suggesting that Islam is intrinsically violent? No, they reject that view. Are they implying that a 30-year plan was formulated and then implemented, albeit by different regimes? At times, they hint at something like that. But their skill as historians holds them back from saying anything so crude.
 
In one of their best passages, Morris and Ze’evi carefully discuss possible interpretations of the 1915-16 blood bath, and offer comparisons with debates about Hitler’s Holocaust. As they note, historians have disputed how far in advance the mass annihilation of Jews was dreamed up. Regarding the Armenians, they say, there is no doubt that the death marches that began in April 1915 were centrally coordinated. But there have been reasonable arguments over how long in advance they were planned, and whether it was always intended that most victims would die.
 
Sifting the evidence, Morris and Ze’evi conclude that the Ottoman inner circle began planning deadly mass deportations soon after a Russian victory in January 1915. However, Ottoman policy was also shaped and hardened by the battle of Van, in which Russians and Armenians fought successfully, starting in April 1915. These conclusions rest on careful analysis.
 
But they are less confident about the fate of the Greek Orthodox subjects of the Ottoman Empire from 1919 to 1922. They document many horrifying incidents but these do not add up to a fluent story.
 
Morris and Ze’evi vigorously challenge the Turkish argument that after World War I Greek separatism in the Black Sea region posed a danger to the emerging Turkish state requiring deportation. The authors maintain that agitation for a state on the Black Sea was never serious, and that Greeks in that region never offered much resistance to the Turkish regime. Neither of those statements is completely accurate. Greek Orthodox guerrillas held out in the Black Sea hinterland with tenacity.
 
What is more, by challenging the Turkish justification for the Black Sea deportations, Morris and Ze’evi almost imply that if there had been a military threat in that region, the marches and deportations might have been morally right. This leads to a wider point about the book as a whole.
 
The reader is left wondering what the authors ultimately feel about the treatment of civilians in situations of total war. Nothing in the United Nations conventions implies that military expediency can justify the removal, whether by ethnic cleansing, killing or both, of populations whose presence is inconvenient. But by weighing up arguments for and against certain acts of expulsion, Morris and Ze’evi seem at times to be taking a less purist view.
 
There is no doubt that during the Ottoman collapse, millions of Christians died or suffered because humanitarian principles were grossly violated. But they were not the only victims. Consider the wars that drove most Muslims out of the Balkans, starting in the early 19th century and arguably culminating in the genocidal acts suffered by some Bosnian Muslims in 1995. Hundreds of thousands of Islam’s followers were killed and millions displaced, often finding refuge in Turkey. If the era that gave birth to homogeneous post-Ottoman states is to be told as a single narrative, it must surely look on both sides of the mirror.
 
Follow New York Times Books on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, sign up for our newsletter or our literary calendar. And listen to us on the Book Review podcast.
 
THE THIRTY-YEAR GENOCIDE Turkey’s Destruction of Its Christian Minorities, 1894-1924 By Benny Morris and Dror Ze’evi Illustrated. 656 pp. Harvard University Press. $35.