Author: Ekmekjian Janet

PROTOCOL OF INTENT MAY BE SIGNED IN MOSCOW

news.am
Jan 19 2010
Armenia

Another protocol of intent similar to the Mayendorf declaration may be
signed during the Armenian-Azerbaijani-Russian presidential meeting
likely to be held in Moscow, Chairman of the Democratic Party of
Armenia (DPA) Aram Sargsyan told a press conference.

However, he said, the document will not contain fundamental principles
of settling the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. "The fundamental principles
can hardly be signed in only a Russian representative’s presence,"
Sargsyan said.

Speaking of the settlement process, the DPA leader pointed out that
Armenia should be bolder. "If they say to us ‘give our lands back’, we,
for our part, must raise a similar issue and demand Nakhchevan. If
they speak of the necessity for return of refugees, we, I turn,
must raise the problem of our 400,000 refugees. When they speak of
occupation, we must remind them that Nakhchevan was only placed under
Baku’s patronage," Sargsyan said.

Speaking of Nagorno-Karabakh’s involvement in the negotiations, A.

Sargsyan pointed out that Nagorno-Karabakh was to be negotiator
from the very beginning. He does not rule out that, giving consent
to Nagorno-Karabakh’s return to the negotiating table, Yerevan is
employing a strategy of rejecting a settlement scheme by claiming
Nagorno-Karabakh to be against it.

Library Journal Reviews
January 15, 2010

Arshile Gorky: A Retrospective

by Kraig Binkowski

Arshile Gorky: A Retrospective. Yale Univ. 2009. c.400p. ed. by
Michael R. Taylor . illus. bibliog. index. ISBN 978-0-300-15441-2 .
$65. FINE ARTS

This exhibition catalog edited by Taylor (Muriel & Philip Berman
curator of modern art, Philadelphia Museum of Art) is the first since
Diane Waldman’s 1981 Arshile Gorky, 1904-1948: A Retrospective to look
comprehensively at the body of Gorky’s (1902-48) work. The six
accompanying essays incorporate themes from a spurt of recent
biographical research (three published biographies in the last 11
years) and peer at the artist both broadly (Michael R. Taylor’s
"Rethinking Arshile Gorky") and precisely (Harry Cooper’s "To Organize
Painting") in painting a well-rounded and insightful picture of the
short life and work of this increasingly important Armenian-born
American artist. The catalog reproduces in full color 180 objects,
including paintings, sculpture, and works on paper-ranging from early
impressionistic experiments to Gorky’s surrealist final years,
coupling finished pieces with preparatory works. Also included is a
superb chronology (illustrated liberally with documentary photos), an
exhibition history (solo and group) that extends up to the current
year, and an extensive bibliography. VERDICT This retrospective will
be welcomed by anyone interested in American 20th-century art, and the
bibliographic back matter alone makes it indispensable for
researchers.-Kraig Binkowski, New Haven, CT

Azerbaijan.az
Jan 16 2010

Recep Tayyip Erdogan: `If Armenia has good intentions, let it start
with its withdrawal from the regions surrounding Nagorno Karabakh’

The process of normalization between Turkey and Armenia and Nagorno
Karabakh conflict are relating to each other. These processes are
connected with each other behind the scene despite they appear
conducted separately’, Russian Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan
told journalist on board of plane on his way from Russia.

He reminded that the Turkey-Armenia borders were closed because of
Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict: `Let the problem between Azerbaijan and
Armenia be solved and occupation of Karabakh be ended, then the
Turkey-Armenia problem will find its solution. If Armenia has good
intentions, let it start with its withdrawal from the regions
surrounding Nagorno Karabakh. If it will leave those regions, there
will be positive processes’.

Erdogan said: `It is clear what actions will Turkey take. We assumed
risks and allowed flights to Armenia, opened Yerevan-Istanbul flights.
We opened air borders, but it differs from the opening of ground
borders’.

Erdogan said he discussed this issue with Russian President Dmitriy
Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin: `Russia is the most
influential member of the Minsk Group troika for Armenia. If Russia is
careless, it will be difficult to achieve results’.

view original source

ERDOGAN’S STATEMENTS ARE RHETORIC

news.az, Azerbaijan
Jan 15 2010

Recep Tayyip Erdogan Two politically important events that bear a
direct relationship to the region have occurred since the start of
the year.

First is the visit of Turkish Premier Recep Tayyip Erdogan to Moscow
and his important speeches there. Second is the recognition of the
Armenian-Turkish protocols as compliant with the norms of international
law in the Constitutional Court of Armenia, said Fikret Sadikhov.

"Though Erdogan’s statements were quite weighty and important, it
should not be forgotten that this is just a rhetoric though meeting
Azerbaijan’s interests", Sadikhov said.

Meanwhile, he said the documents recognized by the Constitutional
Court as meeting the interests of the country, do not meet Azerbaijan’s
interests at all.

"However, Armenia can be understood here. The country is in a deep
economic recession and it needs ‘gates’ for its economic recovery",
Sadikhov said.

He also noted that the sharp need for the ratification of these
protocols by Armenia is proven by the fact that despite numerous
protests of the population and the diaspora, the protocols have been
recognized by the Armenian Constitutional Court.

Novosti-Azerbaijan

AZERBAIJANI ANALYST: FOR AZERBAIJAN IT IS IMPORTANT WHAT TURKEY THINKS ABOUT IT

Today
html
Jan 14 2010
Azerbaijan

"Processes of normalization of Armenian-Turkish relations and
resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh are directly linked," Azerbaijani
political expert Rasim Musabayov said.

He was commenting on Russian FM Sergey Lavrov’s statement that the
two above-mentioned processes are not related.

"Attempts to artificially link these two processes are not right,"
Lavrov said.

"Sergey Lavrov’s statement are not original. Americans and Europeans
say the same. If they do not want to link these two processes, it is
their own business," Musabayov said.

"But Armenians themselves link these processes. They see improved
relations with Turkey as a major dividend that could delay withdrawal
of Armenia’s troops from occupied Azerbaijani territories, or to
obtain the best conditions for settling relations. But no one is
going to turn a blind eye to it," he said.

"For us it is important what Turkey thinks about it. In the end, it
will be Turkey who will open the border. The Turkish side says that
these two processes are linked. Everyone else will have to take it
for granted," he added.

"I think that these processes are directly linked. Because
Armenia began to toughen its negotiating position as soon as the
Armenian-Turkish dialogue was launched," the expert added.

ACCORDING TO , ARMENIANS, JUST AS BULGARIANS, SHOULD DEMAND COMPENSATION FROM TURKEY

NoyanTapan
Jan 14, 2010

CYPRUS, JANUARY 14, NOYAN TAPAN – ARMENIANS TODAY. Bojidar Dimitrov,
Bulgaria’s Minister in charge of the Agency for Bulgarians Abroad,
stirred a hornet’s nest at the start of the new year by threatening
to block Turkey’s accession to the European Union (EU), unless it
paid billions of dollars in compensation for Bulgarians who were
forcefully displaced during the Ottoman era. "Turkey is surely able to
pay this sum, as it’s the 16th largest economic power in the world,"
said Dimitrov. Dimitrov disclosed that the payment of compensation as
required by the 1925 treaty is one of Bulgaria’s three pre-conditions
in order not to veto Turkey’s admission to the EU. Bulgaria’s Deputy
Foreign Minister Marin Raykov sought to downplay Dimitrov’s demands
by stating that his country did not make Turkey’s EU bid conditional
on the resolution of the compensation issue for displaced persons.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Borissov rebuked Dimitrov, threatening to
fire him should he make a similar statement in the future without first
consulting him. Before that Vaselin Ninov, a Bulgarian government
spokesman, had confirmed that Dimitrov’s announcement represented
official state policy and for that reason he was fired.

According to the website the only wrinkle
to Turkey’s bid for EU membership isn’t Bulgury but some European
countries such as France, Germany, Holland, and Austria strongly
oppose Turkey’s EU membership bid. However, Turkey’s record on winning
lawsuits in the ECHR is not very good. Encouraged by these successful
lawsuits, Armenians living in Turkey and throughout Europe should seek
legal redress for their countless losses suffered during the Genocide.

ARMENIAN RECIPES AS REQUESTED

Chattanooga Times Free Press (Tennessee)
January 13, 2010 Wednesday

This morning we’ve got calls for help in shopping and in cooking.

* "A.C." of Lookout Mountain reported that one can find Marshall’s
biscuits at Pruetts on Signal Mountain, and then asked if you could
tell her where to find Sara Lee’s Pecan Coffee Cake. "Failing that,
I would like a recipe for coffee cake that calls for toasted pecans."

* Liz Kennedy of Tullahoma worked at Erlanger from 1966 to 1971 and
remembers the spice doughnuts. Now, she’s looking for the recipe.

* Finally, an anonymous reader threw away a bottle of balsamic
vinegar because it had a gelatinous mass in it. "Can you still use
the vinegar after removing it?" the reader asked, adding that he or
she would also like a recipe for old-fashioned vinegar pie."

Now to today’s recipes. Terry Keister provided two authentic Armenian
recipes, as requested.

Armenian Rice Pilaf

1/2 stick butter

1/4 cup pine nuts

1 handful thin spaghetti, broken into pieces

1 can long-grain white rice (measure it in the consommé can)

1 can consommé

1 can water

Melt butter in saucepan. Add the pine nuts and broken spaghetti pieces,
and sauté until slightly browned. Add the rice, and stir until coated
completely. Heat consommé and water, and stir. Bring to a simmer,
cover tightly and cook 20 to 25 minutes.

Note: You may use bulgur (coarse ground wheat) instead of rice to
make Armenian Bulgur Pilaf.

Stuffed Armenian Grape Leaves

1 jar grapevine leaves

1/2 cup olive oil

3 medium onions, finely chopped

11/2 cups long-grain rice

Juice of 2 large lemons

2 tablespoons pine nuts

2 teaspoons dill

2 teaspoons mint

1/4 cup minced parsley

Salt and pepper, to taste

Water (about 1 cup)

Olive oil (about 1 cup)

Rinse grape leaves thoroughly in cold running water to remove brine.

Drain. Select 4 or 5 heavy leaves and line the bottom of a Dutch oven;
set aside.

To prepare filling, heat 1/2 cup olive oil in medium skillet. Add
onions and cook until translucent. Remove with a slotted spoon.

In a saucepan, parboil rice in 1 cup water until liquid is absorbed.

Combine rice, onion, lemon juice, pine nuts, dill, mint and parsley.

Season with salt and pepper. Cool.

To fill grapevine leaves, place a leaf, rough side up, with stem
facing toward you. Use about a teaspoon of rice mixture at the base of
a leaf. Lift the bottom sides of the leaf up onto the filling. Fold
both the right and left sides of the leaf over the filling and roll
up. Tuck edges in.

Place grape leaves in Dutch oven, side by side, to cover bottom,
then start second layer and continue until done.

Add water and olive oil to cover and then put an inverted plate on
the grape leaves. Bring to boiling and then cover; lower heat and
simmer 1 hour or so. Test to see if the rice is tender.

Allow to cool in the liquid. Remove carefully and store in the
refrigerator 24 hours before serving. Serve cold.

Marilyn Soehl serves these muffins on a cold day.

Marilyn’s Apple-sauce Muffins

1 cup butter (no substitute), softened

2 cups sugar

2 eggs

4 cups flour

1 teaspoon cinnamon

2 teaspoons allspice

1 teaspoon cloves

2 cups applesauce

2 teaspoons soda

1 cup raisins

Cream butter and sugar; add eggs and mix until combined. In a separate
bowl, mix flour, cinnamon, allspice and cloves.

Mix together applesauce and soda, and add alternately with flour
mixture to the first mixture. Add raisins, and bake in greased and
floured muffin tins in a preheated oven at 375 F for 15 minutes,
or until done.

ENERGY COOPERATION AT THE CORE OF ERDOGAN’S MOSCOW TALKS

Today’s Zaman
Jan 13 2010
Turkey

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan departed the country on Tuesday for
an official two-day visit to Moscow, seeking deeper energy cooperation
with Russia that will boost European Union-candidate Turkey’s quest
to become a key transit hub for Europe.

In Moscow, Erdogan will be accompanied by a large delegation including
Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, Energy Minister Taner Yıldız and
Foreign Trade Minister Zafer Caglayan as his talks with Russian Prime
Minister Vladimir Putin will focus on energy and security. The two
sides are also expected to touch upon trade, investments and regional
and international issues.

Upon the collapse of the Soviet Union, ever-growing cooperation
dominated bilateral relations between NATO member Turkey and Russia
instead of traditional and historic competition. Then-President Putin’s
December 2004 visit to Ankara marked a milestone in relations as it
was the first presidential visit in the history of Turkish-Russian
relations besides that of Chairman of the Presidium Nikolai Podgorny
in 1972.

Afterwards, within the framework of the "Joint Declaration on the
Intensification of Friendship and Multidimensional Partnership" signed
by the Russian and Turkish presidents during the December 2004 visit,
the two countries have in recent years deepened their ties by signing a
raft of agreements from gas and oil pipelines to nuclear power plants
and have sought closer security cooperation in the Caucasus.

Russian gas supplies to Turkey and a number of oil and gas pipeline
projects including the South Stream project to pump Russian and Central
Asian gas to Europe along the bed of the Black Sea, the second leg of
the Blue Stream natural gas pipeline, linking the two countries, and
the Samsun-Ceyhan pipeline to bring Caspian oil to the Mediterranean
via Turkey are among topics to be discussed during the visit as well
as nuclear energy cooperation, including the construction of power
plants in Turkey.

Russia is Turkey’s single biggest trading partner and provides
two-thirds of its gas. The two countries have bilateral trade ties
totaling some $40 billion.

Russia is keen to have South Stream built ahead of the rival EU-backed
Nabucco gas pipeline, which is aimed at cutting Europe’s reliance on
Russian gas. Russia, which supplies a quarter of Europe’s natural gas,
wants to build gas supply routes quickly to bypass Ukraine and other
ex-Soviet states after disputes with Kiev over transit payments in
recent years disrupted flows.

A senior Turkish Energy Ministry official told Reuters that the two
sides would discuss the next step in building the second leg of Blue
Stream, a natural gas pipeline that runs from Russia to Turkey under
the Black Sea. He said Turkey and Russia may also discuss raising
the capacity of the current Blue Stream pipeline and extending it
to Israel.

While in Moscow, Erdogan is expected to have talks with President
Dmitry Medvedev as well, with the Nagorno-Karabakh dispute between
Armenia and Azerbaijan expected to be the main focus of the talks. The
Turkish side will urge Russia for maintenance of the "gained impetus"
in efforts of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe
(OSCE) to resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

The Minsk Group of the OSCE has striven to solve the Nagorno-Karabakh
conflict, a territorial dispute between Baku and Yerevan, for 17
years. Russia, along with France and the United States, is one of
the three co-chairs of the Minsk Group.

Ankara, which last year agreed with Yerevan to establish diplomatic
relations and reopen their border, overcoming a century of hostility
stemming from the killing of Anatolian Armenians during World
War I, insists on seeing improvement toward a resolution of the
Nagorno-Karabakh conflict in parallel with its efforts to normalize
relations with Yerevan. Ankara argues that partial normalization in
the Caucasus cannot be sustainable as long as parties don’t exert
efforts for complete normalization.

FREEDOM HOUSE: ARMENIA IS AMONG ‘PARTY FREE’ COUNTRIES

ArmInfo
2010-01-14 14:57:00

ArmInfo. The state of human rights and political freedom in 2009
worsened in Armenia as compared to 2008, with Armenia assigned a
score of six points out of seven (the worst) according to the annual
report by Freedom House, a Washington- based international human rights
watchdog. Armenia, according to the report, is among the ‘partly free’
countries along with Georgia and Turkey; as for Azerbaijan, it is
considered to be ‘non-free’ during the recent few years. Russia and
Iran are also among non-free countries. The experts of Freedom House
assigned a score of five points to the state of political and civil
freedoms in Nagorno Karabakh. The Baltic states and Ukraine, among
the former Soviet countries, are in the category of free countries.

To recall, two key indicators are taken into account when preparing
a rating of countries: the level of political freedoms and that of
civil freedoms. The level of political freedoms in Armenia makes up
6 points and the civil ones – 4 points.

ADVISOR TO RA PM FADEY SARGSYAN DIES AT 86

PanARMENIAN.Net
11.01.2010 13:40 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Prominent politician, advisor to Armenian Prime
Minister, Dr. Fadey Sargsyan died at 86 on January 10.

A governmental committee will be in charge of funeral organization.

Fadey Sargsyan was born September 18, 1923 in Yerevan. He graduated
from Leningrad’s Budyonov Military Academy (1946). Dr. of Tech.

Sciences (1975), acad. (1977, corr. member 1971). Foreign member of the
Russian, Georgian and Portuguese Academies of Sciences, Honorary Member
of the International Academy of Engineering Sciences, of the "Ararat"
International Academy of Sciences, of the Armenian Philosophical
Academy, of the International Academy of Sciences, Education, Industry
and Arts, Member of the International Informatizations Academy, of
Academy of Military Sciences, of All-National Academy of Knowledge, of
International Academy "Elite", of International Academy of Medical &
Technical Sciences, of the Armenian Academy of Engineering Sciences,
of Russian Academy of Natural Sciences, Member of the Presidium of
the International Academy of National Security. Double laureate of
state award of the USSR, laureate of state award of the Ukrainian
SSR. Has been honored with orders of Lenin, October Revolution,
Red Banner of Labour (3 times) and Saint Mesrop Mashtots.

Served as adviser to the Prime Minister of RA since 2006.