Author: Hakobian Adrine

PREMIERE OF NEW YEAR PLAY "THE MAN AHCHOO! OR A REAL MIRACLE" HELD IN YEREVAN

PanARMENIAN.Net
18.12.2009 17:38 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ The premiere of a New Year play "The man Ahchoo! or
a real miracle" of the Yerevan State Puppet Theater after Tumanyan was
held December 18 in Yerevan. "The show lasts an hour and is divided
into two equal parts: the first part takes place in the lobby, and
the second – on the stage. Father Frost and Snow Maiden participate
in the show," artistic director of the theater Ruben Babayan told a
press conference.

The play will be performed between December 18 and December 29,
January 3 to 10, 2010.

MCA-ARMENIA SIGNS TWO NEW CONTRACTS

armradio.am
19.12.2009 13:06

The Millennium Challenge Account – Armenia (MCA-Armenia) SNCO signed
two contracts: Rehabilitation of Ararat Valley Drainage System (Package
I) and Rehabilitation of Tertiary Irrigation Canals (Package I).

This event holds a special significance for the MCA-Armenia Program
as it marks the completion of contract awards for all ttypes of
irrigation infrastructure to be rehabilitated under its Infrastructure
Activity. The remaining two contracts that are expected to be signed
by spring of 2010 are the second stages of these two assignments. As
of this date, MCA-Armenia has already signed contracts and launched
construction under the Rehabilitation of 6 Main Canals (Packages I
and II), Construction of 5 Gravity Schemes and Rehabilitation of 17
Pumping Stations.

The contract for rehabilitation of the Ararat Valley Drainage System
(Package I) was awarded to Sahakyanshin CJSC (Armenia) with the
contract price of 7,6 million USD. The Contract for Rehabilitation of
Tertiary Irrigation Canals (Package I) was awarded to the Consortium
comprised of Yerevanshin RPU LLC and Kamurjshin CJSC with the contract
price of 2.3 million USD.

The signing ceremony was held at the RA Government press center
with the attendance of Deputy Prime Minister Armen Gevorgyan and
other members of the MCA-Armenia Governing Council, including the
Stakeholders Committee delegates and representatives of the U.S.

Embassy and MCC.

Rehabilitation of Ararat Valley Drianage System and the tertiary
canals are the key components of the Infrastructure Activity
of the MCA-Armenia Program. While the Ararat Valley is the
biggest agricultural zone in Armenia and provides around 30%
of the agricultural GDP of the country, productivity levels have
been decreasing in recent decades as a result of water-logging and
mineralization. The anticipated impacts of the system rehabilitation
include increased crop productivity in the drainage area, better
regulated groundwater levels and mineralization, and reduced
water-logging within settlements. Tertiary canal rehabilitation
directly impacts the reliability of farmers’ water supply and reduces
water losses. During the last year, pilot tertiary canal rehabilitation
was conducted in 4 villages of Ararat and Armavir marzes. The next
beneficiaries of the program are 14 communities in Armavir, Ararat
and Vayots Dzor Marzes.

Following the signing ceremony, the MCA-Armenia CEO answered questions
about the status of the program, progress to date with a specific focus
on the workplan, and targets to be achieved in the next 19 months.

MCC’s total investment into the agricultural and water sector in
Armenia, through the MCA-Armenia Program, should amount to about 180
million USD by the time the program ends in September 2011.

AROUND 80 U.S. COMPANIES OPERATE IN ARMENIA

ARMENPRESS
DECEMBER 18, 2009
YEREVAN

YEREVAN, DECEMBER 18, ARMENPRESS: About 80 U.S. companies operate in
Armenia. They cover various sectors of economy, such as IT, banking,
tourism and hospitality, manufacturing, etc. Executive Director of
American Chamber of Commerce in Armenia (AmCham) Diana Gaziyan told
Armenpress that these, as well as heavy industry, are the spheres
which are of particular interest for U.S. companies.

According to her assessment, even though there are some obvious issues
hindering the development of business in Armenia, the country’s
business legislation is rather liberal and foreign investment
oriented. There is no need to create new laws; the fair application
of the existing ones will be enough. The country is quite attractive
from doing business perspective, which is proven by the fact of the
presence of some major international players.

According to the Armenian Statistical Service, the U.S. investments
in the real sector of the economy during the January-September were
15 million 783,3 USD. This index, though, as compared with the same
span of the past year, reduced by 27,9%. D. Gaziyan says because of
AMD depreciation in Armenia attractive sectors are those which export
or add value or manufacture here.

The American Chamber of Commerce in Armenia has been operating in
Armenia since 2000. Currently, AmCham has around 80 member companies,
which represent various sectors or economy, such as financial services,
insurance, banking, energy and mining, information technologies,
consumer goods, manufacturing, tourism, marketing and promotion,
infrastructure development, internationals organizations, etc. AmCham
is a member of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and European Council of
American Chambers of Commerce.

The executive director assures that one of the most important areas
of AmCham activities is lobbying for the business interests of its
members in its strive to create more competitive business environment
in Armenia. AmCham creates opportunities for its members to network,
enlarge the scope of their business contacts and find new partners. D.

Gaziyan says another important direction is increasing the business
relations between Armenia and Turkey, and AmCham realizes that the
opening of the Armenian-Turkish border will have a significant impact
on the business environment development in Armenia.

AmCham is issuing its Quarterly Business Magazine, each issue of which
is devoted to a specific topic. For example the last issue was devoted
to real estate prices in global financial economic crisis conditions,
while the upcoming one will be devoted to the business consequences
of possible opening of Armenia-Turkey border.

ARMENIAN COMMERCIAL BANKS’ CREDITS TO PRIVATE SECTOR RISE BY 33.4% TO 381 BILLION DRAMS

ARKA
December 17, 2009
Yerevan

YEREVAN, December 17, /ARKA/. Armenian commercial banks’ credits
to private sector rose by 33.4% in January-September of 2009 to 381
billion Drams.

According to their interim statements for Q3, their overall credits
and other borrowings to clients rose to 691 billion drams at the
end of September from 639.3 billion drams on December 31, 2008. It
appears that 55.14% of all credits went to the private sector.

Armbusinessbank was the leading bank in terms of credits made available
to private sector, whose share in the overall volume of credits to
this sector stood at 11.5% at the end of September. Some 77.3% or 43.9
billion Drams of Armbusinessbank’s credits went to the private sector,
rising from 15.1 billion from December 31, 2008.

HSBC Bank Armenia was second with 37.5 billion Drams (56.22%),
followed by Ameriabank-37.3 billion Drams (83.4%), Ardshininvestbank-
34.3 billion Drams (59.65%), Bank VTB Armenia- 32.2 billion Drams
(48.41%) and Unibank- 28.4 Drams (50.38%).

There are 22 commercial banks in Armenia with 365 branches). ($1 –
381.59 Drams).

RUSTAMYAN EXPLAINS ARF STRATEGY TO DERAIL PROTOCOLS ON SIX CITY TOUR

Asbarez
Dec 16th, 2009

Community Support for ARF’s Protocols Position Strong

Armenia National Assembly member Armen Rustamyan speaking at the
governor’s office in Providence, RI

NEW YORK-The East Coast tour of Armenia National Assembly member
Armen Rustamyan concluded on Sunday, December 13, after a guest
appearance at the New York ARF’s commemoration of the Federation’s
119th anniversary. During his December 9-13 visit, Rustamyan met with
Congressional and other US government representatives and visited
east coast communities.

During his successful six-city tour, Rustamyan spread the ARF’s
unwavering message of opposition to the controversial Armenia-Turkey
protocols, which were signed by Armenia’s and Turkey’s respective
foreign ministers in October. Armenian President Serzh Sarkisyan
billed the protocols as a positive economic move for Armenia with the
promised opening of the Armenia-Turkey border. But the ARF opposed
the protocols and warned that opening border in exchange for heavy
concessions by Armenia could only damage the national interests of
the Armenian people.

Armenia National Assembly member Armenian Rustamian speaks to the
Armenian community in Watertown, MA Rustamyan, who is chairman
of the National Assembly’s Committee on Foreign Relations and the
representative of the ARF Supreme Body in Armenia, was welcomed in
Washington, D.C., Philadelphia, Providence, Watertown, New Jersey,
and New York, where the ARF hosted community meetings and arranged
for private meetings with ARF members and US, local government and
community representatives.

Rustamyan explained the ARF’s current strategy to derail the dangerous
protocols and warned that the party will press for regime change in
Armenia if the protocols’ constitutionality is OK’d by Armenia’s
Constitutional Court in January and if the National Assembly
subsequently ratifies the document.

MUSURLIAN CONFRONTS GENOCIDE DENIERS STEVE COHEN & JEAN SCHMIDT

Asbarez
/video-musurlian-confronts-genocide-deniers-steve- cohen-jean-schmidt/
Dec 14th, 2009

Depraved Genocide Denial on display in these two excerpts shot in
Tennessee & Ohio by Peter Musurlian, for his Summer 2010 documentary,
"Turkey’s Tools in the Heartland."

The interviews, from these excerpts, were shot and the overall piece
was edited by the ever-so-talented Ara Soudjian, who produced longer
videos for the 2008 & 2009 ANC-WR (Armenian National Committee-Western
Region) banquets in Simi Valley & Pasadena, respectively. Mark Geragos,
nationally-renowned Los Angeles attorney, is in rare form about 3
minutes into the video.

AZERBAIJANI DEPUTY SAYS ARMENIANS CONDUCT SERIOUS ACTIVITY IN US CONGRESS

Panorama.am
16:21 14/12/2009

The Armenian lobby has big influence not only in the US, but worldwide,
the Azerbaijani Democratic Reforms Party leader, parliament deputy
Asim Mollazade told Day.az.

Referring to the allocations the US Congress made to Armenia and
NKR, he said it would be wrong to underestimate the Armenian lobby’s
influence in the US and worldwide generally.

Only the fact that the Armenians managed to obtain financial aid for
Nagorno-Karabakh under the world financial-economic crisis, evidences
about the serious work the Armenian lobby conducted in the US Congress,
he said.

Armenian MPs ready to support young entrepreneurs’ ideas
12.12.2009 17:01 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Armenian MPs are ready to support young
entrepreneurs’ ideas contributing to the state’s welfare, ARFD MP Ara
Nranyan told a PanARMENIAN.Net reporter.

`Hopefully, those who work for the country’s welfare, creating real
product and opening workplaces, have different mentality since they
invest their resources in their homeland and have personal interest in
making the country prosperous, as well as following that the state
makes transparent use of budgetary means,’ he said.

According to Nranyan, several young entrepreneurs have proposed that
MPs raise key economic problems in Parliament. `As parliamentarians,
we have decided to raise only those questions that concern the state
and society, vs. individual officials or entrepreneurs,’ he noted.

ARMENIAN DEFENSE MINISTRY DENIES ANOTHER AZERBAIJANI LIE

ArmInfo
2009-12-11 23:10:00

ArmInfo. The armed forces of Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh have a
high combat practice and the necessary arms to worthily rebuff any
encroachment, the press-service of the Armenian defense ministry told
ArmInfo when commenting on another lie of Eldar Sabiroglu, the head
of the Azerbaijani defense ministry press-service.

"In particular, yesterday Sabiroglu once again came out with a number
of statements disseminating false information about the number of
Armenian population, reinforcement of armed forces and the situation
in the borderline zone. The disseminated information that Armenia
has a shortage of human resources and the country cannot form the
necessary detachments is false",- the Armenian defense ministry’s
press-release says.

In this connection, the Armenian defense ministry said that the autumn
call-up is being held according to the schedule and army recruitment is
already ensured by over 70%. "As regards the information disseminated
by the Azeri defense ministry press-service is repetition of the
thoughts published by Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev on November
17",- the source says.

BAKO SAHAKIAN: MIGHTY, INDEPENDENT, SOVEREIGN, DEMOCRATIC AND LEGAL STATE IS EXCLUSIVE VALUE HAVING NO ALTERNATIVE FOR US

NOYAN TAPAN
DECEMBER 10, 2009
STEPANAKERT

STEPANAKERT, DECEMBER 10, NOYAN TAPAN. December 10 twice became turning
in Artsakh’s modern history. As it is mentioned in NKR President
Bako Sahakian’s congratulatory address on the occasion of the Day of
Referendum of NKR State Independence and Constitution Day, in 1991 on
this day the Armenians of Artsakh expressed their collective will and
confirmed the resolution of building an independent statehood. And
in 2006 on the same day country’s basic law, the Constitution was
adopted again through a national referendum, which was a regular
great victory of Artsakh having defended its independence and freedom,
firmly standing on the way of democracy.

Reminding that December 10 is also the International Day of Human
Rights B. Sahakian mentioned that this fact in itself is symbolic as
the Artsakh movement, Nagorno Karabakh Republic’s birth and existence
are a component of human rights, reflection of the universal basic
principles of nations’ equality and self-determination right.

"A mighty, independent, sovereign, democratic and legal state is
the exclusive value having no alternative for us," Bako Sahakian’s
congratulatory address read.