Author: Hunanian Jack

CONFERENCE ON "SOCIAL IMPACT OF THE GLOBAL ECONOMIC CRISIS ON ARMENIA"

armradio.am
14.04.2009 13:05

The Ministry of Labor and Social Issues, the United Nations (UN),
World Bank (WB) and International Monetary Fund (IMF) offices in
Armenia, organized a conference on "Social Impact of the Global
Economic Crisis on Armenia." The objective of the conference was
to discuss consequences of the global economic and financial crisis
and find measures to mitigate its impact on vulnerable groups. The
conference brought together around 120 participants.

Representatives from international organizations warned today that the
global economic and financial crisis could have a serious impact on
the Armenian economy and affect the country’s ability to achieve the
Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by 2015. UN, WB and IMF officials
told a conference that while the effects on the Armenian economy are
already being felt, the population is now starting to feel the social
impact as well.

The exposure and impact of the crisis varies across countries and
sectors, but it is becoming more apparent that what started as an
economic crisis is now turning into a human development crisis. During
the first two months of 2009 the unemployment rate in Armenia has
increased, while the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) has decreased by 3.7
percent compared to the same period in 2008. Moreover, non-commercial
private transfers drop ped by about 35 percent in February 2009
compared with a year earlier.

According to the World Bank report on "Implications of the Global
Economic Crisis for Poverty in Armenia," the current crisis could
push 172,000 more people below the poverty line in 2009-10, increasing
the total number of poor to an estimated 906,000 people, out of which
297,000 people will be extreme poor. A large part of Armenia’s gains
in reducing poverty over the last years would be erased.

"In many developing countries, the consequences of the crisis could be
a possible reversal of the gains in human development and progress
towards the achievement of the MDGs, especially in the areas of
healthcare, including reduction of child mortality, improvement
of maternity health, and education," said Ms. Consuelo Vidal, UN
Resident Coordinator.

Acknowledging the government’s commitment to maintain the current
level of funding for the social sector, including salaries, pensions,
family and other benefits, UN Agencies will support the government’s
efforts in devising solutions that will draw together all stakeholders,
including international organizations, private sector and the civil
society. In addition, the UN in Armenia is in the process of tailoring
its current programmes to address the needs of those most affected
by the crisis.

"We need to be fast and flexible and seek cost-effective solutions to
emerging problems, particularly, focusing on bringing international
experience and knowledge to help in developing recovery mechanisms,"
Ms. Vidal emphasized.

"Economic growth in Armenia has led to substantial poverty reduction,
but these achievements are now at risk. The global economic crisis
will have potentially serious implications for poverty and this
calls for significant responses by the Government of Armenia and its
development partners," said Aristomene Varoudakis, World Bank Armenia
Country Manager.

The Government has shown commitment by accelerating the implementation
of World Bank funded projects under the new IDA Fast Track Facility.

Such policy responses may include support to the development of
small and medium sized businesses, design and implementation of labor
intensive programmes, including public works, better monitoring of
the human development impacts of the crisis, development of food
security initiatives, efficient budgetary allocation and spending
in social sectors, continuous support to the government in capacity
building to provide quality social services, adjustment and expansion
of existing basic social safety net instruments to better target the
most vulnerable groups, as well as generation of reliable data on
children and women for tailored policy interventions.

ARMENIA, IRAN DISCUSS WAYS TO FINANCE ENERGY PROJECTS

IRNA
Apr 14, 2009

Tehran, April 14, IRNA — Visiting Armenian Energy Minister Armen
Movsisyan conferred with Iran’s Minister of Economy and Finance
Shamseddin Hosseini on ways to finance energy projects to be
implemented by Iran in Armenia.

In a meeting, the two sides called for expansion of mutual ties in
the field of energy, oil, gas, technical and engineering services.

Hosseini said that the Islamic Republic of Iran is willing to
cooperate with Armenia in developing infrastructure of the former
Soviet republic.

Movsisyan appreciated opening up of credit line for Armenia by the
Export Development Bank of Iran.

He hoped that the ground for expanding two countries economic and
trade cooperation would be prepared in near future.

Nazi camps: Hell on earth

18:07 | 10/ 04/ 2009

MOSCOW. (RIA Novosti military commentator Ilya Kramnik) – On April 9,
1945, the inmates of the Buchenwald death camp near Weimar, Germany,
sent a radio message to inform the Allies that the Nazis were forcing
them to evacuate the camp, and to request assistance.

After they received promises of help from the U.S. Third Army, they
stormed the watchtowers and killed the remaining guards using arms they
had been collecting since 1942. The Americans, who reached Buchenwald
on April 11, liberated 21,000 prisoners.

In 1995, the UN decided to mark April 11 as the Day of Liberation of
Concentration Camps.

Another relevant date is the Holocaust Memorial Day, marked on January
27, the anniversary of the liberation of the concentration camp at
Auschwitz-Birkenau.

Homo Sapiens, seldom good-natured and almost never vegetarian, are this
planet’s most dangerous predators. The 20th century was the bloodiest
century in human history, when millions were killed in concentration
camps.

It would be wrong to blame the Nazis for inventing concentration camps.
Similar facilities first appeared during the Civil War in the United
States in 1861-65, and the term itself became established during the
Boer War (1899-1902), when such camps were set up to sever the supply
routes of the Boer guerrillas. Farmers and their families who supplied
foods to the rebels were forced into those camps. Since supplies were
sent there only when all other institutions received their share, a
considerable number of the camps’ prisoners starved to death.

Turkey and Austro-Hungary set up concentration camps during the First
World War, mostly as a form of genocide against Armenians and Slavs,
respectively.

Russia did not escape that evil either. In the first half of the Soviet
history, the Gulag camps were used to isolate (or liquidate)
politically disloyal citizens. It was also an efficient economic
mechanism used for building vital facilities such as railroads and
canals.

However, the German camps were much better organized and pursued the
most inhuman objectives. The Nazis started setting up the camps as soon
as they came to power in 1933, but they became especially infamous
during the Second World War (1939-1945).

The Nazi camps can be divided into two groups, the labor camps and the
death camps.

In the labor camps, millions worked to produce the commodities Germany
needed to fight the war. Many of them died because of inhuman
conditions and hard labor.

Extermination was the goal of the death camps, where the "inferior
people," especially Jews, Gypsies, Slavs, Soviets, and anyone else who
was not an "Aryan" according to the contemporary Nazi race terminology,
were forced. Over three million of the six million European and Soviet
Jews died there, as well as four million Russians and hundreds of
thousands of other Soviet peoples (out of the total 27 million who
perished in WWII), approximately 200,000 Gypsies, as well as Serbs,
Poles and others.

Treblinka, Belzec, Maidanek, Sobibor, Chelmno, a major part of the
Auschwitz-Birkenau and other camps were cogs in a huge and well-oiled
Nazi extermination machine. Inmates were shot, gassed, and clubbed to
death, and died in inhuman medical experiments. By the end of the war,
some labor camps, including Buchenwald, were turned into extermination
camps.

The Nazis especially hated Jews, Gypsies and Soviet prisoners, above
all Russians.

The "enemies of the Reich" were killed not only in German camps but
also in camps in collaborationist countries, for example at Jasenovac
in Croatia and Salaspils in Latvia.

The camps were structural units of SD (security service) and SS (the
German abbreviation for Protective Squadron, said to be responsible for
the vast majority of war crimes during the Nazi rule), but people were
killed also in the so-called Stalags, or prisoner-of-war camps, of the
German army.

Western servicemen were kept in more or less human conditions in
accordance with international conventions, but for Russian prisoners
these camps were mostly a stopover between a labor camp and a death
camp.

Nazi successors and their accomplices often say that Soviet prisoners
were treated ruthlessly because the Soviet Union had not signed the
1929 Geneva Convention on the Treatment of Prisoners of War.

But they neglect to mention that the Soviet Union joined the convention
in 1931 in a special declaration signed by Foreign Minister Maxim
Litvinov, and that the Geneva Convention bound the Germans, who were
among the first to join it, to respect its norms irrespective of
whether or not their adversaries joined it.

The final stage of the war saw the most ruthless treatment of
prisoners. The Nazis began mass executions in an attempt to conceal
their crimes. Revolts broke out in many camps that were close to the
frontline, because the inmates, doomed to death one way or another,
hoped to survive until Soviet or Allied troops reached them. The
Buchenwald uprising was one of such revolts.

After the war, the Nazis’ crimes were carefully considered during the
Nuremberg Trials, which passed death sentences on the main culprits.

Unfortunately, the idea of concentration camps did not disappear along
with the Third Reich. The goals of those who are using it today may be
different, but the names Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo still jar on the
ears.

The opinions expressed in this article are the author’s and do not
necessarily represent those of RIA Novosti.

AZERBAIJAN: UKRAINE’S YUSHCHENKO PUSHES FOR ODESSA-BRODY PIPELINE IN BAKU

Posted April 10, 2009 © Eurasianet

Ukrainian President Victor Yushchenko visited Baku on April 10 in an
attempt to get his Azerbaijani counterpart, Ilham Aliyev, to commit to
the ambitious Odessa-Brody-Gdansk oil pipeline project.

A feasibility study of the project will be presented in Warsaw on
April 24, the Ukrainian leader announced, according to a report
distributed by the Newsazerbaijan website. In the meantime,
"consultations will continue on the level of foreign ministries," the
site quoted Yushchenko as saying.

Project stakeholders — Azerbajian, Georgia, Lithuania, Poland and
Ukraine — hope to build a conduit that would begin in Azerbaijan and
travel via Georgia and across the Black Sea to link up with Ukraine’s
Odessa-Brody pipeline. The quintet of states hopes to extend
Odessa-Brody as far as the Polish port of Gdnask on the Baltic Sea
coast and eventually, on the other end of the line, build a sub-sea
pipeline across the Caspian Sea to get Central Asian oil powerhouse
Kazakhstan onboard.

The project has evoked a good deal of skepticism among commentators
who believe that Moscow may block Kazakhstan from joining the project
by obstructing construction of the Caspian Sea pipeline. Azerbaijan
alone may not be able to provide necessary supplies, as Baku is
already committed to Turkish and Russian transit routes.

Anadolu Agency, Turkey
April 11 2009

"END TO ARMENIAN LIES" RALLY TO TAKE PLACE IN NEW YORK

NEW YORK (A.A) – 11.04.2009 – A rally titled "End to Armenian Lies"
will take place in New York on April 25 with the participation of
hundreds of Turks living in the States.

The rally is an annual one and is sponsored by the Young Turks
Association under the umbrella of the Federation of Turkish-American
Associations.

The rally is intended to inform Americans that Armenian allegations on
the incidents of 1915 do not represent the reality and are nothing but
lies. (SOL)

Today.Az, Azerbaijan
April 11 2009

Turkey should not allow to deceive itself: adviser for Turkish Premier

11 April 2009 [13:35] – Today.Az

"If talks between Turkey and Armenia do not lead to liberation of the
occupied lands of Azerbaijan, this will be a tragedy. This is a
tragedy for Turkey and this is a very bad precedent", adviser for
Turkish Prime Geybulla Ramazanoghlu.

"I think that the public of Turkey and Azerbaijan will not stay
indifferent to the unconditional opening of borders, establishment of
diplomatic ties between the countries. The government is well aware of
this.

International forces also urge not to protract this issue as it is
unfovorable for us.

The Azerbaijani public should know that if diplomatic ties between
Turkey and Armenia are established without considering definite
conditions and under support of EU and USA, most reasonable people
will resign. I can say this even today", said he.

The adviser for the Turkish Prime Minister noted that friendship
between Azerbaijan and Turkey will last forever and no one will have
questions on this issue.

"As for the talks conducted by the government, as far as I know, there
are definite agreements in this. Yet, it is impossible to specify
these agreements. It is officials that should declare this. We are
aware that the talks will be finalized one day.

Today’s talks with Armenians undergo not because Ankara wants it. It
goes because of the situation and the circumstances. But the most
important thing is that Turkey should not allow to deceive it. Through
the past 50 years we have got different kinds of oral promises, we are
recommended to take some steps, but unfortunately words do always not
turn into the reality. Turkey does not get the promised things", noted
he.

/Day.Az/

URL:

NEW VOICES AT NEW REP SERIES PRESENTS DEPORTED/ A DREAM PLAY 5/4

Broadway World
April 10 2009

New Voices at New Rep, New Rep’s staged readings series, is pleased
to present Deported / a dream play as its final reading for 2009 on
Monday, May 4, 2009 at 7:30p.m. New Voices @ New Rep is open to the
public, and admission is free.

"New Voices @ New Rep is extremely important to New Rep," says Harriet
Sheets, Managing Director. It fosters the new works of playwrights
and introduces New Rep’s patrons to new plays, which is a central
part of our mission."

Ms. Sheets adds, "I am thrilled to be ending our 2009 reading series
with Deported / a dream play and to be working with local playwright
Joyce Van Dyke and director Judy Braha and assisting them with the
development of this play."

Playwright Joyce Van Dyke, author of A Girl’s War (New Rep 2003),
said, "I’ve been working on this play with director Judy Braha and
a company of local actors for the past two years. It began with
the desire to create a play based on Armenian genocide survivor
stories. Using survivor oral history interviews from the Armenian
Library and Museum of America, as well as memoirs, photographs,
official documents, letters, and personal reminiscences of survivors
and their descendants, we began holding improvisational workshops,
and the script has grown out of this process."

Ms. Van Dyke elaborates, "As the demand for recognition and
understanding of these historical events continues to swell, I felt
a personal need to deal with these haunting stories — and also to
create something constructive, life-giving, and even beautiful, out
of their opposites. Judy and I are excited for Deported / a dream
play to have its first professional staged reading at New Rep."

Monday, May 4, 2009 @ 7:30p.m.

Deported / a dream play by Joyce Van Dyke directed by Judy Braha

Featuring: June Baboian, Ken Baltin, Michael Kaye, Paula Langton,
Doug Lockwood, Marya Lowry, Elise Manning, Rob Najarian, Jessica
Rothenberg, and Bobbie Steinbach

Description: A true story of two women who saved each other’s
lives, and a friendship shaped by the legacy of the Armenian
genocide. Inspired by the author’s grandmother and her close friend,
the play’s dream-layered action spans more than a century and projects
into the future. Nine actors play 30 American, Armenian, Turkish,
Jewish, Kurdish, and European characters in an intimate story that
reverberates universally.

To complement Deported / a dream play, there will be a thematic
panel discussion, Telling Stories about the Genocide in the Theatre,
immediately following the reading. The panel will consist of:

· Dr. Martin Deranian: the real-life son of one of the play’s main
characters, Varter Nazarian Deranian, and the author of three books:
Hussenig, Worcester is America, and Miracle Man of the Western Front:
Dr. Varaztad H. Kazanjian, Pioneer Plastic Surgeon.

· Tina Sajonian: President, BU Armenian Students Association.

· Mariam Stepanyan: Executive Director, Armenian Library and Museum
of America.

· Ruth Thomasian: Executive Director and Founder, ProjectSAVE Armenian
Photograph Archives, Inc.

New Repertory Theatre produces plays that speak powerfully to the
essential ideas of our time. Through the passion and electricity
of live theater performed to the highest standards of excellence,
New Rep expands and challenges the human spirit of both artists
and audience. New Rep presents world premieres, contemporary, and
classic works in several intimate settings. We are committed to
education and outreach, including special dedication to the creation
of innovative in-school programming and providing access to underserved
audiences. New Rep is an active advocate for the arts and a major voice
in the national dialogue defining the role of theater in our culture.

New Rep has received Elliot Norton and IRNE Awards for outstanding
acting, scenic design, direction, and production. Programming at
New Repertory Theatre is supported by a grant from the Massachusetts
Cultural Council.

FREE, suggested donation of $10.

Call 617-923-8487, or online at

FRIENDLY RELATIONS BETWEEN ARMENIA AND GEORGIA ARE A TRADITION

PanARMENIAN.Net
10.04.2009 18:04 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ "Georgia is our age-long neighbor, so friendly
relations between Armenia and Georgia are a tradition," RA President
Serzh Sargsyan told a PanARMENIAN.Net reporter at news conference
in Yerevan.

"We welcome Georgia’s wish to become a strategic partner to Armenia. It
might expatiate settlement of some issues between our countries,"
RA President stated.

Last week Georgian Foreign Affairs minister Grigol Vashadze said that
strategic relations between Armenian and Georgia will be established
in near future.

THE 1909 ADANA MASSACRES
By Mihran Boyadjian

AZG DAILY
11-04-2009

Armenian Genocide

The Adana Massacres of 1909, whose 30,000 victims are being
commemorated on the centenary of their death this year, are of special
significance to the Armenians of Cyprus since a large proportion
of them are descendants of the 1915 Genocide survivors from Adana
who found refuge in Cyprus, and who still consider themselves
"Adanatsi". In Larnaca, the Armenian Church of St. Stephanos, built
in 1913, is dedicated to the 1909 victims. Massacres of Armenians
in Turkey were nothing new, in fact about 15 years earlier, the
Hamidian Massacres of 1894-96 had claimed tenfold that figure and
had shown the lack of enthusiasm of the European powers for taking
any effective preventive action. It must be mentioned however that
the American Missions, whose members were eyewitness to the events,
saved countless lives through their valiant efforts on the ground and
their very effective fund-raising back home. Earlier Massacres had been
more local affairs, usually the result of periodic Kurdish raids on
helpless villages and small towns. Some were opportunistic, "pacifying"
operations by local governing pashas whose main aim was to raise
revenue by pillage and extortion to recoup the large sums (some would
call them bribes), which they had to pay the Porte to obtain their
posts. The Russian Empire, whose primary foreign policy objective was
to gain access to the Mediterranean through Ottoman territory, found a
convenient pretext for intervening in Ottoman affairs by assuming the
role of protector to the Christian population. The European powers,
led by Great Britain, fiercely opposed any Russian expansion into the
Mediterranean and wanted any pieces of the slowly collapsing Ottoman
Empire for themselves. Hence they supported the Sultan. The Armenians,
caught in the middle, had great hopes on the constitutional changes
forced on the reluctant Sultan by the European powers. However, these
changes were on paper only and were largely ignored by the Porte. It
was in this context that Cyprus was ceded to Great Britain in 1878
in return for promised British protection against Russia.

Some time ago, I came across and purchased a letter written by the
Commissioner of Kyrenia of the time, W.N. Bolton, which reveals a
macabre link between Cyprus and the Adana Massacres of 1909. The
letter, written on cream coloured notepaper blind embossed with the
British coat of arms, is apparently in response to an enquiry by
Harry Lukach, Private Secretary to the Governor of Cyprus Hamilton
Goold-Adams. Today, he is better known as Sir Harry Luke, having
changed his surname to Luke in 1919. Subsequently, he had a highly
successful career in the colonial service and authored numerous books
mainly on the Middle East where he served in Cyprus, Armenia (1920),
Jerusalem, Malta etc. His books are full of anecdotal material of his
experiences in the places he served in, and show his compassionate
interest in the people he came in contact with.

Kyrenia 30th January, 1912

"Dear Lukach, I have just been looking up the inquests held in my
district in 1909 on unknown bodies washed up by the sea. The first case
was in the first week in May on the body of a man washed ashore near
Lapithos. This body was much decomposed but had two bullet wounds one
in the neck and one in the abdomen just above the groin. The two next
both males came ashore one at Ayios Ambrosios & one at Ayios Epiktetos
but I do not think there were any marks showing cause of death. No
4 was the body of a little girl about 6 to 8 years her head had been
smashed in by some heavy weapon like a hammer or a pick. As far as we
could tell from their dress they were all Armenians. Dr. Fuleihan now
Ast D.M.O. Nicosia was the officer who examined the bodies and might
if you want it give you more information. Besides these there were
several bits on which I did not hold inquests. And I also believe
a very large number came ashore in the Carpas. I cant write owing
to gout which I am glad to say is getting better but very slowly. I
sent you a wire about the Lapithos road on Saturday as Williams was
over in the P.W.D. Motor on Friday & told me it was quite passable
with care, since when they have been hard at work mending it so it
should be quite all right.Yours SincerelyW.N.Bolton".

It is interesting to note that the Adana Massacres started in early
April and bodies started to get washed up in Cyprus about a month
later. Today the fiction being propagated by the Turkish state is that
there was no Genocide in 1915 and that deaths occurred on both sides
as a result of fighting between Armenians and Turks. They further claim
that the deportations, during which some "unfortunate" deaths occurred,
were necessary for the security of the Ottoman Empire. They neglect to
mention that most of the fit Armenian men, who had been conscripted
into the Ottoman Army in 1914, were later disarmed, transferred to
labor battalions, and subsequently executed. The fighting claimed by
the Turkish state only took place in a few mountainous regions when the
Ottoman army tried to enforce the deportation orders of 1915. We see
here another example of reversal of facts employed by the Turkish state
similar to that of claiming the bodies of Armenian victims exhumed
from mass graves were those of Turks killed by Armenians! The final
destination of the entire Armenian population of Anatolia, consisting
mostly of older men, women, and children, was the small oasis town
of Der Zor in the middle of the Syrian Desert! Very few were fit or
lucky enough to reach there. The majority were killed on the way or
died of thirst, starvation or exhaustion during the forced marches,
as was intended by the Ottoman government.

ZARUHI POSTANJYAN AND STEPAN SAFARYAN TO REPLACE RAFFI HOVHANNISYAN AT PACE AND NATO
Anna Nazaryan

"Radiolur"
09.04.2009 17:17

Representatives of the "Heritage" faction Zaruhi Postanjyan and Stepan
Safaryan will replace Raffi Hovhannisyan in the Armenian delegations
to PACE and NATO respectively. Head of the "Heritage" faction Aremn
Martirosyan told a press conference today that the opposition has to
be represented in those structures earlier or later.

Referring to the recent information in media that Raffi Hocvhannisyan
is not going to be in Armenia during the elections to the Yerevan City
Council and is preparing to leave politics, Press Secretary of the
Heritage Party Hovsep Khurshudyan noted the rumors do not correspond
to reality. Raffi Hovhannisyan is not going to leave politics and
the Party will continue its activity.

Armen Martirosyan attached importance to the recent meetings in
Turkey and the visit of the delegation of the EU-Armenia Parliamentary
Cooperation Commission to Armenia. According to him, the "Heritage" had
a meeting with the delegation; a broad range of issues was discussed.

According to Hovsep Khurshudyan’s assessment, reforms are needed in
the political and economic fields of the country.