Author: Jabejian Elizabeth

YEAR OF ARMENIA IN RUSSIA COMMON ACHIEVEMENT

ARKA News Agency, Armenia
Dec 4 2006

YEREVAN, December 4. /ARKA/. The organization of the Year of Armenia in
Russia is the sides’ common achievement, RA Premier Andranik Margaryan
stated during his visit to Moscow, Russia. He expressed the confidence
that the political dialogue, economic and humanitarian cooperation
allow the sides to consistently develop their relations.

According to Margaryan, the arrangements held during the Year of
Armenia in Russia evoked a serious response: Armenia’s best artistic
collectives gave performances, exhibitions, student conferences,
business forums were organized.

Margaryan welcomed the fact that the events were also held in the
Rostov, Astrakhan, Samara, Sverdlovsk and other Russian regions.

The RA Premier pointed out the importance of intensifying
Armenian-Russian humanitarian ties, the Year of Armenia and Russia
and the Year of Russia in Armenia being evidence thereof.

An Armenian Premier-headed delegation went to Moscow on November 30 to
take part in the official closing of the Year of Armenia in Russia. On
December 1, 2006, the Armenian Premier held a meeting with his Russian
counterpart Mikahil Fradkov. The following day Premier Margaryan went
to Saint Petersburg to take part in the opening of the "History of
Armenia" exhibition at the Hermitage. The same day Margaryan took
part in the official closing of the Year of Armenia in Russia.

JAVAKHETI ACTIVIST DEPORTED FROM ARMENIA
By Satenik Vantsian in Gyumri

Radio Liberty, Czech Rep.
Dec 4 2006

An Armenian nationalist activist from Georgia’s restive Javakheti
region was deported from Armenia on Monday shortly after being
controversially handed a suspended one-year prison sentence in a
trial denounced as politically motivated by his supporters.

A court in Gyumri found Vahagn Chakhalian, a young leader of the United
Javakhk organization campaigning for the Armenian-populated region’s
greater autonomy, guilty of illegally entering Armenia, dismissing
his protestations of innocence. It backed prosecutors’ claim that he
crossed the Georgian-Armenian border without a valid Georgian passport.

The court ruled that Chakhalian must return to Yerevan, his temporary
place of residence, and stay there until the verdict’s formal entry
into force. But witnesses said that as Chakhalian left Gyumri for the
Armenian capital in a car he was apprehended by police and escorted
to the Georgian border. His defense lawyer, Tigran Hayrapetian, told
RFE/RL that local police officers showed him a written deportation
order signed by the chief of Armenia’s national Police Service,
Lieutenant-General Hayk Harutiunian.

Chakhalian, 24, was arrested on October 11 just hours after he,
his parents, brother and another United Javakhk activist arrived in
Armenia in a car and were reportedly stopped and beaten up by unknown
men outside Yerevan. The activist, Gurgen Shirinian, sustained severe
injuries and required hospitalization.

Chakhalian was released from custody two weeks later amid an outcry
from a number of Armenian non-governmental organizations and 16
members of Armenia’s parliament. In a joint statement, the mostly
opposition lawmakers accused the authorities in Yerevan of using the
case to please the Georgian government which has been at odds with
United Javakhk.

The violence and the ensued arrest also infuriated the radical group’s
supporters in Javakheti. Dozens of them marched to the Armenian border
to demand his release.

"I repeat that I never illegally crossed the border of the Republic
of Armenia," Chakhalian said in his concluding court remarks.

His mother Gayane also testified at the trial, challenging the
prosecutors to explain why they did not level the same accusations
against herself and the three other persons that entered Armenia with
Chakhalian. "Why is it that only one of us is guilty of breaking the
law?" she said. "Why don’t you try me as well?"

Hayrapetian, for his part, argued that they had no trouble passing
through the Armenian border and customs checkpoints.

Chakhalian’s sympathizers link the case with United Javakhk’s
rejection of the official results of the October 5 local elections in
Javakheti that gave victory to Georgia’s governing National Movement
Party. Alleging massive fraud, United Javakhk rallied hundreds of
supporters in the regional town of Akhalkalaki. The demonstration
turned violent, with the protesters seizing the local government
building before being dispersed by police.

FOR TURKEY’S ARMENIANS, PAINFUL PAST IS MUTED
By Anne Barnard

Boston Globe, MA
Nov 30 2006

ISTANBUL — When Mesrob II, the Armenian Patriarch of Istanbul and
All Turkey, meets today with Pope Benedict XVI, the one topic he says
he definitely won’t bring up is the one that most intensely interests
his people around the world: the Armenian genocide.

Getting Turkey and the rest of the world to acknowledge the slaughter
of more than 1 million Armenians in the early 20th century, many by
troops of the collapsing Ottoman Empire, is a cherished goal of the
Armenian diaspora. The visit from the spiritual leader of 1 billion
Roman Catholics might seem the perfect opportunity not only to draw
attention to the problems of the tiny Christian minority here, but
also to ask the pontiff to press Turkey for an apology.

But for about 68,000 Turkish citizens of Armenian descent, who —
along with 20,000 to 30,000 people from neighboring Armenia who
have migrated here in search of jobs — make up by far the largest
Christian community in Turkey, the situation is much more complicated,
even dangerous.

Armenians here must balance a deep need to preserve the memory of the
killings, known in Armenian as metz yeghern, or "the big calamity,"
with safeguarding the small community that remains, which to them means
avoiding conflict with the Muslim Turk majority or the nationalist
government. Turkish citizens who mention the killings — including
Orhan Pamuk, the Turkish author who won the Nobel Prize this year —
have been charged with the crime of "insulting Turkishness," and risk
fines, jail sentences, and even death threats.

The Armenian community is treading cautiously around the pope’s
visit. Leaders are seeking his support on general issues of religious
expression; during his first two days Benedict has already stressed
the importance of religious freedom. But they are being careful not to
embrace too closely a pontiff widely seen by Muslims as having insulted
Islam — and they are avoiding any public reference to the genocide.

Many Armenians here say they have chosen to leave the past buried —
or partly buried — in order to press for more immediate benefits.

They want to persuade the government to ease onerous restrictions,
such as laws that ban Christians from bequeathing land to the church or
running independent seminaries to train priests. And they want to live
in peace with the rest of this country of nearly 80 million people,
about 99 percent of whom are Muslim and overwhelmingly ethnically
Turkish.

Mesrob, the leader of the Armenian Orthodox Church here, is a case in
point. Speaking the confident English he perfected at Memphis State
University, he chose his words carefully in an hourlong conversation
with three foreign reporters.

Asked whether he would discuss the genocide with the pope, he said
he never brings up "local issues" with visiting dignitaries. Asked
whether he could state for the record that a genocide took place,
he fixed a reporter with a friendly gaze and was silent for a long
moment. Then he said, "I acknowledge that people were killed."

But Mesrob, 50, spoke more readily when asked what had happened to
his own family at the time. His grandfather’s six brothers were all
deported from the town of Izmit, during a time when many Armenians
were shipped off to the Syrian desert. His grandfather, who escaped to
Istanbul and became a baker, never heard from them again. He assumed
most of them died.

Mesrob’s parents and grandparents never told him the details. "They
never talked about it. They didn’t want us to be at odds with our
Muslim neighbors," he said.

"There is no family that didn’t share this situation," said Navart
Beren, 51, an administrator at St. Mary’s Church, across the street
from the patriarch’s residence on a winding street near the Sea of
Marmara, where she was attending Mass last Sunday. Her parents were
close-mouthed, too, she said: "They didn’t want us to carry revenge
in our hearts."

"All that is in the past," said her friend Margarit Nalbantkazar, 52.

"But this did happen: My husband’s father was 8 or 9 years old. He
saw them take his father by hitting him on the back of the head with
a gun. . . . They never saw him again."

Murat Belge, a Turkish academic who runs the publishing house that
prints Pamuk’s books, explained why Armenians inside Turkey walk such
a fine line between forgetting and accusing.

Told of the patriarch’s comments, Belge said: "If he had said there was
an Armenian genocide, it’s very likely that he would be assassinated
by some fascists, the patriarchate would be burned, and Armenians
leading their daily lives would be shot by unknown people."

Turkey has always insisted that the deaths, most of them in 1915,
were part of a war in which a beleaguered Ottoman Empire was facing
Armenian rebels allied with its enemies, which included the United
States, Britain, and Russia.

But most historians agree that Armenians were systematically killed
and driven out. The subject is extremely sensitive in Turkey because
many of the military leaders of the dying Ottoman Empire went on to
found the secular Turkish republic in 1923.

Also in the 1920s, hundreds of thousands of Greek Orthodox Christians
were forced to leave Turkey as smaller numbers of Muslims were forced
out of Greece, under the agreement that established the Greek and
Turkish borders. Today, Christians make up less than 1 percent of
the population.

US policy on the Armenian deaths is to respect the position of Turkey,
an important NATO ally, though the 1.2 million Armenians in America
fiercely lobby Congress to recognize the genocide.

Pope John Paul II called the events a genocide in a 2000 document,
and in 2001 visited a memorial to the victims in Yerevan, Armenia’s
capital. In a speech there, he avoided the term genocide but adopted
the Armenian phrase "big calamity."

The Vatican has given no indication of whether Benedict will mention
the issue.

Mesrob said he hoped the pope’s visit would improve interfaith
relations, but whether it does "depends on what kind of language he’s
going to use," he added with a chuckle. He said the pope’s September
remarks, quoting a Byzantine ruler’s criticism of Islam as violent,
"jeopardized" Christian minorities.

A metal detector and security checkpoint stand outside Mesrob’s ornate
residence, and security will be extra tight during the pope’s visit,
he said.

Mesrob said Turks do not bear all responsibility for the killings
of Armenians but have "the most important responsibility" because
"they were ruling the country." He said many people believe "ethnic
cleansing" was carried out to "remove Christians from public life."

When asked if Armenians in Turkey have a ceremony or memorial site to
commemorate the killings, he said that they do not, but that people
remember the date April 24, 1915, when Armenian intellectuals in
Istanbul were rounded up and deported, as a kind of "beheading of
the community."

Mesrob dismissed recent allegations that he forbids church officials
to speak of the killings. "It’s not a question of silence," he said.

"How can you make friends with someone if you confront them?"

Instead, he recommends cultural exchanges between Armenia and Turkey
to pave the way for an honest discussion of the events, he said. In
the meantime, he said, when foreign governments raise the issue,
ethnic Armenians in Turkey get nervous.

Aida Barsegian, 56, a house cleaner who moved here from Armenia,
said it didn’t help when France passed a law last month declaring it
a crime to deny the genocide. "If they care so much, they should open
the borders of France and let us find work there," she said after
lighting candles at the church. "Here they give me work."

ARMENIAN SINGER TO LEAVE FOR GREAT BRITAIN TO TAKE PART IN BBC CONTEST’S FINAL

Noyan Tapan News Agency, Armenia
Nov 30 2006

LONDON, NOVEMBER 30, NOYAN TAPAN – ARMENIANS TODAY. 17-year-old
Armenian singer Silva Hakobian has passed to the final of BBC’s The
Next Big Thing future stars’ contest and with another six singers
will have an opportunity to leave for the United Kingdom next week
to perform in BBC’s well-known Maida Vale studio.

First the best 20 out of 1100 records were selected at the contest
held since September this year.

According to radio Liberty, the best six performers were to be
selected through Internet voting on November 28, but the criteria
of presented records were so high that the jury chose seven of them,
including 17-year-old Armenian singer with her song "I like."

The song’s author is Silva’s sister Mane and the song was recorded
by Silva’s brother Edgar.

"The participants’ quality was a surprise for people, but not for
us, as from the moment of the idea’s emergence we believed in its
realization," contest producer Simon Pits said.

Maida Vale stage will start on December 6 and the contest commission
will announce the winner on December 9.

The winner will be chosen by musical experts group including Katy
Danis who has worked with Madonna and William Orbit who has written
Kyle Minogue’s song Can’t Get You out of My Head.

Weekend Edition
October 14-15, 2006
"Suddenly, Those Armenian Graves Opened Up Before My Own Eyes"
Confronting Turkey’s Armenian Genocide

By ROBERT FISK

This has been a bad week for Holocaust deniers. I’m talking about
those who wilfully lie about the 1915 genocide of 1.5 million Armenian
Christians by the Ottoman Turks. On Thursday, France’s lower house of
parliament approved a Bill making it a crime to deny that Armenians
suffered genocide. And, within an hour, Turkey’s most celebrated
writer, Orhan Pamuk–only recently cleared by a Turkish court for
insulting "Turkishness" (sic) by telling a Swiss newspaper that nobody
in Turkey dared mention the Arm! enian massacres–won the Nobel Prize
for Literature. In the mass graves below the deserts of Syria and
beneath the soil of southern Turkey, a few souls may have been
comforted.

While Turkey continues to blather on about its innocence–the
systematic killing of hundreds of thousands of male Armenians and of
their gang-raped women is supposed to be the sad result of "civil
war"–Armenian historians such as Vahakn Dadrian continue to unearth
new evidence of the premeditated Holocaust (and, yes, it will deserve
its capital H since it was the direct precursor of the Jewish
Holocaust, some of whose Nazi architects were in Turkey in 1915) with
all the energy of a gravedigger.

Armenian victims were killed with daggers, swords, hammers and axes to
save ammunition. Massive drowning operations were carried out in the
Black Sea and the Euphrates rivers–mostly of women and children, so
many that the Euphrates became clogged with corpses and changed its
course for up ! to half a mile. But Dadrian, who speaks and reads
Turkish fluently, ha s now discovered that tens of thousands of
Armenians were also burned alive in haylofts.

He has produced an affidavit to the Turkish court martial that briefly
pursued the Turkish mass murderers after the First World War, a
document written by General Mehmet Vehip Pasha, commander of the
Turkish Third Army. He testified that, when he visited the Armenian
village of Chourig (it means "little water" in Armenian), he found all
the houses packed with burned human skeletons, so tightly packed that
all were standing upright. "In all the history of Islam," General
Vehip wrote, "it is not possible to find any parallel to such
savagery."

The Armenian Holocaust, now so "unmentionable" in Turkey, was no
secret to the country’s population in 1918. Millions of Muslim Turks
had witnessed the mass deportation of Armenians three years earlier–a
few, with infinite courage, protected Armenian neighbours and friends
at the risk of the lives of their own Muslim families–and, o! n 19
October 1918, Ahmed Riza, the elected president of the Turkish senate
and a former supporter of the Young Turk leaders who committed the
genocide, stated in his inaugural speech: "Let’s face it, we Turks
savagely (vahshiane in Turkish) killed off the Armenians."

Dadrian has detailed how two parallel sets of orders were issued,
Nazi-style, by Turkish interior minister Talat Pasha. One set
solicitously ordered the provision of bread, olives and protection for
Armenian deportees but a parallel set instructed Turkish officials to
"proceed with your mission" as soon as the deportee convoys were far
enough away from population centres for there to be few witnesses to
murder. As Turkish senator Reshid Akif Pasha testified on 19 November
1918: "The ‘mission’ in the circular was: to attack the convoys and
massacre the population… I am ashamed as a Muslim, I am ashamed as
an Ottoman statesman. What a stain on the reputation of the Ottoman
Empire, these criminal people..! ."

How extraordinary that Turkish dignitaries could speak such truths in
1918, could fully admit in their own parliament to the genocide of the
Armenians and could read editorials in Turkish newspapers of the great
crimes committed against this Christian people. Yet how much more
extraordinary that their successors today maintain that all of this is
a myth, that anyone who says in present-day Istanbul what the men of
1918 admitted can find themselves facing prosecution under the
notorious Law 301 for "defaming" Turkey.

I’m not sure that Holocaust deniers–of the anti-Armenian or
anti-Semitic variety–should be taken to court for their
rantings. David Irving is a particularly unpleasant "martyr" for
freedom of speech and I am not at all certain that Bernard Lewis’s
one-franc fine by a French court for denying the Armenian genocide in
a November 1993 Le Monde article did anything more than give publicity
to an elderly historian whose work deteriorates with the years.

But it’s gratifying to find French President Jacques Chi! rac and his
interior minister Nicolas Sarkozy have both announced that Turkey will
have to recognise the Armenian death as genocide before it is allowed
to join the European Union. True, France has a powerful
half-million-strong Armenian community.

But, typically, no such courage has been demonstrated by Lord Blair of
Kut al-Amara, nor by the EU itself, which gutlessly and childishly
commented that the new French Bill, if passed by the senate in Paris,
will "prohibit dialogue" which is necessary for reconciliation between
Turkey and modern-day Armenia. What is the subtext of this, I
wonder. No more talk of the Jewish Holocaust lest we hinder
"reconciliation" between Germany and the Jews of Europe?

But, suddenly, last week, those Armenian mass graves opened up before
my own eyes. Next month, my Turkish publishers are producing my book,
The Great War for Civilisation, in the Turkish language, complete with
its long chapter on the Armenian genocide entitled "The ! First
Holocaust". On Thursday, I received a fax from Agora Books in Is
tanbul. Their lawyers, it said, believed it "very likely that they
will be sued under Law 301"–which forbids the defaming of Turkey and
which right-wing lawyers tried to use against Pamuk–but that, as a
foreigner, I would be "out of reach". However, if I wished, I could
apply to the court to be included in any Turkish trial.

Personally, I doubt if the Holocaust deniers of Turkey will dare to
touch us. But, if they try, it will be an honour to stand in the dock
with my Turkish publishers, to denounce a genocide which even Mustafa
Kamel Ataturk, founder of the modern Turkish state, condemned.

Robert Fisk is a reporter for The Independent and author of Pity the
Nation. He is also a contributor to CounterPunch’s collection, The
Politics of Anti-Semitism. Fisk’s new book is The Conquest of the
Middle East.

EDUCATING TURKEY
By Nazlan Ertan

The New Anatolian, Turkey
Nov 18 2006

Opinions

The week, between the two key congresses of the right wing, was
dominated by an issue just as explosive as the congresses itself:
education.

Admittedly, education has always been the Achilles’ heel of this
government, and The New Anatolian certainly offers its tentative
praise to Huseyin Celik, who managed to keep his post as education
minister despite all the objections from the military, higher education
officials and the public. Erkan Mumcu, who now has his eyes on the
prime ministry, failed miserably in his short tenure as education
minister, attracting both the anger and the scorn of university
professors, who referred to him as "rookie" or "the boy."

But the 17th Education Convention, convening to grab headlines after
— years, proved to be a hot potato rather than an asset to the
government. First of all, the ruling Justice and Development Party
(AKP) was accused of imposing its agenda related to the university
entrance of vocational schools, namely the clergy high schools known
as imam hatip.

Given the time and effort allocated to facilitate students of
vocational schools being able to enter any university of their choice,
many accused the government of not looking at education strategy but
at its own election strategy. Presently, the graduates of vocational
schools get points in the centralized university exam when their
points are calculated for universities of the field they studied,
and have a disadvantage when they decide to switch fields. To give a
concrete example, a graduate of an imam hatip school would get extra
points if his score was calculated to enter a faculty of theology
but not for political science.

The desire to recalculate the coefficient of high school average in
the overall score has been constantly expressed by the AKP government
but was stalled by the president and the Constitutional Court.

Thus, when this issue — rather than the badly needed discussion on
Turkish education’s compatibility with international standards, the
need for adult education, the need for vocational education to meet
the needs of the public and language training — dominated the news,
many felt that this was an imposition.

Education Minister Celik defended the decisions, saying that the
ministry did not impose an agenda on the convention. He said that
several key academics will prepare reports after the convention,
which he described as a platform for free thought, and added that no
opposition party should use certain ideas expressed at the convention
as a tool to denigrate the initiative.

Like Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Celik also gave assurances
that the government respected secularism. "The Turkish Republic’s
education system is secular," he said, blaming, like the premier,
the press for ignoring the big picture and just concentrating on a
couple of mistakes or shortcomings at the convention.

The convention is now over, but alas, the problems and criticism in
the education sector are not.

Search me

One would have thought that State Minister and chief negotiator for the
EU Ali Babacan would have enough troubles without searching for more.

This time trouble went searching for him. When Danish security guards
at the Copenhagen airport wanted to search Babacan, it blew up into
a diplomatic crisis. Denmark apologized, and the event was described
as one that is "unfortunate."

"Unfortunately,&quo t; this was not an isolated action. Copenhagen security
caused similar incidents over the last two years, including one with
recently deceased former Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit in 2005. Ecevit,
arriving in the country with full documentation, was kept waiting
for half an hour during which he fell ill.

Fortunately, Babacan is in better health. Not so much can be said
of Turkish-Danish ties after the cartoon crisis and the Kurdish and
pro-PKK Roj-TV broadcasts.

French leave

The damage imposed on Turco-French ties after the French National
Assembly passed the law to penalize denial of the so-called Armenian
genocide had dropped from the front pages of newspapers. But it made
a pronounced comeback when Gen. Ilker Basbug, the commander of the
land forces, said that the military was boycotting France after the
decision. Paris tried to shrug off the remarks, only to be told the
next day, this time by Turkey’s Defense Minister Vecdi Gonul, that
France was intentionally left off the list of invitees to the Eighth
Defense Industry Fair. A French colonel reportedly left as soon as
he heard the remarks. Hurriyet daily gave the news with the headline:
"Offended by a couple of words".

Los Angeles Times
Nov 25 2006

A tense time for a papal visit

Turkey, which doesn’t recognize the Roman Catholic Church, is still
rankled by Benedict’s comments on Islam.

By Tracy Wilkinson, Times Staff Writer
November 25, 2006

‘It’s a kind of preemptive intolerance: Don’t let it flourish because
it might take over. Everyone is afraid of something.’
– Mustafa Akyol – Writer and expert on interfaith relations, on why
the vast majority of the Turkish people mistrust Christianity.

Protection
click to enlargeISTANBUL, TURKEY – To reach Turkey’s most important
Roman Catholic church, a visitor must scour a traffic-choked street
to find the metal doors, walk down a flight of stairs, cross a
courtyard and finally step into the consecrated basilica.

Inside the Holy Spirit Cathedral here, the lights remain low until a
minute before evening Mass, and then reveal frescoed ceilings with
gold-trimmed arches, 22 crystal chandeliers and blond-marble columns.
On this night, 14 worshipers dot the pews.

In the Turkish capital, Ankara, the only Catholic church is even more
discreet: It is marked simply by a French flag.

When Pope Benedict XVI travels to Turkey next week, he will be making
his first trip to a predominantly Muslim country at a moment of
diplomatic fragility.

He also will be traversing some of the most ancient and revered
milestones of Christianity, in a land where Christianity is
disappearing and where non-Muslim minorities complain of systemic
discrimination, harassment and violence against them.

It is a complex agenda. The pope’s main purpose is to meet with the
Istanbul-based spiritual leader of the world’s 250 million Eastern
Orthodox Christians in a show of ecumenical solidarity. But he must
also use the visit to attempt to repair the damage from comments he
has made that cast Islam in a negative light.

Among Turkey’s nearly 70 million Muslims, reaction to Benedict’s
visit ranges from disinterest to intense anger. A man opened fire
early this month on the Italian Consulate in Istanbul, telling police
later that he wanted to "strangle" the pope. A nationalist gang
called the Gray Wolves is staging regular demonstrations protesting
the pontiff’s arrival.

Among the estimated 100,000 Christians who live in Turkey, there is
hope that Benedict’s presence will cast light on their difficulties.

The Roman Catholic Church is not legally recognized in Turkey. It
functions largely attached to foreign embassies; its priests do not
wear their collars in public.

Most Christians in Turkey are of the Armenian, Greek and other
Orthodox denominations, and although most of these are recognized in
the Turkish Constitution as minority communities, they face severe
restrictions on property ownership and cannot build places of worship
or run seminaries to train their clerics.

Such hardships make it almost impossible for Christians to sustain
and expand their communities, advocates say. The Greek Orthodox, for
example, have dwindled to no more than 3,000, just 2% of the
community’s size in the 1960s.

Fueled by a vitriolic, and growing, potion of nationalism and Islamic
radicalism, spasms of violence have led to the killing of one priest
this year, the beatings of two others and the burning of a Christian
prayer center. Christian tombstones are often vandalized and property
frequently confiscated by authorities.

Turkey has come under repeated criticism from Western human rights
organizations and the Vatican for its failure to promote religious
freedom. Turkey is an Islamic but secular country; in reality, this
means that all religious activity, including mosques and imams, is
controlled by the government.

"Obviously, more needs to be done to promote religious freedom for
all denominations," Ali Bardakoglu, president of Turkey’s powerful
Religious Affairs Directorate, said in an interview. But he defended
the government’s treatment of minorities, contending that Christians
and other non-Muslims do not face serious problems.

Bardakoglu was one of the most emphatic critics of Benedict after the
pope delivered a speech in Regensburg, Germany, in September that
denounced Islamic violence and quoted a medieval Byzantine emperor
who disdained Islam and its prophet, Muhammad. Adding insult to
injury, as far as many Turks were concerned, the emperor was
defending Constantinople, cradle of Orthodox Christianity, against
the Muslim conquest that gave the city its name today: Istanbul.

Bardakoglu said the pope was welcome in Turkey despite the speech,
which touched off outrage throughout the Muslim world. And although
he said he accepted Benedict’s subsequent explanations, Bardakoglu
did not appear completely appeased.

"It is unfortunate that there are circles within Western society that
attempt to blacken the name of our religion and are infected with
Islamophobia," he said. "The role of the Vatican and the pope should
be to help fight stereotypes. Rather than open debate, they should be
seeking to heal wounds."

In a remarkable gesture, the pope will meet with Bardakoglu, the
country’s top religious figure, at his ministry, a modern, imposing
building on Ankara’s outskirts, on the first day of his Turkey visit.
Bardakoglu’s directorate commands a huge budget and oversees all of
Turkey’s imams.

Originally, the Vatican expected Bardakoglu to call on the pope at
the Vatican Embassy, as protocol would have dictated. But the Turks
refused. After a series of negotiations, the pope agreed to go to
Bardakoglu. "It is a gesture of goodwill," a senior Vatican official
said.

The pope’s controversial presence in Turkey represents a balancing
act for the government of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, which
regards itself a vital bridge between the West and East, a way for
Westerners to deal with a modern and democratic Islam. But it also
cannot appear too cozy with a pontiff who, in the view of many, is
not fond of Muslims or Turks.

Erdogan is not scheduled to receive Benedict, citing a previous
commitment to attend a NATO summit in Latvia on Tuesday and
Wednesday. And there is no plan for the prime minister to see him off
when the pope departs Dec. 1.

Both the Vatican and Turkish officials said this was not a snub, but
Erdogan told visiting reporters in Istanbul last month, "You can’t
expect me to arrange my timetable according to the pope."

The frictions are rooted in history. The Ottoman Empire, which ruled
the region for more than six centuries, was relatively tolerant of
Jews, Christians and other non-Muslims. But before and during World
War I, Western powers collaborated with Christian and other
minorities to bring down the Ottomans. In the carnage that followed,
as many as 1.5 million Armenians were slaughtered, a similar number
of ethnic Greeks expelled and 1 million Turks deported from Greece.

The 1923 Lausanne Treaty founded the Republic of Turkey and
recognized minorities. But deep mistrust persists, and even today
among ardent nationalists, Christians are seen as a potential fifth
column.

"It’s a kind of preemptive intolerance: Don’t let it flourish because
it might take over," said Mustafa Akyol, a writer and expert on
interfaith relations. "Everyone is afraid of something."

Akyol, a Muslim, said he once wrote a column advocating that the
museum of St. Sophia, or Aya Sofya, in Istanbul be returned to its
original use, that of a church. The response was harsh: He was
threatened and castigated as a "secret Greek." The pope is scheduled
to visit St. Sophia, built in the 6th century as a Byzantine church
and converted to a mosque in the 15th century by the Ottomans.

The mere rumor that the pope might say a prayer at the site has led
to a bit of hysteria. Islamic newspaper Milli Gazete, in a front-page
commentary last week, lashed out at the government for permitting the
"Crusaders" to plan to bless the former church in a brazen attempt to
"revive Byzantium."

For their part, Turkish officials have sought to minimize the
pontiff’s main mission on this trip: to worship alongside Ecumenical
Patriarch Bartholomew I, head of the world’s Orthodox Christians. The
coming together of the two religious leaders is meant as a bridging
of the 1,000-year-old rift between the two ancient branches of
Christianity.

Such frictions notwithstanding, Turkey, compared with many Muslim
countries, is relatively hospitable to non-Muslims. But its failure
to make more progress on freedom-of-religion issues has been an
important stumbling block in its years-long campaign to join the
European Union.

It is EU pressure that has nudged Ankara along in easing some of the
restrictions on minorities; for example, a Protestant group in
Istanbul has for the first time been allowed to open a church.

"The EU reforms give people a sense of hope that there is light at
the end of the tunnel," said Greek Orthodox Father Alexander
Karloutsos. "It’s been very dark here."

Azat Artsakh, Republic of Nagorno Karabakh
Nov 25 2006

HOW TO SOLVE PROBLEM OF WATER SUPPLY?

LAURA GRIGORIAN

On November 17, the Social Committee of the NKR National Assembly
held hearings on the problems of water supply in Stepanakert and
other areas in the country. The chair of the committee Arpat
Avanessian said after the hearings the parliament will offer a
package proposal to the NKR government. The mayor of Stepanakert
presented the state of the water supply and sewage systems.
Stepanakert gets water from three rivers, four sources and 7 artesian
wells. The system includes two filtering stations, three pumping
stations in the city, 5 pumping stations for high-rise buildings. The
system was built several decades ago, and therefore, the entire
infrastructure is already worn, he said. The reservoirs, especially
the metal reservoirs are worn and are not fit to use. The filtering
stations cannot clean the water, which becomes highly turbid from the
spring torrents, because of the lack of reagents. Pumping stations
are too expensive for the company and are operated in summer only.
The mayor of Stepanakert said the circular pipeline built by Armenia
Foundation operates normally, whereas the network of pipes taking
water to the houses are 30-40 years old and need to be replaced.
Edward Aghabekian said there is a project involving the solution of
these problems, which will be implemented in three years according to
the national program adopted by the government. Afterwards the
members of parliament raised a series of questions: what efforts are
needed to solve the problems, what can the members of parliament do,
how can the city be provided with a 6-hour water supply? Arthur
Tovmassian, Hayrenik faction, asked these questions to the mayor. If
the government – City Hall relations are the reason for this
situation, it should be confessed. The members of parliament may
help. After all, people are suffering, said the member of parliament.
Edward Aghabekian denied these doubts and mentioned that the problem
of water supply has existed over the past ten years. Member of
Parliament Maxim Mirzoyan asked whether the amount of water is enough
to supply the town, and if yes, he proposed finding out where the
water is lost. Vladimir Arzumanian, the director of Water and Sewage
Company said the city gets enough water to supply people but 60-70
percent of water is lost due to the bad state of the pipes. Member of
Parliament Vahram Atanessian, chair of the Committee of External
Relations said the hearings were held too late because soon the
budget of 2007 will be confirmed by the government, whereas it is not
aware of all this. He also wondered why the members of government had
not been invited. `And maybe this infrastructure should be
privatized,’ he said. The chair of the social committee Arpat
Avanessian said the hearings were planned to be held in summer but
were delayed for certain reasons. Member of Parliament Maxim Mirzoyan
reminded that the final draft of the budget is adopted by the
parliament.

PRESS RELEASE
Catholicosate of Cilicia
Communication and Information Department
Contact: V.Rev.Father Krikor Chiftjian, Communications Officer
Tel: (04) 410001, 410003
Fax: (04) 419724
E-mail: [email protected]
Web:

PO Box 70 317
Antelias-Lebanon

Armenian version:

HISHO LINESS ARAM I CONDEMNS THE ASSASSINATION OF MINISTER PIERRE JEMAYEL

His Holiness Aram I sharply condemned the assassination of Lebanese Industry
Minister Pierre Jemayel as soon as he heard about the heinous crime.

In a statement to the media, the Armenian Catholicos said: "We consider this
crime to have targeted, beyond the minister himself, Lebanon’s sovereignty,
independence and unity." His Holiness then called on all Lebanese to come
together, in order to overcome all the threats and difficulties their
country confronts.

His Holiness also expressed his condolences to the minister’s family and
specially his father, former President Amine Jemayel.

##
The Armenian Catholicosate of Cilicia is one of the two Catholicosates of
the Armenian Orthodox Church. For detailed information about the history and
mission of the Cilician Catholicosate, you may refer to the web page of the
Catholicosate, The Cilician Catholicosate, the
administrative center of the church is located in Antelias, Lebanon.

The Messenger, Georgia
Nov 24 2006

World Armenian Congress criticizes Russia
By M. Alkhazashvili
(Translated by Tiko Giorgadze)

Armenia is concerned about the ongoing Russian blockade imposed on
Georgia. President of the World Armenian Congress, Ara Abramian,
urges Armenia to explain to Russia that economic sanctions against
Georgia hurt damage not only Georgia, but Armenia as well.

"We should explain to Russia that Georgia is not hurt by the closing
of the Zemo Larsi checkpoint, but it creates problems for Armenia, a
strategic partner of Russia. Before taking that step, Russia should
have tried to provide us with some kind of corridor," Abramian said.

"Armenia should develop its relations with Georgia further," he said,
as quoted by the newspaper Rezonansi.