Author: Jalatian Sonya

Islamic State (Isis) jihadis have destroyed a 2,000-year-old statue of a lion outside the museum in the Syrian city of Palmyra, the country’s antiquities director has said, reports.

Maamoun Abdelkarim said the statue, known as the Lion of al-Lat, was an irreplaceable piece. “IS members on Saturday destrotyed he Lion of al-Lat, which is a unique piece that is three metres [10ft] tall and weighs 15 tonnes,” Abdelkarim told AFP. “It’s the most serious crime they have committed against Palmyra’s heritage.”

The limestone statue was discovered in 1977 by a Polish archaeological mission at the temple of al-Lat, a pre-Islamic Arabian goddess, and dated back to the 1st century BC.

Abdelkarim said the statue had been covered with a metal plate and sandbags to protect it from fighting, “but we never imagined that IS would come to the town to destroy it.”

Isis captured Palmyra, a Unesco world heritage site, from government forces on 21 May, prompting international concern about the fate of the city’s antiquities.

Russia is holding talks on supplies to Armenia of Iskander-M tactical missile systems, the contract has not been signed yet, a military source told TASS on Thursday.

“The contract has not been signed, talks are underway,” the source said.

He underscored that “all information on such contracts is secret.”

Earlier, Konstruktorskoye Byuro Mashinostroyeniya, or KBM (Machine-Building Design Bureau), which is the key manufacturer of Iskanders, said that the systems will not be exported until 2016. Nevertheless, they have been put on a list of products allowed to be sold abroad.

In particular, last year it was reported that Kazakhstan is interested in the export version of Iskanders. In June, the delegation of Saudi Arabia visited the Army-2015 forum in the Moscow Region to hold talks on acquisition of the systems.

The situation in Armenia should not be politicized by foreign media or governments, Serj Tankian of the System Of A Down has said in a Facebook post.

“It seems like the brutal police crackdown with water cannons and beating up people including journalists has predictably brought more people out into the streets of Yerevan today. This was a peaceful sit in. The police had the right to clear it and legally detain people without using undue force,” Tankian said.

“The situation should not be politicized by foreign media or governments. This is a non-political reaction to an endemic economic marginalization of a large segment of the Armenian populace. The government of Armenia should make every effort to ameliorate the economic suffering of its citizens and address this and other concerns,” Tankian concluded.

Gita Elibekyan
Public Radio of Armenia
Tbilisi

Head of the Georgian Alliance of Patriots Party David Tarkhan Mouravi has called on the Georgian Government to recognize the Armenian Genocide, reports.

“Not a single acre in Turkey belongs to Turks, everything belongs to Greeks, Armenians and Georgians. What happened in 1915 was really genocide, Armenians were killed simply for being Armenian,” David Tarkhan Mouravi said.

He added Georgians were also subjected to genocide, although no one speaks about it.

The Alliance of Patriots was formed a few years ago and is preparing to run fo parliament at the next elections.

 

 

 

The German Bundestag is expected to hold a final discussion on the Armenian Genocide bill and put in on a vote before the summer break by the second half of July, historian Ashot Hayruni told reporters today.

It’s not yet clear what will be the final shape of the resolution, considering the constant pressure on the part of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the Turks living and working  in Germany. As an example he reminded that a German MP recently quit his party because of his party recognizing the Armenian Genocide.

According to Hayruni, the bill pending at the Bundestag is more favorable than the one adopted in 2005. The current document clearly mentions that what happened to Armenians in 1915 was an example of genocide.

He added, however, that the bill is not 100 percent acceptable. It includes “dark” points, which the Armenian diplomatic corps should work to edit. As for the positive sides of the bill, they range from the preservation of the Armenian cultural heritage to the contribution to Armenian-Turkish dialogue.

Five people have died and hundreds are missing after a cruise ship carrying 458 people capsized on the Yangtze River in China’s Hubei province, the BBC reports.

The ship is floating upside down in a wide stretch of river – state media said rescuers tapping the hull had heard calls for help from inside.

The boat, the Eastern Star, reportedly sent no emergency signal.

Media reports say the alarm was raised by several people who had swum to shore and alerted the police.

Most of those on board were tourists aged around 50 to 80 travelling from the eastern city of Nanjing to Chongqing in the south-west – a journey of at least 1,500km.

A resolution to recognize the Armenian Genocide was introduced in the Federal Senate of Brazil on May 26. The  was introduced by senators Aloizio Nunes Fereira Filio and Jose Serra, reports.
The draft resolution expresses its “solidarity with the Armenian people during the course of the centenary of the campaign of extermination of its population” and states that “the Senate recognizes the Armenian Genocide, whose centenary was marked on April 24, 2015.”

James Onnig Tamdjian, representative of the Armenian National Committee of Brazil, said that the project “has a great support from Senators and hopefully in the near future, the Brazilian Senate will vote this proposal, which will be historic for all Armenians and their descendants in Brazil”. Onnig Tamdjian also expressed his hope that “the Senate would continue its support to formalize the decision soon.”

“To honor the victims and recognize the contribution to economic, social and cultural formation of Brazil of the thousands of Brazilians descendants of Armenian refugees, we emphasize that no genocide must not be forgotten so that it does not happen again,” reads the text.

The draft highlights the “need for a racial cleansing to make Turkey, then multiracial, a uniformly Turkish nation.” In addition, it denounces the “systematic denial, pressure and intimidation against those who try to reconstruct historical events”.

“The policy of extermination is so far denied by the Turkish government,” reads the draft resolution, and then cites the cases of recognition from “a growing number of countries,” including “Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Uruguay and Venezuela” in Latin America, as well as “European countries,” the European Parliament and, more recently, Germany and Pope Francis.

“It is estimated that at least 100,000 descendants of Armenians live in Brazil, mostly in Sao Paulo. They are Brazilians whose ancestors had to leave their homeland to escape the genocide. In Brazilian lands they could restart their lives, build families and contribute to the economic, social and cultural development of our country.”

“The Brazilian government, unfortunately, has not yet recognized the Armenian Genocide,” although the legislatures of Ceará and Parana did. “In 2015, the State of Sao Paulo instituted April 24 as the Day of Recognition and Remembrance of Victims of the Genocide of the Armenian people,” concludes the project., social and cultural development of our country.”

President Serzh Sargsyan, who has paid a working visit to the Republic of Latvia, today took part in the European People’s Party Eastern Partnership Leaders’ Summit in Riga where he delivered a statement.

 

Statement by the President of the Republic of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan at the meeting of the European People’s Party Eastern Partnership Leaders

Distinguished President Daul,
Dear colleagues,

At the outset, I would like to thank President Daul for the invitation to partake in the meeting in this format and excellent organization of this meeting.

Mr. President,

Armenia’s European agenda remains a foreign policy priority of ours, and we are committed to deepen and further consolidate our cooperation with the EU. The Eastern Partnership is not going through an easy time right now, but we do not think that it exhausted itself or it is doomed. Basically, the situation ought to be realistically assessed in order to continue anew the journey we embarked upon jointly in Prague. Indeed, the three Partners enjoy one kind of a relationship with the EU, while the rest – other, which stem from the peculiarities of their respective situations. Hence, one needs to fathom what is the pivot that connects the Partners and European Union in new circumstances? What around the cooperation will be built?

It is important to preserve the characteristic and common features, which unite us in the Partnership. We strongly believe that such a commonality shall remain rooted in the adherence of the all Partner States to shared values, such as development of democracy, human rights, rule of law, and ensuring peace and stability in the region. Therefore, our future cooperation shall continue to be rooted in our adherence, in good faith, to build and develop democratic societies and institutes, fight against corruption, conduct of free and fair elections, independence of judiciary, and establishment of a market economy based on free competition.

We, meanwhile, welcome that Towards New European Neighborhood Policy concept paper presented by the European Commission addresses the requirement to take into account the real needs of the Partner States and to display tailor-made approaches, which indeed would contribute to discovering new avenues and perspectives for cooperation with the EU.

We are of the view that any given Partner’s membership to any structure does not limit its cooperation with other structures. It is for that reason that Armenia, while acceding to the Eurasian Economic Union, continues to be committed to deepening and expanding relations with the EU.

With its balanced policy Armenia have avoided setting a new hotbed of tension in the current complicated circumstances of the European geopolitics; moreover, it has managed to build its policy on the premises of compatibility, equilibrium and multi-vectored cooperation with different integration systems.

These very principles will serve as a basis for the envisaged legal document to govern relations between Armenia and EU, for conclusion of which we count on your support.

Dear colleagues,

It has been for a long time that worrying developments in a Partner country, Ukraine, caused a serious crisis. Comprehensive settlement of the state of affairs in Ukraine is of primary significance both for the future of the country and relaxation of the current international tension. I hope that the farsighted attitude correctly appraising the situation will win over here as well; solutions will be found to respect mutual concerns, and the only stable avenue will be paved for mutual understanding; and, throughout every stage of these processes joint endeavors leading to comprehensive settlement will prevail over dissemination of one-sided fault-finding public statements, a temptation that leads nowhere. Unfortunately, I detect such signals also in the EPP declaration of today, on the several paragraphs of which we have not been able to reach consensus. In my view, the basic reason of that was that the EPP partners have not been fully engaged in the drafting exercise.

While discussing issues pertaining to ensuring cooperation and security in the European area, I cannot but address the Nagorno Karabakh conflict, which continues to be one of the most serious challenges both to our regional and European security. Azerbaijan has not ceased resorting to its usual practice of provocations, threats and anti-Armenian propaganda, thus protracting the conflict settlement process. The anti-Armenian campaign in Azerbaijan is coupled with egregious human rights violations, and it has been a while that the opponents to the regime are labeled as Armenian spying agents.

The irresponsible steps of Azerbaijan, which threaten the security of the region we share, shall not go unnoticed by our European partners. Those steps deserve adequate assessment. Hence, I urge not to drift with the current generated by Azerbaijan in various international platforms, and by that avoid sharing responsibility with the latter for increasing tension in our region.

Ladies and gentlemen,

Availing myself of this opportunity, I again express gratitude to the EPP Political Assembly for adopting Resolution dedicated to the Armenian Genocide Centennial on March 3, 2015 titled “The Armenian Genocide and European Values.” I highly value contribution of the EPP and President Daul in person to the adoption of the April 15 Resolution condemning the Armenian Genocide by the European Parliament, which testifies unambiguous position and commitment to the universal values of the European family of nations. Je vous remercie, Monsieur Daul, for accepting my invitation to Yerevan, for joining us to deliver globally message “Never again.”

Dear colleagues,

Throughout the recent months our European agenda had been intensive with a number of events. Among those I shall pick out the Fourth Ordinary Session of the Eastern Partnership EURONEST Parliamentary Assembly held in March in Yerevan, as well as the Ministerial Summit of the European Higher Education Area also known as Bologna process that took place last week.

In conclusion, I would like to reiterate that the Republican Party of Armenia highly values its close cooperation with the EPP, and we clearly see that it bear fruit. In this context, I highly value the RPA’s youth organization’s accession to the EPP youth organization.

I thank you.

An Armenian pensioner is about to complete an epic walk from Yerevan to Moscow, devoted to 70th Anniversary of Victory over Nazism in the Great Patriotic War, reports.

Grigory Tepoyan, a 76-years old Armenian pensioner is completing an epic walk devoted to the 70th Anniversary of Victory in the Great Patriotic War from Armenia to Russia’s capital.

The pensioner has decided to travel the same route that his father had gone during the Second World War.

On the outskirts of Moscow almost three dozen cars with the Armenian diaspora representatives greeted the doughty traveller. The pensioner has walked 2,200 kilometers in 46 days.

“On May 9, after the Victory Parade, I will lay flowers at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. I consider all these people my family. It does not matter to me whether they were Russians or Armenians,” he said.

Grigory Tepoyan started planning his tour about a year ago, preparing his body through intensive physical exercises before undertaking his bold campaign. Eventually, on March 22 he quietly left his house at night.

Grigory Tepoyan is planning to visit Dnepropetrovsk in September 2015 to commemorate his father’s struggle against the Nazi invaders.

The robust 76-year old traveller had to walk about 50 kilometers a day to complete his tour on time.

 

Water channel of Armenian-French friendship put into operation in Tavush region

May 22, 2010 – 15:31 AMT 10:31 GMT
PanARMENIAN.Net –

The rehabilitated water channel of the Armenian-French friendship was
put into operation in Tavush region, Armenia, on May 22.

Armenian Deputy Minister, Minister of the Territorial Administration
Armen Gevorgyan said that the water channel will provide Tavush region
with the opportunity to develop.

According to him, equal development of regions is among priorities of
the Armenian government, thus, the rehabilitation of Armenia’s
irrigation systems will continue.

In his turn, French Minister of Economic Recovery Plan and President
of the General Council of Hauts-de-Seine department Patrick Devedjian
noted that Tavush region has huge unused opportunities. He added that
Armenia can completely provide itself with the required agricultural
products and foodstuff, if favorable conditions are created for it.

Executive Director of Hayastan All-Armenian Fund Ara Vardanyan,
Governor of Tavush region Armen Gularyan and other high-ranking
official were also attending the ceremony.

Due to the 15km long water channel rehabilitated and expanded through
the funds allocated by Hauts-de-Seine department to Hayastan
All-Armenian Fund, several rural communities of Tavush region will
have the opportunity to irrigate over 600ha of land.