Author: Kajoyan Gevork

KOCHARYAN REJECTED TER-PETROSYAN TOO

March 9 2015

“The Village Council records up to the UN records show” that Kocharyan
has ousted the Nagorno-Karabakh from the settlement process Recently, a
notable incident occurred in the political arena. After Ter-Petrosyan’s
declared “political analysis” and “bourgeois-democratic revolution,”
ANC somehow bypassed the subject of Kocharyan’s criticism, obviously
took a break in his once tactics of keeping the matter of his role on
March 1 issue heated. Even it comes to the point that on one occasion
Levon Zurabyan alarmed about the risk of loss of Kocharyan’s property
stating the following, in case of being re-elected in 2013, Serzh
Sargsyan would be his best to expel major economic and financial
capacity possessing Gagik Tsarukyan and Robert Kocharyan from the
political arena. “Whoever is the head of the power, he possesses
the property. Therefore, the person who loses the power loses
of property too.” On March 4, Kocharyan’s press secretary issued
a clarification, which stated that Kocharyan put a full stop to
the ceasefire existing between Ter-Petrosyan and Kocharyan. The
motive of Kocharyan’s spokesman’s issued article was Ter-Petrosyan’s
speech on March 1, in which he specifically said, “At the same time,
the Kocharyan administration allowed a more serious failure in the
foreign policy. Before that, the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic being a
full member of the conflict was expelled from the settlement process,
and the right to self-determination of the people of Artsakh turned
into a subject of the Armenian-Azerbaijani territorial dispute”. It
is noteworthy that in the March 1 rally, Ter-Petrosyan again evaded
the issue of Kocharyan’s responsibility for March 1, probably sending
a message to Kocharyan with the expectation of becoming allies with
Kocharyan after expelling Tsarukyan from the political processes.

While Kocharyan, three days later after this speech, countered that
Levon Ter-Petrosyan has ousted Nagorno-Karabakh from the negotiations,
actually denying Levon Ter-Petrosyan’s expectations. Basically, this
subject was just an excuse for Kocharyan to emphasize his denying
attitude towards Ter-Petrosyan. As for the “achievements” of Kocharyan
and Oskanyan in the Nagorno-Karabakh peace process in 1998-2008,
it really is not a subject for discussion, because as said in the
famous work of the famous writer, “the village council records up to
the United Nations records show” that Nagorno-Karabakh was ousted
from the peace process during the years of their tenure. And it is
an irrefutable reality. Recall that in 1998, Kocharyan promised to
settle the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict in package, in a “winning” way,
and had promised to establish an independent Nagorno-Karabakh on
the territory covering 8 thousand square kilometers, to the point,
without introducing this issue into the referendum and involving the
Karabakh into the negotiation process. But, later, it turned out that
Kocharyan and Oskanyan are even supporters for the Nagorno-Karabakh to
be annexed as a part of Azerbaijan as they had agreed and negotiated
around the offer of “Common state” acceptable for them (the version of
the “Common state” suggested during Kocharyan’s tenure was published
in the press in 1998). To the point, this offer was submitted to the
Nagorno-Karabakh, and Stepanakert has also accepted it. After that,
Kocharyan entered into the talks of exchange of territories. In 1999,
Kocharyan signed the Charter for European Security at the OSCE summit
in Istanbul and recognized the primacy of the principle of territorial
integrity, and generally, after the 1998 change of government,
the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict came out of the sphere of the right
to self-determination of the nations and turned into a territorial
dispute between Armenia and Azerbaijan. This is not all. One of the
“achievements” during the tenure of Kocharyan and Oskanyan was the
discussion of the idea for setting up a corridor that links Nakhchivan
to Azerbaijan though Meghri, this topic is widely discussed in the
Armenian press under the name “Meghri’s option”. The matter is about
the talks on Nagorno-Karabakh conflict settlement in the city of Key
West, Florida, USA, on April 3-7, 2001, where, according to circulated
information, the question of Meghri was raised, the issue of providing
a corridor to Azerbaijan through Meghri was on the table. The round
of Key West talks was held under the auspices of the US Secretary
of State Colin Powell. It was then that the statements to surrender
the “occupied” territories without preconditions were circulated
extensively. The information following the Key West talks were as
follows: there are disagreements on the status of Nagorno-Karabakh that
were not squeaked through. It is known that the Key West “agreement”
was planned to be signed in the same year, in summer at the summit in
Geneva, but it just did not happen. “Robert Kocharyan himself expressed
a wish to present both Armenia and Karabakh in the talks. At some point
Nagorno-Karabakh walked out of the talks and currently both parties
should give their consent to its return. The day when Karabakhi people
participate in the wide-ranging talks will come. And the sooner, the
better,” said the OSCE Minsk Group French co-chair Bernard Fassier
repeatedly mentioning this idea, in response to the complaints of the
Armenian side at the Rose-Roth Seminar of NATO Parliamentary Assembly
hosted in Yerevan in 2010 that Nagorno-Karabakh nowadays does not
participate in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict settlement process. It
should be noted that the last Minsk Group plenary format talks were
held in Helsinki in April of 1997, in participation of the three
parties, after which, the co-chairs have submitted the three parties
written proposals. Kocharian, after coming to power, has ousted the
Nagorno-Karabakh from the talks process by his own personal decision,
while not Karabakh settlement proposals were submitted after October
27, 1999. After October 27, 1999, when Kocharyan was already at
the head of the sole government, no settlement suggestions were
made to Nagorno-Karabakh, which unambiguously shows Kocharyan’s
and Oskanyan’s consistent policy of ousting the Nagorno-Karabakh
from the talks. And generally, when it comes to Nagorno-Karabakh’s
participating in the negotiation process, we need to understand what is
meant by involvement of the parties in the negotiation process. First
of all, this is a circumstance to present the settlement options
to the parties, and here, we must remind that in 1997, the package
and stage-by-stage options for the Karabakh conflict settlement were
presented to Armenia, Azerbaijan as well as to Nagorno-Karabakh. One
more remarkable episode. During the presidential elections campaign in
2003, everyone remembers the television dispute between the candidates
for the president – the Head of the People’s Party of Armenia Stepan
Demirchyan and Robert Kocharyan, during which Kocharyan, in response
to Demirchyan’s following accusation addressed to him that he ousted
Nagorno-Karabakh from the peace process, did not deny it, moreover,
he justified the righteousness of his four-year “tactics” as follows:
it is right that Armenia takes a greater commitment in the negotiation
process without Karabakh. So, with regard to existing irrefutable
facts, the “proof-reading” works of Kocharyan and his office, to put
it mildly, are ridiculous.

Emma GABRIELYAN

Read more at:

NO POLITICAL OPPOSITION IN ARMENIA – ASHOT MANUCHARYAN

09:44 * 09.03.15

Public and political figure Ashot Manucharyan commented on the recent
radical changes in Armenia’s politics in an interview with Tert.am.

According to him, there is no political opposition in Armenia, and
real opposition is capable of freeing a person of money power.

As regards the “new period” before the 2017 mentioned by the ruling
Republican Party of Armenia’s (RPA), Mr Manucharyan said:

“The Republican Party of Armenia members had better speak of something
else – how they are going to stop the country’s disintegration,
which they have been doing since coming to power. They must realize
they have no recipe now.”

With respect to opposition forces, Mr Manucharyan said:

“There is no political opposition in Armenia as such. Both the
opposition forces are the RPA are advocating money. They are all
destroying Armenia and people.”

Asked what processes he expects in the nearest future, Manucharyan said
he pins great hopes on the political forces capable of fighting the
oligarchy. “Intellectuals propose a very elementary solution: they say
all those who back the opposition and want to topple the government,
propose, instead of them, a government with its own program that would
realize the plan,” he said, in the meantime stressing the importance
of public trust. “So no need to propose a person who does not enjoy a
public trust; we should propose people who do inspire that trust. Hence
we need to consolidate the people to do that unitedly. This is a real
path where I think people will be predominant. ”

Manucharyan added he expects the intellectuals’ call to receive
a strong backing by many, including even members of the ruling
Republican Party of Armenia. “There is now one way for all people:
it is important to realize that the times for money power are in the
past, that a person making money has to leave politics to do business
but at the same convert all his money into a vehicle. If he or she
turns money into luxury, it’s a crime … Money has to be turned into
a field or factory which will again belong to him or her but people
will work there to take care of their families. If the rich person
does not do that, then he or she is a non-entity, a schitzophreniac
who must be treated. ”

ECONOMIST PREDICTS ZERO GROWTH FOR ARMENIA THIS YEAR

YEREVAN, March 9. / ARKA /. Economist Vilen Khachatryan predicts zero
economic growth for Armenian economy this year. To substantiate he
cites the latest forecasts by the EBRD, which said Armenian economy
will stagnate in 2015 and by Armenia’s Central Bank that has revised
its outlook for 2015 downward from earlier projection of 4.1% to 2%

According to him, a new wave of global economic crisis is ripening,
which like all previous global crisis will affect Armenian economy
in 3-6 months.

“Given the strong dependence of Armenia on the Russian market we expect
that the negative developments in Russia and our region will lead to
reduction in turnover and growing unemployment among Armenian labor
migrants in Russia which will in turn affect Armenia’s economy,” he
said at a news conference today adding ‘if Russia fails to get out of
the current crisis, Armenia’s economic growth this year will be zero.”

According to him, there are all signs of pre-crisis situation in the
economy due to weak national currency and the reluctance of banks to
give loans of frozen loans.

According to preliminary data of the National Statistical Service,
the economic growth in Armenia in 2014 was 3.4%, down from the
government’s projection of 5.2%. In terms of money Armenia’s GDP
last year amounted to 4.525.8 trillion drams or about $10.8 billion
(the average exchange rate of USD in 2014 was 415.92 drams).

The Central Bank of Armenia predicts a 0.4% -2% GDP growth for this
year. The government’s projection set in the 2015 budget is 4.1%. -0-

EXPOSITION

TWENTY-NINE PERCENT OF SENIOR MANAGEMENT ROLES IN ARMENIA FILLED BY WOMEN

YEREVAN, March 9, /ARKA/. Ahead of the International Women’s Day, new
research from Grant Thornton revealed that Eastern European countries
dominate the international league table for senior female business
leaders, including seven of the top ten, with Russia at number one.

However the proportion of women reaching the top tier of the business
world has shown little progress over the past decade, leading to
renewed calls for quotas.

Grant Thornton’s research reveals that 40% of senior business roles
in Russia are occupied by women, the highest in the world, and almost
double the global average (22%). The next five countries on the list
are all near neighbors: Georgia (38%), Poland (37%), Latvia (36%),
Estonia (35%) and Lithuania (33%).

IBR data shows that 29% of senior management roles are filled by women
in Armenia. This is up from 35% in 2014. However index is higher
than the last five year average and Armenia remain its position of
the top ten, being 8th on the league table.

Francesca Lagerberg, global leader for tax services at Grant Thornton,
said: “The domination of Eastern European nations is explained by a
complex blend of factors including history, culture and demographics.

A thriving culture of female entrepreneurship is a legacy of the
Communist ideal of equality of opportunity and this extends into
the broad range of subjects women study in the region. Consequently
we find women well represented in services industries too; and not
just those traditionally with high numbers of women like healthcare
and hospitality, but emerging industries such as financial services
and technology.

“Simple demographics are undeniably at play too. Russia, for example,
has 120 women for every 100 men.

“What can the rest of the world learn from Eastern Europe? Clearly
there is no magic wand, but some of the recommendations we set out
in our report – including changing societal norms around the role of
women and eradicating gender bias – are directly drawn from what is
working well in the region.”

Globally, 22% of senior roles held by women is slightly up from 2004
(19%) but down from 24% last year. Japan remains at the bottom of the
list with just 8% of senior roles held by women, followed by Germany
(14%) and India (15%).

Francesca Lagerberg added: “We’ve heard businesses talk the talk on
gender equality for decades now, but still too few are walking the
walk. Aside from the moral issue of ensuring equal opportunity for
all, a more representative blend of women and men in senior roles
just makes good business sense. If an economy is only using half its
most talented people then it immediately cuts its growth potential.

“This presents real challenges not just for businesses but for
governments, society and women too. Society must adjust to changes in
the way we live and work; for example, the stigmatisation of men who
choose to stay at home for family reasons must end. Governments can
support this by facilitating shared parental leave but also building
the infrastructure to allow women to thrive in the workforce. This
could, for example, include mandating quotas for women on boards.”

Grant Thornton’s research also reveals increasing support of 47%
among business leaders for the introduction of quotas on boards of
large listed companies up from 37% in 2013. -0-

INDIRA GANDHI, MOTHER TERESA: VISITS OF WORLD’S MOST POWERFUL WOMEN TO ARMENIA

11:04, 9 March, 2015

YEREVAN, MARCH 9, ARMENPRESS. I encountered a huge caring for people
and heartfelt attitude towards them in Armenia. Mother Teresa (Anjezë
Gonxhe Bojaxhiu), the 1979 Nobel Peace laureate, thus described her
impressions from her visit to our country. On the occasion of the 8th
of March, “Armenpress” introduces the visits of the 4 most influential
women of 20-21st century to Armenia from its archives.

Indira Gandhi

During the Soviet era, President of India Dr. S Radhakrishnan (Sept
1964) and Prime Minister Indira Gandhi visited the Armenian Soviet
Socialist Republic on June 11, 1976. The First secretary of the
Armenian Communist Party Karen Demirchyan welcomed Indira Gandhi.

First, Indira Gandhi visited the Mesrop Mashtots Institute of Ancient
Manuscripts, commonly referred to as the Matenadaran.

Also, Indira Gandhi paid a visit to the Yerevan Computer Research and
Development Institute (YCRDI), where she left the following note in
the book of visitors: “I am charmed by the activity of the Armenian
engineers, constructers, and scientists. This is a brilliant prove
of the intensive progress of sciences and republic’s industry.”

The fact that Indira Gandhi spent the half of her five-day visit to the
Soviets in Armenia tells about the significance of the Armenian-Indian
relations and friendship of the Armenian and Indian people.

Mother Teresa

Learning about the devastating earthquake in Armenia, Mother Teresa
paid a visit to our country on December 18. Mother Teresa was in Gyumri
and visited hospitals in Yerevan. In an interview to “Armenpress”,
Mother Teresa stated: “We were in those places in Armenia, which were
heavily damaged by the earthquake. The size of the calamity shocked
us and we are very sorry for that.”

“I encountered a huge caring for people and heartfelt attitude towards
them in Armenia. I’ll come back soon with my nuns to help the victims,”
she said.

On December 20, Mother Teresa visited Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzi,
where she had a meeting with His Holiness Vazken I, Supreme Patriarch
and Catholicos of All Armenians. In end of the meeting, Mother Teresa
noted that our people is lucky to have such a Catholicos.

Mother Teresa, the 1979 Nobel Peace laureate, offered the Soviets
Monday the assistance of her religious order, the Missionaries of
Charity, which operates orphanages, hospitals, food centers and
schools in more than 25 countries.

The Roman Catholic nun met in the Armenian capital of Yerevan with the
Chairman of the Council of Ministers Nikolai I. Ryzhkov, who “warmly
thanked her for the kind feelings, compassion, and the offered aid,”
Tass said. (THE FULL VERSION OF THE ARTICLE IS AVAILABLE IN ARMENIAN)

VANISHING SPECIES: INTERNATIONAL EXPERTS FIND FAULT WITH CITES ‘DOCUMENTS’

Kristine Aghalaryan

10:18, March 9, 2015

Wild animals imported to Armenia are not only circumventing
monitoring by the customs inspectorate but also that of the veterinary
inspectorate.

Staffers of the Veterinary Inspectorate, under the jurisdiction
of the Ministry of Agriculture’s Food Safety Service, must first
register and examine such animals before being admitted to Armenia,
Only when they are certified as free from disease are they allowed in.

This is how the law is supposed to work. The reality on the ground
is another matter.

Hovhannes Lazarian, who heads the Veterinary Inspectorate, assured
Hetq that such animals are quarantined for another month under constant
supervision by inspectorate staffers.

Hetq has written quite extensively regarding the import to and export
from Armenia of endangered animal species registered in International
Red Book. In particular, we have written about the case of 4 pygmy
chimpanzees (bonobo), 7 common chimpanzees, 4 Diana monkeys, mandrills,
and mangabeys imported to Armenia.

These animals, it turns out, circumvented any veterinary monitoring
before entering Armenia.

Hetq wrote to the Veterinary Inspectorate, asking that it provide
health documents regarding the bonobos (Pan paniscus) and common chimps
(Pan troglodutes) imported to Armenia between 2010 and 2014.

In response, the inspectorate wrote that no such animals were imported
to Armenia in the past three years.

Leaving aside the fact that the individual who has imported such
animals is making a profit from them, such official negligence opens
the door for a variety of contagious viruses to enter the country.

Vivek Menon, the South Asia Regional Director of the International
Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW), says that numerous diseases are
transmitted as a result of the illegal trade of wild animals and
birds. He says that when passengers arrive, you can check them. But
you can’t in the case of illegal shipment. That cargo can also bring
in diseases. Essentially, monitoring of the sector is impossible. Even
the CITES periodically says that the health of wild animals is an
important factor on which governments must work, and that governments
must focus on the trade in wild animals.

In addition to the fact that Armenia’s State Revenue Committee has no
stats regarding the importation of a pygmy chimp on display at Jambo
Exotic Park, and that a case of smuggling is now underway, scores of
primates and monkeys are being imported with invalid documents.

We had Charles Mackay and Elsayed Mohamed, international experst for
the CITES, examine one such document. They found at least three errors,
of which even one makes the document invalid.

The following are lacking in the document:

Exportation, importation or re-exportation permission The document
was dated as signed after the expiration date The document’s stamp
security numbers are not the same.

Charles Mackay has been working for the United Kingdom’s Revenue and
Customs for the past 36 years and has served as a CITES expert for the
past twenty. When Hetq asked Mr. Mackay how he would react to such a
document in the case of the United Kingdom, he said, “Seeing all this,
we would immediately raise the alarm and respond by sending inquiries
to the exporter country. This is an unacceptable and invalid document.”

Examining the legal permits of Armenia’s Ministry of Nature
Protection, the state agency tasked with coordinating implementation
of CITES provisions in the country, we also came across a number of
impermissible errors. (Hetq obtained these documents after a one year
Freedom of Information court case).

According to the experts, the document must show the details of the
importer and exporter. In the document below, the same person, Armen
Khachatryan, appears as both importer and exporter. This, in their
estimation, is unacceptable.

Despite the fact that Armenia signed the CITES (the Convention on
International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora) in
2009, it doesn’t know where such endangered animals are disappearing
to once having reached its shores.

Hetq spoke to the three experts, who had come to Armenia as part
of a five day training course organized by the Foundation for the
Preservation of Wildlife and Cultural Assets (FPWC) regarding the
prevention of the illegal trade of wildlife. The training was funded
by Armenia’s Ministry of Nature Protection and the International Fund
for Animal Welfare.

TIGRAN HAMASYAN: JAZZ PIANIST TAPS ARMENIAN FOLK, METAL RIFFS AND SENSE OF HISTORY – NPR

14:15 * 09.03.15

Musicians arrive at their signature sounds through all sorts of
influences. For jazz pianist Tigran Hamaysan, that collection of sounds
comes from far afield — he’s a fan of progressive metal bands like
Tool and Meshuggah — as well as from his backyard.

Hamasyan was born in Armenia, moved to Los Angeles and New York,
then returned to his homeland as an adult to get more in touch with
his roots. His new albumMockroot is inspired partly by the work of
Bedros Tourian, a 19th-century Armenian poet who died at 21. Hamaysan
says he didn’t need to use Tourian’s words — indeed, the songs based
on the poet’s work are sung in invented syllables from no certain
language — to capture his essence.

“Everybody considered him super-melancholy, super-dark, but I don’t
agree with that. He has poems that are on the darker side, but all of
his poems have light in them; you end up being enlightened and full
of life after reading him,” Hamaysan says. “I like finding inspiration
through poems, but not necessarily using them as lyrics to songs.

Sometimes the music that I write doesn’t need to have lyrics, it just
needs vowels.”

Tigran Hamaysan spoke with NPR’s Arun Rath about exploring the diverse
dark history of his small country, and why he thinks traditional
approaches to piano ignore much of what the instrument is capable of.

Hear their conversation at the audio link.

ARMENIA NEEDS POWERFUL OPPOSITION POLE – LAWMAKER

12:43 * 09.03.15

An Armenian opposition lawmaker from the Heritage party describes
the recent developments on the domestic political arena as a rapid
change in the state of affairs, calling for a consolidation among
the non-governing forces to improve the situation.

“It is necessary to create a really strong and powerful opposition
force. We’ll thus turn out to have the same general understanding
as we had before,” Tevan Poghosyan, the secretary of the opposition
Heritage faction in parliament, told Tert.am.

The opposition MP said he doesn’t think that what happened to the
non-governing parties in the recent rally was a crucial defeat. “It
is a matter of evaluation. On February 20, the public perception
of the opposition was just different from what it is now. But there
are people who work at the National Assembly and present their own
opinions; and we also have extra-parliamentary forces,” he added.

Poghosyan said he thinks that despite the wide divergences of opinions,
the different opposition forces with most different ideologies
seemed to be more consolidated on February 20. “The situation is now
such that each seems to be pursuing its own path. I now think that a
consolidation is necessary to ensure the country’s future development,”
he added.

Asked whether there are any hopes for re-establishing opposition
parties’ previous collaboration format (the trio in which Heritage,
Prosperous Armenia and the Armenian National Congress joined in an
alliance), Poghosyan said he thinks it’s all a matter of time. “I
am happy that the Prosperous Armenia party announced that it does
not see any alternative and intends instead to collaborate with the
opposition. We are hopeful all the rest will become evident in the
course of work after the plenary session is officialized,” he added.

Azeri-Press news agency (APA), Azerbaijan
March 6, 2015 Friday

Ambassador: Turkey wants to deliver a message of peace to world with
events on Canakkale Victory

by Malahat Najafova

“We are celebrating the 100th anniversary of the victory in the Battle
of Canakkale. We are not corresponding with Armenia in this regard. We
want to deliver a message of peace to the world with these events. We
consider it very important to give this message,” Turkish Ambassador
to Azerbaijan Ismail Alper Coskun told APA.

Commenting on the reports that Russia will participate in events
dedicated to the Canakkale Victory, the ambassador said: “We will be
pleased if the country, that we have established good relations with,
like Russia attends this event.”

The ambassador said he doesn’t know representatives from which
countries will attend the event.

“We have sent invitations to all countries involved in the Battle of
Canakkale. We are ready to host the recognition of this historic
event. The Azerbaijani president also said in Turkey that he would
attend these events, we are very pleased of it,” he noted.