Author: Kajoyan Gevork

FASCINATING POLITICAL BATTLE OF LIBERALS’ POWER PLAYERS

The Daily Telegraph (Australia)
April 17, 2014 Thursday

by MIRANDA DEVINE

Mike Baird, the man most likely to succeed Barry O’Farrell as premier,
started the work day at 7.30am yesterday at a high powered business
breakfast at the Shangri-La Hotel with his friend the Prime Minister.

Affable and smiling, the NSW Treasurer was there to concentrate on
youth employment, but some of the well-wishers around him were more
interested in his employment.

“Barry could be in trouble,” said one sage, inadvertently predicting
the bombshell to come less than three hours later.

“Are you ready to step up?” Baird, 46, just smiled.

By the end of the day, despite the private endorsement of John Howard,
Baird was no closer to -answering that question, his office saying
only: “He’s certainly not campaigning to become premier.” Across town
the ambitious Transport Minister Gladys Berejiklian, 43, was all
action. Within two hours of O’Farrell’s resignation, his protégé
had called a meeting in her office, begun to take soundings from the
back bench, and advice from influential supporters such as Joe Hockey.

While Baird counts Gladys as his closest friend in Cabinet, the two
-rivals couldn’t be more different.

Baird, 46, is Liberal party royalty, the blond, sporty, first-born
son of former state Liberal minister Bruce Baird and wife Judy. He
has been happily married for 25 years to Kerryn, with three children,
Laura, 17, Cate, 15, and Luke, 11, and a dog, Moses.

Baird grew up in Canberra and Bonn, Germany, where his father was
assistant trade commissioner. He attended the British Embassy School
where he developed a “very posh accent”, according to his father.

When Baird was nine his father was posted to New York, and the family
settled in bucolic Rye, in Westchester County, where young Mike became
a star baseballer who was popular with the girls.

Back in Australia he attended the Kings School, where he hated the
uniform and was teased for his American accent. He played rugby union
in the second row, surfed and played tennis. He became involved in
Anglican church fellowship, where he met his wife, Kerryn, whom he
married at age 21.

After finishing an economics arts degree at Sydney University,
he joined the National Australia Bank on a graduate program and
specialised in corporate finance.

His investment banking career was flourishing at Deutsche Bank when
he began to wonder: “Is that all there is? Should I be just about
accumulating money?” So in 1994 he told Kerryn he wanted to go to Bible
college and within a year they were in Vancouver at Regent College,
a graduate school of Christian studies. Ironically it was there he
realised his true calling was politics. He went back to investment
banking and was posted to London with his young family, and then to
Hong Kong.

But in 2007 he gave it all up for politics, winning a bruising
preselection for Manly, where he forged a friendship with his federal
counterpart Tony Abbott. The pair run, surf and bike together. One
local says Baird always makes sure he allows the older man to win.

A year later Baird was NSW shadow treasurer and touted as leader.

Sensing a potential rival, O’Farrell split the Treasury portfolio
in two when the Coalition took office in 2011, relegating Baird to
a lowly 10th spot in the cabinet hierarchy. If the ploy was meant to
damage Baird, it backfired.

He worked hard and formed a formidable partnership with NSW Treasury
secretary Phil Gaetjens. Within three years the pair had turned around
the state economy, adding 127,000 jobs and taking NSW from the slowest
economic and jobs growth to the strongest.

“He said he wasn’t in politics for a long time. He was there to make
a difference,” one business leader says.

Berejiklian, too, has won plaudits for her handling of the tough
transport portfolio. Hard working, single-minded, shy and well-liked,
the biggest strike against her may be her link to Michael Photios,
ICAC’s favourite Liberal lobbyist.

The eldest of three daughters of Armenian migrants, Krikor, a welder,
and Arsha, a nurse, she was school captain of North Ryde High and
lived at home until she was almost 30 and has never married.

She did a bachelor of arts at Sydney University, and a master of
commerce, while working part-time for Peter Collins, then Liberal
state treasurer. A Liberal Party member from the age of 21, she worked
at the Commonwealth Bank before winning preselection for Collins’
old seat of Willoughby in 2003.NSW is spoiled for choice. Both are
capable, clever, hard working and genuinely nice.

TURKEY PLANS TO ACHIEVE RUSSIAN GAS PRICE DISCOUNT

April 18, 2014 | 12:46

Turkey intends to achieve Russian natural gas price discounts during
the negotiations to be held next week, said Taner Yildiz, Minister
of Energy and Natural Resources of Turkey.

Yildiz informed that Turkey plans to propose to Russia to have the
planned South Stream gas pipeline set up by land, instead of the
bottom of the Black Sea.

The minister stressed that the Ukrainian crisis “will not affect the
economic relations between Turkey and Russia, since Ankara and Moscow
are strategic partners,” reported ITAR-TASS news agency of Russia.

Turkey FM Ahmet Davutoglu likewise expressed the same position.

“We are exerting considerable effort so that all these developments,
in connection with Ukraine, will not have a negative impact on our
cooperation with Russia. And we don’t expect negative processes in
this domain,” the Turkish FM specifically stated.

News from Armenia – NEWS.am

IRAN-AZERBAIJAN DOES NOT ELIMINATE INTEREST IN IRAN-ARMENIA RUSSIAN RAILWAYS

April 18, 2014 | 02:00

The Iran-Azerbaijan railway project does not eliminate the interest
in the Iran-Armenia project, Russian Railways First Vice-President
Alexander Misharin told Armenian News-NEWS.am.

As per Misharin, the Iran-Armenia railway project is within the
framework of the development concept for the North-South Transport
Corridor.

Even after when the Iran-Azerbaijan railway construction is completed,
alternative routes will be required in the North-South direction,
he added.

The Russian Railways official recalled that there is no business
plan for the Iran-Armenia project, and that work is expected here
from the initiating party of this project.

“And based on this, we will decide on participation. But we are ready
with a potential,” Alexander Misharin stated.

News from Armenia – NEWS.am

ARMENIA NOT TO BE BLAMED FOR THE ABSENCE OF RELATIONS WITH TURKEY: PRESIDENT

18:31 18.04.2014

Armenia, Turkey

It’s not the Armenian side to be blamed for the absence of relations
between Armenia and Turkey, Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan said
during the consultations at the Ministry of Defense.

“We should note that all our partners and supporters have come to
understand that it’s not the Armenian party to be blamed for the
absence of Armenian-Turkish relations. This is important, because
even our friends have on several occasions accused us of being
non-constructive, for trying to talk to Turkey in the language of
preconditions and have our share of guilt in the absence of these
relations. I think no one has such doubts today,” President Sargsyan
said.

The President said the initiative to normalize the relations with
Turkey laid the ground for new culture. “We started to put such
complex issues on discussion and proved once again that we are ready to
discuss the most complex issues with different layers of our society,
our compatriots,” he added.

The President reminded about the criticism of the two protocols. “Many
were insisting that the protocols had at least two negative aspects.

First, they feared it would suspend the process of recognition of
the Armenian Genocide in the long-term perspective,” Serzh Sarsgayn
said, adding that “now the Turks have concentrated all their efforts
to fight against the Armenian Genocide resolution that passed the
Senate Foreign Relations Committee.”

“Secondly, can anyone say today that the protocols have caused harm
to the settlement of the Nagorno Karabakh issue and that with these
protocols we created bases for concessions?” the President said.

“We have a strong position on the issue,” he said. Speaking about the
tension at the line of contact, the President said had the rival’s
position been strong, they would not escalate the tension.

President Sargsyan stressed another important factor. “If, as many
were insisting, the protocols were anti-Armenian and derived from
Turkey’s interests, why haven’t the Turks ratified them so far?”

“It’s obvious that had the documents been pro-Turkish, they would
not stop before anything, would not listen to Azerbaijan’s opinion
and would ratify the protocols,” President Sargsyan said. “Besides,
had the documents been pro-Turkish, they would not create tension
inside Turkey,” he added.

ACTIVISTS MEET WITH REP. SCHIFF OVER ARMENIAN GENOCIDE LIBRARY SERIES

Thursday, April 17th, 2014

Hagop and Knar Manjikian meet with Representative Adam Schiff

LOS ANGELES–Hagop and Knar Manjikian, Armenian authors and activists,
met with Congressman Adam Schiff at his district office in Burbank on
April 5 to introduce him to the Armenian Genocide Library Collection
of books they have been publishing since 2005 and to speak to him
about the tragic attack on Kessab, Syria, on March 21.

The congressman said he would be proud to introduce the Armenian
Genocide Library Collection into the Congressional Record. The
collection consists of 5 memoirs of Genocide survivors written in
the years immediately after the events of 1915, in which the Turks
ordered the deportation and massacre of the Armenian population
within the borders of the Ottoman Empire. The Manjikians had the
memoirs translated to English and self-published them.

The fifth and latest book in the series, “Defying Fate,” contains the
memoirs of Knar Manjikian’s parents, who as orphaned children during
the Genocide were taken in by Arabs in the Syrian desert. After 13
years they broke out on their and went to Aleppo, where they got
married. Schiff said it was very important to preserve these stories
for future generations, saying that with a crime of the magnitude
of the Genocide it’s more effective to talk about a single family
and how the Genocide affected that family. “It brings it home in a
personal way,” he said.

Schiff spoke about his own family lineage from Lithuania and trying
to help a cousin track down ancestors that had been lost during
the Holocaust.

The Manjikians’ appointment with Schiff had been made before the
Turkish-aided bombing of Kessab, Syria, that forced the population
of Kessab and surrounding towns and villages to flee their homes and
live as refugees in the Syrian city of Lattakia. Coincidentally,
Hagop Manjikian is from Kessab, and Knar Avedian Manjikian from
Aleppo, Syria.

The congressman listened with compassion as Hagop Manjikian told him,
“Among the 1,600 plus Armenians who were moved from their homes
by ferocious gunfire from Turkey are my own brother, his son and
wife with their children, and many close relatives. We respectfully
request that you continue the noble task you have taken very recently,
bringing this sad situation to the attention of the U.S. Ambassador
to the United Nations, Samantha Power, and finding a humane solution.”

Schiff said he would address the Kessab situation at a joint press
conference in Washington, D.C., with Congressman Brad Sherman on
Tuesday, April 8, which he did. He told the Manjikians that Congress
would be in recess the weeks of April 14 and 21 and that he would
not be able to introduce the Armenian Genocide Library Collection
into the Congressional Record until after April 28.

TURKEY NEEDS TO RETURN TO ACTIVE NEUTRALITY

Hurriyet Daily News, Turkey
April 17 2014

by SEMÄ°H Ä°DÄ°Z

Developments in Ukraine have pushed the Syrian crisis to the background
much to the satisfaction of the Syrian regime. Bashar al-Assad is
already talking about having turned the tide to his advantage and is
saying it is a matter of time before he wins.

It is doubtful, however, whether he can ultimately win because of the
tactics some groups among the Syrian opposition are using. Al-Assad
may take control over towns and cities, but it is unlikely that he
will be able to prevent the kind of terrorist attacks that we see so
frequently in Iraq.

All of this is bad news for Turkey. Not only because of the actual
spillover effect in terms of terrorism, but also because of the
country’s image. Whether it is justified or not, the impression that
Ankara is aiding Jihadist groups in Syria has stuck, regardless of
how much the government denies it.

Turkey is even being implicated in the attack on the predominantly
Armenian town of Kassab with all sorts of parallels being drawn
between today and 1915. It is, of course, cynical for Armenian
activists to try and capitalize on developments in Syria in favor of
genocide recognition.

This should be an occasion for Armenian and Turkish humanitarian
groups to cooperate to help Armenians refugees from Kassab, no matter
how much this may appear as wishful thinking given ossified attitudes
on both sides.

This aspect of the situation aside, Ankara should do everything
possible to ensure that it is not secretly working with al-Qaeda groups
like al-Nusra in Syria, as is being claimed today. The more it lets
this perception prevail, the more credibility it will lose over Syria.

Meanwhile, the Geneva track on Syria has fallen to the background
due to rising tensions between its key sponsors, the U.S. and Russia.

Neither is it likely to be revived anytime soon given the present
tense atmosphere between the West and Russia.

Put another way, the diplomatic track for Syria will falter unless some
country or group of countries comes up with new ideas to reenergize
it. It should also be amply clear to Prime Minister Erdogan at this
stage that his personal desires for Syria will not be fulfilled.

He must acknowledge that he seriously miscalculated this crisis and
allow Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu to draw up a new road map to
address the situation. A good starting point would be to have close
consultations with Iran.

Both countries are supporting opposite sides in Syria and many accuse
them of maintaining a proxy war there. The continuation of the crisis,
however, is to the detriment of Iran and Turkey in the long run and
there should be enough sense on both sides to see this.

Turkey can also play a role in easing tensions between Iran and Saudi
Arabia. These are two countries that many believe are engaged in a
genuine and destabilizing proxy war for influence in the Middle East.

Turkey must also convince the Saudis that there is no successful end
to this given the prevailing balance of power in the region. A Turkey
that can do all this will also be praised by the world as a positive
power that is working for peace.

It is clear that Turkey will have to return to a position of active
neutrality before it can even consider playing such a role. It is
equally clear that all of this is a very tall order for the Erdogan
government, which will have to seriously change its tack and establish
a positive agenda, not only in terms of foreign policy, but also in
terms of easing domestic tensions.

Success in these regards, however, is what will make history
ultimately judge if Erdogan was a good leader or not, not his ballot
box victories, which he appears to have set so much store by in order
to implement a personal agenda.

SYRIAN ARMENIANS FLEE AS AL-NUSRA FRONT ENTERS KASAB

Al-Shorfa
April 17 2014

2014-04-16 By Nohad Topalian in Beirut

Mother of three Armig Tanilian said she had not believed the fires
of the Syrian war would spread to her hometown of Kasab in rural
Latakia province.

But three weeks ago, Tanilian and her family were forced to flee Kasab
along with hundreds of other ethnic Armenians when al-Nusra Front
(ANF) and Islamist opposition fighters overran the strategic town,
located in a mountainous area on the border with Turkey.

Fierce fighting between opposition and regime forces in Kasab forced
many residents to leave for Latakia city, Ras al-Basseet and other
coastal cities in a hurry, some still in their sleeping garments,
residents told Al-Shorfa.

“I woke early and went into the kitchen to prepare the rest of the
sweet dishes ahead of celebrating Mother’s Day with my sisters-in-law,”
Tanilian said. “It was 6 a.m. when we began to hear the sound of
shelling very close to our house. My 10-year-old son woke terrified,
and we found ourselves targeted by shells and bullets.”

Tanilian and her neighbours decided to leave immediately, she said,
heading to Latakia city in her husband’s truck amid a large convoy
of vehicles, while others travelled on foot.

Tanilian later left Latakia for Lebanon with her three children and
mother-in-law, she said.

The Rev. Nareg Luisian of the Mar Mikhael Armenian Catholic parish in
Latakia told Al-Shorfa he woke at 5:30 a.m. when the attack on Kasab
began. He said he heard the sound of bullets over the parish house,
then a loud explosion at a nearby police station.

“I then witnessed an attack by ANF fighters, Chechens and Iraqis
[identifiable by their accent] with long black beards and black scarfs
covering their heads,” he said.

“We did not wait long before leaving Kasab because the shelling was
intense and concentrated, targeting neighbourhoods and homes,” the
priest said. “About 1,500 of us evacuated to Latakia.”

Luisian said he is now aiding displaced Kasab residents who are
sheltering at Latakia’s Armenian Orthodox Church.

“We do not know what happened to the [residents’] properties,” he
said. “All that we know, we have gleaned from YouTube videos posted
by ANF, one of which showed our church stripped of anything related
to the manifestations of Christianity.”

Kasab residents had not expected ANF and foreign fighters to reach
the town, Luisian said.

ANF seeks to impose its own agenda

“We do not know what they want by getting involved in a war that is
not theirs, but their goals, which became clear in more than one area
of Syria, do not converge with the goals of the people’s revolution,”
he said.

In attacking Kasab, it appears ANF is trying to clear the border strip
with Turkey that extends from Kasab through Aleppo and into north
eastern Syria, including the town of Markada in al-Hasakeh province,
said Lebanese political analyst Tony Issa.

“In doing so, ANF, which inserted itself into the Syrian revolution
with principles that are inconsistent with the principles of Islam,
and which fights using local and foreign elements, would clear the
areas of their original inhabitants and base itself there as extremist
Islamist groups,” he told Al-Shorfa.

“The war ANF is waging in Kasab and other Syrian towns is fundamentally
inconsistent with the objectives of the Syrian revolution,” he
said. “It is fighting a war that is not its war in order to impose
its extremist fundamentalist rules and principles.”

Kasab lies on the slopes of Jabal al-Aqraa, 65 kilometres from Latakia
and three kilometres from the border with Turkey. The majority of its
inhabitants are ethnic Armenians who work in agriculture and tourism.

MEDVEDEV CONGRATULATES ABRAMYAN ON APPOINTMENT AS ARMENIAN PRIME MINISTER

Itar-Tass, Russia
April 17 2014

YEREVAN, April 17. /ITAR-TASS/. Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev
on Thursday, April 17, congratulated Ovik Abramyan on his appointment
as the new prime minister of Armenia.

“Russia and Armenia are bound by relations of allies and strategic
partners based on the traditions of friendship between our people,”
Medvedev said his message to Abramyan.

He is “convinced that further development of bilateral cooperation in
such fields as trade, economy, investment, science and technology,
and the implementation of new major joint projects as well as
full participation of Armenian partners in the process of Eurasian
integration fully serve the interests of our states”.

Medvedev reiterated he is “ready for constructive work” with Abramyan
“on all pressing issues of interaction between the governments of
Russia and Armenia”.

Armenian prime minister resigns Abramyan’s predecessor Tigran Sargsyan
resigned on April 3. The resignation was announced at a meeting of
the ruling Republican Party leaders’ meeting in Yerevan.

He tendered resignation to President Serzh Sargsyan a month earlier
but it was put away pending Armenia’s accession to the Customs Union
of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Russia and the Republican Party’s economic
forum on this topic.

In his letter of resignation, Sargsyan wrote that “the decision is
timely and well considered”.

“This is a balanced decision that was not made on the spur of the
moment,” Sharmazanov said.

He said no candidates for premiership or the composition of a new
government had been discussed at the party meeting.

On April 2, the Constitutional Court ruled that some of the provisions
in the government-initiated pension reform plan were running counter
to the Constitution. The judgment allowed some politicians to say
that Sargsyan’s resignation was inevitable.

The president has not accepted the resignation yet. Once the prime
minister resigns, his whole government steps down with him. Under
the Constitution, a new prime minister has to be appointed within ten
days after the government’s resignation. A new government has to be
appointed within 20 days after the appointment of the prime minister.

Sargsyan was reappointed as prime minister in May 2013.

EMINENT INSTITUTION OF TURKEY DECIDED: MEHMET PERINcEK IS NOT ENOUGH COMPETENT IN ARMENIAN CASE

16:45 17/04/2014 ” LAW

The leadership of one of the most famous universities in
Turkey,”Kayseri-Erciyes”, believes that Mehmet Perincek, the Turkish
historian, author of the book “The Armenian Case in 120 documents of
Russian State Archives,” is not competent enough in the Armenian Case.

Perincek himself told about this “Vesti.az”, reports the Azerbaijani
news agency.

Azerbaijani agency calls Perincek one “of the main exposers of the
myth” on the Armenian Genocide.

Mehmet Perincek stated that the “Kayseri” university has refused him
to attend the Conference on “exposure” of the Armenian Genocide. “The
reason for failure is simply ridiculous – they say as if “I am not
enough competent in the Armenian Case. “But it did not stop me – the
panel on the Armenian genocide will be held on April 25 in another
place with the participation of Professor Yusuf Halacoglu,” said
Mehmet Perincek.

According to the agency, Mehmet Perincek was born on September 19,
1978 in Istanbul. He graduated from the Law Faculty of Istanbul
University and made a post-graduate study at the Istanbul University
Institute of Ataturk’s Principles and History of the Revolution. In
2005 and 2006 he took postgraduate courses at MGIMO, and has become
a scholar at the Russian Ministry of Education.

Note that Mehmet Perincek’s father – Dogu Perincek, who is the leader
of the Working Party of Turkey, in August 2013 he was sentenced to life
imprisonment on the case of the terrorist organization “Ergenekon”,
but in March 2014 was released. Mehmet Perincek was also arrested by
the “Ergenekon” case in 2011, but was later released.

Source: Panorama.am

LIVERPOOL WILL REPORTEDLY TRY AGAIN FOR DORTMUND’S MKHITARYAN

14:19 17.04.2014

Borussia Dortmund, Henrikh Mkhitaryan, Liverpool

Liverpool boss Brendan Rodgers is ready to make a fresh move for long
term target Henrikh Mkhitaryan according to Football Direct News.

The Armenian midfielder was high up on the Anfield wish-list prior
to his move to Borussia Dortmund last summer and could, according
to this source, be ready to consider a move away from the Bundesliga
side this summer.

Rodgers may see Mkhitaryan as a long term replacement for Steven
Gerrard. According to the report, the Armenian international has
performed well in Germany, contributing nine goals and nine assists
to his side’s cause, and Liverpool manager Brendan Rodgers remains
a fan of his.

Football Direct News claims also that the Merseyside club are keen
on luring another Dortmund star – 26 year old German international
Marcel Schmelzer to help boost their options at left-back.