Author: Kajoyan Gevork

THE ARMY CONTINUES OPERATIONS, KILLING MANY TERRORISTS INCLUDING LEADERS

Jul 16, 2013

Provinces, (SANA)- Several leaders of terrorist groups affiliated
to Jabhat al-Nusra were killed Tuesday during a series of special
operations carried out by units of the armed forces in Damascus
Countryside.

An official source told SANA reporter that army units have progressed
in al-Qaboun neighborhood in Damascus after they destroyed several
terrorists’ dens and gatherings and killed and injured many of them.

The source added that another army unit destroyed a weapon and
ammunition warehouse in Barzeh neighborhood in Damascus and killed
the leaders of two terrorist groups. Those are Fadi Sallo and Mohammad
Islam al-Hammwi.

SANA reporter quoted the source as saying that an army unit eliminated
all members of an armed terrorist group and destroyed their weapons
and ammunition in Douma city in the countryside. Terrorists Khalaf
Abdullah al-Salem and Yaser Yasin Badran were among the dead.

A number of terrorists were also killed near the Electricity Company
and Daya Company for air conditioners in Harasta city.

The source stressed that units of the armed forces continued operations
against the terrorist groups in the Eastern Ghouta.

An RPG shooter and all members of a terrorist groups were killed on
the outskirts of Deir Salman village, in addition to the destruction
of two heavy machineguns, according to the source.

Another special operation that targeted a terrorists’ den near Marj
al-Sultan village resulted in the killing of several leaders of
terrorist groups with ties to Jabhat al-Nusra.

A terrorist group was wholly eliminated in the farms surrounding
al-Khamisiyeh village.

Wide operations in Aleppo, many terrorists killed

In the same context, units of the armed forces targeted several
terrorists’ gatherings and destroyed heavy weapons in different areas
in Aleppo and its countryside.

An official source told SANA reporter that army units clashed with
an armed terrorist group in al-Rashidin neighborhood and killed most
of its members.

Another army unit destroyed a gathering for terrorists in al-Matiqa
al-Rabi’eh in the neighborhood.

The source mentioned that members of terrorist groups were killed
and injured in al-Ashrafiyeh and al-Khaldiyeh neighborhoods in the
city of Aleppo. The terrorists’ weapons were destroyed.

In the countryside, units of the armed forces destroyed a mortar
near al-Alqamiyeh gas station which the terrorists had been using in
targeting the military Minnegh airport, according to the source.

Other army units destroyed a den for an armed terrorist group near
Minnegh gas station, in addition to destroying weapons and ammunition
for terrorists on Azaz-Minnegh road.

Armed terrorist groups that had been committing acts of looting
and blocking roads were eliminated near al-Naqarin village on al-Bab
al-Qadim-Aleppo road in the eastern countryside of the province. Eight
vehicles transporting weapons and ammunition were destroyed in
the area.

In the western countryside of Aleppo, an army unit killed and injured
many terrorists to the west of al-Mansoura village, the source told
SANA reporter.

Another army unit killed members of an armed terrorist group who were
trying to sneak from al-Kastillo into Dahret Abd Rabbeh in al-Lairamoun
area and destroyed a heavy machinegun they had with them.

Meanwhile, 22 terrorists were killed near Zaido gas station on
Aleppo-Idleb road and in the farms surrounding Khan al-Assal in the
western countryside with their weapons and ammunition destroyed.

The source told SANA reporter that units of the armed forces killed
terrorists affiliated to Jabhat al-Nusra in the areas near Aleppo
Central Prison.

The source stressed that the authorities managed to deliver 5000
meals to the inmates at the Prison through the branch of the Syrian
Arab Red Crescent in Aleppo.

Terrorists killed, weapons destroyed in Idleb

An army unit carried out a special operation during which it killed
a number of terrorists from Jabhat al-Nusra at al-Talleh roundabout
in Maaret al-Numan in Idleb countryside.

SANA reporter quoted a military source as saying that the operation
resulted in destroying large amounts of weapons and ammunition.

The source pointed out that terrorists Yaser al-Dibes and Hassan
Subhi were identified among the dead.

So-called ‘Ahrar al-Sham’ Brigade eliminated in Hama

A unit of the armed forces eliminated the so-called ‘Ahrar al-Sham’
brigade in an operation which targeted terrorists’ gatherings in
al-Hawash town in al-Ghab, Hama countryside.

An official source told SANA reporter that the operation resulted
in killing a number of members of an armed terrorist group calling
itself as Ahrar al-Sham brigade.

The most wanted terrorist Mohie Eddin Shaher Ayyan, leader of the
brigade, was identified among the dead.

English Bulletin

ARMENIA, RUSSIA DISCUSS ECONOMIC COOPERATION

, Turkey
July 16 2013

The sides expressed satisfaction with the development of economic
relations and discussed prospects for their intensification. The
expansion of economic cooperation was discussed

World Bulletin/News Desk

Armenian Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan and Russian Deputy Minister of
Economic Development Alexei Likhachev discussed economic cooperation,
Armenia Today reported citing the Armenian government.

The sides expressed satisfaction with the development of economic
relations and discussed prospects for their intensification. The
expansion of economic cooperation was discussed.

In this context, Likhachev presented the results of a joint working
group’s activity, coordinated by the Ministries of Economy of two
economies to Armenian Prime Minister.

KOZHARA STANDS FOR PROMOTING RELATIONS WITH ARMENIA

ForUm, Ukraine
July 16 2013

Ukraine and Armenia are satisfied with the high level of bilateral
relations. This was discussed during the meeting between the OSCE
chairperson-office, foreign minister of Ukraine Leonid Kozhara and
the President of the Republic of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan, the Foreign
Ministry press service informs.

During the meeting, the sides discussed issues of further cooperation
between the OSCE and Armenia, and ways to enhance the negotiation
process within the framework of the OSCE Minsk Group on the
Nagorno-Karabakh conflict settlement.

President of Armenia was informed about the efforts of the Ukrainian
Chairmanship of the OSCE in promoting peaceful resolution of this
protracted conflict in the OSCE area.

In the context of discussions on a bilateral component, the sides
expressed satisfaction with the high level of Ukrainian-Armenian
relations and exchanged views on promising areas of cooperation
between the two countries.

In this regard, particular attention was paid to the issues of
cooperation in the political, economic, cultural and humanitarian
spheres.

ARMENIA: MILITARY ACADEMIES OPENING DOORS TO WOMEN

EurasiaNet.org, NY
July 16 2013

July 16, 2013 – 2:18pm, by Gayane Abrahamyan

This year for the first time young women in Armenia can enroll in the
country’s two military academies. Some observers say coeducation has
more to do with Armenia’s dire demographic situation than with any
desire to promote gender equality.

In June, the Defense Ministry announced that physically fit women over
the age of 18 who had passed exams in mathematics and physics and
finished high school would be eligible for admission at Yerevan’s
four-year Vazgen Sarkisian Military Institute and the Marshal
Khanpertsian Institute of Military Aviation. Unlike male students,
they will be required to return home in the evenings – a practical
function due to the lack of coed dormitories. After acquiring a
bachelor’s degree, they will be required to serve as officers in the
military for 10 years.

Defense Minister Seyran Ohanian termed the change “part of large-scale
reforms in the army” and an “opportunity for representatives of the
gentle sex” to gain a “higher military education and professional
growth.”

Representatives of the two academies, speaking on condition of
anonymity, told EurasiaNet.org that interest among women in enrolling
was higher than anticipated. As of the July 1 application deadline, 25
women between the ages of 21 and 23 applied for admission, they said.

Currently, more than 1,500 women are serving in Armenia’s armed
forces, mostly in administrative capacities. Women are not subject
to conscription. Between 1992 and 1994, however, around 600 women
fought as volunteer soldiers, doctors and nurses in Nagorno-Karabakh
war against Azerbaijan; 18 were killed.

Armenia’s move leaves Azerbaijan as the only country in the South
Caucasus that does not have coeducational military academies.

Reactions to the decision to admit women to military academies
generally have been favorable. Defense Ministry representative Artsrun
Hovhannisian explained that Armenia is keeping with the times by now
facilitating women’s access to leadership positions in the military.

“In this era of technical development, physical strength somewhat
yields to [other] capacities, and women are usually quite capable —
they are quick and agile, hardworking and persistent,” Hovhannisian
elaborated. “Right now, a strong mind matters the most, and in that
respect we have no right to discriminate between boys and girls.”

But some observers assert that coeducation is the byproduct of
necessity, not the result of an enlightened impulse. Human rights
activist Artur Sakunts, a longtime advocate for soldiers’ rights within
the army, believes that women’s admission into military academies
has little to do with gender equality and a lot to do with the army
being unable to meet conscription quotas.

“It is simply absurd to talk about gender equality in an army severely
challenged with social inequality,” said Sakunts, who heads the
Helsinki Citizens’ Assembly Vanadzor office. “This is, undoubtedly,
an attempt to somehow resolve the quota issue.”

During the 1990s –amid the Nagorno-Karabakh War, as well as the
economic upheaval that followed the 1991 Soviet collapse — Armenia
experienced a drastic decline in its birthrate. In the 1980s, some
40,000 boys had been born each year, but, in 1995, one year after the
cease-fire with Azerbaijan, that number fell to 25,697, according
to National Statistical Service data. Factoring in migration, “the
number is even smaller,” commented Karine Kulumjian, head of the
Service’s Department of Demography.

Some experts claim that the army, now faced with a dearth of draftable
18-year-old men, is having trouble maintaining troop numbers.

Anxieties are exacerbated by the fact that Azerbaijan, using its
windfall from energy exports, is engaged in a military buildup.

Hovhannisian, the Armenian Defense Ministry representative, disputed
the notion that the admission of women to military academies was
motivated by the military’s demographic quandary. Indeed, he went
so far as to deny the existence of a numbers problem at all. “First
of all, we do not expect that the amount of women might be so high
that it could solve it,” he stated. (Men slightly outnumber women at
the age of conscription.) “Secondly, we do not have a quota issue,
because every year we recruit more contract servicemen and by that
fill the conscription gap. So, this is not an issue.”

Military psychologist David Jamalian, a lecturer at the European
Regional Educational Academy, echoed Hovhannisian’s opinion. Letting
women into military academies “is more about granting an opportunity,”
Jamalian contended. “We do not deny the reality, which is that the
army has the issue of filling its ranks, but not this way. Having a
professional army is the proper perspective, and the Defense Ministry
is gradually getting there.”

For Maj. Gen. Arkadi Ter-Tadevosian, a Karabakh War veteran,
the motivation for this change is secondary to the results. “I
felt the importance of women’s presence during the hostilities,”
Ter-Tadevosian recounted. “With their level of preparedness and sense
of responsibility, women always make men more restrained and balanced
and aspire for improvement, and that can only do the army good.”

Editor’s note: Gayane Abrahamyan is a freelance reporter and editor
in Yerevan.

HRACHYA HARUTYUNYAN’S LAWYER TO FILE COMPLAINT AGAINST POLICE ACTIONS

July 16, 2013 | 20:00

Lawyer of Hrachya Harutyunyan, who was arrested over a fatal car crash
in Russia, will file a complaint against the actions of policemen
who brought defendant to court dressed in a colored robe.

Talking to Armenian News-NEWS.am, the lawyer said he intends to file a
complaint against twenty employees of the hospital who let Harutyunyan
leave the hospital in a robe.

The convoy brought the detainee into the courtroom from the hospital
in a flowered robe and slippers. Such degrading treatment caused
uproar in Armenia.

A truck crashed into a passenger bus on July 13 outside Moscow,
and it was found out that the truck driver was an Armenian citizen
by the name of Hrachya Harutyunyan. The impact of the crash was so
powerful that the bus had split in two. The accident claimed 18 lives
and injured 64 others.

News from Armenia – NEWS.am

RUBEN SAHAKIAN: TREATMENT OF HRACHIA HARUTYUNIAN WAS BARBARIC

Tuesday,
July 16

Chairman of the Chamber of Advocates of Armenia Ruben Sahakian said
the truck driver Hrachia Harutyunian charged in the Moscow car crash
has been treated in a barbaric way.

Asked by Aysor.am if those who woke the man from a drug-induced sleep,
brought him to court in a housecoat and took his photos had any right
to do so, Sahakian replied: “No. It is a flagrant violation of human
rights”.

“However, they may explain there were no other clothes. The court
and legal system of Russia is one of the worst in the world,” the
chairman of Armenia’s Chamber of Advocates noted.

He added that they are prepared to provide assistance to Hrachia
Harutyunian.

TODAY, 17:27

Aysor.am

COMMERCE AND INDUSTRY CHAMBERS OF YEREVAN AND TEHRAN SIGN MEMORANDUM ON EXPANSION OF RELATIONS

YEREVAN, July 16. / ARKA /

The commerce and industry chambers (CIC) of Yerevan and Tehran signed
today a memorandum on expansion of economic, technological and cultural
relations. The document was signed during an Armenian-Iranian business
forum, hosted by the Armenian capital city.

“This memorandum will become a platform for practical steps to deepen
bilateral trade and economic relations. Such forums are the first
steps to bring closer the business people from both countries,’
deputy Armenian economy minister Ara Petrosyan told ARKA.

The forum presented the opportunities of Iranian free trade and
industrial zone Aras that provides a number of benefits to businesses
and entrepreneurs wishing to establish or organize production,
storage and transportation of goods in the area.

The president of Tehran Commerce and Industry Chamber, Sadeq Khazerlu
said Armenian business people may be interested in one of the four
areas of Aras zone, located across the Armenian town of Meghri. He
said some of the privileges of the zone are s a 20-year exemption from
taxes and duties, simplified import and export of goods, registration
of foreign companies within 24 hours, as well as free entry and exit
of foreign nationals.

Aras free trade and industrial zone is located in the north-west of
Iran, bordering with Armenia, Azerbaijan and Nakhichevan. The total
size of the area is 51 hectares. It is divided into 4 areas and covers
parts of two Iranian cities f Julfa and Kaleybar. -0-

– See more at:

MERKEL SAYS US MUST ‘OBSERVE GERMAN LAW ON GERMAN TERRITORY’

16:32 16/07/2013 ” IN THE WORLD

Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, has called for a strict European
agreement on data protection requiring all internet service providers
to reveal what personal information they have stored, and to whom
they have made it available, Financial Times reported.

The fundamental law should ensure that companies such as Facebook
and Google would be subject to the same strict privacy rules in all
EU member states, and not simply obey national legislation in the
country where they are registered, she said.

Ms Merkel has faced sharp criticism in recent days for failing to take
decisive action to protect German internet users from the comprehensive
surveillance of internet and telecommunications traffic alleged to
have been conducted by US and British intelligence services.

“Internet companies which are operating in Europe, such as Facebook
and Google, must give . . . European countries the information about
whom they have given data to,” she said.

The first requirement was to complete negotiations on a common
European data protection law, on which Germany would take “a very
strict position”. She said that although Germany had its own “very
good data protection law”, a company like Facebook which was registered
in Ireland was only subject to Irish law.

Other European countries, such as the UK, had “a very different
philosophy” about data protection, and very different laws granting
intelligence services access to communications traffic. “We must have
an intensive discussion to discover what is reasonable,” she said. The
German position would be that “the end does not always justify the
means” in collecting intelligence information.

In the clearest indication to date that Ms Merkel believes the US may
have contravened Germany’s data protection laws, she said: “I expect
a clear promise from the American government, that in the future they
will observe German law on German territory. We are friendly partners.

We are in a defence alliance and we must be able to rely on each
other.”

Source: Panorama.am

PUTIN ACCUSES US OF ‘TRAPPING’ SNOWDEN IN RUSSIA

13:40 16/07/2013 ” IN THE WORLD

Russian President Vladimir Putin accused the United States of trapping
US intelligence leaker Edward Snowden in Moscow, saying he would
leave Russia as soon as possible, AFP reported.

“As soon as there’s the chance to move somewhere he will certainly
do this,” Putin said in televised remarks.

“He arrived on our territory uninvited, he did not fly to us, he was
flying in transit to other countries,” Putin said.

“But as soon as he was in the air, it became known, and our American
partners essentially blocked off his further flight.”

These were Putin’s first public remarks since Snowden met with several
rights activists and lawyers Friday at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport,
where he is stranded.

Snowden arrived in Moscow from Hong Kong on June 23 and the US revoked
his passport the same day.

Booked on a June 24 flight from Moscow to Havana, Cuba, he never
boarded the plane. Snowden has been stranded in the airport’s transit
zone since then.

Putin said of the United States: “They themselves scared off all
the other countries, no one wants to take him, and therefore they
essentially themselves trapped him on our territory.

“A nice gift to us for Christmas,” he told Russian reporters travelling
with him on a visit to the island of Gogland in the Gulf of Finland.

He did not know what would become of Snowden. “How would I know?

That’s his life, his fate,” the president said.

But he did note a change in position by the former NSA contractor.

Snowden announced on Friday that he did, after all, want to apply
for asylum in Russia until he could travel on to Latin America,
where several countries have offered him asylum.

He had withdrawn his initial application after Putin said earlier this
month that Snowden could claim asylum in Russia only if he stopped
his leaks.

When Snowden announced Friday he was renewing his application, he
said he had promised not to harm US interests in the future.

“Judging by his latest statement, he is somewhat changing his
position,” said Putin. “But the situation has not been finally
clarified so far.”

He said nothing about whether or not Snowden’s application would
be accepted.

Source: Panorama.am

ARMENIAN-POLISH EXPEDITION EXCAVATES AGHAVNATUN SITE

10:55, 16 July, 2013

YEREVAN, JULY 16, ARMENPRESS: The excavation site of the Aghavnatun
Village of the Armavir Marz of the Republic of Armenia is a diverse
monument, where a cultural layer was found dating from the Stone Age
to Bronze Age. As Armenpress was reported by the Coordinator of the
excavations Boris Gasparyan, the excavation works, carried out in the
Aghavnatun site, have been launched since July 3. “The Armenian-Polish
joint expedition will carry out studies of the site this year,
as we are finding new structures and petroglyphs in Aghavnatun”, –
said Boris Gasparyan.

As noted by the Coordinator of the excavations, the expedition
is equipped with all the necessary devices and specialists. “Our
foreign colleagues have a considerable experience in the study of
similar monuments. Besides the general study of the monuments we are
implementing also experience exchange. It is very important for both
of us, as we are learning from each other”, – said Boris Gasparyan,
adding that notwithstanding the fact that there are no established
diplomatic relations between Armenia and Poland, there is a significant
scientific dialogue.

The excavation works in the Aghavnatun Village of the Armavir
Marz have been launched since 2001. Aghavnatun is a systematically
excavated monument.