Author: Kajoyan Gevork

SERZH SARGSYAN ASKED TO TURN OFF CAMERAS

Today President Sargsyan conducted the meeting of government during
which the new members of government were affirmed.

At the beginning of the meeting Serzh Sargsyan noted that in the
past year our country held three big elections. According to him,
a parliament was elected which includes the entire palette of the
political field. In the result of the presidential election we have
a new political culture, he said. And the mayoral election showed
that the citizens are ready to support the officials who work day
and night and change something every day, he said.

President Sargsyan says every election is a trial for our country
and young democracy. “We went through the election confidently
and came out of it as a stronger state and society. Now, in this
most favorable period since 2008, we will commit ourselves to work,
entirely and consistently, to resolve the people’s problems and to
build a more secure Armenia,” Serzh Sargsyan said.

He said there are great expectations from this government and no
obstacles to their efficiency. He noted that this government will be
assessed only by its outputs, very specific outputs.

“Last year the government was tasked to ensure at least 7% growth. The
task was fulfilled. This year the task is the same but we will
expect qualitative indicators from the government. We expect specific
indicators of solution of social issues. We will not be asking what
has been done but what results it has produced. The results must be
measurable and visible,” he noted.

According to Serzh Sargsyan, raising pensions and salaries is
measurable, optimization of the exaggerated public administration
system is measurable, solution of social issues of people is
measurable.

“We have very many issues and in the visible future we will have an
opportunity to speak about these issues and their solutions in a more
inclusive setting. I wish you all success and a clear understanding
that a lot depends on your success. It may be invisible at first
sight but a lot depends indeed,” he said.

For his part, Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan noted that the government
will do everything it can to achieve its goals at best. Then the
government continued the meeting behind closed doors. “We could turn
off the cameras, couldn’t we?” Serzh Sargsyan said.

13:35 08/05/2013 Story from Lragir.am News:

KAREN KOCHARYAN: OPPOSITION COULD GAIN MUCH FROM ELECTIONS BUT IT LOST MUCH INSTEAD

13:35 08/05/2013 ” COMMENTS

The May 5 municipal elections were classical Armenian elections,
political technologist Karen Kocharyan told reporters on Wednesday.

“The opposition could gain much from the elections but it lost
much instead. Unlike the presidential elections, at these elections
the authorities, having learnt more lessons from the presidential
elections, worked more efficiently than the opposition,” he said.

According to the political technologist, the opposition’s defeat was
due to the fact that it failed to unite.

ARFD’s elite also contributed to the party’s defeat, Kocharyan said,
adding that the ARFD’s Armenian leadership needs to be changed. The
defeat of the Armenian National Congress was natural in view of
the party leader’s remarks about the necessity to carry out a
bourgeois-democratic revolution in Armenia, he added.

All Armenian parties need a change of generation, the political
technologist concluded.

Source: Panorama.am

FOOL’S MATE

The members of government are known. Three changes have taken place.

And if there is “logic” about replacing the minister of sport because
he was a frozen member of the PAP but it is not clear why the ministers
of economy and finance have replaced each other. The spokesman for
the RPA Sharmazanov explained that ordinary citizens must feel the
results of the government reforms.

Mildly speaking, it is a weak explanation because the citizens do
not see the result of reforms not due to the performance of these
two ministers. These two ministers did not determine the government
policy. They were operators and they are not even fit for the role
of a scapegoat.

The composition of the government conveys that nothing will change
to favor public interests, and the same policy will continue to be
implemented. It means the economy will remain based on quotas and
monopolies, retaining the priorities of banks, mines and import. A
considerable sector of the economy will remain in the shadow, the
same tax and customs schemes will be used to oust SMEs and rule
out competition. As a consequence, emigration rate will continue to
be high.

Culture and historical heritage will continue to be destroyed. The
Diaspora affairs will remain an arena of tourism. The Ministry of
Foreign Affairs will remain a protocol office the activities of
which will be measured by the number of interviews and visits of the
minister. Initiatives will be absent in internal and external spheres.

This is not a government but a political favor to everyone: the West,
Russia, Kocharyan, the oligarchs, the former young communists, the RPA
youth, the IMF, mine owners, apostolic inclinations. It is intended
to leave everyone content. Similarly, the government cannot resolve
any public and state issue, only internal governmental issues and
redistribution of property.

For its part, it means that hardly any positive change should be
expected in liberal economy and public welfare. The appointment of
this cabinet is Serzh Sargsyan’s fool’s mate to the society and its
expectations.

Haik Aramyan 11:17 08/05/2013 Story from Lragir.am News:

TURKISH EQUIPMENT INSTALLED AT TREATMENT PLANTS AROUND ARMENIA’S LAKE SEVAN

May 08, 2013 | 01:36

YEREVAN. – Turkish equipment, instead of German and Italian gear,
were installed at the sewage treatment plants in Armenia’s Gavar,
Martuni, and Vardenis cities, which are located around Lake Sevan,
the Control Chamber conclusion informs.

The construction tender for these treatment plants was announced
in 2009, and Germany’s Ludwig Pfeiffer Hoch- und Tiefbau GmbH &
Co. KG, which had bid 3.9 million euros, was declared the winner of
this tender. The company was ordered to install solely German- or
Italian-made equipment at these treatment plants, but it was found
out that some of this gear was made in Turkey.

In addition, the Control Chamber recorded other violations, totaling
250,000 euros, in the construction activities.

A TRUE PATH TO ARMENIAN-TURKISH PEACE AND PROGRESS.

Tuesday, May 7th, 2013

Aram Hamparian

BY ARAM HAMPARIAN

It’s time for a new American approach to the Armenian Genocide, one
that is as simple as it is sound: Progress and peace based upon truth
and justice.

American policy on the Armenian Genocide can be both principled and
practical. For, in properly commemorating this crime, standing up
to its denial, and seeking its just resolution, we will be bringing
our policies as a government into alignment with our principles as
a nation – to the benefit of both U.S. interests and American values.

Years of futile U.S. efforts to appease Turkey have failed to end
Ankara’s blockade of Armenia and only hardened Ankara’s denial of
truth and obstruction of justice for this crime. In fact, it was only
moments after Turkey and Armenia signed the Ankara-inspired Protocols
back in 2009 that the Turkish government – rather than moving toward
recognition of this crime – reversed course by brazenly adding new
demands regarding Nagorno Karabakh. Ankara proudly declared it would
continue enforcing its illegal blockade of Armenia, and then, in an
open affront to its U.S. ally, actually escalated its international
campaign of Armenian Genocide denial. Turkey, having secured the
Armenian Foreign Minister’s signature on this document, has, for
the past four years, used it non-stop as its weapon of choice in a
relentless campaign to derail international progress toward a just
resolution of this still unpunished genocide.

To the extent that there is, today, constructive discourse on this
subject within a small but growing segment of Turkish civil society,
the credit belongs to the international campaign for truth, empowered
by independent scholarship and driven by Armenian calls for justice.

Allies of Ankara – including those in Washington, DC, are now
shamelessly seeking to take credit for this new awareness and activism,
but only because they failed to bully Armenians into silence and
bury this epic injustice. These apologists, sadly, remain part of
the problem, not the solution.

Turkey’s obstruction of justice has, over the course of nearly a
century, allowed Ankara to consolidate its hold on the genocidal
gains of its crimes against the Armenian people, blocking the return
to the Armenian nation of key elements – indispensable elements –
of viability that long sustained the Armenian people upon their
ancient homeland. This denial poisons Armenian-Turkish relations,
fosters wave after wave of anti-Armenian intolerance within Turkey,
threatens Armenia’s and Artsakh’s security, and, of course, fuels
regional tensions.

We must reject Ankara’s false choice that, when it comes to the
Armenian Genocide, protecting U.S. interests means compromising
American values. The future of this region – it’s sustainable stability
over the long-term – cannot be built upon a foundation of lies. Justice
is good geopolitics.

It’s time for the Obama-Biden Administration to reject Ankara’s
gag-rule and proudly reaffirm our government’s record of having
recognized the Armenian Genocide. Sadly, under foreign pressure,
President Obama has failed to reflect, much less reinforce, America’s
standing acknowledgment of the Armenian Genocide as a crime of
genocide. Our current President’s retreat is regrettable – on many
levels – and certainly must be reversed, but it does not detract from
the fact that, dating back to the time of President Woodrow Wilson,
the U.S. government has officially condemned Turkey’s intentional
campaign to destroy its Armenian and other indigenous Christian
populations. Since Raphael Lemkin coined the term genocide and
President Harry Truman became the first head of state to sign the
Genocide Convention, the United States has, on several occasions,
formally recognized the Armenian Genocide as a crime of genocide:

– The U.S. Government’s May 28, 1951 written statement to the
International Court of Justice regarding the Convention on the
Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, in which the
“Turkish massacres of Armenians” is cited as an “outstanding examples
of the crime of genocide.”

– President Ronald Reagan’s April 22, 1981 Proclamation number 4838;
in which he stated, in part, “like the genocide of the Armenians
before it, and the genocide of the Cambodians, which followed it –
and like too many other persecutions of too many other people –
the lessons of the Holocaust must never be forgotten.”

– House Joint Resolution 148 adopted on April 8, 1975, which designated
April 24, 1975, as “National Day of Remembrance of Man’s Inhumanity
to Man,” citing “all the victims of genocide, especially those of
Armenian ancestry who succumbed to the genocide perpetrated in 1915.”

– House Joint Resolution 247 adopted on September 10, 1984, which
designated April 24, 1985, as “National Day of Remembrance of Man’s
Inhumanity to Man,” citing “all the victims of genocide, especially
the one and one-half million people of Armenian ancestry who were the
victims of the genocide perpetrated in Turkey between 1915 and 1923.”

– The House of Representatives, on June 5, 1996, adopted an amendment
to House Bill 3540 (the Foreign Operations, Export Financing, and
Related Programs Appropriations Act, 1997), to reduce aid to Turkey
by $3,000,000 (an estimate of its payment of lobbying fees in the
United States) until the Turkish Government acknowledged the Armenian
Genocide and took steps to honor the memory of its victims.

President Obama himself entered office having stated his “firmly held
conviction that the Armenian Genocide is not an allegation, a personal
opinion, or a point of view, but rather a widely documented fact
supported by an overwhelming body of historical evidence.” He affirmed
his U.S. Senate record of “calling for Turkey’s acknowledgement of
the Armenian Genocide,” and, as we all know, pledged publicly that:
“as President I will recognize the Armenian Genocide.”

After years of failed efforts to appease Ankara, it’s time for
President Obama to honor his words, and for our government to live
up to America’s promise of truth and justice.

It’s time to stop outsourcing our nation’s Armenian Genocide policy
to Turkey, and – in the interest of both regional stability and our
core values as a nation – to reclaim American leadership in support
of a truthful and just resolution of this crime.

Aram Hamparian is the ANCA Executive Director

WHEN WILL OFFICIAL REACTION TO 1915 CHANGE?

Today’s Zaman, Turkey
May 7 2013

ORHAN KEMAL CENGÄ°Z
[email protected]

After April 24 we heard the now quite well-known rhetoric from
Turkey’s Foreign Ministry, criticizing US President Barack Obama for
his statement about the events that took place in 1915. The ministry
was quite harsh in its criticism, saying: “We find this statement
that ignores historical realities troubling in all its aspects, and
regret it.” What led to this critical tone was Obama’s statement that
the Armenians were mercilessly massacred and forced on a death march
in the last days of the Ottoman Empire.

Why was the ministry so harsh about Obama’s statement, which does
not even mention the “G” word?

I think this is a part of Turkey’s preparation for 2015. In my
opinion, with this statement, the Foreign Office was trying to create
a deterrent for the future. Let me explain what I meant.

While Armenians and the Armenian diaspora promote 2015 as a milestone
towards the global recognition of genocide (for them the centennial
year of 2015 is an advantage in promoting their cause), the Foreign
Ministry is mobilized by defensive instincts. Turkish officials think
that the Armenian diaspora has long been preparing for 2015 and they
have been preparing for their counter campaign, which is of course
quite rigid and based on a blatant denial of everything.

We had a glance at the general outline of the ministry’s campaign when
Haberturk published a piece on it on Sept. 3, 2011. The title of the
piece was “Foreign Ministry sends coded message to raise 2015 alarm,”
and according to this piece, in a secret message to Turkish embassies
worldwide, the Foreign Office asked Turkish diplomats to monitor and
prevent Armenian activities related to 2015.

Actually, what happened in Denmark in December 2012 confirmed the
content of this piece by Haberturk. In response to an Armenian genocide
exhibit at Copenhagen University in December 2012, the Turkish Embassy
immediately opened an “alternative exhibit.” As you can easily guess,
according to the Turkish Embassy’s exhibit, the Armenian genocide
never happened.

My fellow columnist Joost Lagendijk, in his column dated April 28,
also commented on the Foreign Office’s 2015 strategy. Joost said: “A
report last week by Barcın Yinanc in the Hurriyet Daily News suggested
that the current Turkish government does indeed have a plan for 2015.

The problem is that it looks like more of the same: An old-style
and unimaginative approach that did not wield any positive results
till now. As Yigal Schleifer put it in his blog on EurasiaNet, ‘The
triple-track approach Yinanc lays out — fight Armenian genocide
recognition efforts while at the same time pushing Yerevan towards
normalized relations with Turkey and resolving the Nagorno-Karabakh
issue — seems like one that will likely bear little but bitter
fruit’.”

Keeping all this in mind and rereading Turkey’s reaction to Obama’s
message, it could be understood that Turkey’s message was not for
today but rather for the future. By reacting quite strongly today,
the FO was trying to ensure that the US president would not mention
the “G” word in 2015.

As you may know, for the last five to six years, internal debate on
1915 has been flowing quite freely within Turkey. People use the word
“genocide” freely to label the events of 1915; people commemorate
1915 on the streets and so on. So when it compared what is happening
now with the situation just five to six years ago, it would not be
an exaggeration to say that a silent revolution is taking place with
regard to the Armenian taboo in Turkey.

However, when it comes to the “official reaction,” it seems to me
that it has unfortunately been taken hostage by the fear of 2015. The
more Armenian pressure on the third countries to recognize Armenian
genocide increases, the more the Foreign Office tends to return to
old reflexes. Therefore, before 2015, I do not expect any change in
Turkey’s official reaction to 1915. If anything happens, it will most
probably happen after passing this psychological barrier.

EPISODE 6 : NI ISRAELIENS NI PALESTIENS : ARMENIENS DE TERRE SAINTE

Fait-religieux.com
6 mai 2013

Henri Garabed | le 04.05.2013

Le père Pakrad est l’un des 45 membres de la Fraternite armenienne
Saint Jacques de Jerusalem. Ne au Liban, a Beyrouth, venu a Jerusalem
en tant qu’etudiant en 1981, il n’en n’est plus jamais reparti.

Ordonne pretre en 1991, le père Pakrad est un vartabed, un moine. ”
Notre patriarche est le successeur de Saint Jacques, ” frère du
Seigneur ” premier eveque de Jerusalem “, affirme-t-il. Le patriarche
Nourhan 1er Manougian a ete elu le 24 janvier 2013. Originaire d’Alep,
en Syrie, il est âge de 64 ans. La Fraternite accueille et forme
actuellement 50 seminaristes venus d’Armenie.

Père Pakrad, quelle est la citoyennete des membres de la Fraternite ?

En fait, nous, issus de la nouvelle generation, celle des annees 80,
nous ne recevons aucune citoyennete. Ni palestinienne, ni jordanienne,
ni israelienne. Israël ne delivre aucune carte d’identite aux
pretres qui sont ici. En ce qui me concerne, je vis depuis 32 ans
a Jerusalem et jusqu’a aujourd’hui je renouvelle mon visa chaque
annee. De nombreux pretres sont comme moi. Nos requetes auprès du
ministère de l’interieur sont restees vaines. Ma dernière reponse a
ete. Vous habitez a Jerusalem depuis tant d’annees avec votre visa
et il n’y a jamais eu de problèmes, alors c’est OK…

De fait, je suis encore libanais. Nous, en tant que communaute ici a
Jerusalem, nous nous disons jerusalemites. C’est la meilleure manière
de nous definir compte tenu des enjeux.

D’où viennent les membres de la Fraternite ?

Nous venons d’Irak, de Syrie, de Turquie, du Liban, d’Armenie et
Etats-Unis.

Quelles sont les relations de la Fraternite avec Israël et avec
l’Autorite Palestinienne ?

Avec Israël, nous avons des relations très formelles, sans conflits.

Avec le gouvernement palestinien, nous avons des relations normales
et proches.

Quelle est la situation economique de la communaute armenienne en
Terre Sainte ?

On ne se plaint pas mais ce n’est pas aussi bien qu’avant. Aujourd’hui
c’est très difficile de faire vivre une famille avec les salaires
percus. Les standards de vie ont considerablement augmente.

Cela pousse-t-il a l’emigration ?

L’emigration s’est arretee depuis la fin des annees 90. Depuis il y
a quelques cas, mais isoles. Ceci dit le risque d’un exode existe
si nous ne prenons pas soin de la jeune generation. Nous devons
imperativement trouver des solutions de logement pour les jeunes
couples afin qu’ils puissent poursuivre leur vie ici, dans les Lieux
Saints. C’est très important.

On evoque de plus en plus des tensions avec les juifs ultra-orthodoxes
?

Je l’experimente chaque jour ou presque, en marchant dans le quartier
avec mes vetements religieux. Ces juifs orthodoxes fanatiques
extremistes ou etudiants dans leur yeshivah sont endoctrines. Ils
croient que nous les chretiens, sommes des adorateurs d’idoles,
sans lien avec Dieu. Peu importe que nous soyons armeniens ou
grecs-orthodoxes. A leurs yeux, nous sommes des goys. Ils nous
regardent comme des personnes sans âme. C’est incroyable ! Je suis
alle dernièrement plaider la cause d’un jeune seminariste sur lequel
deux jeunes ultra avaient crache. Cracher c’est denier notre presence.

Ces provocations arrivent aussi dans la nouvelle ville de Jerusalem.

Cela ne vient pas seulement des extremistes, mais parfois de gens
ordinaires portant la kippa. En disant cela, je n’attaque pas les
juifs, car une grande partie de la societe israelienne rejette ces
pratiques, refuse ce phenomène.

Y-a-t-il encore des tensions avec les grecs-orthodoxes ? Dans le
passe, des bagarres ont eclate au Saint Sepulcre entre seminaristes
grecs et armeniens.

Les conflits aux Saint Sepulcre ont toujours existe et cela arrive
de temps en temps. L’Eglise grecque-orthodoxe a une mentalite
imperialiste. Ses membres vivent encore a l’ère byzantine. Ils
aimeraient bien mettre les armeniens sous leur coupe, mais l’Eglise
Armenienne est autocephale. Nous sommes dans la famille orthodoxe
mais nous sommes independants. Nous avons nos droits et nos privilèges
sur les Lieux Saints.

Cela ne pourrait-il pas se regler par une rencontre et un accord
entre les deux patriarches ?

Je n’imagine pas les deux patriarches conclurent un accord. Nous y
serions prets, eux non. Ils ont un trop grand desir de domination.

Avez-vous un message a adresser a l’occasion de Pâques ?

Nous invitons tous ceux qui le souhaitent a venir nous rencontrer et
particulièrement les armeniens dont nous avons grand besoin pour nous
soutenir ici dans ces Lieux Saints. Beaucoup de nations sont passees,
mais nous sommes restes de manière ininterrompue depuis plus de quinze
siècles. Notre Eglise est un tresor et ce tresor doit etre revele et
soutenu pour survivre.

A PERFECT ARMENIAN is Released

Broadway World
May 6 2013

April 24 marked the anniversary of the largest genocide you have never
heard of: the Armenian genocide. Michigan author Keri Topouzian’s
book, A Perfect Armenian, captures the suspense and fear of that
time through the story of a good man born into a life of violence,
illegal business, and tough decisions.

On the 24th of April in 1915, the first phase of the Armenian massacres
began with the arrest and murder of hundreds of intellectuals, mainly
from Constantinople, the capital of Ottoman Empire (now Istanbul in
present day Turkey).

Topouzian’s book, A Perfect Armenian is work of historical fiction
wrapped in adventure and mystery that was inspired by his own family’s
story of survival during the Genocide and the need to raise awareness
about a tragic time in our world’s history that is unremembered.

“If it weren’t for fiction, I believe we would know very little about
our world. A list of historic facts might come and go, but when our
imaginations become involved, we learn. When we are able to place
ourselves within the story and laugh or cry with the characters,
we remember. Not many people know much about Armenia, its history or
its people. I hope that this novel will open a small and interesting
window into this culture. My culture,” said Topouzian, author of A
Perfect Armenian.

Topouzian’s paternal grandmother, Varsenig, came from the village of
Tchingiler, a city that is an integral part of A Perfect Armenian. In
1915, Turkish soldiers forced Varsenig, her family and the rest of
their village to walk from their homes to the desert near Damascus,
Syria. They walked hundreds of miles because the soldiers had convinced
the villagers that they were traveling to safety from World War I. In
reality, they were deprived of food and water, and left to die.

1.5 million Armenians were killed in the genocide.

Topouzian’s book, A Perfect Armenian was inspired by his family’s
story of survival and the need to raise awareness about a tragic time
in our world’s history.

Keri Topouzian, a Bloomfield Hills resident, was born in Detroit,
Michigan. He graduated from the University of Health Sciences,
College of Osteopathic Medicine in 1982. Dr. Topouzian’s mother,
a journalist, was born and raised in Detroit while his father, a
mechanical engineer, was born in Utica, New York. His grandparents
hailed from four different villages in Ancient Armenia (now part of
Turkey), each immigrating separately to the United States.

Topouzian practices holistic and alternative medicine with offices in
Grand Rapids and Detroit. He is active in the Armenian community but
spends most of his free time with his wife and four growing children.

A Perfect Armenian When Armenian drug smuggler, Tavid Kaloustian,
fakes his own death and escapes, it is the first in a series of
dangerous events that transform him into the champion of his people,
even as he deals in the dark, deadly world of the opium trade. As the
Turkish military closes in on him and his family, Tavid is forced into
extreme choices in order to spare the lives of his fellow Armenians
and to extract justice from the Turks who rule them. As World War
I erupts, who will die and who will survive in this complex lethal
game of ethnic pride and principles?

The Armenian Genocide The Armenian Genocide, also known as the
Armenian Holocaust, the Armenian Massacres and, traditionally among
Armenians, as the Great Crime was the Ottoman government’s systematic
extermination of its minority Armenian subjects from their historic
homeland in the territory constituting the present-day Republic
of Turkey. It took place during and after World War I and was
implemented in two phases: the wholesale killing of the able-bodied
male population through massacre and forced labor, and the deportation
of women, children, the elderly and infirm on death marches to the
Syrian Desert.The total number of people killed as a result has been
estimated at between 1 and 1.5 million.

The starting date of the genocide is conventionally held to be April
24, 1915, the day when Ottoman authorities arrested some 250 Armenian
intellectuals and community leaders in Constantinople. Thereafter,
the Ottoman military uprooted Armenians from their homes and forced
them to march for hundreds of miles, depriving them of food and water,
to the desert of what is now Syria. Massacres were indiscriminate of
age or gender, with rape and other sexual abuse commonplace.

Turkey, the successor state of the Ottoman Empire, denies the word
genocide is an accurate description of the events. In recent years,
it has faced repeated calls to accept the events as genocide. To date,
twenty countries have officially recognized the events of the period as
genocide, and most genocide scholars and historians accept this view.

Media Contact: Kim Bode 834 Design and Marketing, 6162992677,
[email protected]

News distributed by PR Newswire iReach:

NKR NA DEPUTY SPEAKER: DEMOCRATIC ARTSAKH CANNOT SURVIVE BEING PART OF DICTATORIAL AZERBAIJAN

19:25, 6 May, 2013

STEPANAKERT, MAY 6, ARMENPRESS: Armenpress interviewed the Deputy
Speaker of the National Assembly of the Nagorno Karabakh Republic
Arthur Tovmasyan. The key issues of the talk were the prospects of
the Karabakh conflict settlement, threatened negotiations stage and
the forthcoming presidential elections in Azerbaijan.

– Mr. Tovmasyan, the attention of the international community towards
Karabakh has considerably increased. It is proved by the latest
events: the establishment of the Artsakh Republic-Lithuanian Republic
Parliamentary Friendship Group, the recognition of the recognition of
the Artsakh Republic by the US Maine State and Fresno City. These
events, as expected, were not accepted normally in Azerbaijan,
mildly speaking. What do you think, what is the real reason for
the Azerbaijan~Rs concern and will Azerbaijan be able to change the
process of the abovementioned events?

– I think, a wave of anxiety was raised by the Azerbaijani
authorities. Recently a big noise was made by the new novel of the
Azerbaijani writer Akram Aylisli ~SStone Dreams~T. There are parts
in the book, where the Azerbaijani is depreciated and the Armenian
is praised. After that the Azerbaijani people called the writer an
Armenian. Akram Aylisli responded that ~Sif I was an Armenian, I will
have declared about it~T. Thus, I share Azerbaijan into two parts: the
nation of the country and the authorities. I am certain that there are
many people in Azerbaijan, who think like the writer. The difference
is that Aylisli spoke about a thing, thought by a significant section
of the common Azerbaijani people.

The Azerbaijani authorities direct oil dollars to purchase of weapons
and armored vehicles, enriching the clan and foreign policy, ignoring
the social programs. If the Nagorno Karabakh Republic is recognized
by some countries or states, the Azerbaijani authorities will direct
their oil dollars to conduct foreign policy with them, thus threatening
the economic stability of the country. In case of Lithuania, I am
certain, they would have suspended their diplomatic relations with the
country. But if the Lithuanian example is followed by many countries,
Azerbaijan would not be able to treat them the same way.

– What will you say about the possibility of the recognition of the
Nagorno Karabakh Republic by Armenia?

– I think, it is not rational to do that in this moment, as the
accepting of the NKR recognition by any of the OSCE Minsk Group
Co-Chair countries will mean that that particular country has already
nothing to do in the settlement process. So, it is supposed that
the current stage of the negotiations process will be settled by
Azerbaijan after the recognition of the NKR independence or if we
accept the precondition of entering into the composition of Azerbaijan,
which I consider to be incredible.

– What do you think, will this year be decisive for the settlement
of the NKR conflict?

– I might seem naïve if I say that this year the independence of
the NKR will be recognized. But I am certain that a progress will be
registered in the settlement process. The authorities of Armenia and
Artsakh are of the same opinion ~V the NKR conflict should be settled
in peaceful way, and that does not mean, certainly, that we want any
peace. We support a decent peace and not a forced one.

– Let us talk a bit about the forthcoming presidential elections in
Azerbaijan. Can it somehow affect the negotiations process?

– During the year of the presidential elections we hear rough
statements, but this year is comparatively calmer. Ilham Aliyev
needs rough statements to keep the power, which are made only for the
internal use to persuade the people and seem a powerful president. I am
confident that the forthcoming elections will be several steps behind
the previous ones. (THE FULL INTERVIEW IS AVAILABLE IN ARMENIAN).

Interviewed by Vahram Poghosyan

MAN PULLED OUT DEAD FROM CANAL IN ARMENIA’S YEGHVARD

16:01 ~U 06.05.13

A 29-year-old resident of Yeghvard (Gegharkunik region) was pulled
out dead from a canal on Monday morning.

Rescue teams from the Emergency Ministry’s crisis management center
went to the scene after receiving an alarm call that a man had thrown
himself into a canal in the vicinities of the city’s cemetery.

The deceased has been identified as K. Alexanyan.

Armenian News – Tert.am