Author: Kalantarian Kevo

PRESS RELEASE
Hayastan All-Armenian Fund
Governmental Buiding 3, Yerevan, RA
Contact: Hasmik Grigoryan
Tel: +(3741) 56 01 06 ext. 105
Fax: +(3741) 52 15 05
E-mail: [email protected]
Web:

26 January, 2012

Hayastan All-Armenian Fund launches construction of kindergarten in Martuni
Region’s Sos Village

Project is yet another education-sector initiative made possible by
French-Armenian community

Yerevan, January 26, 2012 – The Hayastan All-Armenian Fund has begun
construction of a kindergarten in Sos, a village in Artsakh’s Martuni
Region. The project is co-sponsored by the fund’s French affiliate and the
government of Artsakh.

The future kindergarten will be a two-story structure designed to
accommodate up to 50 children. The first floor will comprise a locker room,
naprooms, restrooms, a kitchen, a laundry, and storage rooms; the second
floor will consist of playrooms, an events hall, and a gym. The facility
will also feature a sizeable playground. Currently crews are laying the
foundations of the kindergarten, which is slated to open in Fall 2012.

In the meantime preschoolers in Sos will continue to attend the community’s
existing kindergarten, which was built in the 1970s. The campus is in a
state of serious disrepair and lacks some of the core amenities required of
a modern educational institution, among them central heating and even a
sewage-disposal system.

Due to the dilapidated condition of the old campus, some families have opted
altogether not to send their children to the kindergarten, according to Sos
mayor Igor Ghahramanyan.

Commenting on the construction of the future kindergarten, the mayor
reiterated his community’s great joy and anticipation, given the imminent
availability of a spacious and comfortable kindergarten featuring
state-of-the-art amenities.

Sos is the site of another major development project, the construction of a
critically needed potable-water network, which the Hayastan All-Armenian
Fund implemented in 2010 with the co-sponsorship of the French-Armenian
community and the government of Artsakh. Thanks to the initiative, the
residents of Sos have since enjoyed around-the-clock access to water.

“Our hope is that such projects will vastly improve prospects of economic
and social development in the village of Sos, which flanks the main road to
the Amaras Monastery complex,” said Ara Vardanyan, executive director of the
Hayastan All-Armenian Fund. “In this respect, our high praise goes to our
French affiliate, for its consistent support of preschool-building
initiatives in Artsakh. One of these is the soon-to-be-completed
construction of a kindergarten in Drakhtik, a village in the Hadrut Region.”

Sos, which traces its history to the 1700s, is home to 1,040 residents. The
community’s main occupations are cattlebreeding and winemaking. The local
agricultural-machinery park, established in recent years in Sos village, has
gone a long way to improve farming productivity, Ghahramanyan said.

ARMENIA’S LEVON ARONIAN TOPS TATA STEEL TOURNAMENT

ARMENPRESS
JANUARY 25, 2012
YEREVAN

YEREVAN, JANUARY 25, ARMENPRESS: Armenia’s grand master Levon Aronian
beat Italian Francesco Karuana at the ninth round of the Tata Steel
international tournament in Dutch town of Wijk aan Zee and tops the
list of the “A” group of the tournament, Armenpress Armenian news
agency reports citing the official website of the tournament.

Norwegian Magnus Carlsen, Ukrainian Vassily Ivanchuk and Azerbaijani
Teymur Rajabov share 2-4 places.

FIRST LADY OF TURKEY TAKES REVENGE ON FRANCE

ARMENPRESS
JANUARY 25, 2012
YEREVAN

ANKARA, JANUARY 25, ARMENPRESS: Turkey has decided to turn to the
First Lady in its fighting.

Hayrunnisa Gul, the spouse of Turkey’s President Abdullah Gul, will
tomorrow give a dinner for women ambassadors accredited in Turkey,
wives of ambassadors and women representatives of international
organizations, Armenpress reports citing Anadolu agency.

It is noteworthy that the spouse of the French Ambassador to Turkey
has not been invited.

It is a tradition to organize suchlike banquets in Chankaya
presidential palace from time to time, but tomorrow’s event will be
more large-scale. Nearly 90 guests will be invited. The banquet will
be held behind closed doors. The First Lady of Turkey is intended to
deliver a speech before the dinner.

ERDOGAN SLAMS “RACIST” FRENCH GENOCIDE BILL

Monsters and Critics

Jan 24 2012

Paris/Istanbul – Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday
denounced as ‘discriminatory and racist’ a bill adopted by the French
parliament that makes it a crime to deny Armenians suffered genocide
at the hands of Ottoman Turks a century ago.

Turkey would take ‘step by step’ measures against fellow NATO member
France over the bill, he said, calling it an attack on freedom of
expression.

After seven hours of intense debate Monday the French Senate adopted
the bill, which had already been approved by the lower house of
parliament in December.

Armenia welcomed the move as ‘historic.’

‘The day the law was accepted will be entered with golden letters
not only in the history books of Armenian-French friendship but also
in the chronicles of global human rights protection,’ said Armenian
Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandyan.

President Nicolas Sarkozy has 15 days to sign the text into law.

A spokesman for the Turkish embassy in Paris, Engin Solakoglu, warned
Sarkozy of repercussions ‘in all areas’ – diplomatic, political,
economic, military and cultural – if he enacted the law.

‘France will have to do without Turkey in these domains,’ he told
France Info radio.

In December Turkey already suspended military and diplomatic
cooperation with France, a NATO ally. Turkey has warned this time it
could downgrade ties, among other measures.

Foreign Minister Alain Juppe on Tuesday repeated his appeals for
Turkey to show ‘sangfroid’.

Juppe also admitted in an interview with Canal + television that the
bill, which punishes genocide denial by a year in prison and 45,000
euros (57,000 dollars) in fines, was ‘badly timed.’

France officially recognizes two genocides: the Nazi Holocaust of
Jews during World War II and the deaths of hundreds of thousands of
Armenians in eastern Turkey between 1915 and 1917.

The country already has a law criminalising Holocaust denial. The
current bill extends that punishment to people who deny Armenians
also suffered genocide.

Armenians say around 1.5 million people were either killed or died
during forced deportations in eastern Turkey in 1915, at the height
of World War I.

A dozen countries have declared there was a genocide.

Turkey estimates between 300,000 and 500,000 people died but rejects
the genocide tag, saying that there was no systematic policy to
destroy the Christian Armenian community.

Ankara has accused Sarkozy of fishing for votes among France’s small
but influential Armenian community in the run-up to this year’s
presidential elections.

ARMENIAN GENOCIDE RECOGNITION LAW: IS FRANCE CRIMINALIZING FREE SPEECH?

International Business Times

Jan 24 2012

By Amrutha Gayathri: Subscribe to Amrutha’s RSS feed

Taking the international rhetoric on the Armenian genocide to the next
level, the French government has approved a bill making it illegal
to deny that the massacre of Armenians by Ottoman Turks in the first
quarter of the last century was genocide.

As expected, the approval of the bill, on Monday, sparked an angry
retaliation from Turkey, including a threat of “total rupture” of
diplomatic ties with France.

However, the international debate currently involving France, Armenia
and Turkey seems to conveniently overlook a key controversial element
in the new law – it criminalizes free speech.

The adoption of the new law seems to erroneously suggest that France
has only recently joined the global crusade to recognize the Armenian
genocide. The fact is France passed a bill, in 2001, officially
accepting the Armenian massacre between 1915 and 1923 was genocide.

The new genocide law – which penalizes anyone who chooses to have a
different opinion about the Armenian mass killing from that which
the constitution mandates – is clearly in conflict with France’s
obligation as a democracy to respect free speech.

The new law should, perhaps, have been named Anti-Genocide Denial
law, rather than the widely used but more general term, Genocide
Recognition law.

An overwhelming majority of historians and academic institutions
across the world have already recognized the Armenian mass killing
was genocide. However, this is not enough for legislators to “lock”
history up or constitutionally “protect” history, effectively
criminalizing dissent.

“Officially recognizing the Armenian Genocide is one thing, and I have
no problem with it. Criminalizing free speech is quite another. The
fact that there is a consensus on a particular view doesn’t justify
declaring dissenting views illegal; there is value in periodically
reevaluating our conclusions in cases like this. France should
be ashamed of this attack on freedom,” a commentator wrote on an
Internet forum.

The law which mandates a maximum 45,000 Euro ($58,000) fine and a
year in jail for offenders has met with criticism for being grossly
anti-democratic. The suggestion that the State is better equipped
than the people in determining truth is high-handed, to say the least.

“As repugnant as the atrocities against ethnic Armenians were, it
is undesirable for States to interfere with the right to know and
the search for historical truth, especially when those events took
place in another country,” Article19.org, an organization “defending
freedom of expression and information” wrote in a post, published
while the law was still a draft.

“The notion of forbidding words, even ugly words, is repulsive
in the extreme. It is very sad to see one of the cornerstones of
European democracy taking that path. France has lost all moral right
to condemn anyone else for repressing the right to speak freely,”
wrote another commentator.

When there is no social necessity in France to limit political views,
as is the case during a State-imposed emergency, the new law should
be deemed undemocratic and orchestrated merely to restructure its ties
with Armenia and to appease 500,000 ethnic Armenians in France, in the
wake of a two-round presidential vote scheduled for April 22 and May 6.

TURKEY THREATENS ‘TOTAL RUPTURE’ WITH FRANCE OVER ARMENIAN GENOCIDE BILL

Deutsche Welle
,,15686187,00.html
Jan 24 2012
Germany

Turkey has strongly condemned the French Senate’s approval of a bill
that would outlaw denying mass killings of Armenians by Ottoman Turks
was genocide. Ankara’s ambassador in Paris says he’s ready to pack
his bags.

France’s upper house approved a bill late on Monday making it illegal
to deny that a massacre of Armenians by Ottoman Turks during World
War I was genocide, sparking ire from Turkey and praise from Armenia.

The Senate passed the bill – which allows for a potential one-year
prison sentence and a fine of up to 45,000 euros ($57,000) for those
who deny that genocide took place – by a vote of 127 to 86. The bill,
passed last month by France’s lower house, the National Assembly,
must now be signed by French President Nicolas Sarkozy before it can
become law.

Armenia hailed the French Senate vote as a day “written in gold,”
while Turkey lamented “a black day in [France’s] history.”

The bill initially pertained directly to the killing of Armenians by
Ottoman Turks from 1915 to 1917, but was later broadened to include
all genocides recognized by the French government.

‘Permanent’ consequences

NATO allies Turkey, however, have threatened severe diplomatic
fallout if the bill is rubber-stamped by Sarkozy. Ankara has already
temporarily suspended relations with Paris.

“Turkey is committed to taking all necessary steps against this
unjust disposition, which reduces basic human rights to nothing,”
Turkey’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

Turkey’s ambassador in Paris, Tahsin Burcuoglu, said the vote would
lead to a total rupture of relations between the two countries.

“When I say total rupture I include things like I can leave
definitively,” Burcuoglu told reporters. “You can also expect that
now diplomatic relations will be at the level of charges d’affaires,
not ambassadors anymore.”

The Turkish embassy in Paris said France was “in the process of losing
a strategic partner.”

“If the law is adopted by the government, the consequences will be
permanent,” an embassy spokesman said.

Recognition of two genocides

The bill will mean that France will officially recognize two genocides
– that of the Jews at the hands of the Nazis during the Second World
War and the massacre of Armenians in eastern Turkey between 1915
and 1917.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has accused French
President Nicolas Sarkozy, who is seeking re-election later this year,
of using the law to pander to France’s estimated 400,000 voters of
Armenian origin.

After the lower house vote in December, Turkey suspended all bilateral
cooperation with France and temporarily recalled its ambassador
from Paris.

Author: Mark Hallam, Richard Connor (AFP, AP, dpa, Reuters) Editor:
Andrew Bowen

TURKEY THREATENS MORE SANCTIONS OVER FRENCH GENOCIDE LAW
By Nikolaj Nielsen

EU Observer

Jan 24 2012
Belgium

BRUSSELS – French senators on Monday (23 January) voted in a bill to
outlaw denial of the Armenian genocide at the hands of the Ottoman
Turks in 1915, prompting strong threats of economic retaliation
from Ankara.

President Nicolas Sarkozy is widely expected to ratify the new measure
in February in a move that Turkey said it would punish with “permanent
sanctions if it is passed to law.”

“This is totally unfair … The historical interpretation of events
cannot be judged by French legislation. No parliament has such a
right nor such a competence,” Turkey’s spokesperson for foreign
affairs Selcuk Unal told EUobserver from Ankara on Tuesday.

Unal declined to comment on details of any future sanctions, adding
that the main issue at stake is freedom of speech and expression.

Anyone caught denying the Armenia genocide, or the Nazi Holocaust,
can face up to one year in prison and a ~@45,000 fine.

The vast majority of France’s lower-house voted in the draft law
last month. The December vote also prompted a stern response from
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who retorted that France
itself committed genocide in Algeria when it wiped out 15 percent of
its population.

Erdogan also claimed the bill is a stunt by Sarkozy to garner support
in the upcoming presidential elections from the 500,000 or so ethnic
Armenians residing in France.

Ankara has since cancelled all economic, political and military
meetings with Paris, reports Reuters. Its ambassador has also left.

Turkish foreign minister Ahmet Davutoglu cancelled a planned trip
to Brussels on Monday. He had been scheduled to meet with EU foreign
ministers over the Iranian oil embargo before heading off to Tehran.

Meanwhile, Turkey’s state-run broadcaster said it plans to suspend its
15.5 percent partnership with Lyon-based Euronews if Sarkozy approves
the bill, Bloomberg news reports. Other French business interests
in Turkey are also under pressure, including car maker Renault and
French bank BNP Paribas. Both have assets worth over ~@20 billion in
the country.

“There will be more sanctions and this time, the sanctions will be
permanent, until the change in French position,” Turkish foreign
minister Ahmet Davutoglu said over the weekend.

Press reports indicate that around 15,000 Turks from around Europe
staged a peaceful protest against the law in Paris on Saturday.

Ankara vehemently denies the genocide charge and claims the new law
is both an affront to freedom of speech and an insult to Turkey.

“Politicisation of the understanding of justice and history through
other people’s past and damaging freedom of expression in a tactless
manner are first and foremost a loss for France,” Turkish authorities
said in a statement released Monday.

FRANCE FACES FEUD WITH TURKEY AS ARMENIAN ‘GENOCIDE’ BILL OK’D

The Seattle Times

Jan 24 2012
WA

Turkey had threatened diplomatic and economic reprisals against
France if the bill, to criminalize the denial of genocide in the
deaths of hundreds of thousands of Armenians from 1915 to 1917,
was definitively adopted.

PARIS – France and Turkey headed for another diplomatic showdown after
the French Senate on Monday adopted a bill that makes it a crime to
deny that Armenians suffered genocide at the hands of Ottoman Turks
a century ago.

Turkey has threatened diplomatic and economic reprisals against France
if the bill, which passed the lower house of parliament in December,
was definitively adopted. A majority of 127 senators voted in favor
of the bill after more than seven hours of intense debate. Eighty-six
members voted against. Many senators ducked out of voting on a bill
that was supported by the main parties despite its risk to relations
with a NATO ally.

Under the legislation, people who deny or “outrageously minimize”
genocides recognized by France face a year’s imprisonment and $57,000
in fines.

After Monday’s vote, France now officially recognizes two genocides:
the Nazi Holocaust during World War II and the deaths of hundreds of
thousands of Armenians in eastern Turkey between 1915 and 1917.

The country already has a law punishing Holocaust denial. The text
adopted Monday aims to extend the same sanctions to the Armenian
massacres, which a dozen countries have labeled a genocide.

Several hundred people demonstrated outside the Senate as the sparsely
attended debate got under way. A group of French protesters of Turkish
origin denounced the bill as an attempt to impose a French reading
of history. On the other side of a phalanx of riot police, a group of
Franco-Armenians demonstrated in support of the legislation. “It’s a
fact (that there was genocide). All we want is for Turkey to recognize
that,” an elderly woman told BFM TV.

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu on Monday warned France that
Turkey had prepared a raft of punitive measures.

Many Turks already feel betrayed by France because of President
Nicolas Sarkozy’s firm opposition to Turkey joining the European Union.

After December’s Assembly vote, Turkey already had suspended bilateral
cooperation and temporarily recalled its ambassador. The Turkish
Embassy in Paris says that this time, diplomatic ties could be
downgraded, and that French firms could find themselves frozen out
of Turkish government contracts.

Armenians say about 1.5 million people were killed or died during
forced marches to the Syrian desert between 1915 and 1917. Turkey
estimates between 300,000 and 500,000 people died but rejects the
genocide label, saying that there was no systematic policy to destroy
the Christian Armenian community. Turkey says that many Muslim Turks
also died in the violence, which took place during World War I.

Erdogan has accused Sarkozy of using the bill, proposed by a member of
the ruling party, to win the support of France’s small but influential
Armenian community before this year’s presidential and parliamentary
elections.

Before becoming president in 2007, Sarkozy – who is expected to seek
re-election in April – promised the Armenian community to push through
legislation banning genocide denial.

TURKEY, FRANCE ON BRINK OF DIPLOMATIC, ECONOMIC “WAR”

Vestnik Kavkaza
Jan 24 2012
Russia

Turkey has spoken out against the French Senate’s passing of a bill
on persecution for denial of Armenian Genocide by the Ottoman Empire
during WWI, Reuters reports.

The Turkish Foreign Ministry called it an “irresponsible” step and
warned it may take measures.

The new law punishes people denying the Armenian Genocide of 1915
with a year of prison or a fine of ~@45,000.

There were 127 votes for the bill and 86 against in the French Senate
(upper chamber).

The French National Assembly (lower chamber) passed the bill on
December 22. 45 out of 577 MPs voted, with 38 for the bill and
7 against.

In response, Turkey froze diplomatic relations with France. Turkish
Justice Minister Sadullah Ergin called the bill unjust and
disrespectful towards Turkey. He added that it has no legal force.

A spokesman of the Turkish ambassador to Paris, Engin Solakoglu,
said that France had lost a strategic partner.

The bill will come into force in 15 days, signed by French President
Nicolas Sarkozy.

The Turkish diplomat warned that Ambassador Tahsin Bursuoglu would
leave Paris as soon as the bill comes into force. He added that Ankara
will take counter measures.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan is expected to make a
speech at the parliament, condemning France, and initiate passing of
a list of sanctions.

Turkey threatened Paris on Monday. Erdogan said he would never visit
France again, should the bill be passed. France urged Turkey to remain
calm and called it one of the key partners.

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said earlier that Turkey
would consider recognition of the Algerian Genocide by France in 1945.

Ankara does not want to limit itself with diplomatic measures only. It
limited participation of French companies in tenders, stopped exchange
of intelligence information, closed aerospace for French air forces,
banned the French navy from entering Turkish territorial waters,
stopped support of France in international organizations, stopped
giving Paris information on Iran, Syria and the Middle East and
stopped cooperation in science, technologies and culture.

FRENCH SENATE APPROVES CONTROVERSIAL GENOCIDE LAW

RTT News

Jan 24 2012

(RTTNews) – The French Senate on Monday passed a controversial bill
making it a crime to deny officially recognized genocides, including
the World War I-era mass killings of Armenians under the Ottoman
Empire. The move has triggered strong objections from Turkey.

The measure, which stipulates a year in jail and a fine of EUR 45,000
on anyone in France denying genocide, was approved 127 votes to 86 in
the Senate. It will now be sent to the French President for signing it
into law, as the Lower House of the Parliament, the National Assembly,
had passed the measure in December.

The bill has evoked strong objections from Turkey, which recalled its
envoy from France and froze ties with Paris after it was passed by
the French National Assembly last month. Ankara had also threatened
then to take further actions against France if the French Senate
passed the measure.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan had described the bill
as discriminatory and xenophobic, and announced a set of sanctions
against France.

Erdogan had declared then that Turkey was suspending all economic,
political, military meetings with France in protest. He also said
permission would be denied to all French military planes and warships
to land or dock in Turkey, and added that more punitive actions against
Paris would follow if the measure was cleared by the French Senate.

Soon after the French Senate approved the bill late on Monday, Turkish
Justice Minister Sadullah Ergin condemned the measure and said: “The
decision made by the Senate is a great injustice and shows total lack
of respect for Turkey.”

Meanwhile, the Turkish Embassy in Paris warned that France-Turkey
relations would be permanently damaged if Sarkozy signed the
controversial measure into law. Incidentally, the legislation was
tabled in the Parliament by Sarkozy’s UMP party.

Critics see the move by the UMP party as a political tactic aimed at
gaining the support of some half a million ethnic Armenians living in
France ahead of the upcoming Presidential elections in which Sarkozy
is seeking re-election as UMP candidate.

During a visit to Armenia in October, Sarkozy had urged Turkey to
recognize the mass killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks as genocide,
saying: “Turkey, which is a great country, would honor itself by
revisiting its history like other countries in the world have done.”

Armenians claim that at least 1.5 million were killed by the Ottoman
Turks in 1915-16. Nonetheless, Turkey denies the occurrence of any
“genocide” of Armenians, insisting that those killed were victims
of the chaotic times during the collapse of the Ottoman Empire and
before the birth of modern Turkey in 1923. However, more than 20
countries have formally recognized the mass killings of Armenians
under the Ottoman Empire as genocide.

Turkey and Armenia have not had any diplomatic or economic relations
after Armenia declared its independence in 1991. In addition, Turkey
also closed its borders with Armenia in 1993 as a token of support
for Azerbaijan, which had a territorial conflict with Armenia.