Author: Kamalian Hagop

National Assembly of RA, Armenia
Dec 29 2007

New Year Congratulatory Message of the President of the National
Assembly of the Republic of Armenia Mr. Tigran Torosyan

Dear compatriots,

The end of 2007, the year, which we are now saying farewell to, has
not been a regular year. It concludes the phase of development of our
country, which has been full of hardships and challenges.
Unfortunately, as it is typical for countries overcoming hardships we
were obliged to direct our main efforts to the formation of state
structures, the creation and development of the base of our economy,
formation of efficient legislation, and the defense of Artsakh. The
successful fulfillment of all these things gives us the opportunity
to begin a new phase of the development of the country, beginning in
2008, the key of which must be our citizens and their families . We
can and we must concentrate all our efforts to provide education for
our children in compliance with international standards, science and
culture worthy of a modern state fair judicial system, an atmosphere
of mutual respect, tolerance, trust and cooperation, welfare for
every citizen. Elderly people must be able to grow old with dignity.
Young people must be supported when entering into life. The
workingman must have the opportunity to live with dignity upon
his/her income. After several years it will become a reality.

Dear compatriots, I am sure that 2008 will be a year of achieving
unprecedented success, love and fulfillment of dreams for everybody.

Happy New Year and Merry Christmas!

Courrier International, France
Dec 27 2007

Bertrand Le Gendre and Gaïdz Minassian note the passing of national history

"The more the world shrinks, the more it becomes anxious, and the
more civilisations seek reassurance by revisiting their past. The
Armenian genocide, colonisation, slavery… Dramas that are several
centuries old are resurfacing, in favour of this involution which is
getting, in order to be better heard, the planet to bear witness. …
The 20th century was the century of ready-made truths. The 21st is
the century is that of disturbing revisions", consider the journalist
Bertrand Le Gendre and the political scientist Gaïdz Minassian
observing a multiplication of examples of ‘historical interference’.
"The simultaneity if these revisions confirms the fact that there is
no more room in the global village for purely national history. This
collective rereading may liberate consciences, but it is painful. By
stirring up memories so much, those overlooked by history are of
course being helped, but at the same time, light is being shed on
parts of the past that some would rather had kept concealed."

Le Monde (France)

Today’s Zaman, Turkey
Dec 27 2007

Gov’t to put final touches on Article 301 amendment tomorrow

Final touches on an amendment to a controversial law that has been
widely considered a stumbling block for freedom of expression in
Turkey will be finished tomorrow, a senior government official said
Wednesday.

Justice Minister Mehmet Ali ªahin, who on Tuesday said that within
two weeks the Turkish government would assess the draft amendment to
Article 301 of the Turkish Penal Code (TCK), which makes it a crime
to "insult Turkishness," told reporters yesterday that the amendment
could be adopted as a bill by Parliament in January.
Turkey has been under heavy pressure from the EU to amend or scrap
Article 301, which has been used to prosecute Turkish writers and
intellectuals, especially for comments on the killings of Anatolian
Armenians in 1915 under the Ottoman Empire. Last month, the EU’s
executive commission criticized Turkey for not carrying out any
substantial reforms in the past two years and urged the government,
which was given a strong mandate when it was re-elected to power in
July, to reinvigorate the stalled reform process.

The studies for amendment to the article has been going on for almost
last two years, ªahin emphasized, speaking to reporters at Parliament
ahead of a meeting of the parliamentary Justice Commission. "I
believe that we can set the final touches on the amendment on Friday.
… I believe that we can then send the amendment to the prime
minister’s office. It will, of course, be discussed in the Cabinet.
When an amendment is sent to the Prime Ministry, it is necessary to
ask opinions of related organizations, and this takes a certain
amount of time. It may also be introduced to the Parliament as a
bill. We haven’t yet decided on this. However, I believe the change
to Article 301 of the TCK may be adopted by Parliament in January,"
ªahin added.

As of Tuesday ªahin had said that the most important element in the
draft amendment was that it requires prosecutors to secure permission
from the Justice Ministry to launch court trials against the
expression of opinion. This change is expected to lead to a decrease
in the number of cases opened under Article 301. The term
"Turkishness" in the article is expected to be changed to "the
Turkish Republic," while the expression "insulting Turkishness" is
anticipated to be replaced by "insulting the Turkish nation."

The government has so far refused to heed EU demands to amend the
article without delay, saying the issue would be taken up as part of
its broader drive to reform the current Constitution, which was
drafted under military rule in 1982.

Releasing its annual progress report in November, the European
Commission called on Ankara to make "significant further efforts"
toward improving freedom of expression and religion, stressing that
more people were prosecuted under Article 301 last year than in 2005.
It specifically urged steps to repeal or amend Article 301, saying
talks will not be opened on at least one of 35 negotiation chapters
for Turkey’s accession to the EU if the law is not amended or
repealed.

27.12.2007

Today’s Zaman Ankara

CONSTRUCTION GROWS BY 19% IN ARMENIA IN JANUARY-NOVEMBER 2007 ON SAME
PERIOD OF LAST YEAR

YEREVAN, DECEMBER 28, NOYAN TAPAN. Construction work of 565 bln 279.5
mln drams (about 1 bln 636 mln USD), including construction of
production facilities of 207 bln 929.2 mln drams, was done in Armenia
in January-November 2007.

According to the RA National Statistical Service, in the indicated
amount of construction work, building and assembly work made 505 bln 96
mln drams, including building and assembly work of production
facilities of 168 bln 563.2 mln drams. Construction grew by 19%,
building and assembly work – by 17.3% in January-November 2007 on the
same period of 2006.

9.5% of construction was done with state budgetary resources, 0.5% – at
the expense of the RA government’s reserve fund, 0.1% – with community
resources, 0.6% – with World Bank resources, 2.9% – at the expense of
humanitarian aid, 25.2% – of private organizations, and 61.2% – at the
expense of the population.

PRESS RELEASE
The Armenia Fund
Governmental Buiding 3, Yerevan, RA
Contact: Sose Amirkhanian
Tel: +(3741) 56 01 06 ext. 107
Fax: +(3741) 52 15 05
E-mail: [email protected]
Web:

27 December, 2007

SCHOOL CONSUMABLES FOR STUDENTS IN LORI

Yerevan, December 27, 2007 – On Monday, December 24, 2007 The Armenia
Fund Rural Development Program distributed packages of school
consumables to the students of the six villages included in the Rural
Development Program Lori cluster. The project was sponsored by Vicken
and Roobina Avrikian (2000 USD) through The Armenia Fund Canada
(Toronto) Affiliate.

The Lori cluster includes the villages of Apaven, Artsni, Dzoramut,
Dzunashogh, Gogavan and Paghaghbyur. The six villages have a total of
four secondary schools and 208 students. Each student received a
package of school consumables put together taking into consideration
the schooling needs of his/her age group and various extracurricular
activities the children might be interested in. The schools also
received extra packages for future use and special supplies for the
teachers.

In addition to the essentials: pens, pencils, notebooks, rulers,
erasers and sharpeners, the higher classes received bow compasses and
calculators while the younger students got coloring books and play
dough packs etc.

"Similar small projects are very important for the Rural Development
Program. Although they do not offer fundamental solutions to rural
problems they can, however, provide instant relief to pressing
issues. In one case, this may be a computer for the village library,
in the other – subscription to various newspapers to breach the
informational gap between the urban and rural communities", says Vahe
Aghabegians, The Armenia Fund Executive Director.

With no intentional planning for the timing of the project to coincide
with the New Year and Christmas Holidays, the packages were
nevertheless received with great enthusiasm as New Year gifts. "These
kinds of initiatives reassure the villagers that they are not
forgotten and positive change is on the way", adds Mr. Aghabegians.

###
The Armenia Fund

TURKISH PRIVATE SECTOR FRIENDSHIP ASSOCIATION
Mithat Melen

Turkish Daily News, Turkey
Dec 24 2007

The first time I visited Brussels was 43 years ago. My brief stay
there lasted only three days. Later, in 1972 I landed at Brussels
Airport for the second time at that unfortunate day when a group
of Israeli sportsmen were killed by PLO militants during the Munich
Olympic Games. The next day I started as a trainee at the European
Commission. Afterwards I don’t remember how many times I visited
Brussels, but living there for six years one gathers many memoirs
and makes several friends.

Some days ago I received an invitation to be the keynote speaker
at a conference the Turkish Private Sector Friendship Association
(TOSED) was organizing. The people who issued the invitation were my
old friends Tufan Onder and Vakur Daðdeviren, with whom I had shared
a room at the Brussels University student dormitory. I accepted the
invitation and here I am in Brussels.

TOSED is a nongovernmental organization founded in 1998. It has
125 members. At least once a month they invite an internationally
prominent personality to be the keynote speaker of their conferences.

Recently their guest speakers were 16 famous personalities, including
Wilfried Marteens and Brigitte Grouvers. Most probably you know that
Marteens is the prime minister and Grouvers a member of the council of
ministers of Belgium. TOSED aims to arrange meetings between famous
experts and Turkish business people living in Belgium. The topic of
my presentation was "Turkey, globalization, economy, politics and
the European Union." Two-and-a-half hours passed most pleasantly.

I was happy to learn that several friends from my youth today had
become prominent business people and high level executives. Secondly,
the active participation of my young audience and their questions
gave me a sense of well-being. Some of the names I can remember are
Serdar Bilgic, Fikriye Guzel, Kader Sevinc, Can Kural, Yaþar Tumbaþ,
Uður Þeker.

These NGOs are important both for Turkey and the country they are
established. Although Turkey has been late in involving itself with
civil society groups, I can say beter late than never. Turks living
abroad are concerned about the state of the Turkish economy. They
find us somehow pessimistic. They don’t want an estrangement of Turkey
from the EU. Like some Europeans, some among my Turkish friends were
focused on the lifting of Article 301 of the Turkish Penal Code. I
had to explain to them the truth and the realities of Turkey.

Terrorism in Turkey and the position German and French leaders have
adopted against my country is creating reaction from the ordinary
Turk against the EU. I told my audience that the important issue for
Turkey today is to create more Turkish business owners in Europe and
reminded them that Armenian, Israeli, Greek and Greek Cypriot lobbies
were being fed by big capital around the world.

Changing roles

In the near future, most probably France and Germany will stop being
the locomotives of the EU because of the problems they will face in
employment and the competition coming from the Far East. At this
point Turks living in Europe have to fill this void by creating a
new dynamism in Europe.

With Vakur and Tufan we nostalgically remembered those good old
days. The student restaurant of our university days 35 years ago now
is the famous Tizi Ouzou. As spon as we enter the plush interior the
owner, Yahya, greets us.

We cannot believe our own eyes. He has lost 45 kilos. "I have been ill
these last seven months," he says. Apparently he has lung problems. We
remember the old days. Rue de Moscou where Tizi Ouzou is situated is
filled with Arabic eating places, including couscous restaurants. There
are queues in front of them. Once a student neighborhood, St. Gilles
today has become a high society quarter.

The "F.C. Istanbul 76" football club which was founded in 1976
honors me with a 30th year plaque. I meet several friends there. We
have extensive discussions. Club executives remind me of something I
had said thirty years ago. "Thirty years later if I return here and
discover that the club and you are still there I will be very happy."

The club’s headquarters is in the Scharbeek district. We have to
increase the number of similar sports clubs here.

Belgium is undergoing serious economic problems. The population has
aged, productivity has decreased. China is the big competitor. Even
Turkish businessmen here are doing trade with China. They don’t want
to invest in Belgium because of the strict financial regulations. On
the other hand the euro creates big headaches for Belgium. It has
become an expensive country. But it is still livable.

I go to the apartment flat in the Foret district where we had
lived from 1977 to1980. As everything else in Brussels, nothing has
changed. There is a flat to rent in the same apartment building.

Tufan says the price is 900 euros a month, very sensible compared
to a similar apartment flat iin Istanbul next to mine which goes for
1000 euros a month. Approximate monthly wage in Belgium is 5000 euros.

Compared to Istanbul, Brussels seems less expensive. But comparing
Brussels to Istanbul in every other aspect, "How could I live here
for such a long time?" I ask myself. Being the capital of Europe
and a per capita income of 25,000 euros is very important. But the
political problems take their root from the economic problems. The
king of Belgium is recurrently calling on the people for reunification.

If there wouldn’t be the problem of examinations it would be so nice
being a student in Brussels again.

–Boundary_(ID_OmSVgW4Y8u7fLjWMRD7gfg)–

SABINA FREIZER: "LEADERSHIP OF AZERBAIJAN SHOULD STOP CONVINCING ITS PEOPLE OF POSSIBLE VICTORY IN THE WAR AND RETURN OF NAGORNO GARABAGH IN THE RESULT OF BLITZKRIEG"

Today, Azerbaijan
Dec 24 2007

"If Armenia and Azerbaijan wish to avoid the war, the leaders of
these two countries will have to undertake the responsibility
to convince their peoples of the advantages of compromise. The
leadership of Azerbaijan should stop convincing its people of possible
victory in the war and return of Nagorno Garabagh in the result
of blitzkrieg. Armenian powers, in turn, should stop celebrating
victory and insisting that preservation of occupied territories around
Nagorno garabagh is a key necessity for provision of state security",
Sabina Freizer, manager of program of International Crisis Group for
Europe, said.

She considers that the real resolution of Nagorno Garabagh conflict
will be possible only if Armenian troops are withdrawn from all the
occupied regions, surrounding Nagorno Garabagh, Azerbaijani IDPs
are back to their homes, and Garabagh Armenians and Azerbaijanis
are able to live together peacefully. Only then will mutual trust
and reconciliation allow the two nations to find solution for their
common problems and to restore multinational civil society.

"It will take time, but it is important that the governments of
Armenkia and Azerbaijan be able to start striving for breakthrough
in the negotiation process right now", she noted.

ARMENIA SHOULD BE INITIAING SIDE IN RELATIONS WITH TURKEY, LARISA
ALAVERDIAN SAYS

YEREVAN, DECEMBER 22, NOYAN TAPAN. Armenia should be the initiating
side both in settlement of the Karabakh problem and in relations with
Turkey, the member of the RA National Assembly "Heritage" faction
Larisa Alaverdian stated at the December 21 press conference. In her
words, Armenia should frequently put forward such initiatives on
universal and regional problems that would interest the public of other
countries, including Turkey. Authors of such initiatives may be, in
particular, envoronmental, human rights and other NGOs.

She said that having joined various international structures, Armenia
has recognized the borders of the other members states of these
structures, and so in building relations with Turkey it is inccorect to
call in question the current borders of this country. At the same time,
she considered it wrong to forget and not to use Woodrow Wilson’s
version reagrding the border delimination of two countries in further
negotiations.

In the opinion of L. Alaverdian, the legal package of Armenian-Turkish
relations has no inner contradictions but the Armenian side does not
master the bases of this package at the state, political, diplomatic
and social levels.

A Tale of Two Uprisings: From the Warsaw Ghetto to Musa Dagh

By Khatchig Mouradian

two_uprisings_warsaw_ghetto_musa_dagh

December 19, 2007

On the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, students in
the U.S. joined an ADL delegation to participate in the March of the
Living. In Poland, the students visited the Warsaw Ghetto. ADL
national director Abraham Foxman said, "This trip will teach young
people, both Jews and non-Jews, the importance of remembering the
Holocaust at a time when survivors are dying and individuals still
continue to deny it happened."

Today, very few survivors of another genocide’the destruction of the
Armenians’are still alive. And individuals continue to deny it
happened.

In a time when the memory of genocide victims’from the Armenian
genocide to the Holocaust’is under attack by genocide deniers, I’d
like to invite readers of this post’including, hopefully, Foxman
himself’to learn about the deep connections between the Jewish heroes
of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising and the Armenian heroes of Musa
Dagh. Also central to this story is Franz Werfel, a brilliant Jewish
novelist who helped forge these connections.

***

Franz Werfel, an Austrian-Jewish writer, became an international
literary figure with his 1933 novel, Die vierzig Tage des Musa
Dagh. The book was originally written in German and published a year
later in English under the title The Forty Days of Musa Dagh. It tells
the story of the heroic self-defense of the Armenians of Musa Dagh
during the Armenian genocide of 1915. Werfel decided to write the
novel after witnessing the plight of Armenian refugee children in
Damascus in 1929. Little did he know that his novel would not only
become a classic and an inspiration for generations of Armenians, but
would also serve as a model of survival and resistance for his own
people during the Holocaust.

After the 1938 Anschluss, Werfel left Austria to take refuge in
France. Soon, with the occupation of France by the Nazis, he narrowly
escaped, fleeing to the U.S. He thus avoided the concentration camps,
where a generation of Jewish leaders and youth found solace,
inspiration and a call to uprising in his novel The Forty Days of Musa
Dagh.

According to Professor Yair Auron,

"Momentous moral questions arise from Werfel’s book. It prominently
expresses humanistic values, to which the members of the [Jewish]
youth movements were sensitive, as well as the moral uncertainties by
which they were beset. The story of the defense of Musa Dagh became,
indeed, a source of inspiration, an example for the underground
members to learn, a model to imitate.

"They equated their fate with that of the Armenians. In both cases,
murderous evil empires conspired to uproot entire communities, to
bring about their total physical extinction. In both cases, resistance
embodied the concept of death and national honor on the one hand, and
the chance of being saved as individuals and as a nation on the
other."

Auron notes that "reading the book strengthens the spirit of the
members of the youth movements, the future fighters, as Mordechai
Tannenbaum and other underground leaders suggested."

Werfel’s novel had a great influence on Antek (Yitzhak Zuckerman), the
deputy commander of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising and the author of A
Surplus of Memory: Chronicle of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. When
talking about the Holocaust and what books to read on the issue, Antek
would say that "the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising could not be understood
without reading The Forty days of Musa Dagh."

In an introduction to the French edition of the book, Holocaust
survivor and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize Elie Wiesel says,

"The novel is a masterpiece. … This Armenian community became very
close to me. Written before the coming of Hitler, this novel seems to
foretell the future. How did Franz Werfel know the vocabulary and the
mechanism of the Holocaust before the Holocaust’artistic intuition or
historic memory?"

Wiesel continues, "The novel is precisely about this memory. The
besieged Armenians feared not death but being forgotten…"

***

I hope Abraham Foxman will choose to follow in the footsteps of Franz
Werfel and Elie Wiesel, and not allow the resistance fighters of Musa
Dagh to be forgotten.

ONLY ARMENIAN CITIZENS TO BE CALLED UP TO PROTECT BORDERS

ARMENPRESS
Dec 20 2007

YEREVAN, DECEMBER 20, ARMENPRESS: General Sergey Bondarev, chief of
the Russian border guard contingent in Armenia, which patrols Armenia’s
borders with Turkey and Iran, reminded today that 72 percent of funds
required for this operation are provided by Russia and the rest by
Armenia government.

Speaking at a news conference the General said beginning next year
only Armenian citizens will be called up to protect borders with
Turkey and Iran.

He also said the Russian government released 11 million rubles to
build two kindergartens for officers’ children in Gyumri and Artashat.

Russia sent also 45 vehicles to beef up the border protection.

He said 25 cases of border violation were registered this year
involving 205 people, by 2 more than in 2006.

As a positive achievement he mentioned that no attempts to smuggle
cattle from Armenia to Turkey were registered in the last 3 years.