V. Hovahnnisyan: "Parliamentarian Diplomacy Is An Important Issue"

V. HOVAHNNISYAN: “PARLIAMENTARIAN DIPLOMACY IS AN IMPORTANT ISSUE”

30.03.12

Today the forth conference of the Hay Dat commissions and offices
started in Yerevan. Speaking during the conference head of the
Armenian Revolutionary Federation (ARF) fraction in the Armenian NA
Vahan Hovhannisyan announced that Armenian Parliament is not ready
now for the Parliamentarian diplomacy. The speaker underlined that
many people do not give necessary importance to it but it is really
important issue. So offices of Hay Dat must pay more attention to
the Parliamentarian diplomacy everywhere. According to him Armenian
foreign policy does not assist it sometimes. “Offices of hay Dat must
work as if we have excellent foreign policy. Otherwise we will not
get any results”, V. Hovhannisyan underlined.

During his speech he also referred to the Turkish-Azerbaijani
propaganda. According to the deputy Turkish-Azerbaijani lobby is based
on the material values, but Armenian side is not able to do the same.

“We have never done it as we have a ideological base. We have something
to tell and we have something to prove”.

Vahan Hovhannisyan has presented to the Hay Dat activities some
questions and then answered to them. “Whether the struggle of Hay Dat
is actual issue today? Are Armenians interested in it? Or may be there
are more important and actual issues now and may be it is time to put
away this struggle?”, asked himself V. Hovhannisyan and answered:
“There is no more actual issue now that Hay Dat struggle is as all
other issues are connected with the great tragedy which is called
Genocide. Armenian people suffered it is continued also today. Hay
Dat is struggling for the justice. And this struggle is for every
Armenian citizen. Armenian citizen realizes this but some political
forces do not”, V. Hovhannisyan underlined.

http://times.am/?l=en&p=6283

Nearly 8,000 Italian Tourists Visit Armenia In 2011

NEARLY 8,000 ITALIAN TOURISTS VISIT ARMENIA IN 2011

/ARKA/
MARCH 30, 2012
YEREVAN

YEREVAN, March 30. /ARKA/. Nearly 7,800 tourists from Italy visited
Armenia in 2011, Deputy Minister of Economy of Armenia Ara Petrosyan
reported journalists on Friday.

He noted that this number is increasing by 10-15 % each year.

Petrosyan said nearly 4,500 Italian tourists visited Armenia in 2009,
and 6,500- in 2010.

“Cultural and spiritual tourism is the most popular one with the
Italian tourists, and we will try to increase tourist flow primarily
for this varieties,” he said.

He clarified that the growth of tourist flow from Italy is fostered by
the fact that Italians get introduced to Armenian culture and history.

” We are a new country on a tourist map, and we will have to do a lot
to appear in the international tourism market and take some position
there,” he said.

Petrosyan highlighted improvement in tourist services as a condition
for attracting more tourists.

“Saying services, I mean all the links of the chain a tourist has to
pass through the moment he leaves the airport and till the departure.

This includes the airport itself, roads, reception for tourists at
historical and cultural sites, hotel infrastructure,” he said and
added that even the world most developed tourist centers prioritize
improvement in tourist services.

In her turn, Italian tourism expert Nadia Pasqual said the average
age of Italian tourists coming to Armenia is 45-60 years old.

She added that Armenia should develop new varieties of tourism
to attract young tourists. Eco-tourism, and more available hotel
complexes should be mainly stressed in this direction.

According to the National Statistical Service of Armenia the number
of tourists to Armenia in 2011 jumped 10.3% to 757 935 from a year
earlier.

We Were Unable To Understand Meaning Of Freedom

WE WERE UNABLE TO UNDERSTAND MEANING OF FREEDOM
Siranuysh Papyan

Story from Lragir.am News:

Published: 16:09:44 – 30/03/2012

Interview with Ashot Manucharyan, member of the Karabakh Committee

Mr. Manucharyan, before the party lists were in place, you proposed
a new model, namely full representation of the public sector in the
lists, which was not accepted, though the Heritage Party has partly
involved the public sector. Is there a change in the period of the
election campaign?

There are minor changes. When a cancer patient has a headache caused
by metastasis, you can give him a painkiller, and the pain will
be relieved for a short period but the patient will die unless you
cure the disease. Armenia is suffering from cancer, and the changes
proposed by the parties, even if they are a positive tendency, such
as the proposals of the Heritage, the Free Democrats or the Congress,
their effect will be like the effect of the painkiller on the cancer
patient. Metastasis comes from the Western civilization which is
over because we already have another man thinking comprehensively,
searching comprehensively, who wants to build his human world. We
must change this otherwise we continue to think that our problem is
that we are not like the United States where the president is not
corrupt, at least there are no such allegations, their ministers do
not seem to be corrupt, we have never heard about their oligarchs
running over people with their SUVs, instead a few years ago we heard
that hundreds of thousands of Americans became homeless because of
the financial balloons in their financial system causing a disaster,
which was named a financial and economic crisis. Who said that it was
a financial and economic crisis? Who said that the Congressmen who
are competent people failed to notice the balloons? Or were everyone
under the pressure of some logic which does not allow the public
administration system to reveal all the problems?

After all, billions of people were robbed. Where is the money? There
is Õ¡ doubt that this money goes to a group of people and people
are victims. In other words, this is how it should be in a system of
predators. There are winners who take everything, and losers who have
nothing. The problem is that we want to be in this system and be one
of its leaders. Progressive political systems are in search of this,
while more regressive social systems, the greens and others, propose
looking for another world. This is absurd. This search is commendable.

Now the most important issue is what this world will be like.

Which force is innovative and is not copying others?

In fact, the party framework is outside the political framework. They
are not doing politics, their activities in Armenia are limited to
the distribution of economic opportunities, while politics is done by
the intelligentsia, youth, NGOs (not all of them, most of them are in
the same framework of distribution) Armenia must try to find its place.

The mankind is in a quest, and why not, let it be born in Armenia. In
Armenia there are minds, and Armenia has had such experience.

What do you mean if it is not a civil rule, market economy, democracy,
what should the new system be?

Man has reached a point where its creative, mental, emotional and all
the natures must become complete and serve this human world, man is
the carrier of two worlds, the animal world, and the people’s world.

Now the abilities of the people’s world serve his animal nature.

Europe has departed from the European civilization which sought for
the ways of development but now it serves the animal world, ignoring
all the guidelines, principles, ideas of the European civilization.

Now when they say let us go to Europe, join the European civilization,
they should be mindful that these are controversial things.

What should this creative person do now, how should this human
person who serves human insults build his world? This person has
already understood the necessity to create self-organization and
self-governance systems.

What is a self-organization and self-governance system?

So far man has settled his issues through the state. The public
administration bodies are somehow formed within the state, and people’s
issues are settled through these systems. Two problems occur.

One is the estrangement of the public administration machine and
people. This estrangement can be very deep, lead to a clash, in some
cases people cannot feel it unless people respond to the system like
Wall Street in the United States. Now the first issue is to eliminate
this estrangement. We cannot have people manage our affairs and we
have only one thing to do with governance – once in five years they
give us a piece of paper to toss into the box and they will decide
who will manage us. Then they see that we are full of doubt, so they
say form groups of five and establish civil rule, discuss problems,
such as the color of the fence, but they have nothing to do with what
is happening behind the fence. The civil system merely decides the
color of the fence, declares that it is a strategic issue, whereas
the strategic issue is whether the fence is needed or not. Most
importantly, whatever is behind the fence is outside the civil rule.

Whenever I say that people must represent a function of complete
governance it does not mean that everyone must attack the issue of
governance and start solving it. The point is that the competence
of the society is distributed among people, for instance, there is
nobody whose competence means anything. There is no unnecessary person,
everyone brings his or her contribution but of course there will be
a hierarchy around governance issues.

Mr. Manucharyan, the self-determined citizens are in Mashtots Park.

Will they create self-organization and self-governance systems?

“Self-determined” is a very important word because we use the words
independence, self-determination every now and then, meanwhile we are
in a fantastic dependent state, and we have never been more dependent
before, and our independence, our flag, our president’s car are all
components of our independence, we don’t have independence, and a
person is able to understand what life it lives, why it is so.

Dependence comes from having filled the head of man with false
philosophy, they say man in independent and can do whatever he wants
but the program is in his head, he is the robot, and dependence comes
from this. Now we must tell this person you are a thinking being. We
went through 88 when we had huge numbers of citizens who discussed
different issues, ecology gave birth to the movement.

Then man again became a robot?

Then we made a mistake with people, we said the progressive world
exists which has already found the formula, it turns out that if
we hold elections, have parties, freedom of speech, etc, the other
institutions will come and stand beside us. We stepped into this slough
and we destroyed the self-determined man, the free man, and the real
freedom of man, the creative spirit comes when the person gets rid of
passion, instead we introduced today’s freedom of passion of Europe. We
were unable to understand the meaning of freedom. We replaced freedom
from passions with freedom of passions. We want to integrate with
a progressive place, Europe of Mozart, Hegel has nothing to do with
Europe we are speaking about. Now Europe needs a force to return the
European civilization to Europe. Armenia could do it, why not.

Mr. Manucharyan, you are speaking about Armenia which we can hardly
imagine in our reality. How is it possible to ensure this transition
with a huge part of the society living with the logic of 5,000 to
10,000 drams?

I bring up the issue of three main forces operating in the body of
our country which change and influence our life. One is the wholeness
of our people who does not perform the extraordinary function of
governance, the second part is a group which assumes this extraordinary
function. These are the organizers. There are two types of organizers,
the organizers of the false system, who were appointed as our kings,
viceroys, petty kings by the global stealing system, and this system
works, and the second type is those who stand up against them, such
as Mashtots Park activists, other groups, who try to organize in one
sphere or another. It is necessary to organize mind in any direction
of life, and they are walking along this way and little by little will
happen what happened in 1988, and all the spheres will be covered by
these groups. But the organizers are those people who are not bound
by the clichés of the world, they are seeking justice, often beauty,
truth, truth is beautiful. They are acceptable anywhere, all the
political parties, managers are ready to talk to them. The opposite is
happening, the prime minister invites, they do not go, this is very
important. We have also the wise people, to put it conventionally,
these are the people who know where to go and why, or it seems
to them that they know. In the soviet period, the intelligentsia
assumed the role of the wise people, and in fact most of them were
quite profound people but in the modern period the intelligentsia has
been totally disgraced, they spread falsehood for the sake of wealth,
money, they became fools they are traitors, they betray not only the
country and people but also themselves and their conscience. We can
see people gathered around famous people, intelligentsia who must be
the guardians of people against the oligarchs. Wise people must speak
the truth, they must be self-determined citizens, and they must not
be the victim of ideas coming from the outside and they must lead
people. This new idea is still to come.

http://www.lragir.am/engsrc/interview25648.html

Rustamyan Says Cohesion To Solve Armenia’s Key Issues

RUSTAMYAN SAYS COHESION TO SOLVE ARMENIA’S KEY ISSUES

ARMENPRESS
MARCH 30, 2012
YEREVAN

YEREVAN, MARCH 30, ARMENPRESS. “Right solutions must be offered
to the challenges Armenia is facing,” Armen Rustamyan, Armenian
Revolutionary Federation Party Supreme Body representative stated
at the fourth Conference of Armenian National Committees. Rustamyan
considers challenges are the following – unresolved Armenia-Turkish
relations, Javakhq issue, Nagorno Karabakh conflict. “Each of them
represents threat and I call on to find solutions ourselves. If we
do not step up efforts, we can not hope that the further developments
will be in favor of us,” Rustamyan highlighted, Armenpress reports.

Party representative called on to have official, democratic and
parliamentary diplomacy, where all the forces must be united.

“”Armenian Cause ideology dictates being initiative and
invulnerable. Our ideology is of demanding nature, and our foreign
policy is aimed not only at recognition of Armenian Genocide but
compensation as well,” Rustamyan noted. Armenia must go forward
without yielding lands”.

Sargsyan bids farewell to famous composer Alexander Harutyunyan

President Serzh Sargsyan bids farewell to famous composer Alexander Harutyunyan

15:12 31/03/2012 » Society

Today President Serzh Sargsyan together with members of the burial
committee, family, relatives and fans of Alexander Harutyunyan bade
farewell to the famous composer at Al. Spendiaryan National Academic
Theater of Opera and Ballet, the presidential press office reported.

Source: Panorama.am

Ideology of the Armenian Cause is invulnerable

Ideology of the Armenian Cause is invulnerable

14:16 – 30.03.2012

`Ideology of the Armenian Cause is invulnerable’, said representative
of ARF Supreme body Armen Rustamyan and called to not be afraid to
defend the raised problems either it is the Artsakh problem or
Armenian-Turkish relations.

Talking about challenges of foreign policy he noted that not only the
recognition of the Armenian Genocide should be a part of agenda but
also the compensation issue.

`Ideology of the Armenian Cause provides both initiation and
impregnability. Initiation is the demand which is in bases of the
ideology of the Armenian Cause and demand is the result of our
violated rights. This should be in our agenda and we shouldn’t be
afraid of that as the battle of the Armenian Cause showed that our
ideology is invulnerable as our demands are fair and completely suit
international norms, we do not demand more that we have the right
for’, said Armen Rustamyan.

http://www.yerkir.am/en/news/22658.htm

Books by Hrant Dink on sale

Books by Hrant Dink on sale

13:52 31/03/2012 » Society

`Sari Gelin’ and `That woman’ books on Armenian Cause authored by
Hrant Dink, the founder and editor-in-chief of Istanbul-based
bilingual paper `Agos’, went on sale, Turkish news website
ihlassondakika reported.

The books will be on public open sale since April 13.

Source: Panorama.am

Turkey’s biggest doc on Armenian-Turkish relns will be auctioned

Turkey’s biggest documentary film on Armenian-Turkish relations will
be auctioned

news.am
March 31, 2012 | 13:46

ISTANBUL. – The Istanbul Compulsory Enforcement Service has auctioned
`Sari Gelin’ (`The Bride of Mountain’ in Armenian; `Blonde Bride’ in
Turkish), Turkey’s biggest-ever documentary film devoted to
Armenian-Turkish relations.

The aforesaid Service informed that the film is being put up for sale
because the company that created it cannot repay its debts, Haberler
news agency of Turkey informs.

`Sari Gelin’ will be auctioned off with a starting price of 50,000
Turkish liras (approx. US$ 30,000), which will include the
authorization for the release of the film’s episodes in DVD and VCD
format.

The documentary was filmed in thirteen countries. The six-part film
consists of interviews conducted with 160 people, and with respect to
Armenian-Turkish relations.

`Sari Gelin’ will be auctioned on April 12. But if it is not sold on
that day, a second auction will be held on April 18.

BAKU: Azerbaijan’s Arms Purchases From Israel No ‘Direct Threat To I

AZERBAIJAN’S ARMS PURCHASES FROM ISRAEL NO ‘DIRECT THREAT TO IRAN’

News.Az
Thu 29 March 2012 06:25 GMT | 7:25 Local Time

News.Az interviews Pieter Wezeman, senior researcher on the Arms
Transfers Programme at the Stockholm International Peace Research
Institute (SIPRI).

SIPRI reports that the $1.6-billion arms deal, signed between
Azerbaijan and Israel in 2011, envisages the purchase by Baku of the
Barak-8 missile system, 75 Barak-8 missiles, the EL/M-2080 Green Pine
radar, Gabriel-5 anti-ship missile, five Heron unmanned aerial vehicles
(UAV) and five Searcher UAVs. How accurate is this information?

Almost all the information we have regarding Israeli arms sales to
Azerbaijan is uncertain. It has been widely reported that the Israeli
company IAI signed a deal worth USD1.6 billion with Azerbaijan in late
2011/early 2012, but the exact content of the deal is still not known.

Reports generally agree that at least one Green Pine radar is
included. However, whereas it has been widely reported that the
deal includes SAM systems, anti-ship missiles and UAVs we still
lack sufficient independent reports to confirm which exact types are
involved and how many. Therefore the information about the Barak-8,
the Gabriel-5, the Herons and the Searchers are all estimates, both
regarding type and numbers involved. It is entirely possible that
the deal includes other weapons too.

It’s important to point out that Azerbaijan has acquired a whole range
of other weapons from several suppliers, not just the recent deal with
Israel. I attach a register of major arms procured by Azerbaijan in
the period 2007-2011. The register only shows transfers of major arms
as defined by SIPRI. There are other significant projects ongoing,
e.g. the modernization of T-72 tanks by Israeli companies.

Also all indications are that Azerbaijan plans substantial further
arms procurement in the coming years.

What can you say about those types of weapons, are they offensive ones?

There are no inherently defensive weapons. An offensive is usually
backed up with a proper defence in order to counter a counter
offensive, i.e. you don’t attack with tanks without defending them
with SAM systems against counter air attacks. Therefore weapons
procurement should always be considered in the context of existing
and planned arsenals and military capabilities, security policies,
known or suspected intentions of arms procuring states and military
doctrines. The USD1.6 billion deal with IAI includes air defence
systems, which can defend Azeri forces against air attacks.

The systems could theoretically be used to defend Azeri forces
defending Azerbaijan or to defend Azeri forces using other weapons,
such as the variety of other combat aircraft, tanks and artillery
mentioned in the attached register, to attack a neighbour.

Tehran is still warning that Azerbaijan could use that weapon against
Iran. As a military expert, do you think that this kind of weapon
could pose a danger to Iran?

The Azeri arms procurement from Israel is not a direct threat to Iran,
in the sense that it seems very unlikely that Azerbaijan would attack
Iran. I am also not aware of Iran having complained about all the arms
deals Azerbaijan has signed with other countries. However the Israeli
arms deals are a strong signal that Azerbaijan and Israel have good
relations. This is of strategic importance to Israel and it is not
surprising that the deal probably strengthen Iran’s existing threat
perception of being surrounded by US- or Israeli-friendly countries
equipped with advanced military capabilities.

Pakistan is another country offering similar weapons to Azerbaijan.

What can you say about the quality of the Israeli weapons?

The Israeli arms industry produces a wide diversity of arms and
other military equipment, which is widely regarded as well designed
and of high quality. In particular in the field of command, control,
communication, reconnaissance, intelligence and surveillance systems
and in the field of air-defence systems Israeli companies have achieved
major export successes. But also regarding armour, artillery and small
arms Israeli companies are highly competitive on the international
market.

Still, there is no reason to single out Israeli arms supply to
Azerbaijan, other than that it upsets Iran. Many other arms producing
companies based elsewhere are aggressively marketing their products
in Azerbaijan.

>From the attached list you can see that companies in a variety
of countries supplied arms to Azerbaijan in recent years: Russia,
Ukraine, Turkey, South Africa, Belarus, Bosnia and Israel. In addition
China and Pakistan have been mentioned as countries marketing arms
to Azerbaijan. Standard open market principles can be applied.They
may offer weapons Israel does not offer (e.g. Pakistan offers in
cooperation with China complete new combat aircraft, Russia supplies
new combat helicopters), they may offer less advanced weapons
cheaper, they may offer weapons similar to those offered by Israel
but at better prices or other conditions (e.g. presumably the Russian
supplied S-300 SAM system).

Armenia accuses Azerbaijan of violating the Conventional Forces in
Europe (CFE) Treaty. Azerbaijan is indeed actively arming itself and
does not conceal that it is doing so in case of a military scenario to
resolve the Karabakh conflict. But is there evidence of CFE violations?

The accusations of violating the CFE Treaty go both ways. I cannot
judge myself right now if these accusations are correct. One problem is
that it will be difficult to determine how much operational equipment,
limited by the CFE Treaty, both countries have.

Lavrov To Visit Yerevan, Baku To Discuss Karabakh In Early April

LAVROV TO VISIT YEREVAN, BAKU TO DISCUSS KARABAKH IN EARLY APRIL

Interfax
March 27 2012
Russia

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov is to discuss the Karabakh
issue during his visits to Yerevan and Baku in early April.

“The meetings will focus on the Karabakh issue,” Russian Foreign
Ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich said at a briefing in Moscow
on Tuesday.

Lavrov’s visit to Armenia, where he is due to meet with President
Serzh Sargsian and Foreign Minister Eduard Nalbandian, is scheduled for
April 2-3. He will be in Azerbaijan, where he is to meet with President
Ilham Aliyev and Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov on April 3-4.

“Talks both in Yerevan and Baku will be an intense discussion of the
Nagorno-Karabakh problem,” Lukashevich said.

On April 4-5, Lavrov will pay a visit to Kyrgyzstan and then to
Kazakhstan, the spokesman said.