Author: Kanayan Tamar

ARMENIAN PRIME MINISTER, WORLD BANK REGIONAL DIRECTOR FOR SOUTH CAUCASUS DISCUSS BILATERAL COOPERATION-RELATED AGENDA

/ARKA/
June 2, 2011
YEREVAN

YEREVAN, June 2, /ARKA/. Armenian prime minister Tigran Sarkisian
received June 1 World Bank Regional Director for South Caucasus Asad
Alam. The parties have discussed a bilateral cooperation-related
agenda, including the status of Country Partnership Strategy (CPS)
program, the government press office reported.

They referred to those questions discussed at the 2010 September
forum held in Dilijan town with the Bank~Rs support which bore on the
possibilities for boosting investments, exports and economic growth,
as well as addressing poverty in a post-crisis environment.

In turn, Asad Alam said he joined Armenian vice-prime minister Armen
Gevorkian for a recent visit to Syunik province during which he was
able to familiarize himself with the status of World Bank-supported
projects and activities. In particular, visited Goris Medical
Center as overhauled under the World Bank~Rs Healthcare System
Modernization program where he got also a first-hand view of the
irrigation infrastructures-related projects and the activities of
Meghri customs house.

He next evoked his trip to Tatev monastic complex where he got
acquainted with the status of the road leading to Satani Kamurj from
Halidzor which has been rehabilitated with the World Bank~Rs support.

The interlocutors discussed ways of enhancing efficiency of joint
programs and, in this context, looked at the possibility of getting
technical assistance for some of them.

In conclusion, they discussed the possibility of modernizing the
system of public governance in Armenia through capacity building and
PIU integration with ministry staffs.

ISTANBUL POLICE DETAIN NATIONALIST ‘HERO’ OF KARABAKH WAR

Tert.am
02.06.11

The Istanbul police have detained a prominent figure of the
Nationalistic Movement party and participant of the Karabakh war,
Yusuf Zia Arpacik.

According to the Turkish TV channel NTV, Arpacik was among the 18
detainees arrested yesterday in Istanbul and Dyarbekir on suspicion
of arranging a terrorist plot at the party’s leader Devlet Bahceli’s
rally in Diyarberkir.

Arpacik is said to have been a respected Turkish field commander. He
was the personal bodyguard of Alparslan Turkesh, the founder and
former leader of the Nationalistic Movement party and the Grey Wolves
terrorist organization. A participant of the Nagorno Karabakh and
Iraqi wars, he was sentenced to 10 years in prison and is reported to
have twice taken to flight. He is also said to have connections with
retired general Veli Kucuk, a chief defendant in the Erhgenekon case.

In 1992, Arpacik joined the Turkish Union of Winds organization (a
detachment of retired servicemen of the Turkish armed forces) as a
commander and left for Nagorno Karabakh to fight against the Armenians.

Earlier this year, Arpacik announced that if the war in Karabakh
resumes he will join the Union’s struggle once again to liberate what
he called Azerbaijani lands.

CHAMLIAN GYMNASIUM ARGUMENTS HEARD AT CITY COUNCIL MEETING
By Cassandra Morris

Montrose Patch

June 1 2011
CA

The City Council listened to nearly three hours of public comments
about the Chamlian Armenian School gymnasium.

Over 150 people attended the public hearing regarding the Chamlian
Armenian School gymnasium on Tuesday. After nearly three hours, the
City Council unanimously approved the construction, overturning the
Planning Commission’s January decision.

Here are some of the remarks heard by the council:

In Favor of the Gymnasium

“We get hurt when we play on the asphalt… Having a gym has been a
dream for most of us.”

-Armen Baghdasarian, Chamlian Armenian School 6th grader and volleyball
player

“…We take our physical education program very seriously. Chamlian
students have two class periods of P.E. each week. We have a
structured program that encourages regular exercise, speed,
coordination, teamwork, strength and endurance. Sports include
basketball, volleyball, floor hockey, flag football track and
field, jump rope,table tennis and simplified softball. Our students
participate in the Physical Fitness Presidential Challenge program
which encourages active and healthy lifestyles.

“However, as you might imagine, it becomes extremely challenging or
our PE coaches to run a strong program when they have to deal with
inadequate facilities and cancellation of classes due to poor weather
conditions. Building a gym would no doubt alleviate all these issues
and help us to continue providing our students with a well rounded
postive educational experience at Chamlian.”

-Annette Baghdasarian, Chamlian Armenian School Academic Director

“Some of our neighbors are concerned about the possiblity that we may
use the proposed gym to hold sports tournaments on our school grounds.

I would like to assure you… that will not be the case.

Quite honestly, it is illogical that we would be willing to spend
over $1 million to build a gym just so we could hold two to three
tournaments on our campus once a year. It should be obvious by now
that our only purpose for this project is to enhance our daily physical
education classes for our students.”

-Vazken Madenlian, Chamlian Armenian School Principal

“The difficulty I deal with at school is trying to play any sport
on asphalt. I can’t say how many times I’ve skinned my knees or gone
injured because we don’t have a gym to safely play games. Instead we
have asphalt.”

Our teams suffer because we can’t practice in bad weather… it would
be nice to practice in a gym.”

-7th grade Chamlian Armenian School soccer player

Against the Gymnasium

“The zoning has not changed but the school has. Lowell Elementary
was a benefit to the surrounding neighborhood as a local school. It
is a much different place now, with added new buildings and many
more students after many generous variances for building, reduced
parking and increased enrollment…. It is no longer a benefit to
the surrounding neighborhood.

Chamlian is a commuter school… Lowell Ave is clogged twice a day
from drop off and pick up. Now Chamlian wants to build a large gym
on an already overbuilt property.”

-Rick Larson, Second Ave. resident

“The council needs to consider the needs of the community versus the
values of a private group.”

-Thomas Hall, Abella St. resident

“Respect our neighborhood in spite of the politics, please.”

-Steve Johnson, neighborhood resident

“I don’t want this big monster standing above us. The school has
done well without it and it can continue. We have a lot of traffic
problems in our neighborhood because of the school. There’s gridlock
when I come home from work.”

-Neighborhood resident

Maria Muriello, a Dilbeck realtor, described having to disclose the
gymnasium construction to a recent buyer interested in a home on
Second Ave. “That’s a hard disclosure to make,” she said.

SISLI QUALIFIED TO THE FINAL OF TURKISH TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP

Panorama
June 1 2011
Armenia

“Sisli” Armenian club of Istanbul won in the last two matches of the
semi-final of the Turkish Team Championship. Armenian chess players,
leaded by GM Hrant Melkumyan, had victories over “Taksim” (5:3) and
“Ozel Deniz Adi” (7,5:0,5).

“Armchess.am” informs that “Sisli” won in four of the five matches in
the semi-final and received a right to take part in the final which
is to be held in Konya from July 3 to 10, 2011.

NEW YORK TIMES’ SHAMEFUL BREACH OF STANDARDS
BY ARA KHACHATOURIAN

The New York Times headquarters in Manhattan

In a page four article in Wednesday’s edition of New York Times,
titled “‘Frozen Conflict’ Between Azerbaijan and Armenia Begins
to Boil,” reporter Ellen Barry describes in detail makeshift and
government-sanctioned sniper schools teaching Azeri youth the fine
art of sniper fire to fight Nagorno-Karabakh.

In what can be described as a breach of simple journalistic standards,
Barry provides a detailed account of Azeri “refugees” living in
squalor and turning to the sniper schools to prepare for war against
Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh. Her story is peppered with official
and person-on-the-street accounts of how war is the only option to
resolving the Karabakh conflict.

It is ironic. After all it was Felicity Barringer of the New York
Times who broke the news of the 1988 peaceful demonstrations in
Armenia and Karabakh, prompted by Glasnost and Perestroika, that
started what is now known as the “Karabakh conflict.” Her newspaper
diligently chronicled the savage Azeri pogroms in Sumgait, Kirovabad,
Baku and Shahumian and the resulting war that Barry now references
in her disheveled piece and attempt at reporting.

Barry quotes a 34-year-old and a 15-year-old student, both of whom
express their willingness-and readiness-to go to war and in one
instance also talks of the young Azeris’ shame for living in squalor
as the impetus for their military outlook.

It was also the New York Times that expressed outrage and condemnation
at the Madrassas being operated in Pakistan that trained young Muslims
to fight Osama bin-Laden’s Jihad against the West.

Barry’s piece seems to endorse the Azeri belief that the only way
out of the situation is to establish free sniper schools to teach
the young to fight. One wonders how the same publication can have
such divergent views on what is essentially the same approach.

The reporter also discusses the matter with Azerbaijan’s presidential
adviser, Ali Hasanov, who tells Barry, “There is no guarantee that
tomorrow or the day after tomorrow a war between Azerbaijan and
Armenia won’t start,” adding, “If necessary we are ready to give our
lives for territorial integrity.”

An obvious question for a presidential aide perhaps would have been:
why isn’t Baku spending all the riches it has amassed from oil and
gas deals to provide better living conditions for these refugees,
who Barry describes as “living along a dank, fetid hallway, on one
floor of a former office building” with “three rough, foul-smelling
holes in the concrete floor served as toilets for 21 families.”

Barry’s attempt to provide clarity of the international context of
the conflict also echoes the Azeri cries that they have been left
alone to fend for themselves.

“The United States, France and Russia do not do what they promised,”
Barry quotes Hasanov. “America now thinks Afghanistan and Iraq are
more important – and North Africa, and the missile defense shield in
Europe – than such regional conflicts as Nagorno-Karabakh.”

There is no mention of the OSCE chairman’s appeal-which Azerbaijan
unequivocally rejected-to both sides to withdraw their snipers from
what is known as the “line of conflict.” No mention again of last
week’s statement by president Obama, Sarkozy and Medvedev calling on
the sides to finalize the so-called “basic principles” and condemned
use of force in resolving the conflict. Nor, was there any mention
of the Azeri threats to down civilian aircraft. The latter threat
was even condemned by the most pro-Azeri US diplomat, Matthew Bryza.

The most incendiary part of Barry’s article is her conclusion where she
quotes Shafag Ismailova, a 34-year-old student at the sniper school
as saying: “We had a genocide, and no one helps us. Not America, not
Russia.” The New York Times, which covered the Armenian Genocide as
it was happening, should not allow such callous use of the word and
must warn its reporters to be more sensitive in such matters.

The timing of the piece is also suspect. During a period when
international attention has been focused on Karabakh, including a
meeting by Armenia’s foreign minister with Hillary Clinton on the
matter, the New York Times has mentioned the conflict in passing only
once when reporting on Azerbaijan’s victory in the Eurovision 2011
song competition.

Could it be that Azeri Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov’s current
visit to New York has promoted such a despicable piece in the New York
Times? Or, has Azerbaijan’s $35,000-a-month contract with Patton,
Boggs, LLC. to promote its interests in the US finally breached the
most impenetrable walls of the Gray Lady?

Whatever the case, it is pieces such as Barry’s and those editors
who approve their publication that might bring this “frozen conflict”
to a “boil.”

ILLEGAL COOPERATION BETWEEN VODAFONE EGYPT AND KARABAKH TELECOM REVEALED AND STOPPED

Azerbaijan Business Center
June 1 2011

Baku, Fineko/abc.az. Azerbaijani Embassy in Egypt has revealed the
fact of Vodafone Egypt ‘s cooperation in roaming area with mobile
communication operator Karabakh Telecom illegally operating on occupied
territories of Azerbaijan.

MFA of Azerbaijan reports that in connection with this Azerbaijani
Embassy in Cairo has sent a note to MFA of Egypt. The Embassy held
meetings with the Ministry’s authorities at which it was noted that
Vodafone Egypt ‘s cooperation with Karabakh Telecom was illegal and
did not correspond to international law principles and basic documents
of International Telecommunication Union and demanded to stop that
cooperation at once.

In response to this address of Azerbaijan MFA Egypt MFA has reported
of ceasing cooperation of Vodafone Egypt company with Karabakh Telecom.

GAGIK MINASYAN: DEAUVILLE STATEMENT IS ARMENIAN DIPLOMACY’S SUCCESS

PanARMENIAN.Net
June 1, 2011 – 18:43 AMT

PanARMENIAN.Net – The member of a ruling Republican Party of Armenia
(RPA) Gagik Minasyan believes the Deauville statement by OSCE MG
co-chairs to be a success of the Armenian diplomacy. “If in past,
the OSCE MG co-chairs addressed their urge for Karabakh conflict
settlement to Armenia and Azerbaijan, the Deauville statement was
addressed to conflicting parties. I believe this change to be of
utmost importance,” the parliamentarian said, noting that the statement
crashes Azeri concept that there are two conflicting parties and not
considering Karabakh in the issue.

Mr. Minasyan characterized the presidents’ statement that an attempt
at a new war would be condemned by the international community as
another important fact, as well as the urge “to prepare their people
for peace, not war.”

The leaders of the United States, France and Russia called on Armenia
and Azerbaijan to move toward a peaceful resolution of the Nagorno
Karabakh conflict.

“We…are convinced that it is time for the sides in the conflict over
Nagorno-Karabakh to take a decisive step toward a peaceful resolution
(of the conflict),” said a joint statement by Presidents Barack Obama,
Nicolas Sarkozy and Dmitry Medvedev.

“We firmly call on the leaders of the sides to prepare their people
for peace, not war,” the statement said. “We call on the presidents of
Azerbaijan and Armenia to demonstrate political will and finalize…the
basic principles (of a peace agreement) during the forthcoming summit
in June.”

The Presidents of Russia, Armenia and Azerbaijan are slated to meet in
June in the Russian city of Kazan, the next in a series of trilateral
meetings on the conflict.

AZERBAIJANI FILM FESTIVAL IN YEREVAN ORGANIZER NOT PREPARING TO LEAVE ARMENIA

epress.am
02.16.2011 14:14

Head of the Caucasus Center of Peace-Making Initiatives Georgy Vanyan
has denied rumors that because of receiving threats for organizing
a festival of Azerbaijani films in Yerevan he had to leave the country.

“I haven’t left the country and I’m not preparing to leave. As always,
I spend most of my time in the regions of Armenia and Georgia. Even
those who are friendly toward me believe that the situation has
changed so much that all the doors for peace-making activities in
Armenia are closed to me. I don’t think so and I continue to work,”
he said, reports News.az.

Recall, a campaign on social networking sites and in the media had
begun against Vanyan, whose Center planned to hold a festival of
Azerbaijani films in Yerevan. The human rights activists had received
death threats over the phone and owners of various revenues who
initially agreed to host the festival, withdrew their agreements with
Vanyan. Advertising on Facebook, the Azerbaijani film festival became
the cause of serious debate. Some Facebook users begun to threaten not
only the festival organizers, but also those who seemed supportive,
or in any case, did not speak up against the event, calling them
traitors to the nation.

The festival was supported by the US Embassy in Armenia, and an
embassy spokesperson had told Epress.am that such a festival aims
to promote an appreciation for tolerance, multiculturalism and the
expression of diverse views and opinions.

“These are important values for any democratic society. We thought
the film festival was a good idea when we decided to support it and
we still do,” said US Embassy spokesperson Karen Robblee.

DEFENSE MINISTER, AGBU DIRECTOR DISCUSS DIASPORA’S ASSISTANCE IN ARMY BUILDING

Tert.am
01.06.11

Armenian Defense Minister Seyran Ohanyan received today President of
the Armenian General Benevolent Union (AGBU) Perch Sedrakyan.

The parties considered possibilities of involving the Diaspora’s
potential in army development.

Minister Ohanyan highly praised Armenia and Diaspora’s solidarity
over the idea of protecting the common homeland of all Armenians.

Stressing the importance of Diaspora’s assistance in army building,
Sedrakyan said the AGBU will focus its efforts on military-educational
programs in Armenia.

NEW YORK TIMES’ SHAMEFUL BREACH OF STANDARDS
by Ara Khachatourian

asbarez
Wednesday, June 1st, 2011

The New York Times headquarters in Manhattan

In a page four article in Wednesday’s edition of New York Times, titled
“‘Frozen Conflict’ Between Azerbaijan and Armenia Begins to Boil,”
Moscow bureau chief Ellen Barry describes in detail makeshift and
government-sanctioned sniper schools teaching Azeri youth the fine
art of sniper fire to fight Nagorno-Karabakh.

In what can be described as a breach of simple journalistic standards,
Barry provides a detailed account of Azeri “refugees” living in
squalor and turning to the sniper schools to prepare for war against
Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh. Her story is peppered with official
and person-on-the-street accounts of how war is the only option to
resolving the Karabakh conflict.

It is ironic. After all it was Felicity Barringer of the New York
Times who broke the news of the 1988 peaceful demonstrations in
Armenia and Karabakh, prompted by Glasnost and Perestroika, that
started what is now known as the “Karabakh conflict.” Her newspaper
diligently chronicled the savage Azeri pogroms in Sumgait, Kirovabad,
Baku and Shahumian and the resulting war that Barry now references
in her disheveled piece and attempt at reporting.

Barry quotes a 34-year-old and a 15-year-old student, both of whom
express their willingness-and readiness-to go to war and in one
instance also talks of the young Azeris’ shame for living in squalor
as the impetus for their military outlook.

It was also the New York Times that expressed outrage and condemnation
at the Madrassas being operated in Pakistan that trained young
Muslims to fight Osama bin-Laden’s Jihad against the West. Barry’s
piece seems to endorse the Azeri belief that the only way out of the
situation is to establish free sniper schools to teach the young to
fight. One wonders how the same publication can have such divergent
views on what is essentially the same approach.

The reporter also discusses the matter with Azerbaijan’s presidential
adviser, Ali Hasanov, who tells Barry, “There is no guarantee that
tomorrow or the day after tomorrow a war between Azerbaijan and
Armenia won’t start,” adding, “If necessary we are ready to give our
lives for territorial integrity.”

An obvious question for a presidential aide perhaps would have been:
why isn’t Baku spending all the riches it has amassed from oil and
gas deals to provide better living conditions for these refugees,
who Barry describes as “living along a dank, fetid hallway, on one
floor of a former office building” with “three rough, foul-smelling
holes in the concrete floor served as toilets for 21 families.”

Barry’s attempt to provide clarity of the international context of
the conflict also echoes the Azeri cries that they have been left
alone to fend for themselves.

“The United States, France and Russia do not do what they promised,”
Barry quotes Hasanov. “America now thinks Afghanistan and Iraq are
more important – and North Africa, and the missile defense shield in
Europe – than such regional conflicts as Nagorno-Karabakh.”

There is no mention of the OSCE chairman’s appeal-which Azerbaijan
unequivocally rejected-to both sides to withdraw their snipers from
what is known as the “line of conflict.” No mention again of last
week’s statement by president Obama, Sarkozy and Medvedev calling on
the sides to finalize the so-called “basic principles” and condemned
use of force in resolving the conflict. Nor, was there any mention
of the Azeri threats to down civilian aircraft. The latter threat
was even condemned by the most pro-Azeri US diplomat, Matthew Bryza.

The most incendiary part of Barry’s article is her conclusion where she
quotes Shafag Ismailova, a 34-year-old student at the sniper school
as saying: “We had a genocide, and no one helps us. Not America,
not Russia.” The New York Times, which covered the Armenian Genocide
as it was happening, should not allow such callous use of the word
and must warn its bureau chiefs and reporters to be more sensitive
in such matters.

The timing of the piece is also suspect. During a period when
international attention has been focused on Karabakh, including a
meeting by Armenia’s foreign minister with Hillary Clinton on the
matter, the New York Times has mentioned the conflict in passing only
once when reporting on Azerbaijan’s victory in the Eurovision 2011
song competition.

Could it be that Azeri Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov’s current
visit to New York has promoted such a despicable piece in the New York
Times? Or, has Azerbaijan’s $35,000-a-month contract with Patton,
Boggs, LLC. to promote its interests in the US finally breached the
most impenetrable walls of the Gray Lady?

Whatever the case, it is pieces such as Barry’s and those editors
who approve their publication that might bring this “frozen conflict”
to a “boil.”