Author: Kanayan Tamar

TWELVE ARMENIANS QUALIFY FOR BEIJING OLYMPIC GAMES

ARMENPRESS
Nov 1, 2007

YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 1, ARMENPRESS: Two more Armenian boxers have
qualified for next year’s Olympic Games in Beijing.

Hovhannes Danielian, 48 kg, beat Zviad Khadauri of Georgia at the
world boxing championship in Chicago, USA.

He has moved now to the quarter finals, but irrespective of his
further performance he will fly to China next year.

He has become the second Armenian boxer to have won this right after
Eduard Hambardzumian, 64 kg.

The third boxer is Hrachya Javakhian, 60 kg, who upset an Irish rival,
Erick Donovan.

In 2004 Olympic Games in Athens Armenia had only one boxer, Alexan
Nalbandian.

Overall 12 Armenian athletes have qualified already for the Games-
1 shooter, 2 judoists, 6 weightlifters and 3 boxers.

3.2 BILLION DRAMS TO BE ALLOCATED TO RESCUE SERVICE BY 2008 DRAFT STATE BUDGET

Noyan Tapan
Nov 1, 2007

YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 1, NOYAN TAPAN. By the 2008 draft state budget, it is
envisaged to allocate 3.2 bln drams (about 10 mln USD) to the Rescue
Service of the RA Ministry of Territorial Governance, the RA deputy
minister of finance and economy Pavel Safarian stated at the November
1 joint sitting of the RA National Assembly standing committees.

According to him, out of this sum, 2.9 mln drams will be allocated
for financing the current expenditures, 332 mln drams – for capital
expenditures. 147 mln drams will be allocated to "Active Influence on
Atmospheric Phenomena" state noncommercial organization, 54 mln drams –
to "State Academy of Crisis Management" noncommercial organization,
and 19.1 mln drams – for education of rescuers sent to study at
educational institutions abroad.

The deputy minister said that current espenditures have been increased
by 22.7 mln drams. This sum will be mainly used to raise salaries
and additional payments of 284 employees of the Rescue Service.

Washington Post

U.S. sponsors postpone push for Armenian genocide bill

Reuters

Thursday, October 25, 2007; 9:37 PM

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Backers of a resolution to formally name the
1915 massacre of Armenians by Ottoman Turks a genocide said on
Thursday they would postpone efforts to bring it to a vote in the U.S.
House of Representatives.

The sponsors conveyed their decision in a letter to House Speaker
Nancy Pelosi, after support for the controversial resolution support
faltered in the face of vehement protests from NATO ally Turkey.

But the four chief co-sponsors who wrote the letter did not totally
give up on the proposal, which Armenian-Americans have sought to pass
in the House for years but is strongly opposed by the Bush
administration.

The sponsors asked Pelosi not to schedule a vote "at this time," but
said they would continue to work for "consideration sometime later
this year, or in 2008."

The resolution passed the House Foreign Affairs Committee on October
10 and seemed destined for speedy consideration by the whole House of
Representatives.

Turkey recalled its ambassador in protest and warned of grave damage
to U.S.-Turkish relations and a reduction in military cooperation, if
the House passed it. Turkey provides key logistical support to U.S.
troops in Iraq, with much of the cargo that is flown to the Americans
going through a Turkish air base.

Turkey accepts that many Armenians were killed in World War One, but
denies they were victims of a systematic genocide.

"We believe that a large majority of our colleagues want to support a
resolution recognizing the genocide on the House floor and that they
will do so, provided the timing is more favorable," said the letter to
Pelosi, which her office released.

It was signed by four Democrats who were leading sponsors of the
resolution — Adam Schiff, Brad Sherman and Anna Eshoo of California,
and Frank Pallone of New Jersey.

A Pelosi spokesman said she respected the judgment of the sponsors on
the timing of the vote. She has long advocated passage of such a
resolution.

(c) 2007 Reuters

Source: le/2007/10/25/AR2007102502668.html

FOOTBALL FEDERATION TO HOUSE SARGSIAN’S HEADQUARTERS

A1+
[02:58 pm] 24 October, 2007

Armenia’s Football Federation (AFF) will soon house Serzh Sargsian’s
pre-election headquarters, the AFF press service informed A1+.

The news is really astonishing as the AFF is one of the unique
federations in Armenia which works under tense regime.

The federation had moved to Khanjian as the former office on Sarian
Street was too small for the departments. AFF former press secretary
Suren Baghdasarian explained the information vacuum of 2000-2004 by
the lack of rooms and normal conditions.

According to our verified data, ARF Chaiman Ruben Hairapetian’s study
will be allotted to RA deputy Prime Minister Hovik Abrahamian, the
chief of the pre-election headquarters. This, in turn, implies that
the federation will house Sargsian’s central headquarters.

HARUT SASSOUNIAN AWARDED FOR HIS HUGE INPUT INTO PROMOTING ARMENIA AND ARMENIANS

ARMENPRESS
Oct 22, 2007

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 22, ARMENPRESS: The Armenian government press office
said today prime minister Serzh Sarkisian has decreed to award Harut
Sassounian the memorial medal of the Armenian prime minister.

A press release by the press office said Mr. Sassounian was awarded the
medal for his long-time activities to promote Armenia and Armenians,
implementation of a series of charity projects in Armenia and
Nagorno-Karabakh and for his huge contribution into charity programs.

The government press office said Serzh Sarkisian awarded the medal
during a visit to the Los Angeles, USA.

Harut Sassounian is the publisher of The California Courier, a weekly
newspaper based in Glendale, California. His editorials dealing with
political analysis on international affairs are reprinted by scores
of U.S. and overseas publications.

He is also the founder and President of the United Armenian Fund,
a coalition of several largest Armenian-American charitable and
religious organizations. The U.A.F. has supplied some $500 million
of humanitarian assistance to Armenia on board 140 airlifts and 1,300
sea containers since the 1988 earthquake.

As Vice Chairman of Kirk Kerkorian’s Lincy Foundation, Harut Sassounian
oversaw the implementation of multi-million infrastructure-related
projects in Armenia, including construction of 3,674 apartments,
bridges, tunnels, highways, and city streets, renovation of 34 cultural
institutions, as well as providing $20 million of loans to small and
medium-size businesses.

He is currently overseeing Lincy’s new $60 million projects to renovate
schools, roads and streets in Armenia.

CBA ASSIGNS RATINGS TO THREE ENTERPRISES

Noyan Tapan
Oct 23, 2007

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 23, NOYAN TAPAN. The Central Bank of Armenia (CBA)
has assigned ratings to 3 enterprises. NT was informed by the CBA
press service that Valetta LLS received "B" rating (previous rating –
"B"), Armenian Copper Program CJSC – "B" rating (previous rating –
"C+"), and Shen Concern CJSC – "B" rating (previous rating – "B").

"SYNOPSYS" INTRODUCES "GREEN DESIGN" PRINCIPLE

Noyan Tapan
Oct 23, 2007

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 23, NOYAN TAPAN. Synopsys company (US), the world
leader in electronic automated design, has introduced the principle of
"green design" aimed at reduction of global warming. Integral chips
designed by this principle help reduce losses of consumed electric
current, as a result of which the atmosphere warms less.

Gayane Markosian, PR officer of Synopsys Armenia CJSC – the Armenian
subsidiary of Synopsys, told NT correspondent that software and
integral chips developed jointly by Synopsys and its partners are
designed under the slogan "Engineers Will Save the World".

Rich Goldman, Synopsys’ vice president for strategic market development
and Synopsys Armenia’s CEO, recently gave lectures on the "green
design" principles at the State Engineering University of Armenia
(SEUA), Yerevan State University, the Russian-Armenian (Slavonic)
University and the National Academy of Sciences of the RA.

According to G. Markosian, by the October 19 decision of the SEUA
Scientific Board, Rich Goldman was awarded title of honorary doctor
in recognition of his significant contribution to the development
of an "industry-university" efficient educational model at SEUA, and
for his series of lectures on modern topics of microelectronics for
SEUA’s teaching staff, post-graduate students, masters and students.

To recap, Synopsys Armenia that employs about 300 engineers is one
of Synopsys’ biggest subsidiaries among its 65 subdivisions worldwide.

AHMADINEJAD HONOR OUTRAGES ARMENIAN JEWS

Jewish Telegraphic Agency, NY
.html
Oct 23 2007

The Eurasian Jewish Congress condemned Armenia for honoring Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad.

The Iranian president was presented with an honorary doctorate Monday
at Yerevan State University, as well as a gold medal. Ahmadinejad
was visiting Armenia for a two-day state visit.

In an interview with the Rosbalt news agency, Eurasian Jewish
Congress representative and Armenian Jewish community President Rima
Varzhepetyan expressed outrage at the decision to honor Ahmadinejad.

"The constant anti-Semitic and anti-Israeli rhetoric of the president
of Iran, as well as the regularly organized statements in denial of
the Holocaust, place Ahmadinejad in line with theories not unlike
those of Dr. Goebbels, one of the chief ideologues of Nazi ideology
in Germany," Varzhepetyan said.

THERE’S A WORD FOR IT: GENOCIDE
By Harry Rosenfeld

Albany Times Union, NY
storyID=631926&category=OPINION&newsdate=1 0/21/2007
Oct 21 2007

>From almost the very beginning, the United States has been clear
about what happened to the Armenians living in Turkey during the
First World War. But when Henry Morgenthau, the U.S. ambassador to the
Ottoman Empire, cabled the State Department in 1915 that "a campaign
of race extermination" was being inflicted on the Armenian minority,
there was no epitomizing word to describe the atrocity that was to
take 1.5 million lives.

It wasn’t until a relentless advocate, Raphael Lemkin, invented a
name for it in 1944 — a name now embodied in the official lexicon
of the United Nations and the world’s governments, as well as among
ordinary people. The name Lemkin came up with, and tirelessly lobbied
the United Nations to formally adopt, was genocide.

Lemkin’s extended family had perished in Hitler’s extermination
campaign only a few years earlier, and he hoped that the descriptive
name would help to prevent future ones. It did not, as demonstrated
by what befell Europe’s Jews and arguably Asia’s Cambodians and
Africa’s Darfurians.

>From 1915 onward, the U.S. government in one form or another of
congressional actions or in presidential statements, has cited the fate
of those Armenians who were deported in a death march by the Turks
as dangerous to the war then being waged. Many officials, including
President Ronald Reagan, had no problem with using the word genocide.

However, when a committee of the House of Representatives made the
latest effort in a series for the U.S. "to accurately characterize
the systematic and deliberate annihilation of 1,500,000 Armenians as
genocide," Realpolitik intruded to block the nonbinding resolution
as it had thwarted past efforts.

In an Op-Ed piece in Friday’s Wall Street Journal, Recep Tayyip
Erdogan, the prime minister of Turkey, accurately wrote that "Turkey
and the U.S. have been friends, partners and allies for decades."

Turkey today indeed is not the country it was under the Ottomans. It is
the most democratic and moderate Muslim country, plays a stabilizing
role in the volatile Middle East and is the supply lifeline for
American troops in Iraq.

All that was being put at risk by the congressional action "that is
acutely offensive and unjust to Turks," the prime minister wrote.

Even today, Turkey officially describes what happened in 1915 as a
tragedy, but one that also took many Turkish lives. The documentation
of the slaughter of the Armenians is voluminous, including some from
Germany, Turkey’s World War I ally. There is little if any support
of the prime minister’s invocation of Turkish suffering at the hands
of a beleaguered Armenian community.

Ninety years later that is where the problem resides and the issue
festers. Even modern Turkey, a much more democratic and less corrupt
regime than in the neighboring Republic of Armenia, is not willing to
acknowledge its own history, although at first there were some limited
efforts to punish some officials held responsible for the genocide.

The House resolution could not have been to make crystal clear the
United States’ position on the Armenian genocide. That has been done
throughout the years. What the stalled resolution more likely was
aimed at was to encourage Turkey to face up to the terrible actions
in its past.

Perhaps even in failure the resolution might serve this purpose,
helping the present rulers to better understand the burden their
country’s past exacts to this day. In contrast, contemporary Germany
has confronted the horrors of its past, acknowledging the murder of
6 million Jews and others, and is the better for it today within its
own borders and among the nations of the world.

There are elements in Turkey working to open their society up to
modify the norms that continue to be a stumbling block in their
country’s efforts to join the European Union. As for the U.S., it has
reciprocated the Turkish commitment to the alliance with encouragement
and support, going to far as to block the congressional resolutions.

This controversy probably will simmer down as others like it have in
days past. But it will reappear time and again, through the efforts
of Armenians scattered around the world who can never forget what
happened to their forbearers and who will find support among people
of conscience.

The resolution stated that it "will help to prevent future
genocides." Experience tells us that it will always take more than
words, but that words can have inherent power and influence, as
witness Lemkin’s coinage.

KARABAKH CONFLICT DEVELOPS IN MIDDLE EAST SCENARIO – AZERI EXPERTS

Zerkalo, Azerbaijan
Oct 12 2007

Azerbaijani experts say that the conflict between Azerbaijan and
Armenia over the breakaway region of Nagornyy Karabakh is developing in
accordance with the Middle East scenario or the Israeli-Palestinian
conflict, as peace talks have been lasting for years without any
results. Russian-language Zerkalo newspaper quoted some experts
participating in a roundtable on the conflict as saying that peace
talks will continue at least for a couple of more years.

"A serious breakthrough in the settlement of the Nagornyy Karabakh
conflict will hardly be made before presidential elections in
Armenia and Azerbaijan" in 2008, the newspaper said. The following
is the text of an unattributed report in Zerkalo newspaper headlined
"The Karabakh conflict develops in accordance with the Middle East
scenario say experts at a closed-door roundtable on the settlement
of the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict". Subheadings have been inserted
editorially.

Another closed-door roundtable of experts and political analysts
on the settlement of the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict, which was
organized by the South Caucasus research centre and Analitika.az
website, has recently taken place. This time experts discussed the
topic called "prospects for the development of the settlement of
the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict in accordance with the Middle
East scenario".

The urgency of this issue proceeds from the statements of most
representatives of international organizations saying that a serious
breakthrough in the settlement of the Nagornyy Karabakh conflict
will hardly be made before the presidential elections in Armenia and
Azerbaijan [in 2008]. This situation has been repeated before. Taking
into consideration the facts that Azerbaijan will see municipal
elections in 2009 and parliamentary elections in 2010 following the
presidential election scheduled for 2008, it is not ruled out that
the break in peace talks may continue for two years.

In view of the abovementioned facts experts were requested to answer
the following questions: 1. How real is it that the peace talks on
the settlement of the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict over Nagornyy
Karabakh will last for many years like those on the Middle East
[Israeli-Palestinian] conflict? 2. How much does the delay in the
resolution of the conflict for many years meet the interests of the
conflicting parties, that is, Azerbaijan and Armenia? 3. How much does
it meet the interests of the major mediators, which are the co-chairs
of the OSCE Minsk Group [a team of mediators set up in 1992 to mediate
a peaceful resolution], specifically Russia, the USA and the European
Union? 4. How capable is the OSCE Minsk Group in the current format
to achieve a peace deal that would be acceptable to all the parties to
the conflict? 5. Does the formula "the co-chairs and the international
community will support any solution that would be acceptable to all
the parties to the conflict" contribute to the soonest signing of a
peace deal between Armenia and Azerbaijan? 6. If Azerbaijan is really
interested in speeding up a peaceful solution to the conflict, is not
it the time for Baku to take the conflict to the UN Security Council
so that the council can identify clear frameworks for the settlement
of the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict and the mandate for the mediators
of the OSCE Minsk Group on the basis of international law?

Breakthrough to be hardly made

Most of the experts believe that the likelihood of a breakthrough
in the peace talks in 2007-2008 is equal to zero. Nevertheless, the
experts did not rule out that a fundamental change in the geopolitical
situation in the region may force Moscow or Washington to put the
issue of the settlement of the conflict toughly to Azerbaijan or
Armenia. It was noted that this option may have both positive and
negative consequences for the sides of the conflict.

Everything will depend on which party the great powers that have
geopolitical interests in the region will use to settle the conflict.

Experts believe that this option is unlikely, but say that a window
will be opened for a short time in 2009 for intensifying peace talks
on the resolution of the conflict.

No military action expected

Experts do not think that a resumption of full-scale military
operations is likely in the forthcoming eighteen months, at least
before the presidential election in Azerbaijan. However, even in
this case it is not excluded that the aggravation of the situation
and a resumption of large-scale military hostilities after a certain
geopolitical situation takes shape in the region will fully meet the
interests of Russia. In this scenario Moscow may do any provocation
to make the sides of the conflict resume war.

Experts say that the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict is already
developing in accordance with the Middle East scenario. It is
impossible to achieve compromises between the parties to the conflict,
while a military solution does not meet the interests of the USA, first
of all. That is why the settlement of the conflict has been handed over
to the OSCE, which has no real leverage to solve the conflict at all.

Russia not interested in solution

In the meantime, the unanimous opinion of the experts is that Russia is
not interested in the settlement of the conflict since it may actually
lose leverage to influence Armenia and Azerbaijan, while the USA is
interested in the resolution of the conflict, but tries to do it more
at the expense of Azerbaijan. Experts say that the development of
the settlement process in accordance with the Middle East scenario is
totally contradictory to the national interests of both Azerbaijan and
Armenia. The formula "time is working in our favour", which is largely
promoted in Azerbaijan and Armenia, is deprived of any logic. At the
current stage the region is of interest to Western powers, first of
all the USA, as a source and corridor of transportation of energy
resources. However, this situation is not going to last forever.

Most of the experts said with regret that, as strange as it may seem,
the current "no peace no war" situation meets the interests of the
ruling elites both in Armenia and Azerbaijan.

OSCE incapable of solving conflict

Seven versus four experts believe that the OSCE Minsk Group with
its present mandate and format is incapable of achieving a peaceful
solution to the conflict. However, it was stressed that it is
hardly ever possible to create a different format that would be more
operational under the current circumstances.

Most of the experts (except two) do not think that the formula "the
co-chairs and the international community will support any solution
that would be acceptable to all the parties to the conflict" contribute
to the soonest signing of a peace deal between Armenia and Azerbaijan
because the sides can not reach agreement on the status of Nagornyy
Karabakh. But agreement on this issue could be an ideal option since
it could deprive the great powers which have geopolitical interests
in the region, first of all Russia, of possibilities to manipulate
the situation on the ground.

Therefore, the experts believe that the status of Nagornyy Karabakh
should be determined at a later stage at the Minsk conference, as was
originally envisioned in the relevant resolutions of the OSCE and UN.

Taking conflict to UN

Finally, the majority of the experts (six versus five) think that it
is appropriate to take the settlement of the Armenian-Azerbaijani
conflict to the UN Security Council and other international
organizations. However, some of the experts believe that this will not
result in any actual output because the states which are represented
in the OSCE Minsk Group (Russia, the USA and France) occupy the seats
in the UN Security Council with the right to veto and they are not
ready yet to identify their unanimous positions on the settlement of
the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict.

It should also be noted that the participants in this permanent
roundtable were such experts and political analysts as Arif Yunusov,
Arastun Oruclu, Ilqar Mammadov, Zardust Alizada, Rasim Musabayov,
Sahin Rzayev, Nair Aliyev, Azad Isazada, Casur Sumaranli, Alakbar
Mammadov and Uzeyir Cafarov. The permanent presenter at the roundtable
is a political observer of Zerkalo newspaper, Rauf Mirqadirov.