Author: Karabekian Emil

WAC AND UNION OF ARMENIANS IN RUSSIA PRESENT PRIZES IN SPHERES OF LITERATURE AND JOURNALISM

Noyan Tapan
Feb 14, 2008

YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 14, NOYAN TAPAN. Distribution of prizes in the
spheres of literature and journalism took place on February 13 at
the RA National Academy of Sciences. The event was initiated by the
World Armenian Congress (WAC) and the Union of Armenians in Russia
headed by renowned businessman Ara Abrahamian.

As Levon Ananian, the Chairman of the Union of Writers of Armenia,
said, these prizes instituted specially for prose writers in the
respect of their amount exceed even the state prizes of Armenia
and make ten, five, and three thousand USD for the first, second,
and third places, respectively.

The first prize was presented to Grigor Janikian for his novel
"Yerablur" and the second and third prizes were given to Edward
Militonian and Ghukas Sirunian, respectively.

Astghik Gevorgian, the Chairwoman of the Union of Journalists
of Armenia, said that by the decision of the authoritative jury
comprised of the prize-winners of the previous year, a special
prize was posthumously presented to Garnik Ananian, the former
Dean of YSU Journalism faculty. In the sphere of journalism prizes
were also presented to Juliette Kazhoyan and Haykaram Nahapetian,
correspondents of the Public Television of Armenia, Artyom Yerkanian,
a political commentator at the Shant TV Company, Ara Kochumian, the
editor-in-chief of the Zhamanak daily of Istanbul, Grigor Anisonian,
the editor-in-chief of the Noyev Kovcheg newspaper published in Russia.

According to Hranush Hakobian, the Chairwoman of the RA National
Assembly Standing Committee of Science, Education, Culture, Youth,
and Sport Affairs, such competitions should be also organized in other
spheres of culture. In response A. Abrahamian said that there is such
an idea and it will be discussed with the RA Minister of Culture.

Radik Martirosian, the Chairman of the RA National Academy of Sciences,
in his turn, said that such a competition should be also organized
in the sphere of science. It is supposed that prizes will be given in
five nominations: Armenology, sociology, exact sciences, informatics,
and natural sciences.

USAN SECRETARY GENERAL: WE SUPPORT PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES WHO FAVOR THE SETTLEMENT OF NAGORNO KARABAKH CONFLICT WITHIN AZERBAIJAN’S TERRITORIAL INTEGRITY

Azeri Press Agency
Feb 14 2008
Azerbaijan

Los-Angeles Husniya Hasanova-APA. Yusif Babanli, USAN Secretary
General gave an interview to APA

Yesterday USAN left one month behind. Which achievements do you gain
in this term?

First month of USAN activity was very productive. One of our aims was
to direct US President, congressmen, Senates, governors’ attention to
Azerbaijanis living in US. Azerbaijanis living in US can send letters
to US officials, using system of USAN. About 8,800 letters, faxes and
electronic letters were sent to US officials by now. The letters were
sent to US President, vice-President, governors, State Secretaries,
members of Lower and Upper Houses and mass media. The letters
covers 18th anniversary of 20 January tragedy, Doubling contingent of
Azerbaijani peacekeepers in Afghanistan, Khojali genocide, World Bank’s
statement on economic indicators in Azerbaijan, calling congressmen
to join Work Group on Azerbaijan, Jews’ living with local population
in peace in Azerbaijan, realities of 1988 Sumgait events, negative
reaction of US Azerbaijanis to Democratic candidate Barack Obama’s
report and other important issues. US officials have already stated
their position on these issues. There were various responses from US
officials on Khojali genocide, 20 January tragedy, religious and ethnic
tolerance in Azerbaijan. The project expends gradually and number of
a lot US Azerbaijanis joined this network. Our aim is to in crease
number of letters by 100,000 and number of network members by 5,000.

Can we say that USAN will be virtual movement center of US
Azerbaijanis?

Armenian Diaspora uses above-said system very successfully. Turkish
Diaspora has begun to use this system recently and Turkish Diaspora
had a great influence on US officials by the help of this step. We are
optimistic about the project. Our aim is not to inform US officials
about Azerbaijanis’ position. USAN’s aim is to improve Azerbaijani
community, involve every Azerbaijani who represents our national
interests in this issue. Tomris Azeri, board director of USAN and
the president of Azerbaijan Society of America (ASA), a 50-year old
leading Azerbaijani-American Diaspora organization, Jeyhun Mollazadeh,
head of US-Azerbaijan Entrepreneurs Council, Doctor of Philosophy,
Javid Huseynov, President of the Azerbaijani-American Council and
USAZeris network on Western region, Leyla Mammadova, President of
network on Eastern region, Badir Mammadli, director of organization
on financial affairs, Adil Bagirov, director of network, author of
website on Azerbaijan, as well as author of articles on Azerbaijan’s
history and realities of Nagorno Karabakh admit in Managing Board
of our organization. I believe that, these persons, who informed the
world about realities of Azerbaijan, promoted national interests and
never lost courage will play an important role in expansion of USAN’s
activity and establishment of great Diaspora organization.

USAN Diaspora supported concrete presidential candidates in USA this
year. How did your action help the recognition of Azerbaijanis in
political world of US?

We have aim in the support of Republican candidate for US presidency
John McCain and Democrat Hillary Clinton. It is clear that, it is
early to speak about the influence of US Azerbaijanis on outcomes
of 2008 presidential elections in this stage. Several months are
left for outcomes of primaries of candidates and final elections in
November. It is not accidental that, USAN launched its operation on the
very time. We support presidential candidates who favor the settlement
of Nagorno Karabakh conflict within Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity.

Which measures will you take to involve US Azerbaijanis in election
process?

We have already begun to involve US Azerbaijanis in election process.

We analyze which candidates will have positive influence on the
development of Azerbaijan-Us relations at present. We will answer the
questions of Azerbaijanis in the events will be organized by USAN,
Azerbaijan Society of America (ASA) and Azerbaijan American Council
(AAC).I want to state that, USAN is a new step in the history of
Azerbaijani Diaspora and it is only the beginning. It will have its
fruits soon.

Aero-News Network, FL
Feb 14 2008

Reports: No Fatalities In Armenian CRJ Takeoff Crash
Thu, 14 Feb ’08

At Least Four Injured; Plane’s Wing Touched Ground

ANN REALTIME REPORTING 02.14.08 1300 EST: Details are sketchy about
the circumstances that led to a CRJ-100 regional airliner crashing
shortly after takeoff Thursday from Yerevan Zvartnots Airport in
Armenia, but reports indicate all 21 people onboard the airliner
survived the accident.

BBC News reports the CRJ, operated by Belarussian state airline
Belavia, had just departed for Minsk when the aircraft’s wing touched
the ground, causing the aircraft to flip over several times and catch
fire.

"Nearly everyone on board received burns of various degrees," said
Gayane Davtyan, a spokeswoman for Armenia’s civil aviation authority.
The accident on Flight 1834 took place at 0415 local time Thursday
morning.

There is no immediate indication of what caused the crash.
Unconfirmed reports from the scene state the plane departed the
runway, then rolled to one side, leading to the wing strike.

ANN will update this story as more information becomes available.

tentBlockID=1d157a11-df86-409a-9413-2aa23ad9a3da

Azeri Press Agency, Azerbaijan
Feb 14 2008

Andrzej Kasprzyk: I need special mandate for a secret monitoring in
the frontline of Azerbaijani and Armenian troops

[ 14 Feb 2008 17:13 ]

Goranboy.Teymur Guliyev-APA. `Violation of cease-fire in contact line
has been intensified recently,’ APA Karabakh bureau reports

Personal Representative of the OSCE Chairman in Office, Ambassador
Andrzej Kasprzyk, who monitors the frontline of troops on February 14
told journalist. Mr. Kasprzyk stated that, the body will continue the
monitoring in the frontline of troops. He stated that Azerbaijan and
Armenia were informed about the situation and hoped that the
situation will be stabilized after that.
`The condition of residents who live near frontline is very bad.
Villagers who work in lands risked their life,’ he said. Mr.Kasprzyk
noted that the parties accused each other of violation of cease-fire.
`I need special mandate for a secret monitoring in the frontline of
Azerbaijani and Armenian troops. I am obliged to give information to
both of sides about monitoring now.

Lragir, Armenia
Feb 14 2008

INTERIM REPORT ON MONITORING THE COVERAGE OF PRESIDENTIAL
ELECTIONS-2008 BY BROADCAST MEDIA OF ARMENIA

The coverage of presidential elections-2008 by 8 broadcast media of
Armenia is monitored by Yerevan Press Club with the participation of
`TEAM’ Research Center and with the financial assistance of the Open
Society Institute. The study covers the period of pre-election
promotion, January 21 – February 17, 2008.

THIS INTERIM REPORT includes the period of January 31 – February 9,
2008. As compared to the previous ten days (January 21-30, 2008),
during this study period the volume of editorial coverage of the
election campaign has somewhat increased. This, however, occurred due
to the coverage of the RA presidency candidates, distinctly enjoying
the greatest media attention: these are the RA First President Levon
Ter-Petrosian, the RA Prime Minister, candidate of the Republican
Party of Armenia Serge Sargsian, candidate of `Orinats Yerkir’ party
Artur Baghdasarian, candidate of Popular Party Tigran Karapetian,
candidate of `Dashnaktsutiun’ party Vahan Hovhannesian, candidate of
`National Unity’ party Artashes Geghamian and the candidate of
National Democratic Union Vazgen Manukian. Self-nominated Arman
Melikian and the candidate of `National Accord’ party Aram
Harutiunian are somewhat behind the leading seven. It should be
noted, however, that Tigran Karapetian, following the tradition,
received most of his coverage on `ALM’ TV channel that he owns, and
if he had received as much attention on `his own’ air, as he did in
average on seven other channels studied, he would have been rated the
8th, between Arman Melikiàn and Aram Harutiunian.

The gap between the candidates who received the most and the least
aggregate (on all 8 media studied) coverage have somewhat increased,
too: 37,016 sec. for Levon Ter-Petrosian and 8,725 sec. for Aram
Harutiunian (the proportion here is more than 4 to 1, while during
the previous decade the proportion between the most and the least
covered candidates made less than 2.5 to 1).

The RA First President received most of the coverage on 8 channels
studied during the 10 days presented in this report. He is followed
by Serge Sargsian – 32,786 sec. (of these 9,451 sec. were the
coverage of his activities as a Prime Minister). If the coverage of
the official activities is excluded from the total airtime allocated
to the candidates, in terms of aggregate airtime Serge Sargsian would
fall behind three more candidates – Artur Baghdasarian (29,963 sec.),
Tigran Karapetian (25,706 sec.) and Vahan Hovhannesian (25,601 sec.).

AT THE SAME TIME Levon Ter-Petrosian remains the undisputed leader in
terms of connotational references (146), or, more specifically, in
terms of negative references (143 versus 3 positive ones). The
connotation references to Serge Sargsian are frequent, too (83
positive and 24 negative). These two candidates, similarly to all the
previous monitoring stages (the monitoring of 8 broadcast media was
administered also ahead of the election campaign, in October-December
2007), received polarized coverage. Of the remaining candidates the
positive balance of connotational references is observed for Tigran
Karapetian (8-0) and Vahan Hovhannesian (14-0), the negative one –
for Artur Baghdasarian (11 positive and 16 negative) and Vazgen
Manukian (4-8), neutral or almost neutral – for Artashes Geghamian
(3-4), Arman Melikian (0-1) and Aram Harutiunian (0-0). At the same
time all the positive references to Tigran Karapetian were recorded
by the monitoring group on the air of `ALM’, and 11 out of 14
positive references of Vahan Hovhannesian – on the air of
`Yerkir-Media’. In other words, a positive balance is held only by
the candidates of `party of power’ and/or owning (enjoying support)
one of the leading TV companies. This circumstance signifies that the
problem of unequal conditions in the editorial coverage of election
campaigns remains quite urgent in Armenia.

TO A GREATER EXTENT the existing polarity of coverage of the two
candidates (Serge Sargsian and Levon Ter-Petrosian) was displayed on
`Kenton’ TV channel. Sargsian here was mentioned 19 times in a
positive and never in a negative context, and Ter-Petrosian,
respectively, 0 and 44 times. 9 of the positive references to the
Prime Minister and 30 of the negative references to the First
President were made in `What Newspapers Write About’ TV program. The
picture of this press review practically repeated that of the
previous 10 days. As it is noted in numerous researches of the
Armenian media market, most print media in Armenia have open and
diverse (often radical) political stance. In particular, in the
course of the current election campaign the newspaper stances diverge
dramatically, primarily as concerns the candidacies of the Prime
Minister and the First President. The indicator of references to
Sargsian and Ter-Petrosian, as quoted above, proves that when
addressing the press coverage of these two politicians, the authors
of `What Newspaper Write About’ program display extreme bias.

The First Channel of the Public Television of Armenia, similarly to
the previous ten days, displayed the balance required by law only in
distribution of the airtime, but not in the nature of candidate
coverage (this concerns again Serge Sargsian and Levon
Ter-Petrosian). During the 20 days of pre-election promotion studied
the Prime Minister was referred to in positive context 32 times and
in negative context – 3 times. The First President has 27 negative
references and none – positive. The contrast on Public Radio of
Armenia is a little milder: here Sargsian’s balance of connotational
references for 20 days is 14-0, while that of Ter-Petrosian is 0-16.
In October-December 2007 the Public Radio was, on the contrary, more
unbalanced. The special approach to the coverage of these two
politicians on the Public Radio stands out also against the fact that
the remaining candidates throughout the 20 days of pre-election
promotion were mentioned solely in neutral context. On the First
Channel of the Public Television, too, seven other candidates
received few connotational references: throughout the ten days
(January 31 – February 9, 2008) only 3% of the total number of their
references had connotational coloring. For Ter-Petrosian this figure
made 28%, and for Sargsian – 18.8%. The figures quoted show that the
journalists of the Public TV and Radio Company have the skills of
impartial reporting, but do not always use them.

Similarly to the previous monitoring stages, this trend of coverage
of Serge Sargsian and Levon Ter-Petrosian that has probably become
the main specialty of the current election campaign, was displayed in
the work of all broadcast media studied, except for `Yerkir Media’,
during the past ten days, too. On this TV channel both the Prime
Minister and the First President have a negative balance of
connotational references for the 10 days.

During the pre-election promotion another similarity in the news
policy of the seven TV channels studied has been recorded: they all
air reports about the pre-election events of Serge Sargsian one day
after they had been held, while the rallies of the other candidates
are covered, as a rule, on the same day. In this case, too, the
coverage of the election campaign by `Yerkir Media’ TV channel is
somewhat out of the trend: here the events of Sargsian appear on the
air quite irregularly, but are still broadcast the next day. Hence,
the monitoring group is induced to reiterate its hypothesis about a
coordinated (or directed) policy of covering election campaigns in
Armenia by most of the leading broadcast media.

The Public Radio of Armenia (35,178 sec.) and `Kentron’ (30,981
sec.), similarly to the preceding decade, paid the most attention to
the election-related subjects. These are followed by `ALM’ (30,276
sec.), `Yerkir Media’ (26,802 sec.) and the Second Armenian TV
Channel (26,581 sec.). The least attention to the elections was paid
by `Shant’ (21,310 sec.) and `Armenia’ (20,113 sec.) TV channels.

SIMILARLY TO THE PREVIOUS TEN DAYS, the involvement of presidency
candidates (and the representatives of their election headquarters)
in the discussion programs of the media studied remained low. Despite
the heat of the pre-election promotion, on eight channels during the
ten days candidates or their representatives took part in such
programs only 28 times, less than on January 21-30, 2008 (36 times).
Here it should be noted that the monitoring group did not take into
account the interviews of the candidates on the air of Public Radio
as these were broadcast before 17.00, i.e., the time when the
editorial coverage was not studied. As it follows from discussions of
this issue with media representatives, the reason for this is not so
much the reluctance of broadcasters to invite the candidates, but
rather the unreadiness of some politicians to engage in public
dialogue.

The rarest participants of `guest in studio’ programs were Serge
Sargsian (2 times in 20 days after the launch of the pre-election
promotion) and Levon Ter-Petrosian (3 times) – or, rather, in all
these cases, these were not they themselves, but their
representatives. The greatest openness during the same period was
displayed by Tigran Karapetian (11 programs, 5 of them being on `ALM’
TV channel), Vahan Hovhannesian and Vazgen Manukian (9 each), Arman
Melikian, Artur Baghdasarian and Artashes Geghamian (8 each), Aram
Harutiunian (6). Similarly to the previous stages of monitoring, the
broadcast media were little interested in the opinion of those
Armenian NGOs, who observe various aspects of electoral process.

AS CONCERNS the pre-election promotional materials (political
advertising), the monitoring gives no ground to speak about any
obstruction for them on the channels studied. All candidates use the
free air they are entitled to the First Channel of the Public
Television. By the results of the 20 days studied, the leader for the
aggregate (on all 8 channels) volume of promotional materials is
Vahan Hovhannesian (30,052 paid and free seconds), followed by Artur
Baghdasarian (18,129 sec.) and Levon Ter-Petrosian (18,075 sec.).
Serge Sargsian was only the fourth by this indicator (16,011 sec.).
Three of the candidates listed (except Artur Baghdasarian) reduced
the number of promotional materials during January 31 – February 9 as
compared to the previous ten days (January 21-30).

The paid air of the First Channel of the Public Television was the
most attractive for the candidates during the second decade, too. It
is followed by `Armenia’, `ALM’, `Shant’, Second Armenian TV Channel,
`Yerkir Media’, `Kentron’. The least attractive of all was the air of
the Public Radio.

JANUARY 31, 2007 – FEBRUARY 9, 2008

Mail & Guardian Online, South Africa
Feb 15 2008

When East is West

Nobel laureate Orhan Pamuk has faced criminal charges and even death
threats in his native Turkey, yet he refuses to be disillusioned
about the country’s future, he tells Maya Jaggi

hen Orhan Pamuk received his Nobel prize for literature in December
2006, he was praised for making Istanbul `an indispensable literary
territory, equal to Dostoevsky’s St Petersburg, Joyce’s Dublin or
Proust’s Paris’. Yet it was while visiting New York in the 1980s that
Pamuk found his voice.

Fuelled by a longing for his native city, he had a kind of epiphany
and came to a belated `fascination with the wonders of Ottoman,
Persian, Arab and Islamic culture’.

His fiction recovers worlds largely ignored since Ataturk founded the
secular republic in 1923 on the ruins of a defeated empire. But the
recovery comes with a postmodern twist — Sufi poetry read through
the prism of Jorge Luis Borges and Italo Calvino. Although Pamuk sees
`the East-West divide’ as, certainly for him, an illusion, it colours
his fiction and shapes his characters’ anxieties about tradition and
modernity, authenticity and imitation (copies and doubles recur),
shame and the seeds of nationalist pride. His novels are `made from
these dark materials’.

For the past 200 years, he says, `an immense attempt has been made to
occidentalise Turkey. I believe in that, but once your culture thinks
of itself as weak and tries to copy another, you sense that the
centre is some place else. Being non-Western is the feeling that
you’re at the periphery.’ Yet in his Nobel lecture, My Father’s
Suitcase, Pamuk described how that sense altered as he narrated his
city. `Now Istanbul is the centre,’ he says.

These ideas animate his first book since winning the Nobel, Other
Colours (Faber), translated by Maureen Freely. Shaped as a sequence
of autobiographical fragments, with musings on The Thousand and One
Nights and Tristram Shandy, barbershops and Bosphorus ferries, its
essays elegantly illuminate his life and times.

In August 2005, Pamuk was charged under Article 301 of the penal code
with `public denigration of Turkish identity’ for saying in a Swiss
newspaper interview that `30 000 Kurds and a million Armenians were
killed in these lands and nobody but me dares to talk about it’.
Though the case was dropped in January 2006, and Turkey’s president,
Abdullah Gul, has called for Article 301 to be amended, discussion of
the massacres of 1915-1917 still holds risks.

Yet Pamuk is critical of moves abroad to enforce the recognition of
what happened as a genocide, as in a French assembly vote last year
and the United States Bill approved in October by a congressional
committee, which prompted the recall of Turkey’s ambassador to
Washington.

`The issue is getting to be part of international politics, which I
am upset about,’ he says. `For me, this is first an issue of freedom
of speech in Turkey. We have to be able to talk about this, whatever
one’s opinion on it. The French resolution only made things harder
for the democrats of Turkey. And I don’t want to see Turkey’s
relations with the West destroyed because of the manipulation of this
issue by various governmental bodies.’

After threats from an ultra-nationalist accused of organising the
murder in January of the Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink,
Pamuk spent an extra semester in New York, but declines to call it
exile. `There were death threats from semi-underground
organisations,’ he says. `I’m stubborn — I could have stayed. But
I’m a fiction writer. I didn’t have peace of mind.’

He has bodyguards, but sees the worst as over. `People trashed
intellectuals as betrayers of the country to get votes and prestige
for the army — and it didn’t work.’ In the July elections, `all
these conspiracies did not raise the [pro-army, nationalist] secular
vote, but made the ruling party [the moderate Islamist AKP, which
supports membership of the European Union] even stronger’.

Pamuk was born in Istanbul in 1952 into an `upper-middle-class
Westernised family’ whose fortune had initially come from building
railways. His father was a construction engineer and aspiring poet,
given to absconding. Pamuk sees his elder brother Sevket (an economic
historian) as his `Freudian father — giving me instruction on how to
bow to authority.’

Up until the age of 22, Orhan dreamed of being a painter and studied
architecture, but he dropped out to go to journalism school. At
Istanbul University in the 1970s he had leftwing sympathies and,
after the 1980 coup d’état that presaged military rule by the
Ataturk-inspired nationalists, agonised that `so many prisoners were
being tortured’. But his impulse was to `write beautiful fiction, not
propaganda’.

When in Istanbul, he walks to his office, overlooking the stretch of
water between Europe and Asia, from Pamuk Apartments, the modern
block his family built in the early 1950s. His first reaction to the
Nobel `was to say it would not change my life’. But `it did — I’m
more social. And I’m working even harder.’ One benefit of winning the
prize, he says, is that `all the family made up’: the publication of
Pamuk’s memoir, Istanbul (2003), temporarily `destroyed my
relationship with my mother’, Shekure, who opposed his becoming a
writer, and also led to a breakdown in relations with Sevket, whose
beatings he had described. `Now we’re friendly,’ he says with a
boyish grin. And though he has lived alone since his marriage to the
historian Aylin Turegen ended in 2001, he says his ex-wife and
teenage daughter Ruya `remain my best friends’.

His Istanbul, a `city of ruins and end-of-empire melancholy’, is
mostly taken from the 1950s and 1960s, he says, `the troubled town
that turned inward, that learned from history not to aspire to much.
It’s the same for my characters; they feel second-rate, secondary to
the West.’ His early, untranslated novels, Cevdet Bey and His Sons
(1982) and The Quiet House (1983), were family sagas, modelled on
Dostoevsky, Tolstoy and Thomas Mann.

But he turned to 17th-century Constantinople in The White Castle
(1985), a tale of confused identities between a Venetian Christian
slave and the Ottoman master who looked like him. Wherever `a
non-Western culture wants to be occidentalised — or `globalised’ —
the question of authenticity arises’, Pamuk says. `It’s a social
inevitability, but you blame yourself; you live it personally.’ To be
a writer `is to acknowledge the secret wounds we carry inside us’,
sharing our secret shame to `bring about our liberation’.

At the heart of fiction lies a unique human talent to identify with
the pain, pleasure, joy, boredom of others. Once you base your art on
that, you’re political. As he writes in an essay: `The history of the
novel is a history of human liberation. By putting ourselves in
another’s shoes, by using our imagination to shed our identities, we
are able to set ourselves free.’ — © Guardian News & Media Ltd 2008

LATE CONGRESSMAN LANTOS HAD STORMY RELATIONSHIP WITH TURKEY
Umýt Enginsoy

Turkish Daily News
Feb 13 2008
Turkey

The only Holocaust survivor in Congress had voted for and against
‘Armenian genocide’ resolutions at different times

In his long career in the U.S. House of Representatives’ Foreign
Affairs Committee, either as the panel’s chairman or senior Democratic
member, Tom Lantos several times had to deal with resolutions calling
for U.S. recognition of World War I-era killings of Armenians in the
Ottoman Empire as genocide, winning Turkish officials’ admiration
and invoking ire at different times.

Lantos, 80, died Monday at Maryland’s Bethesda Naval Hospital near
Washington from cancer of the esophagus.

When the House panel, then called the International Relations
Committee, took up a genocide resolution in October 2000, Lantos
stood against the argument that the Armenian deaths amounted to
genocide. His staunch defense of the pro-Turkish position made him
a hero in the eyes of many Turkish officials.

The resolution passed the committee but was stopped on the floor
when then President Bill Clinton made a last-minute personal appeal
against its endorsement.

A similar legislation came to the same committee in September 2005,
but this time Lantos’ position was different.

Championing Israel’s interests in the U.S. Congress, Lantos was
frustrated by what he saw as moves by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip
Erdoðan’s government for rapprochement with Iran and Syria, top
adversaries of the United States and the Jewish state in the Middle
East.

Changing positions:

Lantos this time said he still did not believe that the Armenian
killings constituted genocide, but that he would support the resolution
to punish Turkey. Passing the committee, the bill failed to reach a
House floor vote.

Then came a visit by Khaled Mashaal, top leader of the radical Hamas
group in Palestine, a sworn enemy of Israel, to Turkey in early 2006,
increasing Lantos’ anger with the Erdoðan government.

In October last year, the third attempt in the past nine years for
the passage of a genocide resolution reached the same House panel’s
agenda. Following the Democratic Party’s landslide victory in the
November 2006 congressional elections, Lantos this time was chairman
of the panel, renamed the Foreign Affairs Committee.

At the time Ankara warned that any congressional recognition of the
genocide claim would likely lead to the curbing of bilateral military
ties with the United States, hurting U.S. operations in Iraq.

Speaking at the markup hearing on the resolution, Lantos said he was
torn between a need to recognize a "historical fact" and an urge to
protect U.S. soldiers in Iraq. Still the Turks hoped that he would
oppose the resolution in a final panel vote, but to their huge dismay,
he voted for it.

Turkish diplomats voiced their shock and disbelief, and Egemen Baðýþ,
a leading parliamentary deputy from Turkey’s ruling party, criticized
Lantos, saying his understanding of history was changing with time.

The bill once again passed the committee but did not come to a
floor vote.

Lantos announced in early January that he had cancer and would not
seek a 15th term in the November polls. But nearly a month later he
died. Despite some bitter memories, Turkish diplomats were saddened
by the death of a former ally, with Turkish Ambassador to Washington
Nabi Þensoy sending a message of condolences to Lantos’ widow, Annette.

The Armenian National Committee of America and the Armenian Assembly
of America, the two largest U.S. Armenian groups, have also said that
their community was mourning the congressman’s death.

–Boundary_(ID_fTfRV+sqD84Jgo09udbCSg)–

ARMENIAN MINISTER DENIES EX-PRESIDENT’S ALLEGATIONS OVER KARABAKH SETTLEMENT

Mediamax
Feb 13 2008
Armenia

Yerevan, 13 February: Armenian Foreign Minister Vardan Oskanyan
has described as "immoral" the behaviour of presidential candidate
Levon Ter-Petrosyan, who speculates in the process of the election
campaign with the use of the so-called "Meghri variant" of the Karabakh
settlement. The Armenian foreign minister said this on the Shant TV
channel late on 12 February.

"What Ter-Petrosyan is doing is a cheap pre-election trick, this is
immoral. And when he tries to relate his statements to the terrorist
act in the Armenian parliament [in October 1999], it becomes clear
to me that Ter-Petrosyan will stop at nothing, and we will yet have
the chance to make sure of that," Vardan Oskanyan said.

The minister stressed that the document, which was published last
week by Haykakan Zhamanak newspaper and which Levon Ter-Petrosyan
referred to during his latest rally, has never been a topic of the
settlement negotiation.

"The idea of exchanging Meghri for Nagornyy Karabakh belongs to retired
US diplomat Paul Gobble, the roots of which are in the early 1990s. I
clearly remember that in 1994 the given idea was discussed with the
participation of Armenian President Levon Ter-Petrosyan, who stated at
one of the meetings that the proposal could be interesting if Armenia
also gained the north part of Naxcivan [Azerbaijani exclave]. However,
I do not contend that Ter-Petrosyan was ready to exchange Meghri for
Nagornyy Karabakh, do I," Vardan Oskanyan said.

The foreign minister said that in the course of 10 years of
[incumbent Armenian President] Robert Kocharyan’s rule, the OSCE
Minsk Group co-chairs [Russia, USA and France who mediate a solution
to the Nagornyy Karabakh conflict] made three official proposals
on the settlement: the "common state" conception; the plan which
was discussed in Key West; and the latest proposal based on the
"Prague principles". "I declare with all responsibility that in
neither of those proposals there is any notion of handing Meghri over
to Azerbaijan. Being the chief negotiator from the Armenian side,
I never held such talks," Vardan Oskanyan stressed.

According to the foreign minister, in various periods of time, various
plans appeared on the settlement, the authors of which were independent
states or groups of people. "I have many such proposals in my box, but
this does not mean that all of them became topics for negotiations,"
Vardan Oskanyan said. He made it clear that the document which Levon
Ter-Petrosyan refers to is a proposal belonging to this very category.

"The Armenian side repulsed with such determination all the
conversation on Meghri that after 2000 no-one dared to put forward
this topic anymore," the Armenian foreign minister said.

Vardan Oskanyan flatly denied statements alleging that on the eve
of the terrorist act in the Armenian parliament in 1999 there was
discord among the leadership of the country on the Karabakh issue.

"There was nothing of that kind, and I very well know what the
relationship between Robert Kocharyan and Vazgen Sarkisyan [former
Armenian prime minister who was killed in the parliament attack]
was like. I believe that it is time to let the dead in peace and hold
discussions among living people," the Armenian foreign minister noted
with bitterness.

SASUN MIKAYELIAN REMOVED FROM REPUBLICAN PARTY OF ARMENIA

Noyan Tapan
Feb 13, 2008

YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 13, NOYAN TAPAN. Late in the evening of February
12 it was unanimously decided in the sitting of the executive body
of the Republican Party of Armenia to remove Sasun Mikayelian, an MP
of the RA National Assembly and member of the RPA Board, from the
Republican Party of Armenia "on the occasion of not having carried
out the decision of the congress of the party and violation of the
RPA Regulations". The executive body also condemned the political line
of action of non-party Miasnik Malkhasian and Hakob Hakobian, members
of the parliamentarian faction of the Republican Party of Armenia.

It should be mentioned that the above-mentioned people declared at
the February 9 rally about supporting Levon Ter-Petrosian, the first
President of the Republic of Armenia and a candidate running for
presidency, in the forthcoming elections.

VAZGEN MANUKIAN CONSIDERS THAT NO PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE HAS FORMED TEAM

Noyan Tapan
Feb 11, 2008

YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 11, NOYAN TAPAN. No matter who is elected RA
President, Vazgen Manukian, the Chairman of the National Democratic
Union, RA presidential candidate, will not agree to work with
him. Stating this at the February 11 press conference, the latter
also explained that he held various posts under Levon Ter-Petrosian,
as he worked with his team. However, in his opinion, no presidential
candidate has a formed team at present.

Touching upon the provisions of his preelection program concerning
the economic sphere, V. Manukian said that it is envisaged to carry
out indexation of consumer prices once every three months. Armenia’s
economy is divided among oligarches sponsored by the authorities
and dozens of thousands of small and medium-sized enterprises has
suffered much in consequence of the amendments made to the RA law On
Simplified Tax.

According to the amendments, if a company’s annual circulation exceeds
50m drams, it cannot work with a simplified tax. V. Manukian said
that they propose making 50m drams 100m drams to encourage small and
medium-sized entrepreneurship.

V. Manukian said that liquidation of monopolies will be possible only
after the adoption of a new Constitution, as well as after judicial
system’s being really independent.

The presidential candidate did not deny that some businessmen also
support him during the election campaign, but did not wish to publicize
their names.