Author: Karapetian Hovik

Lynn Journal , MA
May 1 2010

Armenian flag raised at city hall
Friday, April 30, 2010
By Journal Staff

Keeping with her promise to open up city hall to the city’s many and
numerous minorities, Mayor Judith Flanagan-Kennedy last week took part
in raising the Armenian Flag in front of Lynn City Hall.

Last week’s flag raising was especially symbolic as this week marks
the 95th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide.

The Armenian Genocide by the Ottoman Turks was the first great
European genocide of the 20th Century, followed of course by the
extermination of European Jewry by the Nazis in the Holocaust.

`I was especially proud to raise the Armenian Flag,’ said the mayor.

Armenians have suffered in the past and then came back to make many
contributions to American society.

Lynn has a small but vibrant Armenian community which has lived here
since the great days of immigration to America after the genocide.

The genocide is commemorated on April 24 because on that night in
1915, the Turkish government placed under arrest 200 Armenian
community leaders in Constantinople. Hundreds more were apprehended
after that. They were all sent to prison in Anatolia where they were
executed, almost to a person.

Thus began the systematic arrest, deportation and excution of Turkey’s
large Armenian population.

It is estimated that between 1915 and 1923 approximately 1.5 million
Armenians were deported and executed in one of the most bloodthirsty
genocides to have taken place.

Despite overwhelming evidence pointing to Turkish responsibility for
the genocide, the Turks have refused to admit their complicity.

There is presently a bill in the Congress set to be debated
acknowledging the Turkish genocide of the Armenians.

The Turks have threatened retaliation if the bill passes.

Russia and about 15 other European nations including France have
already noted Turkish complicity as the cause of the genocide.

rmenian-flag-raised-at-city-hall/

Soccer match in commemoration of Armenian Genocide to be played in Estonia

May 1, 2010 – 12:55 AMT 07:55 GMT
PanARMENIAN.Net –

A soccer match between Ararat-TTU and Art International teams on May 2
will complete the series of events in Estonia dated to the 95th
anniversary of the Armenian Genocide, miasin.ru reported.

Ararat-TTU will play with black ribbons on their arms, in memory of
1.5 million victims.

`It’s important that famous sportsmen, coaches and actors playing for
the team are not indifferent about this problem,’ said Avetis
Harutyunyan, Ararat-TTU leader.

`The Armenian Genocide is often used as a foreign policy tool. Not
condemned, it entailed a chain of atrocities in various countries
across the globe,’ added Albert Stepanyan, the leader of Art
International. `This game is a tribute to the memory of those killed.
It’s our slogan – Never Again.’

TURKISH-ARMENIAN PROTOCOLS: ANY HOPE LEFT?

Hurriyet
April 30 2010
Turkey

Since the very beginning of its announcement at the end of August 2009,
the reconciliation protocols between Turkey and Armenia have caused
an unending fury among many Armenians and Turks. Some Armenians,
like the Armenian diaspora and ultranationalist political parties,
described them as betrayal for the "Armenian cause." In Turkey, main
opposition political parties and experts spreading similar line of
words saw the protocols as one of the worst foreign policy initiatives
that Turkey has initiated in recent time. Neither were the external
views and policies helpful enough to realize the protocols. They
all have overtly or covertly promoted their own interests in the
reconciliation process between Ankara and Yerevan. No party seems to
be retreat from what they have seen fit for their own interests. Then,
what hope, if any, left for the protocols now?

Hazy Initial Atmosphere

The cloudy atmosphere was telling all in the evening of the Oct. 10,
2009, when the Turkish-Armenian protocols were signed. Nalbandian was
so sullen with what he was signing that his dislike was almost written
on his face. He was said to be against about what Davutoglu had to
utter about the resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh (NK) dispute in
his speech following the signing ceremony. So the compromise with
the push of Lavrov was reached between Nalbandian and Davutoglu,
no speech was made but just handshakes.

As every international agreement requires, at least, first the show of
their good intention from all participating states for the application
of that document, the Turkish-Armenian protocols were actually born
disabled. Rather, it was a kind of document which was outcast from the
very beginning. There is possible few, if any, such an agreement like
the Protocols in international level that doubt of one party was so
vividly displayed just, even seconds, before putting his stamps on it.

It was as if the Protocols were signed for the sake of the presence
of high level international dignitaries- Clinton, Lavrov, Kouchner
and so on, but not for the true conscious of the parties to make it
real on the ground.

This gloomy disposition of the sides towards the Protocols have never
disappeared no matter how many times foreign ministers, prime minister
or the presidents between Turkey and Armenia have met in various
occasions since last October. Respective domestic and international
initiatives and developments have fed the hazy atmosphere on the
Protocols in a way that legalization and then application of them have
left to miracle. But, as everyone knows well, there is no room for
miracle in international relations able to shape inter-state relations.

Remembering Objectives of the Protocols

The protocols on paper aimed at initiating relationship between Turkey
and Armenia by establishing diplomatic relationships and opening the
long-closed borders between the two countries. Beyond that, however,
the main sprit behind starting political and economic rapprochement
was to remove the emotional burdens over Turkey’s and Armenia’s
shoulders caused by the so-called Armenian genocide in 1915 and the
Nagorno-Karabakh dispute between Azerbaijan and Armenia.

However, there was no consensus between Turkish and Armenian
governments on how to address these problems in the Protocols. The
way one party understands the problems in the Protocols has occurred
to be totally conflicted with that of the other side’s. The Protocols
did not make any specific references about what really the "History
Commission" would discuss- whether or how the so called Armenian
genocide crime was committed. Nor did the Protocols include any words
on the Nagorno-Karabakh issue, apart from the joint wish that they
would respect international law and work for the establishment of
peace and stability in the region. Turkey relying on these did insist
that there must be a parallel reconciliation on the Nagorno-Karabakh
problem while it was getting ready to opening its border with Armenia.

Yerevan interpreted this Turkish position as a precondition and so
found unacceptable.

The protocols were also supposed to help reduce the economic misery
Armenia has since independence faced, and give to it more trade and
political opportunities in regional and international levels.

Conventional logic suggested that Armenia, destined to be heavily
dependent on economic and political wishes of Russia and Iran, could
easily reach out Turkish and European economic and social markets.

Interdependent relations through strong economic cooperation between
Turkey and Armenia were thought then to lead to the development of much
healthier relations between them and in the region. Even it was once
again stressed more often after the war between Georgia and Russia
over South Ossetia in August 2008 that Armenia could finally be part
of energy development projects and railway and land road connections
from the Caspian to Europe via Turkey. This vision advocated by
Turkey would work only if Azerbaijan became another partner, but the
Nagorno-Karabakh dispute has prevented such a development.

Fate of the protocols: Agreeing on disagreement

It is true that both sides have still kept the Protocols on the
agendas of their respective parliaments and refrained from abandoning
them totally. Rather, they have frozen the ratification processes
of the documents until an unknown moment in which they felt ready to
re-start all over again. But there seems to be no hope in an immediate
future that they can unfreeze the Protocols so long as they continue
displaying a zero-some-game behavior.

Turkey has been adamant on the Armenian withdrawal of some occupied
Azerbaijani territories. Any deviation from this policy as shown during
the discussions of the protocols would harm Ankara-Baku relationship
and seriously disrupt Turkey’s long effort to deepen its political,
economic and cultural links with Central Asian states.

Nowadays having been more aware of this fact, the Turkish government
seems to have increased its call for the resolution of the NK issue in
return for legalization of the protocols in the Turkish parliament. As
the general election in mid-2011 is nearing, it is highly unlikely
that the Turkish government will put the protocols on the agenda
of the Parliament if there is not an unexpected breakthrough on the
Nagorno-Karabakh issue between Azerbaijan and Armenia during their
bilateral talks or within the framework of the Minsk Group.

Armenian government has on the other hand tied its hands so tight that
it has not only left no room for its own maneuver but also provoked
Turkey to take a hasher stance on the legalization of the Protocols.

Though it could easily leave the so called Armenia genocide issue
to the Armenian Diaspora, Sarkisian did choose to be part of their
argument by taking the Protocols to the Constitutional Court. It
ruled out any effort to make the Nagorno-Karabakh issue on the part
of the interpretation and application of the protocols. It further
decided that the protocols could no form or shape contradict Armenian
state’s official policy of, and long struggle for, the international
recognition of the so called Armenian genocide by international
community.

Sarkisian’s announcement of halting the protocols in the Parliament on
April 22 is not coincidence just two days before the U.S. president
delivered his annual speech on the Armenian issue. Sarkisian blaming
Turkey on their decision aimed to send a message to Obama that he
should not hesitate to use word "genocide" for the sake of a frozen,
if not yet dead, reconciliation document. Thus the timing of, and
reasoning for, Armenia’s halt of the protocols suggests strongly that
Armenian government is and still will act the same way as the Armenian
diaspora has long been acting and wishing for. Then this means that,
in short and medium terms, the Armenian government will likely make no
compromise at all on what job the history commission in the protocols
is going to do.

It is true that there still exists a document called the protocols
between the two sides, and they have not withdrawn from their
parliaments. For developments have shown for last seven months, these
protocols can no longer be counted as the documents that both parties
agreed on, but rather something over which they bitterly contravened.

>From this moment on, if they ever come to a point where they start
talking about how to utilize terms of the protocols is a question
that its answer will be very much provided by the level of will that
respectively Turkish and Armenian governments are able to raise
in their discussions and/or negotiations with Azerbaijan over the
Nagorno-Karabakh issue and Armenian diaspora over the so-called
Armenian genocide.

* Dr. Guner Ozkan is an expert on the Caucasus Region at the
Ankara-based International Strategic Research Organization, or USAK
[email protected]

PEOPLE’S PARTY LEADER WELCOMES THE DECISION TO SUSPEND THE RATIFICATION PROCESS
Alisa Gevorgyan

"Radiolur"
30.04.2010 14:33

Leader of the People’s Party Tigran Karapetyan approves President
Serzh Sargsyan’s decision to suspend the process of ratification of
the Armenian-Turkish protocols. Furthermore, he said to be satisfied
with the regress in the process.

"Today our century-old enemy is trying to deceive us, therefore, I
welcome the regress in the process. Of course, it should be done so as
not to cause harm to the image of the country, but I can understand
the anxiety of today’s authorities," Tigran Karabatyan told a press
conference today.

"The President’s address made it clear that the authorities have
concernsabout the differences between the reality and the documents.

Anyway, we haven’t lost anything. It’s necessary to pay attention
to domestic problems, and continue the process of international
recognition of the Genocide of Armenians. We are on the beam," he said.

GAYANE AVAGYAN: "ISSUES OF MOTHER AND CHILD HEALTH PROTECTION SPHERE CONTINUE BEING ON THE AGENDA"

ARMENPRESS
APRIL 29, 2010
YEREVAN

YEREVAN, APRIL 29, ARMENPRESS: Chief specialist of the mother and child
health protection department of the Armenian Healthcare Ministry Gayane
Avagyan presented in an interview to "Armenpress" the works carried out
in mother and child health protection sphere and the existing issues.

– How will you assess the current situation in the sphere? Are the
most important issues solved?

– We have certain progress but the main issues continue being on the
agenda. I will mention the most important achievements – the number
of women and pregnant women applying to doctors has increased. Today
in our country 91% of pregnant women at least once apply to a doctor
and according to our information 70-72% applies to doctor four and
more times. We consider it a progress, thought it is not enough. The
problem is that we must assess not only the mechanical visits but their
quality as well. For assessing the quality today we have monitoring
indicators – women’s satisfaction from the medicine, pregnancy outcome
– miscarriage, early birth, normal birth, pregnancy process – with
difficulties, without difficulties, their timely prevention, timely
medical assistance. We are working with these indicators, but to say
that they fully present the situation will not be right.

We have great achievement and many painful issues which because of
different reasons are considered still unsolved: for mother and child
health preservation we must work uninterruptedly uniting all possible
state and public forces.

– How are the pre-birth, birth assistance consultations, and medical
assistance mechanisms working?

– For already two years birth assistance certificate system is
functioning. It gives the pregnant women an opportunity to not only
get free pre-birth medical assistance in women consultation but also
give birth without thinking about payments. Women with certificate may
apply to a doctor she prefers, get consultation and birth assistance
at the medical establishment she wants.

– Are there free examinations of certain diseases?

– Today we have cervical carcinoma prevention national program which
is unprecedented in the CIS countries. This gives a woman from 30-60
years old an opportunity to apply to women consultation and pass free
examination. But the number of Armenian women applying for it is very
low. Almost 90% of pregnant women, against 5-6% previously registered,
passes examination for HIV too, thanks to which their infection is
being revealed and its transfer to the fetus is being prevented.

– Which are the most hardly available goals of the sphere according
to the annual report?

– The most painful issue here is the abortion. Firstly, there is
incomplete registration of abortions. International experts say
that the official information in Armenia is thrice small from the
real number: it may also be seen by the demographic health research:
over 47% of pregnancies ends with abortion.

– What is the reason for performing abortion?

– These are mainly unwanted pregnancies. Our women do not like
contraceptives, they use traditional means – interrupted sexual
relation, calendar calculations which are not effective. Before the
fetus becomes 12-week old it is for woman to decide whether to perform
an abortion or not. But we are against abortions in the sense that
in any case it is preferable to use contraceptives.

– Is the opinion that there is no secure abortion for women grounded?

– It is difficult to give assessment. Anyway, unequivocally it would
be more right to use medicine than perform abortion. Today like in
the whole world, here too we are trying to make the drug abortions
more extended. In the standard developed in collaboration with the
World Health Organization and, which will soon be applied, there is a
drug abortion as well. But here we again face the Armenian mentality:
women go to pharmacies, buy tablets and use them without knowing
whether they are good for them and how much to use. No matter how
difficult it is to oversight, we are trying to regulate this sphere.

TURKISH YOUNG PEOPLE PROTEST AGAINST BURNING OF TURKISH FLAG

news.am
April 28 2010
Armenia

A group of nationalist young people in Turkey expressed their protest
against the burning of the Turkish national flag in Yerevan. They
called for solidarity and .laid flowers at the Armenian cemetery
Å~^iÅ~_li in Istanbul.

Members of the Turkish National Student Union (Milli Turk Talebe
Birligi (MTTB)) that gathered at the cemetery carried a banner with
the slogan "Come to your senses, O loyal nation" (Millet-i Sadıka
kendine gel) written in Ottoman Turkish. Omer Onder Haberdar, who
spoke at the meeting, stated that the phrase "loyal nation" applied
exclusively to Armenian in the Ottoman Empire. "True, numerous
tragedies occurred, and we grieve for the victims on both sides. On
the Day in commemoration of the 1915 events in Yerevan nationalists
burned our flag and pictures of our President and Prime Minister. The
problem is not to be resolved in this way," he said.

MTTB Secretary Emrah Atila advised Turkish young people to unite. "The
problem is not to be resolved by burning flags, but by intelligent
people. The two peoples have been living together for hundreds of
years, and they will in the future," he said.

FIRST CHANNEL GOES WORLDWIDE

Tert.am
19:41 27.04.10

>>From April 23, 2010 Public TV Company of Armenia commenced the
retransmission and live-webcast of the programs in the internet. Along
with the satellite broadcast, which covers only the territories
of Europe and North America, our world-spread compatriots have the
opportunity to view the programs of the First Channel at the following
web-link without any territorial
limitations. The web-version of "Ararat" cultural channel is available
at this very URL . According
to the opinion of Public TV Executive Director Mr. Armen Amiryan:
"The web-cast of the programs is important not only in terms of
information has availability, but it has also given our compatriots
the opportunity to follow the news with the eyes of an Armenian viewer.

Internet annihilates the distances and borders."

The official web-site itself will soon be updated and upgraded.

AZERBAIJANI MP CALLS ON TURKEY TO CUT TIES WITH ARMENIA

news.az
April 27 2010
Azerbaijan

Azerbaijan should sell gas to Turkey at a discount price if Ankara
stops all contacts with Yerevan, MP Gudrat Hasanquliyev said in
parliament today.

‘We should sell our gas to fraternal Turkey at discount prices and
ask it to stop air communication with Armenia,’ the chairman of the
opposition United People’s Front Party, Gudrat Hasanquliyev, said at
a plenary session of the Milli Majlis.

Turkey and Azerbaijan have since autumn been negotiating on the price
of Azerbaijani gas sold to Turkey and the terms for the transit of
gas via Turkey to Europe. Turkish Energy Minister Taner Yildiz said
yesterday in Turkey that agreement had been reached on most of the
gas-related issues. In March he had said that political considerations,
and specifically the problem of Armenia, were holding up agreement.

Gudrat Hasanguliyev said ‘Turkey should also stop trade relations
with Armenia.’

Hasanquliyev said a law should be adopted, banning foreign companies
from operating in Azerbaijan if they operated in Armenia.

ARMENIANS GATHER, DELIVER MESSAGE
BY ASHLEY KINDERGAN

The Record
39_Armenians_gather__deliver_message.html
April 26 2010
NJ

NEW YORK – Hundreds of Armenians from North Jersey and beyond gathered
at St. Vartan Cathedral in Manhattan on Sunday to commemorate the
95th anniversary of the Armenian genocide.

Rain forced organizers to move the annual ceremony from its usual
Times Square location, making it more difficult for the community to
draw public attention to their efforts to get the U.S. Congress and
Turkish governments to formally recognize as genocide the events that
began on April 24, 1915, with the killing of more than 200 Armenian
community leaders

"We always want the outside experience, because we have thousands
of people passing by who are non-Armenians," said Hirant Gulian,
a Cliffside Park resident and chairman of a coalition of Armenian
groups that planned Sunday’s commemoration.

Still, Armenians from New York, New Jersey, Philadelphia, Boston and
as far away as California showed up.

Buses brought North Jerseyans from the St. Leon Armenian Church in
Fair Lawn to the church on 34th Street and Second Avenue.

Senators and U.S. Representatives from New York and New Jersey also
showed up, vowing to fight in Congress to pass a resolution formally
recognizing the forced expulsions and killings of an estimated 1.5
million Armenians as genocide.

"To overlook human suffering is not who we are as a people, and it is
not what we stand for as a nation," said Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez,
D-N.J. "What happened from 1915 to 1923 was genocide."

A number of speakers and audience members said recognizing the genocide
is not enough.

They called on the Turkish government to pay reparations to Armenians
for the land and property seized during the forced expulsions of
that era.

"Wrongs should be righted, the fruits of crimes restored," said Ani
Tchaghlasian, a Mahwah resident and board member of the Armenian
National Committee of America’s Eastern Region. "We ask for nothing
more and will accept nothing less."

Mark Geragos, a Los Angeles-based criminal defense attorney, urged the
audience to vote non-supportive politicians out of office and support
legal action against the Turkish government to demand reparations.

Geragos was involved in winning a $37.5 million settlement from New
York Life Insurance and Axa Corp. for life insurance policies held
by Armenians killed in the genocide.

Geragos is part of a team of lawyers now suing Deutsche Bank in a
class-action lawsuit, charging that the bank held Armenian deposits
made before 1915 and held assets seized from Armenians for the
Turkish government.

For many local Armenian-Americans, the events of World War I are
still personal.

Donna Donelian Hortian, a preschool teacher from Paramus, came to the
event wearing photographs of her great-grandparents around her neck.

Vannessa Hortian, her daughter, wore a placard with a 1985 New York
Times article that showed Hortian’s father wearing the same photographs
around his neck at the Times Square rally.

"I’m wearing this to represent five generations of the family,"
Hortian said. "How many more generations will have to march before
Turkey accepts responsibility?"

The Turkish government does not acknowledge the Armenian deaths as
genocide, and referring to them as such is a crime under Turkish law.

The border between the two countries is closed.

Hortian said she got a $325 check out of the class action lawsuit
settlement, but that it didn’t make up for the 28 members of her
father’s family who she said died during the genocide.

"If reparations were to come down the path, that would be wonderful,"
Hortian said. "But personally, I am more toward having history righted
and having Turkey own up to it."

TRAFFIC SUSPENDED IN THE CENTER OF BAKU: ARMENIAN SUPREME PATRIARCH ARRIVED IN BAKU

Panorama.am
13:12 26/04/2010

Society

The traffic in the center of Baku was suspended today at 10:00 in the
morning. The security service in the streets has been doubled. Three
limousines started from Baku airport to Gyulistan Palace where the
summit of spiritual leaders will take place. Totally 55 states attend
the summit.

Turan news agency reported citing its sources that Armenian Supreme
Patriarch Karekin II was in one of those three limousines. Other
guests were also driven in foreign cars but the streets weren’t closed.

Armenian Patriarch’s security was specially committed because
Azerbaijani community may have organized protests against Holy
leader’s arrival.