Author: Khoyetsian Rose

Several people have been shot dead in a shooting at a shopping centre in the German city of Munich, police say, the BBC reports.

A big operation is under way. Police are telling people to stay at home and avoid the streets.

Several people have also been injured at the shopping centre in the north-western Moosach district.

Reports speak of one or more attackers. Some shopworkers are reportedly unable to leave the building.

There is no information about a possible motive for the attack.

The security forces have been on alert after a teenage migrant stabbed and injured five people on a train in Bavaria on Monday.

The authorities had warned of the danger of further attacks.

 

 

 

The Walk of Fame was opened in front of the Public Radio building today. The alley features the names of the devotees, who have contributed to the establishment and development of Armenian TV and Radio.

Plates with the names of Ohan Duryan, Ofelya Hambardzumyan, Vera Hakobyan, Tigran Naghdalyan, Robert Mavisakalyan, John Kirakosyan, Vache Hovsepyan , Hovhannes Badalyan, Grigor Chalikyan, Zhirayr Avetisyan, Atrmen aAmiryan, Klara Terzyan and other were solemnly opened today.

Ruben Jaghinyan, President of the Council of Public TV and Radio Company and the initiator of the event, assured that the tradition would continue and the names of other devotees would find their place in the Walk of Fame.

“Armenian radio and TV have developed thanks to those people. They serve an example to the younger generation and all those working in the sphere,” Ruben Jaghinyan said in his opening remarks.

“These people have created the 90 and 60 years of history of Armenian radio and television with their devotion. For those, who’re alive it’s a great responsibility,” said Armen Amiryan, Member of the Council of Public TV and Radio Company and a long-time director of the Public Radio of Armenia.

“I’m deeply confident that under the current conditions of development of TV and radio, it’s important to build upon the old traditions.  These plaques are the cuneiform tablets that shape the solid basis, which the future of Armenian television and radio will be built upon,” he added.

 

 

 

The Vatican is strongly denying Turkish claims that Pope Francis has adopted a “mentality of the Crusades” by recognizing the Ottoman-era slaughter of Armenians as “genocide.”

The Vatican spokesman, the Fr. Federico Lombardi, said nothing in Francis’ texts or words during his Armenian trip showed any hostility to Turkey and in fact were infused with calls for Armenia and Turkey to build bridges of peace and reconciliation.

“The pope is not doing Crusades,” he said Sunday in response to a question by . “He has said no words against the Turkish people.”

Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Nurettin Canikli called Francis’ comments “greatly unfortunate” and said they bore the hallmarks of the “mentality of the Crusades.”

“The Divine Liturgy celebrated this morning at the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin was at the top of the ecumenical reality of the Pope’s visit,” teh Vatican Spokesman said.

“We have had several very important ecumenical moments from the beginning of the visit, but today’s liturgy was a sign of ecumenism in the most profound sense. We have experienced the richness of the Armenian liturgical tradition, which is very impressive,” he said.

To sum up the results of the Pope’s three-day visit, Fr. Lombardi said the ecumenical aspect was probably the most important element of the visit.

He stressed the importance of the Pope’s formulation at the end of his speech at the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin. “Now, Your Holiness, in the name of God, I ask you to bless me, to bless me and the Catholic Church, and to bless this our path towards full unity,” the Pope said.

The Vatican Spokesman stressed that during all meetings in Armenia and during yesterday’s Ecumenical Encounter at the Republic Square the Pope expressed his attention, his compassion to all problems in the history of the Armenian nation, and also a great admiration for the culture, the spiritual tradition.

Armenian football fans in Lebanon are backing Germany in this year’s European Championship, reports.

Abboul Al Damouri, an Armenian living in the capital Beirut, says he has supported Germany in the past.

But this year, following Germany’s recognition of the mass killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks 100 years ago as ‘genocide’, he wants to shout his allegiance from the rooftops.

Sounding his horn loudly, he drives through the capital’s busy streets on a bicycle festooned with German flags and colours.

To show their support for Germany in Euro 2016, many residents of the Armenian neighborhood of Burj Hammoud in East Beirut have hung German flags in the streets.

They say it is in gratitude for the German parliament approving a declaration earlier this month recognising the 1915 killings as genocide.

Armenian restaurant owner, Kaburk Jokjokian, is even offering food free of charge to German fans.

Chancellor Angela Merkel’s office hit back Monday at Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in a blistering row over a German parliamentary vote declaring the Ottoman Empire committed genocide against Armenians, Agence France Presse reports.

Erdogan has angrily condemned last week’s vote on the World War I massacres, charging that the 11 German MPs with Turkish roots who backed it supported “terrorism” by the banned Kurdish Workers’ Party (PKK), and demanding “blood tests” to see “what kind of Turks they are.”

Merkel’s spokesman Steffen Seibert Monday said that while Berlin also considers the PKK a terrorist group, “to associate individual members of parliament with terrorism is utterly incomprehensible to us.”

“The resolution was a political initiative that emerged from the midst of the Bundestag, which is a democratically elected, independent organ under our constitution,” Seibert told a regular press conference.

“The Bundestag reached a sovereign decision. That must be respected,” Seibert said, adding that this was the message Merkel had given to the Turkish president.

Erdogan – in a bitter reaction to the vote to recognize the 1915-1916 killings as genocide – singled out German Greens party co-leader Cem Ozdemir, one of the instigators of the resolution passed on June 2.

Ozdemir has been placed under police protection after receiving anonymous death threats.

The Turkish community in Germany – which broadly opposes the genocide vote – nonetheless criticized Erdogan Monday for the pressure his government and its supporters had placed on German lawmakers of Turkish origin.

“We find death threats and demands for blood tests abhorrent,” its chairman Gokay Sofuoglu told national news agency DPA.

“I think the era when people were defined by their blood ended in 1945. This is absolutely out of place.”

Photo: AP

 

Turkey’s parliament will block a deal reached with the EU on migrants if Turks do not gain visa-free access to the bloc, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has warned, the BBC reports.

The EU says Turkey still needs to meet certain conditions, including changes to its terror laws, something Ankara has refused to do.

The agreement aimed at halting the mass movement of people into Europe.

Mr Erdogan has also said funds promised by the EU have not yet been released.

President Serzh Sargsyan attended today the ceremony of unveiling of the statue of the Hero of the USSR, Chief Marshal of the USSR armored troops Hamazasp Babajanian.

The memorial was opened in the public square adjacent to Babajanian Street in Avan administrative district of Yerevan. The memorial was created by the sculptor Hamlet Matinian and architect Michael Missakian. Present at the ceremony were also Minister of Defense Seiran Ohanian, Mayor of Yerevan Taron Margarian, veterans of the WWII, the Commanding General United States Army Europe Lieutenant General Frederick Benjamin Hodges, the Adjutant General of Kansas, the military commander of the Kansas National Guard Major General Lee E. Tafanelli, Military Attachés of foreign states, natives of Chardakhlu residing in Yerevan (Khachisarians), members of the Gardman patriotic union, and other guests.

The President of Armenia laid flowers on the monument and paid tribute to the memory of the great warrior. After the march of the ceremonial guard, the Honorary Citizen of Yerevan, gross master Rafael Vahanian and the Vice Chair of the Armenian Chess Federation Hovik Khalikian handed to President Sargsyan a symbolic gift – chess board which belonged to Marshal Babajanian which was presented by the descendents of the Marshal.

 

During the raid on al-Assad hospital in Deir Ezzor two days ago, ISIS fighters simultaneously seized most of the Deir Ezzor cemetery which is located a few hundred meters south of the hospital,  reports. 

Islamic State’s media outlet Amaq News said 10 government soldiers were killed during skirmishes at the Christian cemetery. Upon entering the cemetery, ISIS militants were quick to pose for pictures, which they sent to Amaq News to publish for propaganda reasons, the sourse says.

Although the provincial capital of Deir Ezzor city is largely Sunni, the city is also home to a large Christian, mostly Armenian minority.

The Christian districts are located in the government controlled western part of the city, while the Sunni suburbs are split between the SAA and ISIS.

Some 100.000 civilians live in government-held areas of Deir Ezzor, facing an ISIS-imposed siege which has caused food prices to rise some 80%. If the Islamic State is to capture Deir Ezzor city entirely from the SAA, the Christians are expected to be massacred of expelled, similar to the scenarios in Raqqa and Mosul.

The Saint Martyrs Armenian Church in Deir Ezzor was destroyed by the Islamic State in September 2014.

The church was built in 1989-1990, and consecrated a year later. A genocide memorial and a museum housing remains of the victims of the genocide was also built in the church compound.

Thousands of Armenians from Syria and neighboring countries were gathering at the memorial every year on April 24 to commemorate the genocide.

Photo: AP

 

More than 30 people were injured when an Etihad Airways flight hit “severe and unexpected turbulence” flying into Indonesia, the airline said.

The flight from Abu Dhabi was about 45 minutes away from Jakarta on Wednesday when the turbulence hit.

The plane, an Airbus A330-200, landed safely after the incident, but 10 people were taken to hospital.

The United Arab Emirates’ national airline told AFP news agency the cabin luggage bins were damaged and passengers said oxygen masks were released during the shaking.

The actions of the Azerbaijani forces are typical of a terrorist, Nazi state, which violates all norms of international humanitarian law, Spokesman for the NKR President David Babayan said, speaking to .

The Azeri forces kept shelling the populated areas in Karabakh, namely the settlements of Martakert and Mataghis, last night, targeting civilian objects, houses and schools.

Babayan noted that the recent bombardment overlapped with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s visit to Baku, which is not a coincidence. “Turkey has always been inspiring Azerbaijan to solve the issue in a military way,” he said.

On the eve Azerbaijan disseminated a provocative letter dated April 14, 2016 at the UN General Assembly and Security Council, where, striving to put the blame on Armenia, it unilaterally denounced the 1994 trilateral ceasefire agreement signed between Azerbaijan, Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenia.

David Babayan says the response of the OSCE Minsk Group should be harsh. As for the actions of the Armenian side, he said “we must show we are constructive and refrain from radical steps.”