KAREN MOVSISYAN SHARED THE 2ND TO 4TH PLACES IN AN INTERNATIONAL CHESS TOURNAMENT IN SPAIN
armradio.am
20.12.2007 17:41
Armenian Grand Master Karen Movsisyan, who currently resides in Spain,
gained 7 points from 9 possible and shared the 2nd to 4th positions un
the international chess tournament held in the Spanish city of Granada.
Serbian Grad Master Branto Damianovich became the winner of the
tournament with 7.5 points.
PACE, OSCE PA, EP AND CIS IPA INVITED TO OBSERVE RA PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION
PanARMENIAN.Net
18.12.2007 16:24 GMT+04:00
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ December 18, Armenian National Assembly Speaker
Tigran Torosian sent invitations to PACE, OSCE PA, European Parliament
and CIS Interparliamentary Assembly to observe the Armenian
presidential elections due on February 18, 2008, the RA NA press
office said.
With completing registration on December 6, the RA CEC announced
that the essential documents were submitted by National Consent party
leader Aram Harutyunyan, RA NA former speaker, Orinats Yerkir party
leader Artur Baghdassaryan, National Unity party leader Artashes
Geghamyan, ALM Holding president, chairman of People’s Party of
Armenia Tigran Karapetyan, chairman of the National Democratic Union
Vazgen Manukyan, RA NA vice speaker, ARF Dashnaktsutyun Bureau member
Vahan Hovhannisian, RA Prime Minister, RPA chairman Serge Sargsyan
and Armenia’s first President Levon Ter-Petrosyan.
UKRAINIANS AND GREEKS INTEND TO SUPPORT CANDIDACY OF SERZH SARGSYAN AT PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION
arminfo
2007-12-14 13:32:00
ArmInfo. The Ukrainians and Greeks, living in Armenia, intend to
support the candidacy of RA Prime Minister, leader of the Republican
party of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan at the forthcoming presidential
election.
As Head of the Federation of Ukrainians of Armenia Yavir Romania said
at today’s press-conference in "Tesaket" club, the Ukrainians intend
to vote for the one "who works. I do not understand – the former
Prime Minister and Defense Minister of Armenia Vazgen Manukyan run
for the president again. He has already shown, when taking these
positions, that he cannot work, he better does his direct business,
that is, teaching mathematics. No theatre worked in a period of
Levon Ter-Petrosyan’s presidency, and all the representatives of
the national minorities were living the country, while now, there
is space for placement of showbills as the number of performances is
great. "We stand for the power, for Serzh Sargsyan" , Y. Romania said.
For his part, Head of Union of public organizations of Greeks, living
in Armenia, Arkady Khitarov said that a session of the Union Board will
be held on December 16, which will officially announce the name of the
candidate to be supported by the Greeks living in Armenia. "However,
I can say even now that this will be RA Prime Minister, leader of
Republican party of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan", Khitarov said.
ARMENIA DOES NOT REGARD AZERBAIJAN AS ‘ENEMY" COUNTRY, DEFENSE MINISTER SAYS
ARMENPRESS
Dec 14, 2007
YEREVAN, DECEMBER 14, ARMENPRESS: Armenia’s defense minister Mikael
Harutunian said today the country’s military doctrine has no provision
about an ‘enemy country."
Speaking to reporters after a parliament hearing on the country’s
military doctrine, the minister said Armenia’s relations with
neighboring Azerbaijan are strained because of the Nagorno-Karabakh
conflict, but he added that Armenia’s clear-cut position is that
this and other problems must be settled peacefully and only through
negotiations.
Minister’s remarks came in response to a request to comment on a
provision in Azerbaijan’s military doctrine which describes Armenia as
‘an enemy country."
"I have always said that war will not resolve the Karabakh issue… We
are sure that sooner or later this conflict will be settled at the
negotiations table,’ the minister said.
The Armenian minister also recalled a statement by his Azeri
counterpart, Safar Abiyev who said in late November that the
possibility of a new war in Karabakh was close to 100 percent.
"Negotiations are certainly the best way to solve the conflict to
give the people of Nagorno-Karabakh what they want to have,’ he said.
He said NATO experts criticized Azerbaijan’s military doctrine for a
provision that calls for use of force ‘to liberate’ Nagorno-Karabakh
given the failure of peaceful negotiations.
HRANT DINK – WORLD PRESS FREEDOM HERO
AZG Armenian Daily
13/12/2007
Director of International Press Institute Johan P. Fritz handed over
the award of International Press Institute to Hrant Dink’s widow
Rakel Dink at a ceremony in Vienna.
International Press Institute honored Hrant Dink with the title of
World Press Freedom Hero.
"Hrant Dink’s nomination as our 52nd World Press Freedom Hero is a
tribute to his bravery, but also an acknowledgement of his significant
contribution to freedom of expression and press freedom in Turkey,"
announced Johan P. Fritz.
The Director of International Press Institute mentioned that 91
journalists have been murdered in the world since the beginning
of 2007.
AREVIK WELCOMED AT THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY
armradio.am
13.12.2007 12:45
Speaker of RA National Assembly Tigran Torosyan received the little
singers of the Arevik ensemble of the Public Television and Radio
Company of Armenia. The meeting was attended by the Chairwoman of
the National Assembly Standing Committee on Science, Education,
Culture and Youth Affairs Hranush Hakobyan and Executive Director of
the Public Radio of Armenia Armen Amiryan.
Congratulating the children on the brilliant success at the Junior
Eurovision Song Contest 2007 in Rotterdam, Speaker Tigran Torosyan
awarded a diploma of the National Assembly to the ensemble and gifts
to the eight singers.
The President of the National Assembly said Arevik’s wonderful
performance on the European stage was important from several
perspectives.
First, the name of Armenia was voiced many times and the Armenian
flag flew high on the European stage. Besides, the Armenian song was
loved and the childish spirit was preserved.
Although Arevik’s victory was conditioned also by the support of
Diaspora Armenians, Speaker Tigran Torosyan assured that the success
was achieved primarily due to Arevik and the people working with
the children.
According to the Speaker’s assessment, such achievements inspire our
citizens and help us move forward overcoming all the difficulties,
and years later the members of Arevik will be proud to have made
their contribution to the development of the Republic of Armenia.
Chairwoman of the National Assembly Standing Committee on Science,
Education, Culture and Youth Affairs Hranush Hakobyan also
congratulated the children for the "sunny victory" and handed prizes
on behalf of the Committee.
Director of the Public Radio Armen Amiryan, who visited Rotterdam
with Arevik, expressed gratitude to the National Assembly Speaker
for reception, assuring that the children who granted Armeniansun
to cold Europe will remember this meeting for a long time. As a sign
of gratitude to the Parliament Speaker, Arevik presented the CD with
their songs to Mr. Torsyan.
KOSOVO’S INDEPENDENCE WILL STIR UP TROUBLE. WHO WILL BENEFIT?
John Laughland
Brussels Journal
D ec 13 2007
Belgium
Perhaps the most striking things about the impending declaration of
independence about Kosovo is that is happening at all. Why should
the Kosovo Albanians be striving for independence from Belgrade
now, since there has been peace in the province for eight years
(interrupted only in 2004, when a mob of Albanians killed 25 Serbs)
and since the regime in Serbia, of which the Kosovo Albanians are
citizens, has been democratic and pro-European since 2000?
Why, indeed, did the Kosovo Albanians spend the whole of the first part
of the 1990s in peace, when the rest of Yugoslavia was in flames? If
their desire for independence had really been so intense as their
national propaganda claims, then surely the time to act would have
been when the Yugoslav federation was collapsing in 1992-1992, or
during the Bosnian civil war of 1992-1995.
For that matter, why did the Albanians inside Serbia, who are in
the majority in the area around the Southern towns of Presevo and
Bujanovac, start their attacks there in 2001, a year after the fall of
Slobodan Milo~Zeviæ’s fall from power, whereas they had been left in
peace during the civil war between Serbs and Albanians in neighbouring
Kosovo in 1998-1999?
None of this seems to make any sense.
One thing is certain: the Kosovo Albanians would not have threatened
to declare independence if they were not certain that they would
receive diplomatic recognition from the United States and most European
states. The Kosovo leadership (which means the leadership of the Kosovo
Liberation Army, the guerrilla force whose head, Hashim Thaci, is now
the "Prime Minister" of Kosovo) has very close ties to the West. Thaci
famously kissed Madeleine Albright during the Kosovo war of 1999 and
also visited Tony Blair at Number 10; one of his predecessors as Prime
Minister, Ramush Haradinaj, who has since been indicted by The Hague
for war crimes, is known as a major CIA asset.
No doubt the Kosovo Albanians have some claim to independence,
although it is notable how seldom they refer to the persecution of
which they were supposedly the victims in 1999 under Milo~Zeviæ. This
is no doubt because everyone knows that those claims of genocide bore
as much relation to reality as did the claim made in 2002-2003 that
there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Indeed, the charge
of genocide turned out to be so unsustainable that it was never even
included in the indictment against Milo~Zeviæ.
The loss of Kosovo by Serbia would be a terrible blow to the values of
Christian civilisation, since that region is itself a symbol of the
victory over the European spirit over the superior military force of
Islam, having been the scene of Serbia’ historic battle against the
Turks in 1389. The province contains some of the jewels of European
architecture, the monasteries of Peæ, Deèani and Graèanica.
But the truth is that the new battle of Kosovo was lost a long time
ago, when the Serbs, like most Europeans, stopped having babies
while the Albanians, like many other Muslim peoples, continued having
them – and at a vast rate. The demographic battle having been lost,
there is very little the government in Belgrade can do now to halt
the inevitable.
Worse, perhaps, is the effect which the independence of this small
province will have on the region and the wider world. The anger of
Bosnian Serbs is inflamed by the West’s double-standards. While it
demands autonomy and now secession for the Kosovo Albanians, it is
pushing ever greater centralisation and curtailment of autonomy in
neighbouring Bosnia-Herzegovina. The Serbs there have been told they
must never hold a referendum on independence from Bosnia, while the
EU-back "High Representative" is determined to abrogate what remains
of the autonomy of Republika Srpska. Independence for Kosovo will,
in all likelihood, lead to the fragmentation of the artificial and
largely bogus state of Bosnia-Herzegovina.
But the double-standards are not confined to the Balkans. The
narrative in Cyprus is almost identical to that in Kosovo: a Muslim
population there, the Turks, was the subject of persecution by
its Orthodox co-nationals, the Greeks, until they were protected
by military intervention according to international law: Turkey
invaded Cyprus in 1974 and invoked the terms of the 1960 Treaty
of Guarantee (between Britain, Turkey and Greece) which guaranteed
the constitution of Cyprus. Yet Northern Cyprus (the Turkish part)
has been the victim of an embargo and international isolation ever
since then, an international pariah while Kosovo’s leaders are the
toast of the world’s chancelleries.
The same goes for Transnistria. Transnistria is a small sliver of
land along the left bank of the Dniestr river, North-West of Odessa.
When the Romanian province of Bessarabia was illegally annexed by the
Soviet Union in 1940, according to the terms of the secret protocol
of the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, Transnistria became part of the
Soviet Socialist Republic of Moldova. It had never before in history
been governed from the Moldovan capital, Chiºinãu, and most of its
inhabitants speak Russian. The Soviet Union started to collapse in 1990
precisely when Moscow admitted, after years of denial, the existence
of the secret protocol to the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact and this led to
the secession of the Baltic states and, eventually, the dissolution
of the USSR itself. Transnistria naturally said that its incorporation
into Moldova was as illegal as Moldova’s incorporation into the Soviet
Union and demanded independence. Although it has indeed been de facto
independent since 1992, the West has consistently told it that it
will not allow it to secede from Moldova. Ditto for Nagorno-Karabakh
(formally part of Azerbaijan, populated now exclusively by Armenians),
South Ossetia (part of Georgia but culturally linked to North Ossetia,
which is inside Russia) and Abkazia (also part of Georgia but de
facto independent since 1992).
Encouraging independence for Kosovo will only re-ignite the
conflict which has been basically frozen there since 1999, as well
as the similarly frozen conflicts in the Balkans, in Moldova and the
Caucasus. What is the point of this when the other option is to let
sleeping dogs lie? Does someone have an interest in causing trouble?
The only common denominator in all these various conflicts, indeed,
is attitudes to Russia. Russia supports Serbia on Kosovo and Bosnia;
it is broadly supportive of Transnistria and the other non-recognised
states on the territory of the former Soviet Union (although it has
done little concrete to help them). Any trouble in these area is
trouble for Moscow in its own backyard, which President Putin told
me in September is the last thing he wants. Maybe that is why the
West is determined to provoke it.
–Boundary_(ID_WwV1B/1u5xrorAoh1pH51Q)–
TURKEY ACCUSES EU OF SUPPORTING KURDISH REBELS
Yerkir
12.12.2007 15:14
YEREVAN (YERKIR) – Turkey’s military command has accused certain EU
countries, in particular France and the U.K., of acting in a way that
supports Kurdish militants.
Turkey, a NATO member with European Union membership aspirations,
has long sought to put an end to attacks from northern Iraq carried
out by militants from the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).
"The position of and actions by a number of EU countries, including
our allies, enable the terrorist organization [PKK] to look for new
bases for operations," said Gen. Ergin Saygun, deputy chief of the
Turkish General Staff.
He said that although the EU had recently taken "encouraging steps in
standing up to the PKK," the group’s representatives and sympathizers
"are conducting propaganda campaigns in the European parliament,
as well as in the French and U.K. parliaments."
"Providing support to separatists, including in activities such as
these, is tantamount to sharing responsibility with the terrorists
for material damages caused to Turkey, and for the deaths of people
in its fight against terrorism."
On November 30, Turkey’s government authorized the military to conduct
a cross-border operation against Kurdish separatists in northern Iraq,
following parliament’s approval in mid-October.
The country has deployed about 100,000 troops on the border with Iraq,
according to army sources.
The PKK, labeled by the U.S., NATO and the EU as a terrorist
organization, has been fighting for autonomy status in southeast
Turkey for nearly 25 years. The conflict has so far claimed about
40,000 lives, RIA Novosti reports.
A JOINT ARMENIAN-GREEK STAMP TO BE SIMULTANEOUSLY ISSUED IN YEREVAN AND IN ATHENS
armradio.am
12.12.2007 15:04
As part of its objectives of strengthening collaboration between
Armenia and Greece, and fulfilling the decision of the Hellenic –
Armenian Joint Intergovernmental Commission, the Greek Embassy and
HayPost will hold a special celebration on Friday, November 14.
The Greek Chargé d’Affaires, Mr. Alekos Ikonomopoulos in collaboration
with HayPost, will be welcoming special Armenian and international
guests to the Embassy for a special cultural program.
To symbolize the long-standing relationship between the two nations,
HayPost and ELTA (Hellenic Post) will be issuing a joint Armenian-Greek
stamp simultaneously in Yerevan and in Athens. This joint-stamp will
be issued and circulated during the Armenian-Greek event on Friday.
This joint issue represents the famous statues of Goddesses Aphrodite
and Anahit – the primarily female goddesses in both nations’ mythology.
"We are very proud and excited that HayPost has played a primary role
in substantiating the friendship between these two ancient nations,"
stated Hans Boon, Director General of HayPost. "We trust that this
joint issue encourages not only political and business collaborations,
but encourages the general public to appreciate this as well."
The Greek Chargé d’Affaires, Mr. Ikonomopoulos expressed his
satisfaction for the existing exceptional bilateral relations between
Armenia and Greece, and praised the contribution of Hellenic Post
and HayPost for underlying the secular historical ties between the
two nations.
As of January 2007, the government transferred to HayPost CJSC the
exclusive right to issue postal stamps in Armenia, as the official
national postal operator in Armenia.
–Boundary_(ID_rXu3CGdjyuWAi05XfhkEFg)–
NOT ALL CANDIDATES FOR PRESIDENCY ARE GUIDED BY PRINCIPLE OF PRESERVATION OF STATEHOOD, ARAM HAROUTIUNIAN SAYS
Noyan Tapan
Dec 11 2007
YEREVAN, DECEMBER 11, NOYAN TAPAN. Aram Haroutiunian, the Chairman
of the National Consent party, who is a candidate for presidency,
considers that though the official election campaign has not been
launched yet, "the preelection marathon resembles a fight without
rules." Such a situation, in his words, does not contribute to holding
of democratic elections, as "if the game has no rules, the audience
wishes to see blood without fail."
A. Haroutiunian stated at the December 12 press conference that not all
candidates for presidency are guided by the principle of preservation
of the statehood, and some of them are ready for everything to come
to power. He said that since 1991 up to present he has been the
opponent of first RA President Levon Ter-Petrosian, in particular,
in the issue of settlement of the Nagorno Karabakh conflict. And
in response to the question of in what issue he does not agree with
the other main candidate, RA Prime Minister and RPA Chairman Serge
Sargsian, A. Haroutiunian stated: "I am against his team."
Explaining what hopes he has this time, after receiving few votes in
the previous presidential elections, A. Haroutiunian said that as a
result of elections’ falsification, last time the votes received by
him were "brotherly distributed among pro-governmental and opposition
forces."
According to him, in the 2003 parliamentary elections the National
Consent party received as much votes as the Armenian National Movement,
and ANM can nominate L. Ter-Petrosian’s candidature "in the disguised
way," while the National Consent party, "which is not discredited and
has no faults, has an absolute moral right" to nominate its candidate.
By the way, A. Haroutiunian said that he had managed to get the sum
of pledge necessary for his candidature’s registration with great
difficulty.
He said that no oligarch has financed the National Consent party and
the party has received the necessary sum from ordinary citizens."