Author: Madatian Greg

PRESIDNET KOCHARYAN RECEIVED LORI MARZPET

armradio.am
18.10.2007 16:12

Issues related to the socio-economic, healthcare, cultural and
educational programs implemented din Lori Marz were discussed during
President Robert Kocharyan’s working meeting with Lori Marzpet Aram
Kocharyan.

The interlocutors spoke about the progress implemented in the region’s
economy, particularly the opportunities of exploiting the chemical
complex of Vanadzor at full capacity. The Marzpet informed that an
agreement has already been reached with an Indian company on large
volume of exports and progress is observed in expanding the production
of color stones. Reference was made to the process of collection of
community revenues. The Marzpet informed that this year the revenues
were 13% higher as compared to the previous year.

The President showed interest in the process of accomplishment of
urban development programs in the marz, as well as the programs
implemented in rural regions.

Robert Kocharyan gave instructions regarding the issues discussed. The
Marzpet assured Lori will register progress in all spheres.

THREE THEATRICAL FESTIVALS TO BE HELD ALMOST SIMULTANEOUSLY IN ARMENIA

Noyan Tapan
Oct 17 2007

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 17, NOYAN TAPAN. Three theatrical festivals,
Pomegranate Grain Children’s Festival, 3rd Republican Festival of
Puppet Theaters, and 2nd Festival of Young Producers, will start
almost simultaneously soon with the assistance of the RA Ministry
of Culture. As Karine Khodikian, the RA Deputy Minister of Culture,
said at the October 17 press conference, these three festivals solve
various problems and are addressed to different age groups.

The Pomegranate Grain festival, which is being held for the 7th
time and has been already proved by time, according to the festival
Chairwoman Hasmik Karapetian, contributes to spreading and development
of threater and theatrical art among children and young people,
promote formation of companies of actors. According to H. Karapetian,
various companies of actors take part in the festival every year,
not involving companies, which have already achieved success. This
year the festival will be held between October 22 to November 2, with
participation of 19 companies of actors from Armenia, Artsakh, Javakhk.

According to Hakob Ghazanchian, the Chairman of the Armenian Union
of Theater Figures, the 2nd Festival of Young Producers, which will
be held this year between October 21 to 26 in Gyumri, is aimed at
assisting young producers by giving them a possibility to present
their works.

The 3rd Republican Festival of Puppet Theaters will be held on October
18 in 5 towns of Tavush region. 20 puppet companies of actors from
Armenia, Javakhk and NKR will take part in the festival. They will
present 50 performances. This festival, according to its organizers, is
an expected holiday for children living in remote regions of Armenia.

LAWYER RUBEN RSHTUNI SUBJECTED TO VIOLENCE

Noyan Tapan
Oct 17 2007

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 17, NOYAN TAPAN. Ruben Rshtuni, 64, a lawyer of
the RA Chamber of Lawyers, was subjected to violence at the building
of the Ararat regional court of first instance. NT was informed by
the RA Police Information and PR Department that the lawyer told
policemen of the Artashat police unit that Amalia Aghajanian, 80,
hit him with her walking stick, inflicting him injuries in the head
and back. Ruben Rshtuni was given a forensic examination permit. An
investigation into the incident is being conducted.

PELOSI STUMBLES OVER ARMENIAN RESOLUTION
By Dan K. Thomasson

Seattle Post Intelligencer , WA
Oct 16 2007

It is not unusual for members of Congress to put their own political
welfare above the nation’s interests. It happens all the time to
one degree or another. But every time it occurs, it punctuates the
fallibility of the system.

Take the current brouhaha over a congressional resolution that would
declare 92 years after the fact that the death of a million Armenians
at the hands of what was then the Ottoman Empire was genocide, as if
anyone who was aware of the 1915 slaughter had any doubts about it.

After all, if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it’s a
sure bet it’s a duck. But what might seem like a harmless gesture to
appease Armenian Americans by officially declaring it so all these
decades later is threatening to cause a serious break in relations
with Turkey, an ally we can’t afford to lose.

One expects the Speaker of the House to be far more responsible,
particularly when it comes to dealing with irresponsible, emotional
demands of constituents. But what Nancy Pelosi seems to have forgotten
is that her position makes her the next in line to be president of
the United States after the vice president and that at times that may
require putting the national interests ahead of political expediency
no matter how many Armenian Americans are in her district.

So ignoring the possible consequences of a diplomatic break, which
both Turkish and U.S. authorities warn is a real possibility, Pelosi
has allowed the politically mischievous resolution to be voted out
of committee and has further inflamed the situation by promising
the issue would be taken up by the full House. The result of this,
among other things, has been to increase the possibility of a Turkish
invasion of Northern Iraq to quell Kurdish separatists who Turks
regard as terrorists and the cutting off of vital supply lines and
bases for U.S. troops.

Short of calling for actual reparations to the descendents of the
1915 victims at the threat of bombing Istanbul and sending a nasty
letter to every Turk over there and here, Pelosi and the resolution’s
sponsors couldn’t have done more to undercut American interests.

Nothing apparently said by a desperate White House backed up by the
last nine secretaries of state has so far been able to dissuade the
speaker who came to the high office promising to quell the incivility
of a place that often more resembles a juvenile detention center than
a legislature. Well, how does one spell bipartisanship now that it is
needed. No wonder the only approval rating lower than Bush’s belongs
to Congress.

Even if the process were halted now, experts believe, the committee
vote alone has caused severe harm to relations between the two
countries. There are, they say, enormous hard feelings among Turks who
increasingly believe that the United States is a one-way ally. As a
result U.S. influence over actions that could be devastating to this
nation’s interests has diminished dramatically. Prime Minister Tayyip
Erdogan already is taking considerable heat from his own military over
what is seen as acquiescence to Washington over the Kurdish situation
and now he faces a public that is enormously angry over the genocide
resolution. A recent poll shows that Turks are more and more hostile
toward the United States.

What seems terribly disappointing here is that the speaker’s extreme
partisanship continues to pervade the atmosphere in the House. She
cut her teeth on the partisan ward politics of Baltimore where her
father was mayor and has shown that side of her nature throughout her
congressional career, especially when she was Democratic leader before
ascending to House Speaker. If ever there were a time to put that
aside, it is now. She is a smart, capable politician who certainly
knows the consequences of such an irresponsible action.

That is why it seems inconceivable that she would allow it to go
forward. The only explanation seems to be that she is concerned about
her own reelection in an extremely liberal district where there is
a strong Armenian American presence. Her inability to change the
direction of the war in Iraq has been criticized by liberals. Her
San Francisco opponent is Cindy Sheehan, the antiwar activist whose
son was killed in Iraq, and whose shrill campaigning has made some
inroads on Pelosi’s popularity.

Even if that is her worry, it is time for her and those with similar
concerns to dump this resolution in the Potomac and pray it is not
too late to put things right with a much -needed ally. Hopefully,
there are a few statesmen left in Congress.

Dan K. Thomasson is former editor of the Scripps Howard News Service.

TURQUIE APRÈS UN VOTE AU CONGRÈS AMERICAIN;

Le Monde
16 octobre 2007 mardi
France

Genocide armenien : l’armee turque met en garde Washington

LE CHEF d’etat-major de l’armee turque, le general Yasar Buyukanit,
a averti, dimanche 14 octobre, dans un entretien publie dans le
quotidien turc a grand tirage Milliyet, que les relations entre la
Turquie et Washington seraient alterees de facon irreversible si le
Congrès americain votait un projet de loi qualifiant de genocide le
massacre d’Armeniens au debut du XXe siècle dans l’Empire ottoman.

" Si la resolution qui a ete votee en commission (mercredi 10 octobre)
est adoptee par la Chambre des representants, nos relations dans le
domaine militaire avec les Etats-Unis ne seront plus jamais les memes
", a-t-il souligne, en precisant : " Les Etats-Unis sont clairement
un allie important – pour la Turquie – . Mais un pays allie ne se
comporte pas d’une telle facon. "

Au lendemain de l’adoption du texte de la commission des affaires
etrangères de la Chambre des representants – contre lequel s’etait
eleve le president americain George Bush -, Ankara avait rappele pour
consultations son ambassadeur a Washington. Les dirigeants civils
et militaires turcs se sont depuis concertes afin d’envisager des
mesures de retorsion contre les Etats-Unis. Une visite du ministre
turc du commerce a ete annulee ainsi qu’une reunion du Conseil du
commerce americano-turc.

La Turquie pourrait en outre restreindre l’accès des forces americaines
a la base aerienne d’Incirlik, plaque tournante du transit americain
vers l’Irak ou l’Afghanistan, et prendre d’autres mesures de
represailles dans le domaine de la cooperation militaire entre les
deux allies de l’OTAN. Près de 70 % du ravitaillement aerien destine
a l’Irak, un tiers du carburant et 95 % des engins blindes, vitaux
pour les soldats americains transitent par la Turquie. – (AP, Reuters.)

–Boundary_(ID_770Z87080G6yzQ4qYlEELw)- –

GERMAN BUNDESTAG’S DEPUTY GROUP TO ARRIVE IN ARMENIA ON OCTOBER 17

Noyan Tapan
Oct 16, 2007

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 16, NOYAN TAPAN. Members of the German Bundestag’s
Germany-South Caucasus Deputy Friendship Group, led by Schtefen Raiche
will arrive in Yerevan on October 17.

On October 18, the delegation will meet with RA NA Speaker Tigran
Torosian, as well as members of the NA Standing Committee on European
Integration, RPA, BH, ARFD, Zharangutiun, Orinats Yerkir factions.

The same day the members of the delegation will meet with ambassadors
of EU member-countries accredited in Armenia and the RA Deputy Foreign
Minister, Armen Bayburdian.

On October 19, the members of the German Bundestag’s Germany-South
Caucasus Deputy Friendship Group will visit the Mother See of Holy
Etchmiadzin. The same day the delegation will meet with German
organizations in Armenia and with the RA Minister of Finance and
Economy, Vardan Khachatrian.

ARMENIAN RESOLUTION TESTS OUR CONSCIENCE

Cincinnati Post, OH
ID=/20071015/LIFE03/710150357/1008/LIFE
Oct 15 2007

A fascinating crisis of conscience is underway in the halls of Congress
and the result will tell us a great deal about the state of America’s
soul in the year 2007.

All great nations are tested between the two imperatives of national
interest and national identity. The crucible is now an event that
happened nearly a century ago in a land far away.

Armenia is one of that jumble of nations we always got mixed up in
geography class. There’s Turkey over there and that’s Azerbaijan –
or is it Georgia? – and down there somewhere is Iran.

In the dawning of the First World War, something terrible happened
to the Armenians. The nation and its people had long been an anomaly.

Most historians consider it the first completely Christian nation,
founded 350 years before Islam began its march over the region.

Empire after empire swept over Armenia, changing its borders and its
form of government, but its people remained fiercely independent.

The lowest moment in their national fortune came when they were
declared part of the Ottoman Empire from the late 19th century through
the First World War. The Armenians wanted their national identity
back and were not shy about demanding it.

The dominant Turks were not amused. First in 1894 and then,
catastrophically, in 1915, they slaughtered the Armenians. At the
beginning of the Great War they charged that Armenians were helping the
Russians, so they exiled nearly 2 million, sending them to Syria and
other countries worldwide. In the process, they killed at least 600,000
men, women and children. Some historians put that number at a million.

These facts are not in dispute, except in Turkey, where, to this day,
even ordinary citizens deny that it happened.

How does all of this touch the White House and the Congress of the
United States? For many years, the descendants of those Armenian
victims who settled in the United States have asked that the terrible
thing that happened to their ancestors be declared genocide. They
wanted to set the record straight.

They came close in the 1990s. A committee in the House of
Representatives voted to designate the tragedy a genocide. However,
the Speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert, refused to bring the
resolution before the full House for a vote, so it died aborning.

Why did the Speaker do that? Some in the Armenian-American community
and at least one investigative journalist ascribe a dark motive to
him. In my view, the reason is more prosaic. It is power politics.

Turkey is a fragile ally of the United States in a region where we
have few friends. Pressure was applied to Hastert from his party and
from the White House.

However, the Armenian-Americans did not give up and they have
accumulated some powerful friends. They have also produced a
hard-hitting documentary called "Screamers," ostensibly denouncing
all genocide, but concentrating on the Armenian tragedy.

Last week in Washington, the same committee in the House once again
passed the resolution, 27-21. Voting with the majority, bucking a
great deal of pressure, was Cincinnatian Steve Chabot.

Now the ball is in the court of the new Speaker of the House, Nancy
Pelosi. She has long advocated recognition of the genocide, but she
now has wider responsibilities.

Moreover, the full-court press is on. The President, the Secretary
of State and the Secretary of Defense have hauled out every cliche in
their arsenal, particularly the always potent "War on Terror" to demand
that the issue go away. They need Turkey, they say. Let historians
sort out the details of an event lost in the mist of a century.

However, historians have already spoken. By any rational measure, what
happened to the Armenians was genocide. There are deniers of every
great atrocity in world history. Some say American slavery wasn’t
really so bad, that not nearly as many were butchered in Rawanda as
was claimed, that Stalin didn’t kill millions, that the Holocaust
didn’t happen.

Sometimes, standing up for truth and justice can be painful. Clinton
didn’t do it, Bush doesn’t want to do it. Now, how about our
much-maligned elected representatives?

Who will speak for America’s soul?

ISOLATION WON’T HEAL TURKEY’S WOUNDS
Leon Krauze, a Mexican blogger and a founder of letraslibres.com

Washington Post
Oct 15 2007

The U.S Congress has made a big mistake. On paper, the resolution
to denounce as genocide the killing of 1.5 million Armenians
in early-twentieth century Turkey sounds like a no-brainer. As Jon
Stewart said yesterday, in that inane, unfortunate politically correct
mode he sometimes embraces: "A resolution condemning genocide? Uh,
I think you gotta go ‘yes’ with that one!"

If only world politics were always about the punch line. Truth is, this
diplomatic confrontation between the United States and Turkey comes
at a very inopportune time. With Turkey on the brink of conflict with
the Kurds and American access to Turkish military bases in question,
Congress couldn’t have chosen a worse time for yesterday’s diplomatic
"gesture". Of course, the Armenian genocide – like the conflict with
the Cypriots – has always been a thorny issue for Turkey’s relationship
with the West. It is also true that, if it weren’t for Turkish
inflexibility, the country could be on its way to European membership.

But that doesn’t mean that the best way to deal with Turkey is to
isolate it. Quite the contrary: the country’s deep historical wounds
can only be healed by engagement. And so much is riding on the West’s
ability to fully engage Turkey! It’s increasingly clear that the
enormous challenge the world faces with militant Islam can only be
solved within Islam itself. The example of a modern, democratic, Muslim
country would be a great way to start -probably the only way to start –
such an Enlightenment period. By confronting Turkey at this difficult
time, the U.S. Congress has done a disservice to the entire world.

U.S., TURKEY: THE (FUEL) TIES THAT BIND

Stratfor
Oct 15 2007

An attempt in the U.S. Congress to label the 1915 massacre of Armenians
at the hands of Ottoman Turks as genocide comes at an extremely tense
time in relations between Washington and Ankara — and an even worse
time in terms of military logistics.

The U.S.-Turkish alliance, already on shaky ground after Ankara’s 2003
refusal to allow the United States to invade Iraq from Turkish soil,
continues to suffer as a result of the debate in the U.S.

Congress over a resolution that labels the 1915 massacre of Armenians
by Ottoman Turks genocide. The concern for the U.S. military is that
Turkey could express its anger over the debate by closing its doors
to cargo and refueling operations — which would affect military
operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Of all the U.S. air cargo bound for U.S. forces in Iraq, 70 percent
passes through Turkey, as does 33 percent of the fuel. Incirlik Air
Base, long a major U.S. foothold in the region, is a major hub for
KC-135 Extender refueling operations, as it is well-positioned for
topping off the C-17 and C-5 cargo flights that haul most of the air
freight to Iraq and Afghanistan.

Although air cargo traffic can be rerouted (at a price), and Baghdad
is within reach of a C-130 fully fueled at Germany’s Ramstein Air
Base, the U.S. military relies heavily on Ankara’s good graces for
the transfer of fuel — both in the air and on the ground — in order
to conduct its operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Turkey also is the
only friendly airspace through which the United States can easily move
north to Europe, and it is the fastest route for medical evacuation
flights from Baghdad to military hospitals in Germany.

Should Turkey stop allowing U.S. ground fuel shipments into Iraq,
the United States would be forced to shift even more ground traffic
to the south, which would make the United States increasingly reliant
on an already heavily taxed supply chain into Kuwait (one always
vulnerable to a Shiite uprising in the south). It also would shift
the fuel metrics, requiring more gasoline for more trucks to drive
farther to deliver fuel, a process that was more economically —
not to mention safely and reliably — provided by the northern route.

This northern route looked faintly promising for another U.S. purpose
less than a month ago. At that time, Turkish Prime Minister Recep
Tayyip Erdogan suggested that the United States might be allowed
to withdraw its troops to the north as the drawdown of Washington’s
surge begins. Although in practice this would not have been an easy
arrangement to hammer out — the Turks do not want an increased U.S.

military presence in the border region — it did offer an important
alternative exit strategy from Iraq. For now, this arrangement
looks lost.

Their shared NATO membership will hold the United States and Turkey
together to some extent — meaning the vital Turkish airspace likely
will remain open to U.S. forces — though powerful geopolitical forces
are at work in Ankara.

Turkey still could complicate U.S. logistics efforts through any
number of restrictions and administrative curveballs — and this would
hardly be unprecedented, even among fellow NATO members. Such actions,
however, would be distractions the Pentagon, whose resources already
are strained, does not need. The Turkish alliance and Incirlik Air
Base are cornerstones of the U.S. presence in an unfriendly region,
and Washington can ill afford to lose those now.

Agence France Presse — English
October 11, 2007 Thursday

White House disappointed by Armenian "genocide" bill

The White House said Thursday it was "disappointed" with a vote in
the US Congress labeling the Ottoman Empire’s World War I massacre of
Armenians a "genocide."

"Certainly we are disappointed in the vote that occurred yesterday,"
said Scott Stanzel, a spokesman for US President George W. Bush,
speaking about the vote in the House Committee of Foreign Affairs on
Wednesday.

"We understand the feelings that poeple have about the tragic
suffering of the Armenian people, and the president, as we’ve noted,
has recognized that through presidential messages," he said.

But Stanzel added that the US leader is concerned that the vote could
strain relations with key ally Turkey, which has taken umbrage at the
congressional move.

"Turkey is playing a critical role in the war on terror and this
action is problematic for everything we’re trying to do in the Middle
East and would cause great harm to our efforts," Stanzel said.

Gordon Johndroe, spokesman for the White House national security
council, said the president had marshaled his top aides, including
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Defense Secretary Robert
Gates, in a lobbying effort to halt the legislation.

"The President has made phone calls on this, Secretary Rice, other
administration officials have made phone calls and had meetings with
members of Congress, and we’ll continue to do that as long as this
resolution is still out there," he said.