Author: Maghakian Mike

TURKEY ‘INVOLVED’ IN EFFORTS TO RESOLVE KARABAKH CONFLICT, SAYS GUL

4/14/2009_1
Tuesday, April 14, 2009

ISTANBUL (Combined)–Turkish President Abdullah Gul said Tuesday his
country is involved in efforts to solve the conflict between Azerbaijan
and Armenia, in addition to discussions over the normalization process
with Yerevan.

Turkey aims to ensure peace, stability and normalization in the
Caucasus by solving the region’s frozen conflicts, including the
Nagorno-Karabakh dispute, Gul told reporters before departing for
Bahrain.

"Within this framework, as discussions on issues with Yerevan continue,
we are also involved in efforts to solve the problems between
Azerbaijan and Armenia," he said, adding that diplomacy did allow
him to speak publicly about the steps being taken regarding the issue.

The Turkish government appeared ready to drop that linkage when
it embarked on an unprecedented dialogue with Yerevan last year to
establish diplomatic relations and reopen its border with Armenia,
which it closed in 1993 out of solidarity with Azerbaijan.

But now, Turkey is saying it will be difficult to overcome its problems
with Armenia unless the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict is resolved.

Gul, and his Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, have been repeatedly
echoing that concern, warning that the relations with Armenia will
go nowhere while the Karabakh conflict remains unresolved.

"The Azerbaijan-Armenian dispute should be resolved first. Then,
problems between Turkey and Armenia can be solved, too," Erdogan told a
news conference on April 8. "We hope the U.N. Security Council takes
a decision naming Armenia as occupier in Nagorno-Karabakh and calling
for a withdrawal from the region."

The apparent shift follows threats by Baku to cut off gas supplies to
Turkey, which it says is jeopardizing Azerbaijani national interests
with its negotiations to lift the embargo on Armenia before a Karabakh
settlement.

The official change in rhetoric also comes amid signals by US President
Barack Obama that his views on the Armenian Genocide have not changed,
despite repeated warnings by Ankara that a US recognition of the
Genocide will torpedo reconciliation attempts between Armenia and
Turkey.

Speaking in the Turkish National Assembly on April 6, the US President
stood by his earlier statements recognizing the Armenian Genocide and
said they should not hamper the normalization of Turkish-Armenian
relations, which he stressed, should be based on a "process that
works through the past in a way that is honest, open and constructive."

Armenia meanwhile remains committed to an unconditional rapprochement
with its neighbor. Armenian President Serzh Sarkisian Monday
reiterated that the Karabakh conflict has not been on the agenda
of the Turkish-Armenian talks and said he still hopes that the
Turkish-Armenian border will be reopened by the time he attends a
football match in Turkey between the two countries in October.

But the almost year-long negotiations between Armenia and Turkey
now may end in failure because of the renewed Turkish preconditions,
Sarkisian said speaking at a news conference on the first anniversary
of his inauguration. "My optimism may not prove right," the Armenian
leader cautioned, adding that the Turks could "walk away from our
agreements."

"In my opinion, the ball is now in Turkey’s court," said
Sarkisian. "And speaking of football diplomacy, we have to say that
the ball cannot remain in one court indefinitely. Every football game
has a time limit."

AGRICULTURE MINISTRY OF ARMENIA: GREAT DROP IN TEMPERATURE IN ARMENIA AND RICH SNOW DOES NOT CAUSE MUCH DAMAGE TO AGRICULTURE

ArmInfo
2009-04-14 13:04:00

ArmInfo. According to the preliminary data, great drop in temperature
in Armenia and rich snow did not cause much damage to the republic’s
agriculture, the Ministry of Agriculture of Armenia told ArmInfo on
April 14.

According to the source data, the damage may be caused in case of
drop in the air temperature to minus 4-6 degrees and retention of
this temperature regime during 6 hours at least. According to the
data of the Hydrometeorological Service, the temperature in Ararat
valley, which is the garner of Armenia, was above zero. The source
reports that apricots and peaches, being the most sensitive to the
temperature drop, have already effloresced in the republic. It will
be finally clear whether these fruit trees suffered from the cold in
Yerevan and the regions only three days later.

SOCIAL EXPENSES PRIORITY IN 2009 ARMENIAN STATE BUDGET

PanARMENIAN.Net
14.04.2009 14:17 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Irrelative of further development of the situation,
the Armenian government will secure social expenditures, RA Prime
Minister said.

"The matter concerns not only 114 thousand needy families but the
whole social sector," Tigran Sargsyan said during Social Impact of
the Global Economic Crisis on Armenia conference in Yerevan.

He said that passing on to per quarter budget management, the RA
government will hence plan expenses proceeding from tax collection
level.

"We have revised the budget taking into account all possible risks,"
the Prime Minister said.

CRISIS TO HAVE NO IMPACT ON IMPLEMENTATION OF PRESIDENT’S ELECTION PROGRAM

18:00 10/04/2009
Source: Panorama.am

The economic crisis will have no impacts on the implementation of the
President Serzh Sargsyan’s election program, said the President during
a press conference today. `If I knew about the crisis, I might have
another program. Of course, I could not preview it,’ said the
President and ensured he is not going to decline his promises. The
President reminded that his program covers those five years he is
going to lead the country.

`Crisis makes us to take more efforts to implement those
programs. They are listed in our anti-crisis strategy program,’ said
the President adding that every project, power station, Iran-Armenia
railway, need huge social package to be invested, hence they have not
only economic profit but have serious potential to solve social
problems during the crisis. `I believe that many feel discomfort as
billions should be invested in those projects,’ said the President
encouraging that the Government would have certain things to present
to the public.

SERZH SARGSYAN: IN YEREVAN COUNCIL OF ELDERS ELECTIONS EVERYBODY SHOULD BE READY TO ACCEPT ANY RESULT

Noyan Tapan
Apr 10, 2009

YEREVAN, APRIL 10, NOYAN TAPAN. In the May 31 Yerevan Council of Elders
elections everybody should be ready to accept any result, RA President
Serzh Sargsyan stated at the April 10 press conference dedicated to
the one year of his tenure. In his words, Yerevan has many problems
"thirsty for being solved," and Yerevan residents should elect their
Mayor, who should serve to the capital city. "I call for excluding
hatred, going to ballot for electing Yerevan Council of Elders and
not having other goals, it is very important," S. Sargsyan said.

In connection with first RA President Levon Ter-Petrosian’s decision
to head the Armenian National Congress electoral roll in the
elections, S. Sargsyan said: "I treat the decision of any RA citizen
normally." He again rejected the idea of holding special parliamentary
elections. "The Constitution has determined very exactly in what
circumstances and with what periodicity parliamentary elections
should be held in RA, and we will act in line with the letter of
Constitution," he said.

In response to the question of whether the authorities are ready
to cede the power in Yerevan if the opposition wins on May 31,
S. Sargsyan stated that the power belongs to the people in Armenia,
and it is obvious.

The RA President considers reasonable the position L. Ter-Petrosian
expressed at the 2009 March 1 rally that the opposition should
follow exclusively the constitutional way and renounce revolutionary
struggle. "It is a very reasonable approach, it is a pity that this
statement was not voiced on February 20, 2008," S. Sargsyan said.

Excluding recurrence of the 2008 March 1 events, S. Sargsyan said:
"No June 1 will happen, that is, there will be June 1, but it will
be a normal day and not a day of tragic events."

SERZH SARGSYAN: WE HAVE NO TERRITORIAL CLAIMS TOWARDS AZERBAIJAN

PanARMENIAN.Net
10.04.2009 17:22 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ "Armenia has no territorial claims towards
Azerbaijan. NKR issue belongs nation’s self determination sphere,
and should be solved accordingly," RA President Serzh Sargsyan told
a news conference in Yerevan.

"The people of Karabakh won their independence and wouldn’t change
it for anything. Azerbaijan is an aggressor who received a fitting
rebuff. We never did and will allow NKR conflict settlement determine
the opening of Armenian -Turkish border.

No one can set conditions to Armenia concerning NKR conflict settlement
and Armenian-Turkish ties normalization issues," RA President stated.

TURKISH PREMIER BELIEVES IT DIFFICULT TO OVERCOME PROBLEMS BETWEEN TURKEY AND ARMENIA UNLESS AZERBAIJAN-ARMENIAN DISPUTE IS RESOLVED

ArmInfo
2009-04-09 13:57:00

ArmInfo. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that it
was difficult to overcome problems between Turkey and Armenia unless
Azerbaijan- Armenian dispute was resolved, Haber.turk reported.

Prime Minister Erdogan told reporters, "there has been a difficult
process between Azerbaijan and Armenia for years. We have a difficulty
stemming from that process. It is difficult to overcome problems
between Turkey and Armenia unless Azerbaijani- Armenian dispute is
resolved. We hope that the United Nations Security Council will
acknowledge Armenia as an occupier in Upper Karabakh and take a
decision to call on Armenia to withdraw from the region. The Minsk
Group has been trying to resolve that dispute for more than 17 years."

"Turkey has already taken a step and proposed to form the Caucasian
Stability and Cooperation Platform with the participation of Turkey,
Russia, Azerbaijan, Armenia and Georgia. The Azerbaijani-Armenian
dispute should be resolved first. Then, problems between Turkey and
Armenia can be solved too," Prime Minister Erdogan said. Fir his part
Deputy Foreign Minister of Azerbaijan Araz Azimov commented on the
possible opening of the Turkish-Armenian border before the Karabakh
conflict is resolved, Bakililar.AZ reported. Thus, A. Azimov said
the decision by Turkish authorities would be inconsistent with the
interests of Azerbaijan.

VIDEO: ANI NALBANDIAN ’09 TALKS ABOUT ARMENIAN MEMORIAL AND CHARITABLE CONCERT

College of the Holy Cross
April 9 2009

The daughter of an Armenian priest, Ani Nalbandian ’09 has always
been actively engaged in the life of her church and community.

In October 2007, she was asked by the leaders of the Armenian community
to recite a poem for the head of the Armenian Church, during his
visit to the United States. Last year, she started blogging about
her Armenian Orthodox faith for "On Faith," an interactive Web site
on religion produced jointly by Newsweek and washingtonpost.com.

At Holy Cross, Nalbandian, a premed student majoring in history from
Trumbull, Conn., helped found the Armenian Students’ Association,
which will host a memorial and charitable concert, titled "Pour Toi,
Armenie (For You, Armenia)," on April 19 at 4 p.m. in Seelos Theater.

Watch a video of Nalbandian talking about the concert (total time:
02:21)

rs/features/2008-2009/armenian_concert

ARMENIA: DON’T WORRY ABOUT ANOTHER DEVALUATION – CENTRAL BANK CHIEF

Eurasianet

April 9, 2009

Fears that the Armenian dram will again be devalued are without merit,
Central Bank of Armenia Chairman Artur Javadian told an April 8 news
conference. Commercial banks have recovered from the dram’s rapid
devaluation in early March, Javadian asserted.

The dram tumbled from 305.75 to 372.11 against the US dollar on
March 3 after the Central Bank decided to free float Armenia’s
national currency. As a result of the drop, the banking sector lost
up to 4.7 billion drams (about $12.6 million), the bank’s chairman
announced. Armenian banks converted their deposits from drams to
dollars and euros, and adopted very conservative credit policies,
Javadian continued. The Central Bank spent $600 million to prop up
the dram, he said, Arminfo news agency reported.

ETHNIC ARMENIAN ACTIVISTS CONVICTED IN GEORGIA

Kavkas-Press
April 8 2009
Georgia

Tbilisi, 8 April: On 6-7 April 2009, Georgia’s Akhaltsikhe District
court held final hearings on the case of Vahagn Chakhalyan, a political
activist in [Georgia’s predominantly ethnic Armenian populated]
Javakheti [region] and the leader of the Democratic Alliance One
Javakhk [Armenian name for Javakheti] political movement, his father
Ruben Chakhalyan and younger brother Armen Chakhalyan.

On 6 April the prosecutor had demanded 14 years’ imprisonment and
a 18,000-lari (10,650-dollar) fine for Vahagn Chakhalyan, a three
years’ suspended sentence and a 6,000-lari (3,550-dollar) for Ruben
Chakhalyan, and a three years of suspended sentence and a 3,000-lari
(1,750-dollar) fine for Armen Chakhalyan. That was followed by
defenders’ speeches.

Vahagn Chakhalyan made his defence speech on 7 April, following which
the judge retired to her room and produced the sentence.

In his speech, Chakhalyan described the court’s actions as shameful.

"The legal proceedings against me are nearing their end. I can describe
them only as shameful. They are shameful because of the numerous
odd unlawful acts, forged and fabricated ‘evidence’, and witnesses,
all of whom were representatives of law enforcing structures," the
defendant said.

The court found Vahagn Chakhalyan guilty on all accounts, including
accusations under Article 236.1 (purchase and possession of weapons and
ammunition), Article 225.2 (participation in mass unrest), Article 226
(organization of events on a massive scale violating public order),
Article 353.2 (premeditated group resistance to the police or other
representatives of the authorities … by a group of people), Article
239.2.b (hooliganism … b) with respect to public agents or any
other person suppressing hooliganism) of the Georgian Criminal Code,
and sentenced the Javakheti activist to 10 years in prison without
the right to pay any fine for a part of the term.

Ruben Chakhalyan was found guilty under Article 236.1 (purchase and
possession of weapons and ammunition) and Article 225.2 (participation
in mass unrest) and fined 5,000 lari (3,000 dollars). Armen Chakhalyan
was found guilty under Article 236.1 (purchase and possession of
weapons and ammunition) and fined 2,000 lari (1,200 dollars).

The Chakhalyans intend to lodge a complaint against the sentence at
a higher court and, later, at the European Court of Human Rights.