Author: Maral Takmazian

Sports: Mkhitaryan: ‘Roma must improve mentally’

Maral Takmazian
Panorama, Armenia
July 6 2020

Armenia international Henrikh Mkhitaryan felt Roma suffered ‘an undeserved defeat’ against Napoli on Sunday and revealed the Giallorossi ‘must improve mentally’.

Mkhitaryan bagged his seventh in Serie A this term, before the Partenopei captain Lorenzo Insigne scored the match-winning goal to make it 2-1 at the San Paolo.

But the Arsenal loanee didn’t think Roma deserved to come empty handed from Naples, Football Italia reported.

“I think we played better than in previous games, it was an undeserved defeat,” Mkhitaryan told Roma TV. “We tried to give everything.

“After 1-1, we had the chance but weren’t concentrated when Insigne scored. However, we are working hard to finish the season in the best possible way.

The Armenian forward claims Roma’s problems are more mental than physical but claims the Giallorossi have the capacity to bounce back.

“I think it’s more in our heads, we must be calm and not go crazy, thinking we have lost everything,” he added. “There are many games remaining and fate is in our hands.

“We have a great team and can recover if we win the next game. We have to help each other. Everything will be fine because we have a good group.

“In these moments of difficulty, the team are important, and we are a real team, we help each other. We can win the next match if we are strong mentally.”

Mkhitaryan claims the mentality can help them feel better physically too.

“If we feel good mentally, we improve physically too. Without having the right frame of mind, you won’t do anything on the pitch. We must be mentally stronger, then the body is just a matter of training.

“If things are going well, you can give more physically. We have a big squad, and everyone can help out.”

The 31-year-old said he feels better, after having struggled with injuries during the first half of the campaign.

“I feel good, I have played continuously since the resumption. You don’t only need experienced players, but a mix of young and old.

“We need intelligent players, physically strong and the coach knows how to pick his men. Us experienced players can help the younger ones.”

VIDEO: Armenian-Americans Marched in 1918 July 4th Parade in New York

Maral Takmazian
July 6, 2020

[See Video]

The Armenian National Committee of America on Saturday shared footage from July 4th, 1918 showing Armenian Americans participating in the July 4th Independence Day parade in New York City and heading to White House celebrations the same day, urging U.S. support for a newly established independent Republic of Armenia.

2020 marks the 100th anniversary of U.S.-Armenia relations, with the United States officially recognizing the Republic of Armenia on April 23, 1920, and welcoming Dr. Karekin Pasdermadjian (Armen Karo) as the first Armenian Ambassador to the U.S.

Azerbaijan armed forces attempt to seize Armenia border position

Maral Takmazian
Aysor, Armenia

Today at around 12:30 p.m. the servicemen of the Azerbaijani Armed Forces with an unknown reason attempted to violate the state border of the Republic of Armenia, in the direction of Tavush province with an UAZ-model vehicle.

According to the Defense Ministry press release, after the warning of the Armenian side, the Azerbaijani servicemen returned to their position, leaving the UAZ-model vehicle behind.

At 1:45 p.m., the servicemen of the Azerbaijani armed forces repeated the attempt to seize the border position of the Armenian Armed Forces this time using artillery fire, but were suppressed by the Armenian side and driven back, suffering casualties.

The Armenian side did not suffer casualties.

Gallup – majority of Armenians support the prime minister

Maral Takmazian
JAM News
July 3 2020
3.07.2020

85% of respondents in Armenia approve of the activities of Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, say the results of a poll conducted by MPG (Marketing Professional Group). It is the only sociological organization in Armenia officially representing Gallup International in the country.

The poll reports that Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has continued to lead in ratings since the Velvet Revolution in 2018.

Ratings of major political players in the country, according to the opinion poll and expert opinions.


Survey results

“22.7% of respondents approve of the work of the opposition, 54.7% approve of the National Assembly, 67.9% approve of the government, 79.3% approve of the president, and 85% approve of the prime minister,” MPG Director Aram said Navasardyan at a July 3 press conference.

He says that the polls were conducted by telephone on June 10-27. A total of 1,002 people were interviewed. The statistical error of the survey is 3%.

In December 2019, the same company conducted a similar survey. At that time, the most popular politicians were once again, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan (83.2%) and President Armen Sargsyan (83%).

Expert opinions

Political scientist Hrant Mikaelyan believes that it is difficult to truly understand what public opinion is, and that you must take the data with a grain of salt:

“There is no question about the quality of the company’s work. The question is rather how much you can trust the field of sociology.

People are afraid to express their opinions, as in all countries, if they believe that this opinion differs from the majority opinion. At the moment, the public is hearing a lot of very strong appeals from the government, including from the top level. And that affects how people express their opinions.”

Over the past month, several important events have occurred in Armenia which upset a large part of the population. In particular, people are displeased with a bill proposing real estate tax hikes and another proposing constitutional amendments, both which were adopted by parliament in late June. In addition, the coronavirus continues to spread through the country, and some of citizens blame the government for its ineffectiveness in fighting the virus.

In light of this situation, one political scientist explained the prime minister’s high ratings by the fact that “the authorities continue to actively communicate with the public”:

“It is often said that the opposition controls large media resources. But if we talk about the media that the public normally consumes, it consists mainly of different YouTube channels, the prime minister’s live channels, and channels that are loyal to the authorities. A large part of society never learns about alternative points of view.”

And as for the opposition rating, Mikaelyan considers 22.7% to be a rather low number:

“The fact that a very small percentage of the population supports the opposition indicates that we have a very weak party system. It has either gotten weaker, or at least is not getting any stronger.”

https://jam-news.net/armenia-poll-rating-activity-prime-minister-pashinyan/

President Says Will Not Sign Amendments to Constitution

Maral Takmazian

President Armen Sarkissian (right) with Parliament Speaker Ararat Mirzoyan at a meeting in December 2019

President Armen Sarkissian on Tuesday told Parliament Speaker Ararat Mirzoyan that he would not sign further amendments to the constitution about the composition of the Constitutional Court, reported the presidential press service.

Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s My Step bloc on Tuesday more legal approved are amendments meant to complete the dismissal of three of the nine members of Armenia’s Constitutional Court. On June 22, the legislature approved constitutional changes calling for the replacement of three judges and amending the tenure of the high court’s chairman Hrayr Tovmasyan. The president signed the June 22 package of legislation.

The judges in question refused to step down and issued a statement regarding changes that needed to be made to other aspects of the law on the Constitutional Court. On Tuesday, parliament passed legislation making the ousted judges eligible for government pension.

In both the votes last week and Tuesday, the opposition parties represented in parliament, Prosperous Armenia Party and Bright Armenia Party, boycotted the session, thus both changes to Armenia’s Constitution were approved by the parliament majority My Step bloc.

On Tuesday, the parliament also changed the legal procedure for the appointment of Constitutional Court members. The new approach envisions the nomination of justices by the Armenian government, the president and an grouping of the country’s judges. The court will have to fill the three vacancies, before replacing its chairman.

Under Armenia’s constitution, the parliament speaker must sign a bill into law if the president refuses to do so.

US State Department Recognizes Azerbaijan’s Anti-Terrorism Efforts

Maral Takmazian 
Caspian News
By Mushvig Mehdiyev
June 26, 2020
In a new report, the Department of State of the United States labeled
Azerbaijan as a terror-free country, attributing this achievement to
well-coordinated anti-terrorism activities pursued by various
government bodies in 2019.
    “In 2019, the Azerbaijani government actively worked to deter,
detect, and defeat terrorist efforts to move people, money, and
materials across its land and maritime borders and within the South
Caucasus,” read the report that was published on June 24, adding there
no reported terrorist incidents in Azerbaijan in 2019.
“Azerbaijani law enforcement and security services conducted
operations to disrupt and prevent terror attacks, arrested and
prosecuted suspected terrorists, and prosecuted returning Azerbaijanis
suspected of joining or financing terrorist groups fighting outside
Azerbaijan," the report explained.
According to the report, a well-organized coordination between the
Ministry of Internal Affairs and the State Security Service, involving
the services of the State Border Service, and the State Customs
Committee yielded positive results in preventing terrorist acts and
efforts inside the country. The government bodies used terrorist and
criminal watch lists, and biographic/biometric screening at ports of
entry. In addition, they shared the obtained data among themselves,
and with regional and international partners to comprehensively deter
any activity that can relate to terrorism, including the
transportation of people, money, and materials – including weapons of
mass destruction (WMD) – across Azerbaijan’s territory.
The law of Azerbaijan on the Fight against Terrorism identifies what
activities are considered terrorism and how those affiliated with such
activities are defined and punished. A terrorist, according to the
law, is a person who is directly or indirectly involved in deliberate
acts of terrorism as an organizer, instigator, assistant, executor or
eager, as well as helps knowingly a terrorist group, an organized
group or a criminal community carry out terror activities. According
to the legislation, as well as interstate treaties to which the
country is a party, such persons can be prosecuted and punished, or
they may be returned to foreign countries for bringing to criminal
liability or for the execution of assigned punishment.
Despite full-fledged anti-terror policy adopted by Baku, some citizens
of what is the largest nation of the South Caucasus have been reported
to join the Islamic State (IS) terrorist organization in Syria and
Iraq. In September 2017, the officials in the State Security Service
said that around 900 Azerbaijani citizens joined the IS since 2012.
Law enforcement bodies detained 85 of them and brought to criminal
liability. Some 195 have been deprived of the Azerbaijani citizenship,
while many died during fights.
The State Department's report mentioned the Azerbaijani government's
efforts to consolidate non-combat struggle against violent extremism.
The State Committee for Work with Religious Organizations revealed in
April that it has teamed up with the Ministry of Education and the
Caucasus Muslim Board to develop a course to include in the curriculum
of public middle schools and public universities in Azerbaijan as
early as September 2020. The primary goal of the course is to promote
the state’s “secular policy and help counter the spread of radical and
fundamentalist movements,” the report reads referring to the
Committee.
Alongside the persistent efforts to block terrorist activities and
efforts within Azerbaijan, the officials in Baku contribute
simultaneously to global anti-terror efforts. Azerbaijan supports NATO
counterterrorism initiatives as part of the Alliance’s Partnership for
Peace program. Peacekeepers from the country serve in Afghanistan
alongside US forces under NATO’s non-military Resolute Support
Mission. Currently, 120 peacekeeping troops from the Caspian Sea
country settle in Afghanistan. The International Contact Group’s
conference dedicated to promote peace and security in Afghanistan took
place in Baku in June 2018.

Two Armenians on Forbes list of Russia’s most successful stars under 40

Maral Takmazian
Panorama, Armenia

Economy 13:43 27/06/2020Armenia

Two Armenians are on the Forbes 2020 list of the 40 most successful show business and sports personalities in Russia under the age of 40 released on Thursday.

24-year-old tennis player Karen Khachanov ($5.6 million) and 40-year-old comedian Mikhail Galustyan ($1.5 million) rank 23rd and 30th on the list, respectively.

UFC lightweight champion Khabib Nurmagomedov ($16.5 million) has retained his place at the summit of the annual ranking.

Russian TV host Olga Buzova and rapper Egor Kreed come second and third, respectively.

The rankings assign a score based on overall estimated income in the past year combined with perceived ‘popularity’ through aspects including online mentions and search requests (in Russian), as well as social media following, RT reports.

EPP urges Armenian authorities to refrain from pressuring opposition

Maral Takmazian
Panorama, Armenia

President of the European People’s Party (EPP) Donald Tusk has addressed the recent developments in Armenia on Twitter, calling on the authorities to refrain from “pressuring the opposition.”

“EPP is concerned by numerous instances of backsliding of democracy in Armenia. We call on Armenian authorities to refrain from pressuring the opposition,” he twitted.

In another tweet Tusk said EPP will promote EU-Armenia relations in the framework of the Comprehensive and Enhanced Partnership Agreement (CEPA), “exercising political will” for full ratification and implementation of the agreement.


NATO opens probe on France-Turkey naval incident in Mediterranean

Maral Takmazian
Panorama, Armenia

NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg has said the military alliance will investigate French accusations that Turkey’s navy failed to respond to an allied call for inspection this month in the Mediterranean, Al Jazeera reported.

Florence Parly, France’s armed forces minister, brought up the incident on Thursday during a meeting of NATO defense chiefs at a time when the two allies have traded barbs over the crisis in Libya, accusing each other of supporting opposing sides in the country’s war.

Paris has repeatedly accused Ankara of violating a United Nations arms embargo. Turkey rejects the French accusations and has denied that the incident as described by France ever occurred.

Parly said that on June 10 Turkish warships flashed their radar lights three times at the French warship Courbet in the eastern Mediterranean. She said the Courbet was on a NATO mission to check whether a Turkish vessel, the Cirkin, was smuggling arms to Libya after it turned off its transponder, failed to identify itself and did not give its final destination.
She added that Turkish sailors had also put on bullet-proof vests and stood behind their light weapons during the incident.

Turkish military officials on Thursday rejected the French accusations as baseless.

EU facing biggest challenge in its history – Merkel

Maral Takmazian

Save

Share

 18:43,

YEREVAN, JUNE 18, ARMENPRESS. German Chancellor Angela Merkel has urged the European Union to quickly agree a multi-year budget and get a recovery fund for weaker EU economies under way, reports Armenpress citing BBC.

In a speech to Germany’s parliament, Merkel said it was crucial that EU states act in solidarity to survive the economic damage caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

“The pandemic has revealed how fragile the European project still is,” said the chancellor. “Cohesion and solidarity have never been as important as they are today.”

She continued: “To make it very clear: the pandemic, and the economic downturn it brings, are the biggest challenges in Europe’s history.”

Germany begins a six-month stint as EU president on 1 July.