Author: Markos Nalchajian

The Syrian Armenian Relief Fund (SARF) announced its upcoming “SAVE A LIFE” Telethon, which will take place on February 21, 2016 in Los Angeles, California, Asbarez reports.

“The Syrian conflict is reaching its five-year landmark. Unfortunately, as the war in Syria goes on, cities, towns and villages are being destroyed, homes are being leveled to the ground, families are being shattered, and most sadly, the bloodshed continues and innocent lives are being lost to brutality,” SARF said in a statement.

Tens of thousands of families have been dislocated, unsheltered. Hundreds of thousands of civilians lack the very basic necessities of human dignity, water, food, roof and warmth to say the least.

The atrocities have left our compatriots extremely vulnerable. The vast destruction of civic and human infrastructures have turned cities like Aleppo, one of the oldest cities in the world, once the largest city and economic hub of Syria, and the oldest Armenian community of Diaspora, into devastated and dysfunctional ghost towns.

“Witnessing inhumanity, however, is strengthening our humanness and our commitment to serving our people who are in dire need. Our compatriots in Syria are the brink of perishing every moment. Yet, they are surviving at very high cost, the statement reads.

To extend a helping hand and provide our compatriots in Syria with the light of hope, the Syrian Armenian Relief Fund announced its upcoming “SAVE A LIFE” Telethon, which will take place on February 21, 2016 in Los Angeles, California.

In an exclusive interview with , Garo Paylan speaks about the recent parliamentary election in Turkey, the future of the peace process, and the problems of Armenian community.

According to unofficial results, Garo Paylan was elected to parliament as the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) representative for Istanbul. He answered the questions of Agos’ chief editor, Yetvart Danzikyan.

“The moment the peace process was ended, the sides were rearranged”

Assessing the HDP’s reaction to the decline in their votes, Garo Paylan said, “Our expectation was higher. In the local elections in 2014, we received 2,900,000 votes. Just in a year, our votes have doubled. However, the moment the peace process was ended, the sides were rearranged and the polarization intensified. In such cases as this, new supporters get naturally confused. When the statements got harsh, people began to be worried. We see that the voters distanced themselves from us.”

HDP’s votes declined all around Turkey and Paylan assessed HDP’s position in Kurdish region, saying that, “people are more tired there. The peace was so close, but then the negotiations ended abruptly. The state used all of its apparatuses to increase AKP’s votes. It is said that they cannot talk about peace if there is only HDP. We also say this. Other political parties should be involved in this process, but there must be people who want peace. We hope that AKP [parliament members] in the region will focus on the peace.”

“AKP should use its power for peace again”

Evaluating the future of the peace process, Garo Paylan said, “AKP is able to convince its supporters to [do] almost anything.  Two years ago, when they said that they want to stop the tears, their supporters didn’t react. When they ended the process, again, none of their supporters reacted. We want AKP to use its power for peace, for parliament again. We continue to challenge them through democratic politics.”

“Our key phrase is constructive opposition”

Garo Paylan, as an Armenian parliament member, said that he will also speak for the Armenian community and the problems it faces. “Like many other issues, the Armenian Question is thrown aside. In this term, our key phrase is constructive opposition. We have issues like foundation elections, patriarchal election and problem of status, and I have bills for these issues. We held some talks before the election and we continue to work now that the election is over.

Regional Program “Public Financial Management in the South Caucasus” of Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH has signed a co-financing agreement with the EU Delegation to Armenia for the “Strengthening the Independence, Effectiveness and Transparency of the Armenian External Audit system”. The contribution to the Program form EU is 880 thousands Euro which was equal to 458.576.800 AMD on date of concluding the contract. The overall objective of the above-mentioned cooperation between the Chamber of Control, the European Union and GIZ is strengthening the independence, effectiveness and transparency of the Armenian External Audit System. The specific objectives target at to align the processes of Performance Audit and Audit of the Government’s Annual Budget Execution Report as well as the related follow-up mechanisms with INTOSAI Standards and European good practice.

The cooperation to achieve these ambitious results is ongoing and necessary introductory steps have been carried out. The Chamber of Control, the EU Delegation and GIZ have agreed to create a structure for the joint steering and monitoring of the cooperation and hence to raise its effectiveness. The basis for the steering structure will be a Memorandum of Understanding assuring the close cooperation of all parties in all relevant areas of responsibility to achieve the following three accumulated results:

1. A standardized assessment that provides detailed information for future evidence-based reform planning as an output of the standard analysis and assessment of the external audit environment (legislative framework, key Public Financial Management  actors, communication between Executive, Parliament and Civil Society) and the Chamber of Control itself (capacities, procedures, regulations, etc.);
2. Capacity and methodology development to conduct INTOSAI Standards compliant audits;
3. Regulatory framework and practices of the external control system reviewed and aligned with INTOSAI Standards and European good experience.

The realization of the planned objectives is envisaged for the time period till March 2017 and regular steering meetings are preliminary scheduled on December 2015 and March, June, September and December 2016.

President Serzh Sargsyan today held a phone call with President Vladimir Putin of the Russian Federation (RF) congratulating and sending him best wishes on the occasion of his birthday. The RA President also sent a congratulatory message to the RF President, President’s Press Office reported.

“President Serzh Sargsyan today sent a congratulatory message to President Vladimir Putin of the Russian Federation on the occasion of his birthday.

Honorable Vladimir Vladimirovich,

Accept my warmest and most sincere congratulations on your birthday!

Your long-standing statesmanship, rich political experience and consistency targeted at ensuring the prosperity of Russia and well-being of its citizens have earned you deep respect from your compatriots and a high reputation in the international arena.

Armenians highly value your personal contribution to the promotion of allied collaboration between Armenia and Russia which is rooted in the friendship, brotherhood and mutual support between the peoples of our countries. I am confident that we will continue our joint efforts to further broaden our interstate political dialogue, continuously fill the Armenian-Russian cooperation with strategic initiatives and promising projects in the trade and economic, humanitarian, as well as in other spheres, which is driven by the fundamental interests of our peoples.

I strongly believe that the strengthening of the Armenian-Russian strategic partnership within the frames of integration processes and in multilateral format will help to achieve our common goals aimed at ensuring regional stability and security.

Honorable Vladimir Vladimirovich, I heartily wish you good health, happiness, well-being and further success in all of your undertakings,” reads the congratulatory message of the RA President.

Police officer Muhittin Zenit, who had been in contact with a key informant in murder of Armenian-Turkish journalist Hrant Dink, has said he was prevented from giving testimony in the slaying by former police intelligence chiefs Ramazan Akyürek and Ali Fuat Yılmazer, the Hurriyet Daily News reports.

Zenit, who was arrested as part of an investigation into public servants accused of negligence in the murder of Dink, wrote his testimony on March 20 before sending it to the Istanbul Public Prosecutor’s Office.

After Zenit’s statements, prosecutor Gökalp Kürkçü took the testimony of several officials, including Yılmazer, who was the former Istanbul police intelligence chief when Dink was shot dead on Jan. 19, 2007, in Istanbul.

Akyürek was the Trabzon Police Department head at the time of murder.

On May 28, Yılmazer reportedly told prosecutor Kürkçü that he told Akyürek, the former head of Turkey’s Police Intelligence Department, and Zenit not to go to Istanbul to give testimony regarding incidents in the lead-up to the Dink murder.

Yılmazer told the prosecutor that he had informed Zenit and Akyürek that it not be correct to provide testimony regarding key figure Erhan Tuncel’s past as a police informant.

“I told Ramazan Akyürek not to be part of such an incident. I said his [Tuncel] contact with us had been cut long ago and that he had not informed us correctly about the incidents. We cannot talk about a person as an informant when he hides the facts about a murder. A week later, Muhittin Zenit called me and said that his testimony had been demanded in connection with [Tuncel] in Istanbul. I told him that it was not right for him to get involved over someone who had already cut his ties with us,” Yılmazer reportedly told the prosecutor.

The Istanbul Police Department later learnt that Tuncel was a former police informant from his own testimony rather than learning it from the Trabzon police or police intelligence unit.

Ogün Samast assassinated Dink in broad daylight on a busy street outside of the office of the bilingual Turkish-Armenian weekly Agos in Istanbul’s Şişli district. Samast is serving a sentence of 22 years and 10 months in a high-security prison. Yasin Hayal and Tuncel were accused of encouraging Samast to kill Dink in the Black Sea province of Trabzon.

The Monitoring Committee of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), meeting on the margins of the Assembly’s autumn plenary session in Strasbourg, approved the following statement yesterday:

“The Monitoring Committee welcomes the progress of constitutional reform in Armenia, which has been conducted in close co-operation with the Venice Commission. This has resulted in a text that, in the view of the Venice Commission, is of high quality and in line with international standards.

The committee similarly welcomes the fact that the constitutional changes will be adopted by referendum, and it calls on all political forces to participate in the referendum and the consultations that are part of it.

The committee notes that some issues in the proposed reform are politically contentious and hotly debated in Armenian society. The choice of political system is for Armenian citizens, and only for them, to decide in the forthcoming referendum. The committee therefore calls on all political stakeholders to ensure that the referendum is conducted according to the highest democratic standards.”

In a resolution adopted on Thursday the MEPs call for the release of all political prisoners in Azerbaijan.

The European Parliament calls for the immediate and unconditional release from jail of all political prisoners, human rights defenders, journalists and other civil society activists, including Khadija Ismayilova, Leyla Yunus and Arif Yunus, in line with the judgment of the European Court of Human Rights and/or a prompt investigation into the death of the journalist Rasim Aliyev.

It demands that the Azerbaijan government immediately end its crackdown on civil society and human rights work and says that “the negotiations for a Strategic Partnership Agreement with Azerbaijan should be immediately put on hold as long the government fails to take concrete steps in advancing respect for universal human rights”.

The resolution calls on the Commission “to review and suspend temporarily, if needed, all funding not related to human rights, civil society and grassroots level people-to-people cooperation granted to Azerbaijan through the European Neighbourhood Instrument, and recalls Parliament’s decision to send a delegation to Azerbaijan.

The non-legislative resolution was adopted by 365 votes to 202, with 72 abstentions.

As the opening of Istanbul Biennial gets closer, it turns out that there are a lot of works that refer to the Armenian Genocide and the developments that followed it.

– This year, there is a different excitement before Istanbul Biennial. People work on the biennial in strict confidence and it will be opened on September 5; though we can roughly make out what to expect, we will be seeing lots of surprising projects.

Rubbing salt into the wound

14th Istanbul Biennial started out with a comprehensive title like “Saltwater.” When the tight-lipped attitude of curator Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev and of the biennial team was added to this title, which refers to the source of life, geographical connection, Bosporus and many other themes, this event that will begin next week became even more mysterious.
Events of 14th Istanbul Biennial, which will be spread all over Istanbul, from Prince Islands to overseas, are designed with the works that have something to say about current issues and politics. As the curator Bakargiev says, Turkey has plenty of festering wounds. And this year’s biennial has the purpose of pointing at those wounds, though it cannot heal them altogether. In the interview that she gave to Blouin Artinfo on August 18, Bakargiev said: “This is almost a spiritual exhibition. These spirits come from the ethnic cleansing that carried against Armenians and Greeks.” And after “dOCUMENTA (13)” exhibition that she curated, she preferred not to involve in large-scaled projects for a while.

The sea that connects Istanbul to San Lazzaro

A great part of the biennial consists of individual presentations that are located in different places. This means, Bakargiev preferred to organize a group exhibition that consists of solo projects. Unusual venues like Trotsky’s house on Prince Islands, Rumeli Feneri, stores, boats and parking lots will be used as exhibition venues, in addition to museums and art institutions which are the usual destinations on the contemporary art route. The connection between those venues is constituted by the notions that are treated in various ways in the exhibitions and the saltwater that runs through Istanbul.

Considering that the works of Haig Aivazian, Anna Boghiguian, Hera Büyüktaşçıyan, Rene Gabri & Ayreen Anastas that were exhibited in the Armenia Pavilion of 56^th Venice Biennial and the works of Sarkis that had a solo exhibition in the Turkey Pavilion will be exhibited in this year’s Istanbul Biennial, it can be said that the saltwater doesn’t only bridges two sides of Istanbul, but also reaches all the way to Venice and Mıhtaryan Monastery on San Lazzaro Island.

As the opening of Istanbul Biennial gets closer, it turns out that there are a lot of works that refer to the Armenian Genocide and the developments that followed it. Michael Rackowitz’s work, which was inspired by the fibrous plasterer Garabet Cezayirliyan who made the ornamental work on the buildings like Yıldız Palace and Emek Movie Theater, is one of them. Tracing the footsteps of Cezayirliyan in Istanbul, Rackowitz combines his work with the remains that came from Vakıflı Village, which is the last Armenian village in Turkey. Artist Francis Alys, who lives in Mexico City, hails the bird species that no longer exist by imitating the pipes of the birds that lived in Ani district of Kars once; in this way, he also calls out to the Armenians who were forced to leave that region. Making a long-termed research on the lute player Hrant and exhibiting the conceptual sculpture that he made as a result of this research in the Armenia Pavilion in Venice Biennial, Haig Aivazian prepared a performance for Istanbul Biennial. As a part of this performance, the choir of Beyoğlu Üç Horan Church will perform a traditional song, which was also performed by the lute player Hrant, in Galata Greek Elementary School. In the project that Aslı Çavuşoğlu developed for the biennial, red dye will be produced from the insects; this is an Armenian technique that is not used anymore. Using the old building of Agos and Hrant Dink Foundation as a project venue, Ayreen Anastas and Rene Gabri will turn this place into a truth center by referring to the past of the building. It should also be noted that Anarad Hığutyun Building, which is the new place of Hrant Dink Foundation, is one of the biennial venues.

Kanye West has said he is running for president in 2020.  The rapper made his announcement at the end of a speech at the MTV Video Music Awards.

Cheered on by his biggest fan, Kim Kardashian, his pregnant wife and reality star, in a lace-up olive dress, he was greeted by an extended standing ovation as he received a lifetime achievement award, according to Daily Telegraph. 

“I have decided in 2020 to run for President,” he said at the end of a rambling speech in which he also appeared to confess to smoking marijuana before taking the stage.

MTV’s Video Vanguard lifetime achievement award has previously been given to artists including Madonna, Michael Jackson and Beyonce.

The 38-year-old rapper also won Best Video With a Social Message for One Man Can Change the World with Big Sean and John Legend.

Otherwise the night saw Taylor Swift take an early lead, winning two of her whopping 10 nominations and burying the hatchet with rapper Nicki Minaj.

Former speaker of Russia’s State Duma lower parliament house Gennady Seleznyov has died in the age of 67, Seleznyov’s son-in-law Andrei Andreyev told TASS late on Sunday.

He said Seleznyov had been seriously ill in the past several months. “Medics did their best but his heart stopped beating overnight on Sunday,” Andreyev said.