Author: nina hovnanian

Air Armenia asking government to exempt Armenian air companies from air tax

YEREVAN, December 20. /ARKA/. Air Armenia has proposed to the
government to repeal the so-called air tax for Armenian airlines,
general director of the company Arsen Avetisyan told a press
conference on Friday.

“We ask to repeal the air tax of 10,000 drams, like it has been done
for Giumry airport. Russian airlines don’t pay the $23 in their
airports, unlike us”, Avetisyan said.

On December 17, Armenia’s parliament passed a law exempting the
passengers flying from Shirak airport in Giumry from the air tax.

Avetisyan said the air tax should be repealed to raise competitiveness
of the Armenian air companies.

“It is the best support that our government could give us today”,
Avetisyan said.

In late October the management of Air Armenia resorted to drastic
measures to restructure the finances and change the flight schedules.
The company suspended its flights. Earlier, Air Armenia said mass
media allegations about problems in the company made sales drop by
80%, and the revenue fell to a critical minimum level.

The new investor and stockholder of Air Armenia, the East Prospect
Fund holding 49% of the stock, committed itself to investments worth
30 million dollars and is planning to increase the number of aircraft
in the fleet to 5.

Air Armenia began operating commercial passenger flights in 2013 after
the bankruptcy and liquidation of Armenia’s national air carrier
Armavia.

East Prospect Fund is a licensed financial organization registered in
the British Virgin Islands. It is an investment partnership of a group
of individuals and legal entities. The assets managed by the fund are
assessed at $2.5 billion. -0–

ARMENIE-ECONOMIE
L’Arménie classée par > au 56e rang mondial pour y réaliser
des affaires

Le magazine financier américain > vient de publier la liste
des
écrit

The Korea Herald, S. Korea
Dec 21 2014

The Arab world’s vanishing Christians

By Christian C. Sahner

PRINCETON, New Jersey — This Christmas, like every Christmas,
thousands of pilgrims and tourists will travel to the Middle East to
celebrate the holiday in the land of the Bible. In Bethlehem, the
birthplace of Jesus, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem will lead a
midnight mass, while in Syria — where some Christians still speak
dialects of Aramaic, similar to the ancient language Jesus spoke —
celebrations are likely to be subdued, curtailed by the dangers of a
war that is tearing the country apart.

At a time when the Middle East is aflame with sectarian strife, the
observance of the Christian holiday is a sad reminder that the
region’s distinctive religious, ethnic, and cultural diversity is
rapidly disappearing. At the beginning of the twentieth century,
Christians made up roughly 20 percent of the Arab world. In certain
areas — including southern Egypt, the mountains of Lebanon, and
southeastern Anatolia — they formed an absolute majority. Today, just
5 percent of the Arab world is Christian, and many of those who remain
are leaving, forced out by persecution and war.

Jews, too — once a vital presence in cities like Cairo, Damascus, and
Baghdad — have all but disappeared from the predominantly Muslim parts
of the Middle East, relocating to Israel, Europe, and North America.
Even in Muslim communities, diversity has been dwindling. In cities
like Beirut and Baghdad, mixed neighborhoods have been homogenized, as
Sunni and Shia seek shelter from sectarian attacks and civil war.

The waning of diversity in the Middle East goes back more than a
century, to the bouts of ethnic and religious cleansing that took
place during the Ottoman Empire, including the murder and displacement
of 1.5 million Armenian and Syriac Christians in eastern Anatolia.
After the empire’s collapse in 1918, the rise of Arab nationalism
placed Arabic language and culture at the center of political
identity, thereby disenfranchising many non-Arab ethnic groups,
including Kurds, Jews, and Syriacs. Many Greeks who had been living in
Egypt for generations, for example, lost their livelihoods in the
1950s, when President Gamal Abdel Nasser, the great standard-bearer of
pan-Arabism, nationalized privately owned businesses and industries.
Others were forced to flee the country altogether.

The rise of political Islam following the Arab-Israeli Six-Day War in
1967 dealt another blow to religious minorities. By promoting Islamic
revival as a solution to the region’s ills, Islamism led to the
marginalization of non-Muslims, including groups that had played
outsize roles in the region’s economic, cultural, and political life
for centuries. As a result, in places like Egypt, Christians have
faced harsh social discrimination and violence, sometimes at the hands
of the nominally secular state.

The Arab Spring upheavals have given rise to grave new challenges to
cultural and religious diversity in the Middle East. Many of the
authoritarian regimes now under threat of collapse cultivated the
support of minorities. This was especially true in Syria, where the
Alawite-dominated Baath Party fostered ties to Christians and other
small communities by presenting itself as a bulwark of secularism and
stability in the face of a supposedly threatening Sunni majority. Now
that Syria’s Sunnis have risen up against their Alawite rulers,
Christians’ loyalty to the regime has become a liability, even a
danger. In some corners, Christians are regarded as complicit in the
government’s brutal crackdown, making them targets for attack.

The rise of the Islamic State over the last year has sparked even more
violence against minorities. Powered by a fundamentalist Wahhabi
ideology and a boundless appetite for bloodshed, the Islamic State
seeks a return to an imagined pre-modern caliphate that subjugates
Shia and treats non-Muslims as second-class citizens. When the Islamic
State captures a city, its fighters give Christians the choice of
paying a medieval tax known as the jizya, converting to Islam, or
being killed. Many simply flee.

The Yazidis of northern Iraq — whose plight on Mount Sinjar was much
publicized this past summer — are even less lucky. The Islamic State
regards them as pagans, and therefore, undeserving of the protections
traditionally accorded to Christians or Jews under Islamic law. As a
result, many Yazidis are murdered or enslaved.

In addition to persecuting minorities, the Islamic State has set about
erasing all physical traces of religious diversity. Its forces have
demolished Sufi shrines, Shia mosques, Christian churches, and ancient
monuments they consider to be remnants of a corrupt and profane past.

Western governments’ protection of ethnic and religious minorities in
the region has been a controversial matter for more than a century,
and it remains so today. Many Sunnis, for example, accuse America of
favoritism: the United States intervenes to protect Kurds, Yazidis,
and Christians in northern Iraq, they say, but does little to stop the
slaughter of hundreds of thousands of Sunnis in Syria. In fact,
America’s complicated history of church-state relations at home has
made it reluctant to intervene on the part of any religious groups
abroad, especially when the population is small.

The end of diversity in the Middle East is a tragedy not only for
those who have died, fled, or suffered. The region as a whole will be
worse off as a result of their absence. Minorities have historically
served as brokers between the Middle East and the outside world, and
if they disappear, the region will lose an important class of
cultural, economic, and intellectual leaders.

How a society handles ethnic and religious diversity can tell us a
great deal about its capacity to negotiate disagreements and transform
pluralism from a liability into an asset. Yet diversity is all too
often considered a source of weakness in the Middle East. It should be
considered a strength, and one that is worth protecting.

Christian C. Sahner is the author, most recently, of “Among the Ruins:
Syria Past and Present.” — Ed.

(Project Syndicate)

Central Asian News Services
December 18, 2014 Thursday

Kazakh lower house of parliament ratifies treaty on Armenia’s joining
Eurasian Economic Union

ishkek (AKIpress) – The lower house of the Kazakh Parliament, the
Mazhilis, has ratified a treaty for Armenia’s accession to the
Eurasian Economic Union.

The treaty plans Armenia to become a full-fledged member of the
Eurasian Economic Union from the moment the treaty takes effect, so,
after all ratification procedures are complete in the union members,
but no earlier than on January 1, 2015.

In particular, during the transitional period Armenia as a member of
the World Trade Organisation (WTO) should revise its tariff
liabilities under the WTO rules.

Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan have signed a treaty founding the
Eurasian Economic Union in Kazakhstan’s capital Astana on May 29, 2014
which will take effect on January 1, 2015.

On October 10, Armenia inked the deal and Kyrgyzstan plans to become
its next signatory nation.

Russia’s both house of Parliament have ratified the treaty, the
parliaments of Belarus and Kazakhstan should ratify the treaty by
January 1, 2015.

The upper house of the Kazakh Parliament, the Senate, is to ratify the treaty.

Sefilyan meets Bako Sahakyan: auto march postponed

16:53 | December 20,2014 | Politics

The statement of “The Centennial without regime” movement on the
results of the meeting between the authorities of Artsakh and the
representatives of the movement

As we have already informed, on December 19 “The Centennial without
regime” movement representatives left for Stepanakert with the
suggestion of Artsakh authorities to meet Bako Sahakyan and to discuss
some issues conditioned with the peculiarity of the situation in
Artsakh.

The representatives of the movement Zhirayr Sefilyan and Emil
Abrahamyan met Bako Sahakyan at the presidential residence and
discussed the issues relating the awareness auto march in Arshakh
intended on December 20.

During the second half of the meeting, Artsakh Deputy Prime Minister
A. Aghabekyan, Minister of Internal Affairs K. Aghajanyan, Attorney
General A. Mosiyan, DA Deputy Commander S. Karapetyan, NSS Director A.
Gharamyan, NSS Deputy Director G. Sargsyan, as well as movement
representative P. Manukyan and “Artsakh is Armenia” committee
representative V. Badasyan also took part in the discussions.

Bako Sahakyan and other officials noted that the auto march may have
unfavorable consequences for Artsakh.

The essence of their arguments is that close ties with the RA are very
important for Artsakh, which has unrecognized status, and those ties
are mainly based on the belief and confidence of Artsakh people toward
official Yerevan. But auto marches can kill that belief and
confidence. That’s why they don’t want to involve Artsakh people into
political processes of Yerevan.

The representatives of the auto march didn’t agree with the arguments.

They reasoned that our country (including Artsakh) is in emergency
situation because of Yerevan regime anti-national governance, so
emergency steps must be taken to get rid of Yerevan regime and to form
a functional government.

They explained Artsakh authorities that if those steps aren’t
implemented, we will lose Artsakh and our statehood. They also
presented other projects relating to withdrawal from the EEC and
holding consolidation referendum in Artsakh and the RA after removing
Yerevan regime.

The representatives of the movement urged Artsakh authorities not to
believe in Yerevan regime and to take into account that Artsakh was
freed by the efforts of all Armenians, so it is unacceptable to
separate Artsakh from pan Armenian issues. So the representatives of
the movement urged Artsakh authorities not to hinder the involvement
of Artsakh people in the movement.

So it was decided to postpone the awareness auto march in Artsakh on
December 20 and to hold the regular march on December 21 in Syunik.

Additional information will be provided connected with the date of
awareness auto march in Artsakh.

2015: HEAD FOR REPAIRS

Translated from French.

2015 is both the year of opportunities for the Armenian cause, but
also that of all the dangers as for the internal and foreign policy of
Armenia. Meanwhile, the initiatives on the front of the Armenian cause
require an Armenian transnational consensus. For now, the highly
demanding expectations of the diaspora are substantially disappointed
by the lack of anticipation, the lack of visibility of ongoing
actions, whether by the Armenian State, the main political
institutions of diaspora, but also by the unified Centennial
Committee; which is not a surprise: it’s been over two years since
there are voices in the Diaspora to denounce the lack of leadership,
passivity, and neutralization of goodwill people.

The activists, who abhor vacuum, initiated various actions and
programmes nourished by good intentions, thanks to funds that are not
entirely fortuitous, nor specifically devoid of political goals by the
benefactors’ sources. These activities are mainly focused on the
so-called dialogue and reconciliation between the Turkish and Armenian
civil societies, as if anyone needed these programs to communicate,
further forgetting that reconciliation cannot be built without the
establishment of truth. Other initiatives, indeed bolder, but more
prone to manipulations, such as groups allegedly representing Western
Armenia aim at trying to enter into direct negotiations with the
Turkish authorities. Finally, associative or individual statements in
the Diaspora as in Armenia flourish in all directions. Most, however,
also appear as politically unrealistic as legally ill-founded.

Without going into detail, it is useful to recall some legal evidence.
The crimes committed against the Armenian population can no longer be
subjected of a criminal trial: the organizers, perpetrators or
accomplices of the massacres are all dead; the victims and witnesses
as well. The Ottoman trials, in 1919 (“the trial of Unionists’), had
already tried and convicted, primarily, the responsible persons,
mostly in abstentia, for the mass crimes committed against the
Armenian population in the Ottoman Empire. Second, the International
Court of Justice is an interstate court, where only the States
parties, the United Nations General Assembly or the Security Council
may proceed. The double question that arises is: Is the Armenian
Genocide of 1915-1916 a dispute between the Turkish state and the
Armenian State? Let us remind that the latter did not exist at that
time. Assuming that [Armenia] is recognised it’s just standing and its
interest in taking legal action, which means in law would it put
forward? Let us remind that the whole procedure requires that the
opposing State accepts the principle and terms of referral, except
that it is imposed to it by the United Nations General Assembly or the
Security Council. This procedure assumes in all cases that the
international responsibility of the Turkish-Ottoman State be
established in the massacres and deportations committed in 1915-1916;
an element that will be challenged by Turkey, but the existing
evidence is sufficient.

In parallel, we find that the actions of the Armenian Genocide
recognition by foreign governments or parliaments have stagnated over
the past decade; the soothing speeches of Turkey and the
Armenian-Turkish protocols from October 2009 are not strangers to this
result. On the eve of 2015, we are witnessing resurgence of activity
but in no great strategic importance forums, and the phenomenon
promises to be ephemeral and illusory for two main reasons.

The first is that Turkey does not want to admit and fight with
financial and diplomatic forces any legal recognition of his crimes as
genocide qualifier or crimes against humanity. They prefer to evoke
the suffering of the Armenian people and the inhumanity of population
transfers during the troubled period of the First World War. Assuming
de facto qualification and guilt of “war crimes” (those crimes already
have a legal reality in 1915, even if they were not codified
extensively), it provides Turkey the means to develop an application
counterclaim for damages suffered by the Muslim Turkish population in
eastern Anatolia, because of the actions of Armenian armed bands or
Armenian legions supported by the Russian army; actual events that are
obviously not relevant for the period 1915-1916, but which, viewed in
the broader context of the 1914-1918 war, would constitute sufficient
grounds to support an application.

The second reason is that Turkey remains more than ever now, a key
pillar of international diplomacy, particularly in the near and the
Middle East. In that respect, the United States, Israel, and Great
Britain (see the note issued by the Foreign Office on December 9,
2014[i]), on the one hand and Russia on the other, competing to win
diplomatically in the region, engaged willy-nilly into a strategic
partnership with Turkey. There is little hope for these countries to
change their course of action and commit themselves to actions or
support those of Armenia, for the political recognition of the
genocide.

This de facto impunity, gives Turkey the opportunity to strengthen its
business of genocide denial and dissemination of its falsified version
of history. The irruption of Azerbaijan in this business has
strengthened Turkey’s nuisance capacity, even if the hateful, racist
and extremist policy of the Azerbaijani towards Armenians hinders
increasingly Turkey.

The political forces in the Diaspora admit more or less stalled
Armenian Genocide recognition process in the world; inequality of arms
and state funding is acute. This recognition, however, was largely
acquired from public opinion and from the scientific community in the
world, and 2015 will reach the peak of its process. The problem
remains entirely for the post-2015 period. It is also raising some
concern for 2015, as Turkey is doing everything possible to counteract
the media and political significance and impact of the commemoration
of the massacres and deportations of 1915-1916. Their initiatives have
started well in advance.

Dialogue and reconciliation tactics: a win-win move for Turkey

This strategy started in 2004, when Turkey was engaged in the business
of seduction of the European Union. They have understood the strategic
interest, and the United States and the European Commission directly
interested in resumption of diplomatic relations and to a
rapprochement between the civil societies of both countries have
provided funding. For Westerners, this strategy seeks to marginalize
the so-called extremists of the Diaspora and to favour instead direct
dialogue with a weakened Armenia. For the “NGO industry” greedy
financial aid, this represents a direct and immediate windfall (just
for year 2015, about ?¬ 2 million was given to the Armenian and Turkish
NGOs). Turkey draws political dividend.

This process diverts indeed the Armenian side of the political
problems that constitute the substance of the dispute. Besides, these
initiatives affect an infinitesimal segment of the Turkish population,
which over a long period, taking into account the demographic and
economic vitality of the Turkish population, looking to the future
rather than to the past, weakens the hypothetical effects that some
Armenians bet on.

Dialogue programs and intercultural exchange are funded by the
European Union and the US public or private aid but also, which is
more recent, by Armenian and Turkish private foundations. These
programs would not exist without these aids. We could read in recent
weeks some self-congratulatory statements, inclusive those on behalf
of sincere activists of the Armenian cause, which fall short of truly
demonstrating and measuring the outreach of these initiatives. They
should have in this respect taken into consideration the resurgence of
revisionist propaganda and the political and legal activism of Turkish
parastatal stakeholders; Let us remember that this political and legal
activism manifested in France through the legal suits against
activists of the Armenian cause or against Parliamentary Friends of
it. In the United States, where “watchdogs” of the official Turkish
thesis on the Armenian Genocide are institutionally organized, it
manifests in a systematic, politically and legally in American public
life, and paradoxically paralyzes universities. The attack extends
beyond the debate on genocide; scribes in the pay of the Turkish state
present the Armenians as anti-Semites in the US and Israeli press.

Another indirect effect of these programmatic platforms have enabled
Turkey firstly, to gather useful information and ideas to fuel its
strategic analyses and, secondly, to identify some diaspora Armenians,
with which Turkey has decided to pursue this time officially a more
direct form of cooperation (see Harut Sassounian editorial of 10 April
2012[ii]). This phenomenon, which started in the United States, but
later in Europe, is now in battle.

Finally, the diplomacy of Turkey takes appearances of a soothing
speech and openness: the recall of memory for years of “idyllic”
cohabitation in the Ottoman Empire, the expression of a “shared
suffering” and even the recognition of the inhumanity of the
displacements of the Armenian population. This scenario is not new
(there for at least eight years), but its gradual staging hides a
threat, real, that of a public and official a minima recognition, such
as looming for some time, the apology for the suffering of the
Armenian people during the First World War, along with the restitution
of property and buildings belonging to the Armenian religious
institutions; A Turkish government decree has already solved in 2011
the case of properties and assets belonging to the Armenian [Greek and
Jewish as well) religious and cultural minorities foundations (Vakfı,
institutions created by imperial edicts at the end of the 19th century
or beginning of the 20th) instructing the return of property that
entered their capital between 1936 and 2007, but that they had been
confiscated from 1974 onward.

Turkey could easily convince foreign governments that the apology and
refunds constitute an honourable compromise and sufficient to do
justice, which would place the Armenian nation wishing to obtain more
in a very difficult position. To avoid such an outcome and not leave
Turkey alone dictate the future, an offensive strategy is needed from
the Armenian side. It must anticipate and mobilize and be built upon a
pan-Armenian consensus. 2015 represents a tremendous window of
political opportunities to engage precisely in this direction and
abandon the reactive and defensive policy. But the window is narrow,
and one shall not miss it. This is an opportunity to move the
political and diplomatic battle on new field and new grounds,
reminding superpowers: USA, France, Britain, Russia, and Germany at
first, their debts and obligations toward Armenians, and to exploit
the Diaspora as spearhead of this new policy. The Armenian state is
diplomatically constrained by the conflict linked to the
Nagorno-Karabakh (Turkey determines the opening of its border or
ratification of the protocols with Armenia to the evacuation of some
territories) and by its total dependence on Russia; a dominant partner
who has signed a strategic partnership at the regional political and
economic level with Turkey.

Diaspora, which is either asleep or tired of political impasses in
terms of domestic and foreign policy of Armenia, in its ongoing quest
for justice awaits a major action that would open new political
perspectives and consequent work for activists; but also an
opportunity to mobilize every family, and to make work smartly in
close coordination the political and diplomatic forces from Armenia
and Diaspora.

The launch of a repair claim process is the political and legal option
that meets these expectations and criteria. It would withdraw from the
double impasse that is the illusory nature of a formal political
recognition of the genocide by Turkey on the one hand, and the
difficulty one may see, in strictly legal terms, to qualify massacres
and atrocities of 1915 as genocide, on the other.

Reparations are the “new frontier” of the Armenian cause[iii]

The strategic means to be made is the one to engage, on several
fronts, legal and political initiatives to obtain reparations. It
would not be wise to publicly discuss and deliver adversity the
objectives, legal means and arguments underlying them. However, it is
worth noting some quite widespread ideas, legally flawed or built on
wrong misconceptions.

The first is to believe that the official recognition of the genocide
by Turkey as a crime qualified as such is a necessary condition to
initiate requests for financial and moral reparations for the crimes
committed in 1915-1916 by the State Turkish-Ottoman and damage to
property and wealth of the Armenian nation through dispossession,
destruction and confiscations. There is nothing as such in
international public law. The state crime is established and can be
proven and whatever its qualification, it opens right to compensation
to the victims, or rather, a hundred years later, to the beneficiaries
of the latter.

The second misconception is that Turkey longer fear the Armenian land
claims that claims for repairs. Armenians should not lie to
themselves. Armenia is a micro-state, already mired in a military
conflict with Azerbaijan, and confronted with a rising discontent
domestically. Does today’s Armenia represent a sufficient political
and military power to support such claims? Armenia would not find
otherwise alliances in this prospective.

Solutions exist and a legal and political actions’ plan is even ready,
including its operational aspects. Study groups, complementary to each
other (AGIR[iv] and AGRSG[v] in the Diaspora, and a group in
Armenia[vi]), did work on the subject. Catholicos Aram I, for its
part, organized a major conference on the subject in Beirut in 2012.

The strategy must be based on solid and lucid legal foundations and
not rely on the support of third countries. It must be designed in
such a manner that it cannot be injurious to the territorial claims of
Armenia (The State is the only subject of law can act on this issue in
international law) or to continuous actions of political recognition
of Genocide by Turkey or by other countries. This qualification, as we
have said above, is not a prerequisite for requesting repairs.
Moreover, the concept of repair is very broad and contains material
and moral aspects. The moral aspects include among others the
admission of guilt, pardon, stopping the denial of the facts, a proper
educational policy.

To understand that the financial stakes are far more compelling and
disturbing to the Turkish state, one must watch the amounts of
compensation received from Germany by the institution established by
Holocaust survivors Jews (the Claims Conference), i.e. $ 60 billion,
and the result of direct and parallel negotiations between the State
of Israel and Germany, 3 billion DM in 1952, in the name and on behalf
of the victims having no heirs. Compensation claims continue today
(see the recent agreement signed between the French railway company
SNCF and The United States government). Once the process starts, the
field of possible queries is beyond imagination.

The study published by the AGRSG, which has sought to define and
measure the repairs in all its dimensions in the case of the Armenian
genocide, made a first estimate of the damage which, by updating the
amounts indicated in the preparatory conferences of the Treaty of
Sevres (1920) in current values, reaches a compensation amount close
to $ 100 billion. More modern methods of calculation will refine these
figures. Those are present in the minds of Turkish leaders, but also
amongst the so-called friendly Turkish “intellectuals”, who quickly
evacuate the question of a hand backhand when it is addressed. The
strategy must support where it hurts. This requires a well-thought and
structured forward plan. In law, nothing is simple, either the meaning
of words or interaction principles, especially when, in this case,
local law, regional law and international law are mingled. The
positive law is further subject to the interpretation of men that
deliver justice with all the uncertainties and errors that can
accompany their judgment. International justice is particularly
related to international relations. Appeals filed with the United
States in the case Movsesian and al. have shown the limits of the
federal justice, when diplomacy interferes.

Then, the question that arises naturally is: if everything is ready,
why no political decision is being announced and no action engaged?

The political, economic and social situation of Armenia reached an
unparalleled state of desolation: the war with neighbouring Azerbaijan
has resumed on border lines; the rapprochement of Azerbaijan with
Russia, under kind scrutiny of Turkey, also looms and is worrying;
membership in humiliating conditions, to the Eurasian Economic Union,
under pressure from Russia, not only spent the break of diplomatic
balancing between blocks but it has already resulted in a threat of
economic and monetary chaos; Russia takes take Armenia in his descent
into hell. The economic and social discontent grows inside, due to
price inflation, and the number of potential migrants is still
increasing. To top it all, it’s been a resurgence of repression of
political rights and freedoms. By imitation of the Russian model,
physical attacks on activists and opponents and arrests of protesters
resumed and Armenia develops draconian laws to control NGO funding
sources and sources of information for journalists.

So it is in this context that national consensus, in terms of legal
and political actions, is searched for. The appropriate next deadline
to observe is January 29, 2015, date of the next plenary meeting of
the Centennial Committee. Speculation about the arrival of a Turkish
high authority in the commemorations of April 24 in Yerevan only
reinforce the relevance and urgency of an official announcement of the
campaign launch for claims for repairs.

Raffi Kalfayan

December 19, 2014
France
________________________________

[i]

[ii]

[iii]

[iv] Armenian Genocide International Reparation, a legal and judiciary
action group

[v] Armenian Genocide Reparations Study Group, a political study group

[vi] A legal study group controlled by the Constitutional Court of Armenia

Saturday, December 20, 2014,
Ara © armenews.com

Armenia’s NSS prevented 140 hacking attacks this year

21:26, 20 December, 2014

YEREVAN, 20 DECEMBER, ARMENPRESS. Ensuring the safety of information
resources within the public administration system of the Republic of
Armenia and protection from hackers’ attacks remain the priorities of
Armenia’s National Security Service. This is what Director of the
National Security Service of the Republic of Armenia Gorik Hakobyan
said during the solemn session convened on the occasion of the Day of
the National Security Service
Officer of the Republic of Armenia. “This is a relatively new sphere
of activity for the National Security Service, but we have to state
that the efficiency of complex measures is compatible with the highest
international criteria, and that is the honor of the governmental
Department of Communication and Information, as well as the General
Department of
Counterintelligence,” Hakobyan mentioned, as “ArmenPress” reports.

He informed that the National Security Service prevented 140 hacking
attacks and nearly 1,000 attempts to insert viruses and destructive
software into the Internet of public administration bodies.

ARMENIE
Le gouvernement ajourne l’introduction des caisses enregistreuses
nouvelle génération

Le gouvernement d’Arménie a décidé de reporter l’introduction
obligatoire de caisses enregistreuses nouvelle génération pour une
année a annoncé le vice-ministre des Finances, Vakhtang Mirumyan lors
d’une session du cabinet. Il a dit que la mesure a été reportée au 1er
Janvier 2016.

Il a dit que le report est destiné à fournir aux petites et moyennes
entreprises du temps pour résoudre un certain nombre de problèmes
financiers et techniques, relatifs à l’introduction de nouvelles
caisses enregistreuses, qui calculeront et enregistreront les
transactions soumises à l’impôt sur la valeur ajoutée (TVA).

Les nouvelles caisses enregistreuses fourniront également des reçus
indiquant le nom des produits achetés, la quantité, le prix et le
montant d’achat total. 1000 des plus grandes entreprises du pays qui
paient la TVA ont été les premières à les acheter et à les installer
en Janvier 2013. Actuellement, environ 8000 entreprises ont déjà
installé ces caisses enregistreuses.

Plus tôt cette année en réponse à des plaintes de la communauté des
affaires, le gouvernement a réduit le prix des nouvelles caisses
enregistreuses de 370000 drams à 150 000 drams pour les petites
entreprises avec un chiffre d’affaires annuel allant jusqu’à 58
millions de drams et 280 000 drams pour les entités plus grandes avec
un chiffre d’affaires annuel allant jusqu’à 500 millions de drams.

dimanche 21 décembre 2014,
Stéphane (c)armenews.com

ITAR-TASS, Russia
December 18, 2014 Thursday 06:45 PM GMT+4

Russian partners should build security space, not walls – Putin

MOSCOW December 18.

. The West should build a security space, not walls, Russian President
Vladimir Putin said at an annual news conference on Thursday

The key problem of international relations is the continuing
construction by the West of walls and dividing lines, and Russia has
to toughly defend its national security. Putin mentioned the issue at
the news conference.

The president called NATO’s advance to the East and deployment in
Europe of a US missile defense system a new “wall”.

“Our partners have not stopped, they decided that they are the
winners, the empire, and all [the rest] are vassals and they need to
be squeezed. That’s the problem – despite all our attempts and
gestures to work without any dividing lines in Europe and the world in
general,” he stressed.

The head of state said “the tough attitude” Russia took on crisis
situations, including on Ukraine, “should let partners know that the
most right way is to stop building walls and to build a common
security space.”

Speaking on relations between the Russian Federation and China, Putin
said the two countries have many coinciding interests, “including
stabilization of the situation on the international arena.” Moscow and
Beijing, he recalled, “closely cooperate in the UN, the Security
Council, and the Russian-Chinese cooperation in the sphere is one of
the most important elements stabilizing the current global situation.”

The Russian president underlined that the high-profile 30-year gas
contract with China signed in May is not lossmaking, and added that
without it, it is impossible to provide the Far East and Siberia with
gas infrastructure. “This [contract] is profitable. I don’t even speak
about the fact that it is a huge construction site, jobs, revenues for
all levels of the tax system,” he said.

Putin noted the increased role of the Shanghai Cooperation
Organization (SCO), which went beyond the framework of the original
limits and tasks because it is an organization in demand. He recalled
that currently interest in cooperation in the SCO framework is
displayed by Iran, Pakistan, India and a number of other countries who
are observers with the organization.

The SCO’s current members are Russia, China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan,
Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. Mongolia, India, Iran, Pakistan and
Afghanistan have been granted the observer status. In September,
Pakistan and India filed official requests to join the SCO. Iran is
also seeking full-fledged membership of the organization.

Sri Lanka and Armenia have filed requests for the observer status.
Belarus, Sri Lanka and Turkey have the status of SCO “dialogue
partners.”

Regarding Iran, the Russian president expressed the viewpoint that
Tehran demonstrates a great flexibility in the work on the resolution
of the country’s nuclear program. “I don’t quite understand why a
final decision has not been signed yet, but I hope it will happen
soon,” he said.

Iran says it needs nuclear power to generate electricity, but Western
powers led by the United States claim Iran’s eventual aim is to create
nuclear weapons and have pressured Tehran to give up its nuclear
program.

The P5+1 (the five permanent members of the UN Security Council – the
United States, Russia, China, the United Kingdom, and France plus
Germany) and Tehran have agreed to extend the deadline for an
agreement in the talks on Iran’s nuclear program to June 30.

ARMENIE
Le marché financier se stabilise

L’ensemble de la presse fait état du recul des devises étrangères par
rapport à la monnaie locale, le 18 décembre, à la suite d’une
importante dévaluation de cette dernière. Si la veille, un dollar
valait 600 drams et un euro 720 drams, hier ils coûtaient
respectivement 500 et 625 drams. Selon Haykakan Jamanak, les devises
étrangères étaient également en vente libre dans les banques
commerciales et les bureaux de change suite à un déficit de quelques
jours. La Banque centrale a déclaré que sa dernière offre de 4
millions de dollars n’a attiré aucune demande d’achat des banques
commerciales.

Lors du Conseil des Ministres, le PM Hovik Abrahamian, a noté le
rebond du dram : >. Il a
qualifié d’> l’augmentation arbitraire des prix et a
engagé le Président de la Commission anti-monopole à lui présenter des
comptes rendus quotidiens relatifs à l’état des prix sur le marché. La
> de plusieurs quotidiens est consacrée à la visite du PM dans
des supermarchés du centre- ville d’Erevan afin de prendre
connaissance des prix. RFE/RL relève que les députés d’opposition
étaient loin d’être satisfaits des réponses du Président de la Banque
centrale et du Ministre des Finances lors de la session extraordinaire
à huis clos, le 17 décembre, consacrée à la dévaluation de la devise
nationale. Levon Zourabian du Congrès national arménien a affirmé que
le Président de la Banque centrale n’a pas réussi à expliquer
clairement les causes de la fluctuation du taux de change. Selon M.
Zourabian, la dépréciation du dram aurait été rendue possible par un
manque d’investissements étrangers et les fuites de capitaux. Un autre
député de l’opposition, Hrant Bagratian, ancien PM, a fait valoir que
l’affaiblissement du dram a déjà réduit le niveau de vie dans le pays.