Author: nina hovnanian

AN OPEN LETTER TO THE AMERICAN AMBASSADOR TO TURKEY

EMRE USLU
[email protected]

06 February 2013, Wednesday

Whenever the American ambassador to Turkey, Francis J. Ricciardone,
sees a microphone and a camera he shows his passionate support for the
defendants in the Ergenekon and Balyoz investigations as if he is not
an American ambassador to Turkey but the American lawyer of the
defendants in the cases.

Most recently, right after his embassy was attacked by a leftist
terrorist organization, the Revolutionary People’s Liberation
Party/Front (DHKP/C), he met with members of the Turkish press, but
put little emphasis on the terrorist attack on his embassy.

At least this is how Turkish media presented him. For instance, the
Hurriyet and Milliyet dailies, both major newspapers, did not publish
his message concerning the terrorist attack on the embassy on the
front page but they did bring his messages about the Ergenekon
investigation to the first page. This could be a show of typical bias
in Turkish media, but Ambassador Ricciardone is an experienced
diplomat. If he wants his message of condemnation about the terrorism
that he faced to be featured on the front page of newspapers, he could
have done it. Thus, we can assume that the ambassador, yet again,
wanted to give his support to those generals and Ergenekon suspects in
prison.

To a certain extent I can understand Mr. Ricciardone’s passionate
support of those generals. In the years 1995-1999, when he was serving
in Turkey, he probably developed friendships with most of them. Yet
what I don’t understand is his way of showing his support to those
generals. Mr. Ambassador always criticizes the practices of the
Turkish judiciary and stresses that those Ergenekon suspects do not
know what they are guilty of.

It is with this attitude that I have a problem. Mr. Ambassador, if you
are going to give your support to your old buddies, you are welcome to
do that. But do not hide behind your diplomatic mission and do not
pretend to be defending democracy and transparency and fair trials.

This is your weakest point and it really agitates the people in
Turkey. With this attitude, the very few American sympathizers in this
country also lose their faith in America because they think that
America and Americans are honest. They see what you are doing as not
honest because they know that you were serving in Turkey during the
Feb. 28, 1997 coup attempt and you and your embassy did not even say a
single word against those very same generals who are now in prison
back when they were crushing the conservative people in this country.

One should ask you the following questions: Where were you when your
dear friends, the military generals, were oppressing the conservative,
religious people during the Feb. 28 coup process? Weren’t you in
Ankara and serving in this country? Why didn’t you come in front of TV
cameras and criticize the anti-democratic, illegal practices of the
generals during the Feb. 28 coup period? Was it not a problem for you
when deputy Merve Kavakcı was thrown out of Parliament just because
she was wearing a headscarf? Was it perfectly OK with you that all the
judges and prosecutors were invited to the Turkish army headquarters
to “brief” them about how to treat conservative people and their
cases? Was it perfectly OK with you when military generals were
cursing the democratically elected prime minister and the judges and
prosecutors did nothing?

Why didn’t you, as a person who pretends to be so sensitive about the
judicial process, or anyone from the US Embassy, come out and
criticize these illegal actions? If you were so sensitive about the
democratic standards and fair trails in Turkey, why don’t you
criticize other cases that are being criticized in Turkey, too? For
instance, why don’t you come out and say a word against the Salih
Mirzabeyoglu trial? Why didn’t I hear a word from you against the
bizarre developments taking place in the Hrant Dink trial? Why didn’t
I hear a word against the odd developments in the Deniz Feneri trial?

Mr. Ambassador, you are here to represent the American government and
the American people, with whom I share a great deal of sympathy for
their honesty, fairness and understanding of equality. Unfortunately,
your unexplainable sympathy toward the Ergenekon suspects and your
support for them does not compliment the typical American standard of
honesty and fairness. If you want to support your friends, you are
welcome to support them as a friend, but don’t hide behind your
diplomatic mission and don’t do it as if you are criticizing due
process. If you are so passionate about the democratization of Turkey,
be fair to everyone and do not turn a blind eye to one issue while
being so vocal about another.

ARMENIAN WOMEN ARE COMMITTED TO VIOLENCE FOR VISITING THEIR PARENT’S HOUSE

Wed, 02/06/2013 – 17:12

In 2012 the police recorded 766 cases of family violence, from which
612 were committed against women, 145 – against men. The violent acts
against the minors were 15.

Let’s not forget that those are the official numbers, the real cases
are wide spread.

“Compared with the previous year, the number of violence has
increases”- the deputy director of the Third unit of the Police
Criminal Investigation Department, Police Colonel NalliDuryan said
during the meeting with the journalists adding that this doesn’t mean
the number of violent acts has increased, this means our citizens’
trust towards the police has increased and they apply more”

This year 2 family violence incidents were registered; in one case
the 17 year-old sister injured the 15 year-old brother, in another
case the father committed violent acts against his daughter.

The women who are committed to family violence in most cases prefer
to remain silent. Nelli Duryan considered the issue an inter-family
one and said that problem is present in all societies and Armenia
is not an exception. “They consider beating, quarrels,violence as
inter-family issues and don’t want to take it out from the family”.

The psychologist Irina Tsaturyan divided the family violence in 4
categories: sexual, psychological, financial and physical. It turns
out that the people who are committed to psychological violence never
apply to police and it is considered that women more often than men
are subjected to psychological violence.

The psychologist brought an example of how the husband always
complains how the woman deals with the children, how she dresses and
prepares. The male journalists present during the meeting objected
saying that this is the nature of the man rather than a violent act
against the women.

Another example was presented by Nelli Duryan, when the woman visits
her parent’s house and upon the return is committed to violence; this
case was also classified as a man’s nature adding that “if the man
said she shouldn’t go to your parent’s house, then she shouldn’t” So,
it comes out that the woman is committed to violence for the visit
to her parent’s house.

Author: Factinfo

CEC DECLINES CANDIDATE’S COMPLAINT

YEREVAN, February 6. / ARKA /. At an extraordinary meeting today
Armenia’s Central Election Commission declined a complaint from a
presidential candidate, Andrias Ghukasian, who claims that the use of
his image in a campaign ad of the incumbent president Serzh Sargsyan
who is seeking reelection in February 18 polls, may mislead the voters.

According to CEC, it does not have the legal authority to assess
public perception of the information provided by candidates, let alone
impose sanctions because of this perception.

It said in a statement that no law prohibits presidential candidates
from using images of other people in their campaign videos.

The February 18 election will be contested by eight candidates –
the incumbent president Serzh Sargsyan, former prime minister
Hrant Bagratyan, ex-foreign minister Raffi Hovannisian, a Soviet
time dissident Paruyr Hayrikyan, former foreign minister of Karabakh
Arman Melikyan, a political analyst Andrias Ghukasyan, a businessman
Vartan Sedrakian and Aram Harutyunyan, leader of a small National
Unity party. -0-

MEGHRI HYDROPOWER PLANT TO BE PUT INTO OPERATION IN 5 YEARS

February 6, 2013 – 21:09 AMT

PanARMENIAN.Net – Today, on Feb 6, Armenian National Assembly adopted
the draft laws, discussed on Feb 5.

Armenian Deputy Minister of Energy and Natural Resources Ara Simonyan
briefed on the protocol on making amendments to the Armenian-Iranian
agreement envisaging construction of a hydroelectric plant on River
Arax.

He noted that in 2007 Armenia and Iran signed an agreement on
hydropower plant construction in Meghri on the Armenian side and
Karachilare – on the Iranian side. In 2009, Armenian-Iranian memorandum
of understanding was signed on Meghri hydropower plant funding project,
with Tehran expressing readiness to purchase electricity from the
Iranian investor throughout the investment refund period.

On November 8, 2012 laying of the foundation stone of Armenian-Iranian
Meghri hydropower plant took place Armenia’s Syunik province with
President Serzh Sargsyan and head of Armenian-Iranian intergovernmental
commission on economic cooperation, Iran’s Minister of Energy Majid
Namjoo present.

The plant is planned to be put into operation in five years. After
completion of the construction, Iranian Farat-Sepasat company will
assume the operation of the plant for 15 years, with the electricity
to be supplied to Iran to cover-up the investments of the Iranian
side. After the mentioned period, Armenia will take up the operation
of the plant.

CHILD BENEFIT AS MEANS OF LIVELIHOOD

01:15 pm | Today | Social

Hundreds of families in Armenia’s Gyumri city live on social benefits
received from the state.

The local Shirak Center NGO has visited one of these families living
in Ani district, one of the new residential areas in Gyumri.

Laura Aseyan lives with her daughter and granddaughter. Like many
households in the city, the family lives in miserable conditions and
uses wooden boxes and plastic bottles as winter fuel.

For more details watch the video of the center

HUMANENESS IS PRIMARY

February 2 2013

One of political forces spoke badly about Paruyr Hayrikyan in an
interview given to Aravot. It is a strange coincidence; because of bad
communications or other technical problems that article was received
late and didn’t appear on our website on the evening of January 31.

“It is the hand of God,” the Union for National Self-Determination
(UNSD) leader says in such cases. If this article had been published on
the evening of the assassination attempt, Hayrikyan wouldn’t have been
offended; he has never taken offense at manifold negative publications
about him in Aravot over the past 18 years and has always expressed
his approval of an article with which he agreed. It is just that I
would have felt bad, if the article had ben uploaded to our website.

Regardless of political preferences and ideological differences,
I am for humane attitude. I don’t quite understand, for example,
why Andrias Ghukasyan is on a hunger strike, but I feel disgust when
people mock his hunger strike and tell cynical jokes about it. The
person voluntarily suffers hardship for certain purposes; it should
be respected. In Hayrikyan’s case, I don’t agree with claims that all
that is a show, everything is made up, the candidate for president
just carries out PR activities, raises his rating etc. Certainly,
people are inclined to trust nothing and see deception everywhere.

However, in this case, one can wish that Hayrikyan’s ill-wishers
never be offered such a PR opportunity.

I cannot accept the far-reaching “politological” versions, which occur
to people under the influence of this terrorist act. The authors of
those ostensibly know already which countries and security services
arranged that crime. It reminded me of the situation after the events
of October 27 when the Russians wanted to lay the blame for that crime
on the West, and the West on the Russians. One needs some grounds for
such responsible statements, and those grounds are not mentioned with
regard to the assassination attempt on Hayrikyan just yet.

In the end, I don’t like the attitude of the “fundamental opposition,”
which can be defined as follows: “Long live the terrorists; they
impeded the cunning plans of the government to hold a peaceful
election.” I don’t think that an attempt on a person’s life should
become a reason for such happiness, regardless of what political
consequences it causes.

Paruyr Hayrikyan is not my candidate, and I am not ready to vote for
him. However, that person’s endurance all his life is worth respect.

Hang on, Mr. Hayrikyan!

ARAM ABRAHAMYAN

RUSSIA’S CONSUL: ARMENIAN CANDIDATE FOR PRESIDENT PARUYR HAYRIKYAN’S BLAMING RUSSIA FOR THE ASSASSINATION ATTEMPT ON HIM IS AN ELECTORAL TRICK

ARMINFO
Tuesday, February 5, 12:47

Consul-General of the Russian Federation to Gyumri, Vasiliy Korchmar,
thinks that the statement by the candidate for president, Paruyr
Hayrikyan, that Russian intelligence agencies organized assassination
attempt on his life, are groundless.

PASADENA PEOPLE: CATHERINE MENARD, ENVIRONMENTAL DESIGN STUDENT

Her design concept won the Pasadena Armenian Genocide Memorial
competition. She aims to complete the memorial by 2015, in time for
the 100th anniversary of the tragedy.

By Redmond Carolipio Email the author 1:00 pm

If you ask Catherine Menard what she does, you probably won’t hear
“artist.” If anything, she might smile and ask, “What do you think I
am?” It’s in good fun – the 26-year-old is a bundle of smiles and
bouncy hair – but one gets the sense it’s her way to get people to
engage and think on their own.

“I have this belief that you don’t call yourself an artist, people
do,” she said. “And then you prove it.”

Menard, an environmental design student at the Art Center College of
Design, recently won the Pasadena Armenian Genocide Memorial
Competition, which featured 17 proposed design concepts for a memorial
to commemorate the Armenian Genocide. The concepts were judged by the
Pasadena Armenian Genocide Memorial Committee. The proposed site is,
perhaps fittingly, Memorial Park in Pasadena, with the dedication
slated for April of 2015.

The college describes Menard’s concept as “a carved-stone basin of
water straddled by a tripod arrangement of three columns leaning into
one another-is a single drop of water that falls from the highest
point every three seconds, each ‘teardrop’ representing one life lost.

Over the course of one year, 1.5 million tears will fall into the
pool, the estimated number of victims of the Armenian Genocide.”

Born in Louisiana, the French-Cajun Pasadena resident moved to SoCal
when she was 4 years old, living in Upland and Los Angeles before
finding Pasadena. She sat down with Patch to chat about her work on
the memorial.

Patch: Your design won, and I read that your initial reaction was
shock. What’s going through your mind now?

Catherine Menard: Thankfully, I have amazing people who are going to
kind of guide me through this process. Stefanos Polyzoides is going to
be my overseeing architect. We went through a broad overview of what
this is going to look like in stages. We still very much need to
continue to present to the city of Pasadena, because initially for the
competition regulations, there were to be no working systems, no water
systems, the regulation height was five feet … all of these things
that I paid no attention to whatsoever (slight laugh, smile) because I
thought the concept was so strong and had to be a certain way.

Luckily, (Polyzoides) feels that way too, so we’re going to try prove
ourselves in saying that this is the way it needs to be built, please
allow for this, please allow for the Pasadena budget to accommodate,
and possibly get some donations from the Armenian community to upkeep
such an involved memorial.

Patch: What’s it like building something that memorializes a tragedy
versus anything else? What emotions does that bring up?

CM: I couldn’t even approach it. I didn’t feel like I knew enough, so
I just read and I read and I read. I interviewed my Armenian friends.

I did everything I could to just let it get into me. And aside from
not having the direct knowledge of this particular genocide … being an
American girl, I feel so detached from this kind of conflict, tragedy
or brutality … how does anyone relate to this?

Patch: What are some things you learned about the Armenian Genocide
(and in researching other kinds of genocide) that really struck
something within you?

CM: They killed the artists and intellectuals first. That hit me …

you’re annihilating a culture’s artistic creativity and brilliance
instantly. In the displacement of the American Indians, they would
just march them to death. There are these images … these skeleton
mothers holding these skeleton children. That got me more than
anything, because how can you be at the front of this line and watch
this? That imagery is what finally inspired me to say ‘Look, this is
horrific. We have to look at these images, and of course it’s awful,
but you have to understand this true atrocity. Otherwise, we’re going
to stay removed from it and say ‘Oh, 1.5 million people, what does
that mean? That doesn’t sound like a lot to me.’ But when there’s a
pillar of water falling every three seconds to count the 1.5 million
people for the year, you can sit and start to really imagine the power
of that person being lost.”

Patch: Was there ever a worry about such a piece being too dark?

CM: Absolutely. Initially, I just saw that death image, that
triangulated, pyramid-like or gallows-like form, saw potential for
that abstraction … but it was too much, it was too terrifying within
itself, it needed that balance. I was able to balance it with the
water and this hope of eternity and this everlasting collection that
gathers the spirits. The form is weeping. It’s mourning each death.

Yes, it’s terrifying itself, but it has that balance … I think I
finally found that in the ultimate design.

Patch: People are going to take pictures next to this. People from
different generations of a culture will be checking this out …

CM: It blows my mind. When my boyfriend brought this to my attention,
we were having kind of a celebratory dinner, and he was walking me
through this scenario … I was so emotional, I just couldn’t … I’m
still emotional! That is it! You’re just able to impact a people where
it matters so deeply to them… that’s all I hope is that they want it,
and that they love it, and want to come and take pictures with it and
to be a part of it and tell their story. That’s what it is. That’s
what it’s for.

Editor’s note: Since it’s so early in the process, no images of
Menard’s design are available to show. As more details become known,
we’ll share them with you.

OPPOSITION PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE VISITING ARMAVIR

19:16 ~U 05.02.13

Armenia’s ex-premier, Chairman of the Freedom party and presidential
candidate Hrant Bagratyan is visiting Armavir.

At his meeting with local residents he summed up his election program.

Among his priority tasks are an end to the oligarchic system,
monopolies and social polarization.

“For it to be done there must not be Serzh Sargsyan and Tigran
Sargsyan,” Mr Bagratyan said.

He promises to open two offices in each village, with the villagers
as shareholders.

The locals raised the problems of compensation of deposits and
emigration.

As regards the former, Mr Bagratyan said it requires billions of
dollars. “I will resolve the problem by means of bond issues, and
heirs will receive the money.”

As regards emigration, Mr Bagratyan promises that “the first day of
my presidency customs problems will be resolved, and I will create
such economic conditions that there will be no need for emigration.”

He also commented on Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan’s remark during
his meeting with voters in Ararat. The president said “not only 100
steps, but we will also make 100,000 steps.”

“Could you make both 100 steps and 100,000 steps? Why didn’t you make
them? I want to remind you Serzh Sargsyan’s promises he gave five
years ago. Now he is not giving promises, but he is reproaching us,”
Mr Bargaryan said.

The oppositionist delivered his speech in front of the Palace of
Culture, where preparations for Serzh Sargsyan’s visit and speech
are under way.

Mr Bagratyan is to visit Metsamor as well.

TURKEY-ISRAEL COLLUSION IN SYRIA STRIKE

By Countercurrents.org

5 February 2013

Vice Chairman of Turkish Labor Party, Bulent Esinoglu, stressed on
Monday that the government of the Justice and Development Party (JDP)
in Turkey has cooperated with Israel in its aggression on a scientific
center in Jamraya in Damascus Countryside, pointing out that Turkish
Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, turned a blind eye to what happened
and worked to mislead the public opinion*.

In an article published on Ulusal Bakis website, Esinoglu pointed
out that the visits of US and German senators to Turkish President,
Abdullah Gul, before the Israeli aggression on Syria and then heading
to Israel indicates that the Turkish Government was aware of the
aggression in advance.

Meanwhile, Turkish writer, Ilker Bilek, said that Turkey and Israel
are key players on which the US depends in the region.

He added that Israel entered the Syrian equation through its aggression
on the scientific research in Damascus Countryside with acknowledge
of the US and JDP government, pointing out that this aggression is
evident of the intention of the imperialist countries to get instant
results from the aggression.

* SANA, Feb 4, 2013, “Turkish Labor Party: JDP Government
Cooperated with Israel in aggression on Syria”,