Author: Samvel Nahapetian

Iran is considering the possibility of increasing gas exports to Armenia by five folds, as part of construction of a new electricity transmission line between the two countries, director of the National Gas Export Company of Iran Alireza Kameli said Sunday, reports.

The gas export is carried out in exchange for the purchase of electricity between the two sides, the media reported, citing Kameli.

“On the basis of a joint agreement, the possibility exists to increase the amount of gas exports by five times,” Kameli said, as quoted by the Mehri news agency.

Iran exports nearly one million cubic meters of natural gas to Armenia daily, the official added.

The new electricity networks are expected to increase the volume of power trade between Iran and Armenia from the current 300 megawatts to about one thousand megawatts.

Photo: Reuters

British actor Joseph Fiennes has been cast as iconic African-American pop star Michael Jackson in an upcoming TV comedy, provoking scorn on social media on Wednesday and fueling a controversy in the entertainment industry over opportunities for black artists, reports. 

Fiennes, who is white, will play the late “King of Pop” in an apparently real-life story for Britain’s satellite TV channel Sky Arts about a road trip across the United States the singer is said to have taken in 2001 with movie stars Elizabeth Taylor and Marlon Brando.

Sky Arts said in a statement on Wednesday that the 30-minute comedy, called “Elizabeth, Michael & Marlon,” is “part of a series of comedies about unlikely stories from arts and cultural history. Sky Arts gives producers the creative freedom to cast roles as they wish, within the diversity framework which we have set.”

Jackson, who had the medical condition vitiligo that lightened the color of his skin, died in June 2009 at the age of 50 after an overdose of the sedative propofol.

News of the casting decision came two weeks after the omission of any actors of color from the 2016 Oscar nominations for a second year that led Will Smith and Spike Lee to shun the Oscar ceremony in February and Oscar organizers to bring more women and people of color into their ranks.

Stereo Williams, an entertainment writer for The Daily Beast, said the casting of Fiennes was a “symptom of Hollywood’s deep-seated race problem.”

“They seriously couldn’t find a black actor to play Michael Jackson?” tweeted U.S. civil rights activist DeRay Mckesson, a member of the Black Lives Matter movement.

On the occasion of Army day, a group of servicemen received high state awards and military distinction for their dedication, courage and outstanding service rendered in the course of their military duty. The award ceremony took place today at the Presidential Palace. The President of Armenia, Commander-in-Chief Serzh Sargsyan sent a congratulatory message on the occasion of Army Day and congratulated the awardees on receiving Motherland’s high awards and military ranks.

Congratulatory remarks by President Serzh Sargsyan on the occasion of Army Day

Dear Compatriots,
I cordially congratulate you on the occasion of Army Day.

This year, we will be celebrating the 25th anniversary of independence of the Republic of Armenia. It’s been a quarter of a century that we have a free and independent statehood. Throughout this time, we never doubted that our twenty-five year long journey would be possible without the Army which we created.

The Armed Forces of Armenia became the cornerstone which was laid in the foundation of our statehood. It was the dictate of the time and the region we live in. We knew all too well who we are and where we live. We are Armenians, and as one of the ancient nations of the Middle East and Western Asia, we had the millennia long experience.

Tragic events which are taking place today in the Middle East and in the areas which generally are very close to us, are painfully familiar to us and have been repeated regularly. We were the witnesses, contemporaries and chroniclers of similar events. They occurred right before our eyes in last centuries and during two millennia. Twenty-five years ago, when we assumed the responsibility for our own destiny, we were well aware that it was tantamount to entering a battlefield.

And we did. We entered the battlefield for the human and peoples’ rights, for freedom. We had already seen the smoke rising from the Armenian Church in Baku, and it was the last and most convincing sign for those who still had doubts. Later, in our days, the smoke rising from the burnt and blown up religious sites shuddered and astonished the world.

We shuddered in 1988, and the spontaneously formed self-defense units were our first steps in the struggle for survival. We also knew that the Fidayi movement would be doomed to failure, unless it became a regular army. The Armenian regular Army, our victorious Army, withstood the test of war because in those days Artsakh and Armenia, the entire Armenian nation became what a historian called the Askanazian nation, while the Holy Book calls it the Askanizian regiment, which represents the country, the nation and the armed forces.

Dear Soldiers and Officers of the Armenian Army, distinguished Veterans,

This glorious holiday is certainly a state and national holiday, but first of all it is your holiday. We trust in your dedication, in your professional skills, in your high combat spirit. We wish that from now no soldier is killed on the border. To you and our entire nation, I wish peace for our country’s freedom, for diligent work, which is a prerequisite for any progress.

Dear Awardees,

I congratulate you on the occasion of Army Day and on receiving Motherland’s high awards and distinctions.

It is thanks to you and your comrades-in-arms that the Armed Forces of Armenia are carrying out their mission, and fulfill the tasks set before them. You are doing it with honor and you are doing on a high professional level.

You are the worthy followers of those who in the fires of the heroic Artsakh war laid the foundation of our future Army. Many of them died, giving us life and freedom. Today, on this sacred day, we bow to their blessed memory. You are their worthy followers who are true to the behest of the martyrs and to the values they entrusted.

God bless the Armenian Land!
Long live the Armenian Nation and it warrior sons!

New perspectives will open up for Armenia after the lifting of Iran sanctions, expert of Iranian studies Vardan Voskanyan told reporters today.

According to him, with Iran-Azerbaijan and Iran-Turkey relations strained for now, Armenia remains the most efficient, the most reliable and the most important route for Iran to the north.

“In this context Armenia can assume a very important role, as it has allied relations with Russia and good relations with Iran and Georgia,” he said.

According to the expert, the fears that Russia will necessarily block Iran’s energy projects through Armenia have no basis. “Russia understands that it must participate in the programs, as it’s clear that Iran will get to the international market anyway,” he said.

“We have the best opportunity to link Iran to the Black Sea through the North-South Highway, and we have to accelerate the process of construction, since every day spared works against Armenia’s interest in this new conjuncture,” Vardan Voskanyan said.

The expert believes the construction of the Iran-Armenia railway is also realistic. “Funding can be the only obstacle,” he said, reminding that China is another party interested in the project.

Vardan Voskanyan said “the unfreezing of Iranian assets will results in the further growth of investments in Armenia, especially considering that Armenia enjoys privileged regimes with both the Eurasian Economic Union and the EU.”

– Picasso Bust at the center of custody battle between American Armenian art dealer Gagosian and the Qatar Royal Family.

The high-powered art dealer Larry Gagosian says he bought it. The royal family of Qatar says it bought the sculpture, too. And now they are facing off in court over who owns Picasso’s important plaster bust of his muse (and mistress) Marie-Thérèse Walter, a star of the Museum of Modern Art’s popular “Picasso Sculpture” show.

The seller, in both cases, was Picasso’s daughter Maya Widmaier-Picasso, 80. She declined to comment on why she appears to have sold the artwork twice.

In a legal action filed on Tuesday in federal court in Manhattan against the Qatari family’s agent, Mr. Gagosian claims that he bought the 1931 sculpture in May 2015 for about $106 million from Ms. Widmaier-Picasso, and then sold it to an undisclosed New York collector who expects to receive it after MoMA’s show closes on Feb. 7.

But the Qatari family’s agent, Pelham Holdings, run by Guy Bennett, maintains in its own court documents that it secured an agreement with Ms. Widmaier-Picasso to buy the work in November 2014 for 38 million euros, or about $42 million.

The bust, a major work from a highly creative period in Picasso’s life, reflects the evolution of a new erotic style of curves and exaggerated forms inspired by Walter’s charms.

The conflict exposes the stubbornly elusive nature of an increasingly competitive art market, in which deals are made behind closed doors and ownership can be ambiguous.

The case is further complicated by the particular nature of Picasso’s family, which includes a multitude of wives, muses, children and grandchildren who over the years have wrangled over the patriarch’s valuable creations, and in many cases sold off works.

In the action filed Tuesday against Pelham, the Gagosian Gallery asked a judge to “quiet” any challenges or claims to its title of the bust.

“We bought and sold the sculpture in good faith without knowledge of the alleged claim,” the gallery said in a statement, referring to Pelham’s lawsuit. “We are entirely confident that our purchase and sale are valid and that Pelham has no rights to the work.”

Mr. Gagosian has a longstanding relationship with members of the Picasso family, having collaborated with Diana Widmaier-Picasso, the artist’s granddaughter, on a show of Picasso’s sculptures at Mr. Gagosian’s uptown New York gallery in 2003.

The dealer added in court papers that he “did not learn anything” about Pelham’s claim to the work until later that month, when Pelham — realizing that the disputed sculpture was in the MoMA show — alerted Mr. Gagosian that it had a “priority claim” to the work.

Glenn D. Lowry, MoMA’s director, said he had no comment on the case.

Experts say the dispute casts a shadow over a prized piece of art history. “It’s regrettable that this has come to a quarrel between dealers and collectors,” said John Richardson, Picasso’s longtime biographer. “It’s a major work by Picasso.”

Since late November, Pelham says it has been trying to get the Gagosian Gallery to provide information regarding the sale.

“They continue to obfuscate the relevant facts,” Pelham charges.

Mr. Gagosian made clear that his dispute is with the Qataris’ representative, not the royal family. “We have the highest respect for Sheik al Thani, a longtime friend of the Gallery,” the dealer said in a statement, “and regret that he has been unfairly drawn into this matter.”

– In the Chinese city of Yiwu, Christmas comes 365 days a year.

Yiwu could be anywhere in workaday urban China. It is a smoggy, swarming, unremarkable place some 300km south of Shanghai.

Except for one thing – a series of vast halls that constitute what is claimed to be the world’s biggest wholesale market. That’s where Christmas happens every day, even if most Chinese people themselves do not really believe in it.

There’s nothing grand about it – but inside the utilitarian buildings there’s a dazzling cornucopia of festive stuff ready for the world’s consumers. There are hundreds of booths, with thousands of different glittering things to buy by dozen, or the hundreds, or the container load.

There are cascades of plastic flowers, and batteries of singing Santas, there are life-sized reindeers, and twinkling LED garlands in more colours than a rainbow.

There are dozens of cuddly soft toy stalls, with characters bearing a peculiar familiarity to well-known global trademarks.

There are ribbons and baubles, and lights everywhere. Dazzled, the eye does not know where to look, what to take in. You amble on, floor after floor of glittering stuff ready for the export market.

Each of the more than 60,000 booths seems to represent a separate business. Each of them specialises in a very particular product, often from far away factories.

It’s not just toys and baubles. There are hundreds of booths of festive gloves and hats, tools, car accessories, bicycles, and pots and pans. Most of the products are gaudy and low tech. They say that 1,700,000 different things are on show. I gave up counting them.

Effectively this mind-boggling place is the shop window for the great Chinese industrial revolution, the extraordinary rush to turn the country into the global manufacturing powerhouse that has transformed China’s cities over the past 30 years.

It’s one of those statistics which nobody can prove, but they say that more than half of all the world’s Christmas decorations are made in China. A huge proportion of them are on sale to global buyers in the endless booths of the Yiwu wholesale market.

US Secretary of State John Kerry is in Moscow for talks to try to bridge gaps with Russia over the political process to end Syria’s civil war, the BBC reports.

He is due to have meetings with President Vladimir Putin and Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.

The US and Russia have long disagreed on what role Syrian President Bashar al-Assad should play in the process.

The US wants Mr Assad to stand down but Russia says only the Syrian people can decide his fate.

Mr Kerry is to try to prepare the ground for an international meeting on Syria mooted for later this week.

Istanbul will host the presentation of the book “Genocide complicity: Germany’s role in the Armenian Genocide” by German journalist and writer Jurgen Gottschlich on December 2, Ermenihaber.am reports, quoting Turkish Demokrat haber.

The author will read out excerpts from the book and answer the questions of the attendees.

The volume unveils the story of how Germany – which wanted to establish a strong presence in the East during the WWI – lured Turkey into the war. The German officers, who served in the Ottoman army, characterized Armenians as spies and traitors. And when the forced deportations of Armenians turned into genocide, the German government thought it was a “harsh, but productive measure.” According to the author, Germany turned a blind eye to the concerns of diplomats and clergymen about the atrocities perpetrated against the Armenians.

When writing the book, Gottschlich visited the sites of those events, met with descendants of Genocide survivors, simultaneously studying German and Turkish archives.

Today, in Paris President Serzh Sargsyan participated at the 21st Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. The Conference, which is presided over by France, is attended by the Heads of state and government from 150 countries and by thousands of delegates. At the beginning of the meeting, delegations present at this Conference with the unprecedented high level of participation paid a one minute silence tribute to the memory of the victims of the November 13 terrorist attacks in Paris. According to the organizers, the presence of numerous world leaders at the Paris Conference in the wake of these tragic events proves that when it comes to confronting challenges presented to the entire humankind, civilization and solidarity are stronger than barbarity.

In their opening remarks the President of France Francois Hollande, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of France Laurent Fabius, who is presiding over the meeting, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, Prince Charles of Great Britain and speakers after them underscored the importance of the 21st Conference for the future of planet Earth and humanity and noted that today people from all over the world are looking at Paris, expecting that as a result of the deliberations on the gravest challenge faced by the human kind – disastrous change of climate, with no delay there will be adopted a groundbreaking decision. The speakers concurred that the Final Agreement of the Conference to be adopted on December 11, should not be just about good intentions: in their statements the world leaders should come up with clear-cut and strong political messages to ensure that safe future of the humanity has no alternative.

In the statement made at the Conference, the President of Armenia first expressed gratitude to the President of France Francois Hollande for the excellent organization of the Conference on Climate Change and hospitality despite the terrorist attacks which shocked France and entire civilized world.

Considering climate change a global challenge, Serzh Sargsyan underscored that it threatens equally all states, regardless of their size or level of development. Even though Armenia’s share in global emissions is not large and does not exceed two hundredth of a percent, according to the President Sargsyan Armenia attaches great importance to the need of combining efforts of all countries to address this issue and as a developing nation has committed herself to contribute to this global endeavor.

“The Armenian national position was reflected in the “Plan of Actions defined at the National Level” adopted by our Government. It is built upon the following principles:

First, global emissions of the greenhouse gases shall be limited at the threshold, which would keep the temperature increase below the two degrees Celsius.

Second, we shall adopt an approach that is “general but differentiated,” and take into account the varying degree of the current and historical responsibility of the numerous countries.

Third, the responsibility and burden-sharing for limiting the emissions of greenhouse gases shall be distributed by taking into account the rights of the contemporary and future generations to utilize the climate resources.
And, finally, four, not to do anything that would make the developing countries to slide back.

Armenia stands ready to undertake a commitment of a quantitative limitation to the increase of the emissions of greenhouse gases,” said the President of Armenia. In conclusion, Serzh Sargsyan underlined that the challenge of climate change, as well as other contemporary global threats that are of concern to us, recognize neither national borders, nor international law, nor any civilizational norms. According to the President, a challenge that a country may face in the modern interdependent and globalizing world is, in a collective sense, a challenge to all of us. Therefore, the solutions shall be comprehensive, agreed upon, and coordinated. The President of Armenia said that it is important for us to evaluate anew foundations of the global cohabitation, and refine the toolbox at our disposal. According to President Sargsyan, joint response to the challenges of climate change, should it be successful, may become a precedent for a new kind of endeavor.