Author: Tambiyan Samvel

The 2015 statistics of the European Court of Human Rights has been published. According to the report, in all countries of the Council of Europe, there were a total of 823 judgments in 2015, of which 692 (84%) found at least one violation of the convention.

The States with the highest number of judgments finding at least one violation of the Convention were Russia (109 judgments), Turkey (79), Romania (72), Ukraine (50), Greece (43) and Hungary (42).

There were 8 judgments on cases brought against Armenia, and in all cases at least one violation was found. This number of judgments in 2015 is higher than in 2014, when only 4 judgments were delivered.

The highest number of violations found in Armenian cases concerned the right to a fair trial (5 violations).

By the end of 2015 the total number of pending cases stood at 64,850, a decrease of 7 % compared with the end of 2014 (69,900 applications pending) and more than 50% from a highpoint of 151,600 in 2011.

The countries with the highest number of applications pending before the Court were Ukraine (21.4% of the total), Russia (14.2%), Turkey (13%), Italy (11.6%) and Hungary (7.1% – a sharp increase from 2.6% in 2014); between them, these five countries accounted for over two-thirds of the total number of pending cases. 958 applications against Armenia are pending before the Court.

In relation to population, the number of Armenian cases allocated to a judicial formation in 2015 was 0.40 per 10,000 people – comparable to Greece, Luxembourg and Russia. The countries with the highest number of cases allocated to a judicial formation were Ireland (0.04 per 10,000 people), Denmark (0.08) and the UK (0.09).

The Concert Tour of well-known pianist Hayk Melikyan, an Honored Artist of Armenia, will be launching starting from January 13, 2016 in five biggest cities of the Islamic Republic of Iran.

He will be having 6 recitals which are organized by the New Music Center of Tehran in cooperation with the Governmental entities of the Country.

Hayk Melikyan will mainly be presenting the contemporary music by Armenian (Tigran Mansuryan, Arthur Akshelyan and others) and Iranian (Amir Mahyar Tafreshipour, Hormoz and Shahin Farhaz and others) composers and will also include some of the world-known European ones: Heinz Holliger, Michel Karsky, Toru Takemitsu and others.

There will be several premieres during the concert tour and Hayk Melikyan will also conduct special master classes for Iranian students in all the above mentioned cities.

Concert Dates:

January 13: Bushehr (The City Hall)
January 15 & 16: Tehran (Roudaki Chamber Music Hall)
January 17: Yazd (The Municipality Concert Hall)
January 19: Ahvaz (Aftab Concert Hall)
Januart 20: Shiraz (Hafez Concert Hall)

After the return of the Pianist from Iran, he will give a recital for the Yerevan audience, which will launch the 2016 Concert Season of KOMITAS Museum Institute on January 29.

Asa Kent Jennings was an American hero who saved 250,000 people during the Armenian Genocide.

Despite his awe-inspiring life-saving deeds, his story has not been properly recognized, not only around the world, but also in the USA and in Armenia.

The Board of the International Raoul Wallenberg Foundation has resolved to pay tribute to his legacy in a series of activities that will be made public soon.

Jennings was a small-town handicapped Minister originally from upstate New York. At the beginning of the 20th century he worked in the affluent city of Smyrna in Turkey, as a YMCA employee.

In September 1922, the Turkish nationalist army entered the city with the intent of slaughtering all its Christian residents, mostly Armenians and Greek. A huge blaze erupted through the city on September 13, trapping scores of refugees in a narrow strip by the sea. Hundreds of thousands were doome to die on the city s waterfront. Many of them were succumbing to plagues, hunger and thirst, under the Turkish siege.

Aware of their plight, Jennings had set-up a first-aid station for pregnant women in an empty home on the waterfront. He then organized a fleet of ships with the help of the US Navy in an audacious and imaginative rescue plan.

The Jennings evacuation removed 250,000 refugess from Smyrna and relocated them to the Greek Islands and the cities of Thessaloniki and Piraeus.

This blitz operation took only 7 days, to meet a Turkish city amidst threats of deportation. His courage and shrewdness saved the lives of a quarter million innocent human beings from a terrible death.

Asa Kent Jennings is a great American rescuer who went out of his way to save scores of Armenians and Greeks and his legacy needs to be divulged for the world to know that people like him were not indifferent to the plight of other human beings.

His spirit of solidarity should be a beacon of hope and should teach us that one man can make a difference.

The IRWF decision to commemorate the feats of Asa Jennings are in the framework of the NGO s research efforts aimed at discovering the brave women and men who reached-out to the Armenians in their suffering

On 23 December President Bako Sahakyan received the Armenian Central Bank chairman Arthur Javadya, NKR President’s Press Office reported.

Different issues related to cooperation between the two Armenian states in the banking sphere were discussed during the meeting.

NKR prime-minister Arayik Harutyunyan partook in the meeting.

Tens of thousands of Catholic pilgrims assembled in Rome Tuesday to watch Pope Francis open a “Holy Door” in the walls of St Peter’s basilica at the start of an extraordinary Jubilee year, AFP reports.

After a mass on St Peter’s square, the leader of the world’s 1.2 billion Catholics was to pronounce the words “Aperite mihi Porta Iustitiae” — Latin for “open to me the gates of justice” — and the door, which is normally bricked up, opened.

The first pilgrims had been in the square since before dawn in search of a prime spot to watch the latest enactment of a 700-year-old tradition laden with religious symbolism.

An estimated 50,000 people, including hundreds of cardinals, bishops and members of religious orders, attended an event subject to unprecedented security measures in the wake of recent terrorist attacks around the world.

As Francis initiated the mass, many of the pilgrims had tears running down their cheeks, others listened in silent contemplation or private prayer.

Images of the ceremony were beamed live around the world.

In Catholic tradition, the opening of “Holy Doors” in Rome symbolises an invitation from the Church to believers to enter into a renewed relationship with God.

Francis’s predecessor Benedict XVI, who has lived in seclusion within the Vatican since retiring in 2013 because of failing health, has accepted an invitation to attend Tuesday’s ceremony.

It will be a rare public outing for the German ex-pontiff, now aged 88 and said to be extremely frail. His last one was for the canonisation of former popes John Paul II and John XXIII in April 2014.

Tuesday evening will see images by some of the world’s greatest environmental photographers projected onto the facade of Saint Peter’s in an initiative linked to the ongoing global climate conference in Paris.

Six people supporting the Movement for Muslim Unity have been detained by Azeri law enforcement bodies in the country’s western city of Ganja, Azerbaijan’s Interior Ministry said in a statement, Interfax-Religion reports.

Automatic weapons, grenade launchers, a large number of bullets of various calibers, bulletproof vests and religious literature were confiscated from the suspects’ houses, it said.

Seven people, including two policemen, were killed in an armed clash in the village of Nardaran, which is part of Azerbaijan’s capital Baku, last Thursday. There were also reports of injured people. Fourteen people were arrested after those events.

The Turan news agency reported, citing sources in law enforcement agencies, that on November 26 police had conducted an operation to detain Movement for Muslim Unity leader Talekh Bagirzade, but his supporters had tried to prevent Bagirzade’s detention. According to some media reports, the operation was carried out at a mosque during a midday prayer, a circumstance that provoked a fierce response from worshippers.

The population of Nardaran is known for its extreme religious views.

– Moderate coffee consumption reduces the risk of dying prematurely from heart disease, Parkinson’s disease and Type 2 diabetes.

By Alireza Ramezani

If one thing is certain about Iran’s recent move to step up relations with Armenia, it’s that it’s for very good economic reasons. On Oct. 14, Tehran took the opportunity of impending sanctions relief under the nuclear deal signed in July to send First Vice President Eshaq Jahangiri to Armenia to see about expanding bilateral economic relations. Armenia is the sole Eurasian Economic Union member state that shares a land border with Iran, and could thus be a “gateway for Iranian goods” to the 5 billion-strong markets of Eurasia and Europe, according to Jahangiri, the most senior Iranian official to have visited Yerevan since 2011.

Iran and Armenia have already signed agreements that could keep their ties close for years. For instance, Armenia is providing Iran with electricity in exchange for natural gas imports. The swap is set to continue for the next 15 years, with the electricity generated from power plants built by Iranian engineers on the Armenian side of the border. Under the 2007 gas pipeline contract, Armenia generates and sends to Iran three kilowatt-hours per cubic meter of natural gas. When this contract expires, Iran will get paid for its natural gas exports, and Armenia will be free to use the generated electricity entirely for domestic consumption. It should be noted that Armenia’s political disputes with Azerbaijan and Turkey have left it with Georgia and Iran as the best options for meeting its energy needs.

Jahangiri’s recent visit was mainly aimed at reviving Iranian projects suspended due to sanctions and a shortage of financing. The delayed projects include a high voltage transmission line, connecting the Armenian power grid with that of Georgia and a third transmission line between Iran and Armenia worth around $120 million. The latter is set to come on stream in 2018, increasing the transmission capacity from Armenia to Iran from 300 to 1,000 megawatts. Among other matters raised by Jahangiri during his visit was an ongoing project to connect Iran’s rail network to that of Armenia, a plan that would provide Armenia with access to the southern Persian Gulf states through the International North-South Transport Corridor.

Jahangiri’s call for a focus on bilateral trade cooperation during his stay in Yerevan appears to have been welcomed by Armenian entrepreneurs, as soon after, a group of them announced that they will visit Iran on Nov. 9. According to the Iran Chamber of Commerce’s website, Armenia’s minister of economy will lead the delegation, which consists of about 50 top managers in banking, IT and agricultural businesses. This could be in line with a proposal offered by Jahangiri to create a trade hub in Armenia, from where Iranian goods could be re-exported not only to Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Russia, but also to Europe and the United States.

The head of the Iran-Armenia Chamber of Commerce, Levon Aharonian, believes the new effort to facilitate trade could help curb corruption and cut import duties from Iran significantly. In an article in the leading Iranian Tejarat-e Farda economic magazine, Aharonian argued that Jahangiri’s proposal — if accepted by the Armenian government — could be a “great opportunity” for Iranian traders looking for broader markets. However, he wrote, traders and officials from both sides should first help come up with a new trade mechanism to make the idea feasible. Many of the 6,400 items the European Union allows to be imported from Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan at very low tariffs can be supplied by Iranian manufacturers, Aharonian noted.

Iran is currently Armenia’s fourth largest trading partner after the European Union, Russia and China. Moreover, the Islamic Republic’s annual trade with Armenia is set to increase to $1 billion in the near future, up from $300 million now. Earlier this month, Armenian Prime Minister Hovik Abrahamyan agreed with a proposal offered by the Iranian side to revive Armenia’s factories built during the Soviet era. Iran says the factories can be used as a base to process semi-finished goods imported from Iran to eventually be exported to third countries.

But the Islamic Republic is not alone in its interest in Armenia. The United States has provided millions of dollars in assistance to Yerevan since its independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. Moreover, Washington has long been negotiating with the Armenian government to expand bilateral trade and investment relations. Lastly, the United States has — as is also largely the case with Iran — supported the Armenian government in its political and territorial disputes with neighboring states since its independence. These parallel efforts by Tehran and Washington to court Yerevan could end up in a potential clash of interests, even in the aftermath of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, which has repaired US-Iran relations to some extent.

The US 2015 budget provides $24.7 million in assistance to Armenia. Washington has also reached several economic agreements with Yerevan, including the Trade and Investment Framework Agreement (2015), Joint Economic Task Force (1999), Investment Incentive Agreement (1992), Agreement on Trade Relations (1992) and Bilateral Investment Treaty (1992) — all of which provide platforms for deeper economic and trade cooperation between the two countries. According to the Armenian National Committee of America, the two countries have several options to improve their trade relations — including adoption of the Double Taxation Treaty, which is needed to replace the outdated US-USSR Double Tax Treaty from 1974. The committee believes this treaty is an impediment to US investment in Armenia and hinders economic relations between the two countries.

Iran sees Armenia as a regional strategic trade partner, while the United States has been investing in the Caucasian country for an extended period. A potential clash of interests between Iran and the United States thus appears as a serious challenge on the distant horizon. However, if this challenge is addressed wisely and in a timely manner, conflict can be avoided and the American market could even be accessible to Iranian manufacturers through Armenia in the medium term.

International organizations should consult with OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs before issuing reports on Nagorno Karabakh, US Co-Chair of the OSCE Minsk Group James Warlick has said.

“The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe and other international organizations should consult with the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs before issuing reports or resolutions on Nagorno Karabakh,” Warlick said in a Twitter post.

Remind that with a vote of 24 to 16, the Committee on Political Affairs and Democracy of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), approved an anti-Armenian report entitled “Escalation of Violence in Nagorno-Karabakh and Other Occupied Territories of Azerbaijan” by Robert Walter (United Kingdom, EC), a rapporteur of the PACE Political Affairs Committee.

On November 3, the Supreme Spiritual Council of the Armenian Church, began its work session at the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin.

At the opening session on November 4, under the presidency of His Holiness Karekin II, Supreme Patriarch and Catholicos of All Armenians; a prayer was offered for the souls of the departed Armenians who were killed in the Moscow-Yerevan bus crash on the Don highway in Tula, Russia.

The Supreme Spiritual Council members expressed sympathies to the families and relatives of the deceased. The Council members also wished a speedy recovery to all the injured.