Author: Tambiyan Samvel

ARTSVIK MINASYAN: THE INITIATORY POLICY HAS FAILED
Karen Ghazaryan

"Radiolur"
22.03.2010 16:50

Unlike the previous years, the existence of the Armenian-Turkish
protocols creates new obstacles for putting the Armenian Genocide
Resolution (H. Res. 252) on the agenda of the plenary session of the
Congress, member of the ARF Dashnaktsutyun Artsvik Minasyan told a
press conference today.

Although the MP says the bill will hardly be put on the agenda of
the plenary session, he adds that "everything depends on how the US
policy in the region, especially Turkey, will change."

Artsvik Minasyan said "Armenia’s initiatory policy has completely
failed, and it has caused harm to both Armenia’s international image
and the opportunities of inner unity."

According to Artsvik Minasyan, the famous statement by the Turkish
Prime Minister evidences that that country’s attitude towards Armenia
has not changed. This was a surprise for the mediators, as well, and
the MP considers that one of the main tasks of the Armenian diplomacy
is to draw the attention of the mediator countries to the fact that
Turkey’s attitude towards ethnic Armenians has not changed.

"We have to withdraw from the process as soon as possible. Turkey
and its authorities have provided us with this opportunity," Artsvik
Minasyan says, adding that the protocols counter the national interests
of Armenia.

"These protocols and this process have already caused a lot of damage.

The unity of world-spread Armenians is endangered today," the MP said.

ROBERT HOVHANNISYAN SURPASSES A GM NORM BY 1,5 POINTS

Aysor
March 22 2010
Armenia

19-year-old Armenia’s chess player Robert Hovhannisyan has recorded
a GM norm at the European Individual men&women’s chess championship,
held in Croatia’s Rijeka, a spokesperson for Armenia’s Chess Federation
said.

According to report by spokesperson for Chess Federation, Robert
Hovhannisyan surpassed a GM norm by 1,5 points.

FAMOUS SINGER OF LYRIC SONGS VALENTINA TOLKUNOVA DEAD

/lang/en
2010-03-23

MOSCOW, MARCH 23, ARMENPRESS: Famous singer, People’s Artist of the
Russian Federation Valentina Tolkunova died at the Botkin hospital
in Moscow on Monday morning. She was 63, the singer’s family told
Itar-Tass. Tolkunova had long been ill and the family expected the
inevitable end.

Valentina Tolkunova was born in the city of Armavir on July 12, 1946.

The family moved to Moscow when she was barely one year old. In
childhood, Tolkunova sang in a children’s choir, conducted by
Soviet famous composer Isaak Dunayevsky. Tolkunova graduated from
the Gnesinsky College of Music with a diploma of a choir conductor,
and later from the Moscow Institute of Culture.

In 1966 composer and jazzman Yuri Saulsky created a pop group "VIA-
66" and invited Valentina Tolkunova to join. She sang in the group
for five years.

The singer’s first night as a soloist was in 1972 when she sang at
a concert devoted to famous poet, author of verses to many popular
songs Lev Oshanin. Since 1973 Tolkunova was on staff of the Soviet-era
Mosconcert company. Since 1987 she was an artistic director of the
Moscow theatre of musical drama and song she organized. She proved to
be a talented singer of old romances and music compositions presented
in the ethnic and urban folk style. In 1986 Tolkunova made her debut
as an opera singer and starred in a fantasy film. The singer released
12 records and CDs.

President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin have
expressed their condolences in connection with the singer’s death.

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said that "her death is a tragic loss
and grief to all of us. Valentina Vasilyevna will always live in our
memories as a highly spiritual, enchanting person, a wonderful singer
loved by the audiences. Her life in music and her songs were always
imbued with a positive emotional connotation and kindness, and people
will never forget them," Putin said in a telegram of condolences
addressed to the singer’s family, the government press service said.

EURONEST meeting postponed

21.03.2010 18:28 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ The EURONEST Parliamentary Assembly established in
the framework of the EU Eastern Partnership initiative has postponed
its first meeting scheduled for March 23-24 in Brussels, since the
European Parliament and Minsk failed to agree on the composition of
the Belarusian delegation.

`The Armenian delegation received a notification on postponement of
the meeting,’ MP Naira Zohrabyan told a PanARMENIAN.Net reporter.

`The meeting was delayed for a month or two. Anyway, the Armenian
delegation is formed and we commend the RA National Assembly Speaker’s
decision to appoint ARF Dashnaktsutyun parliamentary group chairman as
head of the delegation,’ she said.

news.am, Armenia
March 19 2010

ARFD calls on Armenians to leave Turkey immediately

14:32 / 03/19/2010ARF Dashnaktsutyun faction leader Vahan Hovhannisyan
called on Armenians of Turkey to leave the country immediately,
considering Erdogan’s recent statement an alarm to nationalists to
take concrete actions.

`It is welcoming, when RA Foreign Minister tries to respond to
Erdogan’s words, but I think he’d better reply to statements by the
U.S. Secretary and UK Foreign Secretary who attempt to hamper Genocide
recognition internationally in every possibly way, seeking to
discredit the fact of Genocide,’ he underlined. ARFD leader also
criticized Edward Nalbandian for drawing parallels between the recent
developments in Armenia-Turkey relations with last century’s events.
`Presently, Turkish Premier threatens to deport Armenians illegally
working in the country, but in the beginning of 20th century the
situation was dramatically different. Armenians owned that territory,
they lived in their motherland, while Turks had migrated there and
lived a poor, vagabond life,’ Hovhannisyan noted.

The other day, Turkish Premier Erdogan threatened to deport 100.000
Armenians illegally working and living in Turkey.

A.G.

Interfax, Russia
March 18 2010

Baku distorting situation in negotiations on Karabakh – Armenian FM

Armenian Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian has accused Azerbaijan of
distorting the essence of the negotiating process on settling the
Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

"Azerbaijan is distorting even what it accepts – the essence of the
negotiating process and the discussions," Nalbandian said at a press
conference in Yerevan on Thursday.

"We can only welcome that Azerbaijan accepts the Madrid Principles of
settling the conflict. Although they are claiming that they accept the
principles with some exceptions, we think there are more exceptions
there than what the Azeris actually accept," he said.

The Madrid Principles remain on the table in the negotiations on
settling the conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh, he said.

"We have repeatedly received and are receiving working proposals from
the Minsk Group co-chairs within the framework of the Madrid
Principles.

We discuss these and the previous proposals. Saying that one of the
parties accepts these principles and the other does not is only a
screen that Azerbaijan has used from time to time, especially lately,"
Nalbandian said.

The OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs proposed the Madrid Principles to
Armenia and Azerbaijan in November 2007. At the end of 2009 and in
early 2010, Yerevan and Baku were offered updated Madrid Principles.

Turkish PM threatens to expel illegal Armenians

The Irish Times

March 18, 2010 Thursday

ANKARA Turkey s prime minister has threatened to expel thousands of
illegal Armenian immigrants after US and Swedish lawmakers passed
votes branding the first World War-era killings of Armenians by
Ottoman Turks as genocide.

Muslim Turkey, a Nato member and candidate to join the European Union,
recalled its ambassadors to Washington and Stockholm earlier this
month after the non-binding votes and warned they could hurt a fragile
effort to reconcile with Christian Armenia after a century of
hostility.

Asked about the votes in an interview with the BBC Turkish service,
prime minister Tayyip Erdogan said: There are currently 170,000
Armenians living in our country. Only 70,000 of them are Turkish
citizens, but we are tolerating the remaining 100,000. If necessary, I
may have to tell these 100,000 to go back to their country because
they are not my citizens. I don t have to keep them in my country.

Commentators have said the US vote could affect Washington s use of
the Incirlik Air base in southeast Turkey, which provides vital
logistical support for US troops going to and from Iraq.

Mr Erdogan s comments were met with a stern reaction from Armenia.
This kind of political statement does not help improve relations
between the two states, said prime minister Tigran Sarksyan. I agree
with the assessment that when the Turkish prime minister allows
himself to make such statements, the events of 1915 immediately return
to our memory, he added.

Thousands of illegal Armenian immigrants, mostly women from the
impoverished countryside, work as cleaning ladies and in other
low-skilled jobs in Istanbul, where many settled after an earthquake
in their homeland in 1988.

The exact number of Armenian immigrants in Turkey is unknown. But
Turkish-Armenian groups say Turkish politicians inflate numbers of
illegal workers and threaten expulsions whenever tensions escalate
between Ankara and Yerevan.

Mr Erdogan said Armenian immigrants had been allowed to work in Turkey
as a display of our peaceful approach, but we have to get something in
return .

Aris Nalci, an editor at Turkish-Armenian weekly newspaper Agos, said
it was not the first time Mr Erdogan had made such remarks. We are not
taking it as a serious threat, he said.

Muslim Turkey and Christian Armenia signed historic accords last year
to establish diplomatic ties and open their border. But the deal has
yet to be ratified by their respective parliaments and the governments
have accused each other of trying to rewrite the texts.

Mr Erdogan s comments could further strain the process of normalising
ties that have been burdened by the deportation and killing of
Armenians during the chaotic end of the Ottoman empire almost a
century ago.

Mr Sarksyan said the issue of illegal immigrants should be solved
through diplomacy and for that to happen the two countries should
normalise relations.

The deportation threats will be frowned upon by European governments
that have voiced support for Turkey s EU bid, and have backed the
peace accords with Armenia. Suat Kiniklioglu, foreign affairs
spokesman for the ruling AK Party, played down Mr Erdogan s statement,
saying the premier felt the need to remind the public about Armenians
living illegally in Turkey. He said Mr Erdogan was not talking about
something that would happen today or tomorrow .

ERDOGAN GOES BACK ON HIS WORD

PanARMENIAN.Net
19.03.2010 17:06 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan on
Friday defended his statements about deporting undocumented Armenian
workers and criticized the media for misinterpreting his remarks.

He said the media was wrong to compare Roma and Armenian citizens to
illegal immigrants, saying his comments in London were distorted.

Erdogan said Tuesday in an interview with the BBC Turkish service
that illegal immigrants from Armenia would be expelled, sparking
outrage among the opposition and media.

Things are evaluated differently for citizens within the framework
of the law, he said at the ruling Justice and Development Party,
or AKP, headquarters on Friday, adding that citizens are different
than people who reside in the country illegally.

Erdogan said the foreign press had misinterpreted his definition of
"illegal". He said he was not addressing Turkish citizens of Armenian
descent.

He criticized those asking for an apology. "We know very well who
that apology should come from," he said.

Erdogan made the threat after U.S. and Swedish lawmakers
approved a resolution recognizing the Genocide of Armenians,
Assyrians/Syrians/Chaldeans and Pontic Greeks.

During his speech on Friday, Erdogan reminisced about Sunday’s meeting
with nearly 13,000 Roma in Istanbul. "The enthusiasm at this meeting
did not wane for a moment," he said.

"The Roma citizens are my citizens, and they have not benefited from
citizenship laws for the last 10 years," he said. "We will fix these
problems. If there is a need to apologize to them, I will apologize
to them now in the name of the Turkish state.

"The Roma are not a minority but an essential element in this country,"
he said, Hurriyet Daily News reported.

WITH FRIENDS LIKE THESE . . .

Wall Street Journal
March 18 2010

. . . Armenia doesn’t need enemies.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan this week told the BBC he
could deport 100,000 undocumented Armenian immigrants. The cue for his
threat was the recent U.S. and Swedish "nonbinding resolutions" saying
the mass expulsions and serial murders of Armenians by Ottoman forces
95 years ago ought to be called a genocide. Not content to have done
more damage to Turkish-Armenian relations than anything Ankara has done
recently, the U.S. House of Representatives has not ruled out taking
up the declaration by the Foreign Affairs committee in a full vote.

Mr. Erdogan’s diatribe was most likely a bluff. Ankara tends to
inflate its numbers of illegal Armenian workers, either to display its
goodwill toward that country’s nationals, or to threaten them–whatever
seems most opportune at the time. But that’s not to say that the
increasingly heavy-handed Turkish premier can’t make life difficult
in other ways for however many Armenians live and work in his country,
whether they’re within the law or not.

For now, bluster is begetting bluster. The feel-good meddling from
Stockholm and Washington, and Mr. Erdogan’s bombastic reaction, has
drawn equally unhelpful rhetoric from Yerevan, where officials are
branding his threat a potential abuse of human rights, and saying
his words smack of the Ottomans’ World War I-era atrocities against
Armenians. The two countries in October struck a landmark deal to
normalize relations and open their common border, though the pact has
yet to be ratified. Given the recent tumult courtesy of American and
Swedish lawmakers, that doesn’t seem likely to happen anytime soon.

Meanwhile, Moscow is reportedly eyeing the U.S.-Turkish and
Turkish-Armenian spats and wondering how it can benefit. Hooray for
Congressional exercises in statecraft.

It remains to be seen how the American declaration will affect
Turkey’s heretofore stalwart support in Afghanistan, not to mention
its reluctance to back sterner action against Iran’s nuclear program.

But in the meantime, other lawmakers eager to set other countries’
nearly 100-year-old records straight might reflect on the hazards of
empty-gesture diplomacy.

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OSCE MG CONSIDERS TALKS WITH RA FM CONSTRUCTIVE

news.am
March 18 2010
Armenia

"The talks between OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs and RA Foreign Minister
Edward Nalbandian were held in a constructive spirit and will be
continued during the forthcoming travel of the Co-Chairs to Yerevan
and Nagorno-Karabakh," OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs issued a statement.

They discussed Armenian comments on the Co-Chairs’ latest formulations
of the basic principles for the peaceful settlement to Nagorno-Karabakh
conflict, the statement reads.

As NEWS.am reported previously, March 16, RA Foreign Minister
Edward Nalbandian met OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs Robert Bradtke,
Bernard Fassier, Yuri Merzlyakov and Personal Representative of the
Chairman-in-Office Andrzej Kasprzyk in Paris.