Author: Taslakhchian Andranik

Levon Aronyan’s recurrent victory

armradio.am
29.01.2007 15:36

The Corus International Chess Festival in the Dutch city of Wijk aan
Zee came to an end. In the last 13th round leading chess player of
Armenia Levon Aronyan defeated Sergey Tivyakov (Netherlands). Gaining
8.5 points, the Armenian Grand Master shared the 1st-3rd places with
Veselin Topalov (Bulgaria) and Teymur Rajabov (Azerbaijan).

In Group B Gabriel Sargsyan gained 8points out of 13 possible and
shared 2-5th places with four other chess players.

Panorama.am

17:36 27/01/2007

ARMENIAN AND TURK DIPLOMATS MEET IN TURKEY

At the initiative of Turkish sides, deputy foreign minister of
Armenia, Arman Kirakosyan and department head of bilateral relations
at the Turkish foreign minister, Reshad Uman, met in Istanbul,
Vladimir Karapetyan, press secretary of the Armenian foreign minister,
told RFE/RL.

In his words, the sides discussed dispositions of the two countries
and looked for ways for improvements in relations. `It must be said
the differences in dispositions between the two countries still
exist,’ Karapetyan said also saying Armenia is still ready to enter
into closer relations with Turkey without preconditions.

Source: Panorama.am

Ynetnews, Israel
Jan 28 2007

Recognizing global atrocities

All mankind must view concentration camp history as sign of lurking
dangers

Dr. Nili Keren Published: 01.28.07, 18:48

"First they came for the Communists, and I didn’t speak up because I
wasn’t a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn’t speak
up because I wasn’t a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a trade unionist. Then they
came for the Catholics, and I didn’t speak up because I was a
Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time no one was left
to speak up."

These words, spoken by Martin Niemöller, a German pastor and a
dissident of the Nazi regime, should have been the main motto for the
International Holocaust Remembrance Day marked Saturday.

The indifference of the nations of the world and their leaders during
the Holocaust enabled the mass murder of Jews almost without
interference, until Allied troops were at the gates of the camps.

International Holocaust Remembrance Day is aimed at reminding all
nations of the world of their duty not to forget. The increasingly
sophisticated attempts to deny the Holocaust and the attempts to deny
that the world stood to one side during this genocide will inevitably
breed the next Holocaust – even if it is not called a Holocaust, a
term reserved exclusively for the genocide of the Jewish people.

There is a risk that this Remembrance Day will turn into the core
issue, namely, that the nations of the world would feel as though
they have fulfilled their duty by simply conducting learned
discussions and ceremonies and by rolling their eyes towards the
heavens once a year, while at the same time further genocides are
carried out under their very noses.

Israelis ignore non-Jewish victims

International Holocaust Remembrance Day should remind the world that
due to apathy, nations and societies can and do commit crimes against
humanity in almost every continent, including in Europe (the former
Yugoslavia,) not to mention Africa and Asia. The role of the
civilized world is not to mark the good and the bad, but rather, to
completely change modes of conduct. Meanwhile, humanistic values must
be put to the test without any economic, ethnic or other
considerations.

Israelis have for years been involved in perpetuating the memory of
Jewish victims of the Holocaust while completely ignoring other Nazi
victims who were not Jewish. Instead of speaking out against genocide
in various corners of the world, we are busy preventing comparisons
between them and "our" Holocaust. We demand that everyone recognize
Jewish suffering, and even today we take every foreign leader to
visit the Yad Vashem Museum.

Yet we refuse to recognize the suffering of the Armenian people, for
example, almost half of whom were killed by the Turks. We refuse to
believe that for the Armenians this too was a Holocaust.

Jews have a special commitment on International Holocaust Remembrance
Day. We should devote our thoughts and deeds to identify with other
victims of the Nazi regime: Gypsies, homosexuals, Communists and the
peoples of occupied nations. We should join the effort and physically
prevent mass murder from being carried out in our times, and to fight
the perpetrators by every means available.

As Primo Levi wrote in his book "If this is a man," all mankind must
view the history of the concentration camps as a sign of the dangers
lurking on the horizon. Such things must serve as a warning light for
all of us all – today and for all 365 days of the year.

Dr. Nili Keren is a pedagogical advisor at Massuah, the Institute for
the Study of the Holocaust at Tel Yitzhak

,7340,L-335793 3,00.html

IP TELEPHONES ARE NOT DISCONNECTED YET

A1+
[12:45 pm] 25 January, 2007

Under the January 8 decision of the Commission For Regulating Public
Services (CRPS) the telephones of all the providers transferring more
than 400 millisecond voice via the Internet were to be disconnected
on January 25.

Reminder: Robert Nazaryan, head of CRPS, promised that the decision
will spread over the providers breaching the monopoly of "ArmenTel"
according to which the Armenian Commission for Regulating Public
Services secured the ArmenTel CJSC’s exclusive right to voice data
communication services

Artyom Khachatryan, head of Dashink cadre center, informed us that
Mr.Nazaryan’s words have nothing to do with the reality, as the
"commission regulates a sphere they have no notion of".

Currently none of the telephones has been disconnected but they will
likely be disconnected at 5-6 p.m. as it is like "ArmenTel".

Hasmik Chutilyan, head of ArmenTel’s press service, informed A1+
that the company isn’t going to disconnect the telephones of IP
companies. "We have special equipment with the help of which we make
checks from time to time. Only the telephones of the providers which
will attempt to transfer voice will be disconnected", assured Hasmik
Chutilyan.

M. Bryza says it is possible to sign a peace treaty on Karabakh in 2007

PanARMENIAN.Net
25.01.2007 16:04 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ During consultations with Azeri authorities the main
principles of the Nagorno Karabakh conflict settlement were discussed,
as well as energy issues, stated American Co-Chair Matthew Bryza in
the airport of Baku. In his words, the Azeri foreign minister treats
the talks seriously and constructively, which allows to hope reaching
agreements in the current year. The American Co-Chair says it is
possible to sign a peace treaty on Karabakh in 2007, but some problems
must be solved. Alongside, M. Bryza added that Armenia and Azerbaijan
are seriously protecting their interests during the negotiations,
but in constructive atmosphere, Azeri newspaper ‘Zerkalo’ reports.

HRANT DINK WAS DOOMED TO DEATH: PERSON IN CHARGE OF "TEKEYAN"
ORGANIZATION’S OFFICE IN USA AND CANADA

Yerevan, January 26. ArmInfo. The Editor-in-Chief of "Agos" newspaper,
Hrant Dink, killed in Istanbul on January 19, was doomed to death
under modern conditions of the Turkish society, the person in charge
of the "Tekeyan" organization’s office in the USA and Canada, a
member of Ramkavar Azatakan party Yervand Azatyan said at today’s
press-conference.

He underlined that the Armenian community of Turkey, unlike the
Armenian Diaspora in other countries, behaves extremely gingerly
and cautiously, taking care of its business and daily needs only
and tries not to "show itself". And there appears a journalist who
make an accent in his publications not so much on the necessity
of recognizing the Armenian Genocide by Turkey as on "stopping to
consider the national minorities, living in Turkey – the Assyrians,
Armenians, Curds and others the slaves of the Ottoman Turkey".

Naturally, a radically disposed part of the Turkish society could
not forgive Hrant Dink for this, Azatyan said.

As for the response of the Armenian, Turkish and international press
for the murder of Hrant Dink, the Armenian press, according to Y.

Azatyan, has responded rather emotionally, not without an anti-Turkish
hysteria. The Turkish press has also responded emotionally, but in
its typical manner – one newspaper even tried to reveal the Armenian
roots at H. Dink’s killer. As for the international Media, the American
press did not respond at all, while the European Mass Media have even
managed to come out with analytical calculations, Y. Azatyan said.

Agence France Presse — English
January 20, 2007 Saturday 11:26 PM GMT

Turkey detains teenager in journalist’s murder

by Nicolas Cheviron

Turkish police detained a 17-year-old male Saturday suspected of
murdering journalist Hrant Dink, one of Turkey’s most prominent
ethnic Armenians, whose slaying sent shock waves through the country.

Ogun Samast was captured at 11:00 pm (2100 GMT) on a bus in the Black
Sea port city of Samsun, Istanbul Governor Muammer Guler told
reporters.

He was en route to his nearby home town of Trabzon, a nationalist
stronghold, still carrying the gun he allegedly used to shoot Dink,
53, three times in the head and the neck outside the office of his
Agos weekly in downtown Istanbul on Friday afternoon, Guler said.

Six other people suspected of being involved in the assassination
were detained in Trabzon.

The NTV news channel quoted Samsun prosecutor Ahmet Gokcinar as
saying that Samast confessed to gunning down Dink in his first
interrogation.

Samast, a jobless secondary school graduate, was reportedly involved
in extreme nationalist groups.

Dink was one of the taboo-breaking critics of the official line on
the mass massacres of Armenians under the Ottoman Empire, which he
labeled as genocide, and was last year given a suspended six-month
jail sentence for insulting "Turkishness."

Nationalists had branded him a "traitor" and Dink wrote in his recent
articles that he received threats and hate mail.

The hunt for the suspect, caught on the security camera of a bank
near the site of the attack, gained speed after his father called
police to identify the young man in the images.

The images released by the police showed a lean, young man clad in a
denim jacket and jeans and wearing a white beret. He was seen holding
an object, which officials said was a gun, under his jacket.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan hailed Samast’s detention "in the
name of democracy and the struggle for freedom".

All seven detainees were to be flown to Istanbul, where three other
people were taken into custody Friday but later released.

"All their links are being investigated," Guler said. "The
investigation will show whether any (illegal) organisation is
involved."

Samast allegedly came to the Agos office about three hours before the
attack, presented himself as a student and asked to see Dink, Guler
quoted Agos secretaries as telling the police.

He was turned down and when one of the secretaries went out about two
hours later she saw him still standing in the street outside.

Anger boiled over Dink’s murder across Turkey, with the government
under fire for failing to protect a man who had received threats and
hate mail.

In a January 12 column in Agos, Dink also mentioned he was summoned
by one of Istanbul’s deputy governors in 2004 and warned that he
might become the target of nationalist violence if he did not tone
down his writings.

Despite the controversies, the soft-spoken and often emotional Dink
had won many hearts here as a sincere activist for Turkish-Armenian
reconciliation, who also denounced Armenian radicalism and most
recently a French bill to jail those who deny that the 1915-17
massacres constituted genocide.

The press condemned the murder as a "national disgrace" and called
for the journalist’s funeral, scheduled for Tuesday, to become a mass
event in the name of democracy and peace in Turkey.

Dink was convicted under the infamous Article 301 of the penal code,
which has been used against other intellectuals including 2006 Nobel
literature laureate Orhan Pamuk, and which the EU has denounced as a
threat to free speech in the EU-hopeful country.

The EU’s German presidency said Saturday it was "appalled" by the
"abominable killing" and neighboring Greece said the murder was aimed
at undermining Turkey’s EU ambitions.

Armenians at home and elsewhere in Europe expressed their dismay on
Saturday, with scores attending rallies in Armenia and France.

In Istanbul, hundreds of mourners paid their respects at the spot
where the journalist was gunned down, lighting candles and laying
flowers at his portrait. Some groups shouted slogans condemning the
murder.

Thousands also marched in Istanbul late Friday, holding Dink’s
pictures and shouting "We are all Armenians, we are all Hrants."

The police will also look into any possible links between Dink’s
assassination and the murder of an Italian Catholic priest in Trabzon
in February, Erdogan was quoted as saying.

The Globe and Mail (Canada)
January 20, 2007 Saturday

Editorial: Turkey and Hrant Dink

The murder of Hrant Dink, a prominent Turkish writer and editor of an
Armenian-language newspaper, has been forcefully condemned by Turkish
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who said yesterday that "a
bullet has been fired at democracy and freedom of expression" in
Turkey. Indeed it has. But it is not enough to lash out at the
"traitorous hands" behind Mr. Dink’s killing. Mr. Erdogan needs to
look at Turkey’s own role in assaulting free expression.

Mr. Dink was prosecuted three times on charges of "denigrating
Turkishness" under Article 301 of the Turkish penal code. His crime?
Speaking openly about the mass killings of ethnic Armenians at the
beginning of the 20th century, killings that Turkey refuses to come
clean on. Mr. Dink’s conviction on one of those charges was upheld by
a court last year. He is not alone. Dozens of writers and
journalists, including Nobel laureate Orhan Pamuk, have been
similarly prosecuted.

Article 301 came into force in 2005, replacing an even harsher law,
as part of a package of reforms aimed at easing Turkey’s entry into
the European Union. It was immediately condemned by human-rights
groups, which say it poses a direct threat to free expression.
Amnesty International warned in 2005 that those "who express views
which run counter to ‘official history’ or the dominant ideology may
find themselves prosecuted." Prosecutions such as that of Mr. Dink
have borne that out. Yet Mr. Erdogan’s government has failed to
repeal the law.

Authorities also failed to act on Mr. Dink’s understandable fears for
his safety. He had received death threats, and in his last column
expressed concern about the absence of protection by police despite
numerous complaints. "Who knows what other injustices I will be up
against," he wrote. Now, tragically, we all know. The human-rights
campaigner has suffered the ultimate injustice; his life has been
brutally snuffed out. Official Turkey needs to respond to this crime
with more than an obligatory round of hand-wringing.

A spokeswoman for Amnesty International said yesterday that Turkey
retains "a number of harsh laws which endorse the suppression of
freedom of speech. These laws, coupled with the persisting official
statements by senior government, state and military officials
condemning critical debate and dissenting opinion, create an
atmosphere in which violent attacks can take place." If it is ever to
achieve its goal of admission into the European Union, Turkey must
own up to the dark episodes of its past, and at the same time
demonstrate that it is prepared to fully embrace freedoms in the
present – freedoms of the kind that Mr. Dink agitated for at the
expense of his life.

PanARMENIAN.Net

Hrant Dink Strove For Reconciliation of Two Peoples
20.01.2007 17:45 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ The symbolic meanings of the killing of Hrant Dink
are clear. The murder as if extends the prevailing cultural climate in
Turkey of denial of the Armenian Genocide, and the prevailing infamous
law 301 which makes it a betrayal of the Turkish nation to speak of
the Armenian Genocide, told Executive Director, Institute on the
Holocaust and Genocide of Jerusalem Prof. Israel Charny the
PanARMENIAN.Net corespondent. In his words, Hrant Dink was both a
loyal member of his Armenian people and a loyal citizen of his Turkish
nation. `He strove for reconciliation of the two peoples and he wanted
his nation to be accepted as a member of the European Community. We
hope that the tragedy of his murder will lead to prompt condemnation
by Turkish society and to police and legal steps to convict his
murderers. But we also hope that this ugly murder will have a stunning
effect on decent Turkish society, which will lead it to abolish law
301, and to acknowledge the history of genocide of non-Moslem peoples,
including the Armenians, Assyrians, and Greeks, during the period of
1915-1922,’ Prof. Charny underscored.

PanARMENIAN.Net

Chief of General Staff of Turkish Army Condemns `Hateful Attack’
Against Hrant Dink
20.01.2007 14:08 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ `We strongly condemn hateful attack against Hrant
Dink,’ stated Chief of General Staff Gen. Yasar Buyukanit. The Turkish
Press reports Gen. Buyukanit released a statement noting that he
hopes those who staged the attack will be found as soon as
possible. He also repeated that bullets fired at Dink were also fired
at Turkey.

Dink was shot in front of his office building in Sisli district of
Istanbul yesterday, and died instantly at the scene.