Author: Tumanian Talar

OpEdNews, PA
Oct 20 2007

President AhmaBUSHnejad

by Curt Day

The mass deportation and death based on ethnicity was undeniable. In
both cases, world leaders fight against the use of derogatory labels
to describe these events. In both cases, these same world leaders
employ a post-modern way of reasoning–that is an unwanted conclusion
implies that a statement must be false. So in the face of
incontrovertible evidence, how can President Ahmadinejad deny the
Holocaust and why is President Bush squeamish about calling the
slaughter of the Armenians by the Turks of the Ottoman Empire
genocide?

Earlier in the year, we experienced the lunacy of President
Ahmadinejad’s denial of the Holocaust. The reasoning behind such a
denial is quite understandable. The Holocaust has been illegitimately
used to justify Israel’s harsh occupation against the Palestinians.
Part of this occupation includes confiscation of land, imprisoning
and torturing people, robbing and denying use of basic resources such
as water, and according to some Israelis, the bulldozing of
Palestinian homes with the residents still inside. Israel’s B’Tselem
website () documents some of the
inequity that is being forced on the Palestinians and it does so
without mincing words about the evils of Arab terrorism against
Israel. Thus, one way of undermining the reasoning used to inflict
such suffering is to deny the basis for that reasoning. According to
President Ahmadinejad, if the Holocaust is used to justify Israel’s
horrific treatment of the Palestinians, then the Holocaust could not
have occurred. So though President Ahmadinejad’s Holocaust denial is
despicable, we can see the rationality behind it. But little does he
know that when he sacrifices the truth about the Holocaust for a
legitimate concern for the Palestinians, his efforts to help become
counterproductive.

But how different is Ahmadinejad’s genocidal denial different from
President Bush’s refusal to call the mass killings of Armenians by
the Turks in the early 20th century genocide? Like the Jews in Europe
during the 1930’s and 1940’s, the Armenians were driven from their
homes and sent to their deaths. Even President Bush accepts the
historicity of the suffering of the Armenian people
( =07/10/11/1339254). But
the possible ramifications have tempered President Bush’s response to
this suffering. These ramifications include Turkey’s cooperation in
the War on Iraq and the War on Terror. In addition, we are now seeing
Turkey place 60,000 troops along its Iraqi border in response to the
resolution.

Who is to blame for Turkey’s response? President Bush and his
followers would like to point the finger at the Houser Foreign
Affairs Committee. After all, if they had not passed their
resolution, Turkey would not have thrown a tantrum. But isn’t that
line of reasoning the same as blaming a child for being abused
because if the child had not upset their monster parent, the parent
would not have been abusive?

Does the abuse model fit here? Consider Turkey’s actions as of late.
Turkey has been severely persecuting its Kurdish population. Turkey
has been killing thousands, driving many from their homes, and either
imprisoning or exiling its critics. This is not the Ottoman Empire of
the early 20th century; it is today’s Turkey. And we have been
quietly supporting all of this since the 1990s
( .htm,
m).

Two lessons should be apparent here for President Bush. First, both
mincing words and denying reality for expediency’s sake carries with
it unwanted consequences. For example, consider our immediate
response to Saddamn Hussein’s initial use of WMDs. It was tepid
because Saddamn was an ally in a troubled Middle East. So instead of
calling him a monster, we referred to him as a moderate–that is
until he invaded Kuwait.

Or think of the `Freedom Fighters’ we helped in Afghanistan in the
1980’s. We knew what kind of people we were dealing with and yet we
supported them because of expediency – these fighters provided a way of
bleeding the Soviet Union to collapse.

Second, unless President Bush wants to become more like a nemesis,
which in this case would be President Ahmadinejad, he should be
honest with the past rather than opportunistic or utilitarian. At
this point, we should note the difference in Presidents Ahmadinejad’s
and Bush’s messages. In President Ahmadinejad’s case, he denies
history in order to defend an oppressed people. In President Bush’s
case, he minces words about history to protect abusive powers that
currently serve us. And yet, what these Presidents have in common is
to deny or revise history for gain.

So rather than criticizing the resolution passed by the House Foreign
Affairs Committee, President Bush should be praising it. By doing so,
he would be placing principle over partisanship which would stand in
contrast to President Ahmadinejad’s treatment of history.

Curt Day is a religious flaming fundamentalist and a political
extreme moderate. Curt’s blog is at

http://www .opednews.com/articles/opedne_curt_day_071017_pres ident_ahmabushne.htm

Minneapolis Star Tribune , MN
Oct 20 2007

Armenian church is rebuilding, reaching out

Leader touring the U.S. will visit an Armenian church in St. Paul and
the University of St. Thomas.

By ANNE MARIE IDDINS Special to the Star Tribune
Last update: October 19, 2007 – 5:43 PM

ETCHMAIDZIN, Armenia – During 70 years of Soviet domination, Armenian
parents and grandparents baptized their children in secret, fearing
reprisals.
The Soviets left Armenia in 1991, and today in the holy city of
Etchmiadzin, baptism parties grace the flowered grounds of the Mother
See, the Armenian Apostolic Church’s Vatican. On a late summer
Sunday, young girls in puffy pastel dresses waited outside the
18th-century baptistery, where more than 100 people are received into
the church daily.

Soon baptisms will take place in a new building, one of three going
up near the Mother Cathedral, parts of which date to the fourth
century. The new chapel will have a marble pool where adults can be
baptized by full immersion.

The construction is an example of how the Armenian Church is
revitalizing itself after centuries of political strife, genocide at
the hands of the Turks in 1915, a massive earthquake in 1988 — and
decades of Communist repression.

"During the Communist years, it wasn’t forbidden to enter the
seminary, but if you did, the next day you would be shipped to
Siberia," the Very Rev. Zaven Yazichyan said. "At the time we had one
Catholicos and 10 clergy for all Armenians. Now we have 20 to 25
graduating the seminary each year."

Just as the church is rebuilding its physical base, it also is
reaching out to help Armenians around the world find their heritage.
On Sept. 30, Karekin II, the Catholicos of all Armenians, began a
monthlong visit to the United States. The Catholicos, the temporal
leader of the Armenian church, will make 18 stops in 12 states,
including next Thursday and Friday in the Twin Cities, where he’ll
visit St. Sahag Armenian Church in St. Paul and the University of St.
Thomas.

He will participate in a service at St. Sahag at 7 p.m. Thursday,
which will be followed by a public reception at 8 p.m. Karekin II
also will give an address and receive an honorary degree at 10:30
a.m. Friday at the University of St. Thomas School of Law in the
Schulze Grand Atrium on the university’s downtown Minneapolis campus.
(For more information about the events, call 651-603-1940 or go to
)

The church’s outreach is important because most Armenians live
outside the country, including about 1,150 Armenians or people of
Armenian descent in Minnesota. They are part of a diaspora that has
gone on for centuries.

Minnesota Armenians opened St. Sahag’s in 2001, a symbol of the
church’s renewed role in the lives of Armenian-Americans.

"We have a small congregation, but lots of talent," said Sam
Charchian, chairman of the parish council. "We’re continuously
growing."

Elyssa Karanian, 22, an Armenian-American who has studied the role of
the church, believes that the church plays a larger cultural role in
diasporan communities than in Armenia itself.

"I think the years of Soviet rule did quite a bit to diminish the
church’s role in Armenia," said Karanian, who lives and works in the
capital city of Yerevan.

Added Sister Katarina Schuth, Endowed Chair for the Social Scientific
Study of Religion at the St. Paul Seminary: "In Armenia’s case, I
think [religion] is critical to help keep people together and bring
them closer."

l

TEMPLE OF VIRGIN MARY TO BE DISPOSED TO RELIGIOUS ORGANIZATION OF
COMMUNITY OF RUSSIAN ORTHODOX CHURCH AS PROPERTY

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 19, NOYAN TAPAN. The government of Armenia ordered the
Mayor of Yerevan in the sitting held on October 18 to provide the
checking of the plot of the temple of the Virgin Mary of the Russian
Orthodox Church of Armenia necessary for the maintenance and
preservation of the temple together with the RA Minister of Culture in
a one-month term. It was also decided to alienate the temple of the
Virgin Mary of the Russian Orthodox Church of Yerevan with the right of
gratuitous ownership and to dispose the plot necessary for the
maintenance and preservation of the temple to the religious
organization of the community of the above-mentioned church with the
right of gratuitous use.

STANDING DOWN ON SCHIP, GENOCIDE

The Gate – National Journal, DC
Oct 18 2007

Updated.

The House Democratic leadership failed to wrangle the 12 to 15
additional votes it needed to push an expansion of a health care
program for poor children past a presidential veto.

Lawmakers voted to override President Bush’s veto 265 to 159, just
under the two-thirds majority required. Squabbling over the bill,
popular in spirit but contentious in practice, culminated in lawmakers
using and attacking real live children volunteered by their parents
as props in the debate.

Today’s vote was originally scheduled for around noon, but had to be
delayed because of still more ugliness. During floor debate preceding
the vote, California Democrat Pete Stark accused Republican fiscal
conservatives of "telling lies" about the breadth of the expansion.

He continued: "You don’t have money to fund the war or children. But
you’re going to spend it to blow up innocent people if we can get
enough kids to grow old enough for you to send to Iraq to get their
heads blown off for the president’s amusement."

The National Republican Congressional Committee fired off video
of Stark’s remarks so fast that it misidentified the loose-cannon
lawmaker as a fellow Republican. Protesting GOP lawmakers called for
a reprimand vote on the remarks, which failed.

It seems that the hard-charging Democrats of nine months ago have hit
a wall when it comes to Bush’s vetoes. Today’s vote means they will
be forced to make concessions, despite a vow from House Speaker Nancy
Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid yesterday (subscription)
that they would not give in on the $35 billion figure for SCHIP
expansion. Lawmakers are under the gun to push reauthorization through,
as a number of states have already suspended their programs in the
face of no new federal contributions.

In remarks yesterday warning House lawmakers against an override,
Bush said, "Now it’s time to put politics aside and seek common ground
to reauthorize this important program." The president, backed by a
bloc of fiscal conservatives in Congress, has criticized the package
as overly expansive, because in some states middle-class families
qualify for coverage. The program’s intent was to cover families too
poor to afford private insurance but ineligible for Medicare.

Bush signaled yesterday that his veto should stand because there is
plenty of room for compromise. "If it requires more than the 20 percent
increase in funding that I proposed, then we’ll work with Congress
to find the funding that we need," he said in a press conference.

Also yesterday, Pelosi signaled the House would back off on a
nonbinding resolution condemning the Ottoman Empire’s genocide of the
Armenians nearly a century ago. Even critics of Turkey, which denies
the genocide occurred despite overwhelming historical evidence, have
come to acknowledge that the issue is one of timing. The Turkish
government reacted angrily after the resolution passed committee,
and is retaliating by threatening cross-border military strikes in
northern Iraq and warning of a severing of ties with Washington. The
Bush administration and all of the living former secretaries of state
have urged the House to drop the matter.

"We don’t have the number of allies we used to have. We’ve lost so
much credibility worldwide," said Pennsylvania Democrat John Murtha,
predicting the measure would not pass.

The prospect of losing Turkey as an ally is proving too much even
for lawmakers who feel strongly about the Armenian genocide issue.

According to a National Journal poll of congressional insiders that
will be released tomorrow, the most frequently cited reason for
backing off the resolution is timing.

"Even as a co-sponsor, I do not believe this is the right time,"
said one Republican lawmaker.

ARMENIAN UNDER-19 FOOTBALL TEAM TO PLAY QUALIFIERS WITH LITHUANIA, POLAND AND SAN MARINO

armradio.am
18.10.2007 12:38

The Armenian under-19 football team left for Lithuania to participate
in the European Championship qualifiers. The Armenian team is included
in the same group with the teams of Lithuania, Poland and San Marino.

The chief trainer of the Armenian youth team is Armen Gyulbudaghyants.

The tournament will start on October 20 and will continue through
October 25.

HERMINE NAGHDALYAN: "FEMALE DEPUTIES WILL SOFTEN ROUGH DECISIONS"

Panorama.am
20:28 17/10/2007

"Social processes have a frozen appearance. Even though not always
obvious, the role women play is large, but the number of those who
appear is quite small," stated Republican deputy Hermine Naghdalyan
while talking with journalists today about the role women play in
government. She added that it isn’t important so much the part women
play in government or social organizations but instead of the rough
activities one feels the softening affect offered by women. Concerning
this question, Jemma Hasratyan, president of the university women
education association, said that the number of women in the field
of health and education is 70-80%, which isn’t necessarily positive,
as most of these are feminists.

With that, the speakers said that there was a positive movement in
place, as in the past NA there were seven women, now the number has
reached 12. "The government shouldn’t only espouse equal rights and
opportunities, but create the means to ensure these things," expressed
Naghdalyan, stressing the need for corresponding laws. Hasratyan
said that the European Union has the goal of member countries having
women making up 40% of their parliaments by 2020, a goal that Armenian
lawmakers should be trying to meet.

DAYS OF WAC AND UAR FINISH IN ARMENIA AND ARTSAKH

Noyan Tapan
Armenians Today
Oct 17 2007

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 17, NOYAN TAPAN – ARMENIANS TODAY. The event
"Armenia is the Homeland of All Armenians" took place at Yerevan
school No 67 after Yeghishe Charents on October 17. This was the last
event organized within the framework of Days of the World Armenian
Congress (WAC) and the Union of Armenians of Russia (UAR) in Armenia
and Artsakh.

The WAC bureau member Manvel Adamian, who has participated in the
events under the slogan "Armenia is the Homeland of All Armenians" held
in three shools of Yerevan, expressed satisfaction at the fact that
the national spirit of the Armenian Issue was felt at all the events.

WAC and UAR donated three computers to Yerevan school after
Y. Charents.

THE WORST TIMES THE TURKISH DIPLOMACY HAS TO GO THROUGH

PanARMENIAN.Net
Analytical Department
16.10.2007 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Falah Mustafa Bakir, the Head of the Kurdistan
Regional Government’s (KRG) Department of Foreign Relations states:
"The Armenians are winning, we are paying off. The Kurdish province in
Iraq is the safest and the most stable one, but it can pay off a very
big price for the actions of the Kurdish Workers Party in Turkey,
exactly as for the voting of Resolution 106 about the Armenian
Genocide. None of these questions has any relation to the Kurdish
people of Iraq or the government of the province. We are not looking
for any conflicts with Turkey; just on the contrary, we believe that
the friendly relations with Turkey are one of the key priorities we
can have."

True though, there are "other" Kurds who welcome the Resolution
about the Armenian Genocide of 1915. It should be mentioned that in
1947 when the Turkish troops occupied the northern part of Cyprus,
the World Community’s reaction was not so violent.

Perhaps the present government of Turkey has a strong reason to
think of the Young Turks with a kind of jealousy, for it was all the
same for them how the World Community would response to the Armenian
Genocide. The truth is though, that in those times too the newspapers
wrote about the terrible slaughters. In its article "The Armenian
Slaughter. Annihilation of a Race. Horrifying History" published on
October 8, 1915 The Times wrote about the Armenian Genocide. The
article told in details about the systematic exterminations of
the Armenians in the Ottoman Empire, the atrocity of the Turkish
soldiers butchering the Armenians, about the Kurds attacking the
Armenian villages, about how crowds of wounded, exhausted and faint
with hunger Armenians were forced to cross the desert Deir ez Zor,
where the dead bodies of women, children and old people covered all
around. The Times also writes about the vain attempts of European
diplomats, having witnessed those horrifying events to prevent the
violence of the Ottoman Turks and quotes Talal Ataturk’s words who
announced in the beginning of the 20th century, "Armenians are the
race, whose extermination will not be any big loss for anyone at
all." The other day the newspaper published the reprinted edition of
this article. And The New York Sun writes about the whole issue with
an open text: "It was Genocide, and it is simply indecent to deny
it. In our days the denial of the Armenian Genocide is considered to
be a sign of bad form."

Elements of absurdity are sure to be observed in this story. The
statement made by Turkish Prime Minister’s advisor on foreign policy
issues Egemen Bagis saying that, "Turkey must apply sanctions against
Armenia, since it supports the Resolution 106 of the U.S. House
Committee on Foreign Affairs about the Armenian Genocide" cannot be
qualified differently. Or maybe the advisor forgot that the borders
have been closed since 1993, or he intends to close the way to Armenia
from Turkey through Georgia. Even if Georgia agrees to do that,
it will have to deal with Europe, which is already inclined to the
earliest opening of the Armenian-Turkish borders. Otherwise what will
this symbolic gesture give? Another more dangerous thing will be the
arrest of the Armenian citizens who are in Turkey illegally. According
to Turkey there are 70.000 of them, but more reliable sources show
that there are 10.000-15.000 people. This will already be enough to
complicate the situation of RA’s foreign policy. The aim of these
statements is quite clear, it aims at upsetting Armenia’s routine with
the hope that it will finally agree with the Turkish suggestion of
establishing a commission of historians and follow whatever comes next.

According to the former Ambassador Gunduz Aktana, one of the most
fervent opponents of the recognition of the Armenian Genocide, Turkey
should apply the hardest sanctions against the USA, "Whatever happened,
happened. Turkey must undertake return measures," announced Aktana in
his interview with Turkish Daily News. According to him, otherwise
the country could pay a higher price and in the final result could
lose the principles of its foreign policy. Nuzet Kandemir turned to
the government with the request to consider all the risks the possible
responses from the USA.

"These measures shouldn’t be publicly discussed, they should be
discussed secretly and seriously with the condition of realizing them
only when the right time comes," he said.

The problem is that the relations between Turkey and the United
States are not correctly qualified. The strategic partners act like
one state and two nations, but in American-Turkish relations things
are quite differently arranged. The approval of the Resolution
106, the reestablishment of the relations with the radical Islamic
grouping HAMAS and the agreement on cooperation with Turkey and Iran
in the field of energy showed that these two countries have not been
strategic partners but only allies. If we look at the problem in this
prospective, we will not find ourselves in confusion," thinks Turkish
diplomat Inal Batu.

DID HILL KILL THE ARMENIA BILL?

Hot Air, MD
Oct 17 2007

Now we hear a dozen lawmakers have changed their mind on the resolution
in the past 24 hours. Of the three Democrats mentioned as flipping
this morning – Reps. Allen Boyd of Florida, Jane Harman of California,
and Mike Ross of Arkansas – two (Harman, Ross) have endorsed Hillary.

It does make sense: Would you want to start your term in the White
House with a major NATO ally spitting mad at the US?

I’m sure the Democrats who were all set to vote on this bill will
still get a chance to annoy another vital ally eventually. Hey look,
Japan’s cabinet has approved extending its naval mission in support
of the war in Afghanistan. Let’s draft a resolution condemning them
for the 17th century suppression of Christianity.

NPR.org
October 17, 2007

Two Sides of the Controversial Genocide Bill Debate

Listen to this story…

Day to Day, October 15, 2007 – The U.S. House of Representatives is
considering a resolution that calls the 1915 massacre of Armenians a
genocide. The White House has opposed the measure and it has angered
the Turkish government.

Nigar Goksel, editor in chief of Turkish Policy Quarterly, says the
events of 1915 are not denied in Turkey. The contention is over the
use of the term genocide, which many in Turkey believe is being used
to discredit them. Turkey also contends that the Armenian deaths were
not as systematic as the term suggests.

Goksel says there is already a lot of anti-Americanism in Turkey over
the war in neighboring Iraq. However, the U.S. military uses the
country’s airspace and one of its bases to conduct the war. But if the
House passes the resolution, relations could be further stained and
Turkey could cut off military ties with the United States.

For Armenians in the U.S., though, the passage of the House resolution
is being considered a "historical moment."

Southern California has the largest number of Armenians living in the
United States. Doualy Xaykaothao of member station KPCC reports from
Glendale, the Armenian heart of Los Angeles.

The House resolution has wide-spread support in the Armenian
community. Some Armenian-Americans suggest that passing of the measure
might even spur the U.S. to address a genocide modern Darfur.

The House vote is expected sometime before Thanksgiving.