Author: Tvankchian Parkev

ARMENTEL INSTRUCTED TO RESUME PROVISION OF SERVICES TO 134 ORGANIZATIONS AND PERSONS

Noyan Tapan News Agency, Armenia
Oct 18 2006

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 18, NOYAN TAPAN. By the October 18 decision of
the RA Public Services Regulatory Commission, ArmenTel company
was instructed to resume temporarily the provision of telephone
services to 134 organizations and persons. The provision of services
was suspended on September 7. According to ArmenTel, the indicated
organizations and persons received voice services via the Internet,
which represented a violation of ArmenTel’s monopoly right.

NT correspondent was informed from the RA Public Services Regulatory
Commission that administrative procedure was initiated in connection
with violation of ArmenTel’s exclusive rights. A respective decision
will be taken based on the procedure results. ArmenTel was instructed
to present facts and evidence that the indicated organizations and
persons violated the exclusive right reserved to the company by its
licence no.60.

COMPANIES OF KRASNOYARSK AND ARMENIA CONCLUDE SEVERAL AGREEMENTS ON ECONOMIC COOPERATION

Financial Information Service(Registration), Russia
Oct 17 2006

KRASNOYARSK, October 16. /FIS/. As noted by Chairman of Armenia’s
Commodity Producers Union Vasgen Safaryan, a ‘SibArmAlco’ warehouse
is to open in Krasnoyarsk within the next month on the base of the
‘Siberia’ shopping and exhibition center having a representative
office in Armenia. The warehouse is intended for wholesale trading
of Armenian cognac, dry and vintage wines and champagne. Other plans
are to facilitate the cooperation between Armenian and Krasnoyarsk
enterprises, namely KrAZ, General Rubber Goods Plant, wood industrial
and machine building complexes. Concluded are also contracts on the
supply of Armenian mineral water and facing slabs from Armenia’s
precious stones.

ACCORDING TO ROBERT KOCHARIAN, ARMENIA HAS MUCH POTENTIAL FOR EXPORTING ORGANIC FOOD STUFFS

Noyan Tapan News Agency, Armenia
Oct 16 2006

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 16, NOYAN TAPAN. Armenia has much potential for
production, procession and export of ecologically pure organic
foodstuffs, and the state should create favorable conditions for using
this potential. The Armenian President Robert Kocharian stated this
at the October 14 press conference on results of his working visit
to Ararat marz.

In a response to a question of NT correspondent, he said that several
programs on organic food production already started in Armenia. R.

Kocharian indicated the program implemented by Argentinian Armenian
businessman Eduardo Ernekian in Armavir marz as the most successful
of these programs.

"We are ready to create favorable conditions, we are asssiting with the
process to produce good results: then farmers should decide themselves
which is more beneficial – to produce less but 5 times as expensive
production than now," he said.

According to him, the Armenian economy is undergoing a dynamic
development, and "innovations may have quite an efficient and favorable
effect in terms of developing the country’s economy."

EU SLAMS FRENCH BILL ON MASS KILLINGS IN ARMENIA AS ‘COUNTERPRODUCTIVE’
By Matti Huuhtanen, Associated Press Writer

The Associated Press
October 14, 2006 Saturday 2:43 AM GMT

The European Union on Friday condemned a French bill making it a
crime to deny that the World War I-era killing of Armenians in Turkey
was genocide, calling it unhelpful at a critical stage in the Muslim
country’s EU entry talks.

European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said "this decision
at this moment is helpful in the context of the European Union’s
relations with Turkey."

The bill was approved by lawmakers in France’s lower house Thursday,
but still needs approval by the French Senate and President Jacques
Chirac to become law. Turkey has said the decision would harm relations
with France.

Chirac’s government is thought to be unlikely to forward the bill
for passage by the Senate.

EU Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn said the bill, "instead of
opening up the debate, would rather close it down." He said it came at
a bad time as the 25-member bloc was trying to avoid "a train crash"
in negotiations with the predominantly Muslim nation.

"This law is counterproductive," he told reporters.

France, which is home to hundreds of thousands of people whose families
came from Armenia, has already recognized the 1915-1919 killings of
up to 1.5 million Armenians as genocide. Under the bill, those who
contest it was genocide would risk up to a year in prison and fines
of up to $56,000.

Armenia accuses Turkey of massacring Armenians during World War I,
when Armenia was under the Ottoman Empire. Turkey says Armenians were
killed in civil unrest during the collapse of the empire.

LA QUESTION ARMENIENNE ANIME LE DEBAT ELECTORAL AUX PAYS-BAS
Jean-Pierre Stroobants (Bruxelles, correspondant)

Le Monde
14 octobre 2006 samedi

Le debat francais sur le genocide armenien a ete suivi avec un
interet tout particulier a La Haye. A grand renfort d’analyses et de
comparaisons avec les Pays-Bas, les principaux medias ont accorde une
large place a une question qui agite aussi le royaume a l’approche
des elections legislatives du 22 novembre.

Trois candidats d’origine turque ont ainsi paye, a la fin du mois de
septembre, leur refus de reconnaître la realite du genocide de 1915.

Deux etaient membres de l’Appel chretien-democrate (CDA), le parti du
premier ministre, Jan Peter Balkenende. Le troisième etait un elu du
Parti du travail (PVDA) de Wouter Bos. M. Balkenende et M. Bos sont
au coude-a-coude dans les sondages.

Les candidats du CDA, Osman Elmaci et Ayhan Tonca, ont, dans un premier
temps, semble se rallier au programme de leur parti, qui qualifie de "
genocide " le massacre d’un million d’Armeniens. Dans un entretien au
journal turc Sabah, ils ont refute ensuite cette vision. S’appuyant
sur ce qu’il a appele " une difference structurelle d’opinion ",
le CDA les a rayes de sa liste. Erdinc Sacan a subi le meme sort
lorsqu’il a confirme qu’il n’adherait pas aux vues du PVDA, qui
reclame d’Ankara une reconnaissance de la realite du genocide avant
une eventuelle entree dans l’Union europeenne.

Cette triple eviction, et singulièrement celle de M. Tonca, l’un
des principaux hommes politiques de confession musulmane, a jete le
trouble dans la communaute turque, forte de 360 000 personnes. Dans
une lettre ouverte publiee le 9 octobre, une quinzaine de mouvements
turcs ont critique la " faute historique " des deux grands partis et
estime que les prochaines elections ne seraient " pas democratiques
". Ils n’ont cependant pas appele au boycottage du scrutin.

Certains leaders de la communaute turque invitent desormais a un vote
" strategique " en faveur d’une candidate du petit parti reformateur
D 66. Une pression intense s’exerce maintenant sur Nebahat Albayrak,
numero deux du Parti travailliste, sommee de se positionner. Elle
a, jusqu’ici, tente de se tirer d’affaire en affirmant qu’elle
estimait justifiee la qualification de genocide. Mais, formellement,
ajoute-t-elle, on ne dispose d’aucune preuve. Une explication aux
allures de pirouette, mais qui semble acceptee par les responsables
du PVDA.

–Boundary_(ID_5DolQWS5MYwc6Tr88fhDBw)–

UNDER FIRE, BUT STAYING TRUE TO ART
Joy E. Stocke

Philadelphia Inquirer, PA
Oct 15 2006

Thursday, it was announced that Turkish writer Orhan Pamuk had won
the 2006 Nobel Prize for Literature. When I interviewed Pamuk on the
Columbia University Campus last year, rumors were circulating that
he had been short-listed for the Nobel. But he was already focused
on his new memoir, Istanbul: Memories and the City, which was still
in galleys.

The day before, an advance copy of Istanbul had helped me stay awake
for the 11-hour flight home from that city. We’d originally been
scheduled to meet at his flat overlooking the Bosphorus. But before I
was to leave for Istanbul, Pamuk phoned. He spoke beautiful English,
with an accent inflected with the rhythm of an upper-class Turkish
background.

"I have left Turkey for personal reasons," he said. But something
in his voice made me doubt those words. Pamuk is a lightning rod in
Turkey, writing candidly about ethnicity, race, and Ottoman history,
subjects that have long been considered taboo. I was, and still am,
thrilled by his work. I am often transported by his dark sense of
humor, and unflinching eye in the face of political and cultural
truths.

In February 2005, Pamuk had spoken to a Swiss journalist, expressing
his opinion that during the final years of the Ottoman Empire,
100,000 Armenians and 30,000 Kurds were killed in an effort to rid the
empire of its Armenian population, addressing what might be the most
sensitive subject in Turkey, the charge that the first genocide of the
20th century took place there. Even as Turkey works toward acceptance
into the European Union, the government has vehemently denied charges
of genocide. (Last week, when France passed a law against denial of
the Armenian genocide, it touched off demonstrations in both France
and Turkey.)

Pamuk told me that when he spoke to that Swiss journalist, he had
asked that his remarks remain off the record. They were printed.

Death threats came thick and fast. Eventually Pamuk was charged with
crimes against Article 301 of the Turkish Penal Code. His crime:
insulting Turkishness. If he were proven guilty, he would be sentenced
to prison. (Charges were dropped on Jan. 22.) At the urging of friends,
he sought refuge in New York City.

Something stays in my mind about the day we finally met in a large
ballroom with a piano on one end, a table and two chairs at the
other. The man accused of crimes against the state sat down at the
piano and played. As music filled the cavernous room, his actions
made it clear that our interview was to concern art.

"My all-consuming passion," he said, "is to write the very best books
I am capable of writing." He spoke about his new memoir.

"First of all, I did not intend to write a book about Istanbul,"
he said. "As my agent was shopping around my novel Snow, I said,
‘I have so many articles about Istanbul, let’s put them together and
sell that book, too.’

"Publishers were enthusiastic," he said, "And I thought, ‘I can’t
give these guys who are so honest and strong in their support a mere
collection of articles. I will give them a new book.’ I stopped
everything on my current novel, The Museum of Innocence, which is
more ambitious than anything else I’ve written. I thought I would
write the memoir in sixth months. It took a year. I worked 12 hours
a day, just reading and working. My life, because of so many things,
was in a crisis. But every day I would wake up and have a cold shower
and sit down and remember and write."

Opening a notebook filled with dense handwriting, he added, "A writer
is nothing if he cannot be true to his work."

I’m reminded of the first sentence of one of Pamuk’s less-known novels,
The New Life, a sentence that sums up what Pamuk’s work has meant to
so many: "I read a book one day, and my whole life was changed."

For the full text of Joy E. Stocke’s interview with Orhan Pamuk,
see

Cyprus News Agency, Nicosia,
13 Oct 06

CYPRUS CRITICAL OF TURKEY, FRANCE OVER GENOCIDE LAW

Nicosia, 13 October: Cypriot government spokesman Khristodhoulos
Pashiardhis said on Friday [13 October] that historical events and
historical truth cannot be distorted, no matter how apt to such
behaviour contemporary Turkey is.

Asked about the law passed by the French National Assembly on the
Armenian genocide, Pashiardhis said this was a matter that
"exclusively concerns Turkey, Ottoman Turkey".

"Historical events and the historical truth can neither be violated
nor distorted, no matter how apt to such violations and distortions
contemporary Turkey is," he said.

The French National Assembly approved a resolution making the denial
of the Armenian genocide a criminal offence, a move that caused
Ankara’s reaction.

Panorama.am

17:40 12/10/06

ARMENIAN FOREIGN MINISTER HOLDS PRESS CONFERENCE WITH SPECIAL REP OF
NATO SECRETARY GENERAL

Armenian Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanyan held a joint press
conference today with Robert Simons, special representative of NATO
Secretary General. Oskanyan mentioned that Armenia is developing
smooth relationships with NATO through individual partnership
programs. The minister said these programs are developed upon mutual
consent based on the preferences of the partner-country. He also
assured that Armenia willingly is not involved in some programs where
Azerbaijan and Georgia are present.

`I want once again to mention that NATO supports Minsk Group,’
Mr. Simons said speaking about Karabakh conflict. He said he had
uttered the same in Baku ten days ago saying NATO is not part of
negotiations and the issue should be solved within OSCE Minsk Group.

Speaking about Russian-Georgian conflict, NATO represerntative was
very careful in words as saying, `The steps that Russia undertakes are
not favourable not only for Georgia but for the whole region.’
/Panorama.am/

TURKEY SAYS TIES DAMAGED BY FRENCH APPROVAL OF ARMENIA GENOCIDE BILL

International Herald Tribune. France
The Associated Press
Oct 12 2006

ANKARA, Turkey Turkey’s foreign minister said the country would
consider retaliatory measures against France, and unions called for a
trade boycott after French lawmakers on Thursday passed a bill making
it a crime to deny that Armenians suffered genocide at the hands of
the Ottoman Turks.

In Ankara, angry protesters pelted the French Embassy with eggs,
while others laid a black wreath at the gate of the French Consulate
in Istanbul.

"No one should harbor the conviction that Turkey will take this
lightly," Turkey’s foreign minister, Abdullah Gul, said. "The
parliament will meet on Tuesday with a special agenda and no doubt
we have measures to take in every field."

Gul did not elaborate but his comments were interpreted by many as
also being a reference to proposals currently being debated by Turkish
lawmakers to recognize an "Algerian genocide" by France.

"This is a national issue, no doubt our reaction both at the official
and public level will be very big," Gul said.

He said the bill dealt a serious blow to Turkish-French relations
and seriously damaged the credibility of France as a European Union
member which defends freedom of expression.

"From now on, France will never describe itself as the homeland of
freedoms," Gul said. "It will never be proud of being the country
where ideas are freely expressed."

"This shame will really be a grave one for them," Gul said.

France in 2001 recognized the killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians
from 1915 to 1919 as genocide; under Thursday’s bill, those who contest
it was genocide would risk up to a year in prison and fines of up to
~@45,000 (US$56,000).

Armenians say the killings were part of an organized campaign to force
Armenians out of eastern Turkey. However, Turkey says the death toll
is inflated and contends that a large number of people died in civil
unrest during the collapse of the Ottoman Empire.

Several trade groups called for a boycott of French goods, asking
the government to oust French firms from multimillion dollar energy
and defense tenders. Turkey had removed French firms some lucrative
tenders back in 2001 when French lawmakers voted to characterize the
killings of Armenians as genocide.

Gul hinted that Turkish reaction would now be much stronger.

Bulent Deniz, president of Turkish Consumers Union, said French goods
would be boycotted.

"Every week, we will announce a French trademark and increase the
number of goods in the boycott list," Deniz said. "We will reflect
the Turkish consumers reaction in the right way to France, it is
economic sanctions."

Ahmet Ozkul, a local official of a pro-Islamic businessmen association,
MUSIAD, in the western city of Bursa, also pressed for economic
sanctions against France.

"French firms, especially those operating in environment,
transportation, energy and defense sectors, must be ousted from major
tenders," Ozkul said.

ANKARA, Turkey Turkey’s foreign minister said the country would
consider retaliatory measures against France, and unions called for a
trade boycott after French lawmakers on Thursday passed a bill making
it a crime to deny that Armenians suffered genocide at the hands of
the Ottoman Turks.

In Ankara, angry protesters pelted the French Embassy with eggs,
while others laid a black wreath at the gate of the French Consulate
in Istanbul.

"No one should harbor the conviction that Turkey will take this
lightly," Turkey’s foreign minister, Abdullah Gul, said. "The
parliament will meet on Tuesday with a special agenda and no doubt
we have measures to take in every field."

Gul did not elaborate but his comments were interpreted by many as
also being a reference to proposals currently being debated by Turkish
lawmakers to recognize an "Algerian genocide" by France.

"This is a national issue, no doubt our reaction both at the official
and public level will be very big," Gul said.

He said the bill dealt a serious blow to Turkish-French relations
and seriously damaged the credibility of France as a European Union
member which defends freedom of expression.

"From now on, France will never describe itself as the homeland of
freedoms," Gul said. "It will never be proud of being the country
where ideas are freely expressed."

"This shame will really be a grave one for them," Gul said.

France in 2001 recognized the killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians
from 1915 to 1919 as genocide; under Thursday’s bill, those who contest
it was genocide would risk up to a year in prison and fines of up to
~@45,000 (US$56,000).

Armenians say the killings were part of an organized campaign to force
Armenians out of eastern Turkey. However, Turkey says the death toll
is inflated and contends that a large number of people died in civil
unrest during the collapse of the Ottoman Empire.

Several trade groups called for a boycott of French goods, asking
the government to oust French firms from multimillion dollar energy
and defense tenders. Turkey had removed French firms some lucrative
tenders back in 2001 when French lawmakers voted to characterize the
killings of Armenians as genocide.

Gul hinted that Turkish reaction would now be much stronger.

Bulent Deniz, president of Turkish Consumers Union, said French goods
would be boycotted.

"Every week, we will announce a French trademark and increase the
number of goods in the boycott list," Deniz said. "We will reflect
the Turkish consumers reaction in the right way to France, it is
economic sanctions."

Ahmet Ozkul, a local official of a pro-Islamic businessmen association,
MUSIAD, in the western city of Bursa, also pressed for economic
sanctions against France.

"French firms, especially those operating in environment,
transportation, energy and defense sectors, must be ousted from major
tenders," Ozkul said.

FRENCH MPS DEBATE ARMENIA ‘GENOCIDE’ BILL TO TURKEY’S FURY

Turkish Press
Oct 12 2006

PARIS – French MPs began debate Thursday on a bill that has provoked
fury in Turkey because it aims to criminalise opinions dissenting from
France’s official view that the 1915-1917 massacres of Armenians by
the Ottomans constituted genocide.

Introduced by the left-wing Socialist opposition, the draft law would
make it a crime in France to deny that the killings were genocide,
hitting violators with a prison term of up to one year and a fine of
up to 45,000 euros (57,000 dollars).

Turkey, the modern state which emerged from a sprawling Ottoman empire
that included Armenia, has said that, if the legislation is passed,
it would threaten France’s economic investments on its soil.

"If the bill is adopted, Turkey will not lose anything, but France
will lose not only Turkey, but something of itself as well," Turkish
Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul said Wednesday.

Ankara contests the term "genocide" for the killings and strongly
opposes the bill’s provisions.

It says 300,000 Armenians, and at least as many Turks, died in civil
strife when Armenians took up arms for independence and sided with
invading Russian troops as the Ottoman Empire fell apart during World
War I.

Armenians claim up to 1.5 million of their ancestors were slaughtered
in orchestrated killings that can only be seen as genocide.

Around 400,000 people of Armenian origin are estimated to live in
France, the most famous being the singer Charles Aznavour, born
Chahnour Varinag Aznavourian to immigrant parents.

One French MP of Armenian descent Patrick Devedjian, who belongs
to the ruling conservative UMP party, told RTL radio that "I see no
reason why the right shouldn’t vote" in favour of the bill.

He said an amendment he had attached to it which would exclude
scientists, historians and academics from the provision of the law
made the bill "more reasonable".

Turkey was simply trying to employ "denial propoganda" over the
Armenian killings, he claimed.

France in 2001 already adopted a law officially calling the massacres
a genocide — sparking a first found of Turkish anger that had
short-lived negative consequences for French firms in Turkey.

The new bill would go further by making it illegal to deny that
genocide took place, much in the way denial of the Holocaust during
World War II is a crime in France.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has called the proposed law
"a blunder" and Turkish newspapers Thursday were scathing in saying
the bill undermined France’s commitment to freedom of expression.

"Liberty, equality and stupidity," was how one daily, Hurriyet,
headlined its opinion.

The French press showed less interest in the furore, relegating
coverage of the debate to deep inside its newspapers.

Liberation, a left-wing daily, printed a letter from the Socialist
MP who wrote the bill, Didier Migaud, in which he argued that it was
needed so France "is not an accomplice to a censorship" of history.

The vote on the bill which is to follow its debate could come as
early as Thursday. But even if the MPs pass it, that would only be
the start of a lengthy process.

>>From the French National Assembly, the lower chamber of parliament,
it would then be sent up to the UMP-dominated Senate, or upper chamber,
for another vote before returning to the National Assembly.

If adopted by both chambers, Chirac would be required to sign it
into law.

Ankara has warned that if that eventually happens, French companies
will be barred from economic projects in Turkey. A boycott of French
goods has also been threatened by Turkish businesses.

Bilateral trade totalled 8.2 billion euros (10 billion dollars) in
2005, and France is a major investor in Turkey, with some 250 firms
active in that country.