Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan has sent a congratulatory message to
newly elected Secretary General of the Council of Europe Marija Pejcinovic Buric.
The message runs as follows,
”Honorable Mrs. Marija Pejcinovic Buric,
I heartily congratulate you on being elected the Secretary General of the Council of Europe and express the support of the Government of the Republic of Armenia for successfully carrying out your high mission.
I am confident that you will use your great professional capacities and rich experience for the future improvement of the organization and overcoming the challenges, ensuring that our common value system will live everlasting.
We highly praise the role of the Council of Europe in the comprehensive reforms aimed at the continuous strengthening of the democratic institutions in Armenia.
Recently Armenia-Council of Europe Action Plan for 2019-2022 was launched in Yerevan. The Action Plan is one of the successful examples of our close cooperation, in the sidelines of which large-scale reforms in the judicial system of Armenia are planned by the consultative support of the CoE.
I reaffirm our resoluteness to continue the productive cooperation with the Council of Europe and expect to host you in Armenia in the near future”
Garen Yegparian
BY GAREN YEGPARIAN
The idea for an article about sustainability in the Republic of Armenia has been brewing in my head for some time now. It was to take the form of recommending that a Ministry of Sustainability be created. The adoption of a flat tax by RoA’s parliament brought the need for such a piece to the fore.
It would not surprise me if you are wondering what a flat tax and sustainability have to do with one another, and thinking that such a ministry would be redundant with that of Nature Protection which already exists.
Two clarifications are in order: what sustainability is and what a flat tax does.
I’ve noticed that many people perceive “sustainability” to be just another way of saying “environmentalism” or “conservation” – just a new name for an old thing. That is not the case. Sustainability is founded on the concept of a triad that assures the best possible conditions for human society. That triad is known as “The Three Es” – ecology, economy, equity (listed in alphabetical, not priority, order, since they are co-equal from a sustainability perspective). What is done in these three areas should be perpetually doable without causing damage that would eventually make the same activity impossible to continue. (examples- if you cut trees too fast and do not replant, eventually there are no trees left to harvest; if you don’t invest in factories and newer technologies, eventually, there are no jobs to be had; if you overwork and underpay people, they will eventually leave, get sick or die, and no labor will be available).
The idea is that without a properly functioning environment, an economy which provides opportunity, and fairness for people in their work and other aspects of life, no society can long survive, let alone grow and develop. So you see, the environment is only part of the sustainability picture.
The idea of a flat tax, i.e. everyone in a jurisdiction (country, province, city, etc.) paying the same rate is superficially appealing and seems very fair. Every citizen is treated the same, right? Wrong! The problem lies in its IMPACT on people. Let’s say that a 10% flat tax is enacted for the citizens of a country called Yergeer. Now, let’s look at the impact of that flat tax on three citizens named Low Tsadzian, Middle Meechagian, and High Partsrian. Let’s say Low makes 100 money units (MUs), Middle 500 MUs, and High 1000 MUs. Let’s also say that each of them is part of a family of five people. Naturally, people eat more or less the same amount, which means the cost of food is roughly the same for each of our three citizens. Similarly, the cost of housing is roughly the same for them. The same applies to transportation, recreation, etc. But we all know that as people make more money, they tend to buy more expensive versions of the same things, so we’ll say that Middle spends 10% more, and High 20% more, than Low on each category of life expenses. What do we get? Take a look at this table.
Sustainability and the flat tax
You can see that the Tsadzian family has very little left for emergencies or recreation, even savings, after paying for the necessities and the flat tax. So the IMPACT of the 10% flat tax on the budget of the family is much greater than on the Meechagian and Partsrian families. A fairer tax system might be one that is progressive. In our example, perhaps the Tsadzians should pay 5% (or even zero), Meechagians 15%, and Partsrians 25%. This would leave the families with 25MUs, 348 MUs, and 741 MUs, respectively. Obviously, the latter two families would still be comfortable with this arrangement, while the Tsadzians would be significantly less negatively IMPACTED, i.e. those extra % MUs would be a big boon for them.
Yet, despite the obvious fairness of a progressive tax system, the parliament of the RoA just adopted a flat tax system, throwing out the previously existing progressive one. This was done despite advocacy by the ARF (probably others too, of which I am unaware), and even demonstrations by the AYF, against the flat tax.
This is very ironic. Parliament is currently composed of members coming from the people who led last year’s uprising against the corrupt system and leadership that was smothering the RoA. Citizens were expatriating in droves. The uprising threw out the corrupt oligarchs and inspired hope for a better life. Yet now, we have the flat tax which benefits the same class of people who enriched themselves on the backs of the population at large while hurting those who are in the weakest economic condition. It’s insufficient to fight corruption and tax evasion by the rich, which this government has made a priority and is achieving some success in accomplishing. An equitable system must be put in place.
That’s why a RoA Ministry of Sustainability is needed, along with a corresponding committee/commission in parliament. It would be the purview of this ministry to review all proposed policies for how sustainable they are. It would be the barrier to adoption of policies such as the flat tax that flouts the notion of sustainability in both the economy and equity aspects.
Let’s let the RoA government know how bad of a decision they have made- write and tell it through Armenian embassies worldwide.
Friday,
New Owner To Relaunch Armenian Copper Mine
• Karine Simonian
Armenia - Open-pit mining at Teghut copper deposit, 20Dec2014.
A large copper mine located in Armenia’s northern Lori province will resume its
operations next week after an 18-month shutdown that led to mass layoffs and a
change of ownership.
Mining and ore-processing activities at the Teghut deposit were halted in
January 2018 due to problems reported at its waste disposal facility. Vallex
Group, a private operator, is understood to have lacked funds to refurbish the
tailings dump that posed a growing threat to the environment.
Vallex had borrowed $380 million from Russia's VTB bank to build and launch the
mine in 2014. It was no longer able to repay the debt after the shutdown. VTB
gained ownership of Teghut as a result.
New senior executives of the Teghut company said on Friday that renewed
production operations there will start on July 1. They said the company has
hired 700 workers ahead of the restart.
Russia -- A sign displaying the logo of VTB Bank, covered with icicles, is seen
above the bank office in central Moscow, February 27, 2012
Some 1,200 people used to work at Teghut. The vast majority of them were laid
off after the shutdown.
Residents of nearby villages are dissatisfied with the employment numbers,
saying that the new owner must hire more locals. Earlier this week, they
blocked a road leading to the mine in protest.
Anahit Amirjanian, a villager whose family was forced to sell its 4,500
square-meter plot of agricultural land to Vallex a decade ago, said some of her
family members worked at Teghut until being fired in January 2018. She
complained that none of them has been rehired by the new mine operator.
“We are from an adjacent community and we had lost our source of a living.
Since they had dispossessed us we should have been the first to be rehired,”
argued Amirjanian.
Armenia - A newly constructed ore-processing plant at the Teghut copper mine,
20Dec2014.
The Teghut company’s new director general, Vladimir Nalivayko, insisted,
however, that it has hired more people from the local communities than worked
at the mine before the shutdown. They make up nearly half of its 700 newly
hired employees, he said, adding that 200 other workers are from Alaverdi, a
nearby mining town.
“I don’t care if they are from Alaverdi, Shnogh or Teghut,” Nalivayko told
RFE/RL’s Armenian service. “But I asked our bosses to hire locals and try to
avoid bringing in outsiders. I have trouble doing that now because I can’t find
mechanical engineers, software engineers or interpreters in the villages.”
Nalivayko also complained about the company’s bloated staff under the previous
owner, saying that the revived mine will have a total of only 900 workers.
“There were too many deputy managers, assistants and consultants here,” he
said. “We now have a more compact and cost-effective structure.”
Mining has long been the single largest source of Armenia’s export revenue.
Copper, other base metals and ore concentrates accounted for around 40 percent
of Armenian exports worth $2.4 billion in 2018.
Armenia, Azerbaijan Free Captives
Armenia -- A view of the Tavush province bordering Azerbaijan, November 6, 2018.
In a prisoner swap facilitated by the International Committee of the Red Cross
(ICRC), Armenia and Azerbaijan freed on Friday two civilian citizens of each
other’s country.
The freed Armenian, Zaven Karapetian, crossed into Azerbaijan from Armenia’s
northern Tavush region in unclear circumstances two years ago. The 45-year-old
man was detained and paraded on Azerbaijani television, with the Azerbaijani
military claiming to have captured him while thwarting an Armenian incursion.
The Armenian government strongly denied that, saying that Karapetian is a
civilian resident of Vanadzor, a city around 130 kilometers from a section of
the Armenian-Azerbaijani border crossed by him.
For its part, Armenia repatriated Elvin Ibrahimov, a 33-year-old villager from
Azerbaijan’s western Gazakh district bordering Tavush. He crossed the Armenian
border in March this year.
Armenian soldiers shot and wounded Ibrahimov before detaining him. He spent
several weeks in Armenian hospitals.
Switzerland -- Armenian Foreign Minister Zohrab Mnatsakanian meets with
president of the International Committee of the Red Cross, Peter Maurer, in
Geneva, June 24, 2019.
The prisoner exchange was most probably the result of confidence-building
understandings reached during high-level negotiations held by Armenia and
Azerbaijan in the last several months. The foreign ministers of the two
countries met in Washington as recently as on June 20.
At least one Armenian national remains in Azerbaijani captivity. Karen
Ghazarian, a 34-resident of the Tavush village of Berdavan, was detained in
Azerbaijan in July 2018. Like Karapetian, he was accused of being a member of
an Armenian commando unit.
In February, an Azerbaijani court sentenced Ghazarian to 20 years in prison on
charges of plotting “terrorist attacks” and “sabotage” in Azerbaijan. His trial
was reportedly held in closed session.
Yerevan condemned the ruling and demanded Ghazarian’s immediate release. It
said he has a history of mental disease and never served in the Armenian army
because of that.
Three residents of other Tavush villages strayed into Azerbaijan in 2014. Two
of them were branded Armenian “saboteurs” by Baku and died shortly afterwards.
Law Against ‘Criminal Environment’ Planned In Armenia
• Artak Khulian
Armenia -- Justice Minister Rustam Babasian, June 19, 2019.
The Armenian Justice Ministry has drafted a bill calling for lengthy prison
sentences for anyone who would create, lead or join a “criminal environment” in
the country.
The bill submitted to the government on Thursday was recently posted on a
government website but removed shortly afterwards. The Justice Ministry said on
Friday that it will undergo some changes before being made public again.
The original version of the bill would criminalize associations of individuals
defying “general rules of coexistence” and favoring other, illicit forms of
social behavior. It says the purpose of such groups is to bully people,
propagate violence and sponsor crimes.
Creation of the “criminal environment” would be punishable by between 4 and 15
years in jail. Reputed crime figures involved in them would risk between 10 and
15 years’ imprisonment.
Artur Sakunts, a human rights campaigner, welcomed the proposed measure. “The
passage of such a law is more than necessary because we need to free the
political system from the criminal underworld,” he said. “The underworld must
also not have any involvement in the economy, politics, and [government]
decision making.”
But Arshak Gasparian, a criminal law expert, was skeptical about the bill,
saying that it does not set clear criteria for the authorities to identify
people involved in a “criminal environment.” “Usually people at the top of
criminal hierarchies are less personally involved in concrete crimes,” argued
Gasparian.
Gasparian believes that the state should instead put the emphasis on preventive
measures and start from schools. “Until we know what why in, say, 300 of
Armenia’s 1,900 schools things are more conducive to crime we won’t be able to
say how to prevent the emergence of crime figures,” he said.
Press Review
Armenia -- Newspapers for press review illustration, Yerevan, 12Jul2016
“Haykakan Zhamanak” says that radical opponents of the Armenian government
increasingly cite Azerbaijani media and pro-Azerbaijani Russian circles in
their anti-government discourse. “Azerbaijani media write, for instance, that
the ‘war criminal’ Robert Kocharian is again in jail and our so-called
oppositionists enthusiastically disseminate that, forgetting to mention that
Kocharian is under arrest for totally different reasons,” writes the
pro-government paper. “This creates the impression that the Armenian
authorities also consider Kocharian a war criminal and are therefore against
the results of the Karabakh war and isolate war heroes in order to make
territorial concessions [to Azerbaijan.]”
“Hraparak” says that even the harshest criticism is useful for the government
because “we have witnessed many cases where even the most modest official
changes and becomes an arrogant and self-righteous monster in a matter of
months.” “But there is a boundary which [critics of the government] must not
transcend,” writes the paper. It says that they must under no circumstances
cooperate with foreign forces “at the expense of our sovereignty and dignity.”
“No matter how unacceptable Nikol Pashinian and his government are to you, no
matter how much you crave their departure … never do that at the expense of a
loss of our country’s international authority,” it says. “And do not rejoice at
sanctions taken against us or new dangers hanging over our country.”
“Zhoghovurd” reports that the Armenian government decided on Thursday to raise
the minimum wage by 23 percent and make healthcare free for all citizens under
the age of 18. The paper cautions that the fist measure will not affect many
people because the vast majority of workers in Armenia earn more than the
minimum wage. “But even consider this the initiative is welcome because
employers paying the minimum wage will not be able to abuse citizens’ rights,”
it says. The other government decision, it says, will cover more people. “The
1.75 billion drams ($3.7 million) allocated from the state budget [for free
healthcare] is definitely worth it,” the paper goes on. “It’s just that
children’s hospital must be able to confront this challenge. Why? Because
whenever there is a slight outbreak of infectious diseases hospitals fail to
cope with that burden … and refuse to take in child patients on the grounds
that there are no free beds.”
(Lilit Harutiunian)
Reprinted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL
Copyright (c) 2019 Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty, Inc.
1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.
www.rferl.org
The Armenian Apostolic Church marks today the commemoration of St. Gevorg the Captain (St. George the Warrior). As qahan.am reports, he was born in a pious Christian family. Becoming a soldier of the Roman Army in a short period he deserves the honor of becoming Captain thanks to his courage and devotion. During the council convened by the Roman Emperor Dioklethianos he opposes to his plans on Christians’ execution, and thus the fact that he is Christian, is revealed. The King, becoming surprised and astonished, orders to imprison the Captain and subjects him to severe torments. Many people, among them the Queen Alexandria, become Christians thanks to the preaching of St. George. A magician is ordered to prepare two kinds of remedies for trying the saint and changing his faith. By the first cup the saint should change his mind, and drinking the second cup, he should die. St. Gevorg drinks both cups, but thanks to the power of his faith towards God he remains alive. He also raises a man from the dead.
After the King’s repeated requests St. Gevorg finally agrees to offer sacrifice to the idols. However, reaching the heathen church he breaks all idols one by one. For this act the King orders to behead St. Gevorg and he is martyred in about 303 A. D.
St. Adoktos (Adauctus) has been martyred in 320 A. D., in the Armenian Melitene, during the reign of Maximianos. He has been a state servant in Ephesus. Not willing to marry her daughter – Kalistene, with the Heathen King, he takes her away to the East. For being Christian upon the King’s order he is deprived of his title and property and is exiled to Melitene. The local governor also fails to convert Adoktos to the heathen religion. Remaining steadfast and unshaken in his faith, the saint is beheaded. His wife and the other daughter – Pelopia, bury him. Costantsa – sister of the Emperor Kostandianos, defends and protects Kalistene, he transfers the relics of his father to Ephesus, where a chapel is built over the saint’s tomb of in the future.
St. Romanos the Singer (the Melodist) is considered to be the author and creator of the church hymns’ canons. He has served as a deacon in the Church of St. Sophia, of Constantinople. Many people have mocked at him for his being unable to sing and read well. Once St. Mary appears to him in his dream and giving him a paper roll, orders to eat it. After the dream Romanos is granted the virtue to create and sing church hymns and songs. St. Romanos passes away in 556 A. D.
An exhibition named “The Solid Line” opened at Erarta Museum on Friday to showcase famous sculptor Georgy Frangulyan’s indoor sculptures featuring different styles and materials.
As the Museum website reports, Georgy Frangulyan creates indoor and monumental sculptures using a wide range of materials including bronze, marble, wood, ceramics and glass, as well as drawings and paintings.
A distinctive feature of Frangulyan’s creative method is his constant search for new figurative solutions reflecting and organizing the surrounding space. At the same time, the sculptor subscribes to the opinion that the monumental nature of artworks lies not in their physical dimensions, but in the spatial idea that underpins them. If architecture and sense of scale are present, the artwork itself can be of any size.
The exhibition will be open until October 2019.
Author: Jerry Burger, Fresno native, social psychologist at Santa Clara University
How long is the shadow of genocide? How does it affect the offspring of the survivors? And how do survivors and their families retain a belief in justice when atrocities go unpunished? These questions are addressed in Jerry Burger’s novel, “The Shadows of 1915.” The story takes place in Central California in 1953, where Armenian immigrants and their families live one generation removed from the 1915 murder of more than 1 million Armenians at the hands of the Turkish government.
An encounter between the sons of a genocide survivor and some Turkish college students forces each of the main characters to make difficult decisions that pit loyalty to family and community against personal and legal standards of right and wrong. It is a story about a displaced group of people and the consequences of real historic events that have rarely been examined in fiction. It is also a story about culture, family, recovery from tragedy, and the nature of justice. (Golden Antelope Press, 218 pages)
Armenia’s only representative in cycling at the European Games in Minsk Edgar Stepanyan participated in the point race event on Friday. As the National Olympic Committee reported, Stepanyan who had joined the European Games with a hand double fracture failed to cross the finish line.
Earlier on June 27 Edgar Stepanyan had taken part in the scratch competition where had taken the last, 16th position. On June 23 Edgar had missed the road race by the doctor’s permission.
Boxer Hovhannes Bachkov at 64 kg has qualified for the final of the 2nd European Games, the National Olympic Committee reported.
On the 8th day of the European Games underway in Minsk Bachkov fought against Netherland’s Enrico Lacruz in the semifinal and won 4:1, the source saod.
On June 30 in the final bout Bachkov will face the winner of the semifinal of Luke Mccormack (Great Britain) vs Sofiane Oumiha (France) pair.
Hovhannes Bachkov had entered the ring from the 1/8 finals where had had a confident win 5:0 over Irish James Mc Givern and in the ¼ finals the Armenian boxer had competed with Greek Alexandros Tsanikidis and had celebrated victory, 5:0.
On June 28 Armenian boxer Artur Hovhannisyan (49 kg) also won the semifinal and got a chance to fight for a gold medal while Karen Tonakanyan (60 kg) and Gor Nersesyan (81 kg) lost the semifinal bouts satisfying with bronze medals.
Armenian Greco-Roman wrestler , an Olympic Champion (2016) a three-time World Champion (2014, 2015, 2017) reached semifinals at the European Games in Belarusian capital Minsk.
Alexanyan entered the competition from 1/8 round on the 9th day of the tournament, celebrating 2:1 victory over Revaz Nadareishvili of Georgia.
In the semifinal the leading Armenian wrestler will face Alexander Golovin of Russia.