Category: News

The 16^th sitting of the Armenian-Russian Intergovernmental Commission on Economic Cooperation was held in Yerevan today co-chaired by Armenian Prime Minister Hovik Abrahamyan and Russian Transport Minister Maxim Sokolov.

“I’m confident that the start of activity of the Eurasian Economic Union will serve an important impetus for the modernization of the two countries and the rise of competitiveness. We expect that the volumes of trade and investments, the employment level will increase in the near future, and we have all mechanisms to reach this,” Armenian PM Hovik Abrahamyan said in his opening remarks.

“Our countries are closely cooperating in key spheres like energy, transport and communication, agriculture, etc. A joint scientific-technical infrastructure has been formed, which will allow to actively develop the innovation element in the economic cooperation,” the Prime Minister said.

Russian Transport Minister Maxim Sokolov said, in turn, that 2014 was a milestone for the Armenian-Russian inter-state relations, as Armenia jointed the Eurasian Economic Union.

“From that very moment the cooperation between the two countries entered a qualitatively new stage, as Armenian businessmen got access to a market of 170 million.”  “Besides, the free movement of goods, services, capital and workforce is guaranteed,” Sokolov noted.

The participants of the sitting discussed issues related to the development of trade-economic relations, expansion of the legal framework, implementation of the long-term program of cooperation until 2020. Reference was made to the perspectives of cooperation in the fields of energy, transport and communication, industry, agriculture, migration, healthcare, education and science, culture, sport and tourism.

President Serzh Sargsyan received today Thea Tsulukiani, Minister of Justice of Georgia, and Giorgi Mghebrishvili, Minister of Corrections of Georgia.

The president welcomed the guests and their participation in the first Armenian-Georgian Forum for Legal Cooperation held in Yerevan. Expressing his satisfaction with the fact that Armenia and Georgia continue to conduct high-level political dialogue and deepen multi-sectoral cooperation, Serzh Sargsyan stressed that it lays the groundwork to add new dimensions for partnership. In that context, the Armenian president attached importance to the relationship between the two countries’ legal affairs ministries and expressed the hope that the forum for legal cooperation will continue on a regular basis, thereby bringing its contribution to the further strengthening and development of friendly ties between Armenian and Georgia. Serzh Sargsyan underscored that the mentioned ministries mainly deal with problems faced by both Armenian and Georgian citizens, and, hence, it is important to find effective solutions to them through mutual discussions and exchange of experience so that citizens can feel the difference.

At the meeting, President Serzh Sargsyan once again expressed his sincere support for the friendly people of Georgia on the occasion of the floods and natural calamity in Tbilisi and expressed the hope that Georgia’s government and Tbilisi’s local authorities will try their best to quickly overcome the effects of the calamity. The Armenian president reiterated Armenia’s readiness to render necessary assistance to the friendly country of Georgia.

During the meeting, Serzh Sargsyan also emphasized that our country is keen on developing and deepening Armenian-Georgian interstate relations under new conditions created by Armenia’s membership in the EAEU and the conclusion of the Georgia-EU Association Agreement.

Ministers Thea Tsulukiani and Giorgi Mghebrishvili underscored that they intend to follow the legal cooperation format established during the Armenian justice minister’s visit to Georgia and make it a tradition, as well as to conduct exchange of experience and promote cooperation between the two friendly countries.

At least 27 people, mostly foreigners, have been killed in an attack on a beach near two tourist hotels in the Tunisian resort town of Sousse, according to the interior ministry, the BBC reports.

Officials say one gunman has been shot dead and another is being pursued.

Sousse is a popular tourist destination.

Tunisia has been on high alert since March when militants killed 22 people, mainly foreign tourists, in an attack on a museum in the capital Tunis.

– 52 days have now passed since the resistance began at Kamp Armen on May 6 after bulldozers entered the camp in Tuzla to demolish the facilities. Despite promises made by the government and municipality, the deed has still not been returned to the Armenian community.

The resistance began when the current property owner tried to demolish the camp in order to realize his own project. It had initially appeared that significant process had been made in meetings before the general election. In a statement he made on May 23, Fatih Ulusoy, the current owner of the property, had declared he would donate the camp to the Gedikpaşa Armenian Protestant Church. Following the statement, Ulusoy submitted a document announcing the donation to the Church Foundation; however, the document is worthless unless the donation is registered at the deed office.

Meetings that also included Tuzla Municipality continued throughout last week, but no clear statement was made to the public regarding at which stage the return process was facing a deadlock. It was also revealed that Istanbul Mayor Kadir Topbaş had also taken part in the recent meetings. Sides taking part in meetings stated only that the process might accelerate in the coming week.

Kamp Armen Solidarity and Nor Zartonk held a press conference last Friday, and criticized the failure to return the camp. The statement read: “Since the injustice was caused by the State, it needs to be solved by the State. That is why we are not part of the commission for negotiations. The State is trying to hide behind the property owner in developing a solution. The owner initially said he had paid for the property, and he could sell it back to the Armenian community; but then, and these are his own words, he declared he would donate the property upon the requests of other actors in the process, including the Prime Minister. How did this change take place? We do not know the link between the two because the process is not transparent.”

Kamp Armen Solidarity and Nor Zartonk are holding a second rally on 26 June 2015, Friday, at 19:30, that will begin in Tünel Square, with the slogan “Enough with Delaying Tactics – Return Kamp Armen to the Armenian People”. A rally will also be held on Yüksel Street in Ankara on the same day.

Islamic State (IS) militants have killed more than 120 civilians since launching a fresh attack on the Syrian border town of Kobane, activists say, the BBC reports.

IS “fired at everything that moved” after entering on Thursday, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

A separate IS attack on the north-eastern city of Hassakeh has displaced 60,000 people, the UN says.

Kobane became a symbol of Kurdish resistance in January after an IS siege lasting several months was repelled.

IS launched an apparent two-pronged offensive on Thursday after Kurdish fighters from the Popular Protection Units (YPG) cut off one of the militants’ major supply routes near Raqqa.

Raqqa is the de facto capital of the IS “caliphate”, whose creation IS announced a year ago after it captured large swathes of northern and western Iraq and parts of Syria.

Yerevan Zoo staff has announced that the 28 year old hippopotamus Manuk will be put down soon.

Though hippos’ life spin is estimated about 50 years, it is also known these animals cannot live long after their jaw-teeth are worn away.

“Manuk has been under medical treatment for the last years: the care and consistency of the vets prolonged his life for a few more years. However, the hippo is very weak these days and refuses to eat,” teh Yerevan Zoo said in a statement.

Manuk is one of the oldest inhabitants of Yerevan Zoo. He was brought to Yerevan in 1989 from Nikolayev Zoo at the age of 2.

There are two species of hippopotamus – the Common Hippopotamus (also called a River Hippo) (hippopotamus amphibius) and the Pygmy Hippopotamus (Choeropsis liberiensis or Hexaprotodon liberiensis). Yerevan Zoo hippos belong to the first species which is listed in the IUCN Red List as “Vulnerable.”

An attacker carrying an Islamist flag killed one person and injured several others Friday at a gas factory in eastern France, according to a legal source, AFP reports.

The suspected attacker entered the factory and set off several small explosive devices, the source said. A decapitated body was found nearby the factory, another source said.

The attack came nearly six months after the Islamist attacks in and around Paris that killed 17 people in January that started with a shooting at satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.

Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said he would go “immediately” to the scene, his office said.

Yevgeny Primakov, a former Russian prime minister, foreign minister and spymaster, has died, the Kremlin said on Friday, Reuters reports.

Primakov, whose political career began in the Soviet era, was 85.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters that President Vladimir Putin had been informed of Primakov’s death and was deeply saddened, but gave no other details.

Born in the Ukrainian capital of Kiev in 1929, Primakov was brought up in Tbilisi, the capital of Georgia.

After graduating as an Arabic scholar from the Moscow Institute for Oriental Studies in 1953, he went on to be a correspondent for state radio and television, including postings in the Middle East in the 1960s.

He entered the Soviet parliament in 1988 and chaired the chamber from 1989-90. He then played a prominent role in failed efforts to avert the 1991 Gulf War when Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev sent him to negotiate in Baghdad with Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Primakov was made head of the Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) and was appointed foreign minister in January 1996. Primakov was seen abroad as a hawk but won respect from peers such as U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright during negotiations on NATO enlargement.

President Boris Yeltsin appointed Primakov prime minister in September 1998, seeing him as a compromise figure to help ease political tensions after a market crash and effective default.

Primakov was credited with restoring a degree of stability after years of chaos but liberals accused him of freezing economic reforms. He was sacked in May 1999.

Out of government, Primakov aligned himself with a left-leaning political bloc and indicated he would run in the 2000 presidential election, but dropped out when Kremlin powerbrokers united around the bid of Vladimir Putin.

In a 2003 reprise of his mission to Iraq before the first Gulf War, Primakov met Saddam Hussein at Putin’s request for last-ditch peace talks. Three days later, the U.S.-led offensive got under way.

In later life, Primakov headed a business lobby group and was respected as one of Russia’s leading elder statesmen.

The co-rapporteurs for the monitoring of Armenia by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), Axel Fischer (Germany, EPP/CD) and Sir Alan Meale (United Kingdom, SOC), have appealed to police as well as protesters to show maximum restraint in order to ensure that peaceful protests can take place unhindered, without them degrading into violence as happened on the evening of Monday 22 June.

The right to demonstrate peacefully must prevail, they stressed. They welcomed the release of those detained on 22 June and the reported agreement between the leadership of the “No Plunder Initiative” and the national police that has led to a de-escalation of the tensions in Yerevan.

At the same time, the co-rapporteurs expressed their concern at allegations of the excessive use of force and the purposeful targeting of journalists by the police when breaking up the protests on 22 June. These allegations should be impartially and transparently investigated, they said.

The co-rapporteurs are due to present an information note on their last visit to Armenia at a meeting of PACE’s Monitoring Committee on 3 September 2015 in Sarajevo.