Category: News

By Frank J. Perez

Denying acts of genocide is morally irresponsible and dangerous, especially when it becomes entrenched in a country’s fabric. This is the case with Turkey. For over a century it has buried the truth about the Armenian Genocide, while attempting to persuade the world that a charnel house was never built nor occupied on its land.

An ad in last week’s Mercury News was an effort to perpetuate the falsehoods and dissuade inquiry into Turkey’s dark history. But indisputable facts underscore what scholars have declared was the 20th century’s first genocide.

The Armenian experience within the Ottoman Empire, as Turkey was formerly called, was one of marginalization, persecution and violence.

A Christian minority living in a Muslim country, Armenians historically lacked political clout and protection. Extortion by corrupt tax collectors, land theft and government-sanctioned kidnapping of young Armenian boys for military service and of young girls for satisfying war-weary soldiers was common.

Far removed from Istanbul — then the seat of power — Armenian enclaves formed in eastern Anatolia. Angry over their status as second-class citizens, dissident voices called for rebellion in the 1890s. The short-lived revolt was silenced by Kurdish mercenaries hired by the empire’s leader, Sultan Abdul Hamid II. The killings, known as the Hamidian Massacres, resulted in over 200,000 deaths.

In 1908, the sultan’s rule ended with the arrival of the Committee on Union and Progress, or Young Turks, a political party that proclaimed, “A Turkey for Turks.” Nationalism was to eclipse ethnic divisions and religious differences. For once it seemed, Armenians would stand as equals on Turkish soil.

But when World War I erupted along the Eastern Front, inclusion gave way to exclusion, and later genocide.

The Young Turks blamed the country’s loses in battle on the Armenian soldiers within the ranks. Consorting with the enemy – Russia – was the charge. Stripped of weapons, the dishonored troops were assigned to work battalions. The government then extended condemnation to all Armenians, paving the way for a bloodbath.

On April 24, 1915, more than 200 Armenian intellectuals were rounded up and hanged. Sunday marked the anniversary, and for the 101 years since, Turkey has tried to stop the bleeding that pours from historically accepted versions of the truth.

The hangings led to systematic executions of Armenian community leaders and able-bodied men. Towns and villages were then liquidated, as their inhabitants were led on death marches. Ripped away from parents, children were “adopted” by Turkish families that changed their identities and often forced them into servitude. Indiscriminate rape was wielded as a weapon.

Nearly 60 percent of the Armenian population — 1.5 million — perished at the hands of the Ottoman Empire. While the United Nations’ Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, the accepted definition of genocide, didn’t exist in 1915, the historical record is clear that the Turkish government was complicit in genocidal acts.

Unlike Germany, Turkey has never acknowledged its blood-stained past. Denial is championed, while voicing culpability is criminalized.

Sadly, President Obama bolstered Turkey’s impunity once again, omitting the word genocide from a recent statement commemorating the events of 1915. Voters could change that by urging their representatives to pass House Resolution 154, a proposal calling upon the president to make Turkey finally own up.

The final destination for Armenians who survived the death marches was the Syrian desert, where their perpetrators forced them into a circular pattern. Walking aimlessly, thousands died.

Their sun-bleached bones dot the arid terrain still today — a reminder of lives lost and an exclamation point on the truth.

Frank J. Perez of Hollister is a world history teacher at San Benito High School who teaches about the Armenian Genocide and has developed an entire unit on genocide.

he World Bank Board of Executive Directors approved today a US$30 million loan for the .

This Project will support the Government’s efforts to maintain adequate and reliable electricity supply by improving the financial condition and governance of the state-owned power generation companies and the private power distribution company.

Throughout the last five years, the state-owned generation companies have been experiencing a shortage of cash to finance key expenditures, because of lending and spending for purposes not related to their core business of generating and supplying energy. This is how the Armenian Nuclear Power Plant (ANPP) and Yerevan Thermal Power Pant (YTPC) have accumulated large cash deficits amounting to US$104 million which accounts to 80 percent of their total estimated revenues for 2015.

If the financial difficulties of the ANPP and YTPC are not overcome, it will have significant impact on their ability to maintain the current levels of generation with resulting negative consequences on the cost and adequacy of electricity supply in the country. In 2012-2014, those two plants accounted for 42 percent of total annual electricity generated for domestic needs. Inability of ANPP and YTPC to generate power at current levels could push up the average cost of electricity supply and possibly cause an electricity deficit.

“Improvement of the financial standing and governance of the state-owned power generation companies, and a better managed financial relationship with the private power distribution company is critical for maintaining adequate and reliable electricity supply at affordable tariffs, “ says Laura E. Bailey, World Bank Country Manager for Armenia. “The Government is committed to improving the financial governance of these companies, and has already undertaken a number of steps in that direction as reflected in the Program for Financial Recovery of the Power Sector.”

There are four results areas which this Program will achieve: elimination of cash outflows of state-owned power generation companies for non-core business related reasons; reduction of expensive commercial loans, recovery of receivables, and repayment of YTPC’s payable for natural gas; setting of tariffs reflecting changes in the cost of electricity supply, and maintaining the generation capacity of the gas turbine at YTPC’s Combined Cycle Gas Turbine (CCGT) plant.

Since the end of January 2016, the generation companies were able to start repaying the loans because of the recovery of receivables from Electricity Network of Armenia (ENA), the only company operating the power distribution network. The recovery of receivables from ENA will allow financing the backlog of expenditures for critical repairs and maintenance, however, additional cash injection is needed to help YTPC and ANPP as they regain their solid financial condition.

“The beneficiaries of the Program are all electricity consumers in Armenia along with the state-owned generation companies and the private power distributer. Financial health of ANPP and YTPC, as well as ENA, will ensure they have enough resources to spend on maintenance and finance some of the new investments required for reliable supply of electricity. Moreover, 140,000 businesses and other legal entities connected to the network will also benefit because the Program will help to fully meet their demand for electricity in a reliable manner,” says Arthur Kochnakyan, World Bank Task Team Leader of the Project.

In 2012-2014, ENA suffered a cumulative loss of around US$50 million due to revenue shortfall, accumulated for reasons not under its control (e.g. dry years in terms of hydrology, longer-than-planned recurrent repair of ANPP). In addition, the existing regulation did not allow Public Services Regulatory Commission (PSRC) to adjust ENA’s tariff margin to reflect the full amount of difference between the actual and forecast cost of purchased electricity in subsequent tariff period.

The tariff margin was revised in 2015 to compensate for those losses incurred during previous years. Going forward, PSRC will be revising the methodology to allow reflecting in ENA’s tariff margin the 100 percent of loss (profit) plus interest cost (profit) due to the above highlighted difference.

The World Bank will provide a US$30 million IBRD loan of variable spread with a 14.5-year grace period and the total repayment term of 25 years. Since joining the World Bank in 1992 and IDA in 1993, the total IDA and IBRD commitments to Armenia amount to around US$2.3 billion.

On April 28, Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian received Edward Djerejian, eminent US diplomat, director of Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy.

The interlocutors discussed steps carried out towards strengthening of Armenian-US relations.

Upon the guest’s request, Minister Nalbandian presented the situation unfolded due to large-scale military aggression launched by Azerbaijan against Nagorno-Karabakh, continuing gross breaches of the cease-fire regime by Baku, attempts to undermine negotiation process on peaceful settlement of the issues.

Edward Nalbandian and Edward Djerejian exchanged thoughts on developments in the Middle East, pressing international issues.

The Azerbaijani army is violating international humanitarian law by using own civilians as a human shield.

The NKR Defense Army has pointed out all military objects, which are considered legitimate targets, according to the principles of ionternational law (Protocol 1 Additional to the 1949 Geneva Convention on Protection of Victims of International Armed Conflicts), the NKR Defense Ministry said in a statement.

Azerbaijan deploys its military objects in populated areas in violation of Article 58 of the same Protocol.

The intensity of the armed conflict in Nagorno Karabakh is not reducing, Secretary General of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) Nikolay Bordyuzha said, TASS reports.

“The threat of escalation of so-called frozen conflicts is still there. Unfortunately, the intensity of the armed confrontation in Nagorno Karabakh is not reducing,” Bordyuzha said at the 5^th Moscow conference on internationals security.

– Human rights lawyer Amal Clooney’s April 26 remarks to the have hit a raw nerve in Azerbaijan, the ex-Soviet petrocracy where her client, investigative journalist Khadija Ismayilova, is kept prisoner.

After Clooney described the political reasons for Ismayilova’s arrests, the Azerbaijani government apparently did what it always does when pressed on its human rights record —  claimed a global Armenian conspiracy.

No matter if Clooney’s case at the European Court for Human Rights involves an Azerbaijani journalist’s struggle against the Azerbaijan state.  Azerbaijan’s state propaganda will find an Armenian connection even if there is none.

“Turns out that Armenia indeed has a weapon that we could not even dream of… the ‘deadly weapon’ that Armenia is using against Azerbaijan is the quite well-known, failure-of-a-lawyer Amal Clooney, née Alamuddin,” Day.az  sniped.

The smear campaign, waged loyally by Azerbaijan’s predominantly pro-government mainstream media, comes shortly after Azerbaijan and longtime archenemy Armenia fought a brief, so-called four-day war earlier this month. The seemingly endless feud between the two neighbors began after a bloody war in the late 1980s and early 1990s over separatist Nagorno-Karabakh, which resulted in the eviction of the enclave’s entire ethnic Azeri population.

For that reason, in Baku’s thinking, Clooney’s past role as a legal advocate for the Armenian government before the European Court of Human Rights make her highly suspect. Her support, and that of husband George Clooney, for recognition of Ottoman Turkey’s slaughter of ethnic Armenians as genocide only add to the suspicions. Turkey ranks as Azerbaijan’s closest ally.

When Clooney said she was taking up Ismayilova’s case, Azerbaijani media claimed that the British lawyer was of Armenian descent. Clooney, who scoffed at the charges, is, in fact, of Lebanese extraction, but Lebanon houses a large Armenian Diaspora. So, for Baku, it all comes together.

“The Armenian diaspora must have some sort of trick prepared to use that good-for-nothing lawyer,” opined Rizvan Huseynov, a researcher with Azerbaijan’s National Academy of Science.

Azerbaijan’s pro-government media seemed particularly incensed with Clooney’s recent attempt to rally support for Ismayilova’s case in Washington. Clooney told the BBC that she believes international pressure can help free the journalist, who has been serving a seven-and-a-half-year sentence since late 2015 for alleged abuse of power, tax evasion, illegal business activity and embezzlement.

“We know that diplomatic pressure can work on the [Azerbaijani] government because what we had happened in the last month,” Clooney said, referring to Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev’s pardon of internationally recognized political prisoners ahead of a visit to Washington in late March.

In fact, Aliyev releases prisoners each year before Novruz, the traditional Zorastrian New Year celebrated in Azerbaijan, but the comment hit its mark.

Researcher Huseynov wrote in the pro-Aliyev News.az website that the Armenians paid Clooney to go to Washington and set the White House and Capitol Hill against Azerbaijan.

How far Azerbaijan’s pro-government hacks will go with this theme of an  international Armenian conspiracy remains to be seen, but crossover PR tactics from the Karabakh fight should be expected.

Sona Rubenyan’s new song is dedicated to mothers of all fallen soldiers.

Music by Sona Rubenyan
Lyrics by Avet Barseghyan

By Sen. Mark Kirk

The time has come for Azerbaijan to face consequences from the United States and the international community for its blatant military aggression against the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic (NKR).

After years of saber rattling, Azerbaijan’s four-day assault on the NKR earlier this month is its most egregious attack since it signed a cease-fire agreement with Armenia and the NKR in 1994. These recent military actions indicate the clear need for new measures to modify a cease-fire framework that is not working.

With no system to referee the cease-fire, Azerbaijan has become increasingly belligerent while facing no consequences for its violations. This must change.

I strongly support a congressional response, spearheaded by Chairman Ed Royce (R-Calif.) and ranking member Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.) of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, that offers three pro-peace measures to bring needed oversight to a cease-fire that has been precariously self-regulated by Armenian and Azerbaijani forces for more than two decades.

First, all sides should agree not to deploy snipers along the Nagorno-Karabakh line of contact.

Second, advanced gunfire locator systems and sound ranging equipment, monitored by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), should be installed along the line of contact to verify the source of any attacks.

And third, additional OSCE observers should be deployed along the line of contact to more effectively monitor cease-fire violations. There are only six OSCE observers monitoring the conflict zone — woefully insufficient given the number of cease-fire violations each day.

More than 80 members of the House of Representatives have signed the bipartisan Royce-Engel proposals, which have also been supported by the U.S. State Department and the co-chairmen of the OSCE Minsk Group.

In order for a lasting peace to be established, there must be goodwill and trust on both sides. But, while both Armenia and the NKR have affirmed their support for these peace-building measures, Azerbaijan has not. In truth, the lack of oversight on the current cease-fire framework provides useful cover for Azerbaijan’s belligerence.

U.S leadership is needed now to stop the bloody pattern in which Azerbaijan attacks the NKR, the NKR responds, and then Azerbaijan blames the Armenians for violating the cease-fire. We should no longer accept Baku’s flagrant duplicity.

I call upon the administration to raise the Royce-Engel proposals to the highest levels of the Azerbaijani government.

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev has faced a chorus of international criticism for human rights abuses, such as the wrongful imprisonment of Radio Free Europe journalist Khadija Ismayilova and some 20 others who have been prosecuted on politically motivated charges, according to Human Rights Watch.

Just as the international community has come together to hold the Baku government responsible for its transgressions against civil society in Azerbaijan, so too should we call it to account for its treatment of the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh.

The OSCE’s Minsk Process, which started in 1995 to bring the parties of the conflict to a peaceful and comprehensive settlement, is hanging on by a thread. If diplomacy is to endure, there must be a verifiable cease-fire in place.

The onus is on Azerbaijan to demonstrate to the U.S. and the international community that it truly wants to be a partner in peace with Armenia and the NKR. Baku must fully commit to the Royce-Engel proposals.

The choice for President Aliyev is clear: Either he subscribes to diplomatic negotiations with the Armenians under peaceful circumstances or continues with a belligerent and futile policy of attrition.

If he chooses the latter, he should know that every act of Azerbaijani aggression will only further validate the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic’s argument that it go the way of Kosovo. As a veteran of the Kosovo War, I truly hope Azerbaijan realizes that the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict should only be resolved through peaceful means.

Kirk has represented Illinois in the U.S. Senate since 2010 and was previously a five-term U.S. representative from the northern Chicago suburbs.

A musical project in Dresden has come under fire for branding the Armenian massacre a “genocide.” The head of Germany’s cultural council says it’s yet another case of Turkey’s inappropriate interference abroad, reports. 

The director of the Dresdner Sinfoniker Markus Rindt conceived an ambitious project in November 2015, alongside German-born Turkish guitarist Marc Sinan. Musicians from Turkey, Armenia and Germany would come together for the concert project “Aghet” in remembrance of the persecution and massacre of Armenians 101 years ago during the final days of the Ottoman Empire. The event was intended to be a sign of reconciliation.

Turkey, however, has taken umbrage in this, and is particularly offended by the use of the term “genocide” on the homepage of the European Commission, a main sponsor of the event. The EU appears to respect Turkey’s position and has removed its related pages. But Olaf Zimmermann, head of the German Cultural Council, says that this could become a slippery slope leading to encroachment of freedom of art and expression.

DW: Turkey appears to be targeting German cultural figures once more. This time it has taken aim at a concert by the Dresdner Sinfoniker orchestra, scheduled to be performed this weekend to commemorate the Armenian massacre at the end of the Ottoman Empire. The Turkish government does not view the killings as a “genocide” – but surely that’s not all?

Olaf Zimmermann: No, it’s not just about that one word, of course. It’s about an artistic endeavor that examines the unique fate suffered by Armenians as they were forced into migration. Needless to say, the characteristics of this project deal with a situation 101 years ago. So referring to these massacres as genocide is not a creative concept, but rather builds on the opinion of reputable historians. Those artists in Dresden don’t represent dissenting views, but are part of the mainstream interpretation of events.

But Turkey has repeatedly resisted being associated with the terminology of genocide in the past when it comes to Armenians.

And that’s perfectly fine. Everyone has to find their own way to come to terms with the past. But trying to enforce one particular interpretation of a historic event amounts to a transgression and is, simply put, unacceptable. What they are doing is like aiming their cannons in the general direction of Dresden to do nothing but hit mere sparrows.

But Turkish President Erdogan skipped the immediate step of voicing his grievances at the orchestra and rather went straight to the EU, which is one of the sponsors of the project. And in response to his complaint, the EU actually went ahead and removed the description of the concert from its website to rephrase its wording. What do you think about these measures?

I think that’s problematic. Mr. Erdogan tells our leaders to jump and they seem to ask “how high?” At first it was only our chancellor, who reacted that way to that poem recited by comedian Jan Böhmermann, and now it’s the entire EU. Instead they could just tell him that it’s none of his business and that we won’t do anything about these things.

There have been such interventions in the past already, but they’re beginning to amass. And this is on account of the fact that Erdogan apparently seems to believe that the German government and the EU as a whole have become susceptible to such blackmail since we need his assistance in dealing with the refugee crisis. That’s why he seems to feel free to intervene in our domestic issues. Both the German government and the European Commission have become nervous and fearful, and the Turkish president is abusing this. This is a considerable problem.

Markus Rindt, director of the Dresdner Sinfoniker, says that this amounts to a major encroachment on freedom of expression and freedom of art. Are these freedoms being undercut?

At the very least, we’re getting accustomed to a foreign president having something to say about what we choose to do artistically in Germany, and if he doesn’t like something he seeks to prevent it. That is a rather unusual way of dealing with things, and I would really, really, really like to ask the government for more backing here, telling Erdogan to keep out of our business.

The Azerbaijani side not only continues to shell the populated areas in Karabakh, but also tries to present the events upside down, accusing the Armenian side of targeting its own settlements, the NKR Defense Army reports.

Committed to the principle of speaking with facts, the NKR Defense Army presents the video of rocket attack on the settlement of Mataghis.