USA OFFERS ARMENIA TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE IN 2008 PRESIDENTIAL POLLS

Mediamax
Oct 25 2007
Armenia

Yerevan, 24 October: During a meeting with Armenian Prime Minister Serzh Sargsyan on Tuesday [23 October] in Washington, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice expressed on behalf of the US government readiness in case of necessity to assist the Armenian authorities in the solution of technical problems while organizing the presidential elections of 2008.

As Mediamax was told in the press service of the Armenian government, the sides discussed a wide circle of issues, including the process of the Karabakh conflict settlement, the relations of Armenia with the neighbours, issues of energy and security, as well as the participation of the Armenian military in international peacekeeping operations.

Touching upon the topic of Nagornyy Karabakh, Serzh Sargsyan and Condoleezza Rice stressed the importance of acceleration of the negotiation process. As the Armenian prime minister noted, the militant statements of the Azerbaijani authorities do not promote the activization of the peace talks at all.

Tuesday evening Serzh Sargsyan also had a meeting with the leadership of the Armenian Assembly of America (AAA).

POLICEMEN BEAT REPORTER YESTERDAY

Lragir
Oct 23 2007
Armenia

In an incident involving policemen and the participants of the march at the intersection of Abovyan and Koryun Streets the special operations personnel injured Gohar Vesiryan, reporter of the Chorord Ishkhanutyun. On October 24 Nichol Pashinyan, a member of the Alternative Initiative stated this October 24 who says he witnessed how the red berets hit the reporter. Nichol Pashinyan says he feels ashamed for the people who wear a uniform with the emblem of the Republic of Armenia and beat women.

Nichol Pashinyan was also injured. His face is swollen from punches.

The eleven participants of the march who had been detained by the police got different injuries, Nichol Pashinyan says. Some of them, including Nichol Pashinyan, were referred to the forensic doctor but he stated that they are not going to be examined by the doctor.

The policemen and the participants of the peaceful march clashed when the policemen approached about 30 participants of the march and asked to stop the action organized to inform the public about the rally on October 26 and hand out their megaphones. The policemen had nothing to offer in return for the demand to give legal grounds for their demand. Instead, the participants of the march offered their legal right which, however, was not taken seriously by the police. The policemen continued to demand to hand out the megaphone but the participants of the march did not give up. Afterwards the police used force.

Climate Changes in Martuni

A few of months ago, I got a call from someone interested in purchasing a very large scoop for a bulldozer that I've had sitting in front of my stone factory that I had purchased as a spare for a bulldozer I sold a few years back. Today's going rate for such a part is $500.

At that time in July, my truck driver Lavrent and I went down to get the part ready for pick-up and discovered that this 2 ton scoop was not where we left it and all that we found was a bare spot of soil with no grass on it, where the scoop had been months easier.

We asked my guard where the scoop was and he told me that there was no such part and in the three years he had worked for us, he had never seen such a thing where the bare spot of earth that was the size of the scoop now exists.

I told him I would give him time to think about where the scoop my have gone and until such time that he has an answer, I would withhold his pay.

Well in the last month, my guard has come to me for his pay and I've asked him if he found my scoop? Of course up until now, his answer has not changed.

Today, I visited my local police station to report the missing scoop and a detective drove out with me to the stone factory where the bare patch of earth is and my guard who was sticking by his story was sleeping 10 meters away.

The detective asked the guard where the scoop was and he again told his story of there never being such a scoop and justified the bare spot of a piece of tin having been on the ground. We gave my guard a ride down to the police station for questioning.

At the station, the guard again stuck to his story, to which the detectives there understood that what he was staying just didn't add up.

They asked the guard if someone was threatening his that he was not willing to tell who came and took the 2 ton scoop, which even if 20 people came, could not lift it up on a truck and it was clear that it had not been dragged away. The guard stuck to his story.

The detective told me that I could return to what I was doing and they were going to keep the guard at the station a bit to get to the bottom of things.

I went home and on the way, ran into my former general manager. I told her what had happened and she just shook her head and told me that she is a witness to the scoop being there when we hired him and said that she really does not understand why people lie and how things in Martuni have really changed over the years for the worse.

I will say that the recent elections for mayor here were a very good indicator as to the new climate of things and people really have changed in a way that is not cohesive for the development of a civil society.

I'll pay a visit to the police station tomorrow to see if there are any developments. I'm also going to find myself a new guard for the factory.

Changes in Martuni...

We are kind of over the shock of the elections in the city of Martuni for mayor.

We thought that my wife's uncle Artyom was going to win for sure based on 1,400 people who told us that they were going to vote for Artyom. In the end Artyom only ended up with less than 700 votes coming in 3rd.

There were 4 people running, the person who came in second was Artyom's aid, Azizyan, a man I can only describe as uneducated, unlucky in almost everything he does, never seeming to pick the right road to take and on top of this owing money to the bank and many many people. He once borrowed from me 20,000 dram for a month, but it took him 3 years to pay me back.

The reason why Azizyan ran we later found out was not only was he being backed by the Dashnag's (they always seem to back up someone who if elected they can later on try to control, thus someone who is uneducated in this case was their choice). On top of this, the commander of one of the bases in Martuni, said he and the former police cheif and present day director of the electric company would back him and make their people vote for him, but later on had their people vote for the mayor who ended up winning. The commander and head of the electric company did this to split the votes that Artyom was to get and it worked. If Azizyan didn't run, Artyom could have got 1,500 votes.

So who is our new Mayor? His name is Nelson and he is a businessman who has a small wine factory, a real working stiff who underpays his workers and in many cases was found working his own fields since no one was willing to work for slave wages that were many times paid late. He is also uneducated and can be controlled by those who got him into office. During his visits to schools, the electric company and other gatherings to present his plans if he is elected, he claimed to have an income far less that what he has, only claiming to have a family income of 2,300,000 dram, which for his family of 8, would provide about $65 a month per person. The reality is that he has an income of 10 times that, but only pays taxes on the lesser amount. He also claimed that he donated $15,000 to the construction of the memorial to the people who died in the Artsakh war with Azerbaijan. The fact is that he donated 250,000 dram (about $750).

Anyway, I saw Nelson yesterday at his office and the guy I have seen for the last 10 years working his crop was wearing a suit. I asked him if he had problems with the feel of a suit, which though I didn't say it, really didn't look good on him at all. He said that if it was not raining, he would be wearing his working clothes so he could go out and work in the city to make things better.

Artyom has had 3 job offers since the elections and I'm guessing that there is a good chance that next year they will appoint him regional minister of Martuni.

As for the commander and head of the electric company, word is that there are people at the top who did not like their divide and concur tactics to get their man elected. As a result, I've been told that the head of the electric company will be removed and there is a good chance we will be seeing a new commander in Martuni.

One other sad note. Night before last we had a car crash in the center of the city. It seems that a drunk driver hit the gas instead of the brake and ended up hitting the wall of the theater building, killing the two people in the car and leaving another is very bad shape.

ARMENIAN PARLIAMENT PASSES ACT ON HUMAN TRAFFICKING

HULIQ, NC
http://www.parliament.am/
Oct 15 2007

Armenia's parliament adopted a bill on Thursday aiming at identifying and saving human trafficking victims on airplanes before take off

The National Assembly of Armenia passed the Anti-Human Trafficking on Air Act on Thursday requiring notification to all air passengers about the threatening high number of women and children being transported from/through Armenia by traffickers for sexual exploitation purposes without the passengers' knowledge or consent before airplanes take off.

The notification process will include distribution of brochures in three languages (Armenian, Russian and English) to all passengers shortly describing human trafficking and asking passengers to let the attendant know they are in danger at any time during/before the flight and they will be guaranteed safe evacuation and persecution
of their traffickers.

Before the airplane takes off, a video-recording or an attendant will announce in three languages (Armenian, Russian and English) that if there are any children on the airplane who are traveling with somebody else's passport they are at high risk of being raped and abused in the countries of their destination. They will be also given additional two-minutes of presentation about how to identify human trafficking. The passengers will be told if they have a slight doubt they may be a victim of human trafficking they will be in safe protection after notifying an attendant. Two unidentified enforcement agents, trained to combat human trafficking, will be on the flight to help the victims before the plane takes off or after it arrives or to interfere during the flight if absolutely needed.

"Even if this Act saves one life it will serve its purpose," said Raffi Hovhannisyan, an American-born Armenian legislator who sponsored the bill. "It is time to fight the horrible abuse of already oppressed women and children from poor and unprotected families who are treated like animals after being tricked into human trafficking."

Armenia is not only a resource for human traffickers, experts say, but also a transit country for other victims of eastern European and central Asian origin. The victims, often from single-mother families, are told they will be working in restaurants and cafes in rich Middle Eastern or European countries. Once they get to their destinations, they are beaten and forced into prostitution serving dozens of men every day against their wills.

A handful legislators who voted against the bill expressed concerns for the funding of the project. But several Armenian NGOs and charity organizations vowed to contribute to the project. "We will do everything in our power to support the fight against human trafficking in Armenia," said a spokesperson for the U.S.-based Cafesjian Foundation.

Armenia's President Robert Kocharyan signed the bill into law the following day, expressing his admiration for the legislature'sreadiness to combat modern day human slavery. "The Armenian leadership can have no moral leadership in the fight for Genocide recognition if it ignores the sexual exploitations and physical and psychological tortures of women and children at the hands of human traffickers."

The sponsors of the Act still expressed concerns about a fabricated news item posted on Blogian.net and republished by other websites several months ago announcing the passage of a "bill combating human trafficking" claiming Armenian parliament's official website as the source. The webmaster of Blogian.net, an Armenian-American student, had deliberately fabricated the story with hopes that Armenia's leadership and parliamentarians would finally start thinking about ways to fight human trafficking.

"I am glad Blogian.net brought the inevitability of this issue to our attention ," Hovhannisyan said, "But I thought I was dreaming when I read the news attributing statements to me I had never made - not that I didn't wish I had made them in the first place."

Several Armenian-American groups also denounced Blogian.net for "misleading tactics" and "spreading lies in uncivilized ways."

THE ROAD TO RECOGNITION PASSES THROUGH JERUSALEM

By Anshel Pfeffer

Ha'aretz, Israel
Oct 11 2007

"The Turks are not the only ones who believe the way to Washington passes through Jerusalem," says Archbishop Aris Shirvanian, director of Ecumenical and Foreign Relations for the Armenian Patriarchate of Jerusalem. "We also know that this alliance is very important, and the day Israel recognizes the Armenian genocide, the U.S. administration will, too."

The almost mystical belief that Israel and the Jewish lobby have the power to sway votes on Capitol Hill is sometimes reminiscent of the conspiracy theory in the style of the protocols of the Elders of Zion. This is probably the one thing the Turks and Armenians have in common in their historic war over the recognition of the Armenian
holocaust.

The archbishop was not surprised that Turkish Foreign Minister Ali Babacan chose this week to act in Jerusalem against U.S. Congress' decision to recognize the genocide.

"Recent statements in the U.S. led the Turks to suspect that the Jews and Armenians were collaborating to pass the law in Congress. They know the Jews in the U.S. have close ties with Israel, so they are pressing the government here as they have in the past," he says.

There is no escaping the Armenian holocaust in the narrow streets of the Armenian Quarter in Jerusalem's Old City. Posters on every wall call on people to remember it and a new monument in the Theological Seminary's yard is to be inaugurated on memorial day on April 24.

The memorial features a large Armenian cross and six smaller ones, representing the West Armenian districts where the slaughter took place during World War I.

But Shirvanian and the 20,000 Armenians living in Israel know that the way to the recognition of their holocaust is still long and paved with disappointment. They also understand that remembering their massacre has become a cipher in the complex equation of global politics.

It includes strategic American and Israeli interests in conflicts with Syria and terrorism, Turkish national pride, concern for Istanbul's Jews and relations between minority groups in America.

There is little place for history or justice in such an equation.

One example is the decision of the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai Brith six weeks ago to recognize the Armenian massacre as genocide.

The statement followed ongoing pressure by Armenian communities that argued that an organization that fights racism cannot ignore another nation's genocide.

A few months ago, a controversy erupted in the organization and the ADL's New England branch director, who sided with the Armenians on this issue, was fired. This led to contributors' pressures on the ADL and finally director and chairman Abraham Foxman announced that the ADL was changing its position.

The Turkish rage following the move was not directed at the ADL's offices in Washington but toward Jerusalem. Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan called President Shimon Peres and asked him to intervene. Peres contacted Foxman who promised to issue a new statement saying that the matter was merely semantic and that the ADL objected anyway to a resolution proposal in Congress.

The Turks knew they could depend on Peres. Five years ago, when then education minister Yossi Sarid said at a remembrance ceremony for the Armenian massacre that it would be taught as a subject in Israeli schools, then foreign minister Peres leaped to disassociate Barak's government from the statement. He rushed to Ankara and stated that Israel regarded the Armenian affair as "a disaster" but not genocide.

"We sent him a letter of protest and he didn't reply," says Archbishop Aris. "Since then, we haven't had any contact with him."

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/911630.html

Same old things...

I’ve been quite lazy in writing impressions of life in Armenia and the main reason would have to be that married life presents itself with a whole new set of priorities and as much as I have to write about, much of the stuff I am exposed to outside of my family life are the same old things I’ve been writing about for the last 5 years. I’m not interested in sharing my family life with the world, so other than rehash, there really is not that much to write about.

Let me give you a quick rundown in what is going on in my world right now so you can see how much of it is similar to the past.

- Mayor elections in Artsakh are on Sunday. My wife’s uncle Artyom is running for a 4th time. It’s an interesting process that I am participating in for the first time. We have nightly meetings at Artyom’s election headquarters. I’m sure it’s a much more serious process in the West, but here for the most part we talk about who we think will vote for Artyom (this goes on for maybe 15 minutes), trying to get an idea of how many votes he will win by. For the rest of the night we drink tea and gossip. I’m thinking the reason we meet for so long is we have a “good reason” to stay out all night with the boys and avoid our wives (this is also why the women are not allowed into the headquarters and why my wife is so interested in what we do all night). I think the other reason we may meet so long is so the other candidates will think we are working away really hard on how to win and since I’m sure they have less votes to count and if they meet as long as we do, are consuming more tea and candy than we are. Since I'm the one to leave first to go home to my wife, since I'm not intersted in avoiding her, tonight I caught one of the opposition supporters outside our headquarters and it looked like he wanted to see what we were up to? After startling him, we engaged in small talk. He asked me when I going to give him a copy of pictures I’ve taken of him over the years (he is a former police chief and present day director of the local wine factory. He is also related to our present day Prime Minister, who is not intersted in Artyom winning since Artyom refuses to join the PM's political party)? I told Slavik I didn’t know about the old pictures, but we could take a picture together after Artyom wins. He said that he didn’t need a picture after such a sad event. We shook hands and he disappeared into the dark.

- I’ve had some transmission problems on my wife’s car that started right after I had it serviced on in Yerevan last week. It had me very concerned as I’m going to be selling her car and the people who worked on the car have told me that I’m in need of a new transmission. Nonetheless in a semi-crippled state, we drove the car back to Martuni, not understanding what was wrong with it. So after pulling my hair, my truck driver Lavrent comes along to look at the car and discovers that the transmission oil was just a little bit over the maximum level. He drained out ½ a liter of transmission oil and low and behold, the problem went away. Then I discover that Artyom, the Mayor, has a manual in Russian for Opel cars, which is what we have and in our model which has an automatic transmission, there is a sensor that if the oil is low or high, the transmission goes into a safety mode that you basically have to manually shift gears. I want to call the two mechanics in Yerevan who basically ripped me off in the tune of $300 for doing nothing and tell them how incompetent they are, but know that doing this will not change them, nor will it make me feel any better.

- I’m still building and there is no end in sight. Our house is still not finished. Our second house is still not finished. Though there is movement forward on the new factory building, I’m working on enquiring more commercial property to expand on the lot I already privatized earlier this year, which means I will end up starting to build more buildings. I guess I like construction projects to be never ending and to tell you the truth, it does not bother me a bit. The real problem is that when the end of building is near, for some reason I elect to expand it.

- I signed into an artist management contract with Nick, our talented musician. We are hopeful that within the next few months, we will sign into a contract with a major music group, which I already have solid contacts with and are ready to listen to Nick's demo. Of course when then happens, our lives will really change directions. If things materialize the way I think it will, life will have a little bit more variety. Of course I won’t give up human rights activism, and with some of my proceeds, I will hire a competent staff here in Martuni and Kashatagh to continue my work I won't have time to do. Depending on how successful Nick is, will determine how much more I can invest in development here.

- Life is changing for the better for me and my wife with the additional of a new life in the next couple of months. We are expecting our first child and are both very much looking forward to the joys of parenthood. These last few weeks I’ve been taking in and enjoying uninterrupted sleep full nights, knowing that in a couple of months all that will change. It will be interesting how I will change and once again be more forgiving to the environment around me. I remember this peaceful feeling 6 years ago when I cared for a newborn orphan for over 2 months, that my cousin adopted. With all the crap we see and experience on a daily basis, a much welcomed diversion will enter in our lives and from what I remember, the simple things through the eyes of a child, brings solitude and peace to ones soul. I’m sure looking forwards to the change. Of course this does not mean that I’m going to become mister nice guy, it just means that I’m going to be more relaxed while bad knocking people around, since I know that there is someone at home who needs me and will give me unconditional love.

Yezdi Brothers killed at Gomidas 16

Yesterday morning I heard on the radio that two Yezdis were shot and killed at Gomidas 16. There were no details as to the reason behind the shooting, nor did I hear anything on the news later on that night.

As for the television show which was disrupted due to an attack on one of the hosts by members of the audience, in the afternoon, they showed it again and the station was claiming that it was a preplanned skit.

Looking at it a second time, it looked nothing like a preplanned skit and if it was, those “acting” in it deserve an Oscar and to convince me it was what they said it was, then the host and "actors" need to go on television together and state that it was a skit.

Just prior to the attack, there was a skit about Yezdis, which though may have seemed funny to some, could have been offensive to Yezdis.

A friend of mine has a neighbor who was part of the studio audience and said that what happened in the studio was not some joke, but for real and the people who attacked the host were Yezdis.

And for those of you who did not get to see the attack yourself, it was the host that punched the audience member first and then the big Yezdi was the mustache slammed him on the table.

It’s not everyday that we have Yezdis killed in Armenia and you just have to wonder if the killing at Gomidas 16 had anything to do with the attack on television the night before?

Home-Grown Wild Animals of Armenia on Live T.V.

Just a few minutes ago my wife and I were watching Erevan1 television's live comedy show called "Agoump 32 Adam".

At the start of the show, there were some persons in the audience that were disruptive. The hosts of the show asked the disruptive persons in the audience who invited them to the show and the disruptive audience members said that it didn't matter. The host played down the whole thing and the show continued.

At 10:40 p.m., the same disruptive audience members started up again and someone asked if security should be called in or send Vahe, one of the comedians, to talk with them?

The next thing we see is Vahe getting off stage and saying something to the disruptive audience members, which was followed by this big thug of a man with mustache picking up Vahe and like you see in wrestling, slams him down on a table head first. The table breaks and Vahe goes head first to the floor. We then heard someone yelling to lock the doors! It looked to me like the guy with the mustache stabbed Vahe, but I think the stabbing motion was him reaching his hands between Vaheís crotch to life him up in the air and slam him down. Next thing we know, were watching a bunch of commercials and then a music show come on.

We are now sitting here in shock wondering who the hell these people where that attacked Vahe on live television and what happened after the they cut to commercial? Did a brawl break out or did someone get killed? Did they beat the crap out of the guy with the mustache and his friends and which mafia are they connected with that they could do what they did on live television? Will they be arrested and charged? What the hell is going on in Armenia and when will this madness stop?

Apologies to the underdog

A little over a week ago a group of people from Martuni, Shushi and Stepanagert paid a visit to the village of Haygazyan, which is located in Southern Kashatagh.

For those of you who have been following Martuni or Bust for the last year, you will remember that we paid a visit to Haygazyan and Hale villages on January 6th with Father Christmas to spread holiday joy to the children and monetary aid to the 16 families living there in the dark as the government had failed to provide them with electricity for almost 10 years (see: http://aramanoogian.blogspot.com/2007/01/haygazyan-update.html and http://aramanoogian.blogspot.com/2007/01/they-went-to-make-artsakh-strong.html).

Our visit last week was to celebrate the electrification of the village and the allocation of a tractor, which was secured via an interest free 2-year loan the Shahan Natalie Family Foundation provided.

Though the celebration was wonderful, I learned that the pressure we put on the Kashatagh and Artsakh governments to fulfill their obligation of electrification came at a price to three other villages. It seems in an attempt to appease the Diaspora/native collective voice demands, the government did the right thing by helping the underdogs of Haygazyan and Hale, but in the process ended up depriving equally deserving underdogs in the villages of Kashunig, Vereni Kashunig and Marajur, who have also been waiting for 10 years in the dark and were going to receive their electricity this year.

I had a meeting with Ernist, the Kashatagh Governor in July regarding electrification of Haygazyan and at the same time brought up the subject of perusing former regional administrators of Kashatagh, especially the former governor who was Antranig Markaryanís in-law, who had basically stolen all of the money from the 2007 budget for the region and who presently holds a very good and lucrative government post in Armenia. I also added that minister Armo had stated in our January 7, 2007 meeting (see: http://aramanoogian.blogspot.com/2007/01/great-success.html) that he had desired to review all projects in Kashatagh which equates to millions of dollars, but large parts of them have obviously been stolen. Armo said that though this was his desire, the President and Prime Minister at the time said that he was crazy to consider such a thing and declined his request. Governor Ernist's answer to me on pursuing the former governor and Armo's plan, which was not pursued under the former corrupt Gulkasyan administration, was that if we do that, 80 out of 100 people will have to face criminal charges and instead of disrupting what we have, we should forget the past and just move forward.

Well seeing how the electrification has come to Haygazyan and the price paid by Kashunig. Vereni Kashunig and Marajur villages, I think that the now Deputy Prime Minister Armo's desire of reviewing all work done in Kashatagh and making the people who have enriched their personal wealth via misappropriation of funds that were earmarked for the development of the region should be a priority of the new Artsakh government. Of course if this does not happen, then it means that the next 5 years are not going to be any different than what we have faced during the last 10 years and the human suffering our people have faced due to a corrupt government will continue until we start to think about the people and not the 80% of those who hold government posts who have and most probably will continue to enrich their lives at the price of what should reach the common citizens so their lives will improve.

On a bright note to this story, thanks to the electrification of Haygazyan, the village has been added to a program that teaches computer science to villages in the regions with computers provided by Friends of Armenia. This is a very popular class that is attended by young and old alike every Friday and Saturday.