Armenian News... A Topalian... No Agricultural land for outsiders!

ARKA, Armenia
Jan 16 2018
Foreign citizens will not have right to own agricultural land in Armenia
A set of changes to Armenia’s Land Code, passed today by the parliament in the second and final reading, deprives foreign citizens of the right to own agricultural land in the country. 

First deputy justice minister Artur Hovhannisyan explained that the changes affect both foreign nationals and former citizens of Armenia who did not acquire or lost the special status of a foreign citizen in a timely manner. According to him, the changes are stipulated in the new edition of the Constitution. 

He said if citizens of Armenia are deprived of their citizenship, the community in which they own land plot will have the right to put it out for a public auction and sell it within a year. The decision on the sale of land plot can also be made on the basis of a court ruling on a community petition. 

In fact, as Hovhannisyan explained, if a person has emigrated to another country and adopted its citizenship, or if they are in Armenia, but do not have Armenian citizenship, then under the new rules their land plots will be alienated. 

He noted that all data on citizens, as well as their property, will be constantly checked by the state register and other responsible structures for regular monitoring and verification. 

"It should also be emphasized that the provision of the law applies only to agricultural land and will not extend to other real estate, including the houses of non-residents," Hovhannisyan said. 

He said this problem can not be put off as areas of uncultivated agricultural land, including in irrigated and high yielding regions are increasing in rural communities as their owners emigrated to other countries and many of them received their citizenship , while retaining ownership of land in Armenia. 
 

Public Radio of Armenia
Jan 16 2018
Freedom in the World 2018: Armenia & Artsakh ranked as ‘partly free’ 
Armenia and Nagorno Karabakh have been rated as a “partly free” in a new reports published by the Freedom House. 

The reports titled “Freedom in the World 2018: Democracy in Crisis” indicates that democracy faced its most serious crisis in decades in 2017 as its basic tenets—including guarantees of free and fair elections, the rights of minorities, freedom of the press, and the rule of law—came under attack around the world. 

Armenia’s neighbor Georgia is also ranked as “partly free,” will Azerbaijan, Turkey and Iran are all labeled as “not free.” 

European Economic Union members Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus also have the “not free” status, while Kyrgyzstan is “partly free.” 

Freedom in the World is an annual global report on political rights and civil liberties, composed of numerical ratings and descriptive texts for each country and a select group of territories. 

The 2018 edition covers developments in 195 countries and 14 territories from January 1, 2017, through December 31, 2017. 


A1+
Quality of life index of Yerevan is ranked 152 out of 204 cities
January 11,2018
According to one of the world’s largest databases, Numbeo’s latest results, the quality of life index in Yerevan in 2017 was 112.59 points, ranking 152th among 204 cities. 

In determining the quality of life index, the purchasing power, safety index, health care index, cost of living index, property price to income ratio, traffic commute time index, pollution index, and climate index are taken into consideration in calculating the quality of life in the country or city. 

The worst indexes for Yerevan are the purchasing power and property price to income ratio. Health care index and pollution index are average. 

Our neighbor Tbilisi, Georgia, is on the 151th in the list, with a slightly higher purchasing power and health care index than in Yerevan. Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, is on the 182th place, with lower indexes than Yerevan, except for the climate index. Moscow ranked the worst among the former USSR capitals by taking the 184th place, which has lower indicators than Yerevan by all indicators, except for purchasing power and health care index. 


Panorama, Armenia
Jan 16 2018
Armenia Murals of the Armenian Church attract thousands of visitors in Turkey
Thousands of tourists and locals visit to see the murals of the Armenian Church in T the southern province of Karaman in Turkey, Ermenhibaner reported. 

The Holy Mother of God Church located in the ancient Tapujak district is reportedly an examples of Byzantine era basilica with construction records dating back to the 17-18 centuries. 
In 2007, the Church was passed to the ownership of Turkish ministry of culture and tourism with later renovation works launched in the building. 

The head of the province tourism and culture department Abdullah Kuluch told Anadolu Agency, the mural paintings on the church ceiling were covered under plaster and were discovered only in 2007 during the renovation works. 

“Thousands of visitors attend the church annually to see the murals which are unique in the whole province of Karaman, thus even further attracting the flow of people,” the agency quoted him as saying. 

Kuluch added that before 2007 the church had been used as a prison, while the renovated building today hosts number of cultural events. 


News.am, Armenia
Jan 14 2018
Istanbul street officially named after famous Armenian photographer 
Tosbağa Street in the Beyoğlu district of Istanbul, Turkey, has formally been named after famous Istanbul Armenian photographer Ara Güler. 

Güler has photographed the sign of the street named after him and posted it on his Twitter account. 

Ara Güler has lived at this street for numerous years, and his photo studio is also located there. 

Güler, who was recognized as “Photographer of the Century” and is also known as the “Eye of Istanbul,” was born in the city in 1928. He began his journalistic career in 1950, he has received many Turkish and international awards and titles, and he has photographed numerous world-renowned personalities. 


Aravot, Armenia
Jan 14 2018
Azerbaijani teacher dismissed for putting Armenian national costume on pupil 

Gohar HAKOBYAN 
Azerbaijanologist Tatevik Hayrapetyan, speaking about the Azerbaijani teacher dismissed because of peace urges, noted: “Azerbaijani teacher had organized a performance at school, trying to represent the conflict simulation together with pupils of 5-6 classes. He had written on his Facebook page that he hated war, which had induced the response of Azerbaijani nationalists. He was humiliated in front of his pupils and called Armenian.”

We speak of the teacher of High School. N. 200 of Baku, Roshan Azizov, who had even put Armenian national costume on his pupil and taken her photograph in front of a closed Armenian church in Baku, he had also published a video about his Armenian-speaking pupils, which Azerbaijanologist Tatevik Hayrapetyan considers a courageous step.

By the way, the nationalists had entered the school by force and shot on the peace-loving teacher. Azerbaijanologist mentions that he was dismissed because of calling on for tolerance and peace, however, in Azerbaijan they say that the reason was a non-proper working style.


A1+
About gold mine project in Amulsar presented by Lydian International
January 12,2018 |

It is no news that on December 24, 2017, international independent experts declined the invitation of Armenia’s Minister of Nature Protection Artsvik Minasyan to participate in the trilateral meeting with Lydian International’s consultants to discuss the problems of gold mine project in Amsular. Despite this, we’ve learned that Ministry of Nature Protection and Lydian are having a closed discussion today morning. In their reply , the international independent experts had also mentioned the reasons for rejection and promised to present in a few days their final evaluation of this project in a short and concise manner.

Armenian Environmental Front (AEF) civil initiative has received via email the final evaluation (in English) and its summary from chemical/environmental engineer Harout Bronozian. We present you the summary.

“Amulsar Gold Project: Overview of Concerns with the Amulsar Gold Project, Potential Consequences, and Recommendations. Final Submission.

10 January 2018

For the attention of Lydian International, Lydian Armenia, the Armenian Government and ALL others concerned.

Greetings,

The Bronozian Consultants have conducted a series of reviews of the Amulsar Gold Project in Armenia over the past eight months. The overall purpose of our work has been to provide a critical, detailed, and independent technical evaluation of the project aimed at identifying the potential operational and long- term consequences of the mine. We attach our final review : a summary of the potential consequences of the project and technical recommendations for Lydian to enable them to better develop their environmental strategy. The submission contains a prioritized list of concerns and recommendations; a more thorough list of all concerns, potential consequences, and recommendations from our reviews; a limited list of similar mines around the world and their environmental consequences; the documents we reviewed; and the reports and memoranda we have produced. Our overall conclusion remains that the high risk of acid drainage and contaminant leaching, the poor geochemical evaluation, the inadequate water quality predictions and mitigation measures and Lydian’s inexperience combine to make this an environmentally high-risk project during mining and for a lengthy period after operations cease.

We are also concerned about public statements made by Lydian that the deposit is completely oxide, which erroneously implies that acid rock drainage (ARD) will not develop during or after mining. These statements do not reflect the reality of the situation on Amulsar Mountain if the mine is developed as planned. Accurate statements regarding the acid-forming components in this deposit from Lydian must be mandatory.

Lydian has responded to our reviews and have stated consistently that they remain confident in the “global best practice” mitigation measures developed for the Amulsar project. Public statements and reports by Lydian make it clear, however, that they have severely underestimated the potential adverse impacts of the mine, especially to water quality, which has been our primary focus and is commonly the most critical and long-term environmental concern for large-scale metal mines. Additionally, while Lydian’s consultants appear to have experience in certain aspects of mine operation and closure, we have seen no evidence that their principal consultant in the area of acid mine drainage, GRE, is experienced in the evaluation and understanding of ARD, geochemical characterization and interpretation of testing results, mitigation measures specifically aimed at ARD, and the effective treatment of ARD. We have extensive experience in these areas and provide a perspective that is independent of the mine proponent.

The project is located in an area that supplies clean water for drinking and agricultural uss across Armenia. There is a high risk, given the current mine and mitigation planning, that acid drainage and contaminant leaching will pollute groundwater; springs; the Arpa, Darb, and Vorotan rivers; and the

Kechut Reservoir (Amulsar topography and surface waters are shown here: https://goo.gl/l5pWkJ ). We hope that the Ministry of Nature Protection will review this final submission and re-evaluate Lydian’s proposed environmental plan in light of the likely long-term negative environmental impacts of this project.

Moreover, contrary to allegations made by Lydian on January 8, 2018, we did not agree to attend a meeting in Yerevan with the Ministry of Nature Protection (MNP) and Lydian in January, 2018. We carefully considered the invitation sent by the MNP (attached) and declined the meeting, the reasons for which were well articulated in our letter of December 24, 2017 (attached in English and Armenian). We are ready to assist the MNP and the Armenian Government directly and to meet with them regarding the Amulsar Gold Project. We present our independent opinions but their implementation and responsibility for this project lies with Lydian and the Armenian Government.


Righteous Turkish Professor Condemns Turkey’s Denial of the Armenian Genocide
By Harut Sassounian
Publisher, The California Courier 
On Dec. 30, 2017, Cengiz Aktar, a prominent Turkish political scientist, journalist and writer, published a candid and compassionate article about the Armenian Genocide. Aktar’s article titled, “Confronting past violence with more violence,” is posted on Ahvalnews.com, an independent overseas website, beyond the reach of the Turkish government’s oppressive regime.

Prof. Aktar begins his article with a stern warning to Turkish denialists: “Unless we, as a society confront a massive crime in our past like the Armenian Genocide of 1915 and unless we commit due reparations to the descendants of innocent victims, impunity will haunt us, and even more evil will follow. This is a century-old ethical predicament with remarkably deep roots.” Aktar not only demands recognition of the Armenian Genocide, but more significantly, “reparations.”

Prof. Aktar believes that the denial of the Armenian Genocide by the Turkish government is at the root of all vile events that have occurred in Turkey since 1915: “Considering that Genocide is a substantially massive crime than any of the public, individual or collective infractions, or the incessant evils of today , if the public consciousness can stomach Genocide, it can easily stomach any lawlessness. And thus, evil begets evil. We as a society have constantly refused to bring up the events of 1915 due to the intensity of the transgressions that followed suit -- directly correlated to the impunity of Genocide -- as well as voluntary or forced dementia.”

Indeed, violence and injustice have become routine in Turkey due to the reluctance of dealing with the mass crimes of the Armenian Genocide: “…Collective dementia, collective violence, and collective depravity that were imposed after the transgressions of 1915 became our lifestyle. Now we have unlimited violence and depravity everywhere, inside our homes, barracks, workplaces, hospitals -- in every arena, from politics to the media -- against everything from humans, to animals, nature, cities, and culture. But lawlessness, impunity, injustice, and indifference are everywhere as well.”

Aktar describes the denial of the Armenian Genocide as an on-going ‘curse’ upon Turkey that has led to many of today ’s evils in Turkish society: “Some kind of schizophrenia that immediately forces one to forget and try to make others forget the violence it just inflicted. This is a collective sickness that transgresses the delusions of banal everyday politics. However, the suppressed memories of the past violence keep themselves alive in the public sub-consciousness by creating more violence, testing the confines of our dementia. So much so that while trying to forget an evil, we beget a new one! Maybe this is the curse of a society that refuses to face voluntarily its past violence through involuntary confrontation with daily violence with all its sinister consequences.”

At the end of his graciously humanistic article, Aktar reposts another powerful article he had written just before 2015, on the Centennial of the Armenian Genocide, in Taraf newspaper which was deleted from the website by the Turkish authorities.

In his earlier article, Prof. Aktar also blamed all the evils occurring in Turkey today due to the curse inflicted upon Turkish society by the victims of the Armenian Genocide: “Who knows, all the evil haunting us, endless mass killings, and our inability to recover from afflictions may be due to a century-old curse and a century-old lie. What do you think? This is perhaps the malediction uttered by Armenians, children, civilian women and men alike who died moaning, and buried without a coffin. It may be the storms created in our souls by the still agonizing specters of all our ill-fated citizens including Greeks and Syriacs and later Alevis and Kurds. Perhaps, the massacres which have not been accounted for since 1915 and the charge which have remained unpaid are now being paid back in different venues by the grandchildren. The curses uttered in return for the lives taken, the lives stolen, the homes plundered, the churches destroyed, the schools confiscated, and the property extorted.... ‘May God make you pay for it for all your offspring to come’… Are we paying back the price of all the injustice done so far? Does repayment manifest itself in the form of an audacity of not being able to confront with our past sins or in the form of indecency that has become our habit due to our chronic indulgence in unfairness? It seems as if our society has been decaying for a century, with festering all around.”

When Turkish leaders accept the mass crimes committed by their ancestors and make amends for them, as Prof. Aktar suggests, that is when Armenia and Turkey can establish normal diplomatic relations and only then can they put the past behind them. May Allah bestow His blessings on this righteous Turk and his pursuit of Godly justice!


The Guardian, UK
Jan 13 2018
Elif Shafak: ‘Nations don’t always learn from history’ 
When The Bastard of Istanbul was published in Turkey in 2006, the author was accused of insulting her homeland. Sadly, things have been getting worse since then …

When BBC Radio 4 asked to feature my novel The Bastard of Istanbul in its Reading Europe season this month, I found myself reflecting on the cultural and political journey that my motherland, Turkey, has undergone in the years since the book was published. 

The novel came out in Turkey in 2006. It tells the story of a Turkish family and an Armenian-American family, mostly through the eyes of four generations of women. It is a story about buried family secrets, political and sexual taboos, and the need to talk about them, as well as the ongoing clash between memory and amnesia. Turkey , in general, is a society of collective amnesia.

Shortly after publication, I was sued for “insulting Turkishness” under Article 301 in the Turkish criminal code, although nobody quite knows what either “Turkishness” or “insulting” means in this context. The ambiguity of its wording allows the article to be interpreted to stifle freedom of speech and the freedom of the press; and for the first time, a novel, a work of fiction, was put on trial under the article. The words of the Armenian characters in The Bastard of Istanbul were plucked out of the text, and used as “evidence” by the prosecutor’s office. As a result, my Turkish lawyer had to defend my Armenian fictional characters inside the courtroom. The whole thing was surreal and I was acquitted.

What I remember of those anxiety-ridden days today, however, is neither the trial process nor the ultranationalist groups organising protests on the streets and spitting at my photo and the EU flag, but the amazingly heart-warming, uplifting and inspiring feedback I received from readers. The majority of fiction readers in Turkey are women – Turkish, Kurdish, Alevi, Jewish, Armenian, Greek … women of all ethnicities, cultures and classes . In Turkey, if women like a book, they pass it on to other women. A book is not a personal possession. The same copy is read on average by five or six people, underlining different sentences with different coloured pens. Even though Turkey’s written culture, media and publishing industries, especially as you move up the ladder, remain male-dominated, it is mostly women who are the bearers of memory and it is mostly women who keep multiple traditions of storytelling alive.

Nonetheless, although words were dangerous in Turkey in mid-2000s, the situation for writers and publishers was never as dire or dark as it has become today. Over the past decade Turkey has been sliding backwards, at first gradually and then at a bewildering speed. Authoritarianism, Islamism, nationalism, isolationism, and sexism have all been on the rise, systematically feeding and encouraging one another. It has not helped that the prospect of Turkey’s EU membership was shattered.

As the country became more and more distanced from Europe, the growing gap was exploited by nationalists and Islamists. The ruling elite began to talk about joining the Shanghai Pact instead of the EU. Today Turkey’s relations with the EU are at their lowest point. The AKP government has become increasingly undemocratic, inward-looking, illiberal and intolerant. In April 2017, a controversial referendum and a narrow (51% to 49%) vote means Turkey will change from a parliamentary democracy to a state in which President Recep Tayyip Erdogan holds an absolute monopoly on power.

Turkey has become a shocking example that the ballot box in itself is not enough to sustain a democracy. If there is no rule of law, no separation of powers, no media freedoms, no academic freedoms and no women’s rights in a country, democracy cannot thrive or survive.

Today my motherland is a polarised and bitterly politicised country where thousands of intellectuals have lost their jobs. There is an increasing number of court cases against academics, journalists, writers, thinkers and commentators. One of the country’s most celebrated cartoonists, Musa Kart , has spent five months in prison and even though he was released under judicial supervision, still faces up to 29 years in jail. The Cartoonists Rights Network International has issued a statement describing the trial as “an embarrassing effort on the part of the Turkish government to further disappoint its own people”.

The most difficult profession in Turkey is journalism. Since the bloody coup attempt in 2016 , more than 160 media outlets have been shut down and a widespread purge was introduced. With more than 150 journalists in prison, Turkey has surpassed China’s sad record, becoming the world’s leading jailer for journalists. Many more have been blacklisted, sacked, stigmatised, or had passports confiscated.

The cases against academics are equally worrying. Academic freedoms are being destroyed one by one. More than 4,000 academics have been expelled from universities throughout the country. Those who were signatories to a peace declaration in 2016 have lost their jobs, with no chance of finding a job at another Turkish university; many are being prosecuted and prevented from travelling abroad. One of the most disturbing arrests was of Osman Kavala , a leading human rights and peace activist, businessman and philanthropist who is greatly respected by democrats, liberals and minorities in Turkey.

With self-censorship increasingly widespread, there is far less civil public debate. Across social media and mainstream media almost every week someone new is being targeted, attacked, lynched. The International Press Institute (IPI) is looking into more than 2,000 separate cases of online abuse in Turkey directly targeting journalists.

The impact of all this on women’s rights is enormous. When countries go backwards and slide into populism, authoritarianism and nationalism, women have more to lose than men. Today some of Turkey’s biggest fights for democracy are carried out by women.

In 2016 the Turkish government put forward a bill that pardoned child rapists if they agreed to marry their underage victims. The MPs who came up with this abominable idea were clearly more interested in preserving an abstract notion of “family honour” than the lives of millions of women and girls. In the face of widespread reaction from the public, the bill was put on the backburner.

But the same MPs were eventually able to pass another bill that allowed muftis , religious officials, to perform civil marriages. In a country where one out of every three marriages involves a child bride, this is a very dangerous development. It will increase the number of child brides and cases of polygamy. It will enable conservative/religious families to marry off their daughters at a younger age and without any supervision. When multiple women’s organisations expressed their concern about the bill, and women took to the streets to protest, President Erdogan said that it would be passed “whether you like it or not.”

Women’s rights have been melting away. Meanwhile Islamist newspapers are running pieces against women’s shelters

Domestic violence against women is escalating at a frightening rate and there is no investment in women’s shelters. The government’s rhetoric is based on the sanctity of motherhood and the sanctity of marriage. Under the AKP, women’s rights have been melting away. Meanwhile Islamist newspapers are running pieces against women’s shelters and some organisations are launching petitions to make women travel in “female priority” carriages on trains. Women-only pink buses are already running in several cities.

Gender segregation will neither lessen sexual harassment nor provide a solution to the cycle of violence. “When women go to police or the prosecutor for protection, they are either sent back home, they try to reconcile [couples] or they receive a protection order only on paper,” says Gulsum Kav, of the We Will Stop Femicide organisation.

Equally alarming are the changes in the education system: in the new curriculum Darwinism will not be taught. In the early 2000s around 60,000 students attended imam hatip schools, designed to train Muslim preachers. Today that number is 1.2 million. In order to avoid the Islamicisation of the national education system, the families who can afford it send their children to private schools. and the percentage of children in private education has increased from 7% to 20 %. There is also a sad exodus under way, and Turkey is experiencing a brain drain like never before.

Many academics, intellectuals, activists, journalists, liberals and secularists are leaving the country. But many more remain. And they try to keep their spirits up. Turkey’s civil society is far in advance of its government and Turkey’s women are clearly not giving up the fight for their rights.

This is still a country of mesmerising contrasts, brave and beautiful souls. But now, more than a decade after The Bastard of Istanbul was first published, it is heartbreaking to see that nations do not necessarily learn from their mistakes. History does not necessarily move forward. Sometimes it goes backwards. Turkey, once regarded as a glowing bridge between Europe and the Middle East, and a role model for the entire Muslim world, has become an undemocratic and an unhappy country.

• Reading Europe – Turkey: The Bastard of Istanbul is on Radio 4 on 21 and 28 January at 3pm.