Saturday, January 31, 2015

STRATFOR - Belarus and Armenia Re-Evaluate Relations with Russia

STRATFOR claims in report, Belarus and Armenia Re-Evaluate Relations with Russia, "and on Jan. 27 Armenian Defense Minister Seyran Ohanian admitted that the helicopter that was shot down had deviated from its course and said that officials were dismissed as a result." STRATFOR asks for feedback comments (internal only) in association with their reports. I submitted the following comment:

STRATFOR wrote, "Seyran Ohanian admitted that the helicopter that was shot down had deviated from its course and said that officials were dismissed as a result." Clearly, I have not read everything that exists in print and in every language, but I would like to see a reference for this as I have not even heard even a rumor of such an admission. Is this claim from an Azerbaijani source?

I live in Yerevan, Armenia.


Let's see what STRATFOR responds with, if anything.

Monday, January 26, 2015

The Guardian published an article, Jewish leaders call for Europe-wide legislation outlawing antisemitism

On January 26, 2015 The Guardian published an article, Jewish leaders call for Europe-wide legislation outlawing antisemitism

In that article it stated:

"The yardstick, say the drafters, should be that if an international tribunal has ruled genocide has taken place, it should be accepted everywhere in Europe as criminal conduct to contest that in public. The Holocaust, the Rwanda genocide, and the mass murder of Muslims by Serbs in Srebrenica, Bosnia, in 1995 would be covered. The Turkish massacre of Armenians in 1915, for example, would not be covered."

This article was subsequently picked by at least two other outlets: http://www.wpxnews.com/business/jewish-leaders-contact-for-europe-wide-legislation-outlawing-antisemitism-h6938.html and http://www.uniongazette.com/business/jewish-leaders-get-in-touch-with-for-europe-wide-legislation-outlawing-antisemitism-h15659.html

I posted the same reader comment text to both sites:

d.davidian

Apparently, Jewish leaders specifically reject the genocide of the Armenian as not worthy. Raphael Lemkin specifically highlighted the Turkish genocide of the Armenians when his coined the term genocide. What kind of anti-Armenian legislation is this! Frankly, it is an outrage!

Yerevan, Armenia

Later on in the day both of these non-Guardian sites pulled the article. What remains is the original Guardian article, providing no reader comments

Friday, January 23, 2015

Armenia can't count on Russia any more

Al Jazeera refused to post my reader comment (twice attempted, 24 hrs apart) on an Opinion piece they published. I am posting that reader comment here, using the same title as the original article: Armenia can't count on Russia any more. Sending feedback to Al Jazeera asking what possible reason this comment wasn't posted resulted in a standard template reply. Below is my comment:

David Davidian
Your comment is awaiting moderation
The title of this article is in contrast with its content. Little of the content provides evidence that Armenia cannot count on Russia. Clearly, there are issues with operations at the Gyumri base and legal jurisdiction overall, brought to the surface through the horrible murder of an entire family. None of this demonstrates to Armenia that Russia cannot live up to its agreements, which are far reaching.

It is sometimes easy to become complacent. Russia operates Armenia's nuclear plant providing almost half of the county's electrical power, it supplies gas so cheaply that the vast majority of vehicles in Armenia have converted from gasoline to gas. This list goes on. The part of this list that doesn't get much notice is that every morning Armenians wake up to another day of peace, enough so that enterprises such as the author's think tank can write these opinion pieces. This only comes from the Russian military patrolling the Turkish-Armenian border. Turkey has made direct military moves across many of its other borders, but has not threatened its Armenian border. This is no accident. If there is an equal or better replacement for this condition, we would all love to see its plan and execution.

Yerevan, Armenia