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16 The Armenian Reporter | April 25, 2009ArmeniaFrom Armenia, in briefThe Adana Massacres,100 years onThe Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute organized an internationalconference to commemorate thecentennial of the Armenian massacresin the Adana district of theOttoman Empire, Arminfo reported.The two day conference, April20-21 brought together historiansfrom Armenia, Italy, Hungary, Austria,France, the United States andSweden.Hayk Demoyan, director of theArmenian Genocide Museum-Institutesaid that the Adana massacresof April 1909 became a symbolicprelude for the state orchestratedand executed policy of genocideagainst the Armenian populationof the Ottoman Empire. He wenton to say that the true perpetratorsand organizers of the Armeniansmassacre in Adana still remain unpunished.Also taking part in the conferencewere Diaspora Minister HranushHakobyan, Minister ofScience and Education SpartakSeyranian and other high rankingofficials.The official address of the Catholicosof All Armenians His HolinessKarekin II on the occasion of thecentennial of the Adana massacrewas read out at the conference.In 1908, the Young Turkishrevolution brought some hope forchange for the Empire’s Christianminorities. However, the initial euphoriaand hopes for equal rightsfor Muslims and Christians weredashed in with the brutal slaughterof the Armenian population inCilicia and its center Adana. Thismassacre revived the fears of Christianminorities, particularly of Armenianstowards the traditionalOttoman policy against them.Ethnic cleansing and large-scalemassacres were carried out evenearlier; during the Hamidian massacresin 1894-1896 when 300,000Armenians were annihilated anddeported.Diasporan Armenianarchitects take part inconference organizedby Diaspora MinistryPanelists at the conference to commemorate the centennial of the Armenianmassacres in Adana. Photo: Melik Baghdasaryan/Photolure.Armenia’s Diaspora Ministry organizedthe first-ever pan-Armenianconference on Armenian architecturein the 21st Century, which tookplace from April 21-24 in Yerevan.According to the ministry’s pressoffice, the objective of the conferencewas to support the developmentof Armenia-Diaspora cooperation;to bring together Armenianarchitectural potential toward theresolution of Armenian architecturalissues; to create the necessaryconditions for the preservation ofArmenian architectural heritage aswell as the establishment of a pan-Armenian association of architects.More than 100 Armenian architectsfrom around the world tookpart in the conference as well as studentsfrom Yerevan State Universityof Architecture and Engineering.During the opening ceremonies,Armenianarchitects fromaround the world.Photo: MkhitarKhachatryan/Photolure.Armenia’s Prime Minister TigranSarkisian told conference participantsthat Armenia will be participatingin Expo-2010 in Shanghaiand the Image of Armenia will becreated by the efforts of Armenianarchitects from all over theworld. According to Arminfo, theprime minister said, “I would liketo draw your attention to the factthat the next World Exhibitionwill be held in Shanghai in 2010, inwhich Armenia will also take part.What kind of brand will we showthe whole world? This will be conditionedby your imaginations andsuggestions which we are waitingfor. We have already received materials,which have interested us includingthe creation of a City of Armenians.And we shall be gratefulif these materials will also becomea topic for you to discuss.”President Serge Sargsian, Catholicosof All Armenians KarekinII and President of Nagorno-KarabakhBako Sahakyan sent messagesto conference participants.Within the framework of the conference,a Diaspora Park will beestablished on the grounds of theGenocide Memorial Museum-Institute.On April 24, the participants ofthe conference took part in the processionto the Genocide memorialafter which they left for Gyumri tomeet with the architects of Armenia’ssecond largest city.OSCE Minsk Group inthe regionOn April 21, OSCE Minsk Groupco-chairs were in Yerevan and metwith the president and foreign affairsminister of the country. YuriThe Singing Men of Oklahoma,otherwise known as the SingingChurchmen of Oklahoma were inArmenia on the invitation of theArmenian Evangelical Church toperform throughout the countryand at the Genocide Memorial onApril 24. Leading the group was Dr.Bill Green of the Oklahoma BaptistChurch. The group of almostabout 270 spiritual troubadourssang in English and Armenian.However, their trip was marredby controversy as certain statementswere placed on their website,which said that Armenianswere antisemitic and describedthe Armenian Church as oppressive.The Armenian Church issuedthe following statement: “The ArmenianChurch appreciates andvalues all organizations, representativesof religious organizations,and all people of goodwill who callfor the universal recognition andcondemnation of the ArmenianGenocide. However, we criticizeefforts made by any organizationor religious community to characterizeArmenia as anti-Semiticand intolerant, and assess suchaccusations as being false and irresponsible.“We also condemn the actions ofthe leaders of the local ArmenianEvangelical Church for taking advantageof the solemnity of theApril 24 commemoration of theArmenian Genocide, by invitinga choir group who has obviouslylittle or no accurate knowledgeabout life in Armenia, to give aseries of concerts in Armenia thisMerzlyakov (Russia), MatthewBryza (USA), Bernard Fassier(France) and personal representativeof the OSCE chairperson-in-officeAndrzej Kasprzyk discussedthe current round of the Nagorno-Karabakh talks and the possibilityof bringing the parties to the conflictcloser within the framework ofContinued on page 17 mPastor Garik Khachatryan of the Armenian Evangelical Baptist Church ofArmenia at a press conference with reporters in Yerevan. Pastor Khachatryan isshowing the apology issued by Dr. Bill Green of the Oklahoma Baptist Churchfor derogatory comments placed on their website about Armenia and theArmenian Church. Photo: Tigran Tadevosyan/Photolure.The Singing Men of Oklahomacause controversy in ArmeniaOSCE MinskGroup co-chairsmeeting withPresidentSerge Sargsian.Photo: MelikBaghdasaryan/Photolure.week, including one on April 24at the Memorial to the ArmenianGenocide in Yerevan. Further, theleaders of the local ArmenianEvangelical community shouldhave quickly refuted and publiclydisavowed the comments madeby members of the Singing Menof Oklahoma, which they knew tobe inaccurate. The fact that theydid not should guide our faithfulin their evaluation and assessmentof the Armenian Evangelicalleaders in Armenia.”The organization for theirpart stated: “The Singing Men ofOklahoma have sung around theworld as ambassadors of goodwilland faith. As Christian peopleand Americans, the choir worksto build bridges for strengtheningrelationships among peopleacross the world. They go to Armeniawith great respect for theChristian heritage of the Armenianpeople.“We have recently become awareof statements made and put intoprint regarding our upcomingtrip to Armenia. These statementswere not posted on our officialWeb site and were writtenby someone who is not an officialrepresentative of the choir anddoes not speak for them. We regretthat these statements do notaccurately communicate the purposeof our trip to Armenia andhave caused offense and misunderstandings.It is our desire tobuild bridges of unity and goodwillthrough our participation inApril events commemorating theArmenian Genocide.” f
The Armenian Reporter | April 25, 2009 17ArmeniaMarket updateby the CascadeInvestments GroupCurrency MarketHighlightsUSD/AMD. A shift towards a floatingexchange rate put the dramwithin the range of AMD 360- 375for 1 dollar throughout the wholemonth. The pros and cons of thisshift have been still debated, howeverone thing is clear; the newlyestablished rate has put importconditions under the ringer andresulted in hoisting prices forconsumers’ goods. Meanwhile, inFebruary, the volume of the dramin circulation shrunk by 17% comparedwith January, 2009. Thismay result in abrupt changes of therate in case the increased demandfor the dram. So, we are of the viewthat the USD/AMD pair rate will bevolatile and there is some likelihoodfor the dram to appreciate, atleast in the short run.EUR/USD. Till the middle ofMarch the EUR significantlygained against its main counterpart,after the Federal Reserveannounced a massive easing ofthe US monetary policy. Withthis field of view, investors wereleft fearing that the dollar wouldnot be able to maintain its statusof the safe haven and the world’sreserve currency. These factorsbrought strong improvement tothe EUR’s overall outlook resultingin significant appreciation of thesingle currency. However, afterthe drop in annual retail spendingin Germany by 5.3%, manufacturingPMI decreased to 33.9 and then Continued from page 16negotiations based on the Madridprinciples.Prior to the official meetings,the American mediator MatthewBryza was engaged in shuttle diplomacyby visiting Baku, Ankara andthen arriving in Yerevan with theother co-chairs. He expressed hopethat “normalization of relationsbetween Ankara and Yerevan willcause good evolution in Armenia’sstance, which will help us succeedin the Karabakh conflict as well.”The co-chairs will travel to Azerbaijanand Nagorno-Karabakh.ARF holds conferenceon Armenia-TurkeyRelations.Believes that Armenia has lostin the negotiation processOn April 22, the Armenian RevolutionaryFederation (ARF) organizeda one-day conference on thecurrent state of Armenian-Turkishrelations. Speaking to participants,the representative of the ARF BureauHrant Markarian stated thatArmenia had lost soccer diplomacyto Turkey. He called on Armenianauthorities to demonstrate adherenceto their principles and not togive in to Turkish pressure.Also taking part in the conferencewas representative of the SupremeCouncil of the ARF, ArmenRustamian; Hagop Tchakryan,a specialist on Turkey and politicalanalyst with the daily Azg who statedthat normalizing relations stemsfrom Turkish interests; Sos Sarkisian,one of Armenia’s greatest actorsand ARF presidential candidate(1991) who warned that Turkeycould never be trusted; member ofthe ARF Bureau Levon Mkrtchian530510490470450430410390370390370350330310290270European Central Bank loweredthe interest rate by further 25 bpsto a new record low 1.25%, the EURstarted giving back its gains andlet the greenback to rally. Nowthe overall outlook for the dollaris bullish, but where the currencywill go from here depends stronglyon the US economic data and itsimpact on the investors’ mood, asFrom Armenia, in briefwho said that no one has as muchexperience and history in dealingwith the Turks than the ARF,therefore if the ARF is concerned, itshould also concern everyone else.BarCamp Yerevan 2009kicks off in YerevanEUR/AMDJ-08 M-08 M-08 A-08 O-08 D-08 J-09 M-09EUR/AMD EUR/AMD Index (Jan'08 -100%)J-08 M-08 M-08 A-08 O-08 D-08 J-09 M-09ArmenRustamian.Photo: HaykBadalyan/Photolure.USD/AMDUSD/AMD USD/AMD Index (Jan'08 -100%)well as further positioning of thedollar’s European counterpart.Key MacroeconomicIndicators%13012512011511010510095908580%14012010080604020GDPGDP of January-February decreasedby 3.7 % comparing withthe same period of 2008. The mainOn April 18-19 BarCamp Yerevan2009 took place in Yerevan gatheringspecialists in information technologiesand the new media sphereincluding Internet users, bloggers,managers, entrepreneurs, designers,educators and representativesof companies who work in Internetand digital technologies and thosejournalists who use these new technologiesin their daily work.Gegham Vardanian, one of theinitiators of this program told Armenpressthat the objective of Bar-Camp Yerevan 2009 was to bringtogether all those people involvedin this sphere to share, communicateand exchange experiencesand to make suggestions. Over250 people from Armenia, Ukraine,Russian, Georgia and the UnitedStates took part.This initiative does not foreseean official agenda but rather theagenda is formed by the participants.BarCamp is usually a “nonconference”in the sphere of informationtechnology, new media andthe Internet. A “non-conference”is the unofficial, informal part ofthe conference supporting opendiscussions and a free exchange ofideas and opinions.BarCamp was first implementedin California in 2005, after whichit spread globally. In the CIS, thefirst BarCamp took place in Kiev,Ukraine in 2007.connect: www.barcamp.am$500,000 ViktorHambardzumyaninternational scienceawardBy a decree of President SergeSargsian an international scienceaward in honor of renowned astrophysicistViktor Hambardzumyanwas established.According to the president’s pressservice, the award will be grantedonce every two years for outstandingscientific work in the sphere ofastrophysics, affiliated physics andmathematics. Citizens of Armeniaand other countries may participatein the competition.The first award will be presentedin 2010.f06.565.554.543.53%F-08 A-08 J-08 S-08 N-08 J-09 M-09the same because of low demand.factors contributing to the downwardtrend were drastic declineof export and import by 45% and21% respectively. The volume ofindustrial output went down by10%, while construction sectorsqueezed by 1.5% only.Inflation OverviewAt an extraordinary session, whichtook place at March 10th, the CBABoard maintained the repo rateunchanged at 7.75%. Relativelyhigh interest rates supported bythe CBA will mitigate acceleratedinflation resulted from the dram’sdrastic depreciation. We believethe further trend of refinancingrate will be highly correlated withthe fluctuations of the exchangerates and corresponding risks.Cascade CommodityIndexIn March the CCI rose by further1.3% to 21009. The upward movementof the index reflects the highrates of inflation. For instance, theprice for oil went up by 2.8% in onemonth period. However, for somecommodities like steel prices remainby Tatul Hakobyan“In an incredible irony of history,Western sovietology, which hadfailed to read the coming Sovietcollapse, was now invited to advisethe new republics, headed by theRussian Federation, on what to donext.”This is one of the passages fromVicken Cheterian’s book, War andPeace in the Caucasus. The talentedreporter and political scientist isa Swiss-Armenian born in Beirutand has been working on this booksince 1992. It was launched in Yerevanon April 22.Speaking to reporters and politicalscientists at the Caucasus Institute,which he himself establishedwhen he lived in Yerevan someyears ago, Mr. Cheterian said, “Iwanted to understand why the Caucasusbecame the most ferociousbattleground after the collapse ofthe Soviet Union.”Since 1992, Mr. Cheterian has onmany occasions visited hot spotsin the South and North Caucasus,where several bloody wars werein progress – Nagorno-Karabakh,Abkhazia, Chechnya. In his words,there isn’t one single explanationfor the flare-up of conflicts in theCaucasus. However, in the case ofthe Karabakh, Abkhaz and Chechanwars, “historical trauma” was veryimportant.For Artsakh Armenians and forArmenians in general, the ArmenianGenocide was the “historicaltrauma.” For the Abkhaz andChechens, it was exile and deportation.The author believes that if the SovietUnion had collapsed over thecourse of 20 years instead of four,Cascade Business Sentiment IndexCascade BusinessSentiment IndexIn March the CBCI rose from 3.29to 5.06. Despite the upward trend,the index still remains low reflectingpessimism towards the businessenvironment, as the recentdepreciation of the AMD reinforceda weakening outlook of the overalleconomy.Corporate SecuritiesIn March the volume of traded corporatebonds on the NASDAQ OMXdecreased by 35% to approximatelyAMD 1.5 billion. The average yieldincreased from 11.6% to 12.7%, asthe prices of bonds had downwardtrend during the month. In generalinvestors were fearful of furtherdram appreciation and tendedto sell out their bonds forcing theprices to drop.This month, the most tradedbonds were those issued by Ardshininvestbankand HSBC Bank Armeniawith corresponding volumes40% and 22% (from the total fixedincome trading).fVicken Cheterian’s War and Peace inthe Caucasus presented in YerevanThe cover of Cheterian’s book.then the conflicts in the Caucasuswouldn’t have been what theywere.Putting aside easy and trivialexplanations, Mr. Cheterian hastried to give explanations in hisbook as to why Georgia with apopulation of 5 million lost thewar to the Abkhaz’s and SouthOssetians who were less than100,000 strong. Why did Azerbaijanwith a population of 7 millionlose to the Armenians who wereeconomically and militarily weakerthan them? Or why did onlyfive conflicts flare up – Nagorno-Karabakh, South Ossetia, Abkhazia,North Ossetia-Ingueshetiaand Chechnia – out of a dozenpossible ones?Most of those present at thebook presentation were specialistsin the field and very well informedabout the Caucasus region and itsconflicts. Therefore besides askingquestions, which they did, mostalso expressed their opinions. f
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