CUSTOMS: Soldiers guard the Eastern Gate, 66 kilometers from Kars, has been shut since 1993, which was the final year of direct trade between Turkey and Armenia. DHA photo


Armenian reconciliation to boost border trade with Turkey

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

ARAM EKIN DURAN

ISTANBUL -Referans

The historic protocols signed last Saturday by the Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu and Armenian Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian in Zurich is expected to have a deep impact on commercial life in the region.

Aimed at normalizing relations between the two countries, the protocols are expected to make way for collaboration in a wide variety of industries including textile, food and tourism when the border between Turkey and Armenia opens in the New Year.

Georgia has long been used as a route for back-door trade between Turkey and Armenia. The annual value of trade is about $150 million, a figure expected to reach $500 million once the border opens.

Kaan Soyak, the co-chairman of the Brussels-based Turkish-Armenian Business Development Council, said although the border between the two countries has been closed for years, the volume of indirect trade between the two countries has reached $150 million. When the border gates become operational, trade volume is expected to rise three-fold, he said.

Especially with the start of railroad trade all products that Armenia and Middle Eastern countries purchase from Mediterranean countries will pass through Turkey. "Turkey will run the show. That means an extra $150 million income for Turkey,” said Soyak.

The deal will also benefit Turkish textile companies that have trouble sending materials to Russia. Shifting 5 percent of the total investments to Armenia would enable companies to benefit from the free custom agreements between Armenia and Russia.

Food, health, transportation and textile industries will also be at the forefront, said to Soyak. "Our textile exporters, who have been struggling to send materials to Russia, will benefit from the Armenian route. That is because Armenia and Russia have signed a free customs agreement. If our businesspeople produce 5 percent of their products in Armenia, they will be allowed to benefit from the deal and export to Russia without paying a customs fee. It would also enable development in the Eastern Anatolia.”

“Diaspora tourism” will also be launched soon to established improved ties between Turkey and Armenia. Many members of the Armenian diaspora wish to visit Turkey to see the villages and towns where their ancestors lived at the beginning of the 20th century. Tours will be organized to Kars, Erzurum, Van, İstanbul, Muş, Yozgat and Adapazarı.

Meanwhile, Istanbul Kültür University Faculty Member Mensur Akgün said Armenia would benefit from the new protocols.

Nalbandian announced Monday, via an Armenian news agency broadcasting over the Internet, “The border could be opened by the New Year.” This announcement may be perceived as symbolic of a new era for the commercial structure of the region. The Eastern Gate located 66 kilometers from Kars has been shut since 1993, the final year of direct trade between both countries, although trade relations between Turkey and Armenia have continued through Georgia. However, the existence of Georgia as the middleman has meant that businesspeople and customers lacked the advantage of establishing close business relations. Using an intermediary is also more expensive, increasing the price of trade products.

Following the signing of the protocols in Zurich, the Union of Manufacturers and Businessmen of Armenia, or UMBA, Chairman Arsen Ghazarian came with 10 delegates arrived in Turkey on Monday. For two days, Turkish and Armenian businesspeople engaged in discussions. It has been 15 years since both parties met face to face. UMBA delegates will also meet with Turkish Industrialists' And Businessmen's Association, or TÜSİAD, representatives. Wednesday’s meeting will be in the northwestern city of Bursa. Members will watch the 2010 World Cup qualification stage Group 5 game between Turkey and Armenia.

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WATCH: Born in war and raised in an uneasy peace, an entire generation of young Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh is reaching adulthood and could see its world change yet again. With momentum building for a final settlement that could mean an end to the region's isolation, the author traveled to the enclave and spoke to young people about their views on the conflict and their hopes for the future.



Will Turkey-Armenia Deal Lead To A Season Of Change In Nagorno-Karabakh?

October 12, 2009

By Brian Whitmore

STEPANAKERT/BAKU -- Aleksandr Osipov likes things just the way they are in Nagorno-Karabakh. In fact, he wouldn't change a thing.

Enjoying the autumn sunshine in a well-manicured park in downtown Stepanakert, Osipov, an animated 85-year-old ethnic Armenian pensioner with a thick shock of white hair, dismisses any talk of the breakaway republic ever returning to Azerbaijani rule.

"The people of Karabakh have conclusively decided to be free," Osipov says. "If we are part of Azerbaijan, we will never live freely. We want to live in our republic. We are Armenians and want to live with Armenians."

But Osipov's comments come amid a season of change that may dramatically alter the status quo in Nagorno-Karabakh.



Aleksandr Osipov


The mountainous region, which was the site of a bitter six-year war between Armenia and Azerbaijan, has enjoyed de facto independence since a cease-fire was declared in 1994. But with an Armenian-majority population on the one hand, and legal ties to Azerbaijan on the other, Nagorno-Karabakh's long-term fate is far from settled.

And the issue is once again under the spotlight, following the October 10 signing of an accord reestablishing ties between Armenia and Azerbaijan's historic ally, Turkey.





Ankara severed relations with Yerevan in 1993, in solidarity with Baku over Armenia's occupation of Nagorno-Karabakh. (An unresolved dispute over the World War I-era mass killings of ethnic Armenians by Ottoman Turks has also contributed to historically sour ties.)

Last weekend, after months of coaxing by the international community, the foreign ministers of Turkey and Armenia met in Zurich and signed accords restoring diplomatic ties and opening the countries' border.

There is no formal link between Nagorno-Karabakh and the Turkish-Armenian rapprochement. But analysts say the presence of officials from the United States, Russia, and France -- the three countries that serve as co-chairs to the OSCE Minsk Group, which monitors negotiations on Nagorno-Karabakh -- made the connection implicit.

"The presence of the Minsk Group co-chair countries during the signing ceremony proves that there is a link -- almost a formal link -- between the progress at the Turkey-Armenian rapprochement and progress in the negotiations between Armenia and Azerbaijan," says Baku-based political analyst Ilqar Mammadov. "Armenia has no way to avoid this connection."

The deal was welcomed in the West but has stirred anxieties in more local corners like Nagorno-Karabakh, where residents fear their region's unresolved status may prove to be a chip in a grand bargain between Turkey, Armenia, and Azerbaijan.

Those worries may have intensified on October 11, when Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan stated flatly his country's parliament might refuse to approve the peace accord unless Armenia agrees to withdraw from Nagorno-Karabakh.

The Armenian president, Serzh Sarkisian, dismissed Erdogan's statement as intended for audiences in Turkey and Azerbaijan. Sarkisian confirmed his intention to travel to Turkey on October 14 for a landmark visit to watch a Turkey-Armenia World Cup qualifying match at the invitation of his Turkish counterpart, Abdullah Gul.

And in Nagorno-Karabakh, ordinary citizens like Osipov bristle at the mere suggestion of an Armenian withdrawal, or the return of Azerbaijanis forced to flee during the war.

"If the Azerbaijanis return, they will say they are in charge here, that this is their land, and that we must leave," Osipov says.



A man stands in front of a poster in Stepanakert depicting scenes from the Karabakh war.


One Toilet For 100 Families

Meanwhile, 350 kilometers away from Stepanakert, in the Azerbaijani capital, Baku, Azeris displaced by the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict have worries of their own.

Nearly 700,000 Azerbaijanis were forced to flee the fighting in Nagorno-Karabakh and the surrounding territories. Fifteen years later, the vast majority of them are still living in unbearable conditions, many in squalid dormitories provided them by the state.

Residents of one ramshackle, Soviet-era building say that as many as eight people are forced to share a single room, that they often go without water and gas, and that more than 100 families share one toilet.

"Nobody would want to live in a single room sharing it with seven other people. Nobody would want to queue up for toilet with 85 people," says Yosuf Abbasov, a lanky 43-year-old who fought in the 1988-94 war before fleeing to Baku.

"Instead of fighting with each other in this queue for the toilet, it would be better to fight with Armenians to get back our land," he says.



Heyvagul Abbasova escaped the fighting along with her then-infant son


Heyvagul Abbasova, a 43-year-old woman who escaped fighting in Lachin with her son, then an infant, works in a kiosk selling cigarettes, newspapers, and soft drinks outside the dormitory. She weeps softly as she recalls her homeland.

"If I see Karabakh in reality -- not in my dreams, but for real, with my own eyes -- I'm afraid my heart might give out on me," Abbasova says. "If I were told today that our lands were freed, I would run there without anything. I would walk there barefoot. It is always in our dreams."

She says she constantly tells her children that they "have not always been refugees" and once had a home and "a normal life on our own land."

But like many of the displaced, Abbasova is skeptical that the latest round of negotiations will result in them returning home.

"We'll always live with the hope that one day we could return to our land. But we don't see any results from the negotiations. For almost 18 years already, they've been telling us that the occupied lands will soon be freed. But there are still no results," she says.

"My 4-month-old son, who left Karabakh in my arms, is now 18 years old and he will join the military service soon. How can I believe in these negotiations?"

Azerbaijani officials had been pushing for Armenia to agree to return five districts surrounding Nagorno-Karabakh and to allow displaced persons to return to their homes as preconditions for Turkey reestablishing diplomatic ties with Yerevan.

But while officials described a meeting between Sarkisian and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev on October 8 as "constructive," there was no breakthrough ahead of the deal between Yerevan and Ankara.

Azerbaijani officials are clearly nervous about the Armenian-Turkish rapprochement, which deprives Baku of a degree of leverage over Yerevan.

In an interview with RFE/RL, Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry spokesman Elkhan Polukhov described the Turkey-Armenia deal as "completely against the national of interests of Azerbaijan," because it comes without a resolution of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Noting a growing disappointment with Turkey, Polukhov added that energy-rich Azerbaijan has the means and will to defend its interests itself, even if Baku's international allies do not.

"Azerbaijan is not a puppet country that can be manipulated," Polukhov says. "We are a major power in the region. We are an active and irremovable part of many international projects that involve many big powers."

Azerbaijani officials have subtly suggested that Baku's participation in international initiatives like the Nabucco pipeline project, which would transport gas from the Caspian Sea region to Europe, could be in jeopardy if its interests were not taken into account in Nagorno-Karabakh. (In an interview published just ahead of the Zurich signing, Aliyev noted significantly that the price of Azerbaijani gas sold to Turkey had not yet been finalized.)



Men outside a Baku dormitory for internally displaced persons from Nagorno-Karabakh


'We're Speaking About Our Future'

Just as the Armenia-Turkey deal has Azerbaijani officials worried about being left out in the cold, many in Nagorno-Karabakh are concerned that Yerevan may cut a deal over the territory behind their backs.

The Minsk Group is urging Yerevan and Baku to agree to a series of confidence-building measures, known as the Basic Principles, as an interim step before the territory's final status will be discussed.

These include the return of Armenian occupied lands surrounding the territories to Baku's control, an interim status for Nagorno-Karabakh that provides for self-governance, the establishment of an international peacekeeping mission, and the return of tens of thousands of Azerbaijanis displaced by the 1988-94 war.

Azerbaijan has embraced the Basic Principles, while Armenia has remained noncommittal. Officials in Nagorno-Karabakh, who complain that they have no representative in negotiations that will ultimately determine the territory's fate, have rejected the proposal out of hand.

In an interview with RFE/RL, Nagorno-Karabakh's de facto deputy foreign minister, Vardan Barseghian, says the entire peace process, in which Azerbaijan and Armenia negotiate under the auspices of the Minsk Group, needs to be overhauled.

"Karabakh needs to be present at the negotiating table. This current format needs to be reviewed and reset, and the Basic Principles need to be modified," Barseghian says. "We're speaking about our future. We're speaking about the future of this region and the future of these people, who have a desire to live in freedom."

Officials like Barseghian, as well as ordinary people in Nagorno-Karabakh, point out that not only Azerbaijanis were displaced by the 1988-94 war. Some 140,000 Armenians from Azerbaijan were also driven from their homes during the conflict.



Vladimir Agamirov, a Baku native who now lives in Stepanakert


Many of them, like Vladimir Agamirov, a feisty 74-year-old, settled in Nagorno-Karabakh. A native of Baku, Agamirov fled to Armenia shortly after the conflict broke out in 1988.

He eventually settled in Shusha, a former resort town a short drive from Stepanakert, where he is repairing a rundown apartment for his family.

Agamirov says he has fond memories of living with Azerbaijanis before the war and is not opposed to seeing them return to Nagorno-Karabakh now. He adds that it is high time for politicians to finally resolve the protracted conflict over the territory.

"We all need to live in peace. Everybody. All people need to live in peace," Agamirov says emphatically.

"Nobody needs another war. Let them come to an agreement. If the politicians want a war, let them fight it themselves. Neither the Azerbaijanis, the Armenians, nor anybody else needs another war."

Lucina Musayelian of RFE/RL's Armenian Service contributed to this report in Stepanakert. Ulviyye Asadzade of RFE/RL's Azerbaijani Service contributed to this report from Baku

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Yerevan picks historians for commission

Monday, October 19, 2009

VERCİHAN ZİFLİOĞLU

ISTANBUL - Hürriyet Daily News

Yerevan has already picked the Armenian historians expected to participate in the controversial history commission, although the historic agreement aimed at normalizing relations between Turkey and Armenia has yet to be ratified by either parliament.

Also, an Armenian historian who was born in Istanbul has been unofficially put in charge of the committee by the Turkish government.

The history commission, which is expected to be part of an intergovernmental commission between the two countries, is one of the most delicate matters in the recently signed diplomatic protocols.

Although not mentioned in the protocols, Turkey has been naming a settlement on the long-standing territorial dispute of Nagorno-Karabakh and the history commission as preconditions for reconciliation with its ex-Soviet neighbor. Ankara says the joint history commission should study and discuss the 1915 deaths of Armenians during the last days of the Ottoman Empire.

Armenian President Serge Sarkisian and his government rejected Turkey’s offer of a history commission, labeling it as “politically motivated.” However, while saying Armenia would never step down from its stance on the 1915 killings, Yerevan has already chosen the historians for the commission.

The names for the commission were selected by the administration of Sarkisian, a senior Armenian government official told the Hürriyet Daily News & Economic Review. The official was speaking on the condition of anonymity due the sensitivity of the issue. Another diplomatic source from the Turkish side also verified the appointments, further saying that the commission would begin working immediately if the diplomatic protocols are ratified by both the Turkish and Armenian parliaments.

Meanwhile, an Armenian historian who was born in Istanbul is unofficially holding meetings for Turkey about the establishment of the commission. The Armenian historian, who went to Yerevan last year to conduct research using the archives of the Genocide Museum, is also the first historian of Armenian origin who was granted special permission by former President Fahri Korutürk to conduct research using the Ottoman archives in 1974.

The Armenian side would offer only Armenian historians to the commission, he said, adding that historians from the diaspora, who have been carrying out research in the archives of many countries, would not be included.

Ara Sarafian, a leading diaspora historian and the director of London-based Gomidas Institute, said the commission matter is political and he does not want to comment on the issue. In a previous interview with the Daily News, Sarafian said Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s call for a history commission was a positive move, but added that Armenia is not the right address for the issue. “The archived documents in Armenia are insufficient. The freedom of historians is limited. So, a delicate matter such as genocide will be pulled into the political arena,” he said.

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Fate of eastern Turkey's Humanity Monument uncertain

Monday, October 19, 2009

Elem Tuğçe Oktay

Hürriyet: Kars

The construction of a monument in the eastern city of Kars, on Turkey's border with Armenia, could be a great chance for regional peace. However, the fate of the unfinished Monument of Humanity is still in the hands of Turkey's Ministry of Culture.

Dialogue and mutual rapprochement between Turkey and Armenia became more clarified after the two neighbors recently signed a historic deal in Zurich to normalize diplomatic relations following a century of hostility. The historic steps particularly accelerated after Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan sent a letter to Armenia's president at the time, Robert Kocharian, proposing the establishment of a historians’ commission to investigate the deaths of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire in 1915, which some people labeled as genocide.

The monument depicts two figures standing face to face on the verge of shaking hands. Its construction was inspired by an Azerbaijani folk song. A three-meter-high hand that was supposed to join the two figures was never attached. It lies fingers up on the gravel in front of the monument. The construction work began under the auspices of the then Kars Mayor Naif Alibeyoglu, the local head of the Justice and Development Party, or AKP. From its inception in 2006, it has encountered stiff opposition. Political prejudices in the country overshadowed the project. Oktay Aktaş, the local head of the Nationalist Movement Party, or MHP, has led the opposition campaign against the construction. Currently, it still stands unfinished.

Mehmet Aksoy, the architect of the unfinished monument, said the monument is being used as a tool for political gains. “The construction of the monument has been halted even though it calls for peace. We have a hypocritical policy. The only thing preventing construction is a lack of conscience,” Aksoy said.

Aksoy said the monument should make its debut amid a great inauguration ceremony for Turkey to prove its sincerity to normalize ties with Armenia. "They have tried to make peace on one hand, while they tried to prevent peace on the other,” he said.

Aksoy said its demolition could destroy other cultural heritage sites in the area. “It is difficult to destroy the 1,500-kilogram Monument of Humanity. They can destroy it only if they place a bomb inside it. However, such destruction could destroy the Twelve Apostles Church and the historical bastions,” he said, adding that if the council were to do that it would be no different from the Taliban.

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Poll: Armenians oppose Turkey thaw, support open border

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

YEREVAN – Agence France-Presse

Most Armenians oppose a deal to establish ties with longtime foe Turkey, according to a poll released Monday, but nearly half nonetheless want to see the border between the two countries opened.

The survey of 1,000 people carried out by the Armenian Sociological Association found that 52 percent opposed deals signed between Armenia and Turkey this month to establish diplomatic ties and open the border. About 39 percent supported the deals.

But 48 percent of respondents also said they wanted the border to open, compared with only 41 percent who wanted it to remain closed.

The association’s director, Gevorg Poghosian, said the apparent contradiction reflected the longstanding distrust of Turkey in Armenia.

“Our society considers Turkey an enemy state.... Breaking that stereotype is very difficult,” he said. “There is a lack of trust that this is a positive process that will have a positive result.”

The survey was carried out between Sept. 21 and 25, before the Turkish and Armenian foreign ministers signed the landmark deals in an internationally hailed step toward ending a century of hostility.

The protocols still need parliamentary ratification to take effect and the process is expected to take time amid nationalist ire in both countries.

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