How has the world changed with the advent of the most recent Ukraine crisis? How realistic is Russia’s isolation by the West? And are we experiencing a new geopolitical paradigm shift? CrossTalking with Martin McCauley, Mark Sleboda and Christoph Hoerstel.
The difference between South African and Turkish thieves
By EMRE DELİVELİ
emre.deliveli@gmail.com
The biggest difference between the two countries is the behavior of their thieves. After a morning hike in Blyde Canyon on March 20, noises from the living room woke me up from my afternoon nap. I thought it was housekeeping, only to find a baboon family who had apparently entered through the window to steal our biscuits. Having been caught red-handed, they immediately left.
Turkish thieves would have condemned me for having caught them in the first place. They would have claimed I was interfering with their freedom to sin. They would then have cut off my communication by breaking my cellphone. Having secured themselves, they would have sat down and started watching the TV as if nothing had happened.
If you continue to #RememberBerkin and remind everyone around yourselves of him, maybe the Turkish prime thief, who also admitted to having given the order for Berkin’s murder, will leave one day as well…
Assad cousin killed in Syria’s Latakia – report Al Jazeera
Last updated: 24 Mar 2014
Cousin of President Bashar al-Assad killed in battles with rebel fighters near border with Turkey.
Hilal al-Assad, a cousin of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, has been killed along with seven of his fighters during fighting in the border town of Kasab in Latakia province, after shells from rebels targeted his vehicle.
The UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an activist group, reported Assad’s death. It was confirmed by Syrian state television, which described Hilal as the head of the National Defence Force in the province of Latakia.
Hilal founded the National Defence Army, a group of pro-government civilians fighting alongside the Syrian army.
The Syrian rebel group Jaish al-Islam claimed responsibility for the killing in a statement published on its website.
“The first rocket was fired around 7:15pm, followed by another five minutes later. The rockets targeted a house where Hilal was holding a meeting with other members of the National Defence Army” the statement said.
On Sunday, activists and state media reported clashes near the town of Kasab and said both sides were dispatching reinforcements. Syrian officials said the opposition fighters were coming from inside Turkey.
The battle for Kasab broke out on Friday and at least 80 fighters on both sides have been killed.
Latakia province, which includes Assad’s family village, is considered a government stronghold and many of its residents are from his Alawite minority.
Syrian Rebels Capture Town Near Turkish Border
Hard-line Islamic rebels captured a small town in northwestern Syria near the Turkish border as part of their offensive in the rugged coastal region that is a bastion of support for President Bashar Assad, activists said Monday.
Fighters from an array of armed opposition groups seized the predominantly Armenian Christian town of Kassab on Sunday. The rebels, including militant from the al-Qaida-affiliated Nusra Front, have also wrested control of a nearby border crossing to Turkey.
The advances, while minor in terms of territory, provided a welcome boost to a beleaguered rebellion that has suffered a string of battlefield losses in recent weeks. Forces loyal to Assad have captured several towns near Syria’s border with Lebanon as part of a government offensive aimed severing rebel supply lines across the porous frontier and securing the border.
Rebels launched their offensive on Friday in Latakia province, which is the ancestral home of the Assad family and a stronghold of his Alawite sect. Since then, the fighting has focused around Kassab and the nearby border crossing.
Rami Abdurrahman, the director of the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said rebels were in control of the center of Kassab on Monday but that clashes were raging in the hills outside of town.
Government warplanes were conducting airstrikes on several positions in the area, including Nabeh al-Murr and the scattering of homes and fields surrounding Kassab, the Observatory said. There was no immediate word on casualties.
In an amateur video posted online, two opposition fighters stand on a rooftop in Kassab and raise their arms in celebration. A checkpoint near the post office, replete with sandbags and oil drums painted like the Syrian flag, sits abandoned. The streets are deserted. The camera pans past the base of a smashed statue that the narrator says was of Assad’s late father and Syria’s former leader, Hafez.
The video appears genuine and corresponded to other AP reporting.
This is not the first significant rebel offensive in Latakia.
Last August, a mix of moderate and extremist rebel brigades captured around a dozen villages in the Latakia mountains, before a government counteroffensive expelled them.
Afterward, Human Rights Watch said nearly 200 civilians, including children, the elderly and the handicapped, were killed in the attack. It said rebel abuses during the operation amounted to war crimes.
Now in its fourth year, Syria’s conflict has killed more than 140,000 people, forced more than 2 million people to seek refuge abroad, and triggered a massive humanitarian crisis across the region.
The U.N. Security Council last month demanded immediate access everywhere in Syria to deliver humanitarian aid to millions of people in need. It also called for an end to sieges of populated areas, and a halt to all attacks against civilians, including indiscriminate shelling and aerial attacks using barrel bombs in populated areas.
In a report released Monday, Human Rights Watch said the Assad government has continued its sweeping aerial campaign against opposition-held areas of the divided city of Aleppo in defiance of the U.N. resolution.
“New satellite photos and witness accounts show the brutality unleashed on parts of Aleppo,” said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director for the New York-based group.
Turkey seeks to devastate Armenian-populated Syrian regions
The armed tensions in Syria’s north-west are a clear sign of Turkish intentions to devastate the Armenian-populated regions across the country, says an Armenian orientalist.
“All that is going on now was being plotted several years ago, as Turkey began to be actively involved in the emerging disaster. We did predict that the devastation of Syria’s Armenian-populated regions could be one of Turkey’s goals, so we are now the eyewitness of that,” Ruben Safrastyan told Tert.am, commenting on the Sunday militant attack on Kessab.
He said the devastation plan is of a strategic importance for Turkey given that the Armenian community of Syria (especially in Aleppo, Damascus and the surrounding villages and regions) includes mainly descendents of the Genocide survivors.
The expert noted that the Armenians in Syria had no intention to leave (like those in other eastern countries who went moved to other states in the course of time) up until the outbreak of the recent tensions.
“That’s very important; they are now doing all their best to force the Armenians out. The next factor is that the community in Syria – which is very literate and patriotic – has published a considerable literature. It is attached to the Armenian communities in Beirut and Lebanon, so I believe it is one of Turkey’s direct goals to empty Syria of Armenians,” he added.
Safrastyan said he thinks it is important to urgently draw the world’s attention to the problem. “At the same time, we must be able to be a country giving hope to our compatriots. They must never lose the hope that Armenia can lend a helping hand to them,” he added.
Safrastyan further stressed the importance of cooperation with the Syrian authorities. “We must be maintain contact to maximum assist the Syrian authorities to offer the maximum the best possible protection to the Armenians there,” he said,
Catholicos Aram I of the Holy See of Cilicia had earlier contacted President Bashar al-Assad’s office to call for sending more troops to Kessab to ensure a better protection for the Armenians.
The Syrian ambassador to Lebanon, who later visited the patriarch ,said President Assad had given him assurances that the Syrian state and army would do all their best to re-establish peace in the region.
A former foreign minister of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic, Arman Melikyan, said in a post on Facebook earlier today that Armenia is obliged to undertake measures to protect the Syrian-Armenians. He called upon the authorities’ efforts apply the United Nations Security Council and Syria’s ruling government in an effort to seek the best possible protection for the Armenians in Syria.
Tigran Balayan, a spokesperson for the Foreign Ministry whom Tert.am contacted for comments, declined to give any details, saying that their activities are not subject to publication for the time being.
Serzh Sargsyan to make statement on Kessab
Syria Reports Cite 80 Dead in Kessab (Video of Syrian Airforce pilot)
On the border with Turkey, Syria Kessab Armenian-inhabited town in the centuries after the attack on the El Nusr major wounds received as a result of the clashes are said.
EMRE CAN Dağlıoğlu
My misakmanusyan@gmail.co
Antioch Yayladağı at noon in the Syrian side of the border in a Syrian fighter planes shot down. Chief of Staff, on the website gave a statement about this incident. According to this explanation, Syria started two MIG-23 aircraft, Syrian airspace north on the right flight at noon, followed began, Turkey airspace approach after being alerted, and an airplane this warning to obey and boundary violations do on the hour 13:14 ‘te, belonging to Turkey by an F-16 was shot down.
Prime Minister Erdogan, today’s rallies on the issue, as “particularly the Chief of Staff, including air force” congratulated, Hatay Governor Mehmet Celalettin spotless, Syrian aircraft, Syria’s Kessab town on the western side drops said. Towards the border with Turkey on the border of Syria Kessab air on March 21 against the attacking troops off El Nusr is estimated.
With this event, once again came to the fore Kessab, already under attack 48 hours. civilnet According to the report, the border by Turkey El Nusr facade depends on foreign troops to the town, attacked the then Syrian regime troops attached to these forces clashed on most Armenians that town residents leave town to have been forced. By land and sea, while the knowledge that there are going to Latakiya, precise information about casualties and no casualties. According to the information given by the Anatolia News Agency, at least 15 wounded in ambulances brought to Antioch, were being treated in various hospitals. One of the injured, lost their lives.
civilnet speaking to the elders of the town, as of March 23 states that are completely emptied of villages and attacks result in the destruction of the town “no longer Kessab” were the words said. The first of the attacks, on the morning of March 21, which is a part of Kessab loved Aghby began in the village. According to eyewitnesses, an armed group crossed the border of Turkey, conquered the hills surrounding the village and then attacked the village. Kessab of the attacks spread to all of the area on the seafront on the seizure, regime troops have intervened in the region by land and air.
El Nusra this attack, a region on the seafront, allegedly to seize. This event on Syria’s UN Ambassador Bashar Jaafari, the NATO Security Council and the Secretary-General addressed to the President by writing a letter, has accused Turkey of supporting international terrorism. Establishment of the Cooperation Council for the Armenians of France (CCAF) also issued a letter, because Turkey is responsible for this attack, while another of the government of Turkey and the Syrian regime to terminate this attack wanted to help.
Kessab known as settlement of Armenians for centuries, before the start of the civil war in the country, was one of the popular holiday resorts of Armenians in Syria. Town during the war, the Armenians who fled from Damascus and Aleppo has been a settlement for the safe. In 1939, Turkey joined the poll result Kessab located within the boundaries of Hatay, Turkey to attend nine months had resisted and Cardinal Krikor Aghajanian as a result of the request of Pius XII. Through the intervention of Pius remained within the borders of Syria.
Armenians Kessab have found refuge in the Armenian church Surb Asdvadzadzine Latakia
After the attack Friday in the Armenian village Kessab Syria, located at the Turkish-Syrian border by more than 300 Islamist fighters against the regime in Damascus, the few villagers 3500-mainly Armenians and Alevi Kurds, fled. Many Armenians found refuge in the Armenian church Surb Asdvadzadzine (Holy Mother of God) of Latakia on the Mediterranean coast. On site, the Red Crescent has supported the Armenian refugees by distributing beds. Moreover, according to official sources reached Damascus, the Syrian army would contrattaqué and dislodged the Islamist attackers from their rear base located in Turkey.
Krikor Amirzayan
France: The CFC holds Erdogan responsible for the onslaught against Kessab
The National Office of the Coordination Council of Armenian Organizations of France condemns in the strongest terms the assault against Kessab by forces called “jihadists” from Turkey. This town located in northern Syria is home to one of the last Armenian communities of the region. And he is not innocent he may be referred, as the world prepares to commemorate the centenary of the 1915 genocide.
No cause, no religious or political, is no reason to go after civilian villages who want to live in peace. The CFC holds the Turkish authorities responsible for these terrorist actions launched from their territory and are now cause many casualties and a new exodus of Armenians remaining in the region. He calls the French government to respond and put all his weight on the Erdogan government and Syrian forces receive support to stop this attack immediately and physical integrity of Armenians in Syria is the warranty.
National Bureau of CCAF (Coordination Council of Armenian Organizations of France)
Ara © armenews.com
Germany: Turkish deniers protest to Constance against a play on the Armenian Genocide
About 100 demonstrators protested Friday night with Turkish flags and German flags and banners against the performance of a play about the genocide of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire.
“The events of 1915 are events that need to be explored by historians and are still subject to scientific debate,” said Aras Tugrul, one of the organizers.
However, neither he nor the Turkish Consul General Serhat Aksen would have demanded the withdrawal of the play “The Tale of the Last Thought” writer Edgar Hilsenrath. Protesters outside the theater have mainly targeted the posters of the piece: They show the feet of a man lying on the ground that a white cloth covers. On the bottom a Turkish flag with a sentence of Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said: “In our history, no genocide was committed.”
“The death of an innocent person can not be combined in this way with the flag of the republic, Tugrul decalre Aras. Artistic freedom has been exploited at the expense of human dignity. That is why we are here. This is an obvious violation of artistic freedom. ”
The Director of the theater Christoph Nix scored protesters after their silent march through the city center of Constance in front of the theater. “It is your right to be here,” said Nix. However, “it is the duty of art to face history.” However, before the show, he read a statement from the Consul General of Turkey, outlining his vision. The show itself was not disrupted by protests.
The theater director was supported by the entire political class Constance. “This is something that you need to support,” said Mayor Constance Andreas Osner after the show.
Green member of parliament Siegfried Lehmann expressed his dismay at this discussion. In particular, the intervention of the Consulate General described as “unacceptable face of artistic freedom speech,” said the Green Party in a letter to the editor. “The public debate is not only appropriate, but it is time to bring to the surface the sensitive subject of the history of Turkey.” Even Peter Friedrich (SPD) Minister of Bundesrat, Europe and International Affairs, from Constance and representing the interests of Baden-Württemberg federal and European political level was present at the first. “The sensitivities are due to the fact that there is still no adequate answer to the question,” said the minister. “Our review of the history of murder, systematic destruction and the displacement of hundreds of thousands of Armenians from 1915 shows that it is not enough to leave it to historians to review the law Criminal. To develop a good democratic culture must address this issue of history in society as a whole. This is the only way to develop a good and open democratic culture. I thank the Stadttheater Konstanz have driven this debate. “.
Sunday, April 13, 2014, the municipal theater provides a roundtable with Seyhan Bayraktar, Erdal Dogan, Patrak Estukyan (AGOS), Dr. Raffi Kantian (the German-Armenian Society), Kemal Yalcin (writer) and will be moderated Wolfgang Koydl, (Süddeutsche Zeitung). Other performances of the play are scheduled.
Sunday, March 23, 2014,
Stéphane © armenews.com