BBC Archives

BBC presents six facts about Armenia the world may not know

May 4, 2018 By administrator

Armenians have been making headlines by shutting down cities with major protests, BBC writes, referring to the anti-government protests across Armenia over the past days. The source has compiled a list of six significant facts about the country to check what knowledge people around the globe may have about “the landlocked former Soviet Republic.”

The first fact is about the fact that more Armenians live outside the republic than in it. “The country’s population is around three million but millions more live abroad. There are big diasporas in the United States, Russia and France. Many recent Armenian migrants go to Russia for its proximity and because many speak Russian,” writes the source. Secondly, it notes that Mount Ararat is considered a national symbol in Armenia even though it is in Turkey.

Thirdly, it is reminded that Armenia was the first country to adopt Christianity as its official religion in the early 4th Century and its Church is completely autonomous from other Christian Churches of the world.

It next refers to the fact that learning chess is compulsory. “Since 2011, all children in Armenia from six to eight years old have had compulsory chess lessons. The country has produced numerous grandmasters and it currently has more than 3,000 qualified trained chess teachers in its schools,” says the source.

Armenian brandy come the next with reference to the history when during World War Two, Soviet leader Joseph Stalin sent Winston Churchill several dozen cases of Armenian brandy as a present.

Finally, in the sixth place the source recalls all famous Armenians around the world, French composer Charles Aznavour; Russian grandmaster Garry Kasparov; US singer Cher and celebrity Kim Kardashian West among them.

BBC like Brother CNN cannot stamic the Truth about chemical weapon deception going after Sarah Abdallah @sahouraxo

April 19, 2018 By administrator

Sarah Abdallah

Sarah Abdallah is one of the most influential Twitter users commenting on conversations about the conflict in Syria,

As the investigation continues into another alleged chemical attack in Syria, one group of influential online activists is busy spreading their version of events.

Inspectors from the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) are attempting to access the previously rebel-held town of Douma, where medical organisations and rescue workers say President Bashar al-Assad’s forces dropped bombs filled with toxic chemicals in an attack on 7 April, killing more than 40 people.

The Syrian government and its key ally, Russia, say the incident was staged. But the US, UK and France – who support the opposition to Mr Assad – say they are confident that chlorine and possibly a nerve agent were used.

Despite the uncertainty about what happened in Douma, a cluster of influential social media activists is certain that it knows what occurred on 7 April.

They’ve seized on a theory being floated by Russian officials and state-owned media outlets that the attacks were “staged” or were a “false flag” operation, carried out by jihadist groups or spies in order to put the blame on the Assad government and provide a justification for Western intervention.

The group includes activists and people who call themselves “independent journalists”, and several have Twitter followings reaching into the tens or hundreds of thousands.

CPJ Report: BBC journalist questioned by US border agents, devices searched

February 1, 2017 By administrator

New York, February 1, 2017—Customs and Border Protection officers should respect the rights of journalists to protect confidential information when subjecting international reporters to screening on their arrival to the U.S., the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.

Ali Hamedani, a reporter for BBC World Service, told CPJ that border agents detained him at Chicago O’Hare airport for over two hours and questioned him when he arrived in the U.S. on January 29 to interview a Persian singer. The journalist, who said he was traveling on a Media I Visa, told CPJ that agents searched his phone and computer and read his Twitter feed.

Hamedani told CPJ that when he traveled to the U.S. on the same visa in November he did not have any issues at the border. The detention of the British-Iranian journalist came two days after President Donald Trump signed an executive order banning entry to the U.S. for 90 days for individuals from seven countries, including Iran.

Link: https://www.cpj.org/2017/02/bbc-journalist-questioned-by-us-border-agents-devi.php

Erdogan rounding up foreign Journalist BBC, Voice of America Detained in Turkey

November 27, 2016 By administrator

bbc-voc-detain A BBC Turkish reporter Hatice Kamer was detained on Saturday when he went to the Sirvan town in southeastern Siirt Province to meet with the relatives of copper mine collapse victims, while a Voice of America (VOA) journalist was also arrested in the Turkish city of Diyarbakir on Saturday, according to media reports.

MOSCOW (Sputnik) — A BBC Turkish reporter has been detained in the southeastern Turkish city of Sirvan, media reported Sunday. According to the Hurriyet newspaper, Hatice Kamer was detained on Saturday when he went to the Sirvan town in southeastern Siirt Province to meet with the relatives of copper mine collapse victims. The authorities reportedly provided no reason for the detention.

According to the reports, a Voice of America (VOA) journalist was also detained in the Turkish city of Diyarbakir on Saturday.

At least 10 bodies have been recovered from the copper mine that collapsed due to prolonged rains on November 17. After military attempted to overthrow government in July 2016 massive purges swept through Turkey, with many newspapers shut and journalists arrested. Earlier this month, a french reporter was arrested and deported from the country.

Turkey: Interim minister: Turkey in Gallipoli-like war against Reuters, CNN, Der Spiegel

September 5, 2015 By administrator

Yalçın Topçu (Photo: DHA)

Turkey’s Interim Culture and Tourism Minister Yalçın Topçu has argued that the country is in a war against leading foreign media outlets such as reuters, BBC, CNN and Der Spiegel in what he said a struggle that is similar to Gallipoli battle, the failed British-led naval invasion against the Ottoman Empire.

“While our ancestors fought in Çanakkale with bayonets and canons, we are today face to face with Der Spiegel, BBC, Reuters and we are fighting with them,” he said on Friday.

Topçu, former leader of the nationalist Grand Unity Party (BBP), has been recently appointed as the culture and tourism minister of an interim government led by the Justice and Development Party (AK Party).

Also recently, he expressed his personal desire to see Hagia Sophia museum, a former church turned into a mosque after the conquest of İstanbul, to be turned into a mosque.

Turkey lashes out at BBC for ‘supporting terrorism’

August 21, 2015 By administrator

The Turkish government has censured the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) for airing a report on the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), saying the news organization is “overtly” supporting “terrorism.”

The Turkish Foreign Ministry on Friday slammed the BBC’s coverage of the “written and visual propaganda of the PKK terrorist organization,” saying a report by the channel on August 20 was an attempt to whitewash the image of the militant group.

“Giving such coverage to an organization designated as terrorist by many countries including the EU member states is an overt support to terrorism,” a statement on the Foreign Ministry’s website said, adding that the broadcast “attempted to portray this illegal organization… as if it were an innocent organization merely engaged in a struggle with another terrorist organization.”

The controversial report by the BBC narrated the story of an Izadi woman in Iraq who escaped captivity by the Daesh Takfiri terrorists and joined the PKK. It showed images of PKK training camps where Kurds and Izadis were being prepared to fight Daesh.

Turkey has been engaged in major military operations in its southern border region over the past weeks. The Turkish military has been conducting offensives against alleged positions of Daesh terrorists in northern Syria as well as those of the PKK in northern Iraq and southeastern Turkey.

The military operations began in the wake of the deadly July 20 bomb attack in the southern Turkish town of Suruc, an ethnically Kurdish town located close to the Kurdish town of Kobani on the other side of the border in Syria, where over 30 people died. The Turkish government blamed Daesh for the bombing. On July 22, the PKK claimed responsibility for the killing of two Turkish police officers, saying they were cooperating with Daesh.

The Friday statement by the Turkish Foreign Ministry said the BBC’s report facilitated PKK’s recruitment, adding that the militant group could become more encouraged through “such irresponsible and hypocritical approaches vis-a-vis terrorism.”

It said the PKK has killed more than 60 people and injured hundreds more in its new wave of attacks in southern Turkey.

Turkey anger at Pope Francis Armenian ‘genocide’ claim

April 12, 2015 By administrator

Turkey summoned the Vatican ambassador over Pope Francis’s use of the word “genocide” to describe the mass killing of Armenians under Ottoman rule in WW1.

The foreign ministry reportedly told the envoy it was “disappointed” by the comments, which caused a “problem of trust” between Turkey and the Vatican.

Armenia and many historians say up to 1.5 million people were systematically killed by Ottoman forces in 1915.

Turkey has consistently denied that the killings were genocide. report BBC

The Pope’s comments came at a service in Rome to honour a 10th Century mystic, attended by Armenia’s president.

The dispute has continued to sour relations between Armenia and Turkey.
‘Bleeding wound’

The Pope first used the word genocide for the killings two years ago, prompting a fierce protest from Turkey.

At Sunday’s Mass in the Armenian Catholic rite at Peter’s Basilica, he said that humanity had lived through “three massive and unprecedented tragedies” in the last century.

“The first, which is widely considered ‘the first genocide of the 20th Century’, struck your own Armenian people,” he said, in a form of words used by a declaration by Pope John Paul II in 2001.

Pope Francis also referred to the crimes “perpetrated by Nazism and Stalinism” and said other genocides had followed in Cambodia, Rwanda, Burundi and Bosnia.

He said it was his duty to honour the memories of those who were killed.

“Concealing or denying evil is like allowing a wound to keep bleeding without bandaging it,” the Pope added.

On Sunday, Pope Francis also honoured the 10th Century mystic St Gregory of Narek by declaring him a doctor of the church. Only 35 other people have been given the title, including St Augustine and the Venerable Bede.

Armenia marks the date of 24 April 1915 as the start of the mass killings. The country has long campaigned for greater recognition of what it regards as a genocide.

Analysis: David Willey, BBC News, Rome

The Pope was perfectly conscious that by using the word “genocide” he would offend Turkey, which considers the number of deaths of Armenians during the extinction of the Ottoman Empire exaggerated, and continues to deny the extent of the massacre.

But the Pope’s powerful phrase “concealing or denying evil is like allowing a wound to bleed without bandaging it” extended his condemnation to all other, more recent, mass killings.

Pope Francis’ focus today on Armenia, the first country to adopt Christianity as its state religion, even before the conversion of the Roman Emperor Constantine, serves as yet another reminder of the Catholic Church’s widely spread roots in Eastern Europe and the Middle East. More than 20 local Eastern Catholic Churches, including that of Armenia, remain in communion with Rome.

BBC Radio: special 100th anniversary of the mass killings of Armenian Bishop of Gloucester

April 7, 2015 By administrator

Click Here to Listen Armenia, Bishop of Gloucester

In this special edition of the programme, marking the 100th anniversary of the mass killings of hundreds of thousands of Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire, Religious Affairs Correspondent, Caroline Wyatt explores what the events mean for Armenians living here in Britain.

Twenty-two countries officially recognise the 1915 massacre as genocide. The Turkish government maintains that while it was a great tragedy, it was not genocide. We debate the issues with the Armenian Bishop Vahan Hovhanessian, Geoffrey Robertson QC and Professor Ayhan Aktar.

We hear the story of journalist Meline Toumani, who grew up an American Armenian but moved to Istanbul to get to know the country and its people as a way of understanding what happened to her community.

Bob Walker charts the history of the UK’s Armenian community, visiting the first Armenian Church in Britain, Holy Trinity Armenian Church of Manchester, which opened its doors on Easter Day in 1870.

Caroline shares a meal with an Armenian family in London to learn about how the mass killings of Armenians 100 years ago still has an impact on 3 generations of the same family.

Also in the programme: the new Bishop of Gloucester, Rachel Treweek, talks to Caroline about what she hopes to bring to the role as the first woman diocesan Bishop in the Church of England and the first woman bishop to sit in the House of Lords later this year.

Producers:
Amanda Hancox
Carmel Lonergan

Contributors:
Bishop Vahan Hovhanessian
Geoffrey Robertson QC
Professor Ayhan Aktar
Meline Toumani
Ven Rachel Treweek
Mohammed Shafiq.

BBC Radio On Easter Sunday, Roy Jenkins hears an #ArmenianGenocide story

April 6, 2015 By administrator

The Armenian Genocide

BBC Radio Wales All Things Considered

On Easter Sunday, Roy Jenkins hears an Armenian story of hope and resurrection. Award-winning religious affairs programme.

One hundred years after the start of the Armenian Genocide, Roy Jenkins reflects on the impact of those events with the Rev. Canon Dr Patrick Thomas, Vicar of Christ Church, Carmarthen – an expert on Armenia and author of Remembering The Armenian Genocide 1915-2015 out later this month.

Visiting the Armenian Genocide Memorial in Cardiff’s Cathays Park, the only public memorial to the Genocide on British soil, he also meets members of the Welsh Armenian community to learn how this event, a hundred years ago, still resonates for them today. The programme also includes extracts from eyewitness accounts and sacred Armenian music.

Extracts include ‘Der Zor’ translated by Verjiné Svazlian in The Armenian Genocide, and Peter Balakian’s translation of Gregoris Balakian’s work Armenian Golgotha.

http://armeniangenocide100.org/

BBC: Rights concerns cast shadow on Azerbaijan’s political rise

May 8, 2014 By administrator

By Leyla Najafli
BBC Azeri

Nida is struggling to maintain campaigns with its activists in jail Continue reading the main story
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The latest lengthy jail terms handed out to activists in Azerbaijan have raised already high concerns over human rights abuses in the country – just as it is due to take on a prestigious international role.

Eight young activists from the prominent Nida movement were convicted of organising mass unrest, and possession of illegal drugs and weapons. They had been on a 20-day hunger strike – but a Baku court sentenced them to between six and eight years in jail on Tuesday.

Amnesty International has called them “prisoners of conscience”, while Human Rights Watch called the judgment a “colossal injustice”.

But the authorities maintain that they were imprisoned for their criminal activity, dismissing any doubts about the courts’ impartiality.

‘Bitter irony’
The activists, aged between 18 and 30, had protested against non-combat soldier deaths in the army – some of the biggest demonstrations the country has seen in recent years.

The court verdict came days before the country is due to assume chairmanship of the cabinet of ministers at the Council of Europe (CoE) – the continent’s leading human rights watchdog.

In a recent open letter to members of the CoE’s parliamentary assembly (Pace), the European Stability Initiative, a European think-tank, wrote of the “bitter irony” of Azerbaijan taking over the chairmanship at a time when it has “never had more political prisoners”.

“There should not be any [political prisoners] in a Council of Europe member state. Pace… has so far turned its eyes away.”

Since the crisis in Ukraine, the search for alternative gas sources, which would reduce Europe’s dependence on Russia, has become a priority for Europe.

Azerbaijan provides this alternative, with new gas pipeline projects due to be finished in the coming years.

But Western diplomats continue to be accused of “selling out democracy for energy”.

Indeed, while Western diplomats and European officials have expressed “concern” and “disappointment” at the the verdicts against the activists, there is no sign of shock.

‘Hardly news’
The muted reaction is in stark contrast to five years ago, when bloggers Adnan Hajizada and Emin Milli – known as the “donkey bloggers” – were jailed for “hooliganism” charges.

There was uproar in the international community, and Hillary Clinton, then US secretary of state, raised the issue with Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev. The activists were released by presidential pardon after a year in prison.

But that was then.

“Alas, it’s hardly news any more that activists are handed long prison sentences in Azerbaijan,” said Giorgi Gogia, senior researcher at Human Rights Watch. “This has been a mainstay in the government’s two-year effort to silence its critics.”

With so many jailed activists and journalists – Azerbaijan’s Human Rights Club says there are 142 political prisoners – it appears that being active in civil society in Azerbaijan is more of a risk than ever in its 20 years of independence.

There have been no mass protests in the country since the disputed presidential elections in October, when Mr Aliyev claimed victory for a third term in office with more than 84% of the votes.

In comparison with previous post-election protests, the demonstrations were small and ineffective.

Many put this down partly to a crackdown which had jailed opposition activists in the run-up to the vote.

But, to many, the overall picture is clear: despite its best efforts, civil society in Azerbaijan is paralysed because of recent events; and gas and geopolitics are seen as too important for the West to put any real pressure on the authorities.