Ambassadors of Great Britain and Germany in Armenia, Catherine Leach and Reiner Morell, held a press conference Wednesday, October 29 in Yerevan in particular to expose their preparations for the commemoration of the 100th anniversary of the First World War. Entitled “100 years after the First World War,” the program of events organized jointly sign of reconciliation includes visits to schools, the symbolic planting
UK Shifts Policy on Armenian Genocide after Jurist Robertson’s Report
BY HARUT SASSOUNIAN
Geoffrey Robertson, prominent British expert on international law, wrote a 40-page report in 2009, exposing the false and inaccurate statements on the Armenian Genocide by the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO).
Robertson’s investigative report, “Was there an Armenian Genocide?” was based on internal British documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, which revealed that the Foreign Office had denied the Armenian Genocide and misled the British Parliament on this matter in order to curry favor with Turkey.
Mr. Robertson had sent me an advance copy of his new 286-page book, “An Inconvenient Genocide: Who Now Remembers the Armenians?” to be published this month in the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, and the United States. Anyone who reads this influential jurist’s meticulously researched book will have no doubt about the true facts of the Genocide and Armenians’ just claims for restitution.
The confidential FCO documents recently obtained by Robertson reveal that the British government has made a gradual shift in its position on the Armenian Genocide, going from denial to declining to state its position. The Foreign Office acknowledges that the change in governmental policy is a direct result of the powerful legal arguments advanced by Mr. Robertson in his 2009 report.
Until recently, Great Britain had tenaciously clung to its outright denialist position on the Armenian Genocide. A secret 1999 FCO memo, quoted by Robertson, admitted that the British government “is open to criticism in terms of the ethical dimension. But given the importance of our relations (political, strategic, and commercial) with Turkey, and that recognizing the genocide would provide no practical benefit to the UK or the few survivors of the killings still alive today, nor would it help a rapprochement between Armenia and Turkey, the current line is the only feasible option.”
However, shortly after the publication of Robertson’s 2009 report, British officials quietly shifted their position from denial to avoidance of taking a stand on the genocide issue. In a 2010 internal memo, FCO stated: “Following Mr. Robertson’s report and the publicity it attracted, we have updated our public line to make clear that HMG [Her Majesty’s Government] does not believe it is our place to make a judgment (historical or legal) on whether or not the Armenian massacres constituted genocide.” In another memo, FCO explained that it will no longer maintain that “the historical evidence was not sufficiently unequivocal to persuade us that these events should be categorized as genocide.” The memo went on to assert that “there is increasing agreement about the extent of the deaths and suffering experienced by the Armenian community” and that “jurisprudence in relation to genocide, and particularly the nature and type of evidence required to prove the relevant intent, has developed significantly in the wake of events in Rwanda and the Balkans in the 1990’s.” Yet, FCO still advised against an explicit recognition of the genocide because “the Armenian diaspora in the UK is relatively small (less than 20,000) and there is limited wider public interest.”
Nevertheless, in view of the upcoming Centennial of the Armenian Genocide, the British government has decided to become a bit more accommodating on this issue. Last year, when the British Ambassador to Lebanon asked London for guidance on attending an April 24 commemoration in Beirut, the Foreign Office advised him to go ahead. FCO also recommended to its staff not to “give the impression that we deny what happened in 1915…we still consider them (the massacres and deportations) to be truly dreadful and in need of remembrance.”
To bring the genocide issue to a legal resolution, Mr. Robertson makes two suggestions: that the Armenian government submit it “to adjudication at the International Court of Justice [World Court] pursuant to Article IX of the Genocide Convention” or ask the UN Secretary General to establish an ad hoc court on the Armenian Genocide.
Geoffrey Robertson should be commended for authoring a most important book on the eve of the Armenian Genocide Centennial. The Armenian National Committee of UK has already purchased 1,000 copies for distribution to elected officials and members of the media in London. The book is available from Amazon.com. I feel honored that Mr. Robertson has made half a dozen references to my columns in his monumental work.
Mr. Robertson has appropriately dedicated his book to the cherished memory of Ben Whitaker, author of the 1985 UN Report which classified the Armenian mass killings as genocide.
UK Investors pull $27bn out of UK in one month amid fears of Scotland’s exit – report
Almost $27 billion of financial assets were pulled out of Britain in August in the run up to Scotland’s vote on independence, according to a new report by a London-based 
consultancy comparing the capital outflow to the Lehman Brothers collapse in 2008.
The financial outflow of 16.8 billion pounds ($27 billion) in August was the biggest since the white heat of the 2008 financial crisis when the US bank Lehman Brothers went bust, according to a CrossBorderCapital report compiled by the consultancy and released on Friday.
“Sterling outflows have been an issue since the end of June, but they really gathered pace in August and now look like intensifying again with the possibility of Scottish independence coming to the front of investors’ minds,” said Michael Howell, the managing director of the CrossBorder Capital.
The consultancy pointed out that the figures also dwarfed the selling of UK assets around the 2010 general election, afrer which there were several days of uncertainty over who would form the government.
Howell added that UK outflow was more than double the combined outflow from Germany and Australia and only Japan is currently seeing a faster rate of capital outflow from the country. This year UK has experienced a net 127 billion pound outflow ($206bn), while in 2013 a net 39 billion pounds ($63bn) flowed into the nation’s economy, he added.
The daily equity flow data pointed to “some of the largest UK equity selling on record, demonstrating investor concerns ahead of the Scottish referendum next week,” said Morgan Stanley on Friday.
Scotland is to vote in a referendum on its independence from Britain on Thursday, with opinion polls displaying a narrow gap between the pro-independence campaigners and those against the exit from the union. The latest ICM/Sunday Telegraph poll showed the biggest ‘Yes’ share of the referendum campaign, with 54 percent reporting an intention to vote ‘yes’ and 46 percent ‘no’.
The new liquidity report comes as the world’s leading investment banks warned of the financial folly Scotland would face if it votes for leaving the 307 year union with the UK.
On Friday, Deutsche Bank issued a paper criticizing independence and saying that it would be one of the greatest historic mistakes ever made.
“A ‘yes’ vote for Scottish independence on Thursday would go down in history as a political and economic mistake as large as Winston Churchill’s decision in 1925 to return the pound to the Gold Standard or the failure of the Federal Reserve to provide sufficient liquidity to the US banking system, which we now know brought on the Great Depression,” said Chief economist David Folkerts-Landau.
Deutsche Bank described the desire for independence as ‘incomprehensible’ saying it will entail negative consequences.
Three retail giants joined the debate in a letter to the Scottish Daily Record newspaper on Friday. Sir Ian Cheshire, of B&Q-owner Kingfisher, Marc Bolland, chief executive of Marks & Spencer, and James Timpson, of cobbler and key-cutter Timpson agreed that consumers north of the border will suffer from the country’s exit
“We are concerned about the greater complexity of trading across a national border coupled with the uncertainty over big issues such as the single currency and membership of the EU,” the joint letter read.
“Within our group there is first-hand experience of trading across national borders – in France, Ireland and across the world. Our experience is that it always leads to more red tape and higher costs and we feel it is important to share this experience.”
“We know that running a separate pricing system in Scotland will mean taking the difficult decision as to whether or not to pass on the increased costs through higher prices to Scottish consumers.”
Mega Police Op: 660 arrested in UK’s biggest anti-child abuse raid
British police have arrested 660 people in a massive six-month operation against accessing child abuse images online, the National Crime Agency (NCA) has revealed.
The operation saw 45 police forces involved, 833 properties searched and nearly 10,000 computer hard drives examined.
Teachers, doctors and social care workers were among those arrested, on charges ranging from possessing indecent images of children to serious sexual assault.
Of those arrested, 39 had been convicted of sexual offences previously, but most had not attracted attention from the police.
The operation targeted people who accessed indecent web images using software which would be difficult to detect by UK authorities, NCA Deputy Director General Phil Gormley has said.
“Our aim was to protect children who were victims of, or might be at risk of, sexual exploitation. A child is victimized not only when they are abused and an image is taken. They are re-victimized every time that image is viewed by someone.
“We want those offenders to know that the internet is not a safe, anonymous space for accessing indecent images, that they leave a digital footprint, and that law enforcement will find it,” he warned.
The NCA (dubbed the ‘British FBI’) reported that the operation has guaranteed the safety of 400 children, and that the police forces were dealing with an “unprecedented” increase in reports of sexual abuse of children.
Among few specific details disclosed by the NCA, it’s been revealed that some of the arrested suspects had viewed images of child abuse “for decades,” while others had even traveled to Cambodia and Vietnam to engage in sexual activity with minors.
“During this operation, we’ve targeted offenders accessing child abuse images. Police must continue to use a range of investigative techniques targeting all forms of abuse if we’re going to protect children and bring offenders to justice. Chief officers are committed to using all the tools available to them, because nothing is more important in policing than protecting vulnerable people,” Chief Constable Simon Bailey, national policing lead for Child Protection and Abuse Investigations added.
UK children’s charities have welcomed the operation, saying that the police action sends a “strong message” to child abusers that they will be traced and prosecuted.
“Industry has to find inventive ways of blocking the flow of such horrendous pictures, which are only produced through the suffering of defenseless children – many of who are not even old enough to go to school,” said Claire Lilley, head of online safety at the NSPCC.
“So while this operation must be rightly applauded we should view it as yet another warning sign that far more needs to be done if we are to stem the sordid trade in these images, which are often used by those who go on to abuse children,” she added.
The most recent data from the NSPCC shows that one in 20 children have been victims of sexual abuse, and that in 2012-13, there were 18,915 incidents of sexual crimes against children recorded in England and Wales.
Prince William and Kate Middleton open Tamar Manoukian Outdoor Centre
Prince William and Kate Middleton accompanied by Prince Charles opened on Friday the new Tamar Manoukian Outdoor Centre at Dumfries House.
Prince Charles said he was ‘enormously grateful’ to the Manoukian Foundation for funding the outdoor centre, the Daily Mail reports.
The Tamar Manoukian Outdoor Centre can host up to 52 young people and six adults and will be open to youngsters from the uniformed youth services such as the Scouts, Guides and Army Cadet Force and schools from across Scotland.
Members of the youth services already have the venue booked every weekend until December. Local young people have access to the centre during the week.
Blair washes his hands of responsibility for Iraq crisis
A mask of Britain’s former prime minister Tony Blair during a protest in London, England (file photo)
Presstv: Britain’s former prime minister Tony Blair has rejected the idea that his decision to support the US invasion of Iraq in 2003 caused the recent surge of violence in the country.
“We have to liberate ourselves from the notion that we caused this”, Blair wrote in an essay published on his website on Saturday, adding that the belief that the US-led invasion of Iraq had led to the current situation was “bizarre.”
The former premier insisted that the invasion of Iraq, which led to the toppling of former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, was right and that things would have been worse if he had not been ousted from power more than a decade ago.
The so-called Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) militants gained control of parts of Iraq’s northern areas on June 10. The militants first took control of Nineveh Province, including its provincial capital, Mosul. Rights groups say around half a million people have been displaced in and around Mosul.
The terrorists have also vowed to continue their raid toward the Iraqi capital, Baghdad.
Critics, however, dismissed Blair’s claims, saying that the US-UK invasion of Iraq was the main reason for the current situation in the Arab country.
Michael Stephens, from the Royal United Services Institute, said he thought Blair was “washing his hands of responsibility” and that the Iraq War played a major role in destabilizing the country.
UK forces participated in the US-led invasion of Iraq in a blatant violation of international law in 2003 under the pretext that the regime of Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction. No such weapons were ever discovered in Iraq.
UK seeks to reconcile Armenians and Turks ahead of Genocide centenary
June 6, 2014 – 17:11 AMT
The European Integration NGO is collecting stories to be presented by real people whose ancestors survived the Armenian Genocide and were saved with the help of their 
Turkish neighbor, friend or an ordinary Turk witnessing the events, Panorama.am reported.
The project titled “The Turk Who Saved Me” is supported by the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office.
The selected stories will be published in Armenian, Turkish and English languages in Armenia and Turkey. Some of the stories will also be published in a book.
The organization further requested those have similar stories or know people who could tell of such to contact it at info@europeanintegration.am (subject line: “100 years… True Stories”) or call at 00374 10 588 911 or 00374 98 491 019.
The Armenian Genocide
The Armenian Genocide (1915-23) was the deliberate and systematic destruction of the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire during and just after World War I. It was characterized by massacres, and deportations involving forced marches under conditions designed to lead to the death of the deportees, with the total number of deaths reaching 1.5 million.
The majority of Armenian Diaspora communities were formed by the Genocide survivors.
Present-day Turkey denies the fact of the Armenian Genocide, justifying the atrocities as “deportation to secure Armenians”. Only a few Turkish intellectuals, including Nobel Prize winner Orhan Pamuk and scholar Taner Akcam, speak openly about the necessity to recognize this crime against humanity.
The Armenian Genocide was recognized by Uruguay, Russia, France, Lithuania, the Italian Chamber of Deputies, majority of U.S. states, parliaments of Greece, Cyprus, Argentina, Belgium and Wales, National Council of Switzerland, Chamber of Commons of Canada, Polish Sejm, Vatican, European Parliament and the World Council of Churches.
Source: PanARMENIAN.Net
Swan killer in UK turns out to be of Turkish origin
The man pictured at the scene after zipping up the dead swan in his rucksack
The man who killed a swan in the English town of Hildenborough, Kent, on March 18 has been identified as Turkish-origin Hasan Fidan, the London Evening Standard reported on June 2.
The 46-year-old man was pictured at the scene after zipping up the dead swan in his rucksack. Police are believed to have found the swan, chopped into pieces and jammed into Fidan’s freezer, when they traced him to his house in Tonbridge.
Read the rest of this story in the London Evening Standard
Armenian genocide, new evidence in the UK (Book)
According to the Italian newspaper “La Stampa” a book recently published in Britain, “In the front line: a doctor between War and Peace” written as a private for his children by 
Dr Alec Glen memo provides novel evidence and testimony about the genocide of Armenians and other Christian minorities – especially Greek and Syriac – by the Turks in 1915.
According to the journalist Marco Tosatti Alec Glen was a doctor in the British Army, and in 1918 he walked in northern Iran to Baku, capital of Azerbaijan, where he witnessed the plight of Armenians who had attempted to escape deportation and massacres of 1915. Indo-British troops had joined Glen met thousands of Armenian refugees every day.
“It was a tragic and surprising vision … we passed a person who died on the way, or someone who is already dead and half eaten by dogs and jackals … we’ve collected some- one of the youngest, who was lucky to survive. We put on the backs of mules and we’d take in the closest “villages.
“Craig Salisbury (another doctor, author’s note UK) told me later that he had taken care of an old refugee on the road, and, before dying, gave a leather belt full of coins, asking him to spend it to help the refugees. “
Thursday, May 29, 2014,
Stéphane © armenews.com
Stéphane © armenews.com
Flush with coke: UK so high on cocaine that users have ‘contaminated tap water’
The Sunday Times reports
Experts from the drinking water inspectorate found that cocaine use in Britain is now so high it has contaminated the drinking water supply, even after it has gone through 
intensive purification treatments, UK media reports.
Scientists found supplies of drinking water contained traces of benzoylecgonine, the metabolized form of the drug after it has been processed by the human body. Benzoylecgonine is the same compound used for urine-based tests for cocaine, the Sunday Times reports.
The findings are an eye-opening indication of how widely the drug is used in Britain.
“We have near the highest level of cocaine use in western Europe. It has also been getting cheaper and cheaper at the same time as its use has been going up,” Steve Rolles, from the drug policy think-tank Transform, told the Sunday Times.
Nearly 700,000 people aged 16-59 are estimated to take cocaine every year in Britain, and there are around 180,000 addicted users of crack cocaine, according to the charity DrugScope.
Health officials stressed that the amounts found in drinking water were very low and unlikely to represent a danger to the public, however.
A recent report from Public Health England found that quantitiess of cocaine at 4 nanograms per liter, around one-quarter of what was found before the water was treated.
“Estimated exposures for most of the detected compounds are at least thousands of times below doses seen to produce adverse effects in animals and hundreds of thousands below human therapeutic doses,” the report states.
Although cocaine use in Britain is among the highest in Europe, its use has actually decreased since the 2008 financial crisis and has been steadily falling among 16-24 year olds, who no longer see it as glamorous – largely because its widespread availability has reduced its subversive appeal.
But among older generations, it still retains its whiff of subversive decadence and glamour.
“It’s ridiculous, I’ve been at parties when there have been more people in the bathroom than outside it, yet this strange etiquette is still upheld. I think it’s partly about exclusion and inclusion – who’s in, who’s out, who’s cool and who’s not. It’s remarkably childish, but if you’re a middle-aged professional who doesn’t get out much, then that bathroom can seem like the hottest ticket in town,” Matthew, a 49-year-old corporate lawyer, told The Guardian.
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