A pending agreement for Iran to graze sheep inside Armenia has sparked a furor among Armenian environmentalists and nationalists over whether or not the prospective deal poses a threat to the country’s national security.
Armenia may not have a sea, but the Yerevan city government was once proud to say that, like “many developed cities in the world,” it did have a dolphinarium. Not any more. To the cheers (and jeers) of environmentalists, the Ukrainian company that ran the controversial facility has decided to set sail for fresh waters.
The 900-visitor dolphinarium, one of three in the South Caucasus (Baku and Batumi also have dolphin tanks), was built in 2010 in a downtown Yerevan park at about the same speed with which it is now being dismantled. The facility’s senior management cite the end of their “period of operations” as the reason for the decision to pull out.
“The animals have been moved to Ukraine; the performances are over since the period of operation has expired,” Nemo Dolphinarium Director Lili Sahakian told EurasiaNet.org. “This is the only reason.”
But environmental activists claim the real reason is entirely different.
“How could the dolphins survive in Armenia, which has no sea? Could they bear the extremely chlorinated water of the pool, the endless performances, or the frozen fish they were fed?” asked Silva Adamian, chairperson of the Bird Lovers’ Center, a non-governmental organization which heads an alliance of 50 NGOs which opposed the dolphinarium’s opening.
“Back in 2010, we talked to international specialists and they said the animals won’t last even two years. So, we now have what we have.”
Are Armenia’s oligarchs using their financial and political power to block the world’s second-largest retail empire, the French-owned Carrefour Group, from entering the country’s largely monopolized foodstuffs sector? For Armenian consumers beset by high food prices and low incomes, the question has become a matter of principle.
Raffi Hovhannisian -- the California native who finished second to incumbent President Serzh Sargsyan in Armenia’s February 18 presidential election -- has promised to fight “a battle of love” to have the official voting results scrapped, and “the rule of the people” restored. But how many people, and for how long, are willing to support Hovhannisian’s post-election campaign remains unclear.
With the official outcome of Armenia’s February 18 vote widely seen as a given, attention within the country is instead focusing on the election process itself.
With less than ten days to go before Armenia's February 18 presidential vote, Armenians still do not know for sure when, exactly, the election will take place.
The reason is presidential candidate Paruyr Hayrikian, the victim of a January 31 shooting attack. By law, Hayrikian can ask the Constitutional Court to postpone the vote for two weeks to give him time to recover his health; a request he had previously indicated he would make.
But on Tuesday, he decided against such a move. Then, late on Thursday, he changed his mind again.
At last word, Hayrikian intended to file the request on February 8, but a spokesperson for the Constitutional Court told EurasiaNet.org late in the day that it still had not heard from him. The Court will remain open over the weekend in case Hayrikian stands by his latest decision and requests a delay in the elections.
Hayrikian's earlier surprise decision to not mind his damaged collarbone, but carry on with his campaign had sparked speculation that he had made a deal with the government, but the candidate angrily dismissed such claims.
More surprises, though, came today, when the National Security Service unexpectedly reported that it had arrested two 40-something suspects, Khachatur Pogosian and Samvel Arutiunian, in the shooting and that both had "confessed to the crime." The suspects are said to be “illegally residing in Armenia," and allegedly have a criminal record for drug dealing. Their supposed motivation for the attack has not been released.
In 1998, Armenian presidential candidate Paruyr Hayrikian ran for office with the slogan "Let’s not lose an historic moment." Fifteen years later, he has a similar one: "The historic moment has come." But many Armenian observers believe that, by not requesting an election delay after suffering from gunshot wounds, 63-year-old Hayrikian has lost his chance for "an historic moment."
"[N]o act of terrorism should hold the power of disrupting the natural flow of political realities,” he commented, in a surprise appearance at a February 5 press-conference in Yerevan. "I have come simply to show my presence," he said to explain his hospital exit.
The candidate's statement was echoed by Karo Yeghnukyan, a representative of his campaign team, who told reporters that if Hayrikian had “exercised his right,"it might mean that he was “taking advantage of the situation."
Now, some Armenians claim that it is the government itself which is doing that.
Incumbent President Serzh Sargsyan, Prime Minister Tigran Sarkisian and other high-profile officials visited Hayrikian in the hospital and condemned the assault, investigated as an assassination attempt, as intended to «disrupt the elections» and aimed against Armenia itself.
But the memory of Hayrikian's earlier comments lingers on.
Like anyone else, Armenian government officials like to look and feel their best. But how much should taxpayers spend to keep them in toothpaste, shampoo and toilet paper?
According to Ministry of Finance data cited on December 9 by online TV outlet CivilNet, state bodies spent nearly one-third of a million dollars ($325,775 or 132.3 million drams) on personal-hygiene and cleaning supplies over the past year, with toilet paper alone costing taxpayers roughly 7.8 million drams (about $19,165).
The Ministry of Justice’s Penitentiary Department, apparently quite desirous of a clean shave, spent a whopping $41,000, or over 16.6 million drams, to buy 175,000 razors – more than 36 times the size of Armenia’s 2011 prison population of 4,812 people.
But personal hygiene is not the only area in which the government seems eager to spend. The apparently house-proud National Security Service, the country’s intelligence agency, spent over 2 million drams, about $5,000, on supplies of scrubbing powder between September 2011 and August 2012, nearly $2,000 (750,000 drams) on kitchen cutting boards and a puzzling $850 (340,000 drams) on matches and gloves.
The presidential administration, which paid the dram-equivalent of roughly $1,700 for 800 rolls of $2-plus toilet paper -- about double the price of the most expensive retail variety -- declined to respond to a query from EurasiaNet.org about its purchases of shampoo, toothbrushes, toothpaste and other personal hygiene items.
The report also provided some telling consumer comparisons; while the National Security Service spent 150 drams (37 cents) per toothbrush, the presidential administration favored the 850-dram (about $2.09) variety.
