(Saturday, November 20)
“Hraparak” claims that Armenia’s leaders mostly maintain contacts with their counterparts in Russian and that “the world has been sort of left out of our sight.” “This would not be that dangerous if these contacts were sometimes counterbalanced by mutual visits with the West and dealings with Western capital and policy,” editorializes the paper. It says President Serzh Sarkisian “irreversibly breached that balance” with his decision to boycott the NATO summit in Lisbon. “Moreover, there is an impression that the decision was made two days ago in Moscow and that its authors are the Putin-Medvedev duo,” it says.
“Aravot” says that “sects” in Armenia can be not only religious but political ones. “Government officials in Armenia are members of a money sect,” the paper says in an editorial. “One gets the impression that they hanged pictures of the dollar on the walls in their homes and pray in front those pictures every day … As for the opposition circles, ever since the early 1990s they have had the habit of spending hours discussing who is the purest ideological fighter against the regime and who is the regime’s servant not espousing that sole right religion.”
According to “Zhamanak,” Diaspora Minister Hranush Hakobian has stated that her recent calls for Diaspora Armenians to serve in Armenia’s army were only a joke. “It was a mistake, a misunderstanding,” a spokesperson for Hakobian’s ministry is quoted as saying. The paper says the ministry has also issued a separate statement saying that Hakobian simply joked.
Interviewed by “Hayots Ashkhar,” pollster Gevorg Poghosian disputes Prime Minister Tigran Sarkisian’s claims that 75 percent of Armenians support the existence of foreign-language schools in Armenia. “We still don’t know which pollsters had assured the prime minister that 75 percent of our country’s population is in favor of foreign-language schools,” says Poghosian. “One should differentiate between PR and opinion polling. Both polling and psychology are used for PR, but the purpose of that is totally different. There are pollsters who promote a particular individual or a party but present what they are doing as scientific polling.”
(Aghasi Yenokian)
“Hraparak” claims that Armenia’s leaders mostly maintain contacts with their counterparts in Russian and that “the world has been sort of left out of our sight.” “This would not be that dangerous if these contacts were sometimes counterbalanced by mutual visits with the West and dealings with Western capital and policy,” editorializes the paper. It says President Serzh Sarkisian “irreversibly breached that balance” with his decision to boycott the NATO summit in Lisbon. “Moreover, there is an impression that the decision was made two days ago in Moscow and that its authors are the Putin-Medvedev duo,” it says.
“Aravot” says that “sects” in Armenia can be not only religious but political ones. “Government officials in Armenia are members of a money sect,” the paper says in an editorial. “One gets the impression that they hanged pictures of the dollar on the walls in their homes and pray in front those pictures every day … As for the opposition circles, ever since the early 1990s they have had the habit of spending hours discussing who is the purest ideological fighter against the regime and who is the regime’s servant not espousing that sole right religion.”
According to “Zhamanak,” Diaspora Minister Hranush Hakobian has stated that her recent calls for Diaspora Armenians to serve in Armenia’s army were only a joke. “It was a mistake, a misunderstanding,” a spokesperson for Hakobian’s ministry is quoted as saying. The paper says the ministry has also issued a separate statement saying that Hakobian simply joked.
Interviewed by “Hayots Ashkhar,” pollster Gevorg Poghosian disputes Prime Minister Tigran Sarkisian’s claims that 75 percent of Armenians support the existence of foreign-language schools in Armenia. “We still don’t know which pollsters had assured the prime minister that 75 percent of our country’s population is in favor of foreign-language schools,” says Poghosian. “One should differentiate between PR and opinion polling. Both polling and psychology are used for PR, but the purpose of that is totally different. There are pollsters who promote a particular individual or a party but present what they are doing as scientific polling.”
(Aghasi Yenokian)