Italian based low cost air carrier “wind jet” has stated it will begin regular flights to Yerevan from the regional Italian airport of Forli as of April this year.

Yerevan is currently listed on their website as a destination, but no information on price is available yet. It does seem, however, to be a true low cost carrier with flights around Europe offered as little as 16 Euro One Way.

I am wondering why WindJet has decided to enter the Armenian market, especially since Italy is not noted for a large Armenian community, however, this “Forli” airport could well become a hub for Europeans wanting a low cost option for travelling to Armenia. I wait for the day when I can get from London to Armenia for as little as a flight to Turkey costs

Every year I have presented my thoughts on Armenia’s Eurovision song contest chances. This song contest whilst a joke in the UK is taken seriously elsewhere and if ( !) Armenia wins would mean the chance to host the event in Yerevan. We have a national final this year, the singer is Sirusho, an excellent vocalist and with four excellent songs.

Here are the songs, download and tell me what you think!.
Qele Qele
Strong
I Still Breathe
I Can’t Control It

I know which one I prefer, but I’m not going to say. The national final is tonight at 18.30 GMT on the Armenian Public TV Channel. All I am saying is I think we have a potential Eurovision winner on our hands!

You may or may not be aware that I have not posted here in a while. I just thought I’d pass some reflection on what has happened in Armenia over the past few days. Forgive me for the emotive nature of this post, but I’d appreciate anyone elses thoughts. I realise the elections were not perfect, but if this has shown anything, it has shown that stability is indeed what we need for Armenia at this time.

I arrived home from work at a bar at about 3am UK time, BBC News 24 was on the TV, I cast my eyes over to see a burning car, gunshots and/or petrol bombs. I had to shake some sense into myself as I couldnt believe that the caption underneath read “State of Emergency Declared in Armenia”. What an incredible sinking feeling, I don’t think I will forget that.

OK, so we see this all the time. We see it in Paris, we see it in Palestine, we see it in Iraq, Georgia, and (often with a quiet shake of the head) we see it in Turkey. Usually, the inbuilt Armenian arrogance kicks in and I shake my head and say to myself ‘whatever Armenia is, this wouldn’t happen there ‘… Now I guess I don’t have that safety net. It does happen there, and it makes me feel utterly sick.

Perhaps it’s because I have held Armenia, and Armenians up on a pedestal for far too long. We are just like anyone else, we do eat , and go to the toilet like any other race. We have criminals, and we have riots, we have drug addicts, and we have alchoholics.

What I can’t accept is the thought of Armenians fighting each other. It just doesn’t work for me. It hurts, it’s like watching two members of your family hitting each other. It just shouldn’t happen, it makes you want to look away.

It hurts to see soldiers who have worked to protect what we value and boast about so greatly, just attacked by drunks or brainwashed civilians lulled into a false sense of “revolution”.

It hurts to see the city which we have watched grow and develop into a pleasant, safe environment to be left so bruised and tattered.

To the average European watching the news, we are just another backward, ‘revolution’ driven former Soviet republic, that still cannot understand the concept of an election.

It hurts because we always managed to stay away from this, and it hurts even more that I , and many other Armenians around the world, feel helpless to stop it.

AP: A senior U.S. State Department official is on his way to Armenia to encourage talks between the government and opposition protesters. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Matthew Bryza’s trip comes after Armenian President Robert Kocharian declared the 20-day state of emergency Saturday.

A U.S. State Department spokesman, Tom Casey, says that the United States does not want to signal that it supports a crackdown, but also does not want «people to move from peaceful expressions of political opinions and engage in violence.»

Armenia’s main opposition group and the government are unlikely to start negotiations soon to end a standoff which triggered rioting that killed eight people,a European envoy said on Monday after he met both parties.
“In all likeliness this kind of dialogue between Ter-Petrosyan and the government at the moment is not possible,” Heikki Talvitie, a special envoy for the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), told reporters after being asked if the two sides would start negotiations. “But let’s not exclude it from the future,” he added.

AFP: France called today, Monday, for the “rapid lifting” of the state of emergency in Armenia, the “release of people who have been arrested” and the launch of political dialogue to end the violence that left eight people dead in Yerevan at the weekend.
“We ask for a rapid lifting of the state of emergency and the release of the people who have been arrested,” said Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Pascale Andreani.

“The violence and attacks on individual freedoms must stop,” she stressed, asking “the authorities and all Armenia’s political forces to launch a political dialogue to promote a democratic process that will enable a lasting return to stability in the country”.

Itar-Tass: Moscow has met with regret the reports about the recent developments in the capital of the friendly Republic of Armenia, which led to the loss of life, a representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry said on Monday.
“We express heartfelt condolences to all those who lost their relatives,” he added. “We hope that the measures, taken by the Armenian leaders, will bring about the settlement of the domestic political situation through a peaceful dialogue of the authorities with all the public forces in the interests of ensuring the security of the Armenian people and the stable development of the country,” the Russian diplomat stressed.

Vakit calls on the Government, NGOs, and the Turkish public in general not to remain uninterested in the ongoing internal
conflict in Armenia and urges the Parliamentary Human Rights Commission to send observers to Yerivan to help find a
peaceful solution to the unrest in Armenia.

Turan: The extremely tense situation in Armenia is a result of an ill-conceived policy of this country’s government,” Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev has said, addressing residents of the city of Naftalan in western Azerbaijan.
He believes that the current situation is a logical result of wrong and aggressive policy of Armenia, which has isolated itself from the rest of the region and lacks normal development. The stability is connected with the development and vice versa, Aliyev said.

Two pro-opposition Armenian lawmakers have been arrested for allegedly attempting a coup d’etat following violent clashes in the ex-Soviet country that left eight dead, police said Monday. Deputy Miasnik Malkhasian was arrested for “attempting to seize
power,” the press service of the Armenian police told AFP. A source in the security services said that deputy Hakob Hokopian was arrested on the same charge. The two were arrested overnight Sunday, police said.
The opposition immediately denounced the arrests. “This is a new step in the violence the authorities are using against the opposition to deprive it of its leadership,” said Arman Musinian, a spokesman for opposition leader Levon Ter-Petrosian.

Georgian (opposition) Republican Party has disseminated a statement regarding the current events in Armenia. The party has called on the Armenian government to immediately cease violence against its own people.

Mediamax: The Armenian prime minister and president-elect, Serzh Sargsyan, has addressed the nation, saying that organizers of the disturbances in Yerevan “will answer before laws, history and generations”. “As a result of the latest events, our nation have suffered heavy and irreplaceable losses - there are victims from both the police, who were performing their service duty, and among protesters, who fell under influence of a group of people. Hundreds of people suffered following illegal actions of the radical opposition,” Serzh Sargsyan said.”Today, I share grief of all you,” the president-elect said in his address.

(Itar-Tass) - The authorities have fully resumed control over the situation in Armenian capital Yerevan after mass riots triggered by the radical opposition on Saturday and overnight to Sunday, the press service of the city police told Tass on Monday. A state of emergency is in place in the capital.
( The Tone of news is very interesting)

Earlier Today I posted about Human rights watch statement on the recent incidents in Armenia,here is the full statement.

The United Nations human rights chief today voiced deep concern at reports that at least eight people have been killed and many others injured during demonstrations in Yerevan, the capital of Armenia, where the results of recent presidential elections have been disputed.

Louise Arbour, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, issued a statement in which she said she was particularly concerned that force was used against peaceful demonstrators yesterday and that opposition protesters have been detained.

Levon Ter-Petrosian said on Sunday the opposition may now seek to organise protests outside the capital, where emergency rule is not in effect. “We might organise demonstrations in other cities not far away from Yerevan, it would be legal,” he told reporters in his home.
Ter-Petrosian blamed authorities for provoking the unrest and criticised foreign observers for backing the elections. “Until the attack in front of the opera everything was peaceful … But if you had been hit on the head there, at the next demonstration you would grab a rod to defend yourself. “I hope the international community understands that the regime in Armenia does not have the support of the people. This conflict will now last five years, with full-time violence.”

AFP: Army chief of staff Seiran Oganian warned in televised comments that fresh protests would be met with “a severe response.”

meanwhile The city was relatively calm on Sunday and shops and cafes around Yerevan were open as residents examined the damage. Dozens of burnt-out cars, stones and metal poles from the night of violence were cleared from the streets.

AFP: The head of the Council of Europe on Sunday called on Armenia’s government to justify its state of emergency declaration amid violent protests that have left eight dead.
The secretary general of the democracy and rights watchdog, Terry Davis, said the government was required under the European Convention on Human Rights to “inform me of the measures it has taken and the reasons” for it.
“I expect that they will do so without any delay,” Davis said in a statement issued by the institution, which has 47 member countries including Armenia since 2001.
He also said the government should “review the justification for the restrictions imposed especially on media, political parties and non-governmental organisations.”

BBC Monitoring: Representatives of the Armenian community of Georgia and the Georgian nongovernmental sector have
condemned the violent dispersal of peaceful protests in Yerevan. They held a protest rally today outside the Armenian embassy in Tbilisi, where they signed a joint statement which they later gave to the staff of the embassy. The statement urges the EU and OSCE to pay more attention to the situation in Armenia.

Nino Tsikhistavi, head of the Women’s Network of the Caucasus said:” We, representatives of nongovernmental organizations and representatives of the Armenian diaspora, have gathered here in order to firmly express our solidarity with the Armenian public and the Armenian people. We understand very well what kind of unrest has broken out there. We believe the measures used by the Armenian authorities are absolutely unacceptable.

Arminfo: Armenian President Robert Kocharyan today had a telephone conversation with Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili. The president’s press secretary, Viktor Sogomonyan, has told that the Georgian president asked for information
about the situation in Armenia following yesterday’s riots by opposition supporters. “The Georgian president expressed his support for the people and authorities of Armenia,” Viktor Sogomonyan said.