16 replies to this topic

[EZ]

Would anyone care to shine a light on this subject?

I'm rather ignorant in this kind of stuff, but reading the article about corruption in Armenia made me wonder... Turkey is insisting on becoming a full EU member soon, but I don't think they will be able to meet the EU's criteria any time soon; corruption and human rights issues will take a very long time to be set straight since it requires a certain way of thinking that can't be created overnight and faking it won't work I'm afraid or rather: "i hope"... I just don't think that Turkey can do it. In this context, after reading the article that Azat posted on corruption in Armenia I started thinking: "I wonder if Armenia wants to enter the EU. That would be a different matter. Whatever corruption is going on there, I believe they would be able to fix those problems, because, well, ..." (just sharing some simple thoughts that occurred to me while I was making dinner for my family)...like also: "but Turkey would get really pissed off if Armenia would enter" and "...and "the USA is trying to help Turkey get in", "Turkey seems to be very important strategically... "

Well, however it's a different issue, it's clear that I'm very worried that 'certain' pressures will help Turkey get into the EU, before it's their time, IF ever.

But Armenia is in trouble economically. So, what about the EU? Is it a possibility?

By the way, hello, I'm Elly and I am back.

[ December 02, 2002, 04:14 PM: Message edited by: EZ ]

[Azat]

Hi Elly, it is great to have you back.

I think MJ or Alpha would be your best bets to answer your question so I hope one of them will.

[Accelerated]

I think Armenia is a long way from entering the EU (ie. meeting EU membership criteria)

[EZ]

Thank you for your short but clear answer!

[EZ]

Thank you Azat.

Ok. MJ, Alpha, Gamavor... anyone else, the subject is Armenia and the EU.

[MJ]

I am humbled by the honor offered to me…

I don’t think Armenia would become a EU member, especially if Turkey is not admitted into EU. I am not even sure that Armenia’s membership in EU is expedient for Armenia. Armenia belongs to the Caucasian-Middle Eastern domain both economically and politically. Culturally, Armenia doesn’t belong to any of these domains or belongs to all.

I think it is better for Armenia to be some kind of free economic zone facilitating inter-structural cooperation throughout the continent and the region – some special economic status.

[EZ]

Well, naturally my best man on this forum has the honor.

BUT...

"free economic zone facilitating inter-structural cooperation"

Pfffffffff, I'm only me MJ, you know that. Can you step down to my kitchen for a minute?

How can I interprete that... Armenia as a sort of Andorra?

So Armenia belongs to the EU culturally but not economically. OK.

I can see what you mean by Turkey having to enter the EU first. I think we'd better hurry up with that AG recognition thing then.

So my conclusion should be that Armenia and the EU just isn't a subject?

[MJ]

Pfffffffff, I'm only me MJ, you know that. Can you step down to my kitchen for a minute?

Good timing! I am hungry...

How can I interpret that... Armenia as a sort of Andorra?

Sort of...

So Armenia belongs to the EU culturally but not economically. OK.

Not really. Armenia is a cultural chaos... It belongs neither to Europe nor to Asia. It is just something mixed and has been so for centuries - filter between Europe and Asia. However, in the last 50 years or so, Turkey has captured some of that function.

Greetings to L. from the City Hall!

[ December 04, 2002, 04:25 PM: Message edited by: MJ ]

[EZ]

Maybe Armenia should go into the money order business Oh, why didn't we think of that sooner! All problems solved!

Greetings to the scary one.

Kgrum em.

(hope that was spelled right)

[Sip]

"Check cashing" also seems to be big in the US now. With the concept being: "You give me a check, I'll cash it in two weeks from now ... with a "slight" interest and a minor fee of course"

So what would the advantage of belonging to the EU be? Could it maybe create a more secure environment for investors to bring more money into? I am trying to see the pure economic advantages ... but "culturaly", I see MJ's point.

[Accelerated]

Well, culturally I would say Greece (current member of EU) has more in common with Armenia than say Norway or Sweden. And sooner or later the EU will move into the Balkans proper (allready in Slovenia), and I would say that we have more in common with countries like Bulgaria, Macedonia, Albania etc. than they do with Northern European countries.

[mikebond]

I live in Italy and in the EU and I'm well informed on EU subjects.
My hope is that Europe will be united in 20-30 years: I'd like all European states to join it, included Turkey and the Caucasian countries. I think that Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan will be allowed to join the European Union one day, if they make efforts to improve their internal situation. The Treaty of the European Communities say that EVERY European country matching the conditions of being a democracy, having a market economy and others can apply to join the EU. Unfortunately the region of Caucasus has been ignored so far when dealing with EU enlargement.
However, when Turkey becomes a member of the EU, the issue of Caucasus in the EU will raise, because Georgia and Armenia have deep historical, cultural and religious ties with the rest of Europe; Azerbaijan is more an Asian country but it couldn't be left out because lots of Armenians live there.
Therefore I'm quite optimistic on the future of these three states at the borders between Europe and Asia. I think you could join the EU around 2020. Of course, there's still a lot of work to do, but you'll eventually succeed in this goal.

[gamavor]

http://armenians.com...?showtopic=6907

[Armat]

Azerbaijan is more an Asian country but it couldn't be left out because lots of Armenians live there.

Mike,
Please read some current data on Armenians living in Azerbaijan. After the Sumgait pogroms and the war between Azerbaijan and “Karabagh” Artsagh the Armenian were totally emptied out of Azerbaijan.
The 1988 events in Sumgait and Nagorno Karabagh, an Armenian region of Azerbaijan, were a part of a long series of efforts by the Azeris to grab Armenian lands and drive out Armenians to live in their own shrunken republic. Previously Armenians had been forced out of Nakhichevan as well as other regions they traditionally held. As well, Armenians suffered pogroms before in Baku in 1918 and Shusha in 1920.
At rallies and on television, leaders of the Communist Party of Azerbaijan and various Azeri and Muslim groups exhorted mobs into a frenzy for slaughter. Many well educated and well respected Azeri leaders infuriated their followers with ludicrous stories of Armenians butchering Azeris in Nagorno Karabagh. These assertions were completely unfounded.
From that point on thousands joined mobs to hunt for Armenians at their homes. The fact that the Azeris were supplied with the addresses of so many Armenians and the fact that, on a local level, nothing was done to discourage or halt the pogrom attests to the Azeri government's complicity. As well, trucks delivered ample supplies of vodka, drugs, and weapons to the crowds.
In Sumgait gangs roamed from building to building forcing their way into Armenian homes. Houseware, pianos and personal belongings, etc, were stolen or destroyed. Armenian men were pounded with hammers, young girls were carved up in front of their parents then thrown off balconies. Axes, knives, and crowbars were commonly used. Then the gangs would often return to Armenian homes see if they missed anything and would just wreck more havoc.
Systematically groups of men as well as teenagers checked cars and buses. Demanding identification they would pull suspected Armenians out onto the street, club them senseless with machine armature shafts or stone them to death.
Armenians had no time to flee or to organize self-defense. Yet families armed and protected themselves as best they could, often converting household materials into improvised weapons.
In one case a father and son combined electrical wiring, a metal bed frame with metal parts of their apartment's doorway to create an electrified barrier. When, from inside, they heard a gang try to batter down their door the Armenians poured water onto the bed frame. The result would have made Thomas Edison proud!
The evidence in the Sumgait Tragedy shows that many Azeris protected their Armenian neighbors. While there were always those who would finger the apartments owned by Armenians many hid or physically defended women and children. Soviet soldiers who did bravely protect the Armenians were often stoned severely by hysterical crowds.
In the hospitals, literally adding insult to injury, Armenians who had been severely beaten or raped often faced hateful Azeri doctors and nurses. When anesthetics were available they were often denied Armenians on the operating table. Others died needlessly after prolonged delays in medical care. But again, there were also those medical personnel who were sympathetic and looked out for their Armenian charges.
Were the pogroms against the Armenians in Azerbaijan just the result of old ethnic rivalries or a civil war? That was the view of Gorbachev, the US press, and many in the Armenian community here at the time. Not true! Numerous Azeri intellectuals, the Armenian witnesses in our book, as well as some Western journalists who dug a little deeper come together on one point that this situation was at least partly created as a way to divert attention from economic mismanagement.
Gorbachev's response was that there was no genocide; that shameless drunken youth were responsible for 'a few dozen deaths of people from different nationalities..' Did Gorbachev also collude in this massacre? According to the Armenians interviewed, the Soviets had full knowledge that something would occur in Baku and Sumgait. A major Soviet garrison stationed a mere 10 miles from Sumgait; yet, they were never fully deployed to protect Armenians.
There is much more but the above is enough...

[Nikephoros_Phokas]

EU integration would be worse thing possible for Armenia. Integrating with the EU economic community will make goods too expensive for the average Armenian too afford, in Greece this is what EU integretation has done: raise the price of goods. But the economy in Armenia is much worse so the situation will be much worse.

And to the person who said maybe Armenia will get in if Turkey does? Do you hate Europeans? We do not need millions more of Turkish fascists running around in Europe. Turkey will be no good for EU. Maybe there will be a hope if Russia gets into the EU, because while Russia also has huge problems it has huge potential, but Turkey has huge problems and no huge potential.

[gamavor]

Nick, I perfectly understand what you are saying. These are the sentiments of many Greeks and also many "new" Europeans. Poles, Hungarians, Checzhs and many others are not happy either, at least not all of them. Life is difficult everywhere but eventually it would get better. Many people in and outside of Armenia have the same fears, and want to keep the Republic as kind of historic preserve, forgetting that it is a real country with real problems and real aspirations. For many Diasporians having our cute little Armenia somewhere in the corner where you can have everything for less is much desirable, same is true for the political elite in Yerevan. Why bother with some hard to understand, and even harder to implement programs when life is beautiful as it is. All of the above is good, but it wont last for very long.

As to Turkey accession, I don't think Armenia's advancement to Europe is in any way linked to Turkish or Russian European accession. To me more interesting are Moldova, Ukraine, Balkans, Cyprus and Baltic states, and of course Georgia.

Edited by gamavor, 13 October 2003 - 11:04 PM.

[krikorantranik]

You are right Gamvor. i think that the future of every European nation is sooner or latter, integration. If Armenia does not integrate, in 100 years there will be no Armenia. About the problems mentioned above, other countries like spain or italy also had them, and they suffered the same when they came into the EU, but finnaly they got out, and their economy is today stronger than ever.