Turkey province denies permit for conference on Armenian, Greek heritageOctober 5, 2019 - 10:45 AMT PanARMENIAN.Net - The Hrant Dink Foundation has decided to hold an international conference on the Greek and Armenian heritage of Turkey’s central province of Kayseri in Istanbul after the Kayseri governorate refused to issue the necessary permit, Ahval reports. The foundation, established in 2007 after the assassination of its namesake, the Armenian-Turkish journalist Hrant Dink, works to “encourage dialogue, peace and the culture of empathy,” and has held similar academic conferences in the 12 years since. “Unfortunately, the request to have a face to face visit to the governorship of Kayseri to inform about the conference remained unanswered for weeks, and then the governorship called to inform that holding the conference in Kayseri was not appropriate,” the foundation said in a statement. “Our demand for the justification afterwards and re-evaluation unfortunately remained unanswered as well,” it said. The conference on the history of Kayseri and the region will now be held in the Hrant Dink Foundation’s Anarad Hığutyun Building in Istanbul on Oct. 18-19. Hrant Dink was an outspoken figure on the issue of the 1915 Armenian genocide, which the Turkish state denies took place. He was prosecuted three times for insulting Turkishness, an offence according to Article 301 of the Turkish penal code. His assassination by a Turkish ultranationalist gunman in front of the Istanbul offices of bilingual Turkish-Armenian newspaper Agos on Jan. 19, 2007 sparked nationwide protests. Top stories The EU does not intend to conduct military exercises with Armenia, Lead Spokesperson for EU Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Peter Stano says. Hikmet Hajiyev has said that there is no place for USAID operation in Azerbaijan any longer. A telephone conversation between Putin and Pashinyan before the CSTO summit is not planned, Peskov says. London’s Armenian community has been left feeling “under attack” after the city’s Genocide monument was vandalised. Partner news | Armenia to participate in key EU meeting for the first time ever National Assembly speaker Alen Simonyan has said that Armenia will for the first time participate in the Conference. Russia clarifying reports on Baku’s alleged arms supply to Ukraine Russia says is carefully working to verify reports about alleged arms supplies from Azerbaijan to Ukraine CSTO: Armenia has not participated in secretariat’s work recently Recently Armenia has not participated in the work of the secretariat of the CSTO, Imangali Tasmagambetov said. Meeting with U.S., EU not against third parties, says Armenia The meeting scheduled for April 5 is dedicated to strengthening of the Armenia-EU-US cooperation, Yerevan added. |