{"id":8808,"date":"2017-11-01T12:02:34","date_gmt":"2017-11-01T12:02:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/media.am\/armenian-newspapers-the-day-after-1999-parliament-shooting\/"},"modified":"2017-11-01T12:02:34","modified_gmt":"2017-11-01T12:02:34","slug":"armenian-newspapers-the-day-after-1999-parliament-shooting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/newsroom\/2017\/11\/01\/8808\/","title":{"rendered":"Armenian Newspapers the Day After 1999 Parliament Shooting"},"content":{"rendered":"

In 1999, Armenia\u2019s newspapers were still influential. Reports on the days following the October 27, 1999 terrorist act conveyed the new reality on the morning of October 28.<\/p>\n

Hayastani Hanrapetutyun<\/em> (Republic of Armenia) described what happened as a \u201cbloody crime.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Haykakan Zhamanak<\/em> (Armenian Times) wrote that the Armenian prime minister and parliamentary speaker were killed and informed that \u201ca significant part of the government is held in captivity\u201d (the paper was sent to the printer at night, when the hostages weren\u2019t yet released).<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Yerkir <\/em>(Country) published a black rectangle on its first page instead of a photo.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Hayots Ashkharh<\/em> in its October 28 issue broke the news that the state and the nation were delivered a \u201ctragic, Turkic\u201d blow, while then president Robert Kocharian called for vigilance.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

In the same issue, Hayots Ashkharh<\/em> published a few anecdotes. One was about how a real mother-in-law should be and how King Salomon by commanding the child be cut in half was able to determine which of the two arguing women was his mother-in-law.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Along with an article titled \u201cThis isn\u2019t a portrayal of Armenians\u201d in the paper\u2019s October 29 issue, where citizens of different occupations provided an assessment of what happened, published was a quite remarkable photo that hasn\u2019t lost its relevance to date. A soldier tries to obstruct a camera operator\u2019s work.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

In Iravunq<\/em>\u2019s October 26 issue, one day before the tragedy, published on the first page was a cartoon, where Vazgen Sargsyan and Robert Kocharian are fighting for the position, that is, the power to distribute positions, and they\u2019re distributing secular and spiritual positions.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

In the October 29 issue, two days after the shooting, Iravunq<\/em> tried to analyze whether the incident was favorable for external or internal forces. \u201cSince there was a strong pro-Russian wing in government in Armenia in the face of Sargsyan and Demirchyan, \u2026 it can be assumed that the National Assembly bloody events were encouraged and planned by special Western services,\u201d according to one of the theories.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Not even the weekly sports paper Futbol+<\/em> (Football+) bypassed the bloody parliament events. \u201cThe people are shocked; the world, surprised,\u201d wrote the paper, offering its condolences to the victims\u2019 families.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Haykakan Zhamanak<\/em> in its October 28 issue tried to understand: how did 5\u20136 armed men manage to enter the National Assembly hall? While in a piece called \u201cBlack Wednesday,\u201d the paper claimed the choice of day wasn\u2019t accidental: US Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott was in Armenia, and law enforcement officials\u2019 attention was going to be mainly on that visit. Catholicos elections were taking place at Etchmiadzin, and the tense pre-election atmosphere was going to focus greater attention toward Etchmiadzin. Nevertheless, according to the paper, what happened was against Vazgen Sargsyan.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Haykakan Zhamanak<\/em> journalist Zhanna Aleksanyan, currently a human rights defender, in the article \u201cThe terrorists already have defenders\u201d writes, \u201cNo matter how strange it is, attorneys from Armenia\u2019s  lawyers\u2019 union have assumed their [terrorists\u2019] defense; that is, their defense is carried out by the state.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Hayastani Hanrapetutyun<\/em> talked with citizens, asking them to assess what happened. Sixth-grade student Arman says, \u201cIt was like a real thriller [like in the movies]. If I had a gun, I would kill them too; it would be an Armenian thriller.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Aravot<\/em> daily\u2019s main headline in its October 28 issue was \u201cThe ideological murderer.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

In the issues following the October 27 incident, driven by the stunning speed of the development of events, the press was rich with theories. Maybe it\u2019s unusual, but those days the special criticism of the print media wasn\u2019t yet sharp. That apparently was also conditioned by the complicated situation that was created.<\/p>\n

Gagik Aghbalyan
\nPhoto credit on Yerkir<\/em>\u2019s front page: Taguhi Melkonyan<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In 1999, Armenia\u2019s newspapers were still influential. Reports on the days following the October 27, 1999 terrorist act conveyed the new reality on the morning of October 28. Hayastani Hanrapetutyun (Republic of Armenia) described what happened as a \u201cbloody crime.\u201d Haykakan Zhamanak (Armenian Times) wrote that the Armenian prime minister and parliamentary speaker were killed Read the full article…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":8790,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8808","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-newsroom","author_posts-gagik-aghbalyan"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8808","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8808"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8808\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8790"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8808"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8808"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8808"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}