ArmenPress
Sept 24 2004
PRESIDENT KOCHARIAN TO VISIT CHINA ON STATE VISIT
YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 24, ARMENPRESS: Armenian president Robert
Kocharian will pay a state visit to China from September 26 to
September 30 at the invitation of the Chinese president Hu Xintau.
According to Kocharian’s press office, the Armenian delegation will
include territorial minister Hovik Abrahamian, agriculture minister
David Lokian, culture minister Hovik Areyan, other government
officials, businessmen, scientists and journalists.
President Kocharian will meet with president Hu Xintau, prime
minister Vin Diabao, parliament chairman U Bango. Based on the
visit’s results, both sides will sign a declaration and also
inter-govenrment agreements on economic and seismological cooperation
and a plan of cultural cooperation for 2005.
President Kocharian will also visit a range of historical sites of
Beijing. On September 29 the Armenian delegation will leave for
Shanghai, where Kocharian will meet with the city leadership and will
also visit a local town-building development exhibition and a tourism
center.

ArmenPress
Sept 24 2004
ARMENIA, GREAT BRITAIN SIGN MEMORANDUM OF UNDERSTANDING ON DEFENSE
CONTACTS AND COOPERATION
YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 24, ARMENPRESS: The Ministry of Defense of the
United Kingdom and the Ministry of Defense of the Republic of Armenia
have agreed a Memorandum of Understanding on Defense Contacts and
Co-operation. The aim of the Memorandum is to further strengthen the
good relations which already exist between the two Ministries, and to
serve as a basis for increased co-operation between them in the field
of defense.
Serge Sarkisian, the Armenian Minister of Defense, and the British
Ambassador to Armenia, Miss Thorda Abbott-Watt, signed the Memorandum
in a short ceremony at the Armenian Ministry of Defense in Yerevan on
Friday, 24 September 2004.
Over the last year the United Kingdom has sponsored places for 16
members of the Armenian Armed Forces to conduct a variety of training
courses outside Armenia, including the first Armenian cadet ever to
attend the Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst. The British Ministry
of Defense also funds English language training through the
Peacekeeping English Program run by the British Council Armenia in
the Armenian Ministry of Defense.
The Memorandum of Understanding reflects a common recognition
that stable and democratic sovereign states contribute to confidence,
stability and security in Europe as a whole. It will put the existing
co-operation program on a formal footing, and enable Britain and
Armenia to develop further contacts in areas such as the management
of defense in democratic societies, language training, peace support
in humanitarian operations and arms control.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

ArmenPress
Sept 24 2004
US AMBASSADOR MEETS WITH MEMBERS OF US COMMERCE CHAMBER AND AMERICAN
BUSINESS COMMUNITY IN ARMENIA
YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 24, ARMENPRESS: Newly appointed US ambassador
in Armenia John Evans met with members of US Commerce Chamber and
American business community in Armenia in Armenia Marriott Hotel. The
meeting passed in the presence of 45 members of US Commerce Chamber
and economy and trade department representatives of US Embassy.
According to US Commerce Chamber sources, the aim of the meeting
was to introduce the ambassador to American business community in
Armenia. According to US Commerce Chamber charter, the ambassador is
a member of Chamber Board of Directors. After being introduced to US
Chamber of Commerce members, the ambassador briefed on his activities
during the first one month.
” Close links between the embassy and the Commerce Chamber is a
priority in our strategy to increase investment in Armenia,” the
ambassador said.
During the meeting, the chamber members spoke about business
opportunities in Armenia and difficulties. The chairman of Commerce
Chamber Edith Khachatrian mentioned in his speech that US Chamber of
Commerce is an organization which opens up opportunities for
cooperation with Armenian business community and the participation of
ambassador Evans will be very decisive in their aim to create a
favorable business environment.

ArmenPress
Sept 23 2004
ARMENIAN WEIGHT-LIFTER WINS GOLD AT EUROPE YOUTH CHAMPIONSHIP
BURGAS, SEPTEMBER 23, ARMENPRESS: Tigran Martirosian from
Armenia’s second largest town of Gyumri has snatched the golden medal
at Europe’s youth weight-lifting championship in Bulgarian Burgas.
Martirosian competed in the weight category of 62 kg.

The Daily Star, Lebanon
Sept 25 2004
Late 20th century life gets a twist of ‘Vodka Lemon’
Iraqi Kurd’s tragicomic film about post-communist Armenia is a
highlight of the Cinema Days festival
By Jim Quilty
Daily Star staff
BEIRUT: Hinner Salim’s “Vodka Lemon” opens with an old man in bed. A
car is dragging him, bed and all, along a snow-covered road. He
arrives at his destination, the graveyard, solemnly removes both
racks of false teeth and begins to play the doudouk – the beautifully
mournful pipe that is probably Armenia’s best-known export, aside
from the Armenians themselves. The old fellow is one of a band of
musicians summoned to perform for somebody else’s funeral.
It is one of those moments that audiences have learned to expect of
films emerging from the once-communist world. Gypsy brass bands run
behind speeding cars while they play (alternatively having money
thrown and bullets fired at them), a la Emir Kusturica’s
“Underground.” Cows inexplicably fall from the sky to kill
bridegrooms, as in Bakhtyar Khudojnazarov’s “Luna Papa.” These
bizarre, funny, poetic conjurings serve as brilliant metaphors for
the tragicomic dislocations of the late 20th century.
There are a number of such moments in “Vodka Lemon,” one of the
non-Arab “guest films” at the Ayam Beirut Cinemaiyya (Cinema Days)
film festival which ends Sunday. Salim’s skill in using them renders
his story – which is pretty damn depressing in itself – all the more
entertaining and artful.
Set in a bleak, snowbound Armenian village, the story revolves around
Hamo (Romik Avinian) and Nina (Lala Sarkissian) and the snowbound
graveyard they visit every day. Hamo’s wife died some years earlier,
leaving him a trio of grown sons. The oldest, Dilovan (Ivan Franek),
lives poorly in the same village as Hamo, another works in Russia,
the youngest, Robert, has emigrated to the good life in Paris.
The arrival of the youngest son’s letters sends Hamo to Yerevan
periodically, in hopes the boy is sending money. Salim wrings some
great comedy out of Hamo’s plight. Upon his first return from
Yerevan, his son, then the other men of the village materialize on
his doorstep looking for handouts. None of them believe that there
was no money enclosed, so he has to show them the letter and the
photo of his son happily hugging his French girlfriend.
Money, or the lack of it, nudges the plot forward. The village is
becalmed, stuck in the doldrums of economic transition. The communist
economy has evaporated, and with it the provision of basic
essentials. Consumer capitalism – or rather the jobs that make
consumer capitalism “work” – has yet to arrive. With no visible means
of income aside from sheep-rearing and sales of the local tipple (the
ubiquitous, almond-flavoured “Vodka Lemon”), the locals have been
forced to start selling their meager possessions. The images of
people staggering along desolate roadways lugging pieces of furniture
on their backs would be utterly depressing were they not so absurdly
funny.
Nina is also next to penniless. Her husband, a fighter of some
description, has been dead for a decade, leaving her with a pair of
daughters. One of them has made it safely outside the village. Nina
explains to Hamo that the other daughter, a musician, plays piano in
a hotel but that her only source of income are “tips” from her
“admirers.” As we later see, in post-communist Armenia personal
possessions aren’t the only things people are forced to put a price
on.

When Hamo’s granddaughter becomes pregnant by one of the local men
who’s made good in capitalist Russia, Hamo, his son and the young
man’s father negotiate a marriage. Hamo’s son remarks that his
daughter is no whore, yet we later learn that the fee for the
“marriage contract” – the price of his daughter’s virginity – is
$2,000 and a job for him in Russia. When his son-in-law can’t furnish
the fee, the father-in-law shoots him.
Though he carries a gun and, like so many of the men in the film,
looks a bit of a thug, Hamo’s son isn’t particularly villainous. He’s
just desperate for want of money. The film lingers over the
implication that in circumstances where everything has a price –
which, with greater or lesser degrees of overt violence, are the
circumstances everywhere – human dignity goes out the window. Many a
devastatingly bleak film has worked with this very theme, in fact.
Salim, however, resists the temptation.
This may have something to do with the fact that – if the press is to
be believed – Hinner Salim is relatively new to film. Like Iranian
director Abbas Kiarostami, this native of Iraqi Kurdistan is known as
a poet and painter. It is tempting to compare Salim’s pacing, and his
remarkable use of landscape, with that of Kiarostami, but the
comparison wouldn’t do justice to the subtle emotion and wry humour
that are central to “Vodka Lemon.”
Hamo and Nina strike up a friendship while visiting their respective
graves. When she’s not on the bus one day – she can’t pay the $5 in
accumulated fares she owes the bus driver – Hamo pays her bill,
though he’s been selling his possessions at the open market. Nina
later loses her job at the Vodka Lemon kiosk – the owner complains
that the location’s not making him any money – at the same time that
her daughter loses her meal ticket. Destitute, she calls upon Hamo to
give her a hand, moving her only valued possession – an out-of-tune
piano that her daughter uses to practice.
They move it to the roadside, but Salim lets the couple find another
use for the instrument, one that – if fantastical, in the tradition
of magic realism – reaffirms and reinforces the dignity of his
characters rather than utterly extinguishing it. Though set in
Armenia, Hinner Salim’s film takes his audience on a stroll through a
compact metaphor for the human condition at the beginning of the 21st
century. Remarkably enough, he leaves us smiling.
Hinner Salim’s “Vodka Lemon,” the closing film of Ayam Beirut
Cinemaiyya Film Festival, will screen at Beirut’s Cinema Sofil on
Sunday, 26 September, at 8.30pm

United Press International
September 24, 2004 Friday 12:58 PM Eastern Time
Analysis: Russo-Chechnya war escalates
By RICHARD SALE
The massacre at the Beslan school that killed hundreds, including
more than 170 children, was a locally directed operation and not an
al-Qaida terrorist plot, U.S. intelligence officials said.
For 52 hours, 33 attackers held hostage 1,100 teachers and children.
The massacre began when a terrorist explosive went off, apparently by
accident, and Russian Alpha Special Forces rushed the school as
terrorists began shooting hostages and detonating explosives,
according to several newspaper accounts.
According to U.S. government sources, the operation was set up by
Shamil Basayev, who was trained in an al-Qaida terror camp and who at
one time had a close relationship with terrorist mastermind Osama bin
Laden, an account confirmed by bin Laden expert, Rohan Gunaratna.
Gunaratna, in his book, “Inside al-Qaida,” noted that shortly before
the Soviet Union collapsed al-Qaida set up an office in Baku and
supported the Azeri mujahidin in their war against Christian Armenia
for control of the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh enclave from 1988 to
1994.
When war broke out between Russia and Chechnya in 1994, Basayev
emerged as the most capable military commander, U.S. government
officials said.
Several U.S. intelligence sources have said that al-Qaida’s major
involvement in Russia began in December 1994, when a former Soviet
Air Force general, Jokar Dudayev, began a movement for an independent
Chechnya.
Gunaratna confirmed this, adding that a series of terror bombings in
Russia began not long after.
But in spite of the al-Qaida connections, this latest school massacre
was not authorized or supervised by bin Laden or elements of
al-Qaida, in spite of statements to the contrary by Russian
officials, U.S. officials said.
“It was not an al-Qaida operation, nor is Chechnya a major theater
for al-Qaida,” according to Stephen Blank, an Army War College
terrorism expert.
But U.S. intelligence officials told United Press International that
the targeting of non-Muslim children, along with the recent blowing
up only a week earlier of two Russian airliners “represents a
definite escalation,” in the Russian-Chechnya war.
Blank agreed: “The targeting of non-Muslim children is a very
sinister development.”
North Ossetia where the school is located, is predominantly Christian
and usually allied to Moscow, he said.
Since Aug. 24, Russia has been hit by four terrorist strikes,
resulting in the deaths of about 450 innocent civilians, according to
B. Raman, former senior official of India’s intelligence service.
The children were being used as hostages to wrest certain concessions
from the Russian government, U.S. government officials said.
There were 90 deaths from the two Russian aircraft blown up on Aug.
24 by “black widows,” or Chechen women, who stood in the rear part of
the aircraft or were in the bathroom, when they detonated their
explosives, Blank said.
Ten persons were killed when another Chechen woman blew herself up
outside the entrance to a Metro station.
“All of this implies a high level of planning and coordinated
activity,” said former CIA counterterrorism chief Vince Cannistraro.
Cannistraro explained that the Chechen female suicide bombers were
called “black widows” because so many Chechen women have lost
husbands or fathers or other male members of their families to
Russian attacks.
“Chechnya has a large pool of these women to draw on,” he said.
In the Beslan massacre some of the attackers were Ingush, from a
nearby statelet known to be “a hotbed of radical Islamists,”
Cannistrro said.
A former senior CIA official said that the explosives used in Beslan
were believed to have traveled to the Beslan through Ingushetia.
“The Russians have played this czarist game of empire, divide and
rule and has allowed a whole group of corrupt little statelets to
form out of Georgia,” said Blank.
The result is that terrorists move easily back and forth over
Russia’s borders, weakening its security, he said.
Ariel Cohen, a Caucasus expert at the Heritage Foundation, told UPI
some time ago: “The whole Russian-Chechen war is a nightmare. There
are plenty of side deals between the Chechens and Russian military,
the latter easily bribed into selling the Chechens weapons and
explosives.”
Blank went even farther: “The Chechens would not survive without the
support they get from the Russian army. That army is notoriously
corrupt.”
Fiona Hill, Chechen expert at the Brookings Institution, agreed,
adding: “The Chechens even have sympathizers inside the FSB” (the
Russian internal security service.)
She added that the Russian military is involved in criminal
operations involving “drug smuggling, prostitution, exchanging
weapons with Chechens for profit.”
To this list Blank added: “the widespread smuggling of drugs,
contraband, explosives, and nuclear materials.”
Said Hill: “The Russian army “has helped to fund and prolong the war
by capitalizing on it. It’s a total failure of Russian political
governance.”
Blank said that the airport security guard who allowed the two
Chechen women to board the aircraft they destroyed did so after
accepting a bribe of $34. “I mean, I’ve heard of cheap — but $34?”
he said.
The continuing violence has killed a number of behind-the-scenes
diplomatic initiatives to try and end the Chechen war for secession,
Hill said.
The first series had been halted by 2002, when Chechen terrorists
took 600 hostages at a Moscow theater, she said.
The Moscow theater assault of October, 2002, was alarming because it
meant Chechens were targeting foreigners for the first time.
According to U.S. officials, the Bush administration has offered
Russia intelligence, technology and specialist support.
But the State Department is “resolutely opposed” to any Russian
military action that targets the state of Georgia.
To Blank, one of the most dangerous aspects of this war is that it
can spread, “and it has already begun to spread.”
“It could swallow most of Russia if it gets out of hand,” a U.S.
government official said.
The solution? A Russian cleanup of its security services, Blank said.
“The violence will go on unless there is fundamental reform of the
entire Russian security sector. There has to be comprehensive
reform,” he said.
“As it is, Moscow cannot defend Russian security and they can’t
effectively project power beyond Russia’s borders until this
(cleanup) happens,” he said.

United Press International
September 24, 2004 Friday
Azerbaijan accuses Armenian of occupation
UNITED NATIONS, N.Y., Sept. 24 (UPI)
Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev told the U.N. General Assembly
Friday Armenians are illegally settling in his country.
“Armenia has launched an outrageous policy of massive illegal
settlement of the Armenian population into the occupied Azerbaijani
territories, which is a blatant violation of the international law,”
he said.
The conflict has forced more than 1 million Azerbaijani people to
become refugees, Aliyev said.
“The situation deteriorates with the use of these territories for
drug trafficking, arms transfers, harboring terrorists, illegal
economic activities and smuggling.”
Azerbaijan has asked for U.N. participation in returning the refugees
to their Azerbaijani homes. The two countries have long been in
contention, the Azerbaijani a Muslim nation historically allied with
Iran and Turkey, and the Armenians a Christian people who accuse the
Turks of genocide in the early 20th century.
Aliyev criticized the U.N Security Council for having a “passive and
silent attitude” on the migration issue.
“We expect more responsive strategy by the United Nations in relation
to the situation of a forgotten humanitarian crisis in Azerbaijan,”
Aliyev said.

RosBusinessConsulting Database
September 24, 2004 Friday 6:04 am, EST
Analysts on Gazprom’s strategy in Georgia
Gazprom could only be interested in acquiring gas distributing
companies in Georgia, analysts believe. Gas is delivered to Armenia
via Georgia, therefore, Gazprom may benefit from a stake in Georgian
gas distributing companies. Tbilgaz is Georgia’s largest gas
distributing asset and it contributes 20 percent of the overall gas
supplies to Georgia. And a fair price for it may amount to $20m.
Other experts believe that Gazprom may be interested in Georgian
pipelines. The Russian gas giant may be interested in strategic
cooperation with Georgia so that to ensure a lack of problems related
to gas supplies to Armenia and Turkey, they say. Gazprom may provide
necessary funds for the reconstruction of the existing Georgian
pipelines in exchange for control over transportation facilities and
lower transportation tariffs. Thus Gazprom may win control over
Georgian gas distributing facilities and prevent neighboring
Azerbaijan from entering the Turkish market.
In any case, Gazprom will benefit from stable relations with Georgia,
experts point out. Last year it had problems with payments for
supplied gas. But the situation has changed and the company is going
to improve relations with Georgia so as to boost gas supplies in the
future.

Agency WPS
DEFENSE and SECURITY (Russia)
September 24, 2004, Friday
ARMENIA HAS NO INTENTION TO SEND ITS MILITARY TO IRAQ
Armenian Foreign Minister Vardan Oskaryan announced this to
journalists on Wednesday.
“We’ve never declared our intention to send our troops to Iraq. The
matter concerned humanitarian aid and involvement in the post-war
restoration of Iraq only,” he noted.
In Oskaryan’s words, Armenia is ready to send military medics and
field engineers to Iraq, but this step has to be discussed and
approved by the Armenian parliament.
On September 6 President Robert Kocharyan of Armenia and Alexander
Kwasniewski of Poland signed an agreement on bilateral cooperation in
the security sphere. Under this agreement, the Armenian troops of 50
military medics, field engineers and drivers will be dispatched to
Iraq in late 2004 – early 2005 to join the coalitional forces under
command of Poland.

Agency WPS
DEFENSE and SECURITY (Russia)
September 24, 2004, Friday
KNOW YOUR FRIENDS AS WELL AS YOUR ENEMIES[]
SOURCE: Nezavisimaya Gazeta, September 21, 2004, p. 5
by Viktor Myasnikov
CIS summit in Astana resolved to reorganize structures of the
Commonwealth. CIS Security Council for dealing with terrorism will be
established. “Globalization and appearance of new threats force
countries of the Commonwealth to pool effort in dealing with pressing
international problems,” President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev
said.
There are two parallel collective military structures in the
Commonwealth, nowadays. One of them purely military. The CIS Council
of Defense Ministers was formed 12 years ago for the purpose of
working out a common military policy. It includes a permanent
secretariat, CIS Headquarters for Coordination of Military
Cooperation, and a number of councils and committees.
The second structure is counter-terrorist. The Organization of the
CIS Collective Security Treaty includes 6 countries of the
Commonwealth – Russia, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, Armenia,
and Belarus. The Organization has the Rapid Response Collective
Forces that include several battalions of mobile troops, a helicopter
squadron, and frontal aviation.
Bona fide military cooperation has been developing among these six
countries only because they face a common enemy – international
terrorism. Joint exercises are run within the framework of the
Organization of the CIS Collective Security Treaty, and the
Counter-Terrorism Center performs the duties of the coordinating
body.
CIS military structures formed in the early 1990’s for the purpose of
construction of a common military organization found themselves in
the background. They never performed their task because CIS countries
do not agree on what constitutes a military threat. Working out a
common position is difficult indeed when some countries aspire for
membership in NATO and others regard its eastward expansion as a
potential threat. Add here the border dispute between Russia and
Ukraine and the latent conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia. In
short, any coordinated military policy is simply out of the question.
It means that withering away of the CIS Council of Defense Ministers
and related military structures was but a question of time.
There is no love lost between the Organization of the CIS Collective
Security Treaty and CIS military structures. Sources who know what
they are talking about ascribe it to the pitiful financial standing
of the latter. Establishment of the counter-terrorist CIS Security
Council will automatically lead to abolition of the ineffective CIS
Council of Defense Ministers with all its headquarters and
committees.
The CIS United Antiaircraft Defense System is the only structure to
be spared by the forthcoming military-administrative reforms. No
country of the Commonwealth including Russia can hope to close its
skies entirely on its own, and cooperation in this sphere has
proceeded at a fast rate. CIS leaders allocated 2.3 billion rubles
for the CIS United Antiaircraft Defense System in 2005 – against 800
million in 2004 (almost tripling the sum, in fact).
The Organization of the CIS Collective Security Treaty and its Fast
Response Collective Forces are a response to the threat of terrorism.
Military cooperation between its members will continue while the
threat exists. Moreover, the view of international terrorism as an
external threat guarantees mutual defense of members of the
Organization from any external aggression. That is why the
Organization includes Russia, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan (the
countries directly involved in the war on international terrorism),
Kazakhstan (whose geo-strategic location may make it a target too),
and Armenia (the country that does not want a renewal of a shooting
war with Azerbaijan). And Alexander Lukashenko’s regime in Belarus
needs defense against actions of the opposition that may spark a
“humanitarian intervention” of the Yugoslavian make.
Uzbekistan, the country seriously affected by terrorism, steers clear
of all military blocs. On the other hand, it may decide to join the
counter-terrorist CIS SC.
Ukraine is another potential candidate. It is not facing any threats
from the West or the East at this point. Separatism of the Crimean
Tatars is under control. All of that makes it a political issue for
President Leonid Kuchma, not a military. And an economic issue as
well – the war on money laundering and drain of capitals is of
paramount importance for Ukraine. On the other hand, just like
Moldova or Turkmenistan, Ukraine does not participate in the CIS
Council of Defense Ministers.
Implementation of Nazarbayev’s suggestion will certainly improve
coordination of efforts in the war on terrorism. As things stand,
commanders of CIS border troops have their own committee, defense
ministers their own, secret services and foreign ministers have
structures of their own too. Pulling them together is a must. As for
the attempts to set up at least some semblance of a common military
organization or even to establish cooperation between armies, all of
that is finished. Time to forget it.
Translated by A. Ignatkin