Month: June 2005

OSCE MG CONSIDERS POSITIVE PARIS MEETING OF ARMENIAN AND AZERI FMs
YEREVAN, JUNE 23. ARMINFO. OSCE Minsk Group considers positive the
June 17 Paris talks of the Armenian and Azeri foreign ministers,
Russian co-chair of OSCE MG Yuri Merzlyakov says to the 525th
newspaper (Baku).
The positive impulse of the Warsaw presidential meeting was continued
but there were also difficult points. Many problems were left
unsettled but otherwise there would be no further talks.
Merzlyakov says that MG is now developing a basis for the future peace
agreement – it is determining the key components. The agreement itself
will be drafted by expert delegations. They will have long and
frequent meetings as soon as the agreement of principle has been
reached. It is hard yet to say who will lead the delegations – the MG
co-chairs or the deputy FMs, says Merzlyakov.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

RUSSIAN OBSERVERS FOLLOWED NKR ELECTIONS ON THEIR OWN
INITIATIVE AND IN PERSONAL CAPACITY: RUSSIAN FM
MOSCOW, JUNE 23. ARMINFO. The Russian citizens observing the
parliamentary elections in Nagorno Karabakh did that exclusively on
their own initiative and in personal capacity, says Russian Foreign
Ministry.
The source says that Moscow consistenly supports the principle of
Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity like the other norms and
principles of the international law. Russia does not recognize
Nagorno Karabakh as an independent state. The Russian FM is convinced
that the status of Nagorno Karabakh should be determined by peace
talks under the Minsk process. It does not consider that the peace
process should depends on some elections in Nagorno Karabakh. The FM
assures that Russia together with the US and France will continue its
active efforts to help the Azeris and Armenians to find a solution to
the Nagorno Karabakh conflict, reports RBK.

ARMENIA MAY BECOME EU MEMBER EVEN EARLIER THAN NORWAY, THINKS SPEAKER
OF NORWEGIAN PARLIAMENT
YEREVAN, JUNE 23. ARMINFO. In 2006, the Norwegian Council for Refugees
will allocate Armenia $5-6 mln, Speaker of Armenian Parliament Artur
Baghdasaryan made this statement at a joint press conference in
Yerevan with Chairman of Norwegian Parliament Jorgen Kosmo.
Artur Baghdasaryan says that Armenian-Norwegian cooperation was at a
low level, but such visits will contribute to activation of bilateral
relations. He put the stress on the necessity of activating the
cooperation of the two countries’ parliamentary delegations in
international structures. He also pointed out the necessity of
deepening the Armenian-Norwegian cooperation in the sphere of economy,
agriculture, science, education and culture. Baghdasaryan says an
Armenian-Norwegian deputy group of friendship is created at the
Armenian Parliament, which will contribute to bilateral
inter-parliamentary cooperation. The speaker of the Armenian
parliament highly appreciated the activity of the Norwegian
Development Agency in Armenia.
In his turn, Kosmo highly appreciated the role of Armenia in
establishment of peace and stability in the South Caucasus. He pointed
out that Armenia might become a member of the EU much more earlier
then Norway. He pointed out the necessity of political solution to
urgent problems of the South Caucasus and development of democracy in
the region, promising contribution of Norway to it. He thinks it is
time to develop Armenian-Norwegian political and economic ties. Kosmo
pointed out the necessity of activation of bilateral cooperation in
the sphere of energy. He says not only Armenia but also the whole
South Caucasus is interesting for Norway from the point of view of
economy. As this region can become a new market for Norwegian
goods. He pointed out that Armenia had a great potential for
development of tourism and that the issues of the bilateral
cooperation would be discussed in details in the course of a
forthcoming visit of Armenian parliamentary speaker to Norway.

ARMENIA DOES NOT SEE ITS FUTURE WITHOUT ATOMIC POWER PLANT:
ARMENIAN DEPUTY MINISTER OF ENERGY
YEREVAN, JUNE 23. ARMINFO. Armenia does not see its future without
atomic power plant, Armenian Deputy Minister of Energy Areg Galstyan
made this statement presenting the strategy of energy development for
2025 adopted by the Government today.
Galstyan says the country has a good infrastructure for development
of atomic energy today, however, training of specialists in the
sphere will take Armenia long years. In the meantime, there are good
specialists in Armenia who have created a perfect school. “Even the
Greens currently understand the ecological privileges of atomic
energy as compared with thermal one,” the minister said. According to
optimistic forecasts, reserves of hydrocarbon raw-materials in the
world will be exhausted before 2070, according to pessimistic data –
by 2050. At the same time, a stable rise in prices for the given type
of fuel is observed, Galstyan says. In such situation, atomic energy
must undoubtedly develop in Armenia, he thinks. Earlier Armenian
Energy Minister Armen Movsisyan did not rule out a possibility of
construction of a new up-to-date APP in the country, which would
require $1 bln.
The first unit was put into exploitation in 1976, the second in 1980.
At the beginning of 1989, the plant was closed down for political
ideas, and then the second 404 megawatt power unit was reactivated.
The resource of the power unit is limited. The Armenian APP is under
financial management of the Inter RJSC UES of Russia for 5 years.

Deutsche Welle, Germany
June 23 2005
Turkish Writer Picks up German Peace Prize

A literary ambassador for Turkey

Turkey’s best-selling novelist Orhan Pamuk has been awarded the
German Book Trade’s Peace Prize, reflecting a growing awareness that
many of the issues preoccupying Turkey these days have a profound
global resonance.
Just one week after demonstrations took place in Berlin against the
German parliament’s resolution in memory of the massacre of Armenians
by Turks in 1915, Germany has awarded one of its most prestigious
cultural prizes to Turkish writer Orhan Pamuk, an outspoken critic of
his country’s inability to own up to its often harrowing history.
Born in 1952, Pamuk grew up among Turkey’s secular upper classes.
After spending several years in New York, he was given a mixed
reception when he returned to Istanbul, the city where he was born.
The country’s Islamic intellectuals accused him of exploiting
religious and historical themes to pander to Western tastes. Still,
however progressive and pro-European he may be, his support of
Turkey’s westward development is far from unconditional.
Admirers see his work as a rejection of a recent intellectual
tradition that aspires to be western by ignoring the past. “If you
try to repress memories, something always comes back,” Pamuk once
said in an interview with Time magazine. “I’m what comes back.”
A love-hate relationship
According to the selection board that chose Pamuk, in novels such as
“Snow” (2002), “he follows the historical traces of the West in the
East and of the East in the West in a way no other writer does.”
He enjoys both commercial success and critical acclaim in his home
country. His 1990 novel “Kara Kitap” is widely seen as one of the
most controversial and popular readings in Turkish literature.
But despite his phenomenal popularity, Turkey itself has a love-hate
relationship with Pamuk. Nationalist groups angry at his criticism of
Turkey’s treatment of its Kurdish minority want to see his books
removed from public libraries.
And while many welcome the attention he brings Turkey as its literary
ambassador, others envy his international stature. “There is a lot of
jealousy that Orhan Pamuk has been translated into so many
languages,” said one anonymous source in an interview in the
Tagesspiegel newspaper.
Yavus Baydar from the newspaper Sabah has described the award as
“very significant for freedom of speech in Turkey.” He knows what
he’s talking about. Earlier this year, he asked Pamuk to write an
article for Sabah about South Korea. After it was published, he was
bombarded with outraged readers’ mail, accusing him of having given a
voce to a “traitor.”
A relevant writer

The prize jury’s decision continues a tradition of honoring writers
whose works have a topical significance. In 2003, US essayist Susan
Sontag (photo) received the award for her reflections on the fragile
state of post 9/11 trans-Atlantic relations. A year later, the
selection of Hungarian novelist Peter Esterhazy came shortly after
the EU’s eastwards enlargement. In 2005, the choice of Pamuk serves
as a reminder of just how much Turkey and Turkish issues factor into
Germany’s political and cultural debate.
“My novel (“Snow”) is about the inner conflicts of modern Turks,” he
told Die Zeit in April. “It’s about the contradictions between Islam
and modernism and the desire to be integrated into Europe — and the
simultaneous fear.”
In 1998, Ankara wanted to present him with Turkey’s highest cultural
accolade, the title of state artist. He rejected the honor. “For
years I have been criticizing the state for putting authors in jail,
for only trying to solve the Kurdish problem by force, and for its
narrow-minded nationalism,” said Pamuk. “I don’t know why they tried
to give me the prize.”

This time, though, Pamuk will be accepting his award — at the
Frankfurt Book Fair in October.

ITAR-TASS
June 23 2005
Putin says presidents satisfied with CIS security organization’s
summit
Moscow, 23 June: Russian President Vladimir Putin has announced that
all six presidents of the members states of the CSTO (Collective
Security Treaty Organization uniting Russia, Belarus, Armenia,
Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, and Kyrgyzstan) are satisfied with the
results of today’s summit.
“As always, openly and in a business-like manner, we discussed the
most important issues of multilateral cooperation and reached a
number of practical agreements of principle,” the head of Russian
state told a news conference following the summit.
Putin said that by the end of the session, the sides signed, among
other documents, an agreement on training military personnel. “I am
convinced that (it) has in many ways a defining significance for our
cooperation,” the Russian leader noted. In his view, “the decision to
set up an inter-state commission for military-economic cooperation
serves as a stimulus for closer cooperation of our (CSTO countries’)
military-industrial complexes”.

Armenian delegates mentioned Armenian Genocide in Turkey
23.06.2005 19:03
YEREVAN (YERKIR) – Ninety years after the Armenian Genocide, the
members of the ARF’s Youth Organization spoke openly about the
Genocide and even distributed booklets, Zinavor Meghrian and Karen
Mnatsakanian, members of the Youth Organization delegation to
International Union of Socialist Youth (IUSY) meeting in Istanbul,
told a news conference on Thursday in Yerevan.
On June 16-19, the delegation was participating in the IUSY Black Sea
Area Cooperation meeting, titled “We all are Minorities” and held in
Istanbul, Turkey, attended also by delegations from Georgia, Russia,
Ukraine, Azerbaijan, Turkey, Bulgaria, Moldova, Serbia, Sweden and
other countries.
The Armenian delegates also were interviewed by the Turkish newspaper
Milliyet. “We discussed the Armenian Genocide from different aspects
during the interview,” Meghrian told the news conference. “We also
spoke of the closed borders and formation of a group of historians,
which we refuse since we have no doubts about the fact of the
Genocide.”
In his turn, Mnatsakanian mentioned that the Turkish youth wrongly
belive the Armenian government is not raising the Genocide issue and
that it is only the Diaspora that is interested in it. “It is because
some young Armenian politicians make such statements,” he said. When
asked to name those politicians, Mnatsakanian said he was referring to
Sargis Asatrian, the chairman of the Armenian Youth Party.

OSCE Washington meeting may adopt resolution on Armenian Genocide
23.06.2005 11:32
YEREVAN (YERKIR) – Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe
(OSCE) Parliamentary Assembly, scheduled to hold its session in
Washington on July 1-5, may adopt a resolution related to the Armenian
Genocide, Armenpress reported, citing the Turkish news agency Anadolu.
Armenia has already launched lobbying efforts, according to the
Anadaolu, though no written proposal has yet been submitted. In case
the initiative is approved by the parliamentarians, nothing would
stand in the way of the Armenian delegation to reach its goal, the
news agency concludes.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Turkish Press
June 23 2005
Press Review
TURKIYE
ARINC CONDEMNS GERMAN PARLIAMENT’S DECISION
Parliament Speaker Bulent Arinc yesterday sent a letter to his German
counterpart Wolfgang Thierse condemning the approval of an Armenian
resolution last week in the German Federal Parliament. Stressing that
the decision had caused anger among Turkish parliamentarians, Arinc
said that both government officials and parliamentarians visiting
Germany over the last three months had expressed Turkish views on the
matter and warned of possible anger among Turks if such a decision
was made. This one-sided decision made by a friendly allied country
deeply wounded some 3 million Turks living in Germany, said Arinc.
/Turkiye/

Turkish Press
June 23 2005
Press Review
HURRIYET
GERMAN PEACE AWARD GOES TO ORHAN PAMUK
The German Publishers’ and Booksellers’ Association has chosen
Turkish author Orhan Pamuk as the recipient of its peace prize.
According to the association, this award will be given to Pamuk to
recognize his efforts for human and minority rights and his fearless
remarks about Turkey’s political problems. They also praised Pamuk’s
exploration of `the historical footprints of the West in the East and
the East in the West.’ Asked whether the award has anything to do
with Pamuk’s controversial comments about the Armenian issue, an
association representative said that it did not. The association’s
prize jury added, `Pamuk has created a genre in which Europe and
Islamic Turkey coexist.’ He will receive the prize on Oct. 23.
/Hurriyet/
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress