Month: October 2006

ARMENIAN BUSINESSWOMEN – 2006 SECOND EXHIBITION TO OPEN THURSDAY IN YEREVAN

Arka News Agency, Armenia
Oct 18 2006

YEREVAN, October 18. /ARKA/.Armenian Businesswomen – 2006, the second
exhibition, is to open on Thursday in Yerevan, press center of ASME,
the exhibition co-organizer, reports.

The other organizer is LOGOS EXPO Center.

The report says that about 60 Armenian businesswomen will expose
their works in various areas such as foods, textile, clothes, stone
and wood processing, carpets and others.

The aim of the exhibition is to present Armenian businesswomen
abilities and to help them expand their business ties in home and
world markets.

Round-table discussions are to be held as part of the event to help
them outline prospects for cooperation.

The exhibition will last until Saturday.

ASME, the program of market development of small and mid-scale
business, was launched on September 15, 2000, and to be completed on
December 31, 2007.

The program is funded by USAID and implemented by Development
Alternatives, Inc. (DAI).

The program’s aim is to create jobs in Armenia through developing
profitable and dynamically developing private companies.

LOGOS EXPO Center is the leading Armenian company in organizing
industrial, national and international exhibitions and congresses.

LOGOS EXPO Center started functioning in 1999. The center has organized
55 exhibitions in Armenia and the outside since then.

ARMENIAN PRESIDENT GIVES HIGH MARK TO COOPERATION WITH WB

Arka News Agency, Armenia
Oct 18 2006

YEREVAN, October 18. /ARKA/. Armenian President Robert Kocharyan
made a high appraisal of Armenia’s cooperation with the World Bank
in developing the country’s economy.

Many years of cooperation with the WB have produced good results in
the development of Armenia’s economy, President Kocharyan stated at
his meeting with Director of the WB Yerevan office Roger Robinson,
who is completing his mission in Armenia.

Kocharyan stressed structural reforms in the state government system,
infrastructure development, poverty reduction programs as important
factors in ensuring the country’s progress.

In his turn, Robinson pointed out positive changes in Armenia and
the WB’s contribution to this process.

During the meeting President Robert Kocharyan wished Rogert Robinson
success in his further activities, expressing the confidence that
they will be as effective as in Armenia.

NKR MFA PRESS SERVICE INFORMS

Azat Artsakh, Republic of Nagorno Karabakh
Oct 17 2006

In the morning of October 5 the OSCE mission including NKR experts
started the monitoring of the area adjacent to the front line
between the armed forces of Azerbaijan and NKR. They started the
monitoring on the Azerbaijani side. Earlier the NKR government had
insisted on postponing the monitoring to include representatives
of NKR in the mission, and sent a note to the OSCE. "We are sorry
that the OSCE did not provide necessary conditions to include NKR
representatives in the OSCE mission set up to study the environment in
the areas which suffered from fires. However, this does not exclude
the possibility of including Karabakh experts in the OSCE mission,
therefore the mission was postponed to include NKR representatives,"
stated NKR Foreign Minister Georgy Petrossian in answer to the
question of news reporters on the action of official Stepanakert
connected with the visit of the OSCE experts. Georgy Petrossian
also informed that the NKR foreign ministry sent a note to the OSCE
stating clearly the stance of the government of the republic on the
participation of experts from Karabakh. "Part of the territories to
be monitored is under the jurisdiction of NKR, which is sufficient
reason for our participation in the mentoring on the opposite side,"
emphasized the minister. According to the reliable information that
the NKR authorities possess, a dramatic situation has occurred in
the Karabakh territories occupied by Azerbaijan: the forests in the
region of Shahumian are destroyed, the ecological balance of the east
of Martakert was broken, where the structure of land and microflora
were damaged.

NKR MOD REFUTES AZERI REPORTS ON SHOOTING IN THE DIRECTION OF AGHDAM

Public Radio, Armenia
Oct 17 2006

NKR Defense Ministry refuted Azeri media reports on mutual shooting
in the direction of Aghdam region. "The Karabakh side is loyal to the
maintenance of the cease-fire regime," NKR MOD Press Secretary Senor
Asratyan told ArmInfo correspondent. At the same time he noted that
the Azerbaijani side is constantly trying to provoke the Karabakh
side by breaking the truce. "In response to that we try to maintain
the cease-fire regime and only in exceptional cases we undertake
similar steps," he said.

Referring to the Ministry of Defense of Azerbaijan, Azeri media report
that the hooting took place last night at about 22:30.

NATIONAL ASSEMBLY ADOPTED DRAFT CONSTITUTION ON FIRST READING

Azat Artsakh, Republic of Nagorno Karabakh
Oct 17 2006

On October 6 the National Assembly of NKR discussed the draft
Constitution. But before discussing the draft, some replacements were
made in the standing committees. Arayik Harutiunyan, the chair of the
finance and budget committee was replaced by Benik Bakhshiyan. Benik
Bakhshiyan, the chair of the committee on industries and industrial
infrastructures was replaced by Gagik Petrosyan, Azat Hayrenik. The
post of Gagik Petrosyan, who used to be the chair of the committee
of external relations, is vacant. The chair of the Task Force on
Constitution Armen Zalinian said all the proposals which were agreed
on during the previous debates were included in the draft. He said the
draft was revised and edited and proposed that the parliament adopt it
on the first reading. He also thanked the members of parliament and
parliament factions for effective efforts and close cooperation. The
draft was put to vote and was adopted almost unanimously; only one
members of parliament abstained.

PAMUK’S TASK
Selcuk Gultasli

Zaman, Turkey
Oct 18 2006

First of all, I want to put it on the record that I have followed Orhan
Pamuk with great pleasure and appreciation since the publication of
his "Black Book," and that, asking for the forgiveness of literary
critics, I think he is the greatest author in Turkish literature’s
recent history.

I wholeheartedly congratulate him on winning the Nobel prize for
Literature.

However, the Nobel Prize for Literature having fallen on the same
day as France’s questionable draft law warns us that we have to be
sparing while showing our excitement and joy.

This Nobel award, for which we will always praise our great writer,
couldn’t have come at a worse time.

What should be done now? Can our Nobel author take a role in the
struggle against the injustice made against his own nation this time?

Let whoever wants to boycott do so; but 200l clearly showed that
stupid plans like bringing France to its knees through trade never
work. France has the world’s seventh largest economy, its per capita
income is almost 30 thousand dollars and its economic volume exceeds
2 trillion dollars annually.

Mistakes like trusting that Chirac will call Erdogan and say, "I’m
sorry," expecting him to obstruct the bill, giving compromise after
compromise hoping he will, and buying plenty of Airbuses, shouldn’t
be repeated.

Both of Chirac’s probable successors, right-wing Nicolas Sarkozy and
leftist Segolene Royal have already made recognition of a "genocide"
a condition of Turkey’s EU membership just like the current "friend
of the Turks" president.

OK, let’s say that Chirac doesn’t sign this bill, won’t it be brought
back to life a few years later?

What should be done is to immediately make the bill a law. As soon as
it becomes a law, a serious struggle should be begun on the basis of
freedom of expression. Last week in Europe there were many decisions
indicating that Turkey would win such a struggle started on the basis
of freedom of expression. We can list them as follows:

The EU Commission took a stand against the bill; not only Expansion
Commissioner Olli Rehn, but also at the highest level, Chairman
Barroso.

France’s largest newspapers agreed that the French National Assembly
had acted unreasonably. In general, the European press supported
this stand.

There were official public statements from the European Parliament,
which is constantly giving Turkey a headache regarding the issue of
"genocide," saying, "You’ve made Voltaire turn over in his grave,"
and, "If a law is being made for the Armenian genocide, why aren’t
you doing anything about other injustices?"

Even one of the genocide-accusing members of the EP, French Marie
Anne Isler Beguin, joined in on the protests, "Do you want to throw
Turkey into the lap of Iran and Russia?"

Without losing any time, France’s most expert historians called upon
Chirac to have the bill rescinded if it passes the Senate.

It can be said that an intellectual alliance is emerging throughout
Europe – even though it’s not strong – believing that France has gone
too far this time and exceeded its limits.

If the bill is not buried in France, it is just a matter of time
before it jumps to Belgium, Holland and other countries.

The best thing to do would be to pull the discussion toward a freedom
of expression platform and get the intellectual consensus emerging
in Europe behind us.

Then Orhan Pamuk’s going to Paris with Hrant Dink would be effective.

Pamuk’s going to Paris as a Nobel-winning author from a country that
has abolished or amended article 301 could turn into a visit that
would make France ashamed.

Actually, this is just the right time to amend Article 301!

In an interview with the BBC just after winning the award, Pamuk
did not mention freedom of expression in relation to questions about
France. This does not promise hope.

However, on the day he is to receive the award, if after criticizing
the genocide bill from top to bottom in the speech he makes in Sweden,
if the bill becomes law and he jumps on the first flight to Paris and,
as Hrant Dink promised to do, he proclaims that he doesn’t recognize
the "genocide" (even if he believes it happened), then the coldness
between him and the Turkish people would to a large extent disappear.

PAN-ARMENIAN CHARITY CHIEF REJECTS KARABAKH CRITICISM
By Anna Saghabalian

Radio Liberty, Czech Rep.
Oct 18 2006

The head of a Diaspora-funded pan-Armenian charity implementing
large-scale infrastructure projects in Nagorno-Karabakh rejected on
Wednesday strong criticism of its activities voiced by the Karabakh
leadership.

The self-proclaimed republic’s president, Arkady Ghukasian, and other
senior officials in Stepanakert have publicly complained in recent
months about the quality of an under-construction Karabakh highway
financed by the All-Armenian Fund Hayastan, implicitly accusing its
executive director, Naira Melkumian, of mismanagement.

"We disagree with such characterizations. I wonder what the authors
of those statements are by training," Melkumian said, questioning
the competence of her detractors. "Economists have no right to pass
judgment on the quality of construction," she added.

Melkumian herself is a philologist by training. She worked as foreign
minister in Ghukasian’s cabinet before moving to Yerevan and being
appointed Hayastan’s chief executive in 2003.

The 170-kilometer road, which will link the northern and southern
parts of Karabakh and is estimated to cost $25 million, is the single
largest infrastructure project funded by Hayastan in Karabakh and
Armenia proper during its 14-year existence. Work on it began in 2000
and is slated for completion next year.

Ghukasian publicly criticized the quality of the construction during a
May meeting in Yerevan of Hayastan’s supervisory board, which is headed
by Armenia’s President Robert Kocharian and comprises senior Armenian
government officials as well as leaders of Diaspora communities around
the world. "We believe the fund must oversee things more strictly,"
he said.

The complaint was echoed by some Diaspora Armenian members of the
board who cited a continuing lack of Diaspora trust in the efficiency
of the charity and the integrity of its top executives.

But Melkumian ruled out the possibility of any financial irregularities
at Hayastan, arguing that the fund is audited twice a year by Armenian
and Western firms. She also said that only one section of the so-called
"backbone highway" was found to have been poorly constructed in 2004
and that it has since been completely rebuilt.

"At the president’s instruction we sent relevant facts to the
[Karabakh] prosecutor’s office," Melkumian told reporters. "The
prosecutor’s office is now examining them."

REWRITING THE PAST
Agnes Poirier

The Guardian, UK
Oct 18 2006

Despite what the French left wants us to think, we cannot legislate
on how we should remember history.

Last Thursday, the French national assembly passed a bill that, if
approved by the French senate, would make the denial of the Armenian
genocide between 1915 and 1917 a criminal offence. Even if the senate
knows better and finally rejects this bill, the question remains:
how on earth have we even got to the point where such a bill could
be proposed, let alone adopted by a majority of MPs?

If this sad affair shows anything, it is the disrespect in which
the French prime minister is held by his own majority (Dominique de
Villepin is so badly considered within his own ranks that rightwing
MPs prefer to play a silly and dangerous game: passing a bill which
will make Villepin look even more of a fool to the French and the
world, and present Nicolas Sarkozy as the only adept runner to the
presidential elections). Secondly, the whole affair has proved how
inept and remote from the nation’s real concerns the French left is.

Not that it is news but it simply gets worse – and we naively thought
we had reached the bottom.

The international community reacted promptly to the news, condemning
the stupidity of the act and warning against its potential disastrous
effects. It would be fair to add that many international publications
also chose to mislead their readers by implying that the bill was,
in effect, passed as law. Some commentators shouted so loudly that
one couldn’t help but be perplexed by such venom.

The French socialist MPs who drafted the bill showed once more how
detached they are from the people they are supposed to represent.

They demonstrated once more their debilitating grasp of reality and
history. Is it the vote of the 450,000 French citizens of Armenian
origin they are after? The more problematic aspect of it all is not
the moral lesson the French MPs seem to be giving to Ankara – no,
that’s just childish; the real tragedy lies in what it says about
the way some of us now think. Instead of addressing issues, which
concern the whole nation (education, reforms, pensions, immigration,
security, globalisation), the French left prefers catering for groups
of clients, embracing cultural relativism. Truth and historical facts
now apparently change according to who speaks and from where.

When communities within a country start asking for laws to be amended
so that they include "their truths", it is the whole nation that
suffers. Many today want to be seen as victims of colonialism, of
past injustices, of forgetfulness, of past disrespect. In fact, they
are victims by proxy, indulging in the suffering of their ancestors.

This is not to say that the Armenian genocide didn’t take place;
we all know it did. But we simply cannot legislate on how we should
remember history, and France should certainly not be doing it on a
Turkish issue.

History is being rewritten; as journalist Eric Conan points out,
"by focusing too much on the shadows of history, the shadows have
blackened and obtruded the whole picture. Crimes alone are kept in
the frame while acts of heroism exit the scene. Let’s concentrate on
Vichy and forget the Nazi occupation. Let’s consider colonisation as
the essence of the republic. And so forth."

This unworthy trend in France is clearly here to divert our attention
from the real issues and the real debate. It offers a sickening
show played by some of the elite who find a narcissistic pleasure in
charging previous generations and asking to be whipped in public for
crimes they didn’t commit. They will tell you that the riots last
November were the heritage of colonisation, when they are actually
the direct result of 25 years of dire education and urban planning
policies, which have led to the rioters living in ghettoes of poverty.

They will tell you that the problem with Turkey is that they don’t
recognise the Armenian genocide at the precise moment when, in Turkey,
a national debate is opening up on the subject. What is the French
left trying to divert us from? Its own inanity? What an undignified
and pitiful spectacle.

U.S. ENVOY DISMAYED BY KOCHARIAN SNUB
By Emil Danielyan

Radio Liberty, Czech Rep.
Oct 18 2006

The U.S. ambassador to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in
Europe expressed on Wednesday dismay at President Robert Kocharian’s
refusal to meet her on her first-ever visit to Armenia that focused
on democratization and other political reforms.

Ambassador Julie Finley, who arrived in Yerevan on Tuesday, said she
received assurances from other Armenian officials that next year’s
Armenian parliamentary elections will be free and fair. She also urged
Yerevan to allow the OSCE to monitor the entire electoral process.

"I am very, very disappointed I did not have even a brief meeting
with your president," Finley said. "Usually in my travels [to OSCE
member states] I do meet with the head of state."

Asked about the official reason for Kocharian’s apparent snub, she
said: "His schedule was full. I asked."

Kocharian, according to his press service, held two meetings on
Wednesday, receiving a delegation of Russian parliamentarians and the
outgoing head of the World Bank office in Yerevan, Roger Robison. He
similarly failed to meet Britain’s visiting Minister for Europe Geoff
Hoon last week. Both Britain and the United States had declined to
officially congratulate Kocharian on his hotly disputed victory in
the last Armenian presidential election criticized as undemocratic
by OSCE observers.

Finley spoke to RFE/RL and the Mediamax news agency after meeting
with other senior Armenian officials, including Justice Minister
David Harutiunian, Prosecutor-General Aghvan Hovsepian, Deputy
Foreign Minister Arman Kirakosian and the chairman of the Central
Election Commission, Garegin Azarian. She also met civil society
representatives campaigning for political reform in the country.

The diplomat said the officials assured her that the Armenian
authorities will do their best to ensure the freedom and fairness
of the 2007 elections. "I am willing to accept in good faith what
certain people in the government so far have told me, just as I am
perfectly willing to take in good faith what certain people outside
of the government have been telling me," she said. "I am trying to
balance everything."

"We all want these elections to run right because these elections
are one of the four main pillars of a democracy," Finley said. "And
I am assuming that I am in a country that has decided it wants to be
a true democracy."

Officials from the European Union have already warned that a repeat
of serious vote irregularities would seriously undermine Armenia’s
efforts to forge closer links with the EU and its participation in
the bloc’s European Neighborhood Policy program in particular .

Finley, who worked for the U.S. National Endowment for Democracy
before taking over the U.S. mission at the OSCE’s Vienna headquarters
last year, would not be drawn on what the consequences would be for
U.S.-Armenian relations. She seemed worried about the fact that the
authorities in Yerevan have yet to officially invite the OSCE to
monitor the 2007 elections.

"The assurance that the government of Armenia has been elected freely
and fairly to the international community is very, very important for
Armenia," Finley said. "The OSCE is the gold standard for monitoring
elections.

"They are coming to the United States to monitor our mid-term elections
in November. Why the heck shouldn’t they be over here to monitor the
Armenian elections?"

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

WILL FRANCE MAKE IT ILLEGAL TO DENY TURKEY’S ARMENIAN GENOCIDE?

San Francisco Chronicle, CA
Oct 18 2006

History, some historians point out, is written by the victors. Are
there times, though, when history is written by legislators?

Last Thursday, deputies in the lower house of France’s National
Assembly approved a bill that would make it a crime to deny that
mass killings by the Ottoman Empire (modern Turkey’s predecessor)
of Armenians between 1915 and 1917 constituted what can be called
genocide; Armenians claim the mass killings and deportations of
ethnic Armenians during that period, which Turkey has long refuted,
was genocide that led to more than 1.5 million deaths.(Le Monde)

Bulent Kilic/AFP

Protesters in Istanbul last weekend expressed their anger at the news
of the proposed French law If the French Senate approves the proposal,
and it becomes a national law, then anyone in France who denies "the
Armenian genocide" could be punished with a year in prison and up to
45,000 euros ($56,000) in fines. In 2001, France’s National Assembly
already officially recognized the Ottoman Turks’ massacres of the
Armenians nearly a century ago as genocide.

France’s action has sparked furor across the political spectrum in
Turkey. French President Jacques Chirac called Turkish Prime Minister
Recep Tayyip Erdogan to say he regretted it. (Still, just a little
more than two weeks ago, in Armenia, Chirac publicly stated that it
would be an "inspired" gesture for Turkey to finally recognize the
Ottoman Turks’ genocide against the Armenians – that is, if Turkey
has any hope of ever joining the European Union.) (Le Monde)

Erdogan later said: "Chirac called me to say he was disappointed…."

The Turkish leader called the proposed French law a "great shame and
a black stain for freedom of expression." Turkish Foreign Minister
Abdullah Gul warned that the bill that is moving through France’s
legislature could "deeply damage French-Turkish relations."

Hurriyet

Bulent Arinc, the speaker of Turkey’s parliament Turkey’s Hurriyet
reports that Bulent Arinc, the speaker of the Turkish parliament, "said
that he does not think…Chirac’s apologetic phone call to…Erdogan in
the wake of the French parliament’s acceptance of the ‘genocide-denial’
bill was ‘genuine.’"

Finnish Foreign Minister Erkki Tuomioja, whose country currently
holds the E.U.’s rotating presidency, called the French deputies’
action "stupid." Qualifying his remark, he stated: "My calling this
French decision ‘stupid,’ and my hope that the bill is immediately
withdrawn ha[ve] nothing to do with [what] actually happened to the
Armenians in Turkey. Personally, I do think that ‘genocide’ is the
correct term to describe what happened to Armenians in the past,
and I wish that Turkey would be ready to accept this." (Hurriyet)

Fatih Saribas/Reuters

The protest in Istanbul brought out supporters of parties across the
political spectrum, all furious about France’s action Commentator Ayse
Ozgun, in the Turkish Daily News, writes: "[T]he Armenian subjects of
the Ottoman Empire were first coaxed by the Russians…to rise up and
fight [their rulers]…allowing them to build their own country….In
the end, however, the Ottomans won, and Armenian independence was
never realized….I can imagine how such a loss could plant extreme
anger in the French towards the Ottomans and, later, the Turks….But
then I ask the French…: How come you did not support the Armenians
with French troops?…The test of time for friendship is not when
the days are sunny and balmy but when they are bloody and tragic."

An editorial in the Paris-based International Herald Tribune (the
New York Times’ sister publication) states: "We have argued many
times that Turkey must come to grips with the crimes of its past
and stop prosecuting writers who mention the Armenian genocide of
the early 20th century. But we found it as absurd and as cynical
when the French National Assembly voted overwhelmingly last week to
make it illegal…to deny that there was an Armenian genocide." The
IHT advises: "France’s Senate still has a chance to throw out this
outrageous bill, and we hope it does. We hope, too, that the Turks do
not retaliate with something similarly nutty, like making it a crime
to deny French colonial atrocities in Algeria….[T]he sooner Turks
confront their past, the better. They are beginning to, in large part
because of the lure of membership in the European Union. That does not
excuse the way French politicians are trying to exploit anti-Turkish
feelings while playing up to the large Armenian-French constituency."