Month: November 2006

UK EMBASSY IN ARMENIA TO INTRODUCE BIOMETRIC DATA REGISTRATION SYSTEM FROM DEC 1, 2006

Arka News Agency, Armenia –
Nov 29 2006

YEREVAN, November 29. /ARKA/. The UK embassy in Armenia will introduce
the registration system for biometric data. The embassy’s press service
reported that this innovation is implemented to inculcate the global
system of human identification, aimed at protecting people’s identity
and facilitating the process of entry to the United Kingdom.

Beginning from December 1, all who want to receive a UK visa should
go to the embassy in person and submit their fingerprints.

The fingerprints will be inputted in the database by a scanner.

"Those who refuse to submit their fingerprints will not be eligible
to receive a visa," reported the UK embassy’s press service.

ARMENIAN PARLIAMENT APPROVES STATE BUDGET FOR 2007

Arka News Agency, Armenia –
Nov 29 2006

YEREVAN, November 29. /ARKA/. The Armenian parliament approved the
state budget for 2007 today. The parliamentary reporter says 77 MPs
voted for, three voted against, and six abstained from voting.

Presenting the final draft budget project for 2007, Minister of Finance
and Economy Vardan Khachatryan reported that the budget’s incomes
in the next year will total AMD 490.2bln compared to the planned AMD
489.5bln, and the expenditures AMD 558.7bln against AMD 557.9bln.

The minister said that the budget deficit will total AMD 68.47bln
(2.3% of the GDP), AMD 124mln increase compared to the first revision
of the state budget.

According to the state budget for 2007, the actual GDP growth will
amount to 9%, and the forecast inflation – 4%. ($1 – AMD 369.69).

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

AZERBAIJANI PRESIDENT HINTS AT NAGORNO-KARABAKH SETTLEMENT
Rovshan Ismayilov

EurasiaNet, NY
Nov 29 2006

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev has announced a negotiating
breakthrough in long-stalled talks to settle the Nagorno-Karabakh
conflict. In comments broadcast November 29 by state television,
Aliyev said "we are approaching the final stage of negotiations." An
Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry source indicated that Baku and Yerevan
had agreed on a way for Azerbaijani to regain territories currently
occupied by Armenian forces.

Aliyev met with his Armenian counterpart Robert Kocharian on the
sidelines of the CIS summit in Minsk on November 28. [For additional
details see the Eurasia Insight archive]. During those talks, Aliyev
said that the two focused on "contentious issues" that have held up
a provisional peace settlement under the so-called Prague Process,
mediated by the OSCE’s Minsk Group. [For background see the Eurasia
Insight archive].

"On some of the issues on which we have previously disagreed, we now
have agreement," Aliyev said, without elaborating. Armenian officials
have not confirmed Aliyev’s depiction of the talks.

A source at the Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry confirmed to EurasiaNet
late on November 29 that "the presidents reached agreement on some
very important issues." The withdrawal of Armenian forces from several
occupied Azerbaijani regions around Karabakh was one of the issues
on which Aliyev and Kocharian agreed in Minsk, the source added. "So
far it is just verbal understanding between the presidents. But trend
of the negotiations process is very positive, and the signing of any
initial document on the conflict resolution in the near future is
not excluded," the source said.

Earlier, some experts in Baku suggested that the recent closure of
the ANS TV channel, along with the eviction of an opposition party
and its newspaper from its erstwhile center-city headquarters in Baku,
might be connected to a potential Karabakh deal. [For background see
the Eurasia Insight archive].

In talking about the breakthrough, Aliyev said that Azerbaijan had
not altered its negotiating stance. "Azerbaijan’s position has not
changed," he said, adding that the country’s "territorial integrity
should be restored, and within that [arrangement], the people
who live in Nagorno-Karabakh should be given the maximum degree
of self-rule." He also said that "the position of international
organizations has changed in positive way" in recent months.

Editor’s Note: Rovshan Ismayilov is a freelance reporter based in Baku.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

UCLA CENTER LAUNCHES NATIONAL EFFORT TO UNDERSTAND, EDUCATE ‘HERITAGE’ SPEAKERS
By Kevin Matthews

UCLA International Institute, CA
Nov 29 2006

With a new National Language Resource Center, the federal government is
recognizing that the preservation of U.S. language communities will not
be accomplished with approaches aimed at monolingual Americans. The new
center grew out of a proposal by the UCLA Center for World Languages
and a UC-wide consortium on language instruction.

Tagalog was part of Chris’s identity; Ryan could talk on the
telephone; Athena simply listened to others at home.The two dozen
students in this quarter’s Section 1 of Introductory Filipino/Tagalog
at UCLA all grew up in California, all have at least one parent of
Filipino descent, and all heard the language at home. It’s a typical
class for Philippine-born instructor Nenita Pambid Domingo. UCLA’s
Tagalog students are "99 percent" heritage learners, she says, and
members of the remaining 1 percent often enroll because of "romantic
entanglements" with Tagalog speakers.

A similar situation holds for many other languages that are less
commonly taught at colleges and universities-that is, they are also
heritage languages because their acquisition by students begins in
homes and communities, not the classroom. Meanwhile, the peculiar
(and varying) pedagogical needs of heritage learners must also be
addressed in popular language programs such as Spanish.

Although the issue has been around for decades, materials and
agreed-upon methods for heritage teaching are lacking to this day,
according to UCLA’s Olga Kagan, director of a new federally funded
center for heritage language education. In U.S. classrooms, only
Spanish has been taught to native speakers for more than a few years,
and even in that case, says Maria Carreira, a linguistics professor at
California State University, Long Beach, who is working closely with
Kagan, "the number and variety of texts for Spanish speakers pales in
comparison to those available for non-natives." Worse, she says, there
are no training manuals or programs for heritage language instructors.

One of 15 U.S. centers charged with setting standards for teaching
languages, the National Heritage Language Resource Center (NHLRC)
seeks to fill these gaps. The NHLRC was launched this summer when
UCLA’s Center for World Languages (CWL, also directed by Kagan) and
the UC Consortium for Language Learning and Teaching won a four-year
Education Department grant, worth $326,000 per year, to oversee nine
major projects in the emergent field.

The ambitious near-term goals of the NHLRC include the creation of
1) a database tracking where certain U.S. immigrant and refugee
communities live, with analysis of their demographics and case
studies of how minority languages are passed on to new generations,
2) a generic framework for the design of heritage language curricula
that takes diversity both among and within groups into account,
and 3) a yearly research institute, or symposium of scholars, for
the study of heritage language knowledge and loss across languages,
to guide the development of course materials and teacher training.

To Paraphrase Tolstoy According to Kagan, the impetus to preserve
heritage languages comes variously from students, their nuclear
and extended families, and their communities. For example, many of
UCLA’s 2,000 Korean American undergraduates at some point develop an
interest in South Korean popular culture, while a Chinese American
student may decide to pursue business opportunities in his parents’
or grandparents’ home country. For Armenian immigrants, the memory of
the 1915-18 genocide and the desire to preserve traditional culture
drive collective efforts to preserve the language (the third most
spoken in metropolitan Los Angeles). Russian parents unfailingly
observe the inadequacy of translations of nineteenth-century novels
such as Anna Karenina, and may view the Russian language as key to
their children’s cultural awareness.

Families and communities can also impede language preservation. For
example, says Domingo, Filipino American students who formally
take up the language more confidently spoken by their parents and
grandparents may do so without encouragement from home. A generation
ago they faced active resistance from parents concerned about a legacy
of discrimination. (And that’s Tagalog-the dominant national language
of the Philippines along with American-imposed English. The islands’
important regional tongues, though spoken around L.A., are scarcely
taught at all.)

Foreign language learners are all alike. Every unhappy heritage
language learner is unhappy in her own way.

The truism will hold even within a single U.S. language community.

Domingo’s students may have a lot in common, but their abilities and
needs vary surprisingly. Chris Torralba, a third-year undergraduate,
says he spoke a lot of Tagalog before class began this fall. His
parents always "thought that the language should be a part of who I
am." Ryan Ruiz, also in his third year, is not so emphatic, but as
a child he could conduct phone conversations in the language.

Meanwhile, Elsie Velasco, another third-year, overheard her family
but did not speak. Fourth-year student Athena Peralta was born in
the Philippines and brought at age two to the United States, where
she has lost a great deal in spite of hearing Tagalog at home.

According to Domingo, any of these students can speak the language
fairly well after a year of coursework. Learning the grammar is often
a greater challenge; there detachment helps, and second language
learners have a slight advantage.

A heritage student may appear to be, and may be, fluent in a language
for many purposes but turn mute when conversation proceeds beyond a
repertory of everyday, home-centered contexts, Kagan says.

Traditional written and oral exams don’t capture such a person’s
strengths and weaknesses. That’s one more in the bevy of shortcomings
that she wants the new language resource center to address.

ARMENIAN PARLIAMENT PASSES 2007 BUDGET

Associated Press
Nov 29 2006

Armenia’s parliament on Wednesday passed a 2007 budget with a deficit
equivalent to US$155 million (euro118 million).

The budget, approved in a 77-3 vote with six abstentions, foresees
revenues of 490.2 billion drams (US$1.11 billion; euro840 million)
and put spending at 558.7 billion drams (US$1.27 billion; euro970
million) — figures similar to this year’s.

The deficit in the poor Caucasus Mountain nation’s budget blueprint
amounts to 2.3 percent of gross domestic product that is expected to
reach 2.9 trillion drams (US$6.6 billion; euro5 billion), growth of
9 percent over 2006.

Military spending is set at just over 100 billion drams (US$228
million; euro173 million) in the ex-Soviet republic, whose dispute
with neighboring Azerbaijan over the Armenian-controlled territory of
Nagorno-Karabakh keeps fears of a major new armed conflict simmering
12 years after a cease-fire ended a six-year war.

Oil-rich Azerbaijan’s parliament passed a 2007 budget Tuesday
that foresees military and security spending of about US$1 billion
(euro760 million).

PUTIN LIFTS WINE BAN FOR MOLDOVA
By Maria Levitov
Staff Writer

The Moscow Times, Russia
Nov 29 2006

Vladimir Rodionov / Itar-Tass

Presidents Vladimir Putin and Viktor Yushchenko heading into a
meeting during a CIS summit in Minsk on Tuesday. Behind them are
other CIS leaders.

President Vladimir Putin used a Commonwealth of Independent States
summit in Minsk on Tuesday to lift the ban on wine and meat imports
from Moldova.

"We agreed on the resumption of shipments of meat and wine from
Moldova to Russia," he said late Tuesday after talks with Moldovan
President Vladimir Voronin, Interfax reported.

Putin also announced that Gazprom would form a 50-50 joint venture
with Belarussian state gas monopoly Beltransgaz. In televised remarks,
Putin said the details of the deal would be worked out by the end of
the year.

No further information on the deal was made available late Tuesday.

Earlier this month, Gazprom indicated that it might charge Belarus
less than $200 per 1,000 cubic meters of gas — the price it is
currently demanding — in exchange for more gas pipeline assets.

Russia suspended imports of wine from Moldova and Georgia last
March, citing health concerns. Both Voronin and Georgian President
Mikheil Saakashvili complained that the ban had more to do with their
aspirations to escape Moscow’s influence and move closer to the West.

The wine ban took a heavy toll on the economies of both countries.

Business Analytica, an industry consultancy, said that in 2005,
Georgian and Moldovan wines accounted for some 44 percent of all
in-store wine sales in Russia.

Saakashvili also asked the Kremlin for a face-to-face meeting with
Putin in Minsk, but was turned down.

The lifting of the Moldovan wine ban was the highlight of the 15th
annual CIS summit, which produced few other positive results.

Importantly, the 12 member states failed to agree on how to reform
the organization, which is increasingly viewed as obsolete.

"In Kazan, we postponed [the implementation of reforms] until Moscow,
and in Moscow until Minsk," Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev
said, RIA-Novosti reported. "Now, we are postponing everything until
Dushanbe," he said, apparently referring to the next CIS summit. A
CIS spokeswoman said, however, that the location of the next summit
had yet to be decided.

The organization’s waning relevance was underscored by the coverage on
Russian state television of a squabble that ensued when two leading
Russian newspapers were denied access to the event for "unfavorable
coverage" of Belarus.

Kommersant and Moskovsky Komsomolets were barred from the summit
because they had published "articles and photographs insulting to
the head of the Belarussian state," Pavel Legkiy, a spokesman for
Belarussian President Alexander Lukashenko, told Interfax.

Despite the incident, which stole the spotlight in Minsk, analysts
said Tuesday that CIS summits remained an important forum where
leaders can meet in person.

In Minsk, Armenian President Robert Kocharyan and Azeri President
Ilkham Aliyev discussed the fate of the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh
republic. Armenia and Azerbaijan have been locked in a bitter,
decades-long struggle for the republic, which they both claim.

Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko met with Uzbek President Islam
Karimov to discuss cooperation on energy resources extraction and
shipping, the RBC Ukraine news agency reported.

Saakashvili did not get to meet with Putin, however. The Georgian
president had hoped to make progress on improving ties between the
two countries, he said in televised remarks Monday.

"I don’t want to insult Georgia and the friendly Georgian people …

but relations with Georgia are not a priority for us at the moment,"
Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov said in an interview published this
week in Germany’s Der Spiegel magazine.

Nazarbayev said that while no bilateral meeting was held in Minsk,
Putin and Saakashvili had exchanged opinions during the summit. This
"gives hope" for the warming of Russia-Georgia relations, Nazarbayev
said in televised remarks.

The CIS remains an important platform where heads of state can meet,
but otherwise it lacks relevance, said Alexei Makarkin, deputy general
director of the Moscow-based Center for Political Technologies.

"It lacks a common idea apart from [providing] a civilized divorce,"
Makarkin said. The CIS was established to ease the transition of its
members to independence after the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991.

Konstantin Zatulin, general director of the CIS Institute, said the
organization would remain a functional political force. "The CIS is
first and foremost a political organization," he said.

Zatulin said the CIS would remain active unless Russia were to pull
out, which would not be in Moscow’s interest. He added that Russia
needed to provide incentives to other member states to compensate
for coming gas price hikes.

Defense Minister Ivanov reaffirmed the Kremlin’s stance that Russia
would no longer supply energy to Georgia, Ukraine or other former
Soviet republics at discounted prices.

"Russia is not obliged to foot the bill for any foreign state as it
has, for example, in Ukraine, covering a $6 billion to $7 billion
annual bill," he said.

ARMENIA’S FOREIGN GROSS ASSETS FOR 3RD Q 2006 INCREASE BY 12.31%

Arka News Agency, Armenia –
Nov 29 2006

YEREVAN, November 28. /ARKA/. Foreign gross assets of the Central
Bank of Armenia (CBA) for the third quarter 2006 increased by 12.31%
or by $98,968,439.79 and totaled $902,694,828.5.

The CBA press service reported that the international reserves of
this amount totaled $902,694,098.55, 12.31% increase in the period
under report.

At the same time, the SDR at the IMF totalled 14,799,004.5 or
$21,848,870.19, 76.25% or $9,452,225.07 increase for the a quarter
at the zero reserve position at the IMF. The net foreign assets of
Armenia totaled $625,090,616.72 at the end of the period under report,
10.03% increase in the period under report , $625,135,535.29 of them –
in the freely convertible currency.

Foreign gross assets of the CBA totaled $803,726,388.71 at the
beginning of the third quarter 2006. Of this amount international
reserves totaled $803,725,656.22. The SDR share at the IMF totaled
8,379,685.80 or $$12,396,645.12 at the zero reserve position at the
IMF. Net foreign assets of Armenia at the beginning of the period
under report totaled $568,100,381.51, $568,141,232.89 of them –
in freely convertible currency.

TURKISH BUSINESSMAN THINKS GEORGIA’S PRIVATISATION POLICY IRRESPONSIBLE
By M. Alkhazashvili
(Translated by Tiko Giorgadze)

The Messenger, Georgia
Nov 29 2006

In an interview with newspaper Kviris Palitra, Turkish furniture
manufacturer Sedat Shahinkai says the Georgian government has been
passing irresponsible privatisation policies. According to him,
investors are being selected based on how much they will pay without
regard for how interested they are in establishing a successful
business in the country.

Shahinkai thinks that in using these methods, the Georgian government
will not be able to develop business and establish a strong economy.

He believes that the major defect of Georgia’s economic policy is
to sell state property to companies registered in off-shore zones,
warning that the mistakes in the privatization process will create
problems for the country.

According to Shahinkai, the Laz Diaspora (an ethnic group in Turkey
closely related to the Georgians) have not been able to invest in
Georgia, while Russian and Armenian companies were able to make
serious investments in the Georgian economy.

‘SCREAMERS’ AND GENOCIDE: A TALK WITH SERJ TANKIAN FROM SYSTEM OF A DOWN

Huffington Post, NY
Nov 29 2006

‘Screamers,’ a documentary by Carla Garapedian, just won the Audience
Award at the AFI Film Festival. It uses archival footage, interviews,
and live music to reflect on the Armenian genocide, its aftermath,
and the effect that later denials of the atrocity had on history.

‘Screamers’ examines efforts to have the Armenian genocide
internationally recognized, and ties it to other genocides, past and
present – particularly Darfur.

It’s a powerful document, both politically and artistically.

The film centers around the highly popular Armenian-American rock
band System of a Down and its lead singer, Serj Tankian, as they tour
Europe and discuss the issues of Armenia, genocide, and human rights.

Last week I spoke with Serj about the film and his own political
work. Serj cofounded Axis of Justice with Rage Against the
Machine/Audioslave guitarist Tom Morello, to mobilize musicians and
music fans around progressive issues.

Here are some excerpts from our conversation:

What politicized you? As an Armenian-American, was it your family’s
memories of the Armenian genocide?

It was the denial of genocide, more than the genocide itself,
that politicized me. I was troubled by the idea that this kind of
violence could occur, only to be ignored or covered up. It made me
feel I had to act and react. There are so many things going on in
the world today that are receiving the same treatment – including,
but not limited to Darfur and Rwanda.

In a way, the hypocrisy of the denial is more politicizing than the
act itself. I think that the memory of Armenia’s genocide opened my
eyes at an early age to the existence of political cynicism.

What’s your definition of "genocide"? The diplomatic community has one,
but does the word have a more personal meaning for you?

My thing is figuring out how to put things in a simple way, so here’s
my definition: If someone gets attacked because they look different,
act different, or pray differently, that’s genocide. And if the mass
execution of a people is organized and perpetrated by a government,
that’s definitely genocide.

But anytime people are made to suffer as a group because they’re
different from others – to me, that’s genocide too.

____________

A lot of political leaders, even well-meaning ones, might say that
forcing Turkey to acnowledge the Armenian genocide would limit our
ability to fight terror or do other good things in the world. What
would you say to someone who argues that the genocide took place
almost a century ago, and that they’d rather concentrate on what we
can do today?

Look: Correct recognition of the past affects the present. It’s
as simple as that. If we’re at the point where we’re going to use
genocide as currency to get something we want from another nation …

well, we’re really fucked, aren’t we?

Let me put it another way: You can’t do the wrong thing for the right
reason. It won’t work. It never has.

____________

The movie shows your efforts to get Denny Hastert to advance a
resolution recognizing the Armenian genocide. The film’s equally
rough on the first Bush administration and Clinton’s over this issue.

Do you think the resolution will do any better now that the Democrats
control Congress?;

You mean, are they real reformers or just "corporate Democrats"?

We’ll see. So far everybody’s enjoying the general feeling of optimism,
but Congress hasn’t even convened yet. Nobody’s really "in" over
there right now.

What do you say when people complain about musicians and other
celebrities who speak out about politics?

I agree with them, in a way. What do musicians know that other people
don’t? Nothing. Plumbers can speak. Electricians can speak. Everyone
can speak. They should speak.

Lech Walesa was an electrician, and he became the leader of Poland.

Exactly. Good for him. I don’t want to spend all my time working as
an activist. I don’t get satisfaction out of it. I’d rather be doing
something else. I’m a musician.

I’ve noticed something about people who say they don’t like actors
and musicians having political opinions, if you ask them who they
think was the greatest President eve,r they always answer "Reagan."

And what was Reagan before he went into politics?

(laughs) Exactly. If anybody wants to speak up, they should speak up.

I don’t want to be a politician …

Serj discusses other topics, including the balancing act between music
& politics and how it felt to become the target of jingoistic attacks
after 9/11, here. "Screamers" opens in Los Angeles on December 8.

BOOSTING CIS EFFECTIVENESS WAS AMONG KEY ISSUES – KAZAKH PRES

ITAR-TASS, Russia
Nov 29 2006

MINSK, November 29 (Itar-Tass) -The leaders of the CIS countries
who held a summit in the Belarussian capital, adopted a statement on
stepping up cooperation in fighting illegal migration.

The CIS presidents also signed an agreement on the director of the
CIS antiterrorist center.

The CIS presidents decided to gather for the next top-level meeting
in St.Petersburg, Russia, on June 10, 2007.

Taking part in the ceremony of signing documents at the summit were
the delegations of the CIS states.

CIS executive secretary Vladimir Rushailo said the heads of state had
failed to reach a consensus on border delimitation issues. "The border
issue was raised by Ukraine. At a meeting between the CIS foreign
ministers on October 16, three countries objected to the document
on state borders. Then, in accordance with the Charter, one of these
countries expressed its objection, so the issue has been taken off,"
Rushailo underlined.

Speaking at a summit meeting attended by CIS delegations, Belarussian
President Alexander Lukashenko said Minsk had always been a good floor
for settling all issues and that his country had done everything for
the current summit to be effective and dynamic.

"We have no complaints from all other summiteers," Lukashenko said.

For his part, Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev expressed his
gratitude to the Belarussian leadership and people for kinds words
and hospitality.

"The agenda was packed; in particular, the CIS leaders were discussing
development prospects, improving CIS effectiveness, humanitarian
cooperation and the stepping up of joint work in fighting illegal
migration," Nazarbayev said.

He elaborated on the problem of creating a zone of free trade in the
CIS, acknowledging that the process was making headway with difficulty.

The issues related to the free trade zone have been under consideration
for a long time, with Ukraine raising them persistently.

Ukraine simply assumes that borders should be open. But a free
trade zone implies uniform tariffs and a uniform tax policy. All
the documents should be signed, ratified and become law, the Kazakh
leader underlined.

As of now, 39 decisions have been approved of the 92 necessary for
normal functioning of the free trade zone. Issues are more often
resolved on a bilateral basis. Unlike the CIS, the Eurasian Economic
Community has coordinated up to 70 percent of documents on creating
a free trade zone.

The Kazakh president said a "very good exchange of opinions" had
taken place between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Georgian
President Mikhail Saakashvili.

"It went very calmly, and it gives the hope that the relations between
the countries will improve with assistance by the sides," Nazarbayev
told a news conference.

The president of Kazakhstan, whose country is presiding in the CIS,
said that the Russian-Georgian relations were not on the summit’s
agenda.

He was asked why the Russian and Georgia presidents had not held a
separate meeting.

"It is not convenient for me to comment my counterparts, this is their
question. This meeting is outside the CIS framework. On the whole, a
very good exchange of opinions has taken place at the summit /between
the Russian and Georgian presidents/," Nazarbayev said.

For his part, CIS executive secretary Vladimir Rushailo, answering the
question about a future participation of Georgia, said this country
had not sent any official document to the CIS administration stating
its intention to withdraw from the organization.

"We haven’t received any statements from Georgia on its intention
to withdraw from the Commonwealth. I wouldn’t like to comment on
politicians’ statements, especially because they’ve been voiced for
the past eight to ten years," Rushailo said.

Azerbaijan’s president Ilkham Aliyev and his Armenian counterpart
Robert Kocharian met after the CIS summit on Tuesday at the Russian
embassy in Minsk, to discuss a settlement of the Nagorno Karabakh
conflict.

The two leaders met one-on-one. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov
opened the talks.

The summit was somewhat overshadowed by Belarus’ decision to bar
several reporters from covering the event. Kremlin journalists then
left the summit venue in protest, saying Minsk’s decision was not
justified. They informed the press office of the Russian president
about their decision, which unsuccessfully attempted to resolve
the problem.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress