Month: March 2007

The Ranger, TX
March 23 2007

Professor shares Holocaust experiences
By Ryan Johnston

The entire nation of Germany took part in discriminating against
minorities during the Holocaust, especially Jews, who were considered
inferior and unworthy of living, a Holocaust survivor said March 6 at
the Methodist Student Center.

Dr. William Samelson, professor emeritus in the foreign languages
department, lectured on his experience during and after the Holocaust
in a session titled "Anti-Judaism, Political Racism and Final
Solution."

This was the first of four lectures in a series at the center, "The
Holocaust: Let Us Remember!"

"Nobody knows how they were convinced on how we were at the bottom of
the ladder," he said.

"They believed racial purity existed."

He was born and reared in Poland until age 11 when he was captured by
Nazis and taken to Buchenwald concentration camp where he spent 3 1/2
years.

He was liberated by the U.S. Army in 1945 and emigrated to the United
States in 1948. He and his brother are the only survivors from his
family.

He also has written books on the Holocaust including, "Warning and
Hope: The Nazi Murder of European Jewry" and his memoir titled, "One
Bridge to Life."

Samelson told the group Hitler thought a "super-race" was composed of
blond, blue-eyed, 6-foot-tall men. The Nazis used measurements in the
skull, nose and cheeks to determine the superior from the inferior.

He recalled that he still has a textbook from high school that shows
how they made the measurements to determine superiority.

"Genocide is political racism," he said.

On the topic of genocide and how it started, he said that in 1913,
Turkey decided Armenians were inferior. More than 1 million people
were killed, including women and babies. Columns of 50 to 60 people
were brought into the streets and shot with machine guns.

During World War II, more than 52 million noncombatants were killed,
he said. More than 6 million of those were Jewish, and more than 1
million were children.

He recalled that propaganda films and photographs of people being
brought to gas chambers and killed were shown to prominent figures in
the Nazi party.

"These people were clapping during the films," he said. "They thought
they were doing away with the vermin. What do we do with vermin? We
kill them."

After his years in the concentration camp, he said he distrusted
society and that his tutor brought him to think otherwise.

"She injected that you cannot live with hate," he said. "That hate is
not a good reason for survival, but that love is."

Following his studies, he decided that he wanted to teach German
language and literature.

"There was a lot of beauty in German culture," he said. "All of that
was banished by Hitler."

The center will take students to the Holocaust Library at the Jewish
Community Center, 12500 N.W. Military Hwy., from 3 p.m.-5 p.m March
29 and Samelson will lead a seder meal at 6 p.m. April 3 at the
Methodist Student Center.

rage/paper1010/news/2007/03/23/News/Professor.Shar es.Holocaust.Experiences-2787792.shtml

Today’s Zaman, Turkey
March 23 2007

Controversy over cross grows amid church’s reopening

In advance of the opening of the newly restored Armenian Akhtamar
Church on Lake Van, a new controversy has emerged in Ankara over
whether or not the church’s steeple should have a metal cross placed
on it.

Akhtamar Church has undergone restoration that was undertaken at the
behest of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Minister of Culture
and Tourism Atilla Koc. The church will be reopened to the public at
a special ceremony on March 29.

Meanwhile, Patriarch Mesrob II, the spiritual leader of the Armenian
Orthodox community in Turkey, has sent a written request to the
Culture and Tourism Ministry asking that a cross, prepared by the
Armenian Patriarchate itself, be placed on the steeple of the
Akhtamar Church. The sentiments in the letter from Partriarch Mesrob
are echoed in a similar letter sent by a group of Armenian
intellectuals and artists to the ministry.

With no answer yet forthcoming regarding what is to be done about the
cross, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism has reportedly sent
letters to the Foreign Ministry to obtain further views on the
matter. Whether or not the cross will be placed atop Akhtamar Church
in advance of the March 29 opening appears to depend on the views on
this matter expressed by authorities at the Foreign Ministry.

While the Ministry of Culture and Tourism intends for the
1,100-year-old church on Lake Van’s Akhtamar Island to be opened to
the public as a "museum," the Armenian community is pressing for the
church to be available for religious services. On the subject of the
placement of the metal cross atop the church, Patriarch Mesrob
references past photographs of the historical church as the reason
why the ministry should allow the cross to be placed there.

"A cross can be clearly seen on the steeple of the church in all old
photographs of it." The official name of the church also arises in
the content of Mesrob’s letter, with the patriarch referring to the
church as " Lake Van’s Agtamar Island Surp Hac Armenian Church."

Within this framework, the Armenian patriarch also suggests that
annual September Sacred Cross Festival be called the Agtamar
Festival, noting that this would have the additional advantage of
drawing local and foreign tourists to the area, with choral groups
from Istanbul and folkloric dancers from Van adding to the content of
the festival.

The patriarch’s letter also focuses on the possible religious
services that might take place at Akhtamar Church during the Sacred
Cross Festival, explaining, "There could be a religious service in
the church’s old nave, followed by choral groups and folklore
groups."

Patriarch Mesrob’s letter ends by noting that he is "praying to dear
Allah for the continued success" of the ministry’s restoration
efforts. In a separate letter on the subject, a group of Armenian
intellectuals and artists request that Akhtamar Church, which they
refer to as "Ahdamar Church," be turned over permanently to the
Armenian community in Turkey. They also note that a cross similar to
the one found on the church must be placed there again, and that even
if the church is not to be opened for religious services, the cross
must still be placed there as a part of restoration efforts.

Oskanian defiant

Representing Armenia at the March 29 opening of the restored Van Lake
Akhtamar Church will be Armenia’s Deputy Minister of Culture and
Youth Affairs Gagik Gurijian.

Speaking Thursday at a press conference, Armenian Foreign Minister
Vartan Oskanian said that Turkey was attempting to influence the
international community by holding a public opening of Akhtamar
Church. Oskanian also reiterated that in order for relations between
the two countries to normalize, Turkey needed to open its borders
with Armenia. Akhtamar Church was built by architect Kesis Manuel on
the orders of Armenian King Gakik I between AD 915-921. The church
has a central dome with four leaf-like wings coming out in a cross
shape. It is made of red "tufa" brick.

23.03.2007

BAHTÝYAR KÜÇÜK

Daily Times, Pakistan
March 23 2007

EDITORIAL: Chirac, Bush and Musharraf: overstaying their welcome?

President Jacques Chirac of France has retired from politics after
two terms in office. The ambience in which he leaves says he did not
live up to his promises, that he spoke big words but was half-cocked
and ambivalent when it came to implementing them. In France,
presidents are elected for six-year terms, and he had his two terms,
meaning that the French people still thought he could do something
for them after a lacklustre first term. But he leaves France at the
bottom of the economic heap among the big six who conceived the idea
of Europe as a super-state at Rome fifty years ago.

In 2003 when Mr Chirac opposed President Bush’s planned invasion of
Iraq, his popular rating was over 60 percent; today it is less than
half that because France has malfunctioned economically and the
population is scared stiff of the high rate of unemployment and the
social unrest it has brought in its wake. In foreign policy, though,
he formed the opposite pole in Europe to President Bush and reached
out to President Vladimir Putin of Russia to check the US at the
global level.

The good side of Mr Chirac will, alas, be clouded by his failure to
take the tough decisions on the French economy. He is a connoisseur
of the non-Western world and is a collector of no mean stature of
third world artefacts. It is a commentary on his enduring ambiguity
that while the French government passed new laws against Turkey (via
punishing those who deny the massacre of the Armenians by the Turks)
he stood for the inclusion of Turkey in the European Union. His
sympathy for the Arabs went hand in hand with his intense dislike of
those who hate the Jews in France. It was his knowledge of the Arab
world that inclined him to oppose Mr Bush’s adventure in Iraq. And he
was soon proved right.

We must understand President Chirac’s ambivalence closely to
understand another president in Pakistan whose lack of clear
direction has brought him to the end of his tether. Was Chirac from
the Left? Yes, once he was. Was he a centrist? He was that too. Did
he favour economic reform in France to wean its people away from
dirigisme or a high-spending, high-taxing state? Yes, he wanted that.
Was he in favour of following the more successful model of the United
Kingdom with low-taxation and low unemployment? No, he thought
Britain’s laissez-faire was not for France. He said reform was
unavoidable; but he also said all was already in perfect equilibrium
and needed little change.

Mr Chirac was 30 years in government in one ministerial capacity or
the other; he was prime minister under a declining earlier president;
he was once the mayor of Paris too. What was the secret of his
electoral success? A constantly flexible approach that gave him space
for movement but satisfied no one completely. His ideological
incoherence and his political opportunism became his trademark
towards the end. An earlier president, Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, has
written that Mr Chirac betrayed his own partyman to support him in
1974, but then ditched him in 1981 to make Mr François Mitterrand
oust him from the presidency.

It seems that this decade is not of the presidents. Neither Mr Putin
in Russia nor Mr Bush in the United States is the ideal ruler. In one
case, the unpopularity is being concealed behind strong-arm
governance and nationalism; and in the other, the people have already
expressed a negative view electorally in 2006. The other president in
trouble is President Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan who chose to be
ideologically incoherent just like Mr Chirac and has ended up, after
seven years in power, being constitutionally incoherent too. That was
not how it started.

President Musharraf kicked off very upbeat and in step with the
aspirations of a nation tired of war and economic downturn under
elected governments. He was also a relatively liberal ruler and
promised to bring solace to a civil society increasingly bullied by
extremists empowered by the state earlier. But the dualism was
manifest quite early in his governance. He declared himself a
`moderate’ who was determined to bring the country back to its normal
state. But in the same breath he ruled out any cooperation with the
liberal mainstream political parties to give himself a leg-up in an
environment that was beginning to challenge his legitimacy.

General Musharraf’s efforts to relieve the hunted minorities were
undermined by persisting duality. He wanted to please everyone. He
thought he could rule in tandem with a party that did not believe in
his liberal worldview and ended up dividing it ideologically.
Although he vowed he was a transitional figure he never sought to put
together a national government of a liberal orientation that could
ease him out of his heavy responsibility through proper
representation and also relieve foreign pressures on Islamabad. The
result was that most of his undertakings floundered just like Mr
Chirac’s, starting with Kalabagh Dam and ending with Balochistan.

President Musharraf lifted the economy from its trough but he could
never establish law and order long enough to attract domestic or
foreign investments. He fought extremism but it actually increased on
his watch and Pakistan was reduced to a killing field of sectarian
violence as never before. People who welcomed him to power never
wanted him to become besieged as he is today. Now they wonder at the
admixture of courage and ambivalence in his person and want him to
come out of his trance.

Mr Chirac is gone, Mr Bush will go in 2008. Both are embedded in the
systems created for them by their constitutions. Both belong to
countries with great economic potential and consequent political
flexibility. In the case of Pakistan, the future is uncertain once
again. If the ten-year trough should strike again, unfortunately
another leader will be accused of not using his window of opportunity
wisely. *

%5C03%5C23%5Cstory_23-3-2007_pg3_1

Turkish Press
March 23 2007

Rice Defends Turkey Against Armenian Lobby
Published: 3/22/2007

WASHINGTON – U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on
Wednesday that Turkey experiences democratization regarding debates
over Armenian issue in history.
Rice spoke at a committee meeting in the U.S. House of
Representatives under insistent questions by a Democratic Rep. Adam
Schiff who prepared a bill on so-called Armenian genocide.

"What we`ve encouraged the Turks and the Armenians to do is to have
joint historical commissions that can look at this, to have efforts
to examine their past, and in examining their past to get over it,"
Rice said.

"I do not think it helps that process of reconciliation for the
United States to enter this debate at that level," she added.

Rice supported Turkey`s arguments saying history should be examined
by historians.

Schiff reminded that Hrant Dink (Turkish-Armenian editor of a
bilingual weekly) was killed, Nobel-winning novelist Orhan Pamuk was
tried in Turkey and claimed that Turkey does not have any efforts for
reconciliation.

Rice responded to Schiff saying that Turkish people staged
demonstrations and embraced Armenians after killing of Dink. Rice
also stated that there is an ongoing evolution in Turkey which she
called a good ally.

Turkish Press
March 23 2007

TUSIAD On Bill On So-called Armenian Genocide
Published: 3/22/2007

WASHINGTON D.C. – "The climate is better when compared with two
months ago, but this matter has not been put aside yet," said Arzuhan
Dogan Yalcindag, the Chairperson of the Executive Board of Turkish
Industrialists` & Businessmen`s Association (TUSIAD) when commenting
on the bill on the so-called Armenian genocide, submitted to the U.S.
Congress.
In a press conference in Washington D.C., after lobbying against the
bill, Yalcindag noted that recent initiatives of Turkey have been
effective.

Yalcindag said that they met executives of the U.S. Department of
State and two think- tank organizations, and told them that this
matter should be left to historians.

Qualifying the bill as "a black cloud" on Turkish-American relations,
Yalcindag said that these dark clouds should be dispersed in order to
enhance Turkish-Armenian relations.

"We have seen that they can understand us and perceive our
sensitivities better," she stated.

-ECONOMIC RELATIONS-

On the other hand, Yalcindag recalled that the TUSIAD delegation also
had meetings with the executives of the International Monetary Fund
(IMF) in Washington D.C, and said that the IMF drew attention to
inflation in Turkey.

"Reaching the target set in the fight against inflation requires a
firm monetary and budgetary policy. We share these views," she noted.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Glendale News Press, CA
March 23 2007

POLITICAL LANDSCAPE:
Focus on genocide in Congress

Rep. Adam Schiff, who represents Glendale and Burbank, pressured
Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice about the State Department’s
stance on the Armenian genocide at a House Appropriations hearing
subcommittee hearing on Wednesday.

Though administration officials frequently acknowledge the mass
killings of Armenians in 1915, the State Department does not
officially recognize the events as genocide.

Rice and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates sent a letter to chairs of
certain Congressional committees stating their opposition to
recognizing the Armenian genocide on March 7, which prompted Schiff
to broach the topic on Wednesday, he said.

"Do you have any doubt in your mind that the murder of 1.5 million
Armenians between 1915 and 1923 constituted genocide?" Schiff said,
speaking directly to Rice, who was speaking before the subcommittee
on State, Foreign Operations and Related Programs on budget matters.

Without saying directly whether the events constituted genocide, Rice
stated repeatedly that the issue should be dealt with by the Turkish
and Armenian governments.

"I think that the best way to have this proceed is for the United
States not to be in the position of making this judgment, but rather
for the Turks and the Armenians to come to their own terms about
this," Rice said.

The exchange between Schiff and Rice happened on the same day that
the House Financial Services Committee debated a bill – the
Accountability and Divestment in Darfur Act – that would prohibit
United States government contracts with companies that conduct
business operations in Sudan.

Bryan Ardouny, executive director of the Armenian Assembly of
America, provided testimony at the hearing in support of the bill.

"Armenian Americans, as descendants of the survivors of the Armenian
genocide, cannot remain indifferent to the suffering of the people of
Darfur," Ardouny said.

The State Department’s recognition of the genocide in Sudan and
simultaneous opposition to recognizing the Armenian genocide sends a
mixed message, Schiff said.

"I don’t see how we can have the moral authority that we need to
condemn the genocide going on in Darfur if we’re unwilling to
recognize other genocides that have taken place," he said.

Endorsements announced

The Armenian Council of America, a federally registered political
action committee, has announced its endorsements for the April 3
Glendale municipal elections.

For the Glendale City Council, the group endorsed current Glendale
Unified School District board member Greg Krikorian and former Public
Information Officer for the Glendale Police Department Chahe
Keuroghelian.

"We need city councilmen that will listen to the people," said Peter
Darakjian, executive director of the Armenian Council of America.
"[Krikorian and Keuroghelian’s] management style is to listen to the
people and then make a decision."

For the Glendale Unified School District governing board, the group
endorsed candidate Elizabeth Manasserian. Manasserian is one of six
candidates running for two open seats on the board.

Tony Tartaglia won the group’s endorsement for the Glendale Community
College Board of Trustees race, which has three candidates vying for
two open seats.

The Armenian Council of America endorsements were made by the group’s
nine-member board of directors, Darakjian said. The group announced
the endorsements on March 7.

College Guild makes endorsement

The Glendale College Guild, which represents faculty at Glendale
Community College, has endorsed Glendale Community College Board of
Trustees candidate Christine Rodriguez.

Currently a full-time professor at East Los Angeles College,
Rodriguez is a former member of the Glendale College Guild. She is
also a practicing labor lawyer.

Senator keeps an eye on college spending

State Sen. Jack Scott, who represents Glendale and Burbank, chaired a
joint hearing of the Senate Education Committee and the Senate Budget
Subcommittee on Education on Wednesday regarding executive spending
practices at the University of California and the California State
University.

The hearing is part of an effort by the Budget Subcommittee to crack
down on state education institutions’ practice of not disclosing the
financial perks they give to school executives.

It was revealed at a Senate Education Committee hearing last year
that the University of California spent tens of thousands of dollars
in bonuses and perks for some executives without fully disclosing
them, said Wendy Gordon, press aid to Scott.

"It is the public’s money, after all, and [Scott] would like to see
the University of California and California State University make
sure that there is transparency in programs for top executives,"
Gordon said.

On Thursday, the committees heard testimony from Robert Dynes,
president of the University of California, and Chancellor Charles
Reed of California State University.

Both leaders reported changes in executive compensation practices
since last year’s hearing.

Reed reported that a California State University program that
entitled departing executives to one year’s salary when they retired
or quit, regardless of whether they started a new job, is no longer
applicable, Gordon said.

Policy changes within the University of California include a new rule
that restricts future campus presidents from sitting on more than
three outside corporate boards. Current presidents who serve on more
than three outside boards will not be bound by the rule, Gordon said.

ITAR-TASS News Agency, Russia
March 23, 2007 Friday 04:07 PM EST

Russia, Georgia coordinating final phase of bases’ pullout

Georgia and Russia are coordinating the final phase of the pullout of
Russian military bases from Batumi and Akhalkalaki.

Representatives of the Georgian Defense Ministry, the Russian Forces
in the South Caucasus and the Russian embassy convened in Tbilisi on
Friday.

Officials from the Georgian Interior Ministry, the Justice Ministry
and some other departments supervising the bases’ pullout also
attended the meeting, the Georgian Defense Ministry said.

“Deputy Chief of the General Staff Vladimir Chachibaya is the
Georgian representative in the joint operative and technical group,
while his Russian counterpart is 12th Batumi base commander Anatoly
Danilov,” the ministry said.

Sources at the Russian bases in Batumi and Akhalkalaki told Itar-Tass
on Friday that the pullout will resume in April.

According to the bilateral agreements, the Batumi base will close by
October 1, 2008, while the Akhalkalaki base will cease to exist by
October 1, 2007.

All heavy materiel and armaments were withdrawal from Akhalkalaki to
Russia and Russia’s military base in the Armenian city of Gyumri last
year.

The remaining vehicles and servicemen will leave Akhalkalaki this
year.

Hardware, armaments and the overwhelming majority of servicemen from
the Tbilisi garrison of the Russian Forces in the South Caucasus were
withdrawn last year. A small group of garrison officers is
supervising the bases’ pullout from Tbilisi.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

ITAR-TASS News Agency, Russia
March 23, 2007 Friday

Karabakh president wants break in his political career

President of the unrecognized Karabakh Republic Arkady Gukasian said
in Yerevan on Friday that he would like to take a break in his
political career.

His second term of office will expire this year.

Gukasian, 49, said he had rejected prospective job offers from
Armenia and decided to stay in Karabakh.

Karabakh political parties are holding consultations, and
pro-presidential forces may have a common candidate for president, he
said.

In his opinion, there will be three or four presidential candidates
in Karabakh.

Gukasian has said many times that he will not run for the third term
of office.

ITAR-TASS News Agency, Russia
March 23, 2007 Friday

Prosecutors charge 2 Moscow students with terrorism

Moscow prosecutors on Friday charged two students of city law schools
with staging an explosion at a gambling machines hall.

Dmitry Fedoseyenko and Nikolai Kachalov, both aged 20, are also
suspects in the criminal case over the explosion at the city’s
Cherkizovsky market on August 21, 2006, in which ten people were
killed an another 55 were injured, city prosecutors said.

“Investigators say Kachalov and Fedoseyenkov were part of the
criminal group which committed the crime, but were not directly
involved in preparing and perpetrating it,” the prosecutors said.

As of now, six people are facing criminal responsibility in the case.

“The investigators have ascertained their involvement in a series of
explosions: in a dormitory in Podyemnaya Street, the Neolit cafe, a
garbage bin in Proyezd Dezhneva Street, a gambling machines hall, the
editorial office of the Russky Vestnik newspaper, the Liliana medical
center, the kiosk in Ostrovityanova Street, near an apartment
building in Yakhroma, Moscow region, as well as in the murder of an
ethnic Armenian at the Pushkinskaya subway station,” according to
the prosecutors.

Moscow’s Zamoskvoretsky court sanctioned the arrest of the students
earlier on Friday.

During the Friday hearing, Kachalov partially admitted his guilt, but
stated that the qualification of the crimes he has been charged with
was “illegitimate and ungrounded.”

“I confess to staging an explosion, but it wasn’t terrorism. In
addition, I state that I set on fire a package of explosives under
the threat of physical violence by Kostyrev and Tinkov /accused of
staging the blast at Moscow’s Cherkizovsky market/, who threatened me
and my relatives,” Kachalov told the court.

Meanwhile, other defendant Dmitry Fedoseyenkov, insisting on his
innocence, stated that investigators had put psychological pressure
on him.

“The criminal case was opened in August 2006, I’ve lived in my house
all the time, found a job, and entered a college; consequently, I’m
not going into hiding; furthermore, I pledge to turn up for all
investigative actions,” Fedoseyenkov said.

His lawyer said the Fedoseyenkov’s being in custody might affect his
health and psychological condition.

But the court agreed with the prosecutors citing that “the
defendants, if freed, may flee the investigation, influence it or
thwart investigative actions.”

“Today’s ruling by the court is indescribable; there’re no ground
for keeping them in custody,” Kachalov’s lawyer Andrei Yakovlev told
Itar-Tass, adding that he would certainly appeal this decision.

The students were detained in central Moscow by FSB agents on March
21, as part of the probe into the explosion on the Cherkizovsky
market.

Fedoseyenkov and Kachalov have also been charged with involvement in
the explosion by the gaming machines hall near the Bratislavskaya
subway station.

In addition, Fedoseyenkov is believed to have been behind the blast
near a trade pavilion in Proyezd Dezhneva.

If found guilty, the students may face up to life imprisonment.

ITAR-TASS News Agency, Russia
March 23, 2007 Friday

Media advisory: Interparliamentary commission to hold session at FC

The Interparliamentary Commission for Cooperation of the Federal
Assembly of the Russian Federation and the National Assembly of the
Republic of Armenia will hold a meeting at the Federation Council
(26, Bolshaya Yakimanka Street, room 701) at 10.00 on Monday, March
26.

Admission is by accreditation cards of the Russian Foreign Ministry.

The Federation Council Press service telephone: 692-5604, 692-1877,
692-7525.

Fax: 692-4305.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress