Month: April 2007

VARDAN OSKANIAN: THE DOCUMENT ON THE SETTLEMENT OF THE CONFLICT IS VERY BALANCED

Azeri Press Agency, Azerbaijan
April 20 2007

"Great majority of the principles for the settlement of the
Nagorno-Karabakh conflict have been agreed," Armenian Foreign Minister
Vardan Oskanian stated in a press conference.

He stated that his latest statement "the parties have never been
so close to the solution of the conflict" should be assessed in the
context of comparison.

"I compare this document to all the previous ones that have ever been
presented by the co-chairs in the past 10-12 years, and this document
content-wise is very balanced and very reasonable," he said. "And
that is why I think this document should provide a promise for making
further progress in our talks."

Oskanian made his comments after meeting his Azerbaijani counterpart,
Elmar Mammadyarov, and the Minsk Group co-chairs in Belgrade.

Oskanian said the meeting focused on suggestions the co-chairs had to
resolve outstanding differences between the Armenian and Azerbaijani
side.

Oskanian described the meeting as "constructive" and "businesslike."

He added it was "much more relaxed and well-intended" than a similar
meeting in Geneva.

"Sometimes, me or Elmar Mammadyarov state that we cannot present the
suggestions to the heads of state. But now the suggestions can be
presented to the presidents," Oskanian said.

The Armenian minister added the next meeting between the foreign
ministers has not been scheduled.

"The co-chairs are much likely to meet with the foreign ministers
by the parliamentary elections. They most probably visit the region
after the elections to discuss the proposals in detail," he said.

EU AGREES IT SHOULD BE A CRIME TO DENY THE HOLOCAUST
By Dan Bilefsky, International Herald Tribune

Boston Globe, MA
April 20 2007

But draft rapped as watered down

BRUSSELS — The European Union approved legislation yesterday that
would make denying the Holocaust punishable by jail sentences, but
would give countries across the 27-member bloc the option of not
enforcing the law if such a prohibition did not exist in their own laws

The draft law, which EU diplomats called a minimalist compromise,
gained approval after six years of emotional negotiations, during
which countries with vastly different legal cultures struggled to
reconcile the protection of freedom of speech with protection of
their citizens from racism and hate crimes.

The legislation calls for jail terms of as much as three years for
"intentional conduct" that incites violence or hatred against a
person’s "race, color, religion, descent, or national or ethnic
origin." The same punishment would apply to those who incite violence
by "denying or grossly trivializing crimes of genocide, crimes against
humanity, and war crimes."

EU officials said that the law was notable for what it omitted.

Fearing that the legislation could be hijacked by groups trying to
right historical wrongs, a majority of EU countries rejected a demand
by the formerly communist Baltic countries that the law criminalize
the denial of atrocities committed by Stalin during Soviet times. As
a political gesture, however, Franco Frattini, the EU’s justice
commissioner, said the EU would organize public hearings on the
"horrible crimes" of the Stalin era in the coming months.

The scope of the law also does not cover other historical events,
like the massacre of Armenians during World War I by Ottoman Turks,
which Armenians call a genocide. Instead, the legislation recognized
only genocides that fall under the statutes of the International
Criminal Court in The Hague, like the mass killing of Jews during
World War II and the massacre in Rwanda in 1994.

There will be no Europe-wide ban on the use of Nazi symbols, one of
the original intentions of the law’s drafters, which gained force
two years ago after the release of photographs of Prince Harry of
Britain wearing a swastika armband at a costume party.

EU officials involved in the drafting of the law, which needed
unanimous approval, said consensus had been achieved by allowing
national laws to take precedence. Britain, Sweden, and Denmark,
which have particularly libertarian traditions, pressed for wording
that would avoid criminalizing debates about the Holocaust and
would ensure that films and plays about the Holocaust, like Roberto
Benigni’s award-winning "Life is Beautiful" and Mel Brooks’s musical
"The Producers," were not censored.

The legislation also states that individual countries’ constitutional
protections of freedom of speech would be upheld. The provision would,
for example, allow publishing caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed in
Denmark, where freedom of speech is enshrined in the constitution.

Denmark and Britain also pressed successfully for a provision to
ensure that attacks on religions are covered only when they are of
a xenophobic or racist nature.

Anti racism groups said the law had been watered down to the point of
rendering it unenforceable . Michael Privot, spokesman for the European
Network Against Racism, said, for example, that a person publishing a
pamphlet denying the Holocaust could do so with impunity in Britain,
while still facing prosecution in France. "We have ended up with a
lowest common denominator law," he said.

Laws against denying the Holocaust exist in Austria, Belgium, France,
Germany, and Spain, and in many cases the national legislation goes
much further than the new EU rules. In a recent high-profile case,
the British historian David Irving spent 13 months in jail in Austria
for challenging the Holocaust before being released in December.

Two years ago, Luxembourg tried to use its EU presidency to push
through Europe-wide antiracism legislation, but it was blocked by
the center-right government then in power in Italy on the grounds
that it threatened freedom of speech. The proposed law was considered
too politically difficult to pass until it was taken up by Germany,
current holder of the EU’s rotating presidency, which has called it
a historical obligation and a moral imperative.

Friso Roscam Abbing, spokesman for Frattini, the EU’s justice
commissioner, said it was inevitable that the bill was diluted, given
the need to reconcile so many different political and legal cultures.

But he added: "We still think it is useful and sends a strong political
signal that there is no safe haven in Europe for racism, anti-Semitism,
or Islam-phobia."

But Muslim leaders accused the EU of having double standards,
arguing that it protects established Christian religions and outlaws
anti-Semitism while doing nothing to defend Muslims against defamation.

SYRIA – ANCIENT GLORIES, MODERN CONFLICTS

Middle East Times, Egypt
April 20 2007

DAMASCUS — Syria, where parliamentary elections take place Sunday,
is a country steeped in human history that today remains embroiled
in some of the world’s most intractable dramas.

In addition to the decades-long conflict with Israel to the south and
continuing controversy over its role in Lebanon to the west, Syria
has since 2003 found itself on the frontlines of the US-initiated
war in Iraq, to its east.

A brief factfile:

HISTORY: Since ancient times what is today Syria has been ruled,
among others, by the Persians, the Greeks, the Romans, the Byzantines,
and a series of Islamic empires concluding with the Ottoman, which
collapsed in the early 20th century.

The country is home to many historic sites, and it was on the road to
its capital Damascus – one of the oldest cities in the world – that
the Christian apostle Saint Paul "saw the light" and became converted.

Syria’s modern borders were defined after World War I, when it came
under French administration and was shorn of several territories
including what is today Lebanon.

Independence after World War II brought a series of coups, culminating
with a military regime under Hafez Al Assad, whose son Bashar Al
Assad succeeded him on his death in 2000 and is still in power today.

Under the elder Assad, Syria was for many years close to the Soviet
Union and professed strong Arab nationalism, although a split with the
dominant party in neighboring in Iraq led it to form a long-lasting
alliance with Iran.

In the 1967 Arab-Israeli war Syria lost the strategic Golan Heights to
Israel. A decade later Assad’s military intervention in Lebanon was at
first welcomed by the West but later turned sour, ending only in 2005.

Since 2004 the United States has imposed economic sanctions on Syria,
accusing it of supporting terrorism.

In recent years Syria has taken in some 1 million Iraqi refugees,
fleeing the effects of the US-led invasion of 2003.

GEOGRAPHY AND POPULATION: At 185,000 square kilometers (71,000 square
miles), Syria is slightly smaller than Britain. It has a population
of 19 million, almost all Arabs, with small Armenian and Kurdish
minorities.

ECONOMY: Syria has modest amounts of oil, and farming accounts for
around one-third of its gross domestic product (GDP). The World Bank
classifies Syria as a middle income country, with a per capita GDP
of $1,200 in 2006.

ARMENIA AND AZERBAIJAN CLOSE TO RESOLVING NAGORNO-KARABAKH ISSUE : ARMENIAN ACTING FOREIGN MINISTER

Trend News Agency, Azerbaijan
April 20 2007

Azerbaijan, Baku/ Trend / Vardan Oskanian, Armenia’s Acting Foreign
Minister, has stated during the joint press conference being held with
his Latvian counterpart, Artis Pabriks in Yerevan today that Armenia
and Azerbaijan are close to resolving the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

"While comparing the document, which is presently on the negotiations
table together with the previous documents, it is evident that the
document is more realistic for both disputing parties. The principles
that are included in the document have been more balanced. In addition,
the overwhelming majority of approaches to the issue have been agreed
by the both parties. We are really close to settling this conflict,"
he stated, Trend reports referring to ARKA.

At the same time, the Head of the Armenian Foreign Ministry noted
that there were some approaches and principles left disagreed by
the disputing parties, but these are to be agreed during the meeting
between the Presidents of the two states. "Only after that, it will
become clear whether the peaceful negotiations will progress or not,"
he added.

Commenting on his last meeting with his Azerbaijani counterpart,
Elmar Mammadyarov, Mr. Oskanian refused to comment by stating that
"the time has not yet come to do it". However, during the last meeting
with his Azerbaijani counterpart he did say that the next date for
negotiations between the two Heads of the Foreign Offices of the two
countries had not been determined.

"No agreement was reached on the next forthcoming meeting. However,
the OSCE Minsk Co-Chairmen will certainly visit the region to become
acquainted with the situation there and prepare a ground for the
meeting between the two Presidents prior to the Armenian parliamentary
elections to be held on 12 May" stated Mr. Oskanian.

Notably, the last meeting was between the Armenian and Azerbaijani
Foreign Ministers held in Belgrade on 18 April where both Ministries
participated in the sixteenth meeting of Foreign Ministries of
BSEC (Black Sea Economic Cooperation). All the OSCE Minsk Group
Co-Chairmen, namely Matthew Bryza (U.S.A.), Yuriy Merzlyakov (
Russia), and Bernard Fassier ( France), as well as Andjey Kaspshik,
the Personal Representative of the OSCE Chairman-in-Office participated
in the meeting between the Foreign Ministries of the disputing parties.

During the discussions held, the Minsk Group Co-Chairmen put forward
some proposals to the disputing parties emphasizing a number of issues,
which have been not been agreed within the principles being presently
viewed by the parties.

CYPRUS BANS ARMENIAN JERMUK WATER

Financial Mirror, Cyprus
April 20 2007

The Cyprus Health Services said that a brand of mineral water from
Armenia was harmful to the health of consumers and was to be withdrawn
from the market immediately. A statement said consumers should not
drink the water bottled under the name Jermuk Group with an expiry
date of November 15, 2008. The water comes in a half litre green
glass bottle, and the importers have been asked to withdraw it from
the market.

The ruling follows a similar move by the authorities in the US,
where the same make was banned.

ARMENIAN GOVERNMENT TO OUST VEDANTA FROM ZOD GOLD MINE
Author: John Helmer

Mineweb, South Africa
April 20 2007
MOSCOW

Armenia reckons that Vedanta is trying to sell out its Zod gold mining
operations before it may revoke the mining licenses altogether.

The Armenian government is furious at the Vedanta group in London,
headed by Anil Agarwal, for attempting to sell the rights to the Zod
gold mine and other gold prospects in Armenia. Evidence of the sale
attempt has been obtained in Yerevan, the Armenian capital, where
a ministerial recommendation is pending at the presidential office
to revoke the Zod licences, and oust Agarwal. The latter claims,
through a spokesman, that the sale is no more than a "rumour", and
no disclosure has been made to shareholders.

According to sources in Yerevan, senior government officials learned
recently that Vedanta has called for bids for the Armenian gold
assets, which Vedanta controls through its Canadian-listed subsidiary,
Sterlite Gold (SGD-T is the Canadian stock ticker).

These include two mines, Zod and Meghradzor, and a processing plant
at Ararat. The officials have already called a halt to mining at
Zod, and a criminal investigation has been opened into charges that
Sterlite and Vedanta have been engaged in a variety of allegedly
unlawful gold operations.

All Sterlite’s minority shareholders have been told to date is that
they may sell their shares to Vedanta at a price that appears to be
lower than the value Agarwal is asking for the assets themselves.

The Armenians believe they alone have the authority to award the
goldmine and prospecting licences; and that the decision on who will
take over Zod will be made in Yerevan, not in London, where Agarwal
has his headquarters.

The ministerial recommendation to revoke the licences cites several
charges, including under-fulfilment of the required mining volumes,
under-counting of gold reserves and output, and shorting payments to
the state budget.

The Armenians say they don’t yet know to whom Vedanta has been trying
to sell the assets. But they suspect Vedanta has not disclosed to
potential buyers the full extent of the sanctions already imposed
on Sterlite. These include a freeze on the bank accounts of the mine
operating company, Ararat Gold Recovery Company (ARGC), and a refusal
to re-register and confirm the licences, on which mining operations
depend. For practical purposes, ARGC, Sterlite and Vedanta can no
longer operate in Armenia.

Sterlite’s disclosures to its shareholders have been limited. The
latest production details released by the company for the Armenian
operations refer to the years 2004 and 2005. No results for the full
year of 2006 appear to have been issued.

The latest operations summary on Sterlite’s website refers to a
February 2002 implementation agreement, according to which Sterlite
risks the forfeit of its ARGC licences, if gold production is halted.

Sterlite’s report says: "The Implementation Agreement stipulates that
should AGRC terminate work either in Zod, Meghradzor or Ararat for
a period exceeding three successive months other than for economic
and business circumstances or for reasons beyond the control of
Sterlite, then Sterlite either must relinquish its mining rights to
the Government or pay the Government an amount of $50,000 for each
month of stoppage beyond the initial three months."

Sources in Yerevan told Mineweb that an application from ARGC to renew
and extend this implementation agreement has not been agreed by the
government. Instead, the sources say, the government has invited
Russian state and commercial interest in acquiring the licences,
and redeveloping the project.

A letter from Russian Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin to Armenian
President Robert Kocharyan recently called for Russian involvement
and assistance to Armenia’s precious metals mining sector. Armenia’s
Prime Minister Andranik Margaryan followed with a letter to Alrosa,
the Russian diamond-miner now diversifying into gold and other
minerals. Armenian sources believe Margaryan may have met Sergei
Vybornov, Alrosa’s chief executive, not long after the latter’s
appointment in February.

This was followed by a public statement from Vybornov of Alrosa’s
interest in gold mining projects in the Commonwealth of Independent
States; Vybornov explicitly mentioned Alrosa’s gold mining interest
in Armenia. Mineweb has reported that the Azatec deposit in Armenia
was acquired by Alrosa about a year ago; details are not yet available
of the acquisition, which was arranged through intermediary companies
in the British Virgin Islands.

The Azatek deposit, in the Vayots-Dzorskaya area of Armenia, was
prospected during the Soviet era, and was reported in the past to hold
13 million tonnes of gold-bearing ore. No grade or reserve estimate
is currently available.

According to the last resource estimate issued by Sterlite, at the end
of 2005 the company claimed the Zod deposit held measured resources
of 215,495 ounces, and indicated resources of 1.9 million oz, at an
estimated grade of 3.9 grams per tonne. For reserve-hungry gold mining
companies eager to boost their share price with an expanded asset
base, as swiftly as possible, Armenia is an alluring opportunity,
at a relatively low entry price. The Russians are bound to have the
inside track, though not all Russians equally.

In addition to Alrosa, interest in Zod may come from Polyus, which is
still the property of Mikhail Prokhorov, an oligarch out of favour
with the Kremlin; and Polymetal, the property of Suleiman Kerimov,
another Moscow oligarch. Kerimov’s spokesman Vitaly Nesis said this
month that Polymetal, which disappointed the market at its recent
London IPO, is on the acquisition trail to strengthen its resource
portfolio. According to Nesis, it is looking to buy prospecting and
mineable properties in the former Soviet Union.

With bidders like these, the Armenian government has lost patience
with the unfulfilled promise of Agarwal. Although he and his spokesmen
at the Finsbury PR firm in London decline to discuss their position
in Armenia, the Armenians say they know he is trying to exit from
Armenia at the best price he can fetch.

On March 25, Armenian Prime Minister Margaryan died suddenly of
a heart attack, and he has been replaced by Serge Sarkisyan, who
previously served as a close aide to President Kocharyan, heading
the president’s national security apparatus, and the security forces
as defence minister. Parliamentary elections are also scheduled in
Armenia for May 12.

The political contest has sharpened criticism in Yerevan of the
alleged violations by ARGC and Sterlite, and the costs to the Armenia
treasury. At the same time, the Armenians believe that Agarwal made a
sizeable personal profit selling his personally held stake in Sterlite
back to Vedanta. Confirmed details of this sale-back transaction have
already been reported in Mineweb.

The last public statement issued by the company relating to the
Armenian government’s concerns appeared more than fifteen months ago,
on December 7, 2005. At the time, Sterlite said it "has recently become
aware of certain press articles suggesting or implying that, among
other things, the Company is in violation of various requirements in
respect of its Armenian mining operations. The Company wishes to state
that it categorically denies all such suggestions and statements. Many
of the allegations cited are based on unsubstantiated, inaccurate or
outdated information."

Sterlite went on to say it "remains committed to its Armenian mining
operations and to expanding those operations. The Company is currently
in the process of conducting studies to complete detailed open pit
design, plant engineering, metallurgical test work, and permitting
with the aim of expanding the present mining operations at Zod. These
initiatives are expected to be completed by the first quarter of 2006."

This past February, Mineweb reported that a state prosecutors’
investigation in Yerevan had uncovered serious and fresh licence
and regulatory violations by ARGC. The move by Armenia’s prosecutors
followed eighteen months of special commissions and ministry-level
investigations that failed to produce compliance by Vedanta.

A 5-page report was also issued in February by three experts,
officials from Armenia’s ministry of natural resources. Their report
had been commissioned on January 24, when they were ordered to
assess Vedanta’s performance in line with a list of 16 statutory and
regulatory agreements and undertakings. The findings followed within a
month. They accused Vedanta’s Armenian mining company of under-spending
on required mine operations and under-valuing taxable assets.

In addition, Armenian ecological experts charge that serious
environmental problems, particularly water pollution, have resulted
from Sterlite’s management of ARGC operations. The mine sites at
Zod and Meghradzor are at opposite ends, northwest and southeast,
of Lake Sevan, which is the largest body of water in Armenia, and
accounts for more than half the potable water supply.

In 2002, Sterlite says it produced 102,960 oz, primarily from tailings
accumulated at the Ararat processing plant. In 2003 output fell
to just over 59,000 oz, as the tailings dwindled, and costs rose
for transporting the ore, mined at the Zod pit, by railway to the
processing plant, 235 kilometres away to the west, at the junction
of the Turkish and Iranian borders. The plant has the capacity to
process about 1 million tonnes of ore per annum, but the cost of
transportation is prohibitive. According to company releases, in 2005,
gold produced from tailings and ore totalled 44,137 oz, a decline of
35% on the year before. The costs of production outstripped revenues;
and according to financial statements issued by the company, losses
in the nine months to September 30, 2005, had mounted to almost $7
million. In the most recent financial report for the nine-month period
of 2006, the Armenian operations were still running at a loss. The
company blames the loss on falling grades at the Zod mine, falling
tonnages of tailings, and lower grades in the tailings.

Substantial investment in a new mill at the mine site was promised by
Sterlite, and according to the company, it was targeting a revival of
production to at least 160,000 oz per annum. A website statement claims
"the Company estimates that a minimum capital expenditure of US$ 80
million will be required to execute the move and will take a minimum
of 18-24 months to complete. The Company is committed to undertake
the move once environmental clearance is provided by the Government
of Armenia. For financing this move, the Company is looking to raise
funds using a variety of options." The clearance has not been granted
by the government, and no fund raising by Sterlite has taken place.

A posting on Sterlite’s website calls for expressions of interest from
"experienced contractors who can bring in their equipment and manpower
to carry out exploration/confirmatory drilling (approximately 80,000
meters) on per meter basis and mining operations (approximately 40
million tons per annum) on per ton basis". In addition, the company
calls for "experienced and reputed parties to provide the latest
technology, engineering, design, supply of equipment, construction,
commissioning, training of manpower and other related facilities for
implementation of the processing plant with pox [sic]".

The implication is that Sterlite and AGRC are planning to resume
operations. Agarwal’s spokesman in London, Faeth Birch, was asked to
clarify details of this call for miners. In addition, she was asked
to explain why Sterlite is trying to sell out of Armenia. Birch told
Mineweb: "Apparently the tender relates to May 2006 and is no longer
current. I have no comment on your second (and unrelated) point as
we do not comment on rumour."

The first to make for the door was Agarwal, whose sale of his 55%
stake in Sterlite to Vedanta last year drew $34 million. Now Vedanta
is trying to exit with a premium, but the Armenian government says
it will intervene.

neweb/en/page34?oid=19868&sn=Detail

IRAN, ARMENIA SIGN MEDIA COOPERATION PACT

Press TV, Iran
April 20 2007

Iran and Armenia have signed an agreement to expand media cooperation.

The agreement was signed by Ezzatollah Zarghami, head of the Islamic
Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB) and Alexan Harutyunyan, the
president of the Council of Public TV and Radio Company of Armenia.

IRIB and Armenia’s Public Television will each open an office in
Yerevan and Tehran, respectively.

Armenia will help pave the way for IRIB’s stronger presence among
broadcasters covering Europe, Harutyunyan said.

Zarghami, for his part, said the media should make every effort in
introducing both countries’ capabilities and capacities, particularly
in economic fields.

He further emphasized that introducing the culture and civilization
of Iran and Armenia "must be on top of our agenda".

Zarghami was on a three-day visit to Armenia which started on
Wednesday.

He met several high-ranking Armenian officials including President
Robert Kocharian and Prime Minister Serge Sarkisyan.

MOURNERS BURY GERMAN VICTIM OF PUBLISHING HOUSE ATTACK IN TURKEY, POLICE DETAIN 11TH SUSPECT

International Herald Tribune, France
The Associated Press
April 20 2007

MALATYA, Turkey: Singing hymns in Turkish, mourners on Friday buried
the German victim of this week’s attack at a Christian publishing
house, while local media reported police had detained an 11th suspect
in the slayings.

The killing of the German and two Turks – who had converted to
Christianity – highlighted the country’s uneasy relationship with
its minorities. Christians expressed fear that growing nationalism
and intolerance could lead to more violence against them.

Police detained five people Wednesday at the scene of the attack
Wednesday in the eastern city of Malatya, including one man who jumped
out of the window to avoid arrest. Another five suspects were detained
Thursday. Private Dogan news agency and other media reported that
police detained an 11th suspect on Friday in Istanbul. Police there
would not comment on the reports.

Hurriyet newspaper reported that some of the suspects told police
they had carried out the killings to protect Islam. Police did not
comment on the report.

The three victims were found with their hands and legs tied and their
throats slit. Their faces were bruised, and the ropes had cut into
their wrists.

On Friday, the Hurriyet reported that at least one victim had also
been stabbed many times.

"There were so many stab wounds that we couldn’t count them," Hurriyet
quoted Dr. Murat Ugras as saying. "It was clearly torture."

German victim Tilmann Geske was buried at an Armenian cemetery in
Malatya, overgrown with weeds. His wife and three children – aged 13,
10 and 8 – were among the mourners, who sang in Turkish to guitar
music and prayed for forgiveness for the attackers. His youngest,
Miriam, wept as dirt was shoveled onto his coffin.

Rev. Ahmet Guvener, the pastor at a church in the city of Diyarbakir,
prayed for tolerance.

"We are part of this country, we are not foreigners here," Guvener
said.

The attack added to concerns in Europe about whether the predominantly
Muslim country – which is bidding for European Union membership –
can protect its religious minorities.

Christian leaders said they worried that nationalists were stoking
hostilities against non-Turks and non-Muslims by exploiting growing
uncertainty over Turkey’s place in the world.

The uncertainty – and growing suspicion against foreigners – has
been driven by the faltering EU bid, a resilient Kurdish separatist
movement and by increasingly vocal Islamists who see themselves –
and Turkey – as locked in battle with a hostile Christian West.

"Our lives are in danger because of this mind-set," the Rev. Ihsan
Ozbek, pastor of the Kurtulus Church in Ankara, told a news conference
in Malatya. He said there was a "witch hunt" under way against
Christians and other minorities.

Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, who as Vatican secretary of state is
Pope Benedict XVI’s top aide, called the attack "an insane act by a
fanatic minority."

"We must not waste the fruits of the pope’s visit to Turkey, which
has really brought us closer," Bertone was quoted as saying by Italian
news agency ANSA.

The pope visited Turkey in November, promising greater understanding
and dialogue with Islam.

Nationalists, who have long dominated public debate in Turkey, have
also begun to call for Turkey to withdraw its EU bid and make its
own way in the world. Some young men indoctrinated with a vision of
Turkish greatness – and with a view of the West as intent on keeping
the Islamic world weak – view non-Muslims with suspicion.

"The problem is our education and our media," Mustafa Efe, head
of Mujde FM, or Miracle FM, a Christian broadcasting station, said
after traveling to Malatya to meet Protestant pastors. "They always
say Christianity is dangerous because Christians are trying to break
up Turkey."

Christians make up just a fraction of 1 percent of Turkey’s population
of 71 million.

"There is this general atmosphere of fear – that Turkey will be
segmented," said Orhan Kemal Cengiz, a human rights lawyer who
represented one of the slain Christians, Necati Aydin, 26, in an
earlier court case. Aydin was charged with insulting Islam and spent
a month in jail after he was found distributing Bibles in the Aegean
city of Izmir.

Christians and other minorities have watched Turkey’s struggling
EU bid with alarm. Many worry the papacy of Benedict XVI, who when
he was still a cardinal spoke against Turkey’s bid for membership,
would only contribute to their problems.

CANADA, THE UN, AND THE RWANDAN TUTSI GENOCIDE

Canadian Christianity
April 20 2007

Photo: Refugees fleeing the 1994 slaughter in Rwanda.

The following address by David Kilgour, a former Member of Parliament
and cabinet minister under Prime Minister Jean Chretien, was given
April 7 at the Canadian War Museum in Ottawa.

IT IS FITTING that so many of us are commemorating the 13th anniversary
of the genocide on the very day when the murder of more than 800,000
Rwandans over the ensuing 100 terrible days began.

If the international community as a whole is finally to cease
re-interpreting our "never again" pledges, made following the
Holocaust, Armenia, the Ukrainian famine, Cambodia, Bosnia, Kosovo
and Rwanda, as "again and again" in new catastrophes such as Darfur,
we must constantly remember what happened to the Rwandan Tutsis
and moderate Hutus, who were abandoned by the UN and rest of the
international community.

UN role

My first focus is the UN role in Rwanda and the source is the recently
published book, The Best Intentions — Kofi Annan and the UN in an Era
of American Power by James Traub. A journalist for the New York Times
Magazine, Traub had good access to Annan and his staff since 2003;
the book is excellent on numerous topics, including Rwanda. The key
points it makes are these:

When Annan, with little experience in peacekeeping, became the
under-secretary-general for peacekeeping in early 1993, a number
of crises were already underway. In one of them, Bosnia, where
UN peacekeepers proved unable to stop an unspeakable massacre
at Srebrenica and the killing of 37 people in a Sarajevo market,
only NATO bombing for two weeks without UN Security Council approval
persuaded the Serbs to sign a draft peace agreement. Traub concludes
correctly that the UN "intervened timidly and clumsily" in the Balkans
and did not intervene at all in Rwanda.

Best Intentions describes the events in Rwanda which led to
the catastrophe and then focuses on the January 11, 1994 "most
notorious cable in UN history" from Romeo Dallaire, commander of the
UN Assistance Mission for Rwanda (UNAMIR) to General Maurice Baril,
(UN Secretary General) Boutros-Ghali’s military advisor, about hidden
Interahamwe weapons, which some said could kill up to a thousand
Tutsis in twenty minutes. Annan soon signed the never-to-be-forgotten
response, directing that Dallaire do nothing "until clear guidance
is received from Headquarters"

The author is clearly sympathetic to Annan overall in the book, but
he quotes his subject looking callous at least when in the overall
context he asked him why he did not refer the cable to the Security
Council: "Obviously we don’t take pieces of cables to the Security
Council." Annan then makes himself look both foolish and weak when
he attempts to convince Traub that his inaction in Rwanda can be
justified by the almost simultaneous problems in Somalia: "It was
probably not a good call."

Traub adds that the ultimate responsibility over what later happened
in Rwanda was Secretary General Boutros-Ghali and that he, who "has
never expressed remorse over any of the catastrophes that took place
on his watch, blames the member states (and notes in his memoirs that
throughout January he was ‘away from New York and not in close touch
with the Rwandan situation’). And the key member states blame the
Secretariat for failing to keep them informed. Where did the buck
stop? Nowhere."

An independent inquiry into the UN’s role in Rwanda later concluded
that Annan’s peacekeeping department erred in not bringing Dallaire’s
cable to the Security Council’s attention. Even worse was its failure
subsequently to press Rwandan President Habyarimana to take action
against the militias. At the end of January, when Dallaire prepared a
detailed plan to seize the illegal weapons, he received yet another
cable from Annan, in effect telling him not to move. Dallaire later
described this as "yet another body blow."

When the mass murders and rapes began on April 7, immediately after
Rwandan President Habyarimana’s plane exploded from a missile hit,
Dallaire was then told by Annan that he was not to side with moderate
Hutus in the hope of helping them to stop the genocidaires. Two days
later, compounding this irresolution, Annan told him that UNAMIR
might have to withdraw from Rwanda. The US Secretary of State, Warren
Christopher, was soon going along with the Belgium Foreign Minister’s
request for a complete withdrawal of UNAMIR after Belgium’s government
had withdrawn its 1300 soldiers immediately after ten of them where
killed by genocidaires. Traub notes that the US government was by then
fully aware that "the killing was systematic and widespread." The
then US ambassador to the UN Madeline Albright finally agreed to
accept what she termed a "skeletal" force of 270 led by Dallaire to
remain in Rwanda.

Traub: "By the end of April, estimates of deaths had reached as
high as half a million, and the newspapers and airwaves were filled
with accounts of unspeakable savagery, and yet the UN continued to
behave as if Rwanda presented a conventional problem of political
reconciliation . . . Boutros-Ghali did not use the word ‘genocide’
until early May . . . the Clinton administration was by then twisting
itself into rhetorical knots to avoid using the word at all for fear
of triggering the provisions of the UN Convention on the Prevention
and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, which requires signatories to
‘prevent and punish’ such crimes."

The slaughter ended only three months later when Paul Kagame and his
Rwandese Patriotic Front soldiers finally took the capital city Kigali,
declared a cease-fire and formed a new government without international
or UN help. In short, the roles of the UN Security Council, the member
governments, the Secretary General and Kofi Annan during the genocide
were all but unforgivable to the Rwandan people and many others across
the world who thought that the UN under its Charter was supposed to
represent all of its member states equally in peacekeeping crises.

Role of Canada

Shake Hands with the Devil by Romeo Dallaire was published in 2003
and is no doubt familiar to most of you. We can only wish that every
high school and university graduate in our country and everywhere else
had to read it. Some days, one wonders if any of the governments and
diplomats dealing with the ongoing Darfur debacle — which has aptly
been termed "Rwanda in slow motion" — even know that the book exists.

The thesis of Dallaire’s book, of course, is that Rwandans and his
small group of UNAMIR peacekeepers were abandoned by the UN and
the international community, including the Canadian and other home
governments. He makes many important points, but my time I’ll only
repeat two of them:

Almost 50 years to the day that his father and father-in-law "helped
to liberate Europe-when the extermination camps were uncovered and
when, in one voice, humanity said, ‘Never Again’ — we once again
sat back and permitted this unspeakable horror to occur. We could
not find the political will or the resources to stop it . . . It is
my feeling that this recent catastrophe is being forgotten and its
lessons submerged in ignorance and apathy. The genocide in Rwanda
was a failure of humanity that could easily happen again."

Today, between Good Friday and Easter Sunday, it seems appropriate
to refer to the title of the book and the concluding note of its
preface. Asked if he can still believe in God after all that he saw in
Rwanda, Canada’s national hero writes: " . . . there is a God because
in Rwanda I shook hands with the devil . . . I know the devil exists,
and therefore I know there is a God."

Two personal observations

First, Dallaire has said frequently that he thinks that a few
thousand well-trained peacemakers could have prevented the massacre in
Rwanda. The new Chretien government in office in 1993 clearly failed
Rwandans, UNAMIR and Dallaire by not sending a decent contingent
of Canadian soldiers with him. As Dallaire notes in the book, it
is expected that the home government of every UN mission commander
will send a respectable number to demonstrate that it is pulling its
weight. How else can other governments be persuaded to send necessary
numbers as well?

And second, in the period 1992-1994, the Canadian Tutsi communities
in Montreal and Ottawa sought repeatedly to raise awareness with
the Mulroney and Chretien governments about what was being prepared
in Rwanda with no visible success. As a Member of Parliament, I
recall visiting the Pearson building with some them on two or three
occasions. We’d leave shaking our heads at the indifference and general
ignorance about conditions in Rwanda among supposed specialists in
the Foreign Affairs ministry. After Kagame formed a new government,
I recall that one of his ministers had considerable difficulty in
obtaining a visa to visit Canada.

Conclusion

In conclusion sadly, we Canadians — aside from Dallaire, his
colleague in Rwanda Major Brent Beardsley, Dr James Orbinski, who
saved "hundreds, perhaps thousands, of people" (Dallaire) working at
the King Faisal hospital in Kigali throughout the genocide, a group of
brave and dedicated staff of Rwandan nationals at the Canadian mission
in Kigali, and other mostly unknown persons (I recall for instance
a Rwandan nun at settlement on the road to Lake Kivu telling me in
1997 that her life was spared by a mob coming to kill her because
of the bravery of a Canadian priest who persuaded them to leave) —
we Canadians and all UN member countries have little to be proud of
about our role in the Rwandan Tutsi Genocide.

Will we make up for it with our actions as we face future crises?

in/na.cgi?nationalupdates/070419genocide

CHAIRMAN OF THE ARMENIAN CB TO PARTICIPATE IN THE REGIONAL CONFERENCE, ORGANIZED BY THE NATIONAL BANK OF KAZAKHSTAN AND THE IMF

Mediamax agency, Armenia
April 20 2007

Yerevan, April 20 /Mediamax/. The Chairman of the Central Bank (CB)
of Armenia Tigran Sarkisian will participate on April 23-26 in the
regional conference in Almaty, organized by the National Bank of
Kazakhstan and the Department for Middle East and Central Asia of
the International Monetary Fund.

Mediamax was told in the press service of the Armenian CB that
the conference in dedicated to the issues of management of large
flows of currency in the countries of South Caucasus and Central
Asia. The Chairman of the Armenian CB will present a report during
the conference, dedicated to the Armenian experience on solving the
problem of large money transfers.

Starting from April 19, Tigran Sarkisian has been in Moscow, where
he is taking part in the session of the Council of Interstate Bank.

During the session, issues, related to the election of the Council
Chairman of the Interstate Bank, the results of the bank’s activities,
the financial accounting, the choices of company on realizing the
audit of the Interstate Bank are being discussed.