Month: April 2007

PanARMENIAN.Net

Fradkov: Cooperation between Armenia and Russia
becomes more balanced and harmonic
07.04.2007 15:37 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov sent
congratulations to Serzh Sargsyan on his appointment as the Prime
Minister of Armenia, the Press Office of RA Government reported.

`Armenian-Russian multilateral relations, which reached the level of
allied cooperation, were developing dynamically during the previous
period. Our political ties are strengthening on mutually acceptable
base, consistently grows trade-economic cooperation, develop
humanitarian contacts. The bilateral cooperation becomes more balanced
and harmonic. We know You as a consistent follower of further
deepening Armenian-Russian relations, and You made a huge contribution
to the development of military-political and economic relations
between our two countries. We hope Your effective activity aimed at
development Armenian-Russian ties, will continue on the post of Prime
Minister,’ says Mikhail Fradkov in his message.

Panorama.am

16:37 07/04/2007

SURVEY SAYS THERE IS NO `BEST’ POLITICAL FIGURE IN ARMENIA

Club Hayely made a survey among women reporters to identify the best
political figure and the best businessman. The survey findings say
women reporters did not name any `best’ political figure. Most named
Khachatur Sukiasyan and Hrant Vardanyan as the best businessmen.

Both businessmen admit women are underrepresented in
business. Instead, they claim that there are relatively more women in
the governance system. `To become a business woman, one needs a lot of
experience and time,’ Sukiasyan said. Anyway, the `winners’
congratulated women reporters and rendered their best wishes.

Source: Panorama.am

PRESS RELEASE
Catholicosate of Cilicia
Communication and Information Department
Contact: V.Rev.Fr.Krikor Chiftjian, Communications Officer
Tel: (04) 410001, 410003
Fax: (04) 419724
E- mail: [email protected]
Web:

PO Box 70 317
Antelias-Lebanon

Armenian version:

GOOD FRIDAY IN ANTELIAS

Good Friday, a holy day for Christianity, was observed in the Saint
Gregory the Illuminator Cathedral in Antelias, with the participation of
hundreds of faithful including the youth. The service was presided over by
His Holiness Aram I. The Pontiff and the members of the Cilician Brotherhood
performed the burial ceremony kneeling down before Jesus Christ’s symbolic
Holy Tomb.

In his Pontifical address the Catholicos underlined the strength of Jesus
Christ’s empty Tomb and the spirit of resurrection and immortality bursting
from it. His Holiness described the Cross of Jesus Christ "as the meeting
place of life and the death. The death was concurred by the life and the
Cross became a symbol of life restored by Jesus Christ". His Holiness
emphasized the sacredness of life "which was given through the Cross to
humanity. We must preserve the sacredness of it. Therefore, His Holiness
said, the Cross of Jesus is not a symbol of death".

His Holiness then blessed the faithful with the relic from the original
Cross of our Lord. Following the tradition, faithful passed from beneath the
empty Tomb, taking with them its flowers and hopes of resurrection and
immortality.

##
View the photos here:

*****
The Armenian Catholicosate of Cilicia is one of the two Catholicosates of
the Armenian Orthodox Church. For detailed information about the history and
the mission of the Cilician Catholicosate, you may refer to the web page of
the Catholicosate, The Cilician Catholicosate, the
administrative center of the church is located in Antelias, Lebanon.

Le Monde, France
7 avril 2007 samedi

Génocide arménien : Ankara menace d’écarter GDF du projet Nabucco

par Guillaume Perrier

En raison de la question arménienne et du débat sur l’adhésion turque
à l’UE, les mises en garde contre la France se mutiplient en Turquie
avant la présidentielle

L’agence anatolienne de presse a annoncé jeudi 5 avril que la
compagnie d’Etat turque de pétrole et de gaz Botas avait suspendu les
négociations avec le groupe français Gaz de France sur sa
participation au projet de gazoduc Nabucco, prévu pour acheminer en
Europe, à l’horizon 2011, le gaz naturel d’Asie centrale via la
Turquie. Selon l’agence, cette décision serait dû à la position de la
France sur le génocide arménien.

Le projet de loi condamnant la négation du génénocide, adopté en
octobre dernier par l’Assemblée nationale mais par encore par le
Sénat, et plus généralement l’hostilité qui s’est manifesté en France
à une adhésion turque à l’Union européenne alimente à Ankara, avant
les élections françaises, un sentiment de défiance. " Nous allons
suspendre le partenariat jusqu’à l’élection présidentielle française,
a déclaré un responsable du ministère turc de l’énergie à Reuters.
Nous prendrons une décision en fonction de la politique suivie après
les élections en France ".

Ni GDF ni Paris n’ont confirmé la suspension des négociations sur le
projet de gazoduc, dont le coût est estimé à 4,6 milliards d’euros.
Celles-ci impliquent, outre Gaz de France, des partenaires de
plusieurs autres pays : l’Autriche, la Roumanie, la Bulgarie et la
Hongrie.

LIENS MILITAIRES SUSPENDUS

La menace sonne comme un avertissement aux hommes politiques
français. Les Turcs ont noté que la candidate socialiste à l’élection
présidentielle, Ségolène Royal, a déclaré récemment soutenir la
nouvelle loi pénalisant la négation du génocide arménien, tout comme
François Hollande, mardi 3 avril, au cours d’une réunion à
Alfortville avec le parti nationaliste arménien Dachnak. Les prises
de position récurrentes de Nicolas Sarkozy ou de François Bayrou
contre l’adhésion de la Turquie à l’UE ne laissent pas présager d’un
avenir plus détendu.

Les pressions n’ont cessé ces derniers mois de monter contre la
France. Depuis le 1er janvier, les liens militaires ont été
suspendus. Des visites réciproques et des autorisations de survol du
territoire pour les appareils français en route vers l’Afghanistan
ont été annulées. Les tracasseries administratives ou douanières se
sont multipliées. " De nombreux hommes d’affaires ou des enseignants
connaissent des difficultés pour obtenir leurs permis de séjour. Les
procédures traînent en longueur ", observe Raphaël Esposito,
directeur de la chambre de commerce franco-turque d’Istanbul.

Plusieurs grandes entreprises françaises ont subi pendant quelques
mois les effets d’une campagne de boycottage lancée en octobre :
Carrefour, Total ou Danone accusant des baisses de leur chiffre
d’affaire allant jusqu’à 10 % ou 15 %. " Ces entreprises semblent
avoir retrouvé un rythme de croisière mais le ressentiment n’est pas
totalement dissipé, constate Raphaël Esposito.

Plus récemment, la menace d’un boycottage a aussi plané sur
Eurocopter ou Areva, candidats à des investissements de taille en
Turquie. Le Crédit agricole, qui était pressenti pour acquérir la
banque Oyak, propriété de la mutuelle de l’Armée turque, s’est
également retrouvé confronté à la question du génocide arménien.

Paradoxalement, les échanges franco-turcs ont pourtant augmenté de 15
% en 2006. Signe que, dès que l’on quitte la sphère publique, les
intérêts commerciaux reprennent le dessus. Cette hausse est
principalement due à d’importants contrats dans l’aéronautique. Autre
exemple, Alstom vient de décrocher, fin mars, un contrat de 323
millions d’euros sur le chantier du Marmaray, un tunnel ferroviaire
sous le Bosphore qui entrera en fonction en 2011. Avec une population
de 74 millions d’habitants et une croissance soutenue, la Turquie est
devenue un marché émergent de premier plan dans de nombreux secteurs
de l’industrie et des services, incontournable pour les grandes
multinationales.

A1+

DAGESTAN’S "DIRTY" ELECTION
[04:18 pm] 07 April, 2007

An election designed to break the hold of ethnic politics is accused
of being unfair.

Opposition parties have cried foul after a parliamentary election in
the largest republic in the North Caucasus, Dagestan, delivered a
resounding victory to the pro-Kremlin party, United Russia.

The final results of the March 11 poll were only announced on March
21, following a partial recount.

As a result of the recount, two opposition parties, the Communist
Party and Patriots of Russia, which would have been denied
representation in the 72-seat parliament by the initial results, were
awarded slightly more than seven per cent of the votes, giving them
five seats each.

United Russia was declared the overwhelming winner, with more than 63
per cent of the vote and 47 seats, with two other parties, Just Russia
and the Agrarian Party also winning seats in the assembly.

The new parliament can be expected to cooperate with Dagestan’s
president, Mukhu Aliev, but will also probably try to tame his
reforming ideas, as powerful businessmen and bureaucrats are well
represented among the United Russia deputies.

The election has been a testing one for Dagestan – Russia’s most
multi-ethnic region – as new rules tried to prevent the poll being
contested on purely ethnic grounds. But the campaign was marred by
violence and the count by accusations of fraud.

Two people died and four were wounded in the Dakhadai region in an
armed clash between supporters of two parties, United Russia and the
Union of Right Forces. Another party leader was wounded in an attack,
and one candidate has vanished without trace.

The election was held under a proportional representation system based
on party lists, with deputies no longer being elected from single
constituencies.

Sociologist Zaid Abdulagatov said the new system was a positive
development as it meant voters were no longer merely casting their
ballot for a candidate from their own ethnic group, but for a party
and its programme.

"If, after the election, people will not talk about how many members
of parliament come from which nationality, we can call that progress,"
Abdulagatov said. "But I doubt we will be able to get away from that."

The Union of Right Forces also complained that the new rules were
manipulated so that they were disqualified from the election.

With the stated aim of preserving a spread of candidates from across
the republic, the lists of each party were required to contain
representatives from all 53 districts of Dagestan. Any party that did
not represent all the regions was struck from the ballot.

This is what happened to the Union of Right Forces after three of its
candidates in the Khasavyurt region unexpectedly pulled out. Some
party members said the withdrawals had been deliberately engineered to
remove their group from the election.

Most of the new deputies have an allegiance to one or other of the two
most powerful politicians in Dagestan, President Mukhu Aliev and the
mayor of the capital Makhachkala, Said Amirov.

The deputies from the Patriots of Russia, which has its electoral base
in southern Dagestan, are close to Amirov. Party leader Eduard
Khidirov was wounded in an assassination attempt during the campaign
and is still in hospital.

Patriots of Russia, the Communist Party and the Liberal Democratic
Party – which did not win any seats – all alleged fraud after the
elections, saying that the results given by the electoral commission
diverged sharply from the data collected by their own poll observers.

Fikret Rajabov, a candidate for Patriots of Russia, said that his
observers estimated that the party had won 18 per cent of the vote and
this was backed up by local electoral officials – but that the party
ended up with only seven per cent.

As an example, he said that in the Akhtyn region local electoral
records had awarded Patriots of Russia 3,500 votes, but the eventual
number of votes they were given was 1,089 votes.

Rajabov alleged that President Aliev intervened in the matter, a
recount was conducted, and the results adjusted in favour of Patriots
of Russia.

The Communist Party has traditionally done well in Dagestan and its
local officials are indignant at the final results of the elections.

A group of Moscow lawyers representing the Communist Party visited
Dagestan after the elections and concluded that 25,000 votes had been
stolen in just ten towns.

"They want to knock us out on the eve of the elections to the
[Russian] State Duma," said Mahmud Mahmudov, first secretary of the
Communist Party of Dagestan and a deputy in the Duma. "It looks as
though this was an order from Moscow, and it was carried out with
great enthusiasm in the republic."

Mahmudov said that he had evidence of stuffing of ballot boxes, voting
machines being changed shortly before the polls opened, and groups of
young men travelling the republic and voting more than once for the
governing party.

"In the Akhtyn region they sent two buses with OMON [armed police]
officers who sealed off the electoral commission building, and
representatives of opposition parties were not allowed to watch the
count," Mahmudov said. "The local electoral commissions were supposed
to bring in the voting records but they put them to one side and gave
totally different figures."

"The whole process was controlled by an official from the White House
[the Dagestani government] who made the electoral commission give the
required results."

"At the moment we are restraining our angry people, but if our lawful
demands are not met, we will hold a demonstration."

The Central Electoral Commission has declined to discuss specific
complaints – although United Russia did lose six per cent of its total
vote in a recount.

Another expert, Tagir Muslimov from Dagestan’s Centre of
Ethno-Political Research, predicted that the new parliament would try
to preserve vested interests and the status quo – in opposition to the
president’s efforts to crack down on corruption.

"Civil society is not a source of authority for us and the elite and
big business just re-elect themselves," he said.

"The president promised to battle against clan structures and
corruption, to bring in new people and to make changes. Some shifts
have taken place – some clans have moved further away [from power],
but other clans have got closer."

By Musa Musayev in Makhachkala

Musa Musayev is a correspondent for Severny Kavkaz newspaper in
Dagestan. Institute for War and Peace Reporting, Caucasus Reporting
Serv

A1+

Georgia Creates Army Reserves
[04:31 pm] 07 April, 2007

The president wants the capacity to call up 100,000 men. Georgia
Creates Army Reserves

The president wants the capacity to call up 100,000 men. Georgia is
moving towards creating a compulsory system of reserve soldiers, which
President Mikheil Saakashvili says will transform its defence
capabilities. However, critics say the new system will only increase
corruption in the armed forces.

The new system being launched this month obliges all men between 27
and 40 to undergo 24 days training in the army every two years, or 18
days if they are students. Employees must cover their salaries during
their leave of absence.

Saakashvili said that within the next two years, Georgia will have a
well-drilled 100,000-strong force of reservists who can guarantee the
`total defence’ of the country, alongside the regular units.

The president himself underwent army reserve training last August, and
said on his return, `In a situation where others are baring their
teeth at Georgia – and this is no game – we should have the capacity
to deploy a minimum of 100,000 men within a few months, if the country
needs this.

`In our villages and towns, there should be tens of thousands or even
hundreds of thousands of our citizens who are ready to defend our
motherland.’

The reserve system began as a voluntary scheme three years ago, but
after a relatively low take-up, it was made compulsory under a law
passed by parliament last year.

De facto officials from Georgia’s breakaway territories, Abkhazia and
South Ossetia, say the fact that reservist camps have been placed near
their borders is a sign of aggressive intent on the part of the
authorities in Tbilisi.

`This is a demonstration that the authorities of Georgia want as many
of their citizens as possible to have experience of military
operations,’ said Gari Kupalba, deputy defence minister of Abkhazia.

Rati Samkurashvili, leader of the majority group in the Georgian
parliament, told IWPR, `We do not plan to militarise the country; our
main aim is to increase its military efficiency.’

Formally, all Georgian males aged between 18 and 27, excepting
students, are required to do 18 months’ military service. However,
just 2,000 young men a year are actually called up, and many others
manage to bribe their way out of the army. Georgia has been moving
away from conscription, and 80 per cent of the 28,000-strong army
consists of professional soldiers.

The reserve system is designed not only to boost the number of
potential soldiers, but also to instill a greater sense of
patriotism. In recent weeks all of Georgia’s television channels have
been running an advertisement which shows a young man abandoning his
expensive car and enthusiastically joining soldiers in an armoured
troop-carrier heading for a military camp.

Giorgi Barbakadze, a 20-year-old third-year student at Tbilisi State
University, won’t have to abandon his car, as he does not own one, but
he will still have to drop his studies to do 18 days of reserve
training.

`I’ve been told that if I do reserve duty twice while I’m at
university, I will have completed my entire military service. That
will allow me to avoid being called up for a compulsory
year-and-a-half service in the army, and make it easier for me to find
a government job in future,’ he said.

Although the scheme has widespread support, it is also being
criticised for being both expensive and unworkable.

Parliamentary opposition deputy Kakha Kukava said he feared the system
would be abused.

`We should be aware that unlike Israel, our state institutions
function properly only in Tbilisi, and [even there] we’re only talking
about a few central ministries,’ he said. `All other state
establishments in Georgia are a sham. In that light, switching to a
reserve service where every district is responsible for a certain
military unit such as a company or battalion, is a fiction and will do
nothing for military efficiency’.

`Training reserve forces does not just mean a month spent in a tent
and a morning run,’ warned military expert Shalva Tadumadze, who
argues that the army should provide specialist training for its
reserve soldiers.

Other analysts warn that the system could increase bribery and
corruption.

Irakli Sesiashvili, director of the non-governmental organisation
Justice and Freedom, said that with around half a million potential
reservists, there will be attempts to buy people off the call-up
lists.

`The lists of potential reservists are being compiled by the interior
and justice ministries, but departments of the drafting agency will be
giving the job of checking them,’ said Sesiashvili. `This is where the
`holes could occur, if we assume that efforts will be made to remove
individual reservists from the lists in return for money.’

According to the defence ministry, the heads of six district drafting
commissions were prosecuted for negligence and corruption last
year. Nana Intskirveli, head of the ministry’s press office, said that
in one town alone – Zugdidi in the west of the country – the existence
of 1,300 conscription-age men was concealed from the defence
authorities.

By law, people who evade military service could face a prison sentence
of three to six years.

The government is also trying to lure young men into joining the army
full-time by promising them rewards. President Saakashvili has said
new commissioned officers will get free apartments.

The president and other government officials plan to visit the reserve
camps to demonstrate their personal support for the new scheme.

Koba Liklikadze is a military commentator for Radio Liberty in
Tbilisi.Georgia is moving towards creating a compulsory system of
reserve soldiers, which President Mikheil Saakashvili says will
transform its defence capabilities. However, critics say the new
system will only increase corruption in the armed forces.

The new system being launched this month obliges all men between 27
and 40 to undergo 24 days training in the army every two years, or 18
days if they are students. Employees must cover their salaries during
their leave of absence.

Saakashvili said that within the next two years, Georgia will have a
well-drilled 100,000-strong force of reservists who can guarantee the
`total defence’ of the country, alongside the regular units.

The president himself underwent army reserve training last August, and
said on his return, `In a situation where others are baring their
teeth at Georgia – and this is no game – we should have the capacity
to deploy a minimum of 100,000 men within a few months, if the country
needs this.

`In our villages and towns, there should be tens of thousands or even
hundreds of thousands of our citizens who are ready to defend our
motherland.’

The reserve system began as a voluntary scheme three years ago, but
after a relatively low take-up, it was made compulsory under a law
passed by parliament last year.

De facto officials from Georgia’s breakaway territories, Abkhazia and
South Ossetia, say the fact that reservist camps have been placed near
their borders is a sign of aggressive intent on the part of the
authorities in Tbilisi.

`This is a demonstration that the authorities of Georgia want as many
of their citizens as possible to have experience of military
operations,’ said Gari Kupalba, deputy defence minister of Abkhazia.

Rati Samkurashvili, leader of the majority group in the Georgian
parliament, told IWPR, `We do not plan to militarise the country; our
main aim is to increase its military efficiency.’

Formally, all Georgian males aged between 18 and 27, excepting
students, are required to do 18 months’ military service. However,
just 2,000 young men a year are actually called up, and many others
manage to bribe their way out of the army. Georgia has been moving
away from conscription, and 80 per cent of the 28,000-strong army
consists of professional soldiers.

The reserve system is designed not only to boost the number of
potential soldiers, but also to instill a greater sense of
patriotism. In recent weeks all of Georgia’s television channels have
been running an advertisement which shows a young man abandoning his
expensive car and enthusiastically joining soldiers in an armoured
troop-carrier heading for a military camp.

Giorgi Barbakadze, a 20-year-old third-year student at Tbilisi State
University, won’t have to abandon his car, as he does not own one, but
he will still have to drop his studies to do 18 days of reserve
training.

`I’ve been told that if I do reserve duty twice while I’m at
university, I will have completed my entire military service. That
will allow me to avoid being called up for a compulsory
year-and-a-half service in the army, and make it easier for me to find
a government job in future,’ he said.

Although the scheme has widespread support, it is also being
criticised for being both expensive and unworkable.

Parliamentary opposition deputy Kakha Kukava said he feared the system
would be abused.

`We should be aware that unlike Israel, our state institutions
function properly only in Tbilisi, and [even there] we’re only talking
about a few central ministries,’ he said. `All other state
establishments in Georgia are a sham. In that light, switching to a
reserve service where every district is responsible for a certain
military unit such as a company or battalion, is a fiction and will do
nothing for military efficiency’.

`Training reserve forces does not just mean a month spent in a tent
and a morning run,’ warned military expert Shalva Tadumadze, who
argues that the army should provide specialist training for its
reserve soldiers.

Other analysts warn that the system could increase bribery and
corruption.

Irakli Sesiashvili, director of the non-governmental organisation
Justice and Freedom, said that with around half a million potential
reservists, there will be attempts to buy people off the call-up
lists.

`The lists of potential reservists are being compiled by the interior
and justice ministries, but departments of the drafting agency will be
giving the job of checking them,’ said Sesiashvili. `This is where the
`holes could occur, if we assume that efforts will be made to remove
individual reservists from the lists in return for money.’

According to the defence ministry, the heads of six district drafting
commissions were prosecuted for negligence and corruption last
year. Nana Intskirveli, head of the ministry’s press office, said that
in one town alone – Zugdidi in the west of the country – the existence
of 1,300 conscription-age men was concealed from the defence
authorities.

By law, people who evade military service could face a prison sentence
of three to six years.

The government is also trying to lure young men into joining the army
full-time by promising them rewards. President Saakashvili has said
new commissioned officers will get free apartments.

The president and other government officials plan to visit the reserve
camps to demonstrate their personal support for the new scheme.

By Koba Liklikadze in Tbilisi Koba Liklikadze is a military
commentator for Radio Liberty in Tbilisi.

A1+

INGUSH ANGER OVER SUMMARY KILLINGS
[04:50 pm] 07 April, 2007

People in Ingushetia blame a series of extrajudicial killings on
security officials from outside their region.

People in the North Caucasian republic of Ingushetia have expressed
outrage at the killing of a local man, which they say is only the
latest in a string of extrajudicial executions they blame on security
service agents from outside the autonomous republic.

Early on March 15, a group of armed men in camouflage gear arrived in
armoured vehicles to detain Husein Mutaliev, 26, at his house in the
town of Malgobek.

Mutaliev’s mother, sister and neighbours said they saw him being taken
outside the gate of the house and beaten up. They say he attempted to
escape, but was shot in the head and fell down. The men then loaded
him into one of the vehicles and drove away.

Husein’s brother Hasan followed the men in his own car as far as
Ingushetia’s border with neighbouring North Ossetia. The Ingush
traffic police at the frontier checkpoint told him that the armed unit
had produced identity cards showing them as agents of Russia’s GRU
military intelligence, and were allowed to pass.

The local authorities returned Mutaliev’s dead body to his family the
next day.

He leaves behind a wife and three-month-old baby.

"The masked soldiers broke into our house without a search warrant,
they behaved badly and swore. When I asked them who sent them, they
answered, laughing, ‘Putin sent us’," the dead man’s mother Makka
Mutalieva told IWPR. "I hope the president will punish them severely
for these words… for using his name while committing crimes, doing
violence and killing people. Fourteen years of war have already
reduced our numbers – when are these arbitrary killings going to end?"

Following the killing, Interfax news agency quoted an official source
as saying that Mutaliev had been "destroyed" after putting up armed
resistance to an attempt to arrest him. He was, the report alleged, an
Islamist militant leader who took part in a bloody raid on Ingushetia
in 2004.

Last September, Mutaliev was held in custody for ten days and then
released. During that time, he said, security officials beat him and
tried to make him confess to being a terrorist.

Other officials in Ingushetia have defended the dead man and said they
were concerned at what had happened. An interior ministry source in
Ingushetia’s Malgobek district questioned the official version of
events, saying Mutaliev was not listed as wanted by the Russian or
local authorities, and had no criminal record. He was not a member of
an illegal armed group, nor did he maintain links with armed
militants, the source said.

Ingushetia’s prosecution service is treating the killing as a
crime. It launched a criminal case several hours after Mutaliev was
detained, and later passed the case to the Russian prosecutor for the
Southern Federal District, which covers the whole of the North
Caucasus.

"This is an exceptional event, a murder for no reason," a source in
the Ingush prosecutor’s office told IWPR.

Ingush president Murat Zyazikov gave his law-enforcement agencies a
severe scolding to his law-enforcers, ordering both the chief
prosecutor and interior minister to prevent such incidents from
occurring in future. He said traffic police should record cases of
security officers coming into Ingushetia from elsewhere, and report
them to the interior minister.

Ingushetia used to be much more peaceful than its troubled eastern
neighbour Chechnya, but in recent years it has seen an upsurge in
violence.

Within Ingushetia, there is common agreement that the men who killed
Mutaliev came from outside – almost certainly from North Ossetia, a
neighbour with which the republic has strained relations.

Ingushetia does not have its own detention centre for suspected
militants, so detainees are taken to Vladikavaz in North
Ossetia. Detainees have complained of being beaten and tortured there.

Makka Mutalieva said the men who took her son talked to each other in
Ossetian as well as Russian.

A source in Ingush law enforcement told IWPR that the unit involved in
the incident consisted of a mix of North Ossetian police, policemen
assigned from other parts of Russia, and officers of the FSB security
service.

Spokesmen for the interior ministry and FSB in North Ossetia refused
to comment.

Ruslan Badalov, who heads an Ingushetia-based human rights group
called the Chechen Committee for National Salvation, commented,
"Russia has banned the death penalty, but these extrajudicial
executions show that de facto it hasn’t been abolished, and this is
glaringly obvious in the North Caucasus."

There have been a number of similar incidents in Ingushetia recently.

On February 7, security services killed two men, Ibragim Gardanov and
Magomed Chakhkiev. The two were shot in the centre of Ingushetia’s
main city Nazran in full view of many witnesses, and the case sparked
widespread anger.

The following day, the press service of the local FSB said it had
trapped two men it described as "bandits" suspected of a number of
serious crimes.

Witnesses tell a different story. They say at least ten armed men
swooped on Gardanov’s car, opened all four doors and started firing at
the two men inside without giving a warning. Gardanov was hit by 17
bullets, while Chakhkiev received 24. To make sure the two men were
dead, the attackers shot them in the head.

For several hours after the shooting, FSB agents kept the scene sealed
off. Many witnesses, including Ingush law-enforcement officers, said
the two men in the car could have been captured alive.

Gardanov was well-known locally as a folk healer. His uncle Ahmed,
himself a famous herbalist, said he could have accepted seeing his
nephew arrested, tried and even executed if he were found guilty.

"But they shoot down our young people like partridges," he said. "We
won’t be game-birds for hunters from the Russian security services."

Gardanov’s brother Jamaldin said officials in the prosecutor’s office
had been sympathetic in private, but said there was nothing they could
do. They encouraged him to prove that the dead men were not
terrorists.

"So instead of the special services having to prove they are
terrorists, we ordinary citizens have to prove that our people are not
terrorists after they’ve already been killed," said Jamaldin Gardanov
angrily.

"It’s painful to realise that we won’t find justice in the country of
which we are citizens, and that if we are to punish the criminals who
killed my brother and his companion, we will have to pursue the truth
in international courts.

"They can try to prove that Ibragim was a terrorist, but we know that
he wasn’t."

By Zurab Markhiev in Nazran

Zurab Markhiev is a correspondent with Regnum news agency in
Ingushetia. Institute for War and Peace Reporting, Caucasus Reporting
Service

A1+

Monastery Divides Georgia and Azerbaijan
[05:02 pm] 07 April, 2007

Suggestions that cave monastery could be shared provoke opposition in
Georgia By Idrak Abbasov in Keshish Dagh and David Akhvlediani in
Tbilisi (CRS No. 385 29-Mar-07)

Georgia and Azerbaijan, strategic allies on many issues, have failed
to reach an agreement on the status of a monastery that lies on their
common border.

The spectacular cave monastery known by Georgians as David Gareji and
Azerbaijanis as Keshish Dagh is an important religious centre and
cultural monument for Georgians. Azerbaijanis regard it as part of
their cultural heritage, and also say it lies on strategic high
ground.

The current border runs through the monastery grounds, with the
majority of the churches on the Georgian side. There are border guards
on both sides.

The exact delimitation of the border was not an important issue in
Soviet times and has arisen only since both Georgia and Azerbaijan
became independent. The two sides have failed to reach agreement at a
number of recent meetings of a bilateral frontier demarcation
commission. The commission made no public announcement after its most
recent meeting this month, although official sources said a plan was
under discussion for the state frontier to remain where it is, while
both sides would be free to use the monastery as a tourist centre.

`All the religious sites should remain in David Gareji, but
tourists from both Georgia and Azerbaijan go there, and it will be
good if the numbers grow,’ said Georgian culture minister Georgi
Gabashvili. `Everyone should have the chance to see the monastery
and I don’t understand what the problem could be.’

The monastery is situated in southern Georgia, 565 kilometres from the
Azerbaijani capital Baku and 60 km from the Georgian capital
Tbilisi. It dates back to the sixth century and is spread over 25
kilometres of arid landscape, with hundreds of buildings and churches
built into rocks and cliffs, many of them still inhabited by monks.

On the Azerbaijani side, the landscape is completely deserted for 15
km between the Boyuk Kesik border checkpoint and the monastery.

The empty territory is used as pastureland, and all along the road
this IWPR correspondent met shepherds and their dogs with flocks of
sheep.

`In summer we go to Keshish Dagh to relax, and the Georgians go to
pray,’ said 61-year-old Ahmed Salimov from the village of Boyuk
Kesik.

There are Azerbaijani border posts at the foot of the hill where the
monastery is located as well as at the top. This correspondent was
told he needed special permission to visit the monastery, meaning it
was only possible to reach it from the Georgian side.

`This is a strategic location,’ an Azerbaijani officer told
IWPR. `It’s true we are on friendly terms with Georgia, but no
country would give up strategic heights like these to another
state.’

In recent years, Azerbaijan and Georgia have cooperated closely on
prestigious projects such as the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline. The
disagreement over the monastery is therefore an embarrassment to both
sides.

Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili told journalists that it was
not right to say there was a `dispute’ over David
Gareji. `It’s not a dispute,’ he said. `We have a
fraternal relationship with our friends have and we hope that we can
settle this issue quickly.’

However, officials on both sides are digging in their heels – while
repeating that bilateral relations are friendly.

Azerbaijani deputy foreign minister Halaf Halafov said, `We should
not make a problem out of this. Everyone knows that the greater part
of the complex lies on Azerbaijani territory, and we will solve this
problem peacefully with the Georgians.’

The head of Georgia’s border police Badri Bitsadze said his country
`will not give up a centimetre’ of the monastery site.’

Georgian deputy foreign minister Giorgi Manjgaladze, who chairs a
commission on border demilitarisation and demarcation, said that
because Georgia attached such cultural and religious importance to
David Gareji, his government was ready to offer Azerbaijan other
territory in exchange for the area under dispute.

`We are interested in a possible exchange of territory,’ he told
IWPR. `We have made this position known to our Azerbaijani
colleagues.’ Manjgaladze said 95 per cent of the monastery grounds
lie inside Georgian territory.

Baku is not keen on the proposed land swap. An Azerbaijani border
guard official who wished to remain anonymous said, `This is the
only strategically important spot on high ground in the surrounding
area, and it is not in Azerbaijan’s interests to give it up in
exchange for other territories.’

Inside Georgia, official suggestions that the territory of David
Gareji could be a shared tourist zone have sparked indignation from
the Georgian public, which is 85 per cent Christian, and from the
Orthodox church.

Patriarch Ilya II said the monastery was a holy shrine that should lie
entirely on Georgian soil.

Members of the Kartuli Dasi party and the non-government Union of
Orthodox Parents of Georgia held two protest demonstrations this
month, one outside the Azerbaijani embassy and one outside the
Georgian foreign ministry.

`It looks as though our leaders are prepared to give Azerbaijan
absolutely anything, including holy shrines, in exchange for energy
resources’ said one protestor, Lasha Zedgenidze.

Georgians point out that some of the frescoes dating back to the
eighth century on the walls of the rockface churches depict kings and
queens of Georgia.

However, some Azerbaijani historians claim that the monastery actually
belongs to the Caucasian Albanian culture – an early medieval
Christian civilisation in what is now Azerbaijan.

`The monastery was inside Georgia only in the 12th century,’
said Azerbaijani journalist and historian Ismail Umudlu, who has
studied the monastery. `Both before and after this period, the area
was part of a state to which Azerbaijan is a successor.’

Georgian art historian Dmitry Tumanishvili dismissed this argument,
saying that the churches were full of evidence of Georgian history,
and there were no traces of Caucasian Albanian heritage there.

`David Gareji is covered in the work of Georgian masters; there are
Georgian inscriptions everywhere dating back to the sixth century,’
he said. `There are no traces of another culture there. After that,
I don’t think you need any further proof.’

Visitors to the monastery play down the quarrel, saying that border
guards on both sides allow them to wander freely through its
spectacular cave landscape.

`I visit this unique place very often and always try to show it to
my friends when they visit Georgia,’ said Khatuna Jangirashvili who
lives in Tbilisi. `It’s absolutely no problem to cross into
Azerbaijan. It’s just that the Azerbaijani border guards don’t
like us photographing their frontier posts. There are no other
problems.’

Idrak Abbasov is a correspondent for the Ayna/Zerkalo newspaper in
Baku. David Akhvlediani is a correspondent for Rezonansi newspaper in
Tbilisi. This collaboration was done under IWPR’s new Cross
Caucasus Journalism Network project.

Institute for War and Peace Reporting’s Caucasus Reporting Service

A1+

OSSETIA’S ABANDONED REFUGEES
[05:18 pm] 07 April, 2007

Ossetian refugees who fled their homes a decade and a half ago have
not even heard of a Georgian law that could give them compensation

By Alan Tskhurbayev in Prigorodny District and Dmitry Avaliani in
Tbilisi

Marina Pukhayeva has lived in the Prigorodny district of North Ossetia
for 16 years since she and her family fled the Akhmeta region of
Georgia following the conflict in South Ossetia. The house she left
behind in Georgia was later burned to the ground.

The Pukhayevs now live in a makeshift house on a former pig
farm. Around 50 other Ossetian refugee families from Georgia live on
the same settlement, consisting of rickety structures in the middle of
an enormous field.

A rough dirt track runs for about a kilometre to the nearest village,
Kambileevka. To get to school in the district centre, the children who
were born and grew up here have to walk much further than that.

The settlement has no sewage system here and no gas, so in winter
people heat their homes with firewood. The water they collect from an
outside standpipe often contains sand or even small fish.

This is a hidden place that few people know about. One local person
told IWPR that the local office of the Russian security service, the
FSB, had a designated officer whose job it was to stop foreign
journalists visiting the settlement.

In the 16 years the refugees have been here, they say they have never
received any assistance from government agencies. Local and
international charitable organisations give occasional help.

On January 1, 2007, a new restitution law came into force in Georgia,
promising compensation for refugees who suffered losses as a result of
the conflict in South Ossetia of 1990-92, which ended in South Ossetia
de facto seceding from Georgia.

However, implementation of the law, which would dramatically improve
the lives of the refugees, is still far off, as the two sides have
failed to set up a commission which would allocate the compensation
money.

The de facto authorities in South Ossetia have called the law a "PR
action" and complained that they were not consulted when it was drawn
it up.

Georgia’s government did not provide for the compensation payments in
its 2007 budget and appears to be waiting for as yet unspecified
assistance from the international community.

And the refugees themselves, the intended beneficiaries of the scheme,
say they have not even heard of it.

According to official Georgian data, 60,000 Ossetians fled South
Ossetia and other parts of Georgia as a result of the conflict. Most
are now resident in North Ossetia, on the Russian side of the border.

The law, passed in a third reading by the Georgian parliament on
December 28, states that anyone – whatever their nationality – who
lost property as a result of the conflict is entitled to compensation
in the form of property or the equivalent monetary value.

The law stipulates that a tripartite commission consisting of
Georgians, South Ossetians and representatives of international
organisations should be set up to look at applications submitted by
people claiming compensation.

Anyone with a relevant claim is entitled to apply to the commission
within a seven-year period after it is set up. The commission is
supposed to rule on applications within six months, and pay out
compensation within a year of its decision.

However, officials in the Georgian justice ministry which drew up the
law cannot say when compensation can actually be paid out.

In an interview with IWPR, Justice Minister Giorgi Kavtaradze blamed
the de facto South Ossetian authorities for showing no interest in
either the law or the commission.

"We presented the draft law to the authorities in South Ossetia
several times," said Kavtaradze. "We also handed it over through
international organisations. They merely sent us a written statement
saying they didn’t like the bill’s title, and it all ended there."

Boris Chochiev, acting deputy prime minister of South Ossetia, told
IWPR he was unimpressed with the bill. "There’s nothing we can do
with it," he said by telephone.

Chochiev said the law had been devised without his administration’s
involvement and had not taken Council of Europe advice into account.

"This is not a law about the return and welfare of refugees, but about
how not to return refugees and give them compensation," said Chochiev.

"How can we talk about the return and welfare of refugees when even
now we are registering [Ossetian] refugees from Georgia? It would be
better if Georgia had given a political verdict on its own policy
towards Ossetians, which has not yet changed."

Relations between the breakaway republic and Tbilisi are currently
very tense and negotiations are stalled on a way forward in the
dispute.

Despite the reaction from South Ossetia, Kavtaradze said that the
commission could still be formed without South Ossetian
involvement. But he said the agreement of international organisations
was needed before restitution money could be allocated from the state
budget.

"The appropriate sums will be allocated from the budget after the
commission starts working," he told IWPR.

Asked what sums would be paid out, Kavtaradze replied, "This is a case
when it’s impossible to make a preliminary financial calculation. We
don’t know how many people will apply to us, we don’t know the market
value of the property at the time of the appeal, and we don’t know how
much the price of property in South Ossetia will rise as a result of
this process.

"We are talking about billions," he added. "Millions won’t be enough
for this."

Kavtaradze said Georgia was planning to hold an international donor
conference to raise the money.

The international community has been encouraging Georgia to take this
step. Last spring legal experts from the Venice Commission of the
Council of Europe held consultations with non-governmental
organisations in South Ossetia and made recommendations to the
Georgian drafters of the bill.

Kavtaradze said a delegation from his ministry had met refugees in the
North Ossetian capital, Vladikavkaz, at a seminar arranged with
British mediation.

"Our delegation came away with very strong impressions – they came
back convinced that it [compensation plan] had evoked great interest
among refugees living there," he said.

However in North Ossetia’s Prigorodny region, where Ossetian refugees
from south of the border live in large numbers, no one whom IWPR spoke
to had been told about the Georgian law, and people sounded
distrustful of it.

"I haven’t heard anything about it and I’ll never believe that Georgia
can help us in any way," said Merab Lazarayev, one refugee.

Lazarayev, who walks with a limp as the result of a wound sustained in
the conflict, shouted out in indignation, "Look how we live here. Tell
me, can people live here? In this mud? I don’t even have a passport;
it got lost, and now they will ask for an identity document from
Georgia. I’m an invalid and I haven’t received a kopek from anyone in
all this time."

North Ossetia’s migration service has almost 18,000 refugees on its
register. Alexander Shanayev, head of the service’s department for
displaced people and refugees, said housing is the biggest problem.

"Today we have 4,275 families in a queue to receive housing," Shanayev
told IWPR. "Last year, just one housing voucher was handed out and
this year there will be another one. So at this rate, to satisfy
everyone we’d need 4,275 years. And our migration service can’t do
anything about it because that is the level of funding from the
[Russian] federal budget."

IWPR requested a comment from the North Ossetian government both on
the situation facing the refugees and on the Georgian restitution
law. However, despite repeated approaches to deputy nationalities
minister Soslan Khadikov, he did not respond to questions.

The refugees are not just fed up with their basic living conditions,
they are also fearful of being evicted from their current
housing. Several of the refugees said they had recently received a
visit from strangers telling them that they would have to leave their
houses by April as the land had been leased by local businessmen.

Sonya Tedeyeva is 75, and comes originally from the Georgian village
of Tetritskaro. Her husband died not long after the South Ossetian
conflict and was buried in Georgia. She said that his gravestone was
stolen and his body dug up. His relatives then brought his body with
them to North Ossetia for reburial.

Tedeyeva, wearing black clothing and headscarf, invited IWPR’s
contributor into her one-room house, which contains just a bed, a
table and a stove, and has bare electrical wires poking out of the
walls. In Georgia, she used to own a large house.

"Aren’t you sorry for us? In 17 years no one has helped us at all,"
she said.

Alan Tskhurbayev is a correspondent for Gazeta.ru in North
Ossetia. Dmitry Avaliani works for 24 Hours newspaper in Tbilisi.

This article is the first to be commissioned as part of an ambitious
new IWPR project, the Cross-Caucasus Journalism Network, which is
bringing together 50 journalists from all parts of the Caucasus for
meetings and collaborative work over a three-year period. The project
is funded by the European Union.

Institute for War and Peace Reporting’s Caucasus Reporting Service

Thursday, April 05, 2007
**********************************************
VICTIMS AS VICTIMIZERS
************************************
Armenians as victims: I will let more competent and qualified men than myself to deal with that aspect of our history and identity. Armenians as victimizers: that’s what I propose to explore here.
If you are one of those brainwashed dupes who believe, since Armenians can do no wrong, they cannot victimize anyone, allow me to quote two well-known and highly respected sources who cannot be said to be dissidents or anti-establishment critics because, in addition to being members of a political party, they were on friendly terms with a good number of establishment figures in both the Homeland and the Diaspora, among them several bosses, bishops, and benefactors.
Antranik Zaroukian (1912-1989), poet, novelist, critic, editor: “They speak of the cross and nail us to it again as they speak.”
Hagop Garabents (1925-1996), novelist, short story writer, essayist, and Voice of America broadcaster: “Once upon a time we fought and shed our blood for freedom. We are now afraid of free speech.”
In our context, to be afraid of free speech means, anyone who dares to deal honestly and objectively with facts is ruthlessly silenced and alienated on grounds of anti-Armenianism.
To those who say, at least we don’t victimize others, only ourselves; I say, that’s because the weak cannot victimize the mighty; the weak can victimize only those who are weaker; in the same way that capitalists do not exploit fellow capitalists, only workers.
Before I rest my case, allow me to quote Zaroukian again: “What kind of people are we? What kind of leadership is this? Instead of compassion, mutual contempt; instead of reason, blind instinct; instead of common sense, fanaticism.”
Contempt, blind instinct, fanaticism: that sounds to me less like Armenianism and more like Ottomanism.
And now, listen to one of those silenced and alienated writers speaking:
Stepan Voskanian (1825-1901): “For thirty-five years I did not write a single line in Armenian. I was treated so shabbily by my fellow Armenians that I could not help hating everything that I held dear as a young man; and since I was starved by my own countrymen, I had to write in French in order to survive.”
Next time you lament our victims, I suggest you remember all our victims, not just a fraction of them.
#
Friday, April 06, 2007
****************************************
ON OPTIMISM
*******************************
After contributing an optimistic commentary to one of our weeklies, a friend writes: “I wonder, was I deceiving myself and my readers?”
*
ON INTELLECTUALS
**********************************
Our intellectuals (so-called), whose function is to expose the lies of propaganda, the double-talk of speechifiers and sermonizers, and the shenanigans of those in power, now allow themselves to be feted by bishops, awarded grants by benefactors, and hired by bosses, all the while shedding crocodile tears over our martyrs. “Danger, danger, danger!” (Zarian).
*
ARMENIAN ETIQUETTE
***********************************
I have spent a lifetime trying to understand my fellow Armenians. After reading a line or two, a Jack S. Avanakian thinks he has me all figured out as an enemy agent. No one can combine loudmouth stupidity with ignorance and arrogance to the same degree than a phony patriot or a brainwashed dupe “whose tongue is sharper than a Turk’s yataghan.”(Zarian again.)
We have an expression: “We are all Armenians here!” meaning, “Why bother with conventional rules of etiquette when we can revert to our Ottoman ways?” Or, “Why stand on ceremony and say ‘I disagree’ when you can kick him in the groin?”
*
ON REVOLUTIONARIES
**********************************
Our revolutionaries (so-called) are now bourgeois reactionaries whose number one concern is keeping up with the Joneses. The only revolutionary thing about them is their fiery speeches. We have another expression, “chartel, peshrel!” — literally, “slaughter and smash!” — that describes the daring of a speechifying revolutionary charlatan.
#
Saturday, April 07, 2007
***************************************
ON THE STUDY OF HISTORY
*******************************************
There are people who study history to prove themselves right and everyone else wrong, and there are others whose purpose is to learn what happened and to understand why it happened. What have we learned from our history? That we are the first nation to convert to Christianity, and the first nation in the 20th Century to be subjected to ethnic cleansing. Which proves that (one) we are better than anyone else, (two) everyone around us is either a bloodthirsty barbarian or a conniving bastard, and (three) everyone who disagrees with us is anti-Armenian.
*
Once in a while I too am called anti-Armenian. If true, then I have some bad news to impart: there are a great many of us out there. So many in fact that all resistance is futile and unconditional surrender is the only option. But I believe the true anti-Armenian is he who thinks his understanding of the past is right because he is infallible. If you are one of them, I say:” You want to understand Turks? Begin with yourself.
*
In movies, a happy ending is a happy ending. In life, it’s more likely to be an unhappy beginning.
*
Paul Eluard: “The inspiration in a poem is nothing; its power to inspire others is everything.”
*
André Malraux: “Being a king is idiotic; making a kingdom – that is what counts.”
*
Jean-Jacques Rousseau: “Name a gentleman and there will be at least twenty people who will tell you he is the son of a scoundrel.”
#