Author: admin

PART OF LEVON ZAKARIAN’S PERSONAL LIBRARY PRESENTED TO “SPYURK”
SCIENTIFIC AND EDUCATIONAL CENTER

YEREVAN, August 2 (Noyan Tapan). The library of the “Spyurk”
(“Diaspora”) Scientific and Educational Center of the Yerevan
Pedagogical University after Khachatour Abovian was replenished with
220 valuable books concerning the Diaspora. Sons of Levon Zakarian,
editor of the “Hayreniki Dzain” (“Voice of Homeland”) newspaper,
presented the center with the complete section of related news items
for 30 years besides these books taken from the personal library.
According to Suren Danielian, Director of the Center, all this
literature will be kept in the reading room of the center as Levon
Zakarian’s personal untouched fund.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Consejo Mundial de Iglesias (Comunicados de prensa), Switzerland
Aug 2 2004

Middle East church leaders respond to Iraq bombings: solidarity and
work for peace needed

Middle Eastern church leaders have condemned attacks on Iraqi
churches and called for solidarity following bombings at churches
yesterday.

Speaking today at the World Council of Churches (WCC) Faith and Order
plenary commission meeting in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, bishop Nareg
Alemezian of the Armenian Apostolic Church (Catholicosate of Cilicia)
said: “This is the first time Christian churches have been targeted.
We condemn this attack and we are very concerned about it.”

Metropolitan Dr Mar Gregorios Yohanna Ibrahim, from the Syrian
Orthodox Church of Antioch, urged Christians and Muslims to work
together for peace. “Solidarity is very important, both inside and
outside the region, both among Christians and between Christians and
Muslims,” he said.

Gregorios stressed that “the WCC and others should encourage anything
that brings Christians and Muslims together, not only in theological
dialogue but also in the dialogue of life and work.”

“I address my appeal to the Arab world, which can support any plan
for peace, and also to the Iraqi people themselves – if they are not
in solidarity, how then can they solve these problems?” he asked.

Alemezian called on international and local people to work for peace.
“This is not just a problem for Syrians and Armenians,” he said. “The
situation in Iraq is not isolated. It is related to the general
political situation in the world.

“We have a conflict, and we have to solve it – the US, the UN, all
parties involved in the creation of this situation, but also local
people and faith communities.”

Both leaders stressed the good relations between Christians and
Muslims in Iraq prior to the bombings.

“Christians are an integral part of the society they are living in,
they are not newcomers, they are not there for any superficial
reason,” said Alemezian. “Middle Eastern Christians are the people of
the land where Christ was born,” he added.

They both stressed the dangers posed by pressure on the nearly
1million Iraqi Christians leading to increased emigration.

“The diminishing number of Christians in Iraq is a terrible thing,”
said Gregorios. “The same picture is replicated in other countries
like Turkey, Iran, and Palestine. We are losing our people.”

Could a situation arise, they said, where there were no Christians in
the Middle East and no Muslims in the West? This would be “dangerous
for everybody,” said Metropolitan Gregorios. “This is very important.
It’s not good for humanity.”

According to news reports, at least 11 people were killed and dozens
injured as bombs exploded at four churches – two of them Syrian and
two, Armenian Orthodox – and a monastery.

Additional information: Juan Michel + 603 2148 9166 Melaka room +4179
507 6363

Para más información: Juan Michel,+41 22 791 6153 +41 79 507 6363
[email protected]

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Independent Online, South Africa
Aug 2 2004

Zarqawi blamed for Iraqi church attacks

Baghdad – Iraq’s Christian minority became the latest target of
violence in Iraq on Sunday when explosions killed at least 10 people
outside churches here and in the northern city of Mosul.

And on Monday, Iraq’s national security adviser said the attacks
carry the hallmarks of suspected al-Qaeda ally Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

“There is no shadow of a doubt that this bears the blueprint of
Zarqawi,” Mowaffaq al-Rubaie told Reuters, adding the attacks on
Sunday evening were an attempt to drive Iraq’s minority Christians
out of the country.

“Zarqawi and his extremists are basically trying to drive a wedge
between Muslims and Christians in Iraq.”

‘There is no shadow of a doubt that this bears the blueprint of
Zarqawi’
Rubaie said Iraq’s national security council would hold an emergency
meeting on Monday to discuss the blasts that hit at least five
churches, including four in Baghdad.

Six car bombs blew up in Baghdad and Mosul churches in the first
attack against Christian places of worship since US-led forces
toppled Saddam Hussein in April 2003. Fifty people were wounded.

Six people died when one of the bombs exploded inside a huge church
and seminary compound in southern Baghdad, causing massive damage,
police and medics said.

A rescue worker at the Al-Dura compound said he pulled out six dead
women and two dead children from the debris.

The bomb exploded as worshippers were leaving evening mass, an AFP
correspondent at the scene said.

‘It’s a crime. It’s Sunday, we were at mass’
A car was detonated by a suicide bomber outside an Armenian church in
Baghdad’s upmarket district of Karada, said policeman Haidar Abdul
Hussein.

Minutes later, a second car bomb exploded next to a Catholic Syriac
church.

Police reported a fourth explosion outside a Chaldean Catholic church
in the east of Baghdad.

“It’s a crime. It’s Sunday, we were at mass. There were a lot of
women and children,” said Bishop Raphael Kutami at the Syriac church
in Baghdad.

Another priest said the explosion occurred as people were leaving the
church and the number of wounded was unkown.

In Mosul, 370 kilometres north of the capital, two car bombs exploded
in the early evening outside the Mar Polis church in the central
Mohandessin neighborhood, Major Mohammed Omar Taha said.

Medics there said one person was killed and 15 were wounded in the
bombings.

In the northern oil city of Kirkuk, police said an explosion went off
in the evening in a Christian neighborhood, but there were no
casualties because most people were at church.

A Vatican spokesperson described the attacks as “terrible and very
worrying because it is the first time that Christian places of
worship have been targeted in Iraq.”

“It seems that someone wants to increase tension by trying to hit all
groups, the churches included,” said the spokesman, the Reverend Ciro
Benedettini.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Lebanese Christian and Muslim clerics denounce church bombings in Iraq

AP
2 Aug 04

BEIRUT, Lebanon

Leading Christian and Muslim clerics on Monday denounced the wave of
church bombings in Iraq as violence that harms both Christians and
Muslims and called for dialogue and solidarity to solve disputes and
prevent such acts in the future.

Lebanese Foreign Minister Jean Obeid also condemned the bombing,
indirectly blaming Israel.

“The results of such attacks are a service to the Israeli project
… which is based on the clash of civilizations, cultures and
religions,” he said.

A series of explosions outside five churches Baghdad and Mosul Sunday
killed at least seven people and injured more than 30 in the first
major assault on Iraq’s Christian minority since the 15-month-old
insurgency began. There was no claim of responsibility, though they
assailants are believed Islamist militants.

“Neither Islam nor Christianity will accept violence as a way to solve
problems,” said Aram I, head of the Armenian Orthodox Church in the
diaspora.

An Armenian church in Baghdad’s Karada neighborhood was one of those
attacked. Iraq has an Armenian community of some 15,000 people.

“Violence in all forms and expressions is against human and religious
values and principles. We have repeatedly stressed the need for
dialogue, solidarity, mutual tolerance, respect and understanding,”
Aram I said in a statement faxed to The Associated Press.

He called on the Iraqi government “to take the necessary measures to
protect the rights and the well being of all the citizens.”

Lebanon’s most senior Shiite Muslim cleric, Grand Ayatollah Hussein
Fadlallah, said the church bombings should be viewed “in a rational
manner away from the emotional instincts,” saying the perpetrators
purpose was to spread sedition between Shiite and Sunni Muslims, and
between Muslims and Christians.

“Our relations as people of the Divine Books make it imperative to
continue to communicate and stand together against the sedition
mongers … those local and those coming from abroad, and those who
bring in with them sedition mongers from the Israeli Mossad
(intelligence),” Fadllalah said in a faxed statement.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

zawya

Bahrain mulling gas deal with Iran, Qatar: report

02 August 2004

Tehran — Bahrain plans to sign agreements with Iran and Qatar next year for
the purchase of gas, a Bahraini press report said, citing a finance ministry
official.

The projects involve pipe laying under the Persian Gulf, which is expected
to finish by 2009, Bahrain Tribune said on its website, quoting
Undersecretary for Finance and National Economy, Shaikh Ibrahim bin Khalifa
al-Khalifa.

It put the cost of the projects at one billion Bahraini dinars. Shaikh
Ibrahim said talks with Iran and Qatar were `progressing smoothly and would
be completed by the year-end`, Bahrain Tribune said.

It said, “Iran has affirmed its keenness to take part in the joint
investment project and provide investment options.”

The Itar-Tass news agency said last month that Iran had begun building a
140-km-long gas pipeline to Armenia. It said the two countries had signed an
agreement on the project worth around 120 million US dollars in May, when
Iranian Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh visited Yerevan.

Under its provisions, Iran will be supplying 36 billion cubic meters of
natural gas to Armenia annually from 2007 through 2027. Itar-Tass, citing
OPEC sources in Vienna, said that the pipeline might be used to ship Iranian
gas to Georgia, Ukraine and farther on to Europe in the future.

Tehran has already a multi-billion-dollar contract with neighboring Turkey
to supply gas for 25 years. The gas flow was launched in December 2001 via a
2,577-kilometer pipeline, running from the northeastern city of Tabriz to
Ankara, which supplies gas from southern Iran near the Persian Gulf.

The contract has been a boon to Iran`s bid to become a sustainable gas
supplier to Turkey and Europe.

Looking for alternative markets, Tehran has held talks with the Persian Gulf
littoral states and the Central Asian nations for the sale of gas.

The country sits on the second largest proven gas reserves of the world
after Russia, which has been a headache for Iran by getting into, what is
feared to be, an unnecessary and costly competition.

© IRNA 2004
Article originally published by IRNA 02-Aug-04

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

SDA – Servizio di base in Italiano
August 1, 2004

Iraq: attacco a chiese; cristiani sono 3% popolazione

ROMA, 1 ago

I cristiani sono circa il 3% dei 23 milioni di iracheni, suddivisi in
maggioranza tra cattolici e ortodossi. Nel Paese sono presenti anche
i protestanti, in numero inferiore rispetto alle altre due
confessioni, in quanto arrivati solo da pochi anni. Nazione a
maggioranza musulmana, l’Iraq conta una forte presenza di sciiti, che
sono la confessione maggioritaria con circa il 63% della popolazione,
seguiti dai sunniti che rappresentano il 34%.

Tra le popolazioni curde, stanziate nel nordest dell’Iraq e contano
circa 4 milioni di persone, si trovano ancora pochissimi ebrei, ma la
comunita’ cristiana e’ tuttora presente. Nel Paese sono presenti
anche i cristiani assiri che hanno ripreso a sperare di poter vivere
la loro specificita’ religiosa e culturale dopo la caduta di Saddam.
Molto variegata la presenza dei cattolici: sono poco meno di 800
mila, tra caldei (700 mila), latini (2.500), siro-antiocheni (75.000)
e armeni (2.000). La popolazione caldea rappresenta il terzo gruppo
etnico in Iraq, dopo arabi e curdi.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Xinhua, China
Aug 2 2004

French Casoni named Armenia coach

PARIS, Aug. 1 (Xinhuanet) — Former French international defender
Bernard Casoni has been named as coach of Armenia.

Casoni, 43, said he had signed a one-year contract with the
Armenian football federation.

Casoni, who has previously coached Marseille from 1999-2000,
Tunisia’s Etoile du Sahel and Cannes, will be assisted by fellow
former international and close friend Bernard Pardo.

Casoni heads to Armenia on Thursday for preparations for the
national team’s first qualifying match for the 2006 World Cup, a game
against Macedonia on August 18. Armenia is currently ranked 118th in
FIFA’s world rankings. Enditem

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
BIRTHRIGHT ARMENIA
Contact: Linda Yepoyan
[email protected]

July 30, 2004

BIRTHRIGHT ARMENIA CELEBRATES ITS INAUGURAL YEAR

Yerevan, Armenia – Armenian youth from a cross section of our diasporan
institutions came together, joined by the newly repatriated diasporan youth
and their Homeland peers, to celebrate the launch of a new and truly
forward thinking organization, Birthright Armenia/Depi Hayk. The inaugural
festivities, under the name ” Gateway 2004″, symbolizing the organizations’
promotion of an ever-widening bridge between the Diaspora and the Homeland,
was held on July 16th in Yerevan with lively dancing, food and drink.

“Gateway 2004” marks this non-profit’s first year of operations in Armenia.
It also served as a means to highlight the diversity of the first group of
young participants which Birthright Armenia/Depi Hayk sponsored from seven
different summer volunteer, cultural, and study programs serving our
diasporan youth. It was an unprecedented evening of unification and
networking in one, under the main “Journey of Self-Discovery” theme. The 40
Depi Hayk participants of 2004 and other diasporan attendees represented the
following organizations: Armenian Volunteer Corps, Armenian Students’
Association-NY, Armenian Assembly of America, Armenian Youth Federation,
Land and Culture Organization, Armenian Medical Association and the Armenian
Church Youth Organization of America, the University of Michigan Summer
Language Institute and the Christian Youth Mission to Armenia .

Welcoming the 160 plus attendees, Birthright Armenia founder Edele Hovnanian
commented that “It is refreshing to see a truly integrated group of youth
gathered together under one roof, all of whom understand the importance of
our presence here in the Homeland at this particular time in the history of
our building a nation-state”. She then introduced Foreign Minister Vartan
Oskanian to continue the welcome and opening remarks. Addressing the group,
Minister Oskanian stated:

“The first time I heard about the Depi Hayk program, I immediately jumped on
the idea, committing the Foreign Ministry to help this new organization in
any way necessary. This is the first step in really increasing the number
of diasporan youth who can experience the Homeland, and I am confident that
it will continue to grow and expand beyond North America to include young
people and groups from all over the world. This will enable young adults to
see Armenia, in all its beauty, to see its progress, to understand the good
and the bad, to take in everything that Armenia is at this moment.

The message I want to leave you with today is the following: please don’t
take what you see in Armenia today for granted. It took us a great deal to
build this and to keep this. We’ve come a long way since the early days of
independence. A long, long way. Our main source of pride should be this
Armenia. Believe in Armenia. Be committed to it. When you get back home,
stay involved, join efforts with others, influence your governments, and
become more engaged. Yes, there are many differences between the Diaspora
and the Homeland, as a result of many things like history and geography. The
result is different upbringing and different thought processes. We can
certainly bridge these gaps, and one of the best ways to do so is through
the younger generations. One of the most effective ways to do so is through
interaction among youth here on Armenian soil, so we can reach our goal and
say we are one nation, comprised of two entities, the Diaspora and the
Homeland. The two together through joint efforts will make Armenia the
place we will all be proud of.”

The Gateway 2004 celebration took place at the spacious art showroom of the
Armenian Center for Contemporary Experimental Art – graciously offered to
Birthright Armenia by co-Founder Edward Balassanian. Live international
music was provided by Arsen Nercessian, a local musician with a
Latino/Calypso touch.

It is foreseen that “Gateway” celebrations will be an annual affair, to
capture the energy and spirit of Birthright Armenia/Depi Hayk efforts at the
peak of the summer programs, and to continually serve as a networking and
relationship building event for Armenian youth worldwide.

Birthright Armenia’s mission is to strengthen ties between the Homeland and
diasporan youth by affording them an opportunity to be a part of Armenia’s
daily life and to contribute to Armenia’s development through work, study
and volunteer experiences, while developing a renewed sense of Armenian
identity. This is accomplished by supporting and complementing the
initiatives of existing diasporan organizations that offer youth programs in
Armenia, and encouraging them to expand their offerings in depth and breath.
Birthright Armenia assists with travel fellowships, language instruction,
in-country seminars, orientation and excursions in exchange for community
service in Armenia. Please visit our Web site at
for more information.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Chicago Tribune , IL
Aug 1 2004

Insurer settles with Armenian families

Items compiled from Tribune news services

LOS ANGELES — A judge on Friday formally approved a $20million
settlement in a class action lawsuit between New York Life Insurance
Co. and the descendants of Armenians killed nearly 90 years ago in
the Turkish Ottoman Empire.

The landmark legal agreement approved by U.S. District Court Judge
Christina Snyder is thought to be the first ever in connection with
what Armenians say was genocide but what Turkey describes as civil
unrest.

Snyder granted preliminary approval for the unpaid death benefits
earlier this year.

Many of the policies languished because heirs could not be found, the
firm said. The company has located about one-third of the
policyholders’ descendants to pay benefits.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

PanArmenian News
July 31 2004

PRESIDENT’S PRESS OFFICE REFUTES HEARSAY ON TRANSPOSITIONS IN
ARMENIAN GOVERNMENT AND RESIGNATION OF MAYOR OF YEREVAN

BAKU AUTHORITIES DID NOT SANCTION RALLY AGAINST ARMENIAN OFFICERS’
ARRIVAL IN AZERBAIJAN

HEARINGS ON COMPENSATION PAYMENT TO ARMENIAN GENOCIDE VICTIMS BEGAN
IN CALIFORNIA

*********************************************************************

PRESIDENT’S PRESS OFFICE REFUTES HEARSAY ON TRANSPOSITIONS IN
ARMENIAN GOVERNMENT AND RESIGNATION OF MAYOR OF YEREVAN

31.07.2004 13:54

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Armenian President’s press office refuted the
reports of the local media about the forthcoming transpositions in
the Armenian government and the resignation of the Mayor of Yerevan.
As President’s Press Secretary Ashot Kocharian told Armenpress
agency, such rumors do not correspond to reality.

*********************************************************************

BAKU AUTHORITIES DID NOT SANCTION RALLY AGAINST ARMENIAN OFFICERS’
ARRIVAL IN AZERBAIJAN

31.07.2004 13:53

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Baku City Administration refused to give sanction
to the protest actions of the United Front Party of Azerbaijan (UFPA)
against the arrival of the Armenian servicemen for the participation
in NATO exercise this September. To remind, UFPA activists intended
to picket the Embassies of NATO member-states in early August. The
press release of the party states the City Administration’s deed as
“gross infraction” of the law on Freedom of Meetings. According to
Echo Baku newspaper, the final decision on the planned rally is to be
taken by UFPA leadership on August 2.

*********************************************************************

HEARINGS ON COMPENSATION PAYMENT TO ARMENIAN GENOCIDE VICTIMS BEGAN
IN CALIFORNIA

31.07.2004 13:51

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ The final hearings of the case “victims of the
Armenian Genocide against New York Life Insurance Company” began in
the Californian Court on July 30. The Court is expected to decree on
the payment of $20 million to the heirs of thousands of Armenians,
who insured their lives in American Insurance Companies and then fell
victims of the Genocide in Ottoman Turkey. To remind, the company
officially recognized the validity of about 2300 insurance policies.
According to the lawyers, Liberty reports, the moral factor in this
case is more important that the material one, since the fact of the
Genocide is for the first time to be recognized in legal form.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress