Author: Badalian Vardan

Armenian parliament endorses constitution amendments to fit EU
By Tigran Liloyan
ITAR-TASS News Agency
September 1, 2005 Thursday
YEREVAN, September 1 — Armenian parliament has endorsed a bill on
a range of changes in the national Constitution that will be put up
for final endorsement at a national referendum.
As many as 98 MPs out of the total 131 voted in favor of the document
Thursday.
Senior MPs say the new amendments fit the requirements Armenia
undersigned while joining the Council of Europe.
One of the changes long awaited by numerous communities of Armenians
living abroad is a provision on dual citizenship, which the effective
Constitution, adopted in 1995 ruled out so far.
The number of Armenians living outside their historic homeland exceeds
five million people. It is roughly a million and a half bigger than
the population of this country proper.
Rough a half of the worldwide Armenian community – about 2.5 million
people – live in Russia.
In the meantime, the proposals to introduce dual citizenship have had
quite a number of opponents here. People in Armenia are apprehensive
of how the worldwide community members will use the right to vote,
which they get automatically along with citizenship.
The opponents believe their impact on election results may be overly
powerful.

Fresh rows flare up in countdown to Turkey talks
By Mark Beunderman
euobserver.com
02.09.2005 – 09:52 CET
| EUOBSERVER / NEWPORT – The atmosphere between Brussels and Ankara is
set to worsen following fresh rows over Cyprus and free speech, one
month before accession talks with Turkey are scheduled to start. The
Commission has drawn a “red line” on Cyprus.
While EU foreign ministers were yesterday (1 September) at a meeting
in Wales struggling to draft a counter-declaration to Turkey’s
non-recognition of Cyprus, Turkish foreign minister Abdullah Gul
publicly took a defiant stance on the Cyprus issue.
Mr Gul stated to the press that Turkey, as a non-EU member state,
does not feel obliged to allow Cypriot planes and ships to enter
its territory – something the EU says is against the spirit of the
customs agreement that Ankara signed with the enlarged EU on 29 July.
“Expectations from full members and expectations from candidate
countries are quite different”, the Turkish minister said according
to the FT. “Everybody knows what the customs union means”, he added.
Enlargement commissioner Olli Rehn today (2 September) just before
meeting Mr Gul in Newport rebuffed the Turkish stance, stating that the
“full implementation” of the customs agreement represents a “red line
for the European Union”.
“This is not a matter of negotiation but of commitment by Turkey”,
he added.
“This issue is of extremely serious concern”.
EU foreign ministers yesterday tried to reach agreement on a
“counter-declaration” to Ankara’s unilateral declaration of 29 July,
which says that it does not recognize the sovereignty of Cyprus
despite extending its EU customs agreement to all new EU member states,
including Cyprus.
The UK presidency has striven to achieve general consensus on the EU
counter-declaration at the Wales meeting.
But Mr Straw told journalists that there was “broad, but not unanimous
agreement” on the text.
Diplomats indicated that there are substantial differences between
member states over the toughness of the EU’s “counter-declaration”.
Wrangling over words The text is set to contain a paragraph reiterating
the status of Cyprus as a state under international law.
But member states such as France, Austria, Greece and Cyprus itself
want reassurance that Ankara will over time take concrete steps
towards recognition.
“They want the declaration to have a dynamic character and call for
progress by Turkey”, one council diplomat said.
The counter declaration has now been referred back to member states’
ambassadors in Brussels.
In spite of the difficulties surrounding the Cyprus issue, Mr Straw
stated that he is “reasonably confident” that the agreed deadline
for opening the accession talks with Turkey, on 3 October, will be met.
Free speech row On top of the Cyprus problem, a fresh row over freedom
of speech emerged yesterday which looks set to dampen the atmosphere
between Ankara and Brussels still further.
The widely-read author Orhan Pamuk was charged by the Turkish public
prosecutor with “denigrating” the nation through his comments about
Turkish history, made to a Swiss paper a few months ago.
Although the Turkish public prosecutor is independent from the
government, the case has already become an issue interfering with
Turkey’s EU membership bid.
A spokeswoman for Commissioner Rehn told the EUobserver that the case
of Mr Pamuk raises “serious concerns” about the actual “implementation
on the ground” of political reforms by Turkey.
She added that the EU executive is also concerned about the
“interpretation of certain provisions in the penal code by judges
and prosecutors” in Turkey.
Turkey had to adapt a new penal code in order to bring its laws in
line with EU human rights standards.
Denis MacShane, the UK’s former Europe minister, said “It is a
sickening blow to all pro-Turks in Britain and Europe …to hear
the news that the Turkish authorities seek to persecute this great
European writer”, the Independent reports.

,beghtol,672 88,22.html
Village Voice
For the Erased
Diamanda Gal commemorates victims of a long-forgotten Turkish ethnic cleansing
by LD Beghtol
August 29th, 2005
Ages ago at college in her native California, singer, composer, and
cultural provocatrice Diamanda Gal abandoned the study of science to
pursue her true passion: experimental music. But biochemistry’s loss
is our gain; over the last two decades, her controversial works have
earned her a place high in the avant-garde music pantheon. Fearlessly
outspoken, frighteningly knowledgeable, and dangerously openhearted,
Gal dedicates her latest work, Defixiones: Orders From the Dead
to the estimated 3 million to 4 million victims of the Armenian,
Assyrian, and Anatolian Greek “ethnic cleansing” committed by the
Ottoman Turks between 1914 and 1923. Since 1999, Defixiones has
been performed to near unanimous acclaim at prestigious venues the
world over, from London’s Royal Festival Hall to the Sydney Opera
House, from the Athens National Opera to Mexico City’s Universidad
del Claustro de Sor Juana. Its New York premiere (presented by the
Lower Manhattan Cultural Council’s “What Comes After: Cities, Art +
Recovery” international summit) is scheduled for September 8 and 10 at
Michael Schimmel Center for the Arts, Pace University~Wappropriately
enough, just across from City Hall, mere blocks from ground zero.
The word defixiones refers to warnings engraved in lead placed onto
graves in Greece and Asia Minor, threatening desecraters with grievous
harm. Gal uses this term in a broader memorializing sense, urging
us to remember the forgotten dead, the “erased,” the massacred. Her
epic performance for solo voice, piano, and electronics speaks for
the poet-author in exile~Wboth far from home and in his homeland~Was
well as for “born outlaws,” as Gal calls homosexuals, echoing Genet.
Informed by excerpts from the Armenian Orthodox liturgy and the
traditional amanethes, or improvisatory lamentations sung at Greek
funerals, Gal 70-minute masterwork showcases both her astounding
vocal technique and her enormous capacity for rage, compassion,
defiance, and ferocious emotionalism. Though at times truly fearsome
in its raw, insistent pathos~Wfamiliar to those who know her crushing
Plague Mass (1990) or Schrei X (1996)~WDefixiones’ real power lies
in those seductively lyrical, quiet passages that occur just before
Gal wail of existential anguish erupts in reverberant majesty. Iraqi
artist-scholar Selim Abdullah notes, “The sentiment, strength . . . and
sensitivity contained in this Saturnian representation go back to the
very aspects the Greeks gave to a whole Occidental culture.” Awash in
blood and tears, and haunted by images of unspeakable (and until now,
largely unspoken) butchery, Gal funeral mass is cathartic, but neither
glib nor sentimental. Any redemption is hard-won.
I spoke with Miss Gal who has lived in the East Village for
the past 10 years, on two occasions in mid August. Over multiple
cappuccinos~Wcaffeine being her current drug of choice~Wshe dazzled
me with her famous intelligence and often barbed wit. Onstage she’s
a mythic figure come to life; in person she is perhaps even more
mesmerizing.
——————————————————————————–
Few people in America, other than those of Greek, Armenian, or
Assyrian descent, seem to have heard of this horror. Why is it so
unknown? This country discusses one or two genocides and markets them
in very contrived ways. They don’t write about them truthfully, the
way [author and concentration camp survivor] Primo Levi did. Think
of Spielberg and the legions of mediocrity he has propagated.
And there’s the conflicting numbers, and . . . What does it matter if
it was 6 million or 2 million or 200? Genocide is genocide. Every
culture has its particular way of killing and torturing its
enemies. And the Turks are still trying to cover it up by calling it
deportation, but that’s just another word for “death sentence.”
You’re perceived as the voice of the fallen and forgotten. Is
that something you’ve chosen? No~WI hated being the poster girl
for the AIDS epidemic. It had to be done, but I hated it. I never
meant to be political~W I’m an artist. An artist can only speak for
herself. But if you get particularly good at something it has a sort of
universality, and then it has a certain audience, and you’re answerable
for that. Like Adon [Syrian-born poet Adon Ali Ahmed Said]~Wa great,
great poet~Wwho is seen as the voice of a “leftist movement” of some
sort, but he’s only writing about what is truth to him.
How did you come to create Defixiones? My father is an Anatolian
Greek. All my life he’s talked about how the finest Greek culture
was from Anatolia~Whome to Assyrians, Armenians, Greeks, and Jews,
who for centuries traded languages, songs, ideas, histories~Wand how
many of these cultures are indistinguishable from one another. So
the notion of racial purity there is just absurd. He also told me
about the atrocities committed by the Turks against Greeks from Asia
Minor. But the direct catalyst was an interview I saw with Dr. [Jack]
Kevorkian, who said, “I’m Armenian, I know what torture is all about. I
know the difference between homicide and helping people end a life
of misery.” He was so articulate, and he was discussing Greek Stoic
philosophy and the Armenians in the same breath, which I found very
unusual at the time. So in 1998 I said to myself: It’s time to do
this work.
Later I read Peter Balakian’s book Black Dog of Fate, which talks
about what being an Armenian in America means~Wit means you’re
invisible. It’s the same with the Greeks. Most people think of Greek
culture as a dead culture: Socrates and Aristotle and the statues
. . . And they think Assyrians are the same as Syrians.
Then, as a fellow at Princeton in 1999, I studied texts by Giorgos
Seferis and others in preparation for a performance at the Vooruit
Festival at the Castle of Ghent [in Belgium]. Defixiones was more a
song cycle then, with [the underground Greek protest music known as]
rembetika and works by Paul Celan, Henri Michaux, and César Vallejo. I
concentrated on exiled poets like the Anatolian Greek refugees of the
1920s~Wmy father’s people. The premiere was on September 11, 1999,
which marked the anniversary of the reign of terror under Charles V,
who persecuted homosexuals, women thought to be witches, and other
heretics.
Defixiones is somewhat a work in progress? Yes. Currently I’m
using texts by Giorgos Seferis, [who] is like my bible~Wand Nikos
Kazantzakis, who people will know from his novel The Last Temptation
of Christ. And Pier Paolo Pasolini, whose poem is addressed to the
people who survived. Everyone just hated him. And Yannis Ritsos. And
“The Dance” by Siamanto, with its description of brides being burned
alive. And the pro-genocide poem “Hate,” which was published by [the
Turkish newspaper] Hürriyet and broadcast by the BBC in 1974, right
before the invasion of Cyprus~Wabout why the Turks should decapitate
the Greeks.
September is such a politically charged month . . . Yes, starting
with the destruction of Smyrna in September 1922. And Black September
1955, when Turkish officials waged a disinformation campaign stating
that Greeks had bombed the consulate in Thessalon resulted in the
desecration of Greek churches and the mutilation and murder of priests
and other men. And the Black September of Ariel Sharon’s going into
Lebanon in ’82. He was doing a real con job. And then the situation
in America in 2001 . . .
Your aggressive style and disturbing subject matter automatically
put you outside the mainstream. Yet your music has a surprisingly
broad appeal. Well, I’ve been creating sacred masses, which are not
exactly a popular art form in this country today. But they’re meant
to be, literally, for the people. The American idea of a populist
art form is rap. Some of it is good, but most is appalling in that it
promotes stupidity and the abuse of the same groups that monotheist
totalitarian governments persecute: women, homosexuals, and anyone
who doesn’t speak precisely your language.
You must get tons of hate mail. Fundamentalists of all sorts despise
me. I’m attacked by my own people too~WAmerican Greek men who are homo-
phobic and think everything I say is heresy. I got shit recently
from a Jewish promoter about doingDefixiones in Mexico. She asked
me if I really believed people would be interested. And I thought:
“Please don’t insult my intelligence~Wor theirs. They’ll understand
the concept of genocide as it has occurred and continues to occur to
so many people around the world . . . ”
I want to perform Defixiones in Istanbul and Smyrna. The psychic
manifestations of violence can be just as devastating as the
physical acts~Wespecially when people refuse to recognize them. It’s
depersonalizing. I have a line in INSEKTA: “Believe me, believe
me.” Not being believed can kill.
Who are your fans? People who find it necessary to think for themselves
in order to survive, because they’re damned by the fact they don’t
agree with the mediocrity that society shoves down their throats. They
rise above this by continuing to educate themselves. This is especially
true of homosexuals, who are born outside the law anyway. They’re
still figuratively and literally buried alive by the Egyptians and
Turks. Here in New York they’re visited upon by the Aesthetic Realism
Foundation and treated with electroshock. In Iran, they hang teenage
“infidels.” It’s unbelievable that ethnic groups still shut out
those who can be so disciplined and organized, and who can do great
things. [Gay men] either disappear completely or they address the
situation. They’ve had to~Wto save their own lives. They are great
fighters. I say these are the first soldiers you should enlist, not the
last. This is the man to whom you should say, “Will you be my brother?
Will you help me?”
Will the Turkish government ever admit these atrocities? I think it
will be forced to, through the ongoing work of their own scholars,
both old and young, and by artists and writers who want to be part
of the rest of the world, despite the horrific censorship that the
Turkish government exercises over them. My website is listed as a
hate site, which is completely ridiculous. I do not hate the Turkish
scholars who are trying to address true events in the world. There
are many Turks who want to see things change, but they’re not given
the opportunity to express themselves. When they do, they get sent
to prison or mental asylums. Midnight Express is absolutely the truth.
But until the government officially apologizes, there is no reason
for it to be accepted by the European Union. You must admit what
you’ve done~Wit shows that your present actions will be mandated by
the apology for your past actions. But until this happens there can
be no trust at all.
——————————————————————————-
For more information about the Greek, Armenian, and Assyrian genocides,
Black September, and Galas’s work, see: diamandagalas.com “Voices
of Truth” series: hellenic-genocide.com/voices-of-truth”Before the
Silence” archival news reports series, run by Sofia Kontogeorge Kostos:
go to next article in music ->
–Boundary_(ID_vuZ2QpjXEyZTFWX5Sms/Fw)–

9/11 TESTIMONY OF ‘INCONVENIENT PATRIOT’ IMPLICATES DENNIS HASTERT, OTHER TOP OFFICIALS IN AL QAEDA-RELATED BRIBERY SCANDAL
By Mike Mejia
Online Journal Contributing Writer
Online Journal, FL
Aug 31 2005
August 31, 2005-Thanks to a Vanity Fair article penned by British
Journalist David Rose, as well as to some excellent follow-up
interviews in the alternative press, the final ‘dots’ in the story
of fired FBI contract linguist and 9/11 whistleblower Sibel Edmonds
are close to being fully connected.
A case that has been shrouded in unprecedented government secrecy
for over three years is finally being forced into sharp focus,
giving the mainstream press no more excuses to ignore a scandal
that makes Tom DeLay’s lobbying shenanigans look like an exercise
in ‘good government’ by comparison. We now have a very good idea
of the countries, organizations and individuals Edmonds heard in
wiretaps connected with the money laundering, arms dealing and drug
trafficking activities that the whistleblower says facilitated the
crimes of September 11, 2001.
Although the Turkish-American Edmonds had always been creative
in drawing an abstract outline of the official corruption she had
discovered as a translator of Central Asian languages at the FBI,
where she was hired a few days after 9/11, she was hindered from
‘naming names’ by a series of Justice Department gag orders. However,
the Vanity Fair article has opened a floodgate of new information,
as author Rose was able to obtain leaks from congressional sources
and FBI officials present during Ms. Edmonds classified testimony
before the Senate Judiciary Committee.
The article reveals for the first time that one of the elected
officials that bin Laden-connected Turkish nationals claimed to
have on their payroll was none other than Republican House Speaker
Dennis Hastert, to whom bribes and illicit campaign contributions may
have been funneled in order to get him to pull a House Resolution on
Armenian Genocide from the House Floor in 2000. It also reveals that
these same Turkish nationals claimed to have bribed several State
Department and Defense Department officials to facilitate illicit
conventional and nuclear arms trades, and had infiltrated U.S.
nuclear weapons laboratories in order to sell U.S. technology to the
“highest bidder” (al Qaeda, North Korea, Iran?)
The one flaw in the Vanity Fair article is that it seems to boil
Sibel Edmonds’ testimony down to an Armenian Genocide resolution, when
actually most of what Edmonds has testified about relates directly to
9-11 (It is not clear why a bunch of Turkish mafia types would have
been so interested in a non-binding resolution on the slaughter of the
Armenians by the Ottoman Turks at the beginning of the 20th Century:
were they acting on behalf of the Turkish government, or were they
afraid a freeze in U.S.-Turkish relations would cut off Turkey as a
transshipment point for heroin and nuclear materials?)
As a result, Ms. Edmonds has been made a pariah in Turkey, while
Dennis Hastert is apparently no worse off than before: except
for one article in USA Today, no major newspaper has reported on
these explosive revelations surrounding the speaker of the House of
Representatives. But although the Rose article missed the mark in
certain respects, it provided a useful launching pad for the follow-up
interviews the FBI whistleblower gave with Amy Goodman, Scott Horton
and Chris Deliso, in which she fleshed out many additional details
of the scandal.
Pulling all this new data together, we now have a pretty good idea
of what exactly Attorney General Ashcroft was trying to hide when
he twice invoked the “State Secrets” privilege to suppress Edmonds’
testimony in the U.S. court system.
Foreign Relations: The Edmonds case has always been quashed by the
State and Justice Departments under the guise of protecting “sensitive
foreign relations.” In the Deliso and Horton interviews, Edmonds hints
this is because U.S. “quasi-allies” Pakistan, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan,
Tajikistan, and at least one Balkan country, are implicated in 9-11,
mainly through partnership with al Qaeda in the global heroin trade.
Government officials: Besides Dennis Hastert, Edmonds testimony
pointed to bribes given to State Department and Pentagon officials.
Edmonds harshest rhetoric is directed at the State Department,
which she hints blocked the investigation into the “drugs for arms”
network, partially because some of its own officials had been bribed.
She also claims that at least some neocons are involved in this
illicit activity.
Organizations: At least three Turkish organizations were apparently
named in Edmonds testimony, including the American Turkish Council
and the Assembly of Turkish American Associations. However, Edmonds,
has spoken of “several” such “semi-legitimate” organizations. Some
of her recent statements may put AIPAC in that category, as well as
other organizations connected to the above mentioned Central Asian
countries (I would personally not be surprised to find the Project
for a New American Century end up on the list someday).
So how does one pull all these new clues together to develop a coherent
narrative of what Edmonds testified to before various Committees and
the 9-11 Commission? One thing that struck this author is the close
parallel between the claims the ‘Inconvenient Patriot’ has been making
and the testimony given by author Peter Dale Scott at the recent 9/11
symposium organized by Representative Cynthia McKinney. Specifically,
Scott pointed out how the U.S. geopolitical strategy in Central
Asia-primarily designed to gain control of the energy resources in
the region-has led to a tolerance of and maybe even complicity in the
heroin trade and to a much more complex relationship with al Qaeda
than was revealed in the 9-11 Commission Report.
Scott writes: “The truth is that for at least two decades the United
States has engaged in energetic covert programs to secure U.S.
control over the Persian Gulf, and also to open up Central Asia for
development by U.S. oil companies . . . To this end, time after time,
U.S. covert operations in the region have used so-called ‘Arab Afghan’
warriors as assets, the jihadis whom we loosely link with the name and
leadership of al Qaeda. In country after country these ‘Arab Afghans’
have been involved in trafficking Afghan heroin.”
Combining the analysis of Mr. Scott with the testimony of Edmonds,
it would appear that investigative reporter John Stanton had it
exactly right when he wrote that the American people ” . . . are easily
sacrificed for a perceived greater good.” From the U.S. support for the
drug-running KLA in Kosovo, to its coddling of totalitarian regimes
in Central Asia, it appears that once again the U.S. is complicit in
the drug trade, even though that same trade also benefits our alleged
enemy, Osama Bin Laden. And the heroin is not just going into Europe:
Edmonds makes clear that the pipeline of Southwest Asian heroin to
the United States that closed after the end of the Soviet-Afghan war
has been reopened. The DEA’s own website may give credence to her
allegations: According to the its Domestic Monitor Program, Southwest
Asian Heroin, which had previously been brought in small quantities by
West African couriers, principally through JFK Airport in New York,
suddenly began appearing in larger quantities in Washington D.C. in
2001. Was this heroin coming in with the full knowledge and even
the support of the U.S. government? Were these narcotics, and not
some obscure collection of Islamic charities, the primary financing
mechanism for the 9-11 attacks?
Anyone who has studied the history of U.S. intelligence agencies
involvement with drug traffickers and terrorists should not be
surprised about these revelations. However, this would be the first
time as far as this author knows, that the drugs being allowed into
the country by U.S. officials may be financing the very attacks that
endanger our citizen’s lives-a fact that would be almost comical if
it were not so tragic. And the next attack, if it comes, could be with
WMD-knowledge obtained not from tinhorn dictators or Iranian mullahs,
but from our own military-industrial complex.
While those of us looking to reopen the 9-11 inquiry have much to be
encouraged about with the recent clues put out by Sibel Edmonds, we
are once again disappointed with the tepid response of the corporate
media, and frankly, the nonresponse of much of the Internet community
(Where are Buzzflash, Josh Marshall, Daily KOS and Juan Cole on
this issue?) Beyond Online Journal, Antiwar.com and Democracy Now,
these stunning allegations have received scant coverage. Yet, if Ms.
Edmonds is correct-and Republican Senator Charles Grassley calling her
‘credible’ is a strong indicator that she is-then at this very moment,
our nuclear secrets are being sold to the very alleged terrorists
our government claims to be chasing down in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Is there any issue more important than the fact that the reckless
hypocrisy of the U.S. government could result in a nuclear attack on
American soil and the subsequent shredding of what little remains of
the U.S. Constitution? If there is, I’m all ears.

SPIRITUAL LEADERS’ DELEGATION FROM CANADA ARRIVES IN ARMENIA
ETCHMIADZIN, AUGUST 26, NOYAN TAPAN. By an invitation of Karekin II,
Catholicos of All Armenians, spiritual leaders’ delegation from Canada
arrived in the Mother See of Holy Etchmiazdin, on August 25, on the
occasion of the 1600th anniversary of the Armenian Letters’
invention. Noyan Tapan was informed about this by the Information
System of the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin. From August 25 to
September 1, the delegation will go round different holy places, get
acquianted with the present activities of the Armenian
Church. Meetings with the Chairman of the RA National Assembly, with
the Foreign Minister and the Chairman of the RA NAA are also
envisaged.

ARMENTEL TO APPEAL AGAINST DECISION OF COMMISSION FOR PROTECTION OF
ECONOMIC COMPETITION
YEREVAN, AUGUST 26. ARMINFO. CJSC ArmenTel has made a decision to
appeal against the decision of the Commission for Protection of
Economic Competition of Armenia to impose $400,000 fine on ArmenTel
for low-quality communication.
Talking to journalists today, Chairman of the commission Ashot
Shahnazaryan said on August 25 evening ArmenTel submitted a letter of
administrative complaint to the commission. In conformity with the
effective legislation, the administrative act of the commission on
imposition of the fine is suspended till the commission replies the
complaint. The commission intends to made a relevant decision at its
next sitting on August 31, Shahnazaryan says.
At the same time, he added that one cannot constantly fine the same
company.
(ArmenTel was fined for four times during the last three years,
including three times for abuse of monopoly in the
market). Shahnazaryan thinks such an attitude to a company making such
investments in he country wrong. He says that ArmenTel assures that
the cellular communication quality will be considerably improved by
September 10-15 and the company is currently attracting large
investments for this purpose.

BAKU Today, Azerbaijan
Aug 26 2005
Russian MP Expects No Progress from Forthcoming Meeting of Azeri,
Armenian Presidents in Kazan
Baku Today / Trend 26/08/2005 09:09
There is no hope in progress during the forthcoming meeting of the
Azerbaijani and Armenian Presidents in Kazan, Russian MP Konstantin
Zatulin, the Director of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS)
Institute, said.
Zatulin noted that people should not pin strong hope in the
settlement of all problems, particularly the Nagorno-Karabakh
conflict, which have remained unsettled for many years between the
countries. He appreciated the initiative taking into consideration
that `generally there is a need in meetings and different problems
have occurred at organization of meetings between Azerbaijan and
Armenia in the different levels so far’.
The meeting of Ilham Aiyev, the President of Azerbaijan, and Robert
Kocharian, the President of Armenia, to be held within the summit of
the CIS heads of countries in Kazan. is scheduled for 27 August 2005

Schweizerische Depeschenagentur AG (SDA)
SDA – Servizio di base in Italiano
August 23, 2005
Svizzera-Turchia: Commissione estera Stati sdrammatizza
SCIAFFUSA, 23 ago
La Commissione della politica estera (CPE) del Consiglio degli Stati
getta acqua sul fuoco riguardo alle tensioni fra Svizzera e Turchia.
Secondo il suo presidente Peter Briner (PLR/SH), i rapporti fra i due
paesi non si sono particolarmente deteriorati nel corso degli ultimi
mesi.
La commissione, riunita ieri e oggi a Sciaffusa, ha discusso della
decisione di Ankara di procrastinare “sine die” la visita del
consigliere federale Joseph Deiss, prevista in settembre. Tale rinvio
– afferma Briner – e’ chiaramente dovuto all’apertura in Svizzera di
inchieste contro il politico turco Dogu Perincek per negazionismo del
genocidio armeno.
In una conferenza stampa odierna, il “senatore” sciaffusano ha
precisato che il viaggio del ministro dell’economia elvetico non e’
stato annullato. La visita e’ stata differita per motivi di
calendario, ha indicato, aggiungendo che Deiss si rechera’ in Turchia
quando gli animi si saranno calmati.
Briner, interrogato dall’ats all’inizio di agosto, aveva affermato
che le tensioni fra Berna e Ankara in seguito alla vicenda Perincek
erano state provocate in particolare dai media. La stampa turca ha
evidentemente “mobilitato l’opinione contro la Svizzera”, aveva detto
il politico. Un secondo procedimento e’ stato aperto dalla giustizia
elvetica anche contro lo storico turco Yusuf Halacoglu, sempre per
negazionismo del genocidio armeno.
Il consigliere agli Stati ha ribadito oggi che la Camera dei cantoni,
contrariamente al Nazionale, non affrontera’ il tema del genocidio
armeno. Non si puo puntare il dito contro la Turchia a 90 anni dai
fatti, ritiene il presidente della commissione.

AzerTag, Azerbaijan State Info Services
Aug 24 2005

TALKS ON PEACEFUL SETTLEMENT OF ARMENIA-AZERBAIJAN CONFLICT CONTINUED
IN MOSCOW
[August 24, 2005, 17:38:31]
On August 24, in a private residence of the Ministry of Foreign
Affairs of Russia passed bilateral negotiations between the Minister
of Foreign Affairs of Azerbaijan Elmar Mammadyarov and Minister of
Foreign Affairs of Armenia Vardan Oskanyan with participation of
co-chairmen of the OSCE Minsk Group from Russia, the USA and France.
The meeting has taken place with assistance of the Ministry of
Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation with participation of
Minister of Foreign Affairs of Russia Sergey Lavrov.
Upon completion of negotiations, the head of the Ministry of Foreign
Affairs of Russia of S. Lavrov, the head of the Ministry of Foreign
Affairs of Azerbaijan of E. Mammadyarov and the head of the Ministry
of Foreign Affairs of Armenia of V. Oskanyan have briefed for press.
S. Lavrov informed that the meeting of heads of the Ministry of
Foreign Affairs of Azerbaijan and Armenia with participation of
co-chairmen of the OSCE Minsk Group today has taken place. `It is
considered that at this meeting the further progress in negotiating
process on settlement of the conflict will be achieved. From our part
as organizers, we shall try to make everything that it was
comfortable to work for participants of negotiations in normal
conditions. At present, negotiations proceed with participation of
co-chairmen of OSCE MG which, undoubtedly, have some ideas, but about
them it is prematurely to speak’, has noted S. Lavrov.
Minister of Foreign Affairs of Azerbaijan Elmar Mammadyarov, in turn,
has thanked the Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs for the
conditions created for negotiating, and also co-chairmen of OSCE,
which have arrived to Moscow for participation in negotiating
process. E. Mammadyarov has declared: `The basic theme of
negotiations was preparation of a meeting of presidents of Azerbaijan
and Armenia which will take place on August 27 this year in Kazan. We
have discussed, how this meeting will pass at the Summit, and in what
format’. The head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Azerbaijan
said: `As a whole, negotiations go ahead, there is a hope that we
together with the Armenian side will find the general positions to
bring peace and stability to region’.
V. Oskanyan also has confirmed that all questions of the agenda are
discussed, and now it is early to speak about details of negotiating
process. `Negotiations are underway, the question of preparation of
the meeting of heads of our states in Kazan was discussed’, he noted.
In negotiations took part also the deputy foreign minister of
Azerbaijan Araz Azimov, the head of OSCE Monitoring Group Andrzei
Kaspshik and other officials of Russia and Armenia.

RIA Novosti, Russia
Aug 23 2005
Azerbaijan, Armenia to discuss Nagorny Karabakh conflict
17:41 | 23/ 08/ 2005

MOSCOW, August 23 (RIA Novosti) – The foreign ministers of Azerbaijan
and Armenia are set to discuss the resolution of the Nagorny Karabakh
conflict Wednesday in Moscow, the Azerbaijani foreign minister said
Tuesday.
Elmar Mamedyarov said he would have an informal meeting with Armenian
Foreign Minister Vardan Oskanyan on Tuesday after the CIS Council of
Foreign Ministers session and an official meeting on Wednesday, where
the two ministers will discuss the resolution one of the bitterest
ethnic and territorial conflicts to affect the former Soviet Union.
Mamedyarov added that talks between Armenia and Azerbaijan had gained
momentum in the last couple of years. “I believe we should maintain
the dialogue and continue working on the issue,” he said. “There is
the possibility of a breakthrough in the negotiation process on
Nagorny Karabakh, and we must reach some sort of an agreement.”