Author: Emil Lazarian

From Conflict Management to Conflict Resolution
Foreign Affairs
November/December 2006
By Edward P. Djerejian
Article preview: first 500 of 2,189 words total.
Summary: The war in Lebanon presented a fundamental challenge for
U.S. policy in the Middle East, but also an opportunity — if
Washington can transform the fragile cease-fire into a lasting and
comprehensive Arab-Israeli peace settlement.
SPARKS AND ROOTS
The recent fighting in the Levant presents a fundamental challenge for
U.S. policy toward the Middle East — but also an opportunity to move
from conflict management to conflict resolution. The United States
should seize this moment to transform the cease-fire in the
Hezbollah-Israeli conflict into a step toward a comprehensive
Arab-Israeli peace settlement. Doing so would facilitate the
marginalization of the forces of Islamic radicalism and enhance the
prospects for regional security and political, economic, and social
progress.
The Hezbollah-Israeli confrontation has further proved what should
already have been painfully clear to all: there is no viable military
solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict. Even with its military
superiority, Israel cannot achieve security by force alone or by
unilateral withdrawal from occupied territories. Nor can Hezbollah,
Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and similar groups destroy Israel.
Peace can come only from negotiated agreements that bind both sides.
Hezbollah may have ignited the spark that set off this latest
confrontation, but it is not the root cause. The fighting was the
combined result of the unresolved Arab-Israeli conflict and the
struggle between the forces of moderation and those of extremism
within the Muslim world — two issues that are linked by the radicals’
exploitation of the Arab-Israeli conflict for their own political
ends. U.S. policy in the region should thus focus both on trying to
promote a peaceful settlement of the Arab-Israeli dispute and on
helping Muslim moderates by facilitating political and economic reform
across the Middle East.
THE NORTHERN FRONT
The crisis on the Israeli-Lebanese border this summer erupted in an
already tense environment. On June 25, Hamas kidnapped an Israeli
soldier, which reignited fighting on the Israeli-Palestinian
front. When Hezbollah captured two Israeli soldiers on July 12, it
precipitated a strong Israeli military reaction, which, by his own
admission, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah had not anticipated.
The Hezbollah-Israeli war lasted 34 days, with major Israeli
incursions into Lebanon and the firing of some 4,000 Hezbollah
rockets. The fighting resulted in major casualties (approximately 855
Lebanese and 159 Israelis killed), as well as large displacements of
people on both sides of the border. Lebanon sustained economic and
infrastructure damage estimated at $3.9 billion, and the toll on
Israel has been figured as running into the hundreds of millions.
When the hostilities began, the international community called for an
immediate cease-fire, but the Bush administration held off, calling
for a “sustainable” cease-fire instead. The Bush administration left
the strong impression that it was giving Israeli Prime Minister Ehud
Olmert’s government time to inflict serious damage on Hezbollah’s
infrastructure and personnel. Meanwhile, the administration and Israel
clearly identified Iran and Syria as the main state supporters of
Hezbollah’s actions, and the danger of a wider regional conflict was
not dismissed.
Eventually, the international community stepped in to stabilize
southern Lebanon and prevent the crisis from escalating further. The
parameters for international action had been set by UN Security
Council Resolution 1559, passed in 2004, which called for the
withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon and the disarmament of …
[rest of article not available]
Edward P. Djerejian is the founding director of the James A. Baker III
Institute for Public Policy at Rice University. He has served as
U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs, Ambassador
to Syria, and Ambassador to Israel.
ssay85605/edward-p-djerejian/from-conflict-managem ent-to-conflict-resolution.html
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

The Guardian, UK
Nov 11 2006
Problem with your country’s image? Mr Anholt can help
Got a problem with your national image?
Oliver Burkeman at the nation branding masterclass in London
Saturday November 11, 2006
The Guardian
Nobody from the government of Kazakhstan was present at the Langham
hotel in London yesterday for the world’s first masterclass in nation
branding. This wasn’t for want of trying: the Kazakhs had appealed
for help in combating the Borat Problem, but Simon Anholt, the expert
in the field of image makeovers for nation-states, had refused on
ethical grounds. Still, representatives from 65 countries did attend
– including a man from the Saudi tourist board, full of ambitious
plans for oil-refinery tours, and an Armenian woman named Armine
Yeghiazaryan.
“We recently completed a survey to find out what people think about
Armenia,” Ms Yeghiazaryan explained.
And what do people think about Armenia? “Lots of people don’t really
think anything about Armenia,” she conceded. Then she brightened.
“But quite a few of them had heard of it.”
Mr Anholt, who works as a consultant to numerous governments,
including Britain’s, frequently gets hostile responses to the term
“nation branding”.
“At first there was outrage,” he recalled. “People said: ‘You’re
treating nations like nothing more than products in the global
supermarket!’ Which I actually thought was a great metaphor.”
In fact, most big countries already have brands, Mr Anholt points out
– gut associations that people make when they hear a country’s name.
“Nigeria? It’s those scam emails. Japan? Technology, expensive …
Britain? Posh, boring, old fashioned. Switzerland? Clean and
hygienic. Sweden? Switzerland with sex appeal.” His job is making
sure those associations are a help, not a hindrance.
“This is fundamentally not a marketing trick,” he insisted. “It’s
national identity in the service of enhanced competitiveness.”
Carol Hunter, from the Isle of Man government, listened intently. If
your gut reaction to hearing Isle of Man is “birching”, she’d like
you to abandon it; if it’s “TT races”, she’d like you to broaden it.
If it’s “tax haven”, you may not be too far off, but these days the
preferred slogan for the Man brand is “freedom to flourish”.
Striding the stage beneath the chandeliers in the Langham’s ballroom,
Mr Anholt told delegates that the image being promoted to sell a
country to tourists is usually exactly the wrong one to sell it to
investors.
“For years, the Scottish tourist board marketed Scotland as a country
stuck about 100 years in the past, a place of emptiness, wildness and
no buildings,” he said. “Actually, there was one building: a thatched
pub and some yokels inside drinking whisky.” That might be appealing
to holidaymakers. “But it’s no good if you’re trying to persuade
Samsung to build their next factory there.”
It was a tension acutely felt by the man from Madrid, who glumly
noted that a reputation for siestas and all-night parties was not
exactly helping promote the Spanish technology sector.
And what of Jamaica? “You think sun, sea and sand, don’t you?” asked
Nicole Maraj-Pandohie, from Invest Jamaica. “You don’t think strong
business infrastructure.” You also think violent crime. “Yes. I deal
with this every day. Every day,” she said, with great forbearance.
Not that nation branding can’t go embarrassingly wrong. “The trouble
with Cool Britannia,” Mr Anholt sighed, “was not the basic idea. The
problem was that the government forgot it was trying to promote
Britain, and started promoting the campaign to promote Britain.”
(These days, the representative from Visit Britain explained, the
UK’s brand values are depth, heart, and vitality.)
Mr Anholt makes moral judgments on who to work with. The Kazakhs did
not make the cut, but if they had, he would have advised them to play
along with Borat, the fictional Kazakh reporter. “At least they have
a reputation now. It may be a bad one, but it’s much easier to turn a
negative into a positive than nothing into something.” Which was not
what the Armenians wanted to hear.
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From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Fistful of Euros, Sweden
Nov 10 2006
323 Years of Caffeine
by Alex Harrowell
One of Thomas Barnett’s commenters complained about Europe being a
cafe society, so why not some café-blogging? After all, the collectif
antilibérale over at European Tribune had a whole thread on
brasseries not so long ago. Der Standard has a long article on the
history of Viennese kaffeehäuser, going back to 1683 and the second
siege of Vienna.
First of all, a classic trope of European history-the fact everyone
knows, but that turns out to be rubbish. Like King Canute telling the
tide to back off (a little like keeping spam out of our comments
threads, but I digress) – everyone remembers that, but hardly anyone
realises that Canute did it to humble his courtiers with the limits
of power, rather than in a gesture of deluded arrogance. Every
schoolboy knows that one Georg Franz Kolschitzky was rewarded for
sneaking through the Turkish lines with a message by being given a
stash of coffee beans from captured stocks. Another version is that,
after the relief of Vienna, he looted the beans from the Turks’
abandoned baggage train, or bought them for a song from a soldier who
didn’t know their value.
The only problem is that it’s not true.
In fact, the first café in Vienna was opened by an Armenian who was a
former servant at the Imperial Court, and who may also have been a
spy. (What else? Cafés are for conspiring.) There are obvious
parallels between the two stories, and it’s hard not to imagine that
Kolschitzky was a more patriotic and Catholic figure for little
Austro-Hungarian boys’ consumption. Brief consideration also debunks
the story that no-one knew what the brown beans were – Venice had
opened the first European café in 1647, and this key strategic
technology spread rapidly along the sea trade routes, so that cafés
were opening in numbers in London in the 1650s.
Gambling and billiards were common from the word go. 40 years on,
newspapers began to appear, and another 20 years saw the first café
with music. Booze and hot food had to wait until 1808, when Austria
joined Napoleon’s trade embargo on the UK and immediately lost access
to coffee. But it was 1856 before women were admitted. From then on,
the sky was the limit-or rather, it was until the eruption of the
short twentieth century.
Vienna’s Ringstrasse is today surprisingly short on cafés; there are
essentially three worth speaking of, the Schottenring at the top end,
the Schwarzenberg at the Schwarzenbergplatz halfway down, and the
Prückel at the Stubentor near the bottom. The reason is grim. Most of
the luxury car showrooms and airline offices are former Jewish cafés,
expropriated before the extermination of their clientele, and
converted to their new use postwar because of their fine locations
and ample clear space on the ground floor. A curious architectural
echo of this exists in London, where a recently opened restaurant
that claims to be an attempt at a classic café-restaurant occupies,
yes, a former car showroom.
My favourites were the Stadlmann, next to the Institute of Political
Science on the Währingerstrasse, and the Alt Wien in the city centre
on Bäckerstrasse. And the Hawelka, but everyone loves the Hawelka.
Any favourites?
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From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Azeri Press Agency, Azerbaijan
Nov 10 2006
Musa Panahov: Vietnam-Armenia railway impossible without Azerbaijan
[ 10 Nov. 2006 17:43 ]
The decision, made at Korean conference of the United Nations
Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific, on laying a
railway line from Armenia to Vietnam is impossible to come true,
Azerbaijani Transportation Minister Musa Panahov told APA.
The commission Executive Secretary KIM Hak-Su told media that the
conference discussed issues concerning construction of
Armenia-Vietnam railway, intensification of the activities in
North-South transport corridor etc.
Mr. Panahov says Azerbaijan joined Trans-Asia Railway Convention at
the conference.
`Azerbaijan stipulated that Azerbaijan will not resume any relations
with Armenia until it withdraws its armed forces from Azeri lands and
sign a peace agreement. The railway line can’t come true with
Azerbaijan,’ he underscored. /APA/
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Zaman Online, Turkey
Nov 10 2006
Armenians Pleased with Democrats’ Victory
By Zaman, Washington
Friday, November 10, 2006
zaman.com
The Armenian lobby in the United States is happy about the victory of
the Democrat Party in the congressional elections. Armenians find the
new Congress leaders closer to themselves and hope that the genocide
claims will pass into law.
A written statement released by the American Armenian Assembly (AAA)
expressed the Armenians’ satisfaction over Democrat Nancy Pelosi’s
new post as Speaker of the House.
Brian Ardouny, the executive director of AAA, said if the alleged
genocide passed in Congress, new opportunities would arise for them.
Sending a statement last month to Harut Sassounian, the owner of the
California Courier, Pelosi said she was in support of the Armenian
claims on genocide and added, `This initiative has the strong
supports of both parties in the House of Representatives. I will
continue backing these efforts in the 110th Congress.’
The American Armenian National Committee also remarked that they were
quite happy about Nancy Pelosi’s new post.
Preparing reports and maintaining files on politicians according to
the extent they support their allegations and making these public for
the Armenian people, the Armenian organizations in the country are
known to have been harboring hatred against President Bush and the
former chairman of the House of Representatives Dennis Hastert for
not backing their unfounded claims.
The majority of those closer to the Armenian policies are from the
Democrat Party.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

DeFacto Agency, Armenia
Nov 10 2006
NKR BUDGET OWN REVENUES INCREASED BY ONE-THIRD
January-September, 2006 the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic /NKR/ state
budget own revenues made 6 milliards 846 millions drams, which is 34,
2 % more as compared with the same period last year.
According to the information DE FACTO got at the NKR Ministry of
Finance and Economy, the budget revenues had been mainly ensured at
the expense of tax incomes, which made 81, 5 % of the revenues’ total
amount.
For the same period the state budget expenses made 16 milliards 981,
8 millions drams. During the 9 months of the current year 5 milliards
188, 2 millions drams were spent for capital expenditures, which is
70, 6 % more than the same period last year. As compared with the
same period 2005 current expenses for the salary of the state
institutions’ employees increased by 15, 5 % making 3 milliards 50, 4
millions drams.
For January – September, 2006 the NKR social insurance state fund’s
own revenues made 1 milliard 809 millions drams, which is 15, 3 %
more than the level of the same period last year.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Azad Hye
November 10, 2006
Reported by Ara Ashjian
A decision was made to construct an Apostolic Armenian Church in the city of
Dahuk in the Iraqi Kurdistan region.
During his recent parochial visit to Kerkuk, Zakho, Dahuk and other
locations, Archbishop Avak Asadourian, Primate of the Diocese of Iraq,
inspected the plot granted to the Armenian community by the Government of
Iraqi Kurdistan, on which the church would be constructed. The dedication of
the 16 foundations of the church is expected to take place during the
Archbishop’s next visit to Dahuk.
It is worth mentioning that there are recently four Armenian Apostolic
(Orthodox) churches in Baghdad; one church in each of Kerkuk, Zakho and
Basrah; a church in the village of Avzrouk in the Governorate of Dahuk and
two churches in Mosul (one of which was a target of terrorist act in 2004
and is now almost ready to serve the believers, following a renovation
project funded by the Iraqi Government).
On the other hand, construction work is going ahead for a multi-apartment
project in the Riyadh suburb (Camp Sarah Khatoun) in Baghdad. The building
site, the construction of which is supervised by the Armenian Apostolic
Prelacy, consists of two stories with a total of 18 residential apartments
and 6 commercial shops. The generated income will be used for the
restoration and maintenance service of the complex. Each apartment will host
one or two members of the community.
See photos: 21sks41
Original Arabic text available at:
p;id=51
Ara Ashjian’s articles are posted also at:
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Azeri Press Agency, Azerbaijan
Nov 11 2006
Azerbaijani and Armenian Defense Ministers expected to meet in
January
[ 11 Nov. 2006 16:08 ]
`Azerbaijani and Armenian Defense Ministers’ next meeting is expected
to be held in January,’ Special representative of OSCE
Chairman-in-Office Anjey Kasprzyk said, APA reports quoting to the
Russian press.
He said he appealed to the sides about it, but hasn’t received an
answer yet.
The Defense Ministers Safar Abiyev and Serge Sarkisian met on the
initiative of Anjey Kasprzyk on October 20. They discussed the
problem of preservation of ceasefire regime.
Azerbaijani Defense Ministry Press Service Department told the APA
they are unaware of Anjey Kasprzyk’s statement. /APA/
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Aravot, Armenia
Nov 10 2006
SLAP IN THE POLICE SYSTEM
The Police haven’t detected yet the attack on former Minister of
Internal Affairs, general Suren Abrahamian.
Deputy chief of RA Police Ararat Mahtesian has informed Panorama.am
lately that those who have attacked on Suren Abrahamian haven’t been
detected yet. «We have carried out a great work, interrogated a lot
of persons, have made serious joint works but the event remains
undetected’, – Mr. Mahtesian said and added that Suren Abrahamian’s
neighbors had also been interrogated but in vain. And the deputy
chief of Police mentioned other reasons for not detecting the case.
«Mr. Abrahamian wasn’t able to testify in the first two days.’ The
correspondent understood from Mahtesian’s words that Suren Abrahamian
was himself guilty, as he didn’t testify at once though the police
have made an enormous work.
Suren Abrahamian told `Aravot’ on this occasion: `If there have a
problem to demonstrate a scaled work, our street a little short for
it, it will be better to interrogate inhabitants on Kievian street
or, perhaps, the whole Arabkir community». Mr. Abrahamian then said
more seriously: «Maybe Mahtesian doesn’t know that the person who
rendered first aid at the first second was a major of police, the
officer of central machinery. Frankly speaking, I don’t want to
accuse the investigator or operative official, as they are simply
executors, however they work. But now I want to ask a question. Has
this case been discussed once at any official of high rank? Who from
the ministers, deputy ministers or Yerevan municipal department did
place this case under control? These are elementary things the
importance of which I and professionals can understand».
The general affirmed again that the case was more a moral pain for
him than a physical: «But that slap didn’t cause so much damage to me
than to the whole system, they will reap the fruits of their actions
sooner or later. In my case I feel underlined negative attitudes of
the RA Police leadership towards my person but they don’t understand
that this will turn against them.
Defense Minister Serge Sargsian, replying to the observation as if
what happened to Suren Abrahamian was organized by the third power to
embroil internal political forces of Armenia had said: `What does the
third power mean, the second power has committed it which considers
these people as it enemies.’ Suren Abrahamian promised to speak about
these affirmations in the near future.
Anna Israelian
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Public Radio, Armenia
Nov 11 2006
Murderer Ramil Safarov may be returned to Azerbaijan
11.11.2006 13:35
Judge of the Constitutional Court of Hungary Andrash Bragyova has
declared in Baku that Azeri Officer Ramil Safarov who brutally killed
Armenian Officer Gurgen Margaryan and was sentenced to life
imprisonment by Hungarian Court, may be returned to Azerbaijan.
According to the Azerbaijani `Uch Nockta’ newspaper, he `expressed
hope that when taking decisions about Ramil Safarov the Supreme Court
of Hungary will take into account the complexness of the motives of
crime.’ He voiced confidence that the Armenian lobby will have no
influence on the verdict.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress