Author: Hakobian Adrine

French and Turkish protesters clash in demo crash

Reuters AlertNet, UK
March 18 2006

Source: Reuters

LYON, France, March 18 (Reuters) – French youths protesting against
a new employment law ended up in an unexpected clash with Turks
demonstrating against an Armenian memorial when their separate marches
crossed paths in this eastern city on Saturday.

Riot police used water cannon to separate the two groups after
about 2,500 Turks opposed to the construction of a memorial in the
city centre to Armenian victims of a 1915 massacre attacked the
demonstrating youths, police said.

The Turks, waving Turkish flags and holding up posters saying “There
was no Armenian genocide,” reacted after youths denounced them as
“fascists” and yelled “go home!”, police said.

Both sides pelted each other with missiles and engaged in fist fights,
they said, adding that some youths protesting the employment law were
apparently of Armenian origin.

Turkey rejects charges that it massacred 1.5 million Armenians living
in the then Ottoman Empire in 1915.

Many of the survivors fled to France, which now has an influential
Armenian minority of about 300,000. After a long campaign by them,
the French parliament passed a bill in 1998 officially recognising
the killing as genocide.

The protest against the new employment law was one of many marches
across France on Saturday aimed at putting pressure on the Paris
government to withdraw the measure that allows employers to fire
workers under 26 more easily.

The conservative government introduced the law to encourage reluctant
employers to take on new staff and help combat unemployment, which
among young people is double the national average of 9.6 percent.

NKR CONSTITUTIONAL COMMISSION SUMMONED A SITTING AT LAST

Iragir/am
18/03/06

NKR President Arkady Ghukasyan conducted the recurrent sitting o the
NKR Constitutional Commission, during which the first two chapters
of the draft constitution of NKR were discussed.

After the address of the head of the working group Armenia Zalinyan,
who is member of the Constitutional Commission, a debate among
the representatives of the political forces of NKR, including the
leaders and high officials of the government and the opposition in
the commission followed. The press secretary of the NKR president
informed us about this.

The president emphasized the importance of compliance of the
constitution to the adopted with the international standards. Arkady
Ghukasyan said the final draft of the constitution will be presented
not only to the political forces and public in NKR but also the
authoritative experts of Armenia and the world.

The president instructed the working group to prepare the schedule
of further activity of the Constitutional Commission.

By the way, the constitution has been worked out for the past several
years. This fact has even given rise to doubts. Some people say the
Constitution will be adopted on the eve of presidential election.
Analysts have noticed that President Ghukasyan gave the instruction
of working out the schedule of adoption of the constitution after his
“argument” with President Kocharyan. He might have felt the necessity
to strengthen his position.

CHANGE OF POWER WILL NOT FACILITATE THE RESOLUTION

Iragir/am
18/03/06

The Karabakh issue will be resolved by the third president of the
Republic of Armenia, announced the leader of the Marxist Party
of Armenia Davit Hakobyan on March 17. “The presidents of Armenia
and Azerbaijan are not insane to sign an agreement on the eve of
the elections and resolve the issue of Karabakh. This issue will
be resolved by the third president of Armenia, and let the present
leadership forget that the third president will be from their circle.
The third president will be from among people,” says Davit Hakoyan.

Khosrov Harutiunyan, the leader of the Christian Democratic Party,
who was also present in this meeting, thinks it is ingenuous to
think that a democratic revolution could enable a resolution of the
Karabakh issue that would favor this or that party. “If you think
that after power changes in Armenia, a new leadership forms through
a fair and democratic election, Azerbaijan will give Karabakh to us,
you are bitterly mistaken,” says Khosrov Harutiunyan. To support his
words he gave the example of the change of power in Armenia in 1998,
saying that after 1998 the standpoint of Azerbaijan became tougher.

Khosrov Harutiunyan hurried to reject that before 1998 Azerbaijan was
willing for greater compromises than now. He said he simply wanted
to show that a change of power would not facilitate the resolution.

Daily Nation , Kenya
March 17 2006

Mercenary claim is a wild-goose chase

Story by PETER MWAURA /FAIR PLAY
Publication Date: 03/18/2006

Being a mercenary is not a crime disclosed in any domestic Kenyan
law. Therefore, it is not clear how the police can legally investigate,
leave alone arrest, a person simply because he has been called a
“mercenary”.

But I suppose the police can always find something in the Penal Code
to nail a potential mercenary, such as section 44, which prohibits
any warlike undertaking.

Kenya has also signed or ratified two of the three international
legal instruments that define who a mercenary is. However, none of
these instruments would come in handy for the police in the current
controversy over the two Armenians whom former Cabinet minister Raila
Odinga has claimed are mercenaries.

Essentially, the police have been set up to investigate what does no
exist in our law and is very difficult to prove in international law.

“Look me in the face,” one of the Armenian brothers is reported to
have told a press conference on Monday this wee. “Do I look like a
mercenary?” A rhetorical question, perhaps, but one that underlines
that the police are on a possible wild-goose chase.

Foreign soldiers of fortune

In fact, the claim about two weeks ago that there were Russian or
Armenian mercenaries in the country was as diversionary as it was
spooky.

Historically, mercenaries have been foreign soldiers of fortune,
and they continue to exist only in war situations.

If any foreigner was involved in the police raid on Standard and
KTN offices, they could not possibly be described as “mercenaries”
unless one was using the term as a figure of speech. By their very
definition, mercenaries operate only in war situations.

If, as he has claimed, the foreigners’ second assignment was to
eliminate Mr Odinga and his opposition colleagues, the Russians or
Armenians would still not legally qualify as mercenaries. One would,
perhaps, call them criminals or hit men, but no more.

The Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions, relating to the
Protection of Victims of International Armed Conflicts, defines a
mercenary as any person who “is specially recruited locally or abroad
… to fight in an armed conflict.” A mercenary “does, in fact,
take a direct part in the hostilities.”

Kenya ratified this convention on 23 February 1999. The Convention for
the Elimination of Mercenarism in Africa, adopted by the Organisation
of African Unity (now African Union), defines a mercenary as a person
who engages in acts aimed at “opposing by armed violence a process
of self-determination or the territorial integrity of another State.”

It is a crime “against peace and security in Africa and shall be
punished as such.” Kenya signed this convention on 17 December 2003
but forgot to ratify it.

The UN International Convention against the Recruitment, Use,
Financing and Training of Mercenaries defines a mercenary as any person
who is “specially recruited locally or abroad to fight in an armed
conflict”, or to participate in “a concerted act of violence” aimed at
“overthrowing a Government or otherwise undermining the constitutional
order of a State”, or “undermining the territorial integrity of a
State”. Kenya has not signed or ratified this convention.

The three instruments constitute the international law on who is
a mercenary. All the three make it clear that a person can only be
accused of being a mercenary if he participates in an armed conflict.

Mercenaries do not exist in any other context. And, I suggest, if you
really want to see a mercenary do not visit the house on Glory Road
in up market Runda, Nairobi. Go and see the movie “Dogs of War”, or
“The Wild Geese”. Or read the book with the same title by Frederick
Forsyth, or by Daniel Carney.

Alternatively, follow the adventures of the likes of Mike Hoare who
was hired by the Belgians during the Congo crisis in the 1960s; or
Bob Denard, the French man who participated in numerous conflicts in
Africa including four coups in the Comoros and the 1978 failed coup
in the Seychelles.

Overthrow the government

Or Simon Mann, the co-founder of Executive Outcomes, the mercenary
outfit involved in conflicts in Angola and Sierra Leone and in the
2004 attempt to overthrow the government of oil-rich Equatorial Guinea,
and is serving a seven-year term at Chikurubi maximum security prison
in Harare, Zimbabwe.

Mercenaries are fighters, not newspaper burners; they are hardened
soldiers and are usually very well trained, with superior skills.

They sell their services to the highest bidder and have no time for
trading political accusations. They take no prisoners.

Congress of world Azeris sets ambitious plans for future

Turan news agency
16 Mar 06

Baku, 16 March: The second congress of Azerbaijanis of the world is
over. The congress adopted several documents.

The congress considered it expedient to prepare a concept of the
diaspora’s activities. For a period to the third congress, it was
proposed to pay a special attention to the following issues:
consolidation of Azerbaijani communities abroad; setting up of
congresses of Azerbaijanis in America and Asia; setting up of the
world organization of Azerbaijanis; expansion of representation of
Azerbaijanis in foreign parliaments, state and municipal bodies;
holding a joint forum of Azerbaijani and Turkish diaspora
organizations; intensification of cooperation with the media;
organization of Sunday schools and other education and cultural
facilities; involvement of businessmen in the implementation of
social and economic projects in Azerbaijan.

A decision was taken to hold a congress of Azerbaijanis of the world
every five years. A sitting of the coordination council of
Azerbaijanis of the world will be held every year.

The congress urged that the Azerbaijanis of the world unite. The
congress appealed to international organizations, foreign
parliaments, heads of state and government over the Karabakh
conflict. The document urges them to denounce Armenia’s aggressive
separatism.

The congress sent an appeal to UNESCO, informing the organization
about damage inflicted to Azerbaijan by the Armenian occupation of
Azerbaijani territories.

The congress elected the president of the Azerbaijani National
Academy, Mahmud Karimov, as chairman of the board of the organizing
council.

[Trend news agency, Baku, in Russian 1842 gmt 16 Mar 06 reported that
the congress elected Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev as chairman
of the coordinating council of the Azerbaijanis of the world]

Mystery deepens
By MAXWEL MASAVA

Kenya Times, Kenya
March 16 2006

LANGATA lawmaker Raila Odinga last evening emerged from the Kilimani
Police station with confidence saying he had provided the police with
enough details to unveil the truth about the so-called mercenaries.

The former Roads and Public Works Minister maintained that he had
never met the two Armenians, saying statements issued by Messrs Arturs
Margaryan and Artur Sargysyan reflected how dangerous they were..

And Raila threatened to sue Environment Minister Prof Kivutha Kibwana
over his recent remarks that linked him to the mercenaries.

Addressing journalists soon after recording a statement with the
police, Raila said he had provided the detectives with more “vital and
urgent information that would greatly help them demystify the issue.”

Some of the information he had given to the police, Raila said, was
how he came across the documents related to the mercenaries that he
provided to the press. “I have brought to the attention of the police
further information that has come to me in the past few days which
is crcucial and important for the investigations.”

The former minister said he had decided to visit the police station
on his own, a fact that was confirmed by the officer in charge of
investigations Isaiah Osugo who had to be recalled to record his
statement.

Raila, who was the first one to bring the issue to the public, denied
claims by the two Armenian brothers that he had met them in Dubai
and later in Kenya where he allegedly received a loan advance of Sh
108 million.

“I am really astonished with the statement that I met them in Dubai.

This is part of a wider government plot to hide the truth about the
issue,” Raila told journalists.

Raila was accompanied by five MPs, among them his lawyer Kenneth
Marende, Reuben Ndolo, William Omondi, Paddy Ahenda and Orwa Ojodeh.

Mercenaries: Probe now extends to Mombasa
By Willis Oketch

Standard, Kenya
March 17 2006

Detectives investigating the identity of two Armenians alleged to be
mercenaries have extended their probe to Mombasa to establish if they
have business links in the town.

Police sources said this followed suspicions that some businessmen
in the town had links with the two foreigners.

A group of detectives from Nairobi will visit the coastal town to
dig up any business links the duo might have.

“Police want to check out claims that these men, who claim to be
Armenians, have business links in Mombasa,” said the police source.

The source said police have received several claims that the two men
were frequent visitors to Mombasa where they stay in one of the top
beach hotels. Police will also be checking out if the Brother Link
Company in which the two are co-owners has been doing import business
through the port of Mombasa.

“If we know the nature of the business they do we will know if they
are genuine business people as they claim,” said the police source.

An earlier claim made by politicians allied to the Orange Democratic
Movement indicated that the two Armenians had business links with
some Mombasa businessmen.

ONLY SERVICE CONTROLLING SANITARY STATE IN AKHALKALAK REGION LIQUIDATED

Noyan Tapan
Armenians Today
Mar 16 2006

AKHALKALAK, MARCH 16, NOYAN TAPAN – ARMENIANS TODAY. The Sanitary
Department of Akhalkalak liquidated by the Georgian Health Care
Ministry’s decree.

According to the “A-Info” agency, noy only 15 people became unemployed
as a result of the liquidation, but the sanitary state of the region
is also left out of control as the above-mentioned department was
the only service engaged in that issue.

Though the Ministry gave a sanitary department laboratory to the
Public Health Care Center, however, the laboratory doesn’t function
because of dischargments.

Factually, the possibilities to resist possible epidemic dangers in
the region became equal to zero.

GENOCIDE DEBATE

Kathimerini, Greece
March 16 2006

Some 70 Turkish and foreign academics gathered in Istanbul yesterday
for a three-day conference to discuss whether the massacres of
Armenians during World War I amounted to genocide or not. In a rare
move, the gathering, organized by the Istanbul state university,
offered the floor to academics of all convictions even though it was
largely dominated by historians and officials who defend Turkey’s
official position on the 1915-17 killings. Yair Auron, an Israeli
researcher of Jewish archives from Ottoman times, openly used the term
“genocide” and appealed to Turks to question their past.

UN REPRESENTATIVE TO ARMENIA MAKES FIRST VISIT TO MOTHER SEE

Noyan Tapan
Mar 16 2006

ETCHMIADZIN, MARCH 16, NOYAN TAPAN. Supreme Patriarch and Catholicos
of All Armenians Karekin II received UN representative to RA
Consuelo Vidal on March 15. According to the information submitted
to Noyan Tapan by the Information Services of the Mother See of Holy
Etchmiadzin, this was C.Vidal’s first visit to the Mother See.

Congratulating the UN representative on the occasion of
her appointment, the Armenian Patriarch wished her productive
activity. Touching upon the effective cooperation implemented between
Armenia and the UN, His Holiness expressed satisfaction for all those
helpfulnesses that the UN structures show in different spheres of
life of Armenia.

The mission and present activity of the cradle of the All Armenian
belief, the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin, was also spoken about at
the meeting. The fact of annihilation of the Jugha Armenian khachkars
(cross stones) in Nakhijevan was also touched upon.