Author: Hakobian Adrine

ARKA News Agency
April 13 2005

214 shares of 212 companies registered at Armenia’s Securities
Commission by Jan 1, 2005

Steps to ensure equal competition made in Armenia

RA Minister of Foreign Affairs: the issue of recognition the Armenian
Genocide is important for Armenia from the standpoint of safety

Armenia to celebrate Global Youth Service Day

Government commission set for World War II Victory celebration
preparation holds Wednesday a widened session

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214 SHARES OF 212 COMPANIES REGISTERED AT ARMENIA’S SECURITIES
COMMISSION BY JAN 1, 2005

YEREVAN, April 13. /ARKA/. By January 1, 2005, the RA Securities
Commission had registered 214 shares of 212 companies, against 225
companies by January 1, 2004, Commission Chairman Eduard Muradyan
told a press conference. He reported that in 2004 the RA Securities
Commission registered two issue prospectuses, one of them being open
issue, when shares worth a total of 633mln AMD were placed.
In 2004, the Commission considered 36 declarations of registration of
issuers (basic documents on the information on activities). After the
Commission discussed them, 53 amendments were proposed. Muradyan
reported that only 25 declarations were registered as a result. In
2004, the Commission stopped registering the securities of 41
issuers, which violated the country’s legislation.
In carrying out its supervisory activities in 2004, the RA Securities
Commission received 1,716 reports of companies, organized hearings
attended by the companies’ representatives. To eliminate faults in
the reports, the Commission issued 61 instructions.
Muradyan also pointed out that in 2004 the Commission carried out
work to consolidates the registers of shareholders of 20 emitters. As
a result, 6,676 shareholders’ accounts were consolidated.
The Commission also conducted inspections of 44 emitters, including
37 current checks, recording 1,708 violations. The Commission made
relevant decisions and issued 190 instructions.
In 2004, the Commission discussed complaints received from
shareholders and registers 18 complaints about violations of
corporate management requirements.
In 2004, the RA Securities Commission initiated 123 actions on
administrative violations, and in 177 cases relevant decisions have
been made. A total of 16.76 AMD fines were to be paid. Legal
proceedings were initiated against 23 entities, and claims for the
payment of 10.6mln AMD have been made. A total of 6.2mln AMD were
confiscated in favor of the state budget.
The RA Securities Commission was formed in August 2000. It has five
members appointed by the RA President for five years. The Commission
is entitled to license, register, regulate and supervise the
activities of broker companies, stock exchanges, RA Central
Depositary, as well as other self-regulating organizations
specializing in securities. P.T. -0–

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STEPS TO ENSURE EQUAL COMPETITION MADE IN ARMENIA

YEREVAN, April 13. /ARKA/. Steps to ensure equal competition and put
an end to `patronage’ in business are being made in Armenia, RA
President Robert Kocharyan stated at his meeting with the members of
the newly elected Presidium of the Union of Manufacturers and
Businessmen of Armenia (UMBA). The RA presidential press service
reports that as an instance the RA President cited inspections of tax
and customs sphere conducted by the Presidential Supervisory Service
to ascertain interrelated persons in business. `The most simple and
efficient means here is ensuring transparency, which reveal all
deviations and makes struggle more effective,’ Kocharyan said.He
pointed out the importance of businessmen proposing mechanisms of
accomplishing this task. The meeting participants also discussed
problems of ensuring equal competition in business, encouraging local
producers, especially their export activities, softening effects of
exchange rate fluctuations.
Addressing the problem of taxation of the import of production
equipment, President Kocharyan pointed out that, considering the
urgency of this issue, he issued relevant instructions to the
establishment in charge of the economic sector. Kocharyan said that a
package of proposals is currently under preparation, which envisages
new solutions and is being discussed with international financial
organizations. Kocharyan assured the businessmen that the
possibilities of resolving all the problems raised at the meeting
will be thoroughly discussed and most effective will be selected.
President Kocharyan wished success to the businessmen, pointing out
that simultaneously with developing their business they should pay
more attention to their tax commitments. P.T. -0–

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RA MINISTER OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS: THE ISSUE OF RECOGNITION THE ARMENIAN
GENOCIDE IS IMPORTANT FOR ARMENIA FROM THE STANDPOINT OF SAFETY

YEREVAN, April 13. /ARKA/. The issue of recognition of the Armenian
Genocide is important for Armenia from the standpoint of safety, as
RA Minister of Foreign Affairs Vartan Oskanian stated at a press
conference in Yerevan. `Without recognition of the Genocide and
admitting the fault by Turkey, we cannot trust that neighbor, which
from the military standpoint is quite powerful and definitely
protects Azerbaijan in Nagorno-Karabakh issue’, he said. According to
him, with such a neighbor Armenia cannot feel safe. Oskanian
emphasized that though 90 years later after the Genocide the fact of
it hasn’t been uniquely recognized by international community,
Armenia should be consistent in its activity. The Minister noted that
on the threshold of the 90th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide
Turkey not only fails to recognize it, but, on the contrary, pursues
even more sever policy. `Instead of being more tolerant and
understanding, Turkey chose contrary position, and today hearings are
held in Turkish parliament on possible counteraction to the efforts
of Armenia to achieve international recognition of the Armenian
Genocide’, he said. According to Oskanian, `this seriously undermines
the authority of Turkey, and will return to Turkish authorities as a
boomerang’. Oskanian emphasized that there are serious discrepancies
between the Turkish authorities and the population regarding that
issue, and Turkish intellectuals more actively discuss that issue and
accept the mistake. `We in our turn ought not to forget bloody pages
of the history, and should every year pay tribute to the victims of
the Genocide to obtain justice’, he said.
No diplomatic relations have been established between Armenia and
Turkey. The stumbling block between the two countries remains to be
the event of 1915 in Ottoman Turkey. The fact of the Armenian
Genocide in Ottoman Turkey in 1915, as a result of which over 1,5 mln
people were massacred, is recognized by some states. A.H.-0–

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ARMENIA TO CELEBRATE GLOBAL YOUTH SERVICE DAY

YEREVAN, April 13. /ARKA/. Armenia will celebrate Global Youth
Service Day on April 15-17, 2005. Programs of community service and
special event will be carried out. As the Press Service of Prohect
Harmony told ARKA News Agency, also, the events will include visits
of schoolchildren to elderly houses in various marzes of Armenia,
concert of young musicians of Swallow NGO, visits to veterans of
Great Patriotic War in Vayots Dzor, Human Rights workshop for
disabled children in Lori marz and visit to Gavar children’s home.
Orphan children from different orphanages in different regions of
Armenia will visit the Internet Computer Centers of the Armenia
School Connectivity Program network. In addition, cleaning works will
be carried out in different regions of Armenia giving youths an
opportunity to make contribution through the volunteerism. 303
schools of Armenia School Connectivity Program network will
participate in the cleaning works.
Project Harmony Yerevan office holds this event 6th year running in
Armenia in association with more than 100 organizations of different
countries
Global Youth Service Day (GYSD) is an annual global event organized
by Youth Service America and the Global Youth Action Network,
together with a consortium of 32 International Organizations,
including the UN, Peace Corps, WB, Habitat for Humanity
International, Jane Goodall Institute, Roots&Shoots program, etc.,
and 150 National Coordinating Committees
The Project Harmony opened its office in Armenia in 2000, when it
launched the Armenia School Connectivity Program in the country.
Armenia School Connectivity program is a program of the US Department
of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs funded through
the FREEDOM Support Act and implemented by the Yerevan office of the
Project Harmony. The project budget is $12.5mln and envisages the
opening of Internet computer centres in 330 Armenian schools, 300 of
such centres actually functioning now. L.V.–0–

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GOVERNMENT COMMISSION SET FOR WORLD WAR II VICTORY CELEBRATION
PREPARATION HOLDS WEDNESDAY A WIDENED SESSION

YEREVAN, April 13. /ARKA/. Government commission set for World War II
Victory celebration preparation held Wednesday a widened session in
Armenian Defence Ministry. According to Armenian Defence Ministry`s
Spokesman Seyran Shahsuvaryan, the course of the preparatory work for
the celebration was discussed at the Wednesday’s session presided by
Armenian Defence Minister Serge Sargsyan. The session participants
came up with a number of proposals focused on proper holding a series
of events connected with the Victory.
Speaking on behalf of 9015 Armenian veterans of World War II,
Major-General Rafik Karapetyan, the Chairman of Armenian Union of
Labor Veterans, Armed Forces and Law Enforcement Agencies, proposed
to change the name of one of Yerevan’s schools by naming it after
General Safaryan. Yerevan Mayor Yervand Zakaryan said a decision on
the issue will be made within a week.
Alexan Harutyunyan, the Chair of the Council of Public TV and Radio
Company of Armenia, presenting a lit of TV programs about the war
broadcast on television and radio, said a series of films about
Armenian soldiers buried in Europe are being shoot now by Yerevan
studio.
Fadey Sargsyan, the President of National Academy of Science of
Armenia, speaking on behalf of veterans, thanked Armenian President,
Government and Defence Ministry for cordiality and willingness to
organize festive events that is necessary not only for veterans , but
also for young generation to implant patriotic ideas in the young.
Armenian Defence Minister Serge Sargsyan said summarizing the session
that `May 9 is the double holiday for our nation’. He said he
convinced that `proper celebration of this glorious holiday depends
on warm and cordial attitude of all of us toward it’. M.V. – 0–

Bahrain News Agency
April 15, 2005 Friday 9:10 AM EST

Rice to tour southern Caucasian countries in May

Manama

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is to embark in early may on a
tour in southern Caucasian countries that includes Azerbaijan,
Georgia and Armenia, said the azeri ”525” newspaper on Friday.

The newspaper quoted diplomatic sources as saying that rice was to
meet with the leaders of the three countries and talks will focus on
deepening relations with the US in the military and security fields,
as well as resolving the Azeri-Armenian dispute over
nagorno-karabakh.

US President George W.Bush will visit Georgia on may 10 coming from
Moscow after participation in the 60th anniversary of the fall of
fascism.

Analyst says USA plans to use Azerbaijan for launching strikes on Iran

Trend news agency
13 Apr 05

BAKU

The brief visit to Azerbaijan by US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld
was not so much connected with the possible stationing of US troops in
Azerbaijan as it was with the possible use of Azerbaijan’s military
infrastructure, political analyst Rasim Musabayov has told Trend.

“But before this infrastructure can be used, it has to be modernized,
which will require certain expenditure. And that, in turn, requires a
guarantee from the country’s administration. This is what might have
been the subject of negotiations,” Musabayov said.

Another aspect of the negotiations, the analyst said, could be the
attractiveness of the Caspian energy resources and the geographic
location of the region for different countries. In this connection,
the expert added, “considering the fact that the direct involvement of
the USA is rather complicated, the sides could have discussed the
issue of ensuring the security in the Caspian using Azerbaijan’s own
resources with the help of American specialists”.

Another political analyst, Zardust Alizada, holds a slightly different
view on Rumsfeld’s visit to Azerbaijan.

“Politicians of Donald Rumsfeld’s calibre usually visit countries like
Azerbaijan only once. But apparently, the Pentagon chief failed to
come to an agreement with the Azerbaijani leadership during his
previous visits, which is why he has paid his third visit,” Alizada
said.

The political analyst believes that Rumsfeld’s visit is explained by
Washington’s desire to boost its military and political presence in
the region: both from the standpoint of the security of the
Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline and from the standpoint of
preparations for strikes against Iran.

“Washington intends to use Azerbaijan as a foothold for dealing a blow
to Iran. The USA already has such footholds in three other countries
around Iran,” Alizada added.

RA NA CHAIRMAN EMPHASIZES GREAT ROLE OF STATE DUMA IN SOLUTION OF
ISSUE OF LEGAL STATUS OF ARMENIANS LIVING IN RUSSIA

MOSCOW, APRIL 14, NOYAN TAPAN. Armenian-Russian interstate and
interparliamentary problems, issues of cooperation in international
organizations were discussed with the members of the Committee on CIS
Affairs and Relations with Compatriots of the RF State Duma at the
April 13 meeting of Artur Baghdasarian, the Armenian NA Chiarman. As
Noyan Tapan was informed from the NA Public Relations Department,
Artur Baghdasarian attached importance to the great role of the State
Duma in solving the issue of the legal status of Armenians living in
Russia, particularly issue on giving them right of 90 days of
residence without visa. This right can be provided either by adopting
a law or signing an agreement. MPs of the State Duma were interested
in the NA Chairman’s opinion concerning sending an Armenian military
unit to Iraq. According to Artur Baghdasarian, Armenia joined the
antiterrorism coalition and sent his professionals on humanitarian
mission to Iraq. Proceeding from the importance of the issue, Armenia
could not reject going to meet USA, which had provided aid to Armenia
worth more than one billion dollars since its independence. So the
problem had both political and economic significance. Issues of the
future fate of CIS, possibilities of carrying out concret programs
within of scientific-educational, cultural cooperation between the two
countries were also discussed at the meeting. The issue of making
definite the legal status of Armenians living in Russia and secure of
90 days residence without visa, which requires legal solutions, were
also discussed at the NA Chairman’s meeting with Igor Levitin, the
Co-Chairman of Armenia-Russia Intergovernment Committee, the RF
Transport Minister.

A1plus

19:12:36 | 13-04-2005 | Politics |

VIKTOR DALLAKYAN BRINGS CRIMINAL CHARGE AGAINST KOCHARYAN

«Kocharyan has committed crime against the Armenian nation, and he will not
be forgiven», said NA delegate Viktor Dallakyan at the beginning of his
speech. The latter is aware that the nation demanding change of authorities
is now interested in two questions: when and how? «When – as soon as
possible, how – with your help – the help of the nation», said Mr.
Dallakyan.

Afterwards Mr. Dallakyan charged the person who is head of the country since
1998 with the crime of getting the power by means of the terrorist act of
October 27. Viktor Dallakyan outlined the possibilities to achieve change of
authorities in Armenia – 2003 elections, confidence referendum, Karabakh
conflict, Constitutional referendum, and elections of local governing
bodies. «We will pay special attention», said Viktor Dallakyan.

NA delegate Shavarsh Kocharyan had found it strange that after the change of
authorities in Georgia, Ukraine and Kyrgyzstan from the 46 European
countries only two have thought that they are too strong and no change of
authorities is possible. And these are Armenia and Azerbaijan.

Lew Rockwell, CA
April 13 2005

What We Can Learn From Woodrow Wilson’s Great Blunder
The Case for Staying Out of Other People’s Wars
by Jim Powell

The worst American foreign policy disasters of the past century have
been consequences of Wilsonian interventionism. Critics have been
dismissed as “isolationists,” but the fact is that Wilsonian
interventionism has dragged the United States into pointless wars and
ushered in revolution, terror, runaway inflation, dictatorship and
mass murder. It’s past time to judge Wilsonian interventionism by its
consequences, not the good intentions expressed in political
speeches, because they haven’t worked out.

Surely, one of the most important principles of American foreign
policy should be to conserve resources for defending the country.
President Woodrow Wilson violated this principle by entering World
War I which didn’t involve an attack on the United States.

German submarines sunk some foreign ships with American passengers,
but they had been warned about the obvious danger of traveling in a
war zone. People need to take responsibility for their own decisions
and proceed at their own risk. It was unreasonable to expect that
because a few adventurers lost their lives, the entire nation had to
enter a war in which tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands more
people must die.

There never was a serious possibility that Germany might attack the
United States during World War I. The German Navy was confined to
German ports by the British Navy, and British convoys dramatically
reduced the number of merchant ships sunk by German submarines. The
German Army was stalemated on the Western Front, and over a million
German soldiers were engaged on the Eastern Front. German boys and
older men were being drafted to fill the trenches. There wasn’t any
armed force available for an attack on the United States. Despite the
suggestion, in German Foreign Minister Arthur Zimmermann’s
inflammatory telegram, about a possible alliance between Germany,
Mexico and Japan, America was safe.

Wilson claimed that American national security was linked with the
fate of Britain, but because the British Navy had bottled up the
German Navy and neutralized German submarines, Germany wasn’t capable
of invading Britain. In any case, Britain was struggling to maintain
its global empire. The settlement following World War I had the
effect of adding more territories to the British Empire. Why should
American lives have been lost and American resources spent to expand
the British Empire?

Why, for that matter, should the United States have defended the
French or the Belgians? They were defending their overseas empires,
and both had shown themselves to be brutal colonial rulers. The
Belgians were responsible for slavery and mass murder in the Congo –
the first modern genocide, involving an estimated 8 million deaths.

How could any U. S. president in his right mind have committed
American soldiers to defend Britain and France, whose generals
squandered lives on a stupendous scale? Britain’s General Douglas
Haig, for instance, whose blunders figured in the deaths of 95,675
British soldiers and 420,000 total British casualties at the Battle
of the Somme (1916). Another 50,729 French soldiers were killed. Haig
not only wasn’t fired, but he continued to squander lives in battle
after battle. It was amazing that a U.S. president would seriously
consider conscripting Americans for European killing fields drenched
in blood. There were the battles of the Marne (1914, 270,000 French
and British soldiers killed), Artois (1915, 100,000 French soldiers
killed), Ypres (Second Battle, 1915, 70,000 French soldiers killed),
Gallipoli (1915, 50,000 British, Australian and New Zealand soldiers
killed), Verdun (1916, 315,000 French soldiers killed), Arras (1916,
160,000 British soldiers killed) and Passchendaele (1917, 310,000
British soldiers killed).

There would have massacres even with better generals. As military
historian John Keegan observed, “The simple truth of 1914-18 trench
warfare is that the massing of large numbers of soldiers unprotected
by anything but cloth uniforms, however they were trained, however
equipped, against large masses of other soldiers, protected by
earthworks and barbed wire and provided with rapid-fire weapons, was
bound to result in very heavy casualties among the attackers…The
effect of artillery added to the slaughter, as did that of bayonets
and grenades when fighting came to close quarters in the trench
labyrinths.”

Woodrow Wilson didn’t need a crystal ball to understand that World
War I wasn’t our war. He knew how the Europeans, with their
entangling alliances, had stumbled into the conflagration. He knew
how they stubbornly refused to quit. He knew how the Allied Powers
had negotiated their secret treaties to carve up Europe and colonial
possessions. He could see how hundreds of thousands of young men were
being slaughtered in the mud.

It was claimed that the United States would have been threatened if a
single power – Germany – had been able to control the entire European
continent. But that was unlikely, since World War I had been
stalemated for more than three years. The best the Germans might have
hoped for would have been to annex Belgium and northwestern France,
where much of World War I had been fought, as well as territories
gained from Austria-Hungary and western Russia. If the Germans had
won the war, they would have had a hard time holding their empire
together because of all the rebellious nationalities, the same
nationalities that figured in the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian
and Russian empires. Most likely outcome of a German victory: costly
civil wars ending in German collapse.

In any event, people have been fighting each other for thousands of
years, and America managed to develop despite a succession of empires
in Europe and elsewhere. America was in its infancy when Spain was
the mightiest power on earth, enriched by precious metals from Mexico
and Peru. During the late 1600s, the French King Louis XIV dominated
Europe, persecuted Protestants and fought one war after another, but
America thrived as a sanctuary. A century later, America broke free
from the British Empire. George Washington, as the first President of
the United States, wisely counseled his countrymen to stay out of
European wars, and this policy was continued by his successor Thomas
Jefferson despite French and British interference with U.S. shipping.
The United States prospered while the French Emperor Napoleon
Bonaparte organized the first modern police state, conquered Europe
and marched into Russia.

America’s Founders had the humility and wisdom to recognize that the
United States couldn’t prevent other people from fighting. If the
United States had tried forcing “peace” on foreigners, this would
have required raising and equipping an army, and fighting adversaries
who knew their land much better than we did. We would have had to
fight with allies whose motives turned out to be less pure than we
had supposed. We would have made enemies we didn’t have before. In
the end, we would have widened a conflict, and probably more people
would have been killed than if we had stayed out.

The arrogant Wilson should have learned a lesson when he tried
nation-building in Mexico, and the effort backfired. What could have
been simpler than sending some American soldiers across the Mexican
border to find a bandit and help install a good ruler down there? Yet
Wilson’s intervention failed to find the bandit, failed to install a
good ruler, killed people and made enemies.

Preoccupied with his good intentions, Wilson never seemed to have
considered the possibility that intervening in Europe might do worse
than fail to achieve peace. Because of historic resentments and
staggering battlefield casualties, there was a lot of bitterness in
Europe. Governments were nearly bankrupt, and people were hungry.
They wanted vengeance for their suffering. The political situation
was explosive. If one side were able to achieve a decisive victory,
the temptation would be strong to seek retribution. So, Wilson
intervened, enabled the Allied Powers to achieve a decisive victory,
and the result was the vindictive Versailles Treaty with devastating
political consequences that played out in Germany and around the
world.

Apparently thinking only about what he wanted, he pressured and
bribed the Russian Provisional Government to stay in the war, when he
ought to have known that country had been falling apart ever since it
entered the war in 1914. Wilson ought to have known that millions of
Russian peasants weren’t going to be affected much one way or the
other by what happened on the Western Front, the only thing that
Wilson cared about. He ought to have known that Russian peasants were
deserting the Russian Army by the thousands, to go home and claim
land, and soon there wouldn’t be any army to defend the Provisional
Government. If Wilson didn’t know these things, he didn’t have any
business trying to play an international war game. Wilson’s blunders
made it easier for Lenin to seize power on his fourth attempt in
1917, leading to more than seven decades of Soviet communism.

Wilson ought to have known he was playing with fire when, at the
Versailles Conference following World War I, he participated in
redrawing thousands of miles of national borders. He knew how
nationalist hatreds had exploded in the Austro-Hungarian Empire and
triggered the Balkan wars and World War I. Turkish nationalists
expelled some 100,000 Greeks from the Anatolian Peninsula where many
families had lived for over a thousand years, and large numbers of
Greek women were raped and Greek men murdered. Turkish nationalists
massacred an estimated 1.5 million Armenians.

Woodrow Wilson’s decision to enter World War I had serious
consequences in Iraq, too. Because the British and French were on the
winning side of the war, the League of Nations awarded “mandates” to
Britain and France in the region. If the United States had stayed out
of World War I, there probably would have been a negotiated
settlement, and the Ottoman Empire would have survived for a while.
The Middle East wouldn’t have been carved up by Britain and France.
But as things turned out, authorized by League of Nations “mandates,”
British Colonial Secretary Winston Churchill was determined to secure
the British Navy’s access to Persian oil at the least possible cost
by installing puppet regimes in the region.

In Mesopotamia, Churchill bolted together the territories of Mosul,
Baghdad and Basra to make Iraq. Although Kurds wanted an independent
homeland, their territory was to be part of Iraq. Churchill decided
that the best bet for Britain would be a Hashemite ruler. For king,
Churchill picked Feisal, eldest son of Sherif Hussein of Mecca.
Feisal was an Arabian prince who lived for years in Ottoman
Constantinople, then established himself as king of Syria but was
expelled by the French government that had the League of Nations
“mandate” there. The British arranged a plebiscite purporting to show
Iraqi support for Faisal. A majority of people in Iraq were Shiite
Muslims, but Feisal was a Sunni Muslim, and this conflict was to
become a huge problem. The Ottomans were Sunni, too, which meant
British policy prolonged the era of Sunni dominance over Shiites as
they became more resentful. During the 37 years of the Iraqi
monarchy, there were 58 changes of parliamentary governments,
indicating chronic political instability. All Iraqi rulers since
Feisal, including Saddam Hussein, were Sunnis. That Iraq was ruled
for three decades by a sadistic murderer like Saddam made clear how
the map-drawing game was vastly more complicated than Wilson had
imagined.

Considering Wilson’s global catastrophes, it’s remarkable that his
interventionist policies have been adopted by Democratic and
Republican presidents ever since. President Franklin D. Roosevelt
followed in Wilson’s footsteps when he maneuvered the United States
into World War II, after promising American voters that he would stay
out. Within five years after Hitler’s defeat, more people than ever –
some 800 million – suffered oppression from totalitarian regimes, in
the Soviet Union, Albania, Bulgaria, China, Czechoslovakia, Estonia,
East Germany, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Rumania and
Yugoslavia. Millions in Eastern Europe were liberated from Hitler,
then handed over to Stalin. Both Hitler and Stalin murdered Jews. One
might make a case that the war against Hitler was pragmatic, but
since the United States was allied with Stalin, an even worse mass
murderer, World War II couldn’t be described as a just war. And, one
must not forget, the Pacific war occurred as a consequence of
American efforts to thwart Japanese aggression in China, but China
ended up going Communist. No justice in that, either.

President Harry Truman followed in Wilson’s footsteps with his
undeclared Korean War that didn’t involve an attack on the United
States yet killed more than 38,000 Americans. President Lyndon B.
Johnson followed Wilson with his undeclared Vietnam War, still
another war that didn’t involve an attack on the United States – over
58,000 Americans killed.

Again and again, seemingly easy interventions have become
complicated, starting with Wilson’s fiascos in Mexico and Europe. The
Korean War became a quagmire with its rugged terrain and Chinese
hordes, the Vietnam War with its jungles and guerrilla fighters, and
the Middle East with its cities and suicide bombers. We play to our
strengths defending our country and play to our weaknesses
intervening in the affairs of other countries where people speak
different languages, have different ideas, live in places that are
strange to us – and are embroiled in conflicts that have little to do
with our national security interests. In some cases, such as the
Balkans, the United States intervened in conflicts that have been
going on for hundreds of years, before the United States existed.

And, yes, the United States has made enemies by intervening in
ancient disputes between Jews and Muslims as well as disputes among
Muslim sects in the Middle East. American blood has been shed
defending unpopular Saudi kings and the Shah of Iran, and trying to
maintain order in Lebanon and build a new Iraqi nation following the
overthrow of Saddam. During the past thousand years, the Muslim world
has produced kings, dictators and religious fanatics – it’s a region
largely unfamiliar with religious freedom and constitutional
limitations on government power. Yet Wilsonian nation-builders have
imagined that they could somehow develop a nice liberal democracy by
sending in soldiers and money. What we’ve seen, of course, has been
terror and civil war.

Americans seem surprised when local people have opposed our
well-meaning interventions, particularly after we helped get rid of
an acknowledged evil like Saddam Hussein. But people don’t seem to
want somebody else building their nation, even when they made a mess
of it. They might want Americans to send money and sacrifice some
lives, then go home. A small but determined terrorist minority can
cause a lot of trouble for us.

An interventionist foreign policy requires a president with the
highest level of foreign policy expertise, but there isn’t any method
of assuring that only such people will occupy the White House. Many
factors other than foreign policy expertise influence the outcome of
presidential elections, such as a candidate’s personality,
achievements and positions on other issues. In any case, the worst
foreign policy decisions, such as entering World War I, the Korean
War and the Vietnam War, have tended to involve a consensus among
foreign policy experts – “the wise men,” as Walter Isaacson and Evan
Thomas called them in their book about postwar policy. “The best and
brightest” was David Halberstam’s phrase in his critique of the
Vietnam War.

How could the experts be wrong? Predicting foreign policy outcomes is
as difficult as predicting anything else. Intervening in the affairs
of other nations means taking sides. It isn’t easy to predict which
among many personalities and groups might emerge as enemies. Anyway,
an outsider has a limited number of options, including support for a
sympathetic regime and conquest, both of which would inflame
nationalist hatreds.

The catastrophes Woodrow Wilson unleashed ought to serve as a warning
that humility is urgently needed in U. S. foreign policy. It is not
possible to control what other people do. We can only control what we
do. We will have our hands full making this the best country it can
be.

U.S. foreign policy ought to be guided by the following principles:

(1) Defend America from terrorism. The focus should be protecting the
national security interests of the United States, not defending other
countries from a wide range of threats. Nor should the United States
try to counter political instability elsewhere. There has always been
political instability in the world, and most of it doesn’t affect the
national security of the United States. We should avoid having
American forces permanently stationed in other countries. American
blood and treasure should be reserved for safeguarding Americans. We
should repeal proliferating restrictions on civil liberties which,
enacted in the name of fighting terrorism, do little if anything to
protect national security.

(2) Stay out of other people’s wars. By definition, these don’t
involve an attack on the United States. We should phase out alliances
that obligate the United States to enter wars unrelated to American
national security interests, such as the NATO alliance obligating the
United States to enter wars in which any of 19 member nations might
become embroiled. The United States should phase out similar
obligations in the Middle East, Korea and elsewhere. The more
American resources expended in other people’s wars, the less are
available to protect American national security interests.

(3) Don’t try to build other people’s nations. Independent nations
cannot be built by stationing U.S soldiers in a territory and giving
the government foreign aid. For better or worse, people must build
their nations by making their own choices. People don’t want
foreigners trying to build their nations, because the foreigners – in
particular, a foreign government – would be making the choices. When
the United States pursues nation-building, American soldiers are
killed enforcing choices that local people don’t want. This
essentially means American soldiers die in vain.

(4) Be open to the world. Maintain freedom of movement for people,
goods and capital, among other things to minimize the risk that
economic disputes escalate into political and military conflicts. We
should abolish immigration quotas and welcome immigrants from all
nations, except immigrants with known terrorist or other criminal
backgrounds. Immigrants should perhaps be excluded from welfare state
benefits (which, considering the debilitating effects of welfare,
would probably give immigrants an advantage over those born in the
United States). There shouldn’t be any tariffs, import quotas,
antidumping penalties or other import restrictions. Nor should there
be foreign exchange controls or other restrictions on capital flows.
The goal should be to minimize government-to-government contacts and
facilitate the entire range of peaceful, private contacts around the
world.

More immigrants have come to the United States than to all other
destinations combined. Immigrants created new technologies, built
great companies, enriched American cuisine and the American language
itself. This was anything but “isolationism.” America became a rich
and influential country precisely because of a willingness to learn
from everybody.

America cannot save the world by fighting endless wars, but we can
set an example. We must protect a flourishing free society which
peaceful people are welcome to join or emulate in their own lands.

April 13, 2005

Jim Powell, a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute, is the author of
Wilson’s War, How Woodrow Wilson’s Great Blunder Led To Hitler,
Lenin, Stalin And World War II (2005), FDR’s Folly, How Roosevelt and
His New Deal Prolonged the Great Depression (2003), and The Triumph
of Liberty, A 2,000-Year History Told Through The Lives Of Freedom’s
Greatest Champions (2000).

Christian Post, CA
April 12 2005

Assyrian Christians Raise Alarm Over Iraq Elections, Representation

`Iraq was liberated to have freedom for everybody, not just Shi’ites,
Kurds and Sunnis.’

Despite the emergence of a fledgling democratic government and a
minority president, Assyrian Christians in Iraq have expressed
concern over the persecution and disenfranchisement of minority
groups during the past two months since the Jan. 30 elections.

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Assyrian Christians make up about three percent, or 800 thousand, of
Iraq’s 26 million people. The majority of Iraqi Christians belong to
the Chaldean Catholic Church, the Iraqi branch of Roman Catholicism.
Their patriarch is known as the `Assyrian,’ according to the Middle
East Media Research Institute.

There are other smaller Churches in Iraq, including the Roman
Catholic, Protestant, Baptist, Nestorian and Armenian.

For Assyrian Christians, the path to democracy and representation in
the new government has been filled with pitfalls.

The head of the Save the Assyrians campaign, Andy Darmoo spoke at a
news conference at the United Nations on Feb. 18 raising a call
attention to the plight of Iraqi Christians.

Darmoo, an Assyrian who left Iraq in 1965, urged the United Nations
and European union to increase international pressure on Baghdad to
give Assyrians more humanitarian aid and a voice in the new Iraqi
government, according to Reuters.

`Iraq was liberated to have freedom for everybody, not just Shi’ites,
Kurds and Sunnis,’ said Darmoo.

He said that Assyrian Christians were the targets of a `quiet
campaign of ethnic cleansing,’ according to Reuters.

The Assyrian International News Agency reported that pleas for help
regarding vote fraud, threats, and killings targeting Assyrian
Christians had been whitewashed by the Iraqi Independent Electoral
High Commission’s report on voting irregularities and lockouts in
North Iraq.

In addition, another report said that the Al-Rafidayn Democratic
Coalition, the main party representing ChaldoAssyrians blasted a
February report by the IEHC. They said the report failed to explain a
decision by the Niniveh governorate to open only 93 of 330 voting
centers on Election day, according to AINA

In terms of parliamentary representation, the agency also reported
that four of six Assyrians elected to the National Assembly are under
the `explicit direction’ of the Kurdistan Democratic Party, which
carried out the `terror campaign’ that was `whitewashed’ by the IEHC,
according to AINA.

Talabani belongs to the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, which had been
at odds with the KPD in the past.

At the Feb. 18 U.N. news conference, Darmoo said that Talabani had
assured minority groups such as the Assyrian Christians that they
would have a role in drafting the constitution.

ARMENPRESS

FORTY-FIVE ARMENIAN COMPANIES TO SHOWCASE THEIR GOODS IN TBILISI

YEREVAN, APRIL 11, ARMENPRESS: Forty-five Armenian companies have
confirmed their participation in a display of Armenian goods and services at
Armenia Today fair that will take place in Tbilisi, the capital of
neighboring Georgia from April 21 to April 23.
Anna Tadevosian, a press secretary of the Yerevan-based Logos Center,
dealing with organization of various exhibitions, said the showcase of
Armenian goods is organized by the trade and economic, foreign ministries
and the Union of Armenian Businessmen and Industrialists.
She said Armenian companies will showcase foodstuff, drinks, various
lathes for processing of stone, chemical and electronic goods, paints,
tourist facilities and services.
The aim of the exhibition is to seek new partners in Georgia and help
expand Armenian exports to that country.

79% OF EMPLOYEES IN ARMENIA WORK IN PRIVATE SECTOR

YEREVAN, APRIL 8, NOYAN TAPAN. Thanks to the policy conducted by
the Armenian government in recent years, a strong private sector has
formed in the country’s economy. The RA Deputy Minister of Trade and
Economic Development Gagik Vardanian stated this at the international
conference “Armenia’s Sustainable Territorial Development at National,
Regional Local Levels” on April 7. According to him, private sectors
have formed in almost all spheres, including industry, agricultural
production procession and information technologies. He indicated
that at present over 80% of Armenia’s GDP is produced and 79% of
employees are working in the private sector. At the same time the
deputy minister noted that the changes in all the spheres of the
Armenian economy are mainly quantitative, and a great deal has to be
done to bring about qualitative changes as well. The high rates of
economic growth and the private sector’s development have taken place
“on a narrow basis”. According to G.Vardanian, the fact that last
year exports made 760 mln USD also bears evidence of a low level
of qualitative changes. The speaker noted that the private sector
already comprehends the importance of funding the scientific research,
as well as innovation activities and environmental and social problems.

Saturday Review: Paperbacks: Paperback writer: The best book ideas come from an open mind and the British Library, says Gillian Slovo
By GILLIAN SLOVO

The Guardian – United Kingdom;
Apr 09, 2005

Having started my novelist’s life as something of a librariaphobe,
I am now one of the British Library’s most enthusiastic converts. It
works for me: its climate control, padded desks, wide chairs and,
most importantly, its conveyor belt of books that rarely falters.

In fact my criticisms are restricted to the catering. Not just of
the food, but those echoing, scrabbling, ill-lit corridors that pass
as adequate places in which to sit and digest. And there’s a space
problem. At peak times, the hunt for somewhere to rest a plate becomes
particularly frenetic. The only remedy is the very unBritish one of
sharing with a stranger.

Which is how I found myself the other day, having coffee with a
man I didn’t know. It had been a slow day and my mounting stack
of reservations felt increasingly unappealing. Looking for serious
diversion, I asked my table companion his life history.

I had lucked out. His was a fascinating story, particularly his career
trajectory: he was a former elite civil engineer who had become a
successful actor. The caffeine was thick in both of us by the time
he’d told me how he’d made the leap from one such seemingly diverse
career to the other.

Then he returned the compliment by asking me what I was doing in the
library. Looking for an idea for my next novel, I told him; without
much success – or so it felt that day. He asked how I was going
about the search. I muttered something about Armenian genocides,
flu pandemics and Suez crises. It sounded even odder than it had
felt in the reading room. Not, however, to my companion. He nodded,
and then, in an apparent non sequitur, told me that the reason he had
been able to make the transition from engineer to actor was because
he had understood that, no matter what the discipline, the creative
process is similar. Part is knowledge and experience, he said, part
hard work. But the final and most important part is to allow your
subconscious free rein. Which means that you, he concluded, are going
about the search for an idea exactly the right way: the only thing
you’re doing wrong is that you don’t trust that it will work.

Sweet words from a stranger. After he left I continued to sit,
thinking about what he’d said.

“Where do your ideas come from?” That’s the question that always dogs
me when I give talks. Since I am a writer to whom ideas come hard,
I can only answer it in hindsight. Take my last, I say: Ice Road
. A novel set in the Leningrad of the 1930s, it was born out of my
admiration for the film director Sergio Leone.

I’d always loved Leone’s spaghetti westerns, but those opening
frames of Once Upon a Time in the West , with its hard men, their
fawn dusters and the machine soundtrack, made me a lifelong Leone
fan. When I was writing my novel Red Dust , set in a desert town,
I kept in mind Leone’s structure of a seeker-after-justice riding
into town. And then, searching out an idea for the book to follow,
I heard that, before his sudden death, Leone had been planning to
set his next film inside the Leningrad siege.

Leningrad’s heroic defiance of the German encirclement had always
fascinated me. This, along with the Leone connection, was enough
to send me to the library. I became fascinated, not only by the
city’s war-time years, but by the period leading up to the siege;
by the way ordinary people survive tyranny. I read and read, giving
myself permission to follow instinct. Which is how, having taken that
all-important decision to set my novel-to-be entirely within the city
perimeters, I ended up following an intriguing footnote into the
Arctic – many hundreds of miles from Leningrad. Conscious planning
sounded out a warning note, but instinct and, I guess, my subconscious
told me to persist, a decision I was never to regret. And so finally,
out of an age-old admiration for a dead film director, I had found
the book that would keep me occupied for the next few years.

So where do ideas come from? Beats me. But if you happen to catch me
in the library corridor, chatting with a stranger, don’t for a moment
assume I’m not working. I’m actually doing the hardest work I know:
keeping myself open for the onset of the right idea.

Ice Road is published by Virago. To order a copy for pounds 7.99 with
free UK p&p call Guardian book service on 0870 836 0875.