Author: Jagharian Tania

Fort Lauderdale Sun Sentinel, FL
July 3 2004
For those who have joined the American family, liberty can never be
taken for granted
By John Dolen
Arts & Features Editor
Posted July 4 2004
July Fourth, Independence Day, our day of freedom.
In 1776, it meant Americans were no longer subject to the whims of
kings. Today it means Americans are not subject to central
committees, tyrannical mullahs or dictators.
Many Americans will pay fleeting heed to this as they scurry to
barbecues and beaches today. But for those who’ve come from elsewhere
to our land of freedom, the memories, and sometimes the fears, are
never far behind.
So is the gratitude for being able to pursue happiness without being
pursued.
While the world’s lack of freedom is front-page news — Cuba opposing
a pro baseball player’s family reunion, a journalist being gunned
down in Mexico — for some, freedom is a lot simpler.
For Johnson Ng, 46, publisher of a Florida-wide Chinese newspaper,
freedom can be about the small things.
“Things are common sense here. Say you have a hole in the wall of
your restaurant. OK, so the inspector comes and says, you have two
weeks to repair,” says Ng. “He doesn’t come back three days later and
demand money.”
Ng (pronounced Eng) has traveled throughout Asia and notes that in
many places, money still has to grease palms to get things done, or
not done. An unlikely newsman, Ng studied drama and stagecraft in his
native Hong Kong. Here he has worked as a chef and as a manager for a
bean sprout business in Miami, where he lives.
When Ng became a manager, his father advised him, “Johnson, no matter
how well you work for that business, even after 17 years, you will
still be somebody else’s manager. This is America. You should have
your own business.”
Not long afterward, Ng started the United Chinese News of Florida.
Once he got the weekly going, his wife became editor. Ng also does
photos and reporting.
So he claimed his piece of freedom: “In the U.S., no matter who you
are, you have your own environment that you can survive in, and
grow.”
Robert Taheri is known around Davie for the sage nutritional advice
he gives out at his health food store, Simply Natural, which he
opened 16 years ago.
Taheri was 14 when he left his native Iran with his family for
London, before the revolution that deposed the Shah and launched the
regime of Ayatollah Khomeini.
“Before the revolution you could do pretty much everything, have
businesses, whatever, although you didn’t have freedom of speech 100
per cent,” Taheri says. “Now, everything there is restricted because
of the Islamic rule.”
How about opening up a health foods store? “Ownership is not
guaranteed,” says Taheri, 47. “They can come anytime and take over
the business with different excuses or reasons.”
Taheri should know. He not only monitors Iran today on satellite
channels but also by staying in touch with two of his brothers, both
of whom support democracy in Iran.
His brother Amir has written books about Iran and, according to
Taheri, “has interviewed most of the leaders of the world.” Amir
currently writes for The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times and
El Figaro, among others.
His brother Ali was editor of one of the two major newspapers in
Tehran. He fled the country after the revolution, when, according to
Taheri, “freedom of the press was immediately demolished.”
Ali later signed on with Radio Free Europe in Prague, Czech Republic,
which counters the heavily censored Islamic radio. Of Ali, Taheri
says: “He is a man of honor telling the truth. He is fighting for the
country, not just for himself.”
Taheri’s wife, Satti, is Armenian. In Iran, certain parts of her
culture had to be suppressed. Says Taheri with a smile, “The
Armenians, they like wine, they have pork, all this is not allowed.”
Making his own transition to the subject of women’s rights in Iran,
Taheri paraphrases the words of last year’s Nobel Peace Prize winner,
Shirin Abadi, also from his country: “They lose their freedom before
they even go out the door, having to dress the way [the ayatollahs]
want, and you can’t wear makeup.”
The Taheris and their 16-year-old son are U.S. citizens. “The Fourth
is a glorious day for us … doubly thrilling,” Taheri says. “Because
we had freedom and then we lost it in our home country. When you have
it and then lose it, you really know what it is.”
First impression
One immigrant remembers an afternoon more than 40 years ago when, as
a teenager, she was looking forward to a big social that night.
But her parents swept her off “to the other side of the island.” The
next thing she knew she was on a plane, soon landing at the Fort
Lauderdale-Hollywood airport.
She remembers being miserable without her friends back in Cuba and
not being able to speak the language of her new country. But soon she
began watching the TV news and teaching herself English “by staring
at the mouths and listening carefully.”
“I was probably more attuned to current events than the average
teenager,” says Diana Wasserman-Rubin of the Broward County
Commission. “The whole civil rights movement, it took me off guard.
That wasn’t what I expected.
“I saw people protesting, and this was my first impression of
freedom.”
It was such a foreign concept: “If you disagreed with someone where I
came from you could not express your disagreement in public.”
Wasserman-Rubin attended schools in Miami Beach and moved to Pembroke
Pines in 1971. Shortly after, she became involved in voter
registration drives.
In the 1980s, she became a member of the South Broward Hospital
District; in the 1990s, the Broward School Board; and she has been on
the Broward County Commission since 2000, where she has served as
mayor in a rotating position.
During that time she has been known as a voice for Hispanics and
blacks.
“If I had similar job in Cuba now I would have some responsibilities
but not the tools to do the job,” the commissioner says. “The Cuban
government is not for the people, not by the people, and people don’t
have a say in who they elect.”
Wasserman-Rubin says she gets emotional on the Fourth of July.
“I’m one of those hokey people who reflects on the meaning of the
holidays, Thanksgiving too,” She says. It reminds me how lucky I am,
to be able to contribute to my adopted country.”
Now the woman who once landed at the strange airport in Fort
Lauderdale serves on the council that runs it.
Wedding massacre
South Florida professor Dominic Mohamed was born and raised in the
Sudan, a country facing a refugee crisis so dire that Colin Powell
and Kofi Annan visited it just days ago in a high-profile effort to
prevent disaster.
The State Department blames Arab militias backed by the government
for the current refugee situation in the west of Sudan, reports The
New York Times, saying the militias “have systematically attacked
hundreds of black African villages in western Sudan and neighboring
Chad.”
Most of his life Mohamed has seen a country at war, between the Arab
Muslim north and the African animists and Christians of the south.
Mohamed’s parents and family were Christian and, tragically, victims
of the conflict.
“Ninety-nine members of my family were killed, children, women and
men, lined up against the wall at a wedding reception,” says Mohamed.
Those who managed to escape the 1965 massacre blame Arab militias,
similar to those that are now waging war on the African Muslim
population in west Sudan.
“They were after the educated and the Christian Africans,” says
Mohamed, who was spared because his flight to the wedding was
canceled due to gas shortages.
Eventually, Mohamed made a new life for himself in the United States
and has been teaching at Florida International University in Miami
for 31 years.
He traces a detailed timeline of civil war and brief truces since
Egypt and Britain ceded control of the Sudan in 1957. It’s a sober
and ongoing story for the 60-year-old professor.
Now with his own family (he married an Ethiopian woman and has three
grown children), Mohamed teaches vocational and technical education.
He stays in touch with the situation in Sudan through Web sites and
letters from those who get out.
He does not take freedom lightly.
“In America, you have unlimited opportunities and you have freedom of
speech,” he says. “You have absolute freedom to choose and practice
any religion you desire, without social or political constraint at
all.”
Raised a Catholic, he is now a Lutheran and worships at the Lord of
Life Lutheran Church in Kendall. When he thinks of Independence Day,
he also thinks of a day 12 years ago.
“When I became an American citizen in 1992, it was the first time I
voted in my whole life,” says Mohamed softly. “I cried in the voting
booth.”
John Dolen can be reached at [email protected] or 954-356-4726.

Baku Today
July 2, 2004
Azerbaijan’s Military Expenses Increased
More 171 billion manats ($34.9 million) will be allocated from
Azerbaijan’s state budget for the country’s military expenses in line
with changes in the 2004 budget, ANS reported on Wednesday.
The amount of money earmarked from the budget for military
expenditures currently equals $147 million, according to ANS. The
figure is $86 million in Armenia, ANS said.
Finance Minister Avaz Alakbarov told reporters that the additional
amount allocated from the budget makes up for 2.3 per cent of the
Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of Azerbaijan.
`It’s not a large figure. One should make strong efforts to find 171
billion manats and finance something. Therefore, I think the
president’s step is very necessary and timely,’ Alakbarov said.

The Republican, MA
6/29/2004
Turmoil in homeland prompts move to U.S.
Wednesday, June 30, 2004
The end of the Cold War was not peaceful for Stella Gabriyelyan. It
brought her the loss of her home, the threat of mortal danger to her
family and years of uncertainty and bitterness.
The Gabriyelyans arrived in America on May 15, 2003, after living for
13 years as Armenian refugees in Moscow.
The date means a lot for them. It was exactly 14 years earlier that
the family arrived in Moscow fleeing ethnic violence in Azerbaijan,
then one of the 15 Soviet republics.
Before 1988, Gabriyelyan recalls, Azerbaijan had just one nationality
– bakinets – residents of Baku, its vibrant capital, located on the
western shore of the Caspian Sea. It was home to about 2 million
people, mostly Azeris, but also Armenians, Russians, Ukrainians and
Jews. “It really didn’t matter what culture a person came from. We
all were just bakintsy. It was such a friendly city. Everyone loved
each other. And then suddenly everything changed.”
Scholars and politicians would likely explain that the ethnic
conflict broke out in the Caucasus as part of a horrible legacy left
by Stalin in his re- drawing of the country’s ethnic map that exiled
entire nations from their ancestral homelands and fomented
disagreements that had been smoldering for decades.
Still, it’s hard to believe that people who used to live and work
side-by-side their entire lives would suddenly find themselves bitter
enemies.
It was the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Region of Azerbaijan that
became a bone of contention for Armenia and Azerbaijan. After the
Armenian majority there broke off relations with Azerbaijan and
joined Armenia in 1988, the conflict between the two neighbors
flared, leaving many dead.
In January 1990 Baku was hit by days of anti-Armenian violence that
claimed dozens of lives. There were certainly stories on both sides
and each side would offer their own explanation. But for sure, it was
not safe for any Armenian to stay in the city.
“I narrowly avoided being killed,” says Stella, who now calls West
Springfield home. “I don’t miss the city. I feel only fear and pain
thinking about those days.”
Vadim, her husband, is a Russian. But as long as Stella’s
“non-Russian” appearance was the obvious sign of an “unfriendly
nationality,” they told their son, Misha, who was 8, that his mom was
a Jew.
Their last days in Baku were spent hiding in their Russian neighbors’
apartment. “We left very early in the morning and we left everything
there.”
Stella doesn’t miss Moscow either.
Many Russian-speaking Baku Armenians sought refuge with friends and
relatives in Moscow and other Russian cities rather than in Armenia,
mainly because of their lack of Armenian language skills.
Unfortunately, they were not welcomed, particularly in Moscow with
its growing “Caucasus phobia” and registration regulations for
non-Muscovites which give police the right to expel non-residents who
had failed to register with the authorities.
Due to the arbitrary refusal of Moscow authorities, the Gabriyelyans,
like thousands of other forced migrants, did not receive local
propiskas – residence permits – and were not recognized by the
authorities as citizens of the Russian Federation after the collapse
of the Soviet Union.
So they became refugees in their own country.
“My grandfathers fought for this country in the second world war. My
father was a border guard. I did nothing wrong. I was a teacher all
my life. Why did I have to have problems acquiring Russian
citizenship?”
There is still much bitterness in her voice.
The first group of Baku Armenians who applied for U.S. resettlement
came to America in 1990. Stella, a Russian and English language
teacher, helped many of them to fill out the forms.
The Gabriyelyans themselves had to wait for a while until they were
granted refugee status. When it was granted, Stella remembers
thinking, “Now we have to start all over again.” Again.
Alex Peshkov, a staff writer for The Republican, emigrated to Western
Massachusetts from Arkhangelsk in 2002. His column focuses on the
Russian-American community. He can be reached at [email protected]

Deseret Morning News (Salt Lake City)
June 27, 2004 Sunday
Limelight shines on pianist, Utah
by Rebecca C. Howard Deseret Morning News
It was the Gina Bachauer International Piano Competition that
initially brought Karen Hakobyan to Salt Lake City. And it was the
University of Utah that kept him here.
But now, it’s the 18-year-old college student who is bringing
recognition to the Beehive State.
Recent winner of the 2004 ASCAP (American Society of Composers,
Authors and Publishers) Foundation Morton Gould Young Composer
Competition, and invited artist in the 2005 Lille International Piano
Festival, Hakobyan has distinguished himself as both a composer and a
performer in the international music world.
But for now, he is with us.
The Armenian-born musician was 5 when his father first bought a
piano. “My sister is five years older than me,” he recalled, “and she
started to play the piano. Every time she would finish playing, I
would go up to the piano and perform the same thing that she had been
practicing without even having any knowledge of music. So my parents
decided I should start taking lessons.”
He was only 6 when his parents enrolled him in the Tchaikovsky
Special Music School in Yerevan, Armenia, and 13 when he wrote his
first symphony for a full-size orchestra.
“After I finished this symphony, I was commissioned to write my
second symphony by a very big festival. It’s called the Young
Euro-Classic International Festival up in Berlin, and they asked me
to compose the second symphony, which was performed in 2001. So I
finished it at the age of 15.”
It was this second symphony that eventually won the ASCAP award, as
well as the Robertson Scholarship in Composition at the University of
Utah.
While all of this was going on, Hakobyan was also busy performing
with different orchestras and entering competitions. “In fact, one of
the biggest accomplishments around then was the Armenian Legacy
Pianists International Piano Competition,” he said.
It was right after that competition that he heard about the Gina
Bachauer competition and decided to enter.
As a 16-year-old, he entered the Young Artists division in 2001.
While he was here, he gave a solo recital at the University of Utah,
where he was “discovered” by some of the faculty. After being offered
a scholarship, he decided to enroll that fall while still only 16.
Now a junior with a double major in piano performance and music
composition, Hakobyan says that the U. has been a great place for
him. “I’ve had very great positive experience here, and I’ve enjoyed
my teachers very much,” he said, acknowledging both his piano
instructor, Susan Duehlmeier, and the several composition faculty
members with whom he has studied.
In fact, it was while giving a solo recital at the U. that he was
again discovered, this time by maestro Jean-Claude Casadesus, who
invited him to be one of about 10 pianists in the 2005 Lille piano
festival. “We each get to perform one concerto with the orchestra and
also one solo recital,” he said. “It’s just a very exciting event,
and it’s something I’m very much looking forward to.”
Since entering the U., Hakobyan has taken first prize in a number of
competitions — including the Pinault International
Audiotape/Videotape Piano Competition, which resulted in a debut
recital at Carnegie Hall. “(It) was very well received by the press
and also the musicians there,” Hakobyan said of the performance.
He added that the ASCAP award is also a significant achievement
because it’s one of the biggest competitions in the United States for
composition. He said they had a record number of people enter this
year — about 500– with his age division reaching up to 32 years
old.
“I would say it’s quite a nice achievement and it’s nice to be
recognized by the ASCAP competition,” he said. One of the most
valuable outcomes of the competition, he added, is the recognition
and potential for future commissions.
“Many musicians, many conductors and chamber musicians contact you
later on for performances for new pieces or commissioning new
pieces,” he said, “so it’s just a very nice opportunity.”
Already, he said, he has been contacted by several people interested
in seeing his work.
In the meantime, he’s hoping to complete a piano concerto that he’s
writing for himself and a work for string orchestra. E-mail:
[email protected]

Baku Today, Azerbaijan
June 25 2004
Azeri Official Accuses Armenian President of Lying to World
Ramiz Novruzov, head of the foreign relations department at the
Azerbaijani president’s office, on Thursday accused Armenian President
Robert Kocharian for his attempt to lie to all the world in his speech
at the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) on June
23.
During his speech, which has caused anger in Azerbaijan, Kocharian
claimed that Nagorno Karabagh has never been part of independent
Azerbaijan.
The Armenian president said that at the time of collapse of the Soviet
Union in 1991 two states were formed: the Azerbaijani Republic on the
territory of Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic and Republic of
Nagorno Karabagh on the territory of the Nagorno Karabagh Autonomous
Region.
`Establishment of both these states has similar legal grounds. The
territorial integrity of Azerbaijan, henceforth, has nothing to do
with the Republic of Nagorno Karabagh,’ claimed Kocharian.
`These are all sheer lies,’ said Novruzov. `Nagorno Karabakh is
Azerbaijan’s historical land. Armenians have been resettled in
Karabakh not long ago and they even have celebrated the 150th
anniversary of their resettlement in Karabakh by erecting a monument
there,’ he said.
The Armenian president’s statement was also rejected by Terri Devis,
the new chairman of the Council of Europe who had worked as a
rapporteur of this high European body on the Nagorno Karabakh conflict
before being elected to the position.
Asim Mollazade, a member of Azerbaijan’s delegation at the PACE said
in his interview with local media that, Davis said during his speech
at the Political Committee of the PACE on 24 June that Azerbaijan
joined the United Nations with Nagorno Karabakh being part of its
territory.
Mollazade said the CE chairman also underlined that Azerbaijan’s
territories have been occupied.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

RUSSIA: DUMA RATIFIES AGREEMENT ON CFE TREATY ADAPTATION
Interfax-AVN military news agency web site
25 Jun 04
MOSCOW
The State Duma voted 355-28 with two abstentions today to ratify the
agreement on the adaptation of the Conventional Armed Forces in Europe
(CFE) Treaty, which was signed in Istanbul in November 1999.
An explanatory note to the document says the treaty must be ratified
by all 30 signatory countries to take effect. The Adapted CFE Treaty
will significantly reduce the conventional arsenals of Europe’s most
powerful nations, as well as the United States and Canada.
“The overall number of tanks to be reduced in NATO’s 19 nations will
total 4,800, armoured personnel carriers 4,000, and artillery pieces
4,000, which is equivalent to the arsenal of nearly one dozen
motorized divisions equipped under NATO standards,” the note
reads. The treaty’s enactment will not lead to any automatic cut in
Russia’s arsenal. Under CFE Treaty requirements, Russia will be
allowed to have 6,350 tanks, 11,280 armoured personnel carriers, 6,315
artillery pieces, 3,416 combat aircraft, and 885 helicopter gunships.
The adapted CFE Treaty will allow Russia to keep its weapons and
military hardware in Armenia and Ukraine. Bilateral agreements with
Georgia will enable Russia to keep its 153 tanks, 241 armoured
personnel carriers, and 140 artillery pieces in that country.

Azeri MPs say Armenian officers’ visit “disgrace”
ANS TV, Baku
22 Jun 04

[Presenter in studio] Our parliamentary correspondent has tried to
find out the deputies’ reaction to the visit of Armenian officers.
[Correspondent] I will deliberately not talk about the draft laws
discussed in parliament today. Because while this session of the
parliament was under way, a conference comfortably attended by two
Armenian officers was in progress only 1 km away. By joining that
meeting, Armenians actually insulted the spirit of thousands of
Azerbaijanis killed while defending the country’s territorial
integrity.
Therefore, I will not waste your time by speaking about the
discussions on joining the international postal convention or on the
draft law on state secrets. As a parliamentary correspondent of the
independent republic of Azerbaijan, I personally think it is much more
interesting to watch the reaction of the Milli Maclis [parliament]
chairman to statements by a number of MPs who tried to express their
protest at the Armenian officers’ visit. He simply cut their
statements short.
[Speaker Murtuz Alasgarov shown during parliament session] We are not
discussing that. Is that clear?
[Correspondent] But it is reassuring that even though the parliament’s
assembly hall is simply a place of gossip for many, at least some
deputies did have the courage not to remain tight-lipped.
[MP Zahid Oruc, captioned] I would like to say a few words about the
two Armenians. We have to express our protest today, Murtuz muallim
[form of address]. On Friday our protests will not be worth anything.
[MP Fazail Agamali] Time is passing. It has to be done today. It
cannot be postponed until tomorrow.
[Speaker Alasgarov] Let me repeat, this concerns everyone, so please
take this into account. We will discuss the issue on Friday.
[Another MP, not captioned] Government bodies which respect themselves
should not have allowed the occupying army’s officers to come here. Of
course [interrupted].
[Alasgarov] Listen, we are not discussing this issue. Is that clear?
[MP Sabir Rustamxanli] Please don’t interrupt us. We, members of the
Azerbaijani parliament and citizens of a country at war, think that it
is a disgrace to have allowed representatives of the Armenian army,
whose hands are imbrued with Azerbaijani blood, to set foot on our
soil. This is unacceptable.
[Correspondent] The chairman of the Milli Maclis eventually had to say
his word.
[Alasgarov] They have come secretly and will leave after the first
meeting of the conference.
[Correspondent] The parliament speaker was right, they will leave. But
we will stay: elected from the occupied Qubadli and Zangilan
Districts, MP Imamverdi Ismayilov, who asks in his books whether our
lands and our houses occupied by the enemy are still there, elected
from Xocali Elman Mammadov, a representative of Cabrayil, Karam
Aliyev, and others. And us. But what has been done cannot be
undone. The Armenians have come, seen and won. Yet another time. No
matter how this is being presented to us.
Afat Telmanqizi and Azar Qarayev, ANS.

UEFA.com, Europe
June 20 2004
Henry strikes for gold
Arsenal FC striker Thierry Henry has become the first Frenchman to
win the ESM Golden Shoe award after scoring 30 goals in the 2003/04
English Premiership, a figure which gives him a total of 60 points in
the final standings.
Henry confirmed
Henry had been the favourite to pick up the award after leading the
table when most of the leagues around Europe finished at the end of
May – and his position at the top of the table was confirmed this
weekend when the Ukrainian league became the last championship of the
2003/04 European season to reach its conclusion.
Ailton in second
SV Werder Bremen striker Ailton finished second to Henry after
scoring 28 goals in the Bundesliga while Djibril Cissé grabbed third
place with 26 Ligue 1 goals for of AJ Auxerre. Both players are
changing clubs this summer, Ailton joining FC Schalke 04 and Cissé
going to Liverpool FC.
Makaay drop
Last season’s winner Roy Makaay finished seventh this time around
after moving from RC Deportivo La Coruña to FC Bayern München at the
start of the 2003/04 season while AC Milan’s Andriy Shevchenko came
highest of the Serie A contingent in fourth. Long-time leader Ara
Hakobyan, of Armenian club FC Banants who play a calendar-year
season, held on for joint ninth.
Final standings
Pos Name Club (Country) Gls Val Pts
1 Thierry Henry Arsenal FC (ENG) 30 2 60
2 Ailton SV Werder Bremen (GER) 28 2 56
3 Djibril Cissé AJ Auxerre (FRA) 26 2 52
4 Andriy Shevchenko AC Milan (ITA) 24 2 48
4 Ronaldo Real Madrid CF (ESP) 24 2 48
6 Mateja Kezman PSV Eindhoven (HOL) 31 1.5 46.5
7 Roy Makaay FC Bayern München (GER)23 2 46
7 Alberto Gilardino Parma AC (ITA) 23 2 46
9 Ara Hakobyan FC Banants (ARM) 45 1 45
9 Henrik Larsson Celtic FC (SCO) 30 1.5 45
11 Alan Shearer Newcastle Unt FC (ENG) 22 2 44
12 Luigi Pieroni Excelsior Mouscron(BEL)28 1.5 42
13 Roland Kollmann Grazer AK (AUT) 27 1.5 40.5
14 Julio Baptista Sevilla FC (ESP) 20 2 40
14 Ruud v. Nistelrooij Manchester Unt(ENG) 20 2 40
14 Martin Max FC Hansa Rostock (GER) 20 2 40
14 Francesco Totti AS Roma (ITA) 20 2 40
14 Louis Saha Fulham FC/Manchester Unt(ENG)20 2 40
19 Tor Henning Hamre FC Flora (EST) 39 1 39
20 Raúl Tamudo RCD Espanyol (ESP) 19 2 38
20 Fernando Torres Atlético de Madrid(ESP)19 2 38
20 Alexander Frei Stade Rennais FC (FRA) 19 2 38
20 Salva Málaga CF (ESP) 19 2 38
20 Javier Chevanton US Lecce (ITA) 18 2 38
20 Mista Valencia CF (ESP) 19 2 38
Last updated: 20 June 2004
Only the leading five countries (Spain, Italy, Germany, France and
England) on the UEFA Ranking have two as their multiplier. This is to
emphasise the difference in international performance level between
clubs from those countries and those from the other countries.
A player cannot first play in a summer league (eg Norway) and then in
a winter league (eg Spain) and combine the points total for each
season.

Armenian army reportedly seizes Azeri village road, residents evacuated
ANS TV, Baku
17 Jun 04
War is continuing on the contact line of the armed forces [of Armenia
and Azerbaijan]. Quoting Qazax residents [western Azerbaijan] as
saying, the Ganca bureau of ANS TV reports that the Armenian army
took control of a road leading to the village of Mazam last night.
The village has come under intensive fire. Our regional correspondent
reports that Mazam residents are being moved to safer areas. Our
correspondent Sahla Abdinova is on the scene and we are trying to
contact her.

ARAM KARAPETYAN INSULTED
A1 Plus | 17:14:09 | 16-06-2004 | Politics |
Hearing of New Times party leader Aram Karapetyan’s suit against
National Unity party chair Artaches Geghamyan and MP Alexan
Karapetyan continued on Wednesday. The suit has been filed over
libelous statements made by above-mentioned persons that damaged Aram
Karapetyan’s dignity.
The plaintiff’s attorney in the trial Levon Baghdasaryan said that
Artashes Geghamyan and Alexan Karapetyan must be charged with libeling
his client by calling him the authorities’ puppet who is dancing to
their tune and by saying his whole activity is focused on tarnishing
the opposition reputation.
The defense attorney Gagik Kostandyan objected saying the articles
published recently about Aram Karapetyan were no more than political
opinions. What has been said about Aram Karapetyan needs no proof
and the aim of this legal proceeding is obvious – to raise his rating
and to mar the opposition.
The court didn’t make any decision at its Wednesday’s session. The
date set for the next session is June 30.