Author: Kalantarian Kevo

SAMVEL BABAYAN DOES NOT EXCLUDE THAT AZERBAIJAN WILL BREAK OUT WAR AGAINST NAGORNO KARABAKH IN NEAR FUTURE

Noyan Tapan
July 22, 2009

YEREVAN, JULY 22, NOYAN TAPAN. "It is a fact that all Armenian
authorities since 1994 have been ready to cede the seven liberated
areas to Azerbaijan.

It is a different thing that Azerbaijan is not satisfied with it
and also demands proper Karabakh," former Nagorno Karabakh Minister
of Defence, hero of liberation fight of Artsakh Samvel Babayan
announced during a press conference on July 22. According to him,
it is no use speaking about compromises until the Azeri side is ready
for that. Instead, as S. Babayan added, the Azerbaijan’s government
continues to prepare for a war. Reminding that after establishment of
an armistice the Azeris have not signed any document on not beginning
any military operations up to the present he did not exclude that
Azerbaijan will attack upon Artsakh in the near future.

"However the Azeris should know that in case of the very first success
of the Armenians they will have 2-3 million refugees," he said.

Answering the question "Which is, in your opinion, the most favorable
way of the settlement of Nagorno Karabakh conflict?" S. Babayan
noted that the first step should be returning Nagorno Karabakh to
the negotiations table.

"The conflict is not between Azerbaijan and Armenia but between
Azerbaijan and Karabakh," he stressed. S. Babayan classed inadmissible
the approach that the representative of Nagorno Karabakh should be
present only at the signing of the final document.

NABUCCO NO LONGER A ‘PIPE DREAM’ FOLLOWING LANDMARK ACCORD

Georgian Business Week
July 20 2009

As governments inked their names to the Trans-Caucasus Nabucco
pipeline project last week in Turkey, Georgia’s economic sector is
looking forward to the prospect of cheaper energy which could spur
stronger investment in the country.

"We are witnessing the launch of a very significant project," Georgian
Economy Minister Lasha Zhvania told Georgian reporters. "It will give
Georgia gas at an affordable price, allowing the government to lower
consumer gas prices. So this will bring a relief to people and on
the other hand will be a good reason for foreign investors to come
and start businesses here."

The prime ministers of Austria, Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania and Turkey
signed the Intergovernmental Agreement over the Nabucco energy pipeline
on July 13. The much-anticipated project would provide Europe with
an alternative route for energy resources from the Caspian Sea region.

Turkey’s capital city played host to the event, which brought together
representatives from 30 countries, including Georgian President
Mikheil Saakashvili.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said he expects the
project will be a "success story," despite some critics dismissing
the 7.9b EUR project as "a pipe dream."

While highly important economically for the transit countries,
the 3,300km project bears mostly a political significance for the
destination point – Europe’s consumer market. That’s because the
pipeline will allow transportation of Caspian natural gas circumventing
Russia, which used gas transit as a political weapon in the past.

The pipeline would run from the Caspian Sea through Turkey to Europe’s
energy market crossing Georgia, Turkey, Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania
and Austria.

The project is supported by the European Union, seeking an ease from
the Russian energy dependence especially following this winter’s gas
war between Russia and Ukraine.

The United States has also provided strong backing based on similar
political motivations as Brussels.

"This Agreement is a significant milestone in achieving our shared
vision of opening a new energy corridor that will bring Caspian
gas to Europe," U.S. State Department spokesman Ian Kelly told
reporters. Energy security is gained through diversity – diversity of
energy sources, delivery routes and consumer markets, and the Nabucco
pipeline is an example of that diversity."

But boosters of the pipeline are mindful that Nabucco won’t be a
cure-all for Europe, which gets almost 40 percent of its natural gas
from the Russian Federation.

Nabucco promises to reduce the reliance on the Russian energy by
approximately 10 percent, which would be considered substantial
progress in Europe’s efforts to diversify its energy supply.

Laying on this important alternative energy route, Georgia expects
both political and economic benefits from participating in the
Nabucco project.

Georgia’s leaders see their country’s unique position as an energy
transit point as a way to secure political leverage when confronting
its own challenges involving breakaway regions, disputes with Russia
and its aspirations to join NATO and the EU.

The economic considerations are similarly important.

Construction of the pipeline is scheduled to start next year with
the first gas deliveries arriving in 2014. Initially the pipeline
will pump 14 billion cubic meters (bcm) of natural gas to Europe
annually. By 2020, it could carry 31 bcm of gas annually. Out of this
volume, Georgia will receive 1.6 bcm of gas per annum as a transit
country. This is 10 percent of the transported gas – 5 percent as a
transport fee and 5 percent at a discounted rate.

This amount of gas, according to Georgian Energy Minister Aleksandre
Khetaguri, can fully meet the current gas needs of the country.

The ministry’s figures show that Georgia needs a total of 1.8 bcm
of gas per year, with the largest share of 800 million cubic meters
consumed by the commercial sector.

"By 2014 we’ll possibly have increased consumption index but anyway the
gas portion [from Nabucco] will supply major part of the consumers,"
Khetaguri told Georgian journalists on July 14.

Azerbaijan is currently the chief supplier of gas for Georgia,
which receives Azeri gas via two ways. Three Azeri companies, SOCAR,
AzeriGaz, and AzeriGaz-Niegli, export Azeri gas to Georgia in addition
to the consortium that owns the Baku-Tbilisi-Erzerum and Shah-Deniz
gas pipeline.

Additionally, 10 percent of the natural gas transported to Armenia
by the Russian gas giant, Gazprom, remains in Georgia in the form of
a transit fee.

SOCAR supplies gas to the population and to power stations. The gas
distribution companies charge people 167 USD per 1,000 cubic meter
gas and 143 USD to power stations.

Nabucco was put in the international spotlight around seven years
ago. Russia’s potential resentment over the alternative gas pipeline
and low-key economic advantages largely were reasons behind the
slow progress.

The insufficient gas supply was also seen as a concern.

However, since the Russia-Ukraine gas row played a catalyst in giving
a green light to the hindered project, it has become clear that for
the global decision-makers far-reaching political considerations
have triumphed.

While Moscow reacted angrily to what it sees as a pompous signing
ceremony, Georgian government officials say Russia only has itself
to blame.

"Endless gas manipulations by Russia has forced Europe to think
twice and start this diversification venture, which has once again
underlined Georgia’s role as a strategically important transit
country," Georgian Minister for Reintegration Issues Temur Iakobashvil
said in the televised comments.

Canberra Times (Australia)
July 18, 2009 Saturday
Final Edition

Killers who flout the Hippocratic oath

‘He was a marvellous GP," said the son of one of Dr Harold Shipman’s
patients, "apart from the fact that he killed my father." Robert
M. Kaplan’s Medical Murder explores the recently named phenomenon of
"clinicide". (But I can’t help questioning the American-style middle
initial: how many Robert Kaplans can there be?)

This is a fascinating book, describing extraordinary and terrible
crimes committed by aberrant medicos. Kaplan, a forensic psychiatrist
at the University of Wollongong, exposes the terrible disparity
between the ethos and practice of medicine as we usually think of it
and these shocking stories. He focuses on several emblematic
individuals, as he acknowledges, a tiny fraction of a profession
routinely enjoying unparalleled means and opportunities to kill if
moved.

These notorious medical murderers include Dr John Bodkin Adams, who
murdered elderly (and wealthy) ladies of Eastbourne, Sussex, acquitted
of killing up to 132 patients. Despite having coincidentally accepted
bequests from several victims, he escaped conviction by law but not by
posterity.

Not so Dr Harold Shipman, Britain’s most notorious multiple murderer,
convicted in 2000 of having killed 15 elderly women over several
years, though later investigations suggested he had murdered between
250 and 450 over 20-odd years.

Kaplan’s account of Shipman’s compulsion to kill is among the most
effective (and indeed, affecting) in the book. While never conceding
the legitimacy of Shipman’s crimes he invokes pity for a person moved
by so deep an evil.

Shipman’s actions were unforgivable, but Kaplan’s skill as a
psychiatrist at least makes his behaviour explicable.

Patients regarded these homicidally driven doctors as caring and
attentive.

Other cases involved practitioners who treated patients with
indifference or even (in the case of feral Sydney neurosurgeon Harry
Bailey) brutality. Kaplan describes Bailey’s notorious "Deep Sleep"
therapy, in which he killed more than 80 patients in Chelmsford
private hospital before colleagues and authorities stopped him in the
late 1970s. Bailey caused deaths from arrogance and indifference
rather than intentional homicide, but one of the virtues of Kaplan’s
somewhat uneven survey is to at least illuminate the varieties of
medical murder, its motivations and manifestations.

Bailey’s bogus and lethal treatment saw bodies arrive at the morgue of
Hornsby Hospital for years before someone apparently a patient blew
the whistle.

Kaplan touches upon but does not make enough of how insufficient
professional and official scrutiny enabled several killers to
continue.

Months before his arrest, Harold Shipman’s auditors commended him for
his diligence in inviting them to examine his (falsified)
records. "Keep up the good work!" their report ended.

Kaplan shows how doctors, like auditors, are but human, subject to
emotions and drives like the rest of us. In discussing Turkish doctors
who participated in or even directed the Armenian genocide in the
Great War, Kaplan quotes Dr Mehmed Resid, who, shortly before he
killed himself, admitted that "My Turkishness prevailed over my
medical calling." Not that that’s any excuse.

Kaplan has a fondness for jargon and obscure philosophic reflection,
not always happily for the reader. He introduces us to the concept of
CASK "carer-assisted serial killing". Here his focus strays from the
pathological killer into more murky ethical waters. One person’s
merciful release is of course another’s mortal sin: Kaplan’s
discussion of Philip Nitschke and Jack Kevorkian’s "assisted suicide"
sit uneasily in his framework of medical murder.

But clinicide could be more common than Kaplan’s concentration on
celebrity- killers suggests. He also writes that American
investigators claimed that perhaps two-thirds of all elderly deaths in
Virginia were deliberate. Such deaths might be regarded as medical
murders, though Kaplan proves to be an unreliable pilot through the
ethical shoals of euthanasia. Some may find it morally repugnant to
assist a terminally ill sufferer to die, but such a death is surely
not murder. Kaplan is more assured dealing with aberrant psychology.

Medical Murder is an absorbing, disturbing, stimulating book. It shows
that as well as healing and helping, individual doctors have been as
ready as any to hurt and harm. Kaplan reminds us of the doctors who
willingly participated in the Nazi Holocaust, Soviet "mental
hospitals", Argentina or Greece’s dirty domestic wars, or indeed,
"our" atrocious torture camp of Guantanamo Bay.

Though idiosyncratically organised, often inexpertly written and
insufficiently edited, Medical Murder remains a fascinating book. It
is full of digressions, chronological jumps and oddities of
citation. Kaplan confuses "uninterested" with "disinterested" and
"mendicant" with "mendacious", and his editor hasn’t corrected
him. Still, the interest of this rather scrappy study is undeniable.

Regardless of its literary shortcomings, Medical Murder is an
absorbing read, even if we become wary that our doctor might want us
to say "arrghh".

Peter Stanley is a Canberra historian.

IRAN AIRLINE REP SAYS REASONS UNKNOWN FOR TEHRAN-YEREVAN PLANE CRASH

Armenia TV
July 15 2009

The reason for the crash of a TU-154 plane flying from Tehran to
Yerevan on 15 July is still not know, a representative of the Caspian
Airlines, which operates the flight, has told Armenian privately-owned
pro-government Armenia TV on 15 July

The reasons are unknown, we can say nothing officially until the
flight recorders are recovered, the unnamed representative of the
Caspian Airlines in Armenia said.

"There are no official lists yet, but the plane has crashed and the
probability of people to have remained alive is very little," he said.

"The information regarding [passengers’] citizenship is being clarified
with the help of frontier guards in Tehran. They said it would be clear
in an hour or an hour-and-a-half. There is nothing on the reasons,
nothing – no theories, no statements. We are now clarifying the lists
of who was the citizen of what country and so on," the official said.

"There were 151 adults, two children and 15 crew members on board,"
he said, adding that a headquarters had been set up in Tehran to
investigate the accident.

‘Adoration’ gives truth a sharp twist

The Detroit News (Detroit, Michigan)
Friday, July 17, 2009

By Tom Long

The line between truth and imagination grows even thinner in the
Internet age; and as the person we appear to be drifts easily away
from the person we actually may be, the temptation looms to drift
right along into the ether of possibility.

The ever-inventive Canadian writer-director Atom Egoyan ("The Sweet
Hereafter") explores this with startling results in "Adoration," a
very personal story that somehow ends up wrapped in modern concerns of
terrorism and high-tech alienation.

Simon (Devon Bostick) is re-writing the story of a terrorist couple
for his French class when he puts his own dead mother and father in
place of the actual terrorists. After his teacher, Sabine (Arsinee
Khanjian), encourages him to run with the story it becomes something
of a performance art project that the two present to the class. Except
the class members think Simon is telling the truth.

Soon enough Simon’s story has become the subject of student chat
rooms, which then branch out to include an ever-widening and more
worrisome group of Web surfers.

As his audience grows, Simon, filling holes in the life he shares with
his stressed uncle (Scott Speedman), continues to act as if the story
is real, and Sabine — who has a story of her own — realizes she has
helped create a modern media monster.

All of which could seem like sci-fi tomfoolery if Egoyan didn’t root
it in such tangible family tragedy. Everyone involved is trying to
work through the very real circumstances of a life they didn’t ask
for.

Egoyan is nothing if not low key; and as dramatic as passages are
here, he keeps the tone under control and the story believable. As he
hints at myriad endings, the film’s tension builds, but he’s not
merely messing around. He senses the possibilities, and they are scary
indeed.

Detroit News Film Critic Detroit News Film Critic [email protected]
(313) 222-8879 Read Tom Long’s blog at detnews.com/tomlongblog. For
reviews or videos, visit detnews.com/movies.

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UKRAINIAN PRESIDENT EXPRESSED HIS CONDOLENCES TO HIS ARMENIAN AND IRANIAN COLLEAGUES

/PanARMENIAN.Net/
16.07.2009 10:46 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko has expressed
his condolences to his Armenian and Iranian colleagues Serzh Sargsyan
and Mahmud Ahmadinejad in connection with the death of their citizens
in yesterday’s air crash.

"We share the grief of those who lost their loved ones. On behalf
of Ukrainian people and myself, I express my deep condolences to the
families of victims," Analitika.at.ua. reports, quoting the telegram
released by Ukrainian President’s administration.

ARMENIA’S MAIN PRINCIPALS REFLECTED IN REGULATIONS ON RESOLUTION OF NAGORNO-KARABAKH CONFLICT: DEPUTY FOREIGN MINISTER

Trend
July 14 2009
Azerbaijan

Armenia’s three main principals on resolution of the
[Armenian-Azerbaijani] Nagorno-Karabakh conflict were reflected in
published regulations, Armenian Deputy Foreign Minister Shavarsh
Kocharyan said in an interview with Novosti-Armeniya

Recently Russian President Dimitriy Medvedev, U.S President Barack
Obama and French President Nicolas Sarkozy made a statement, which
says that the version of last proposals on Nagorno-Karabakh conflict
will be presented to Baku and Yerevan.

In statement the Presidents charge their mediators to introduce
renovated version of Madrid document dated November 2007, including
the co-chairs’ last proposals on formulation of main principles to
Azerbaijan and Armenian presidents.

In addition the main principles on resolution of Nagorno-Karabakh
conflict have been publicized.

It reflects three principles put forward by Armenia, which are under
development, Kocharyan said.

According to Kocharyan, the first principle deals with status of
so-called "Nagorno-Karabakh Republic".

Kocharyan named safe land communication between Armenia and so-called
"Nagorno-Karabakh Republic" as the second main principle

And at last, the most important is the internationally strengthened
and multilayer system ensuring security of Nagorno-Karabakh’s people,
Kocharyan said.

Indeed negotiations are underway. But it does not mean that the
published document is to be signed. The work is serious enough to
require concretizing regulations, serious attention and laborious task,
he added.

The next meeting of Azerbaijan and Armenia presidents in Moscow is
regular, but it also follows a statement of presidents of the three
countries, Kocharyan added.

According to Kocharyan, the meeting will center on regulations and
make negotiations concrete in whole.

However, it is not worth to expect immediate solution of problem
following the statement of the presidents of the OSCE Minsk group
co-chairing countries, because the sides hold different stances on
many issues, Kocharyan said.

The next meeting of the Armenian and Azerbaijani Presidents Serzh
Sargsyan and Ilham Aliyev, is scheduled to be held in Moscow in
mid-July during the informal international horse races for the Russian
President’s Prize. The last meeting between Aliyev and Sargsyan was
in St. Petersburg in June.

FM: ALL THE THREE PRINCIPLES ADVANCED BY ARMENIA HAVE BEEN FIXED IN THE ISSUED MADRID PRINCIPLES

ArmInfo
2009-07-14 14:12:00

ArmInfo. The three basic principles, advanced by Armenia, have been
fixed in the issued provisions on the Karabakh conflict settlement,
deputy Foreign Minister of Armenia Shgavarsh Kocharyan said in an
interview with PTA.

‘In particular, three principles, advanced by the Armenian party,
around which we work and will keep on working, have been reflected. The
first principle concerns the status of Nagorno Karabakh, as its
status may be determined by its people only and through a referendum,
the results of which will be mandatory for everyone. An intermediate
status is stipulated before the referendum, where the NKR has also
a certain international subjectivity’, – Kocharyan emphasized.

Moreover, he emphasized the importance of assuring a reliable
overland communication between the NKR and Armenia. Kocharyan also
attached special importance to availability of an international
multi-layer system assuring the NKR population security. which all
the provisions, requiring serious approaches and a painstaking work,
should be specified>, Kocharyan resumed.

To note, the OSCE site reports that the presidents of OSCE
MG co-chair-countries made a joint statement on the Nagorno
Karabakh Conflict at the L’Aquila Summit of the Eight, July 10,
2009. The statement says that the Basic Principles reflect a
reasonable compromise based on the Helsinki Final Act principles
of Non-Use of Force, Territorial Integrity, and the Equal Rights
and Self-Determination of Peoples. The Basic Principles include, in
particular: return of the territories surrounding Nagorno- Karabakh to
Azerbaijani control; an interim status for Nagorno-Karabakh providing
guarantees for security and self-governance; a corridor linking Armenia
to Nagorno- Karabakh; future determination of the final legal status
of Nagorno-Karabakh through a legally binding expression of will;
the right of all internally displaced persons and refugees to return
to their former places of residence; and international security
guarantees that would include a peacekeeping operation.

AZERBAIJANI TOP OFFICIAL DISAGREES WITH THE U.S. ISSUING FUNDS TO NAGORNO-KARABAKH REGIME

TREND Information
10.07.09 15:12

"It is regrettable that the U.S. Congress has decided to allocate $10
million to the separatist Nagorno-Karabakh regime," said the Head of
the Azerbaijani Presidential Administration International Relations
Department, Novruz Mammadov, in his interview with the ruling New
Azerbaijan Party’s (NAP) website on July 10.

The conflict between the two South Caucasus countries began in 1988
when Armenia made territorial claims against Azerbaijan. Armenian armed
forces have occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan since 1992, including
the Nagorno-Karabakh region and 7 surrounding districts. Azerbaijan
and Armenia signed a ceasefire agreement in 1994. The co-chairs of
the OSCE Minsk Group – Russia, France, and the U.S. – are currently
holding the peace negotiations.

Novruzov said Azerbaijan has repeatedly faced such injustice. "Our
country does not see an adequate response in return for cooperation
with the West. Unfortunately, we have not seen a fair position
from the West in return for our sincere cooperation since we gained
independence. But there is a positive attitude towards Armenia. The
907th amendment is an injust decision," the head of the department
said.

Novruzov commented that it is wrong that the U.S. have allocated $10
million to the separatist regime. "If this is humanitarian aid, then
I want to note that it is necessary to give it to the people who were
left homeless, and the number of which exceeds the number of people
currently living in Nagorno-Karabakh. If the U.S. wants to prove that
they are just, they must take into account the people who have become
internally displaced persons as a result of the aggression," he said.

FASTER PARAM TO TAKE ON US SUPERCOMPUTER
Michael Gonsalves

mydigitalfc.com
Jul 09 2009 21:47 hrs IST

Pune-based Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC)
is developing the advanced high-speed Param super-computer, to be
unveiled by 2012, according to a top official.

"Over 150 top scientists are working on this project. This would be a
major achievement for India," Rajan T Joseph, director general, C-DAC,
told Financial Chronicle, on the sidelines of a conference. The new
supercomputer will have one pita flop (equivalent to 1,000 tera flops)
speed for various computing performances. Only the US has developed
such an advanced pita flop super-speed computer before.

"We will compete with the Americans in this supercomputing technol-ogy
and offer it at a cheaper rate to the world market," said scientist SP
Dixit, director of C-DAC and principal investigator of high-performance
compu-ting centre.

In 1991, C-DAC, had for the first time unveiled Param 8000
superco-mputer which had a speed of one giga flop (1,000 giga flop
is equivalent to one tera flop). While a super computer with one
giga flop performs one billion mathematical operations per second,
one pita flop super computer performs 1,000 trillion mathematical
operations per second.

Prime minister Manmo-han Singh will unveil C-DAC’s latest Param
Yuva supercomputer, with a speed of 54 tera flops, soon, according
to officials. "After 21 years of supercom-puting research (C-DAC
est.1988), and producing a series of supercomputers, the senior
scientist team built the Param Yuva supercomputer," Dixit said. It
will carry a price tag of Rs 25 crore, while the same model made in
the US is priced at Rs 50 crore, he added.

Dixit said the yet-to-be-named super speed supercomputer would cost
around Rs 500 crore. "But we are not here to make money and, therefore,
we may price it around Rs 150 crore since C-DAC’s mission is to help
in capacity building of developing countries," Dixit said.

The team is working on how to use less power, less space and make
it affordable for the world market. At present, Param Yuva super
computer uses 1 MW of power. "Logically, the high-end Param super
speed computer we are building will consume 20 MW of power. But we
are working on reducing the power consumption," said Dixit.

"Top end supercomp-uters cater to various applications in
computa-tional fluid, dynamics, weather forecasting, bio-informatics,
finite element analysis, ocean seismic modelling, material mode-lling,
national database of various kinds, e-govern-ance, telemedicine,
netw-ork applications and a host of high speed activities," said
Joseph.

C-DAC has also sold Param supercomputing clusters to Tanzania, Russia,
Armenia, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Ghana, Myan-mar, Nepal, Kazakhstan,
Uzbekistan, and Vietnam. "We have sold these Param supercomputers
with a price tag of Rs 3.74 crore to Rs 8 crore," Joseph said.