Author: Mary Lazarian

Georgia initiates economic union of Caucasus republics – Armenian report
Arminfo
2 Dec 04
YEREVAN
“At present, there are certain business relations between the
Armenian, Azerbaijani and Turkish sides, and Armenia, on its side,
agrees to consolidate these relations within the framework of an
economic organization,” Armenian Prime Minister Andranik Markaryan
told reporters after the first sitting of the Armenian-Georgian
business association in Yerevan today.
The prime minister spoke highly about the level of the
Armenian-Georgian economic relations. He particularly said that
Georgia had submitted to Armenia a list of its enterprises which could
be privatized with Armenian investments.
The establishment of a similar Georgian-Azerbaijani business
association will be the next phase to form a single Caucasian business
space, Georgian MP Beso Jugheli told the sitting. After that, Georgia
is planning to set up a tripartite Armenia-Georgia-Azerbaijan
association on the basis of the two associations.
The Georgian MP thinks that this will allow to form a single economic
space and a single consumer market with 15m residents in the
Caucasus. “This is our major dream, and business circles should be one
jump ahead of politicians,” Jugheli said.
[Passage omitted: Georgian president’s message to the sitting; other
details]
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Agency WPS
What the Papers Say. Part B (Russia)
November 26, 2004, Friday
LET’S WAIT UNTIL MONDAY
SOURCE: Vremya Novotei, November 26, 2004, pp. 1-2
by Svetlana Stepanenko, Denis Zaitsev, Alexander Tomofeyev
The situation in Ukraine remains uncertain. Even if the candidates
for president are prepared to reach a compromise, their foreign
supporters only want victory.
Vladimir Putin again congratulated Viktor Yanukovich on his victory –
he sent an official message after the official voting results were
announced. The leaders of Kazakhstan, Armenia and Uzbekistan joined
the Russian leader.
However, forces which refuse to acknowledge the validity of the
election have not given up. Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter
Balkenende, said in a telephone conversation with Ukrainian President
Leonid Kuchma that the results of the presidential election are
unacceptable. In other words, the European Union has taken the same
stand as the US, Britain, and Canada, which do not recognize the
election results.
It should be noted that all sides emphasize the necessity of settling
the situation using legal mechanisms. The Ukrainian Supreme Court has
banned the Central election commission from publishing the official
results of voting “until it considers all complaints and lawsuits.”
The Central Election Commission recently said that 49.46% of voters
supported Viktor Yanukovich in the second round of the election, and
46.61% voted for Yushchenko. However, the opposition submitted a
complaint about the decision of the Central Election Commission to
the Supreme Court yesterday.
The Supreme Court will consider the complaint on Monday. The Supreme
Court’s decision means that the winner of the election will not be
able to hold the inauguration until all complaints have been
considered, and Leonid Kuchma will remain the president of Ukraine.
Ukrainian law does not make it possible to invalidate the overall
election results. However, it is possible to invalidate the results
of voting at several electoral districts. It is not ruled out that
the Supreme Court will try not to use this measure, and advise the
Central Election Commission to consider the second round of voting as
invalid. If this happens the Central Election Commission will have to
start making preparations for another election.
Alexander Zinchenko, Yushchenko’s campaign manager, says the
opposition will only discuss the possibility of holding another
election if it’s monitored by the OSCE and international
organizations. In addition, the opposition will insist on the Central
Election Commission being replaced, the government being dismissed,
and three television debates between the candidates.
Mr. Yushchenko said that negotiations with Yanukovich can only start
if both candidates refuse to acknowledge the results of the election.
He threatened to organize a national walkout if government refuses to
make concessions. The people blockade international roads in the
Volynsk, Lviv, Kharkov, Zakarpatye, Sumsk, Ivano-Frankovsk and
Chernigovsk regions. Yushechenko said: “We show that the geography of
the opposition’s influence goes beyond the center and Western
Ukraine.”
Sergei Tigipko, Yanukovich’s campaign manager, warned: “Some people
say the opposition is seeing to create a south-eastern autonomy in
Ukraine.”
Meanwhile, Yushchenko has established a national salvation commission
and issued his first decrees. Decree No. 1 asks the people to defend
the constitutional order. Other decrees concern the creation of the
committee consisting of 30 people and an organization called “the
people’s self-defense.” The opposition asked local government bodies
to join the national rescue committee. The city councils of Boyarka,
Irpen, Vishnesoi and Borispol joined the committee yesterday.
Meetings in support of the opposition and the committee were held in
Sumy, Khrakov, Krivorozhye and Dnepropetrovsk. Deputy Economy
Minister Oleg Gaiduk resigned, saying that this is his “civic
stance.” An orange flag was raised over the building of the Ukrainian
National Bank (Yushchenko headed the bank in 1993-99).
Yushchenko acknowledged that he needs “a very substantial
international intermediary in negotiations with the government in
order to resolve the political crisis in Ukraine.” Leonid Kuchma says
Lithuania could act as such intermediary. Yushchenko’s team trusts
Poland. Polish President Alexander Kwasniewski agreed to come to Kiev
as an intermediary after lengthy telephone talks with Kuchma. He
said: “Negotiations are better than tanks on Independence Square.”
Former Polish President Lech Walensa arrived in Kiev yesterday. He
was invited by Viktor Yushchenko. He warned: “I received the Nobel
Peace Prize, and I can only use peaceful methods.” However, he did
not prove to be a neutral intermediary. At a rally in Kiev, he said:
“Your emotions and passion are needed for defending democracy! I
believe you will win!” Meanwhile, Walensa was told that Yushchenko
and Yanukovich are prepared to negotiate, and do not want to use
force.
Events in Ukraine have become a headache for Russian politicians and
an advantage for their Polish counterparts. Poland is tired of
political conflicts, the threat of dissolution of the parliament and
reshuffles in the government. The problems of its eastern neighbor
are a very good opportunity to forget about Poland’s own problems.
Polish media reports are saying that Warsaw is interested in what is
happening in Ukraine, and concerned about Ukraine’s political drift
towards Russia before the election.
Translated by Alexander Dubovoi
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

PALESTINE WITHOUT ARAFAT. IMMINENT STORM IN DESERT?
Azat Artsakh – Nagorno Karabakh Republic (NKR)
26 Nov 04
Recently the burning issue in the world has been the state of health
of Arafat who deceased on November 11. And it is natural because
for decades this man was the unchanging and well-known leader of
the Palestinian people and his death will have a great influence not
only on Palestine but also the entire Near East. The reason of this
close connection between Palestine and its leader is that Arafat was
not merely the head of autonomy but the charismatic leader of its
people. The death of such a leader usually creates a kind of vacuum
which is refilled either very slowly or never. It is especially
difficult for the countries and people who are either at war or in a
crucial stage of development. Palestine was passing through such a
stage. And because of the fact that the Palestinian problem is related
to the Arab-Israel rather than the Palestine-Israel relationships, on
the whole it has a considerable effect on the political situation in
the Near East. Today, taking into account the increasing influence of
international terrorism, it is not favourable for anyone, especially
the main figures in the region and particularly the USA. To get a
complete idea of the role of Arafat for the Palestinians, it would be
proper to cast a look at his biography. First, it should be mentioned
that there are a number of contradicting facts in his biography which,
by the way, the leader never denied or confirmed, thus creating a
mysterious myth around his name. Yassir Arafat was born on August 24,
1929 in Jerusalem, in the family of salesman Abdel Rauf who worked in
the police of the Ottoman empire in his youth. His wife Zakhva belonged
to the famous family Abu Saud in Jerusalem. The complete name of Arafat
is Muhammad Abdel Rauf Arafat al-Kudva al-Huseini. Later at college
he took the name â~@~Yassirâ~@~] which means â~@~carefreeâ~@~]. In
1933 Arafatâ~@~Ys mother died and his father, unable to bring up his
children alone, sent 4-years-old Yassir and his younger brother to
their uncle in Jerusalem. Three years later Abdel Rauf married for
the second time and brought the children back to him, where Yassir
stayed until his adolescence. His first steps into politics bear
the traces of the valley of Nile. In the years of his studies he was
close with the â~@~Brother Muslimsâ~@~] although he did not belong to
them. He was engaged in military training organized by the Islamists
in the territory of the University of Cairo. As an orthodox Muslim
he prayed 5 times a day, did not use alcohol and fasted in the holy
month of Ramadan. The â~@~brothersâ~@~] were alone to appeal to
continue jihad against Israel. Among them he met his future brothers
in arms Abu Ayad, Abu Jihad, and many others. There was one who
interested him; it was Gamal Abdel Nassir who had dethroned King
Pharuk of Egypt among the group â~@~Free Officersâ~@~] . Arafat
was also persecuted. In 1954 he was arrested for a short period.
Three years later, with the diploma of an engineer in his pocket,
Arafat left for Kuwait. Here the national liberation movement was
being born in the face of several rebels who had no munitions and
were 1200 km away from the front line. Once in the evening (in
1958) five persons gathered secretly in the capital of the emirate
and decided to start a war for the liberation of Palestine. In the
beginning they issued a newspaper â~@~Phalastinunaâ~@~] (â~@~Our
Palestineâ~@~]). A year later they named themselves â~@~Phathaâ~@~]
which means â~@~Movement for Liberation of Palestineâ~@~] and finally
they chose military names for themselves. According to the Arabian
tradition, they use the name of their elder son, but Yassir Arafat,
still a bachelor, became â~@~Abu Ammarâ~@~]. As distinct from Arabian
nationalists they did not anticipate anything from the existing regimes
which were, in their opinion, exhausted. All of them had got education
in Cairo or Beirut, at one time they believed in Islamists, had been
in prison. However, in their small group Yassir Arafat held a special
position. At the time of the disaster in 1948, unlike his friends,
he had been away from the homeland and did not know what expatriate
meant or what refugee camps were. His revolutionary romanticism
was nourished by abstract ideas about Palestine, his wish to create
an independent state was not related to a particular plot of land,
and suffering was a collective one. Many years later this devotion
made him easier in reference to making compromises in territorial
questions. On April 1, 1965 an unknown organization â~@~Al Asifaâ~@~]
(â~@~Stormâ~@~]) assumed the responsibility for the blast in the
pumping station in Israel. Arafat had chosen this name for signing
the information on the military actions. The message in handwriting
sent to the newspapers of Beirut caused surprise. Whereas, the action
that Arafat ascribed to himself had not taken place for the group
which had to put explosives had been arrested by the security bodies
of Lebanon. The bloodshed had started already. The guerillas took
action by action against the Jewish state. After the war in 1967 Arafat
left for the west bank of the river Jordan. He hid from persecution
for several months and tried to organize the local population but
soon he had to leave for the other occupied bank of Jordan. In the
capital of Jordan Amman they challenged the court every day. Arafat
strengthened by victories became the leader of the Organization for
Liberation of Palestine. The organization founded by Naser in 1964
with the hope of trying to control Palestinian nationalism avoided
the Arab influence. The radical groups, including the Peopleâ~@~Ys
Front of Liberation of Palestine announces themselves by hijacking
planes. On September 6, 1970 the air pirates hijacked three airplanes
and made them land in the northern outskirt of Amman. This event
exhausted the patience of the northern king and he decided to
return his power through force. His well-armed troops easily won and
Yassir Arafat managed to escape. The Palestinian soldiers craved for
revenge. Several members of â~@~Phathaâ~@~] who called themselves
â~@~ Black Septemberâ~@~] (in the memory of the tragic events of
September) organized terrorist actions one after another. During the
Olympic games in Munchen 1972 one of the groups attacked the Israelite
delegation; several people died. Yassir Arafat insisted that he had
no connection with this terrorist action but he was aware of the
terrorist plans of his people and for the first time he preferred to
concede the main role to others. He was a very prudent person. In
1974 Arafat who was known internationally separated himself from
terrorism. At the UN General Assembly he announced that he held the
gun in one hand and the laurel branch in the other and begged not to
let him lose the branch. Soon Arafat was banished from Jordan and
found a refuge in Lebanon where his appearance aggravated tensions
among the Maronit, Sunni, Shiite and Drooz communities. On April 13,
1975 war burst out in the country. Everyone fought, the progressives
against the conservatives, Christians against Muslims, clans against
other clans. The country was torn to parts, and bandits took the power
in severed Beirut. The leader of the Organization for Liberation
of Palestine got easily adapted to this chaotic situation. Owing
to the generous assistance of the countries of the Persian Gulf he
became the leader of one of the large companies, directed hospitals,
newspapers, factories, schoolsâ~@¦ his military and economic power
and later his diplomatic success finally started to worry Israel. On
June 6, 1952 the Israeli army attacked Lebanon. The defence minister
then Ariel Sharon secretly from his government planned destroying the
Organization for Liberation of Palestine. The siege of Beirut lasted
for 12 weeks and during this period the Israeli planes scrutinized
for the leader of Palestine, while the American diplomats negotiated
for the withdrawal of guerillas. At the end of August Arafat left
Lebanon. The president of Tunisia Habib Burgiba confessed that he was
ready to accept Arafat but alone, without his groups. The latter were
â~@~ dissolvedâ~@~] in the Arab world. The new life began outside
the homeland. In order not to lose the control over the situation
in November of 1988 he achieved the division of the Holy Land into
two parts. The aid rendered to Saddam Hussein during the war in the
Persian Gulf crushed his peacemaking efforts depriving him of the
sums paid by the large oil companies. After the defeat of Iraq the
diplomatic process was resumed and this time the conditions were
dictated by the USA. The Organization for Liberation of Palestine
on the verge of bankruptcy and isolation was formally left out of
the list of participants in the peace talks in Madrid. However, soon
Arafat managed to save the Organization and achieved the longed-for
international recognition. Soon he became the chairman of the National
Administration and was even awarded the Nobel Peace prize. In June
2000 an agreement was signed in Camp David and the Palestinians made
compromises but soon the prime minister of Israel E. Barak announced
that it is impossible to achieve peace with Arafat. Later there was
an opportunity to sign a new agreement but it was late. With Ariel
Sharon terrorist actions started and the situation became inadequate
for signing a peace agreement. Yassir Arafat remained in Ramallah and
in 2002 George Bush called him politically dead. It was the reason why
during the elections in the USA Arafat openly supported the opponent
of Bush Senator Kerry. To accelerate the leave of Arafat from politics
the USA imposed on him the prime minister Mahmud Abas who was made by
Arafat to resign however. And up to the end he remained at the head of
the political games in Palestine. Yassir Arafat died without naming his
heir. In this situation it is natural that a struggle should begin for
power in Palestine. Most experts say he will be succeeded by either
Mahmud Abas or Ahmed Kurei. Both are mature people but their Tunisian
background will hardly be respected among the common people. Pharuk
Kadumi also has serious levers of influence, who replaced Arafat
as the head of â~@~Phathaâ~@~]. Serious struggle for power is
expected in Palestine. By the way, Kadumi was among the first to
announce about this. He stated that those who think he will resign
are mistaken. And the attempt to kill Mahmud Abas during the funeral
of Arafat testifies to the fact that the open struggle has already
started even before the leader was buried. Of course, it cannot be
denied that Palestine could have changed the power in comparatively
stable and quiet conditions. And if it is the case Palestine will
prove to the world that they are ready to have their own state.
DAVIT BABAYAN. 25-11-2004
–Boundary_(ID_yd+lF6jQkagQahNF2iLHBg)–
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

US Senate OKs trade package for companies, nations
WASHINGTON, Nov 19 (Reuters) – The Senate gave final congressional
approval on Friday to legislation that eliminates tariffs on a long
list of industrial products and doles out trade benefits to Laos,
Armenia, Pakistan and Afghanistan.
The package also ends a dispute with the European Union by repealing
the 1916 Anti-Dumping Act, which Brussels had successfully challenged
at the World Trade Organization. However, the United States can still
impose anti-dumping duties on what it deems unfairly traded products
under different legislation.
At the heart of the Miscellaneous Trade and Technical Corrections Act
are tariff cuts for hundreds of chemical and industrial products not
made in the United States.
The House of Representatives has already the approved legislation
and President George W. Bush is expected to sign it.
“This bill supports American workers and factories by allowing
manufacturers to save money when they import these products,” said
Senate Finance Committee Chairman Charles Grassley, an Iowa Republican,
during floor debate.
Congress usually passes a similar bill without controversy every two
years. However, lawmakers failed to do that at the end of 2002 and
the bill has been delayed by internal Senate politics ever since then.
The bill also extends normal trade relations to Laos, one of only a
few countries that does not currently enjoy that status. The change
will reduce the average U.S. tariff on Laos products to 2.4 percent
from 45 percent currently.
Russ Feingold and Herbert Kohl, Democratic senators from Wisconsin,
strongly objected to that provision on human rights ground.
Wisconsin is home to a large number of Hmong, a Laotian ethnic group
that helped the United States during the Vietnam War and fled the
country afterward.
The bill also extends permanent normal trade relations to Armenia,
a former Soviet republic. Unlike Laos, it has had normal trade
relations with the United States on an annual renewable basis. However,
Armenia’s recent entry into the WTO requires Washington to make the
status permanent.
Another section allows Bush to waive import duties on hand-knotted
and hand-woven carpet. That provision is aimed at helping Pakistan
and Afghanistan, two allies “in the fight against global terror,”
Grassley said.
The measure also strengthens Bush’s authority to bar imports of looted
Iraqi antiquities.
Archeologists and Iraqi museum curators have bemoaned a sharp increase
in activity by tomb raiders and temple thieves in the chaos that
followed the U.S. invasion of Iraq.
11/19/04 21:42 ET
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

A charity born in the cab of a broken lorry
By Ruth Gledhill
The Times/UK
11 Ooct 04
WATCHING yet more television news footage of starving children in
some God-forsaken country, it is easy to wonder whether the world
needs another overseas aid charity.
But there are issues that pictures alone cannot convey, and one of
the best people to explain them is Baroness Cox, a tireless human
rights campaigner who has travelled 27 times to Sudan alone, defying
numerous death threats in the process.
Her new charity, the Humanitarian Aid Relief Trust, or Hart, will
concentrate on regions bypassed by the large aid providers and the
media. These would include parts of Sudan, East Timor, Burma and
Nagorno-Karabakh.
The idea for Hart came to Cox in a 32-tonne truck on a bitter winter
night in a forest in northern Poland.
The country had just been placed under martial law, and Baroness Cox
had agreed to be patron of an aid organisation, on condition that
she could travel with the aid to be certain it reached its intended
destination. Her truck broke down, and the driver went for help,
leaving her in the cab in freezing darkness. Suddenly that the words
came to her: “Share the darkness.” Since then the “Battling Baroness”,
as she is described in Andrew Boyd’s biography, has risked her life
by travelling to danger spots.
Her work in “trying to bring light to people in dark days” included
helping to set up the first professional foster-care programme for
some of the 750,000 abandoned children in Russia and a rehabilitation
centre in Nagorno-Karabakh.
The new charity, whose international director is Jayne Ozanne, a
member of the Archbishops’ Council of the Church of England, is also
committed to advocacy, alongside aid, accountability as well as the
gathering of first-hand evidence of oppression. Although Lady Cox is
a Christian, the charity does not have an overtly Christian agenda.
“Those of us originally involved in it are motivated by the Christian
mandate which is to speak for the oppressed, to try to heal the sick,
feed the hungry, clothe the naked. But the Bible does not say feed
just the Christian hungry.”
Of all the suffering places she has seen, the worst has been Sudan,
where, even before Darfur, she had “walked through miles of human
corpses, cattle corpses, burnt homes.” At the end of one visit, she
says, “I just sat under a tree and wept. It was the sheer enormity
of the carnage. It has been going on in Sudan since the coup in 1989.”
The intractable vastness of such disasters is daunting. Baroness Cox
advocates raising awareness, getting communities involved, mobilising
other and local aid organisations. “In Darfur, the media got in and
the world woke up, but this was two million too late as far as the
people of southern Sudan are concerned.”
But other tragedies in far-flung places never achieve
recognition. “There are two possible answers. One is that the Western
media will all go to one place together, such as Somalia or Bosnia. It
means oppressive regimes elsewhere can get away with murder with
impunity behind closed borders because no one is reporting what
is happening.”
Another reason that some abuses never get the attention they deserve
is that other governments can be anxious to protect their interests
in those countries. She is herself considered an enemy of some of
the countries where she has worked. A prison sentence awaits her in
Khartoum, Sudan, and there is a price on her head in Azerbaijan.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Armenianow.com
Oct 2, 2004
Outside Eye: This Week, An Insider Looks Out
By Julia Hakobyan
ArmeniaNow Reporter
This week I joined hundreds of Armenians in the long line of dreams, waiting
outside the US Embassy in Yerevan for a visa to America. The process is a
test of endurance.
Having previously taken papers, we all were invited between at 9 -9.30 a.m.
and were told to wait. Two by two, applicants disappear inside for about 20
minutes at a time. I was 15th in the line and grew weary calculating when my
turn would come.
I decided instead to indulge in eavesdropping. . .
Two people in front of me and three behind were angrily discussing the
increased price for visiting a consular service. Last year it was $50 and
now it is $100. Even if you don’t get the visa, you pay the fee.
“For what we are paying, for being rejected?,” asked one woman.
“Because here in Armenia it is anarchy,” answered one man. “And the
Americans decided: ‘Why do we have to pay $20 at the airport for leaving
their country. If so let them pay too for entering our country’.”
“They just collect money from people and give visas to a few,” said the
other man. “How do you think the Americans are building their new embassy
here? Each week they collect $20,000 from people like us and it goes to the
construction works and to the wages of embassy employees. They get at least
$1,000, and it all comes from our pockets.”
You can learn a lot about your countrymen, listening to them trying to
leave. By their words, they neither like where they are nor where they are
going . . .
They went on, accusing President Robert Kocharyan of corruption, anarchy,
poor economy in the country and in allowing Americans to take so much money.
“I would never leave Armenia if I feel protected here, if I have job. If my
president can not provide me with a job, I will go to serve another
country,” one man said.
It is a sunny September in Yerevan. The sidewalk, the walls, the pavement
and the heated words are enough for a headache.
I crossed the roped off line to stand in the shadow of a tree between the
stone barriers built by the embassy after 9/11. People watched, perhaps
enviously, but none left the line to join me. However in about five minutes
an embassy guard approached to put me back in line.
“I can’t. It’s too sunny there,” I told him.
“Please go back,” he repeated, politely, but firmly. “You can’t wait here”
“Did I do something illegal,” I asked, jokingly. “I want to wait here and I
see no problem.”
“You hinder the way of passersby,” the guard said. “See everyone stands,
even old people. Please sister- jan go back, otherwise I will be in
trouble.”
Of course I was not obstructing pedestrians, but his last argument persuaded
me.
I returned to the line to find global issues on the talk agenda.
One man predicted an imminent energy crisis in the US.
“Soon Americans will not fuel their cars because it will be too expensive
for them,” the man said. “And they will be deprived of electricity and gas.”
“If it is so, then why are you going there?” a woman asked.
“I go to see my grandsons, whom I’ve never seen,” the man replied. He then
told that his two sons are not US citizens and could not send him an
invitation.
In an hour of listening I realized that I was probably the only one in the
line who had an official invitation from a US entity (for a Duke University
media fellowship) – the only one in that hot line who had reasonable hope.
And I guess that for most people the visa was a one way ticket. For a group
of people I saw, mostly middle-age and old the visa stamp was the most
desirable thing they could wish for.
But what impressed me most was the people’s sympathy towards each others,
their uniting around the common aim. The frankness of Armenians reach its
apex in the visa line. Or so it was that day I was watching people’s true
stories about their life in Armenia and purposes in US. People were so
easily sharing their secrets of their true intentions in US as if we were at
a private party.
A woman of about 40 with emaciated face was telling people around that she
is going to get a job in the US but she would tell the embassy interviewer
that she goes to the US to visit her god mother. The woman had no paper, no
invitation and no idea how she would get a job in the US. The only thing she
knew was that she has to leave Armenia to get a job in America, because no
one of her five family members has a job here.
“If I get a visa we will sell a car to cover the ticket cost,” the woman
said. “And I will not be back for at least five years.”
I tried to persuade her that it is not so easy to get a job and warned her
that she could become a victim of cheaters. But she replied that her friend
left last year and now is a housemaid at one of the hotels in Utah. She too
wanted to be a housemaid. I asked her if she is ready for this job, why she
does not try to find a similar job here.
“I can’t do this job here. My relatives will know about it and I will feel
uncomfortable. If I go to the US I will tell them that I work as a
babysitter.”
In 20 minutes the woman told me the story of her life, about her husband, of
her uneasy relations with her mother-in-law.
I was trying to follow her logic, logic of a tired and unprotected Armenian
woman, who told me her secret only because I was a stranger. I asked her if
she is not concerned that one of the people in line is an employee of the US
embassy who learned about her true purposes. As soon as I said that, others
in the line joined our discussion, saying that no matter why you go to US,
if they (interviewers) decide to give you a visa they do not care why you
are going to their country.
In that line I learned that all the US consular employees are psychic, and
no matter what papers you have, they look at you and make a decision.
Face-control, in other words. I also heard that the most severe consular
agent is a bald American of middle age who rejects everybody.
“There are three windows in the consular room, try to approach the windows
with two young Americans, they give visas,” said one old woman, whose sister
was rejected last month by the bald American.
People in line were generously giving advice on how to behave to get a visa.
The one I liked most was from a woman who was going on her second trip to
visit her daughter.
“Whatever you are asked, you have to tell ‘no’,” the woman said. “Do you
have relatives in US? Say ‘No’. Do you intend to stay in the US? ‘No’. I did
so last time and got a visa.”
Finally my turn came. I got the bald guy.
He went through my papers for five minutes without saying a word. Then he
started asking questions. Turns out that all my answers, in fact, were “No”.
“Do you need a translator,” he asked in Russian. “No,” I replied. “Do you
intend to study or work in the US?” “No.” “Did someone else fill out your
application?” “No.”
I was the last to leave the US embassy that day. The guards asked me the
results, then sincerely congratulated me.
There were some people outside who were rejected but stayed near the
building as if it could help them. One woman was crying, men were smoking.
They all looked very depressed.
I was looking for the woman who indented to go to the US for work, but I did
not see her. I hope that she is aware of human trafficking. And I want to
hope that whatever she does she will not be involved in a bigger trouble.
I looked at them all – at people whose life turned in a way they could never
expect. At people whose children, though safe in the US, can not see their
parents. At people who know the US life only from movies and want to go
there to be in the country where dreams come true. For some.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

World postal body deems Karabakh stamps illegal – Azeri official
Turan news agency
23 Sep 04
Baku
Since the so-called “Nagornyy Karabakh Republic” has printed postage
stamps, Azerbaijan’s permanent mission to the UN and other
international organizations in Geneva has appealed to the Universal
Postal Union (UPU), Matin Mirza, head of the Foreign Ministry press
service, told a briefing today.
He said that the UPU, which includes 190 states, has sent a circular
to all the member countries of this organization, saying that it is
inadmissible to print postage stamps for illegal entities such as the
“Nagornyy Karabakh Republic”.
Apart from that, a statement by the Azerbaijani side about the
illegality of printing postage stamps for the Karabakh separatists was
read out at the 23rd congress of the UPU in Bucharest.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Azeri MPs happy about cancellation of NATO war games
Turan news agency
14 Sep 04
Baku, 14 September: The cancellation of NATO’s Cooperative Best
Effort 2004 exercises in Azerbaijan was discussed at the Milli Maclis
[parliament] session today.
MP Ibrahim Isayev was the first to speak on the issue. He expressed
his regret at the fact that NATO was led by the nose by the Armenians
and had cancelled the exercises in Baku.
“At the same time, we have succeeded in barring Armenians from Baku,
so let me congratulate you on that,” the MP said.
Qudrat Hasanquliyev, chairman of the United People’s Front of
Azerbaijan Party, described what happened as a “major achievement”.
“Our people have shown their unity,” he said with satisfaction.
Hasanquliyev called on everyone to be “on alert” to the people and
companies maintaining “contacts” with Armenia, saying that such
cooperation was unacceptable.
At the same time, MP Musa Musayev expressed his doubt that the
disruption of the NATO exercises was a positive achievement. He
recalled that a great deal of effort was taken by Azerbaijan to become
an associated member of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly. If Azerbaijan
is aspiring to a negotiated solution to the Karabakh problem, it has
to cooperate with NATO, Musayev said.
Parliament Speaker Murtuz Alasgarov said summing up the debate that
in some sense the NATO decision was an answer to the Azerbaijani
parliament’s address.
“We protested at the visit of those who have occupied our lands and
shed the blood of our people, and we have achieved our goal,” he said.
[Passage to end omitted: parliament session’s agenda]
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Interfax
Aug 24 2004
Armenia wants Equatorial Guinea to release its pilots
Yerevan. (Interfax) – Armenia is working hard to convince the
authorities of Equatorial Guinea to release six Armenian pilots who
were detained earlier this year, Foreign Minister Vardan Oskanian
told journalists on Monday.
“I would not like to offer optimistic forecasts, but Armenia is doing
everything possible in this direction,” Oskanian said.
An Armenian delegation has left for a third visit to Equatorial
Guinea for talks, he said.
The pilots, who arrived in Equatorial Guinea’s capital of Malabo in
January 2004, were engaged in delivering cargoes on an Armenian
carrier’s An-12 aircraft under an agreement with German contractors.
They were arrested on March 7.
The pilots have been charged with organizing a coup, serving as
mercenaries and espionage. The accused men have denied the charges.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

POLYCLINIC OF WRITERS’ UNION OF ARMENIA TO BE LEFT TO WRITERS,
MINISTER OF CULTURE ASSURES
YEREVAN, August 4 (Noyan Tapan). “I can distinctly say that the
polyclinic of the Writers’ Union of Armenia will be left to the
writers, a no one has the right of taking back the polyclinic that has
belonged to the writers years running.” Hovik Hoveyan, the Minister of
Culture and Youth Affairs, declared this at the August 3 press
conference touching upon the July 16 decision of the Appeal Court. To
recap, upon this decision the Appeal Court invalidated the decision of
the court of first instance of the Arabkir and Kanaker-Zeytun Yerevan
communities. The latter invalidated the decision of the Council of
Elders of the Arabkir community about alienating the territory in
Kasian 3 address where the polyclinic of the Writers’ Union of Armenia
was situated to citizen Sergey Meliksetian. H.Hoveyan as a member and
the former secretary of the Writers’ Union of Armenia mentioned that
they won’t give their polyclinic to anybody. According to the
Minister, “our judicial system hasn’t been formed and, naturally, they
can’t make a right decision.”
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress