Author: Toganian Liana

RUSSIANS ARE INTERESTED IN THE ENERGY FIELD OF KARABAKH

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[02:27 pm] 06 December, 2006

The tendency of selling certain substructures of Armenia to Russia
is passing on to Karabakh. At least this is what high-ranked people
speak of.

In order to get details KarabakhOpen turned to the NKR Minister of
regional government Armo Tsaturyan. The latter stated that there are
Russian companies which investigate the energy field of Karabakh in
order to make investments for the development of mini hydroelectric
power stations, as Karabakh was interested in carrying out negotiations
in this connection.

The experts say that the area is suitable for constructing
hydroelectric stations which can produce large amounts of energy. "But
at present there are no clear-cut offers", the Minister mentioned.

Asked the question if they are ready to discuss offers if there
are any, Mr. Tsaturyan said, "It depends on the offer itself. It is
meaningless to discuss what does not exist yet".

AVAILABILITY OF FINANCES AND ABSENCE OF IDEOLOGIES ALARMS ARMENIAN DEPUTIES

ArmInfo News Agency, Armenia
Nov 29 2006

The coming Parliamentary elections in the Republic will be marked by
a struggle of financial interests of the Republican party of Armenia
and the "Prosperous Armenia" party, RA Parliamentarian, the leader
of the National-Democratic party, Shavarsh Kocharyan, said at today’s
press-conference in "Mirror" discussion club.

Ho noted a complete absence of ideological struggle of "two competitive
groups" depresses him. "The society still cannot understand what is
the difference between the two party programs.

Whether it may indicate an absence of both the programs and an
ideology in whole? I think yes", S. Kocharyan said. He also noted a
premature start of pre-election race by the "ruling camp". "I could
hope the situation will cardinally change with time. However, it seems
unlikely, taking into account that all the changes must happen inside
the political parties", S. Kocharyan said. He expressed hope that the
Armenian community will be able to properly orient itself before the
elections. "Unfortunately, we continuously become witnesses of the
struggle of illiteracy with injustice. That is the tragedy of our
people", NDP leader said.

The deputy from the Republican party of Armenia, Heghine Naghdalyan,
who participated in the discussion, also agreed that the election
campaign is carried out by "wild methods". She also noted that the
absence of ideology is typical to nearly all the parties of the
country. "Only when our parties have a firm ideological basement, we
shall stop to talk about the "fight of interests of separate groups",
she said.

IRAN BANS WOMAN WRITER`S BESTSELLER

Zee News, India
Nov 28 2006

Tehran, Nov 27: Iran’s conservative cultural body has banned a female
writer’s award-winning bestseller, which deals with a married woman’s
secret and unrequited love for another man, a press report said
on Monday.

"The Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance has prohibited
publication of ‘I will turn out the lights’ by Zoya Pirzad," the
Kargozaran paper quoted publisher Alireza Ramezani as saying.

"We have not been informed of the reasons for the ban," he said,
adding the vetting officials had refused to renew the publication
permit for the book, which has sold more than 200,000 copies in 23
editions since 2001.

Pirzad’s novel, which has bagged four prestigious literary awards in
Iran, tells the story of a bored Armenian housewife who falls in love
with a melancholic widower in early 1960s in the oil-city of Abadan.

Production of music, films and books is subject to supervision by the
Ministry of Culture, which has introduced a new initiative requiring
publishers to renew permits for new editions of the same book.

The Ministry has held up the publication of hundreds of new titles
and reprints over the past months, publishers say.

Among the books banned are Persian translations of Tracy Chevalier’s
bestseller "girl with a pearl earring", which had reached a sixth
edition, and Dan Brown’s "The Da Vinci Code".

Widely-acclaimed Iranian classic, the "Blind Owl", written in 1930s
by Sadegh Hedayat has also been banned.

Iranian press and publication enjoyed some freedom under the reformist
presidency of Mohammad Khatami from 1997 to 2005, with scores of
women joining the Iranian literati and sweeping awards.

EU-TURKEY TALKS ON CYPRUS FAILED

PanARMENIAN.Net
27.11.2006 16:11 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Discussions between the European Union and Turkey
on the Cyprus question have failed.

"This morning I first met with Cypriot Foreign Minister Giorgios
Lillikas and then I spoke with Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah
Gul. Unfortunately we have come to the conclusion that the
preconditions for achieving an agreement do not exist at this stage
during the Finnish EU Presidency", said Finnish Foreign Minister
Erkki Tuomioja, reports CNN-Turk.

The EU has called on Turkey to open its harbors and airports to Greek
Cypriot vessels and planes by December the 6th. In return, the EU has
said that Turkish-occupied North Cyprus could be allowed to trade
directly with the EU. Turkey could face at least some obstacles in
its membership talks with the EU if it rejects the demands. However,
Gul says that he does not believe that there would be any break or
slowdown in the talks. "The Cyprus question is political, and it
should not poison our negotiation process. It is not a part of the
negotiation process", Gul said.

New Zealand Herald, New Zealand
Nov 26 2006

New film pokes the Borat

Sunday November 26, 2006
By Peter Calder

The Russian Club, around the back of a restaurant in Newmarket,
Auckland, is the kind of place Borat Sagdiyev would be very much at
home. Lurid light bounces off a mirror ball and plays on the couches
and curtains.

On the dance floor, a tall, moustachioed man could very easily make a
fool of himself by disco-jiving extravagantly in a too-small,
blue-grey suit.

Borat might be welcome at the club, where immigrants from the
countries of the former Soviet Union gather and converse in Russian.
But Borat’s alter-ego and creator, English comedian Sacha Baron
Cohen, would surely have a bit of explaining to do.

His film, Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit
Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan, which opened in theatres this week,
has launched the gangly television character’s big-screen career. But
it has offended at least some of the more than 16 million natives of
Kazakhstan, the massive central Asian republic that the title
character ostensibly hails from.

Borat – a cringe-inducing mixture of racism, sexism, homophobia and
social ineptitude – is intended as a parody, of course, and also as a
sort of comic guerrilla who tricks his targets into revealing the
hideous attributes he pretends to embody. But not everybody’s
laughing.

The Kazakh Government went so far as to take out advertisements in
the New York Times condemning Borat as "a concoction of bad taste and
ill manners which is incompatible with the ethics and civilised
behaviour of Kazakhstan’s people".

In the Russian club, over glasses of robust Georgian red wine, Andrei
Goubarev and Vadim Novikov tell me they actually found the film quite
funny. They liked the naked wrestling scene – surely the most
appalling moment in a film full of them – and Goubarev assures me
Kazakhs are very good wrestlers. The bits where Borat gets stuck into
mothers-in-law and feminists particularly tickled them.

Goubarev, 27, and Novikov, 31, regard Kazakhstan as home. Even though
they are ethnically Russian, they grew up in the world’s
ninth-biggest country that stretches across all of Central Asia.
"It’s our motherland," says Novikov.

They reckon the only truly offensive moments in the film come near
the beginning, when Borat ridicules his mother and kisses a young
woman called Natalya before introducing her as his sister and "number
four prostitute in all of Kazakhstan".

"Saying his sister is a prostitute," he says, "in any nation you
would find this really offensive."

I suggest to him that most New Zealanders would regard bestiality as
pretty poor form but never get offended when Australians make cracks
about sheep-shagging.

"Well, maybe it is because Kazakhstan is a mainly Muslim culture and
respect for mothers and sisters is stronger than in other cultures,"
says Novikov.

Cohen has said that he made Borat Kazakh "because it was a country no
one had heard anything about, so we could essentially play on
stereotypes they might have. The joke is not on Kazakhstan. The joke
is on people who can think that the Kazakhstan I describe can exist."

Goubarev and Novikov take the point, noting that the country depicted
in the film’s opening scenes looks nothing like theirs (it was shot
in Romania) and none of the characters speaks Kazakh: Borat’s
greeting is in Croatian, he speaks in snatches of Polish, Hebrew and
Yiddish and his offsider Azamat speaks in Armenan.

"But why choose Kazakhstan?" Novikov asks. "Why didn’t he make it
about a non-existent country and call it Berbistan or something like
that."

He detects a geopolitical conspiracy here because Kazakhstan has
stood shoulder-to-shoulder with Russia against George W Bush. But
since the film’s most obvious target is actually America, that’s hard
to argue.

The pair happily offer assurances that Kazakh cars aren’t horse-drawn
like Borat’s. "You can find more Mercs there than in Auckland,"
Goubarev says. And no, he says, he is not in the habit of giving his
sister deep tongue kisses. "I kiss her as my sister," he says.
"That’s it."

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YOUNG MAN KILLED IN GAVAR
[04:15 pm] 24 November, 2006

On November 23 the Gavar department of the Police
received information from the hospital that the dead
body of Hrachik Hoveyan (b. 1976) has been taken to
hospital.

Hoveyan’s wife told the group of policemen that at
about 09:50 p.m. the same day several strangers called
him out. A few minutes later she heard shots and went
out to find her husband with head injuries.

The case is being investigated by the Prosecutor’s
Office of Gegharqounik region.

ARMENIA RUMINATES OVER MEMBERSHIP
By Ara Tadevosian in Yerevan

Institute for War and Peace Reporting, UK
Nov 23 2006

Yerevan seeks to build better relations with Brussels, while not
offending Moscow.

Political leaders in Abkhazia view the prospect of Georgia entering
NATO with deep anxiety, with government officials saying such a move
would be a grave threat to their own hopes of achieving independence,
and warning that it could spur them to move even closer to Russia.

"Above all, we see ourselves as a country allied with Russia," said
Sergei Shamba, foreign minister of the unrecognised republic. "It’s
well known that NATO expansion in our region runs counter to Russia’s
interests.

"If Georgia joins the North Atlantic Alliance, recognition of Abkhaz
independence will become more difficult since the kind of support
Georgia will get from NATO members will be of a different order;
it will carry more weight."

Abkhaz officials say that in such an eventuality they would be
forced to take counter-measures, which many believe would mean closer
integration with the Russia state.

"We need to agree a legal format for the relationship between
Abkhazia and Russia before this decision [Georgian membership of
NATO] is taken," said Astamur Tania, one of the leaders of the Abkhaz
opposition. "The [Abkhaz] parliament recently passed a resolution
on the matter, describing it as an ‘associate relationship’ between
Abkhazia and Russia."

Tania was formerly a political advisor to Abkhazia’s first president
Vladislav Ardzinba, under whose leadership the concept of an
"association" with Moscow first took shape.

Tania was critical of Tbilisi’s "intensified dialogue" with NATO,
saying, "This has made Georgia think that its foreign policy enjoys the
full backing of NATO members. There is another factor to be considered:
with NATO support, Georgia will upgrade its armed forces, and there’s
no guarantee that these units won’t be used against Abkhazia or
South Ossetia."

Citing the case of Kosovo, which many believe will be granted
independence next year without the consent of its former parent state,
Serbia, Tania expressed fears that Georgia would try to preempt that
decision by ensuring that its claims to Abkhazia and South Ossetia
were resolved in its favour beforehand. He warned that in the case
of Abkhazia, "there’s a great danger that the resolution [sought by
Georgia] will be a military one".

"Georgia is in a hurry to speed up its admission to NATO," said Natella
Akaba, a former member of Abkhazia’s parliament. "Tbilisi is clearly
worried that the mechanism that will lead to recognition for Kosovo
has been activated. The Georgian authorities are well aware that once
Kosovo is recognised, attitudes towards other unrecognised states
will change drastically, and Abkhazia’s chances [of full independence]
will dramatically increase."

The authorities in Sukhum maintain that for them, international
recognition is not contingent on the outcome in Kosovo, since they
argue that Abkhazia has a stronger legal and historical claim to
sovereignty. But they are keeping a close eye on developments in the
Balkans, and the possible response from Tbilisi.

Stanislav Lakoba, secretary of Abkhazia’s Security Council, says he
does not expect Georgia to begin the procedure of joining NATO until
2008 at the earliest.

Tamaz Ketsba, director of the non-government group Civil Society-Man of
the Future, argued that Georgia was facing a "problem of time" with the
prospect of recognition for Kosovo set against its own NATO ambitions.

This, he warned, might force the Georgian to seize the initiative
through military action. "Georgia might be given an easy ride and
admitted to the alliance despite its unresolved conflicts, but once
that happens, NATO members… are unlikely to give their assent to a
military operation in Abkhazia or South Ossetia," said Ketsba. "Given
Russia’s political interests in the region, there will be no green
light for any military operation."

To ward off a possible Georgian offensive, the Abkhaz army has been
conducting military exercises almost every month, involving both
regular units and reservists, most of them veterans of the 1992-93 war.

"It’s all a matter of motivation," said Deputy Defence Minister Merab
Kishmaria. "Unlike the Georgians, we have nowhere to retreat to – the
Abkhaz have no other homeland than this. I assure you that despite
our limited resources, we won’t give in to the Georgians. All the
more so since we have experienced a victorious war with Georgia –
that gives us heart, and could demoralise the enemy."

Akaba was the only Abkhaz commentator interviewed by IWPR who took
the view that Sukhum could live with Georgia’s accession to NATO.

"If NATO takes a decision based on principle to admit Georgia without
Abkhazia and South Ossetia, it could have a stabilising effect in
the region," she said. "But NATO is unlikely to make such a move."

Inal Khashig is editor of Chegemskaya Pravda newspaper in Abkhazia
and co-editor of Panorama, IWPR’s Caucasian newspaper.

REPUBLICAN PARTY WILL HAVE PEOPLE RISE

Lragir, Armenia
Nov 22 2006

"Karabakh underlay all our political arrangements and our opinion
has not changed so far. I think it is not expedient and I would like
to call the political sphere not to manipulate Karabakh," stated the
leader of the Republican Faction Galust Sahakyan November 22. With
regard to the approach of the Republican Party towards the settlement
of the Karabakh conflict, Galust Sahakyan told the news reporters that
the Republican has stated its standpoint and did not deny it. As for
returning territories, Galust Sahakyan says he can say that they are
not going to return the territories but they are going to liberate
West Armenia.

"But the reality is different. First there must be negotiations. Our
stance is first the status of Karabakh, then the talks. At that time
everyone will have a problem to decide and I cannot be responsible for
everyone, at least, we will tend to create more favorable conditions
for getting people to rise and solve the problem," Galust Sahakyan
stated.

According to him, the current statements on the return of territories
are mere rumors. "In fact, people are trying to invent something
to criticize, and then to battle against this invention. Moreover,
it is my personal opinion, I have stated it for several times, I
do not consider the settlement of the Karabakh conflict possible in
the upcoming years, certain approaches may emerge or certain results
may be reported, but the final settlement will be in 2012, I think,"
said the leader of the Republicans in the National Assembly.

UNITED JAVAKHK CONDEMNS PASSIVE POSTURE OF ARMENIAN MEDIA IN ISSUE OF COVERING POLITICAL PROBLEMS IN JAVAKHK

Noyan Tapan News Agency, Armenia
Nov 21 2006

AKHALKALAK, NOVEMBER 21, NOYAN TAPAN – ARMENIANS TODAY. The "United
Javakhk" democratic alliance condemns the passive and scared posture of
Armenian mass media in the issue of covering the political problems
preceeding in Javakhk. This is said in the November 20 statement
spread by the alliance. The statement authors demand "to display civil
resoluteness, throw down the timidity unworthy for a journalist and
display boldness in the sphere of informing the society about the
struggle for the rights of Armenians of Javakhk and securing Armenians
of the region."

The demonstration of protest of the Armenians of Javakhk at the RA
Bavra border post on November 20 was actively covered by Georgian and
Russian TV companies, and "United Javakhk" characterized absence of
Armenian TV companies and other media as "an exclusive, unpardonable
and intolerable disgrace."

The "United Javakhk" democratic alliance also informs that today
at the Armenian-Georgian interstate border "about 100-person police
detachment of special meaning armed with self-firings is placed at
the Georgian authories’ command to implement demonstrative control of
the demonstration participants." The alliance condemns the Georgian
authorities’ "policy having no prospects to frighten the Armenians
of Javakhk with the means of threat of using fire-arms and mass
prosecutions and forewarn of possible negative consequences," is said
in the statement.

NEW SECURITY ROLE EMERGES FOR BLACK SEA REGION

SETimes
mes/xhtml/en_GB/features/setimes/features/
2006/11 /08/feature-03

Since 1991, the Black Sea has undergone a dramatic transformation. Once
embedded within the communist world, it has now become a key point
of intersection with considerable geopolitical significance.

Analysis by Paul Ciocoiu for Southeast European Times in Bucharest
– 08/11/06

International Black Sea Action Day was marked on October 31st by
Bulgaria, Georgia, Romania, Russia, Turkey, and Ukraine. The annual
event, launched ten years ago, seeks to promote co-operation among
the six countries in addressing environmental issues in the area.

The occasion also provided an opportunity to reflect on the profound
changes that have taken place in the region. Until 1991, all the
Black Sea states except Turkey were in Moscow’s sphere of influence.

They were either members of the Soviet Union or belonged to the
Warsaw Pact. Today, the Soviet Union no longer exists and the 44-year
bipolar world order can be found only in the history books. Bulgaria
and Romania have not only entered NATO, joining Turkey there, but
are on the threshold of EU membership.

The Black Sea is located at the crossroads of three security spaces —
European, Euro-Asian and Islamic. Its new strategic configuration
became evident as far back as the early 1990s, when the first
pipeline projects for transporting energy from East to West were
mapped out. Crisis intervened, however, in the form of conflicts in
the former Yugoslavia and conflicts afflicting parts of the Caucasus —
Transdniestr, South Osethia, Abkhazia and Nagorno Karabakh.

The terrorist attacks of September 11th, 2001 spurred the West to
rethink its perspective towards the Black Sea. NATO’s long-term
involvement in Afghanistan, the possibility of taking over some
operations in Iraq, and the global war on terrorism in general shed
a different light on the region.

Romania and Bulgaria’s admission into NATO in 2004, along with Georgia
and Ukraine’s pro-Western course, took the area out of Europe’s
periphery. Leaders in Bucharest and Sofia opted both for the European
integration and a pro-US and NATO-oriented strategic stance.

Many analysts attribute this to a longstanding preoccupation in the
two Balkan states with not falling prey to a continental hegemony,
preferring a remoter great power.

According to Romanian President Traian Basescu, partnership with the
United States is based on two elements: a US military presence in
the form of bases, and the internationalisation of problems peculiar
to this area. Romania supports the democratic process in the region
and gives direct assistance to states in transition. It has a key
role in ensuring regional security and stability, and Euro-Atlantic
integration allows it to do so more fully.

On October 31st 1996, the six coastal states signed the Black Sea
Strategic Action Plan for the Rehabilitation and Protection of the
Black Sea, giving regional co-operation an environmental dimension.

The Action Plan acknowledges that collective action is required from
all Black Sea countries to reduce the impact of pollution on the Black
Sea ecosystem, and to ensure a better life for the 16 million people
living in the area.

Influenced by political and military events, the Black Sea has become
transformed into a complicated intersection of geopolitical and
geo-economic boundaries, becoming also a framework within which the
Euro-Atlantic community asserts itself. At no other frontier of NATO
are the stakes as high when it comes to guaranteeing stability and
peace. As before in history, the Black Sea is becoming once again
a zone where opposites meet, overcome segregation and conflict,
and work towards reconciliation.