Author: Torgomian Varazdat

ArmenPress
July 19 2004
NUMBER OF MARRIAGES AND DIVORCES GROW
YEREVAN, JULY 19, ARMENPRESS: An estimated 8,245 marriages were
performed in the first half of 2004 against 7,101 of the same period
of time last year. The marriage growth rate made 1,144. According to
a special department of the justice ministry, registering marriages,
5,601 marriages were performed in the regions and 2,644 marriages in
the capital city of Yerevan.
Also 1,042 divorces were granted in the same time, out of which
543 in Yerevan and 499 in regions. In the first six months of 2003
951 divorces were granted.

Agence France Presse
July 16 2004
Azerbaijan Investigates Officer’s Disappearance
AFP: 7/16/2004
BAKU, July 9 (AFP) – Azerbaijan’s defence ministry said on Friday it
was looking into the whereabouts of one of its senior officers, who
was reported to have applied for political asylum while studying on a
NATO course in Belgium.
Unconfirmed reports in the local media say that Lieutenant Colonel
Firuz Gassymov went absent without leave from his course in Brussels
and approached an unnamed foreign embassy to ask for asylum.
Defence ministry spokesman Ramiz Melikov declined to confirm the
reports but said: “Things are unclear at the moment. We are
conducting an investigation.”
If the reports are confirmed, it will be a serious embarassment for
Azerbaijan, an oil-rich former Soviet republic which prides itself on
the strength of its armed forces.
But it is not the first time that the military has created awkward
moments for the country’s leaders.
Last year, almost the entire student faculty at Azerbaijan’s most
prestigious military academy went absent without leave in protest at
their living conditions.
And earlier this year, an Azeri officer on a NATO course in Hungary
was charged with murder after an Armenian officer studying alongside
him was hacked to death with an axe as he slept.
The Azeri officer is now in jail in Budapest awaiting trial.
Azerbaijan and Armenia fought a war in the early 1990s over the
territory of Nagorno-Karabakh, a dispute which is still unresolved.

ITAR-TASS News Agency
TASS
July 13, 2004 Tuesday
Russia, Armenia sign agreement on cooperation in education
By Andrei Lavrov
MOSCOW
Russia and Armenia signed an agreement on cooperation in public
education. The Russian and Armenian ministers of public education and
science signed the documents in the presence of the prime ministers
of the two countries.
Armenian premier Andranik Margaryan said that “the Russian language
has a high status in the republic”. He emphasized that Armenia trains
Russian language teachers for schools.
In turn, premier Mikhail Fradkov noted that Russia handed over 55,000
Russian language textbooks to Armenia last year. “This is an
important sphere of cooperation,” said Fradkov, stressing that
Armenia has 65 schools with extensive studies of the Russian
language, while 50 schools have classes with extensive studies of the
Russian language.
Another Tass dispatch says that following a meeting with Margaryan,
the Russian premier said that the first meeting of the
Russian-Armenian intergovernmental commission on military cooperation
will be held in September-October.
“We have a positive experience of cooperation in this sphere,”
Fradkov added. As an example he instanced training of Armenian
military personnel at higher educational establishments of the
Defence Ministry.
According to Fradkov, bilateral military cooperation “will be
oriented on updating military hardware, supplied to the Armenian army
earlier,” as well as at prolonging its service life.

La Nouvelle République du Centre Ouest
12 juillet 2004
Petits échos… kiltés
Aux spectateurs de vendredi
La direction des fêtes Franco Écossaise d’Aubigny propose aux
spectateurs qui n’ont pu voir la totalité du spectacle donné vendredi
9 juillet à cause des intempéries, d’assister gratuitement à la
représentation du vendredi 16 juillet. Retirer de nouveaux billets
auprès du Seta, en mairie, au 02.48.81.50.07.
Personnalités
Le spectacle de samedi soir a affiché complet. Parmi les spectateurs
présents, Anne Merloz, préfète du Cher, Philippe Levesque, sous
préfet de Vierzon, Georges Ginoux, sénateur-maire du Cher mais aussi
Jacques Genton, ancien sénateur, Thierry de Montbel, conseiller
général d’Argent, (Michel Autissier, conseiller général d’Aubigny est
venu, lui, vendredi), Maxime Camuzat, vice-président du conseil
général ainsi que de nombreux maire et élus du Cher Nord.
Coups de chapeaux
Un coup de chapeau à la troupe d’acteurs bénévoles de l’association
des Fêtes Franco Écossaise qui a mis beaucoup d’ardeur mais aussi de
professionnalisme à jouer le spectacle, vendredi soir, sous la pluie.
Une mention spéciale pour Laurence Régnier, attachée parlementaire
d’Yves Fromion, alias Quentin le fantôme. Elle a bien joué son rôle
d’autant qu’il demandait de bonnes conditions physiques, descendant
d’une échelle de corde de la tour puis évoluant en l’air, sanglée à
des ingéniosités techniques des services techniques de la ville.
L’ingénierie municipale mérite également un coup de chapeau.
Groupes
Les spectateurs ont eu l’occasion d’apprécier de très beaux groupes
comme Les Lions de Shanghaï venus de Belgique, le groupe folklorique
Sasun d’Arménie, le groupe africain Moudoumango ou encore la troupe
du Far West albinien. A noter que pour les spectacles de vendredi et
samedi, ne seront pas présents, les groupes chinois et arméniens. Ils
seront remplacés respectivement par le groupe Le lion et le dragon et
par l’ensemble Ziema Zywiecka de Pologne.
Fêtes franco-écossaise les 13 et 14 juillet
Dissociés du spectacle, les fêtes franco-écossaise auront lieu, mardi
et mercredi, avec de nombreuses animations. Dès mardi soir, les
traditionnelles ripailles seront suivies d’un spectacle et
d’intronisations d’archers écossais. Mercredi, ripailles à midi avec,
au programme, de nombreuses animations : marché médiéval, défilé des
personnages et groupes folkloriques, reconstitutions de scènes
historiques en centre ville, jeux médiévaux et spectacles des danses
dans les Grands Jardins. Pour terminer, feu d’artifice aux étangs et
bal populaire place du Marché. Le tout, rythmé, cela va de soi, des
cornemuses du pipe band d’Aubigny.
Spectacles
Il reste des places pour le spectacle des vendredi 16 et samedi 17
juillet. Entrée : 5 EUR, gratuit pour les moins de 12 ans. Ripailles
: 11 EUR (dont 1 EUR de consigne remboursé à la restitution du
plateau vaisselle). Réservations au Seta au 02.48.81.50.07 ou à
l’office de tourisme en téléphonant au 02.48.58.40.20.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Armenian premier, EU envoy discuss Karabakh
Mediamax news agency
8 Jul 04
YEREVAN
Armenian Prime Minister Andranik Markaryan met Janez Potocnik,
commissioner in charge of the EU’s European Neighbourhood Policy, in
Yerevan today.
The press service of the Armenian government told Mediamax news agency
that Janez Potocnik said at the meeting that the preparation of
reports on each of the three South Caucasus countries has started
within the framework of the European Neighbourhood Initiative.
The EU commissioner noted that the European Union hopes for the
Armenian authorities’ assistance in this process because an individual
action plan will be implemented in the future on the basis of the
report. Potocnik said that the EU is ready to finance all programmes
of mutual interests in the spheres of the economy, trade, scientific
technologies, justice, the fight against terrorism, etc.
The Armenian prime minister and the EU commissioner also discussed the
situation in the South Caucasus, noting that without solving the
existing problems, the process of the region’s integration into Europe
cannot be complete. Andranik Markaryan and Janez Potocnik discussed
the prospects for establishing normal relations between Armenia and
Azerbaijan, and Armenia and Turkey, and touched on a settlement to the
Nagornyy Karabakh conflict.

Armenian army chief praises army
Arminfo
6 Jul 04
YEREVAN
The borders of the Republic of Armenia “are locked”, the chief of the
General Staff of the Armenian armed forces, Col-Gen Mikael Arutyunyan,
told journalists today.
He said that the Armenian armed forces are battleworthy and have the
necessary material and technical resources, armaments and are fully
staffed with soldiers and officers who are ready to fulfil all the set
targets. The general stressed that 96 per cent of the command staff
are graduates of the Vazgen Sarkisyan Military Academy of the Armenian
Defence Ministry.
Answering a question about the Azerbaijani army he noted that it is
also strengthening the state of its army’s combat effectiveness. It
would be wrong to say that it remained at the level of 1990, the
colonel-general said.

Le Télégramme
4 juillet 2004
Interpellé en état d’ivresse près d’une voiture accidentée
Vendredi, à 21 h 35, les policiers sont intervenus au chemin des Eaux
minérales, qui mène à la vallée de Gouédic, après que des riverains
ont signalé un accident au commissariat.
Vendredi, à 21 h 35, les policiers sont intervenus au chemin des Eaux
minérales, qui mène à la vallée de Gouédic, après que des riverains
ont signalé un accident au commissariat.
Lorsqu’ils sont arrivés sur les lieux, ils ont en effet trouvé une
Opel Omega le pare-chocs au sol et le pneu avant gauche crevé.
A proximité du véhicule se trouvait un homme en état d’ivresse et que
des témoins ont aussitôt désigné aux policiers comme étant le
conducteur.
Emmené au commissariat, ce dernier, gé de 37 ans, de nationalité
arménienne, et demeurant à Saint-Brieuc, a été dans l’impossibilité
de souffler dans l’éthylomètre. Il a alors été conduit au centre
hospitalier, où une prise de sang a révélé un taux de 1,95 g d’alcool
par litre de sang. Placé en garde à vue, l’homme a été entendu hier
matin et a nié être le conducteur du véhicule, qui appartient à l’une
de ses connaissances.
Il a été laissé en liberté et sera cité par le parquet du tribunal
pour répondre des infractions retenues à son encontre, dont celle de
conduite en état d’ivresse en récidive.

The Daily Star, Lebanon
July 6 2004
1st Beirut Jazz Festival hits all the right notes
Mixing international and local musicians, 4-day concert series lights
up Lebanese capital
By Jim Quilty, Ramsay Short and Kaelen Wilson-Goldie
Daily Star staff
Beirut: Now, jazz is not church music, nor has it ever been. It does
not require silence to breathe. Arguably, in fact, it plays best
against the clank and clatter of ice, glass, and a hack redolent of
emphysema. That said, In-Version, the local jazz ensemble that opened
the first Beirut International Jazz Festival, deserves full marks for
art in a hostile environment.
The secondary venue for the festival sits in the foothills of the
Marina Tower, the not-yet-tall monolith that will one day loom over
this site. The tower’s dedicated workmen continued their labors –
sandblasting by the sound of it – until well past 8.30pm, when
In-Version began their set. At first the racket was simply annoying.
Later on, though, as Joelle Khoury doggedly led her group through a
series of seamless post-bop improvisations, the noise seemed to
recede to become merely an unfortunate accompaniment.
In-Version’s playing was just as busy as the workers, but far more
melodic. It’s comfortable jazz, the sort of stuff first generated by
Miles Davis’ 1960s ensembles – and emulated by mainstream players
ever since.
There is a minimal audience, still outnumbered at this hour, by staff
and bemused photographers. Most are arrayed in front of the festival
food court’s several kiosks. Indeed, from time to time it is possible
to discern a smattering of applause, wafting above the soundtrack
that emanates from the Jack Daniels ad, running in continuous loop on
a flat-screen television.
One audience member, apparently noting your scribbling, asks if
you’re a journalist. You ask him if he’s annoyed by the Jack Daniels
monolith.
“Not at all,” he avers. “Are you part of the Jack Daniels Group?”
You assure him that, though you have consumed the product on a number
of occasions, you try to remain nonpartisan in your habits.
There is a good deal of Jack Daniels being consumed, in fact, a
pastime aided by the pairs of black-Jack clad, in-line-skate-mounted
youngsters propelling themselves around the venue in co-ed pairs. The
first such duo intercepts you on the way to the venue, inviting you
to throw back a chilled, paper shot-glass of the featured bourbon.
You oblige. Another is poised in front of a dartboard, inviting
thirsty passers-by to try their luck.
Later, in the In-Version set, another pair, armed with a miniature
crap table, glides by and invites you to roll the bones. “Try to roll
a seven,” the girl enthuses. In return for these exertions, she
assures you, you will be rewarded with a shot of Jack Daniels.
“Are you a journalist?” she asks.
“Afraid so.”
“Oh,” a wave of something like disappointment sweeps across her face.
“Are you being paid well for this?” you inquire.
She smiles like a plastic bride atop a wedding cake. “Well yes!” She
glances at her taciturn escort. “Well enough!”
The first act to test the main stage of Beirut International Jazz
Festival was Abed Azrie’s Arabo-Flamenco fusion project “Suerte.” The
stands were perhaps one-third full.
After an instrumental opening that moved from the Arabic vernacular
to the Spanish and back again, Azrie himself took the stage with the
Spanish vocalist whose crystalline soprano would answer his Arabic
sub-tenor over the course of the evening. Clad in a red, thigh-length
Nehru shirt, and dancing back and forth from emcee to vocalist to
maestro, Azrie is an affable thespian. He is evidently a gentleman as
well, insisting on starting his opening number from the top when he
realizes his partner hasn’t been miked. His vocals, however, are no
match for those of his counterpart.
Azrie’s Suerte ensemble is 16-strong, and at first glance its
contours would be familiar to anyone implicated in the Lebanese
supper club circuit. The Lebano-Egyptian rhythm section – tambourine,
dirbekeh, bongos and frame drums – and Lebanese qanun player are
complemented by a Franco-Syrian string section – violin, viola, cello
and double bass – and accordion player. Nationalities aside, this is
very much an Arabic music ensemble, but it is given a Spanish
inflection by a pair of flamenco guitars and a couple of
hand-clapping vocalists.
As this musical configuration suggests, Suerte is interested in
blending cognate elements of the Spanish and Arabic traditions,
specifically that “energy” that the Spaniards call “duende” and the
Arabs call “tarab.” Azrie’s biography suggests that this “world
music” sensibility is connected to the performer’s upbringing in the
ancient trade entrepot of Aleppo – where he was inspired by Greek,
Turkish, Iranian and Armenian influences.
This is not the first time that Arabic and Spanish traditions have
been spliced together. The Arabo-Andalusian work of Spain’s Radio
Tarifa, Elham Madfai’s guitar arrangements of Iraqi songs, even the
eccentric tarab-flamenco blend witnessed when Lebanese legend Wadia
Safi performed with the young guitarist Jose Fernandez – all are
symptoms of a common condition. Quite naturally, these musical
experiments express different degrees of seriousness and none have
been particularly balanced – with Arabic or Spanish elements ruling,
depending on the band leader’s training.
The same is true of Suerte. Here the flamenco component of the
ensemble is clearly subordinated to that of the Arabic. The
distribution of musical duties within the ensemble, too, is a trifle
utilitarian. Certainly Azrie is correct in recognizing the redundancy
of an oud in a group featuring both guitar and qanun, and it was
interesting to hear dirbekeh alongside flamenco-style hand-clapping.
It would be far more engaging, though, to have heard these “Arabic”
drums converse with the sharper percussive intonations of the Spanish
cajon (box) – a flamenco mainstay.
It is challenging to create a proper musical dialogue. This music is,
like its maestro, affable enough, and when it was energetic it could
please the audience. For the most part, though, Suerte was more an
exchange of monologues. There are points at which the ensemble
settled into a proper conversation, when the chugging string-and-drum
rhythms of the Arab-ish ensemble were not merely accentuated by the
guitars and the clapping hands, but moved onto a different axis. But
such transport was brief and rare.
It was a brave choice for John Kassabian, director of the Beirut
International Jazz Festival, to invite Jacques Loussier and his trio
to perform at the inaugural event on Friday.
The nearly 70-year-old French pianist was little loved by jazz
critics or serious heads in the 1960s when he took baroque music and
underpinned it with jazz rhythms. For them, jazz music had to be
rooted in blues. How could classical music – and how could Bach in
particular – be jazz? For the music buying public at large, however,
it was jazz, and it was popular – with Loussier’s “Play Bach” records
selling in the millions.
Though the crowd was not full strength on Friday – sadly but
tellingly so in a town where straight-ahead jazz is more popular –
Loussier and his trio enchanted the audience with magical and
accomplished improvisations on Bach, Ravel and Debussy.
In two sets of familiar works, a relaxed and humble Loussier
demonstrated how the spontaneity of jazz can link with the symmetry
of Bach – and both his bassist and drummer dazzled with intricate and
powerful solos on the themes.
Seated in front of the mock sails on the stage in Beirut Marina –
pianist on the left, bass in the middle, and drums to the right –
Loussier opens with a fugue that was blissful in its simplicity.
Whether on that composition or Bach’s equally exceptional “Prelude in
C Major,” Loussier demonstrates deft alternations, at once dreamy and
at once fast. His understanding of Bach is exceptional and technique
exquisite, but it is in his improvisational ability that Loussier
shines the most.
His exchanges with drums and bass are as tight as any funk band and
the trio’s understanding of each other is impeccable. In
10-minute-long solos, the bassist makes Bach jazz, blues and funk
with staccato plucking and dynamic riffs. His equal is the drummer,
with powerful cymbal work, brushwork and precision timing.
The Jacques Loussier Trio ends their show with a staggering version
of Ravel’s “Bolero,” Loussier leading with the tune and the familiar
snare rolls coming in thick and fast, moving the march along.
Earlier in the evening, local Lebanese singer Randa Ghoussoub had
entertained with classic jazz standards, and it was good to see how
much she has improved and evolved in the last three years – enough to
command stages worldwide. Post-Loussier, Lebanese percussionist
Ibrahim Jaber and the local Latin-jazz band Gros Bras played on to
end the night.
The Beirut International Jazz Festival – scheduled over four nights –
has been a musical highlight in Lebanon this summer, with
accomplished acts and a great open atmosphere reminiscent of Istanbul
and even Montreux. It has also provided a wider audience than usual
with a chance to see world-class musicians spreading world-class
music and opening minds to more than the average pop that is played
on most Lebanese radio stations. But with Raymond Gaspar, CEO of
Radio One in Beirut and Dubai, as President of the BIJF, perhaps
things will change.
There was a sense of anticipation in the air for the Beirut Jazz
Festival’s main-stage closer on Sunday evening. Shakti, the raga-jazz
fusion brainchild of John McLaughlin and Zakir Hussein, returned to
Lebanon – their last show being the cathartic Beiteddine performance
a couple of years back. It was a variation on a theme of Shakti that
took command of the Beirut Marina, one at once familiar and subtly
new.
Shakti is hardly a new project. It first saw light of day back in the
1970s when jazz guitarist John McLaughlin – having steeped himself in
the waters of fusion with Miles Davis and the Mahavishnu Orchestra –
got together with an Indian ensemble led by Indian tabla virtuoso
Zakir Hussein. A couple of albums were released, then the two
performers diverted themselves with other projects.
The project was revived at the end of the 1990s with another pair of
albums and a series of concert tours. The new Shakti was comprised of
a varied ensemble of veterans – bansuri (Indian flute) virtuoso
Hariprasad Chaurasia, playing a prominent role – and youngsters.
Percussionist V. Selvaganesh provides even greater depth to Hussein’s
rhythmic gymnastics, while incendiary mandolin player U. Shrinivas
makes a perfect foil for McLaughlin’s increasingly contemplative jazz
stylings – playing to McLaughlin the way Trane did to Miles.
In this evening’s incarnation, Shrinivas and Selvaganesh returned to
balance the principals, with an additional layer of complexity coming
in the form of young vocalist Shankar Mahadevan – seated in the
center of the stage. The evening opened with an extended piece of
free improvisation called “Karoma/Five-Peace Band.”
Those who know Shakti’s older work are familiar with the ensemble’s
ability to shift nuance from raga to jazz to “Hindi rap” – the last
coming from the interplay between percussionists Hussein and
Selvaganesh. Mahadevan’s contribution further thickens this fusion
groove. His skills may be grounded in an age-old Hindi classical
tradition, but he is to this mix what a scat singer is to a jazz
quartet.
With the group’s improv legs stretched, Mahadevan exited to allow the
quartet to run through some of their best-known tunes. The first of
these was Hussein’s “Ma No Pa,” a piece built around a progression of
guitar and mandolin interchanges and a sort of rhythmic dialogue
between guitar and tabla.
This concert provided a rare opportunity to see McLaughlin working in
a (relatively) intimate setting. The guitarist’s position in Shakti
is an ambiguous one. Many jazz aficionados and “world music” fans –
carried away by the sheer exuberance of the percussionists and
Shrinivas’ lightning-fast mandolin – have made the mistake of seeing
him as redundant to Shakti’s sound.
Like some of the most-accomplished jazz players, though, McLaughlin
has a habit of sometimes underplaying – a complaint Miles Davis once
made about Bill Evans, his pianist in the Kind of Blue sessions.
McLaughlin uses silences to color his notes and sometimes – as during
his previous, rather taciturn, Lebanon concert – his chord
progressions. For those who thought he was playing the silences a
little too much at the Beiteddine concert, it was a pleasure to find
him in a more gregarious mood this evening.
Indeed, during the dueling opportunities provided by fusion ragas
like “Maya” and “Finding the Way,” the beatific smile could
occasionally be seen to slip from the white-haired jazzman’s mouth.
Shakti was not oblivious to the audience’s needs – Hussein was kind
enough to keep the congregation posted on the score of the European
Cup final between Greece and Portugal. Nor could it be said that the
players were shy about filling-up the open-air venue with as much
music as it could hold.
Over the course of the evening the volume became progressively louder
as the duels between the string players grew more insistent and the
percussionists’ improvisations became more elaborate – coming to a
sort of rapturous climax during “Finding the Way.”
It’s just as well that the sound crew was able to pump up the volume
since, about half way through the show, the concert was in danger of
falling victim to a sudden barrage of ambient noise – in the form of
top-volume Arabic pop music – pulsating venomously from the hotel
district, just west of the concert venue.
“Nothing personal,” someone shrugged. “Just a waterfront turf war.”
>From this point on Shakti most strongly echoed the influence of Zakir
Hussein’s more recent fusion experiment – the Tabla Beat Science
project he authored with Bill Laswell. As the band’s sound system did
battle with the competition across the way, the amount of
reverberation and other playback spinning off McLaughlin’s guitar
rose to an elastic drone. Like jazz, it seems, fusion must learn to
thrive in hostile environments.
With her left hand banging away on a piano and her right hand coaxing
the effects of a keyboard, Tania Maria, the legendary Brazilian
singer, composer, and arranger, bopped her carrot-colored mop of
curls to the rhythms of the Viva Brazil Quartet. Maria and her band
performed a solid show on Saturday night – musically tight,
temporally to the point, and consistently, almost efficiently,
pleasant.
Maria has been a bandleader since the age of 13 (she started playing
piano at 7), and her modus operandi onstage is very much that of a
diva with a rhythm section. Accompanied in Beirut by a drummer,
bassist, and lively percussionist, Maria was all smiles as she
alternately kicked her bandmates into punchy solos, then called them
back into a mesh of tight-knit rhythms.
Born in Sao Luiz in northern Brazil to a musically inclined family,
Maria blended such influences as Bill Evans and Sarah Vaughan with
Antonio Carlos Jobim and Milton Nascimento early on. She spiced jazz
standards and blues traditions with samba and chorinho. At this point
Maria has, to her credit, a score of albums (internationally
acclaimed and popular enough to snag a Grammy nomination) that
experiment with ever more complex fusions, while still maintaining a
distinct and recognizable style.
On Saturday, Maria caressed the keys of her piano to make jazzy
melodies, warm with nostalgia. The quartet added a sexy, rhythmic
punctuation as Maria faded skillfully in and out of the background.
She allowed the other musicians to shine, until those moments where
her voice took over.
If Maria is a composer, arranger, and bandleader all in one, she also
carries the weight of at least two musicians on stage. She scats with
all the strength and nimbleness of Louis Armstrong, but she adds an
entirely new vocabulary of staccato sounds and smoothes it all with
the simmering fuzz of Portuguese.
Thankfully, the hiss of construction from the new Marina Tower, right
behind the crowd, faded after the first two songs, and Maria and her
quartet were able to pierce the night with the crispness of an
ensemble that knows how to stay in sync.
As she pumped the pedals of her piano, the sequins of her black dress
dancing, Maria gave off the grace of a vibrant if weathered performer
(her high cheekbones and puckered mouth have become more and more
pronounced over the years). Decades of performing in bars and clubs
have endowed Maria with a keen sense of how to play the crowd, and
she did so masterfully on Saturday, roping them into an extended
sing-along to a Joao Gilberto standard, and then stunning them with a
final round of scatting.
Maria’s performance did betray an element of being somehow
perfunctory. Her band was so competent that never did you hear a
rough note or a raw surprise. Compared to the mesmerizing night of
music to follow with Zakir Hussein and John McLaughlin, Tania Maria
and the Viva Brazil Quartet come off as solid, pleasing but a bit
ho-hum. If the Beirut International Jazz Festival manages to line up
one, two, five, a hundred nights as accomplished as this in a run-up
to a finale anywhere near as breathtaking as Sunday’s, it will no
doubt join the rarefied ranks of the world’s most prestigious jazz
festivals.

Bulgaria, Armenia decide to boost bilateral trade, contacts
BTA web site, Sofia
29 Jun 04

Sofia, 29 June: The last year and a half has witnessed a breakthrough
in Bulgarian-Armenian trade, the two countries’ National Assembly
chairmen, Ognyan Gerdzhikov of Bulgaria and Artur Baghdasaryan, found
when they conferred here Tuesday [29 June].
“The bilateral political dialogue has experienced a tangible
invigoration in recent years, after lagging behind for a certain
period,” Gerdzhikov said, noting that his guest is the first Armenian
head of parliament to pay an official visit to Bulgaria.
Trade and economic relations topped the agenda of the meeting. “I
declared Bulgaria’s readiness to serve as Armenia’s gateway to
Europe,” Gerdzhikov added. The sides discussed bilateral cooperation
in transport, the prospects to regional cooperation and contacts in
culture, education and science.
Baghdasaryan said that he has agreed with his host to assist the
promotion of cooperation between regions in the two
countries. “Wednesday’s signing of a twinning agreement between
Plovdiv and Gyumri will be the first step in this direction,” he
added.
It was agreed to include members of the business community in the
delegation that will accompany Gerdzhikov on his visit to Armenia
early next year and to organize an economic forum in Armenia to help
the promotion of bilateral economic cooperation.
The two heads of parliament agreed to assist the establishment of a
Bulgarian culture centre in Yerevan and of an Armenian culture centre
in Sofia.
The Armenian MPs are paying a four-day official visit. Later on
Tuesday, they will confer with ranking members of the Foreign Policy,
Defence and Security Committee. The delegation is scheduled to meet
President Georgi Purvanov and Prime Minister Simeon Saxe-Coburg-Gotha.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Armenian minister happy with NATO-sponsored conference in Baku
Arminfo
28 Jun 04
YEREVAN
Armenian Defence Minister Serzh Sarkisyan is happy with the
participation of Armenian officers in the Cooperative Best Effort 2004
planning conference in Baku.
“Naturally I am happy with the fact that the Defence Ministry was
represented at that event,” the minister told journalists
yesterday. He said it had already been decided that seven Armenian
officers would take part in the exercises.
“Our stance has not changed. We will definitely take part and in
fairness to the Azerbaijani authorities, they took necessary steps to
ensure the 100-per-cent security of the officers who took part in the
exercises [conference],” the minister said.
He added that the Azerbaijani side and NATO guarantee the security of
the officers who will take part in the exercises.
Let us remind you that Col Murad Isakhanyan and Senior Lieutenant Aram
Ovanesyan attended the planning conference. Baku will host NATO’s
exercises on 14-26 September.
[A separate Arminfo report quoted the minister as telling the
journalists that “we will all benefit from any events aimed at making
the world and the region in particular more secure”].