Author: Vanyan Gary

ArmenPress
March 18 2005
TURKISH HUMAN RIGHTS ACTIVISTS SAY GOVERNMENT MUST APOLOGIZE TO
ARMENIANS
ISTANBUL, MARCH 17, ARMENPRESS: Two Turkish human rights
activists, Alhan Bilgen and Yusuf Alatash, said public debates about
the Armenian genocide within the Turkish society are taking place in
an uneasy atmosphere raising the concerns of Turkish Armenians.
In an interview with a Turkish daily Yeni Safag, Bilgen said
public discussions on the Armenian genocide must be free of
accusations of the Armenian race in order “not to offend Turkish
Armenian citizens.”
“Like the current government of Turkey bears no responsibility for
massacres of Armenians in the World War I, likewise Turkish Armenians
bear no responsibility for the actions of the Armenian Revolutionary
Federation/ Dashnaktsutyun,” he said, adding that Turks must realize
that Turkish Armenians, Armenians in other foreign countries and
those in Armenia proper are different.
Calling on the government of Turkey to acknowledge that Armenians
were deported in mass in the beginning of the 20-th century, Bingel
said it was done to prevent the revolution plotted by Armenian
nationalists. “The deported Armenians were Turkish citizens and the
responsibility for the deaths occurred during the deportation lies on
the Ottoman government, but nevertheless, the Turkish government must
apologize for those them,” he said.
Alatash in turn was quoted as saying that the latest debates on
the Armenian genocide “have deteriorated the state of national
minorities in Turkey.” “The debates have placed Armenians out of the
frying pan into the fire. Diaspora Armenians demand that they should
join their campaign for the genocide recognition, while Turks call
them traitors,” he said adding also that present day Turks must
apologize for what their grandparents did to Armenians.

OSCE Org
March 17 2005
Organization for Security and Co-Operation in Europe (OSCE)

OSCE Office presents report on alternative sentencing in Armenia

/noticias.info/ YEREVAN, 16 March 2005 – A research study exploring
prospects for non-custodial measures of punishment in Armenia was
presented today to the public.
The main outcome of the research is that key actors involved in the
criminal justice reform process will get reliable guidance to help
them identify priority areas to develop efficient alternatives to
imprisonment. The Criminal and the newly-adopted Criminal-Executive
Codes create the necessary legal basis for the implementation of
penal sanctions, including alternative sentences.
The report was prepared by the non-governmental organization Advanced
Social Technologies, with support from the OSCE Office in Yerevan,
Open Society Institute Assistance Foundation and the British Embassy
in Armenia.
“All OSCE participating States face challenges in implementing
criminal justice policy which includes alternative sentencing
options,” said Stefan Buchmayer, Human Rights Officer at the OSCE
Office, opening the event.
“A comprehensive legal framework and an institutional infrastructure
for the implementation of alternative sentences facilitate making
decisions for a state and its society in choosing a criminal justice
policy.”
The scope of the research included development of the research tools,
data analysis, and an elaboration of recommendations for action. A
survey was also conducted among target groups such as judges,
prosecutors, advocates, police and Criminal Executive Department of
the Justice Ministry, as well as private entrepreneurs, offenders and
their families, and the public at large.
Anna Minasyan, Head of the Advanced Social Technologies and the
co-author of the study, said that the majority of stakeholders in the
process had a positive attitude towards alternative sentencing
options.
“They believe that an enlarged practice of alternative sanctions
corresponds to modern trends in international criminal law and
contributes to important processes, such as proper rehabilitation of
the offenders and building public trust towards the criminal justice
system.”

Radio Free Europe, Czech Republic
March 15 2005
Russia’s Wounded Imperial Consciousness
By Victor Yasmann
Whither the CIS?

Many observers in Russia and abroad believe that recent events in
Georgia, Ukraine, and Moldova have rung the death knell for the
Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), the fragile association
that rose up in the wake of the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Council for Foreign and Defense Policy Chairman Sergei Karaganov told
RTR on 13 March that the CIS has essentially fulfilled its function
and should be radically reformed. On 10 March, apn.ru reported that
National Strategy Institute Director Stanislav Belkovskii had called
for “burying the CIS” and creating a new alliance of countries loyal
to Moscow. Belkovskii dubbed this alliance the USSR, an acronym from
the Russian words for “Commonwealth of Countries Allied to Russia.”
The latest reflection of this new mindset in Russia was a proposed
bill in the Duma that would have regulated the procedures for
expanding the Russian Federation. On 10 March, Motherland Duma Deputy
Andrei Savelev presented the bill on the creation of new constituents
of the Russian Federation that would have amended a 2001 law on the
Russian Federation (see “RFE/RL Newsline,” 3 December 2001) to
facilitate the incorporation into Russia of the self-proclaimed
republics of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, which are part of Georgia;
the Moldovan region of Transdniester; and the Nagorno-Karabakh region
of Azerbaijan.”Now is not the time to think about how to break up
other states but to take care about the unity and sovereignty of our
own country.”
Under the 2001 law, regions wishing to join the federation do not
have to share borders with Russia, but the consent of their present
central governments is required for incorporation. The law also
stipulates that acceptance of new constituents of the federation must
be approved by a referendum of the entire country. In short, the
expansion of the Russian Federation requires an international treaty
and a complete, national domestic political process.
According to media reports, the amendments submitted by Savelev were
drafted by Motherland faction leader Dmitrii Rogozin. They called for
abolishing the requirement that expansion be accompanied by the
consent of the foreign government involved, “Izvestiya” reported on
10 March. Instead, the proposed amendments stated that admission to
the federation would be based only on “the will of the people of a
region as expressed through a referendum” or by the mass acceptance
of Russian citizenship. The only new condition that the amendments
included was a provision that said the population of a candidate
region must have voted “positively on the 17 March 1991 referendum on
the preservation of the USSR.” All of the regions listed above pass
this standard, a fact that Rogozin mentioned in a memorandum he
attached to the bill. In that message, he wrote that Georgia,
Moldova, and Azerbaijan “have lately been intensifying efforts to
project their sovereignty into the territories of these unrecognized
republics” while simultaneously accusing Russia of “supporting
‘separatism.'”
When presenting the bill in the Duma, Savelev stressed that the
proposals correspond with the Kremlin’s political line and its
“ideology of national revanche.” “President [Vladimir] Putin said
last year that we gave up too much and [now] we must get it all
back,” Savelev said, according to strana.ru on 11 March. “We do not
need a new Russia of ‘Yeltsinites’ within the present borders, but a
genuine Russia with its imperial borders.”
The Motherland bill, however, attracted just 91 votes — mainly from
Motherland and its allies — of the 226 required for passage.
Thirty-four deputies voted against the bill and one abstained, with
most deputies not participating in the vote. The pro-Kremlin Unified
Russia party, which controls more than 300 votes in the lower
chamber, declined to support the bill, arguing that it could destroy
“the fragile balance of the territorial integrity of the Russian
Federation.”
Unified Russia’s position seems to follow the old dictum that those
who live in glass houses should not throw stones. Deputy Yurii Konev
(Unified Russia) said: “The time for this law has passed. Now is not
the time to think about how to break up other states but to take care
about the unity and sovereignty of our own country,” strana.ru
reported on 11 March.
Konev’s concerns were echoed by Communist Deputy Leonid Ivanchenko,
whose faction largely supported the measure. Ivanchenko, however,
argued that the definition of “a popular referendum” in the bill
“works against Russia’s interests.” He noted that the Myasnikovskii
Raion of Rostov Oblast, which is in the district he represents, has a
compact Armenian community, RTR reported on 12 March, and that it
could theoretically vote to secede from Russia. First Deputy Duma
Speaker Lyubov Slizka (Unified Russia) concluded the debate by saying
that “adoption of the bill will mean the de facto declaration of war
against neighboring states, whose territorial integrity will be
violated.” She added that it would be another matter if one or
another of these regions gained international recognition and then
expressed the desire to join the Russian Federation.
In an interview with “Argumenty i fakty,” No. 10, TV-Tsentr
commentator Aleksei Pushkov, whose statist views often reflect those
of the Kremlin, said that Moscow is afraid to encourage separatist
claims in Georgia and Moldova because it faces the same problem in
Chechnya. Moreover, if Moscow legitimizes the disintegration of
Georgia and Moldova, it could set off a chain reaction in Ukraine and
Kazakhstan, both of which have large ethnic Russian minorities
concentrated in regions bordering Russia. “It seems that the Kremlin
is seriously afraid of complications in our relations with our
neighbors, although as far as I can tell there is nothing to be
afraid of,” Pushkov said.
The introduction of the bill in the Duma indicates that those in
Russia who harbor imperialist ambitions are not yet ready to
surrender, despite the recent setbacks throughout the CIS. After
Moscow’s defeat in the Ukrainian presidential vote, political
consultant Marat Gelman, who advised pro-Moscow presidential
candidate Viktor Yanukovych in the election there, said that “Russia
should now give up its imperial project,” RosBalt reported on 29
December. “But although there is no chance of realizing any scenario
of the restoration of the empire, our wounded imperial consciousness
remains and is posing a serious problem.”

Sofia News Agency
Sunday 13 March 2005
Varna Spans with Caucasus by Ferry
Business: 12 March 2005, Saturday.
A new ferryboat line will start functioning next year to span Bulgaria’s
Varna and the port of Caucasus, Armenia.
Direct flights will run from Sofia to Yerevan all year round, it became also
known during the visit of Armenia’s Transport Minister Andranik Manukyan to
Bulgaria.
Together with his Bulgarian counterpart, Minister Manukyan visited Saturday
the Black Sea port of Varna.
The ministers of the two countries held a meeting with representatives of
the Armenian community in the city.

PanArmenian News
March 12 2005
OSCE MG US AMBASSADOR CONTENT WITH KARABAKH TALKS
12.03.2005 03:57
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ OSCE Minsk Group Ambassador representing the
US Steven Mann advises that after making public the report of the
fact finding mission, which worked on the “occupied territories of
Azerbaijan,” to familiarize with it in full, Azertag news agency
reported. “People should understand that the report drawn by the
OSCE mission aims at promoting the negotiations. The Minsk Group
Ambassadors, as well as the US Government also want it,” he noted.
Not commenting on the report, which will be made public at the sitting
of the OSCE Permanent Council in Vienna next Thursday, Steven Mann
stated that he would not like to make any conclusions before that
time. However, he noted that he believes that “the document drawn by us
is exact and detailed, professionally reveals the matter. A group of
specialists led by Emily Haber has done a top quality work.” Ambassador
Mann, who participated in discussions on the topic of the Caspian
Gas and Energy Security of Europe in Washington March 10, said he was
content with the course of the talks over settlement of the Nagorno
Karabakh conflict. Steven Mann, who is also State Department Advisor
for Caspian Basin Energy Diplomacy, says that the Karabakh issue takes
most of his time. “I am glad to be busy all the time. This means that
the negotiation cycle between the parties continues,” he added.

Congressional Quarterly, Inc.
Federal Document Clearing House Congressional Testimony
March 8, 2005 Tuesday
SECTION: CAPITOL HILL HEARING TESTIMONY
COMMITTEE: SENATE FOREIGN RELATIONS
SUBCOMMITTEE: EUROPEAN AFFAIRS
FUTURE OF DEMOCRACY IN BLACK SEA AREA
TESTIMONY-BY: MR. BRUCE P. JACKSON, PRESIDENT
AFFILIATION: PROJECT ON TRANSITIONAL DEMOCRACIES
Statement of Mr. Bruce P. Jackson President, Project on Transitional
Democracies
Committee on Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on European
Affairs
March 8, 2005
Mr. Chairman, Members of the Committee, thank you for the opportunity
to testify before you on the state of democracy in the Black Sea
region and the possibilities which the vast democratic transformation
of this region presents for US policy. I would like to discuss three
major questions: (1) What is the Black Sea region and why should
developments there command the attention of this Committee and of US
policymakers? (2) Where are the states of the Black Sea region in the
development of democratic governance and what factors retard
development of a free and prosperous civil society in these states?
(3) Given the strategic importance of the region and the threats to
the freedom of peoples who profess to share our values, what should
be the policy of the United States towards the new democracies around
the Black Sea?
I Historically, the Black Sea has stood at the confluence of the
Russian, Ottoman and Persian Empires and has been a central theater
in the “Great Game” which was played out along its shores throughout
the nineteenth century1. The contours of the Black Sea region which
were established in the competitions between the great European
powers in the Crimean War and World War I are still evident today.
The geopolitics of the region remain heavily influenced by the
internal character and foreign policy aspirations of the larger
regional powers, Russia and Turkey. The middle powers, Ukraine,
Romania and Bulgaria, continue to seek security and stability in
regional cooperation and, particularly, in closer relations with
European institutions. The smaller littoral states, Moldova, Georgia,
Azerbaijan, and Armenia, watch the great regional powers fearfully,
envy the more cosmopolitan and Europeanized middle powers, and are
bloodied by every tremor along the tectonic plate of the former
imperial powers. Today, the same factors, which rendered the Black
Sea region a “black hole” in European history, now argue that this
region is of central strategic interest to Europe and the United
States. There are six major points: 1 For a fuller discussion see
Ronald D. Asmus and Bruce P. Jackson, “The Black Sea and the
Frontiers of Freedom” in Policy Review, June & July 2004
The Black Sea region has for centuries been the entry point to the
broader Middle East. The borders of the democracies of the region
touch Syria, Iraq, Iran and the shores of the Caspian Sea. As the
United States discovered to its dismay on March 1, 2003, without the
cooperation of Black Sea states, in this instance Turkey, we cannot
easily reach the northern approaches to the broader Middle East.
Every nineteenth century European power understood that the nation
which controlled the Black Sea could control the most important real
estate in the Middle East. If we are to be successful in our efforts
to support the democratization of the Middle East, we will have to
build a secure, prosperous, and democratic Black Sea region in the
process.
The Black Sea region was the beginning of the Silk Road of trade with
Asia. While silk and spices have lost much of their allure since the
times of Marco Polo, the energy reserves of Central Asia are becoming
increasingly important to our European allies and to the stability of
world oil prices. Today, the member states of the European Union
import approximately 50% of their energy needs; by 2020 imports will
rise to 70% of consumption. This increase will be delivered to Europe
across and around the Black Sea region, on routes such as the
Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline.
3. The Black Sea region is rapidly becoming part of Europe. With the
exception of Croatia, all current candidates for EU membership are
from the Black Sea region. Romania and Bulgaria are expected to gain
EU membership in 2007 and Turkey sometime around 2014. The western
and southern shores of the Black Sea are also the borders of NATO and
soon the European Union. These facts so impressed the heads of state
of member states of NATO that at the Istanbul Summit in July 2004 the
NATO Joint Communiquerecognized that the Black Sea region was an
essential part of Euro-Atlantic security.
4. It is not, however, only US interests which tie us to the Black
Sea region, but also our political values. Both the Rose Revolution
in Georgia and the Orange Revolution in Ukraine occurred in countries
along the northern and eastern shores of the sea. The possibilities
created by these democratic revolutions not only inspired President
Bush’s Second Inaugural Address and his recent speech in Bratislava,
but they changed the structure of politics in Minsk, Chisinau and as
far away as Almaty, Bishkek and Beirut. Without doubt, the largest
and most dramatic democratic changes are occurring in this part of
the Euro-Atlantic.
5. Sadly, it is not only our hopes that draw our attention to this
region, but also our fears. The most sharp and dangerous fragments of
the former Soviet Union lie scattered in an arc across the northern
shore of the Black Sea. A belt of ‘frozen conflicts” begins in
Transdnistria in eastern Moldova and runs through Abkhazia and South
Ossetia in Georgia to the mountain heights of Nagorno-Karabakh on the
border of Armenia and Azerbaijan. In each of these “frozen conflicts”
created in the civil wars of the dying Soviet empire, brutal warfare
and ethnic cleansing have occurred and could reoccur. In
Transdnistria, Abkhazia and South Ossetia, transnational crime has
found a home and developed a base for trafficking in weapons, drugs,
women and children. These criminal enterprises destabilize the
governments of the region, threaten Europe with illicit traffic, and
ultimately pose a danger to the United States with their capability
and intent to sell weapons and technology to our enemies.
6. Finally, the most negative expression of Russian foreign policy
aspirations now occurs along the northern rim of the Black Sea
region. Since I have already been given an opportunity by the
Committee to testify on the subject of Russian neo-imperialism in
what the Kremlin regards as Russia’s “near abroad,” I will not repeat
the argument here2 . Suffice it to say, whether we are intent on
protecting new democracies from outside inference and coercion or are
simply concerned about the damage Russian policy is doing to its own
people, we are forced to focus on the region.
In short, the democracies of the Black Sea lie on the knife edge of
history which separates the politics of nineteenth century
imperialism from European modernity. Reactionary forces in the region
(separatism, historical Russian aspirations, and criminal interest)
would prefer a return to a balance of power system where the powerful
rule over spheres of interest and the powerless would serve either
autocrat or kleptocrat. On the other hand, those democratic reformers
who view themselves as the direct descendants of the leaders of
Solidarity and Charter 77 who freed Central and Eastern Europe in
1989, aspire to see their new democracies following the path of
Poland and the Czech Republic into a European system based on liberal
values and shared security.
Which of these forces ends up defining a modern Black Sea system is a
matter of great consequence for the United States and Europe. Not
only would a return to the politics of the past constrain our ability
to work for democratic change in the greater Middle East and damage
the energy security of Europe, but if the new democracies fail to
make the Black Sea a part of the Euro-Atlantic system, the lives of a
quarter of a billion Europeans will be nastier, more brutish, and
(inevitably) shorter. II Let me turn from the region as a whole to a
summary discussion of the state of democracy in its constituent
states, where it is somewhat easier to see the great possibilities
and the factors which retard reform and political integration.
Romania and Bulgaria are undoubtedly the success stories of Southeast
Europe and the Black Sea. Both were invited to join NATO in 2002
where they have performed well and contributed to missions in
Afghanistan and Iraq. As I mentioned earlier, both are expected to
join the European Union on January 1, 2007 leading their region into
the institutional core of Europe. The two factors that retard the
political and economic development of both Romania and Bulgaria are
deeply entrenched 2 Bruce Pitcairn Jackson, Testimony before the
Senate Foreign Affairs Committee on “Democracy in Russia,” February
17, 2005. governmental corruption and a weak and often compromised
judiciary. But, even in this, there is a good news story to be told.
In the recent Romanian Presidential election for the first time, the
issue of corruption dominated the campaign and swept reformer Traian
Basescu into the Presidency. His Government has launched a large-
scale offensive against corruption in government and business.
Forthcoming elections in Bulgaria may offer a similar, albeit long
overdue, opportunity to accelerate reform. Clearly, Romania and
Bulgaria are two democracies whose long-term prospects look extremely
bright.
Incidentally, Mr. Chairman, President Basescu arrives in Washington
later today for a meeting tomorrow with President Bush and members of
the Senate. President Basescu is one of the most eloquent advocates
of a comprehensive strategy for the Black Sea, aimed at advancing
prosperity and democracy throughout the region. His goal is nothing
less than to make the Black Sea “a second Mediterranean” in terms of
shared security, commerce, and political cooperation.
Turkey achieved an historic milestone on December 17, 2004 when the
European Union finally agreed to open membership negotiations.
Despite this confirmation of Turkey’s European destiny, there are
strong indications that Turkey’s national and geopolitical identity
crisis is far from over and that Turkey may be entering a difficult
and problematic stage. In June 2004, in order to maintain some manner
of regional hegemony, Turkey played a key role in blocking the
extension of the NATO surveillance operation ACTIVE ENDEAVOR to the
Black Sea. Internally, the ruling AK Party seems have taken a turn
for the worse, characterized by strident anti-Americanism, cultural
anti- Europeanism, and a resurgent xenophobia. (The television
footage of Turkish riot police savagely beating young women at a
peaceful protest for political rights that appeared on BBC yesterday
is but the most recent negative development.)
In foreign policy, during the term of Prime Minister Erdogan, Turkey
has quietly broken off its strategic relationship with Israel,
refused to negotiate with Armenia on the opening of their common
border (thereby obstructing negotiations on Nagorno- Karabakh), and
demanded of the United States a draconian treatment of the Kurdish
population of Iraq. In diplomatic parlance, Turkey has become
“unhelpful.”
Perhaps, most worrying are reports of Turkish-Russian discussions of
a coordinated policy in the Black Sea region, which would inevitably
be conducted at the expense of smaller, pro-European democracies. The
motivation for Turkey’s negative regional behavior appears to be a
classic case of Great Power insecurity and a fear that Turkey will
lose its distinct identity in the economic and demographic
uncertainty of modern Europe. We can hope that the negative trend in
Turkish politics is related to the turmoil in the Middle East and the
problems and contradictions which a secular Islamic government
encounters in the course of European integration rather than a
response to the flowering of democracy around the Black Sea.
Nevertheless, Turkey has entered a dangerous period both for itself
and for US-Turkish relations which deserves serious attention.
Ukraine is possibly the best-known and most inspiring of the Black
Sea democracies. The triumph of Viktor Yushchenko and the Ukrainian
people is without question the most significant event in the advance
of democracy in Europe since the fall of the Berlin Wall. That said,
President Yushchenko and Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko have a
Herculean task in front of them. First and foremost, they must unite
a nation even as they undertake the reforms which are necessary for
Ukraine to become a European democracy.
The most dangerous year for a new democracy is its first year, and
for Ukraine the critical period is from today through the
Parliamentary elections in March 2006. In this defining twelve- month
period, Viktor Yushchenko will have to address the criminal conduct
of the Kuchma period, define and negotiate the rules of the game for
the business community, and make significant progress both within the
Action Plan of the European Union’s Neighborhood Policy and in an
intensified dialogue with NATO. Any one of these tasks would be
formidable, but the new government must accomplish this and more, and
do so in such a way that convinces the people of Kiev, Lviv, and
Donetsk that they share a common future in a united pro-Western
Ukraine. The critical task will be to establish transparent business
practices and to eliminate the “grey economy” without resorting to
large-scale re-nationalization which would destroy the confidence of
foreign investors and dangerously inflame sectional resentments.
The further danger for Ukrainian democracy lies in the hostility of
Moscow towards pro-European democracies in the former Soviet space
and the fear that democratic reform inspires in the criminal clans,
which have dominated the “grey economy” of Ukraine up until now.
Sadly, but necessarily, the stability and security of EU and NATO
membership is some years off and over the immediate political
horizon. The United States and our European allies must bring their
entire diplomatic and economic power to bear to ensure that Russia,
or criminal groups emboldened by Russia, do not undermine the
Yushchenko Government. We must support the Ukrainian people in their
truly historic endeavor.
Georgia’s democratic revolution is only slightly less well-known than
Ukraine’s and is succeeding against even longer odds. Georgia, under
the leadership of President Misha Saakashvili, has finished an
extraordinary first year of reform, which saw the breakaway province
of Adjaria reunited with the constitutional government in Tbilisi. By
all indicators, such as its qualification for participation within
the Millennium Challenge Account, Georgia is delivering on its
commitments to economic reform and the democratic transformation of
its society and government. Like Ukraine, however, Georgia has
encountered serious and continuous obstruction from Russia. The
Russian Government has refused to comply with its international
treaty obligation to withdraw its troops from the Soviet-era bases on
Georgian soil and has consistently supported separatists in the
breakaway Georgian region of Abkhazia. Late last year, Russia blocked
the OSCE from reinforcing a peacekeeping mission in South Ossetia in
order to protect its ability to ship prohibited weapons and
explosives through the Roki Tunnel to paramilitary gangs in South
Ossetia. And, at the December OSCE Summit in Sofia, Bulgaria, Russia
forced the OSCE to close the Border Monitoring Operation which
patrolled the northern border of Georgia with Ingushetia, Dagestan
and Chechnya. Russia’s actions could very well prove to be the death
knell for the OSCE; we must ensure that they are not for democratic
Georgia.
Despite Russian attempts to destabilize the Saakashvili Government,
Georgian democracy continues to mature and was strong enough to
withstand the recent tragic death of Prime Minister Zurab Zhvania,
who was a mainstay of the Rose Revolution. If democracies could be
compared to sports teams, Georgia would be the 1980’s US Olympic
Hockey team. Like the Lake Placid Olympic team, Georgia should not be
winning, except it does. It seems to me that Georgia has the
essential quality of scrappiness that animated successful democratic
movements in Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and the Baltic
States against the monolith of Soviet power; they care more and are
willing to work harder for democracy than the reactionary forces are
willing to work to restore autocratic rule and criminal enterprise.
In contrast, the other smaller states of the Black Sea regime,
Moldova, Azerbaijan and Armenia, retain more characteristics of
post-Soviet autocracies than of emerging European democracies. To
varying degrees, recent elections have not met European standards.
Opposition parties are harassed and opposition candidates are
occasionally threatened with criminal charges or simply imprisoned.
Both civil society and the free press are under duress in these
countries, as we can see from the recent assassination of the editor
of an opposition newspaper in Baku. For the most part, the major
factors retarding the democratic development of Moldova, Azerbaijan
and Armenia are the persistence of frozen conflicts on their
territories and the negative effect these conflicts have on their
economic development and domestic politics. The stand-off between
Moldovan government and the Smirnov clan in Transdnistria has
proliferated corruption and crime throughout Moldova and served as an
excuse for President Voronin to limit the political and press
freedoms of Moldovan citizens. Similarly, the impasse on
Nagorno-Karabakh has served to maintain extremists in both Azeri and
Armenian politics, and succeeded in isolating both countries from
constructive interaction with their Black Sea neighbors and with
Euro-Atlantic institutions.
This brief survey of the mature, nascent and inchoate democracies of
the Black Sea region reveals a special class of democracies which are
torn between the desire of their peoples for a European future (and
all the economic and political freedoms these peoples associate with
Europe) and the lingering grip of a brutal past. In short, this is a
region of Europe where the future of democracy is still at risk.
III If I am correct in arguing that the Black Sea region is a area of
enormous democratic potential, but where democracy remains at risk,
then the policy of the United States has to be to support new
democracies, to dissuade or deter foreign powers from intervening in
their development, and to ensure that the Euro-Atlantic institutions
they seek remain open to them. I have six recommendations for this
Committee to consider and for US policy generally: 1. Accelerate the
leading democracies of the region. The prospects for democracy in the
Black Sea region will be substantially enhanced by the formal
integration of Romania and Bulgaria in the European Union. Their
accession must remain on track for January 1, 2007 in order to convey
to the other states of the region that the possibility of near-term
European integration exists and that painful reforms have their
reward in security and prosperity. The United States can assist
Romania and Bulgaria in achieving their goal by pushing hard for
judicial reform and strict standards of official conduct. The
Department of Defense should make its long-delayed decision on the
repositioning of US European bases to the sites offered by the
Romanian Government in the vicinity of Constanza on the Black Sea.
Nothing could make more clear that the United States shares the view
of the European Union that security and stability in the Black Sea
region is essential to Euro-Atlantic security. 2. Reform and adapt
our institutions to perform in the Black Sea region. Existing
institutions, such as NATO and the OSCE, must be made to perform in
service of democracy in the Black Sea littorals. We must revisit the
decision to block Active Endeavor from being extended to the Black
Sea and overturn the archaic Montreux Convention, which is sometimes
invoked as the justification for barring NATO surveillance from
transiting the Bosphorus. Similarly, we must demand that the OSCE
fulfill its peacekeeping and monitoring responsibilities throughout
the region. Even if we are successful with both NATO and the OSCE,
the Black Sea region remains “institution-poor.” Regional
initiatives, such as the confused GUUAM (Georgia, Ukraine,
Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan and Moldova) or the moribund Black Sea
Economic Cooperation forum have not filled the gap. As a consequence,
we should engage with regional leaders, such as Romanian President
Basescu, Georgian President Saakashvili, and Ukrainian President
Yushchenko, on the formation of new structures for a Black Sea
strategy. 3. Confront both Russia and Turkey: Whatever we hope to
accomplish in the Black Sea region will be impossible without the
willingness to confront Russia where its conduct goes beyond the
acceptable. But we must also communicate frankly to Turkey that we
expect our friends and allies to support other democratic states and
to work for the peaceful resolution of conflicts in their region.
Just because Russian officials become peevish when we point out that
the poison used on Yushchenko and the explosives used in the car
bombing in Gori, Georgia came from Russia, does not mean we should
ignore this conduct. Just because Turkish officials become indignant
at the mention of a genocidal campaign conducted by Ottoman
authorities against Armenian civilians in the early years of the last
century does not mean that coming to terms with history should not be
discussed between democratic allies. If we are to succeed where
democracy is at risk, we must be clear in what we say and do. 4.
Prioritize the frozen conflicts: Beginning with the conflict in
Transdnistria, our negotiators need to redouble their efforts to find
creative solutions. The Orange Revolution in Ukraine has opened up
the possibility of ending the criminal enterprise in Transdnistria
and its secessionist conflict with the constitutional government in
Chisinau. For negotiations to succeed, however, we should expand the
so-called Pentagonal-format to include both the European Union and
Romania, as essential and constructive partners. In Nagorno-Karabakh,
we must press Azerbaijan and Armenia back to serious negotiations and
insist that negotiations begin from the point reached at 2001 meeting
in Key West. Finally, we must show far greater resolve and enthusiasm
when parties take a meaningful step towards peace. President Misha
Saakashvili’s enlightened peace plan for South Ossetia has been
greeted by a resounding silence in Brussels and Washington, which is
dumbfounding. It is also callous and derelict. 5. Harmonize the
democracy support programs of the United States and the European
Union: Both the Millennium Challenge Account and European Union’s
Neighborhood Policy were designed to assist emerging democracies in
their efforts to accelerate economic development and strengthen the
capacity of democratic institutions. Both the United States and the
European Union are active in the Black Sea region, but formal
coordination does not yet exist. The four freedoms of market access,
labor mobility, investment and travel offered in Europe’s
Neighborhood Policy are the obvious complement to what the United
States can offer in terms of security support and developmental aid.
Closer coordination is essential. We must also challenge our
Congressional-funded NGO’s, such as the National Endowment of
Democracy, IRI and NDI, to address a wider spectrum of democracy-
support activities. Elections are not the only things that matter in
the Black Sea region. Strengthening civil society, the press and
parliamentary oppositions are also key. 6. Focus on Ukraine: For
better or for worse, the extent and character of democracy in the
Black Sea region will be defined to a great extent by the successes
and failures of democratic change in Ukraine. Without a democratic
Ukraine, peace in Moldova will remain elusive and the democracies of
the South Caucasus will be isolated from Europe. The ultimate
disposition of Ukraine may well finally answer the question that has
nagged at us since 1989: “What is the size of Europe?” If the Orange
Revolution succeeds and European institutions maintain an “Open Door’
policy towards Ukraine’s candidacy for membership in NATO and the
European Union, then we can assume that all the democracies on the
Black Sea have a place in Europe, including, some day, Russia.
Mr. Chairman, I believe that what is occurring around the Black Sea
may be the beginning of the final phase of the completion of a Europe
whole and free. Over the five years remaining in this decade, I think
that the rapid democratic transformation of Central, Eastern, and now
Southeastern Europe will come to a conclusion, and a new (and far
larger) community of Euro-Atlantic democracies will result. While
democratic change is ultimately the responsibility of the Black Sea
states themselves, the United States has a significant role to play
both in supporting and protecting these young democracies. How well
we play this role will affect the lives of tens of millions of people
and, quite literally, shape the future of the West. Thank you, Mr.
Chairman.

Cold War Echoes
By Dimitrij Rupel
Washington Post
March 7 2005
Monday, March 7, 2005; Page A19
When my prime minister suggested some years ago that Slovenia should
take on the chairmanship of the Organization for Security and
Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) in 2005, I knew it would be a challenge.
Our 55 states face critical security issues that require our full
attention, from terrorism and human trafficking to conflicts in
Georgia, Moldova and Nagorno-Karabakh. The OSCE, a pan-European body
spawned by the 1975 Helsinki Final Act and of which the United States
is an active member, is uniquely placed to address these challenges.
I did not imagine, though, that I would spend my first few months in
the post haggling with fellow foreign ministers about a relatively
insignificant amount of money. Yet that is exactly what I have been
doing. The OSCE faces paralysis within months because we have been
unable to agree on a 2005 budget or on how much each country should
contribute in the future. The sums involved are relatively small —
the OSCE budget was 180 million euros ($238 million) last year, about
4 percent of the annual budget of the District of Columbia. Running
on provisional budget arrangements, the OSCE is unable to launch any
new activities or implement important initiatives. This is both
absurd and embarrassing.
The budget dispute, of course, masks fundamental political
differences that go well beyond the OSCE. The Russian Federation and
some members of the Commonwealth of Independent States argue that the
OSCE applies a double standard, that the way it monitors elections is
flawed, that too much attention is paid to human rights and not
enough to security.
The United States and the European Union, on the other hand, appear
generally content with the focus on the “human dimension”: upholding
basic human rights and monitoring elections. They rarely bring
significant political-military issues to the negotiating table.
I sense a hardening of attitudes on all sides, and I hear rhetoric
uncomfortably reminiscent of the Cold War. If the impasse continues,
the OSCE’s credibility and its survival will be in jeopardy. Does
that matter? I firmly believe it does.
The OSCE started life in the 1970s as a series of meetings between
two opposing blocs that had the power to obliterate one another. It
provided a forum in which trust was slowly and painfully built. The
result was a series of landmark accords, starting in Helsinki, on
confidence-building measures to reduce the risk of war and on new
common standards for human rights and democratic elections. Without a
doubt, the Helsinki process played a significant role in helping to
bring about a peaceful end to the Cold War.
After the collapse of communism, our leaders reinvented the
organization as an operational body with a network of field offices.
Throughout the 1990s, it played an important conflict-prevention role
from the Crimea to the southern Balkans and helped with post-conflict
rehabilitation in places as diverse as Kosovo, Tajikistan and
Georgia.
The OSCE has achieved much on a shoestring budget. But as the only
security organization that includes the United States, Canada,
Russia, the whole of Europe and the former Soviet Union as equal
partners, it could achieve so much more if participating states
mustered the political will to let it do its job properly.
Countries in transition are crying out for the expertise the OSCE can
provide in training police forces. All countries want to boost their
capacity to fight terrorism, and the OSCE helps by bringing together
experts in protecting airports from shoulder-fired missiles and
making passports more difficult for terrorists to forge. All of us
confront the scourges of human trafficking, organized crime, and
racial and religious intolerance.
Yet many OSCE countries appear to contemplate the organization’s loss
of influence with indifference. Our heads of state have not held a
summit since 1999. So what can be done?
First, Russia should stop blocking the budget and engage
constructively in trying to move the OSCE more in the direction it
wants — by negotiation. It should play a more active role in the
work of the OSCE by sending more Russians to field missions,
providing more election observers and submitting more high-caliber
candidates for top positions.
Second, the United States and the European Union should take Russian
concerns seriously. They should avoid patronizing their partners and
acknowledge that not all Western countries are perfect democracies
with flawless human rights records. They should devote more attention
to the political-military dimension of security, without weakening
OSCE human rights commitments, and stop treating the OSCE as if it
were little more than a nongovernmental organization.
Third, all OSCE countries should devote high-level political
attention to the organization and use it as the effective security
instrument it was designed to be. Lip service is no longer enough.
The writer is foreign minister of Slovenia and chairman in office of
the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. This article
reflects his personal views.

Assa-Irada, Azerbaijan
March 3 2005
Paris meeting of Azeri, Armenian FMs adjourned

Baku, March 2, AssA-Irada
The Paris meeting of Azerbaijani and Armenian foreign ministers Elmar
Mammadyarov and Vardan Oskanian, scheduled for Thursday, has been
postponed. This is due to the fact that Oskanian has caught pneumonia
and was recommended by doctors not to go to France, says Foreign
Minister Elmar Mammadyarov.
The Azerbaijani Minister has met with the OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs
in Prague to discuss ways of settling the Upper Garabagh conflict.
The meeting was initially to be attended by Oskanian, but this did
not happen due to his poor health condition.*

Coalition party warns Armenia may turn into mafia republic
Arminfo
1 Mar 05
YEREVAN
The Orinats Yerkir [Law-Governed Country] Party, which is a member of
the ruling coalition, condemns the crime situation in Armenia, a
member of the Orinats Yerkir faction, Gagik Avetyan, told the National
Assembly today.
The criminal world has become embedded in some government structures
in the republic, he noted. Permissiveness and irresponsibility have
become visit cards of certain circles, he said. Avetyan stressed that
Armenia will turn into a clan and mafia republic in the near future
unless timely measures are taken to rectify the situation, which is
possible only by means of consolidating the forces concerned about the
future of the Armenian nation.
Another member of Orinats Yerkir, Ovannes Markaryan, said that
corruption has penetrated all the government structures of the
republic, budget spending and state procurement are not properly
overseen and officials frequently abuse power.

The Journal of Turkish Weekly
2005-02-04 08:34:37
Debre: Armenian Issue is not France’s Problem
Speaker of the French National Parliament Jean-Louis Debre discussed
Turkey’s European Union (EU) membership bid just before his Turkey
visit begins today. Debre responded to a question about whether the Armenian
issue was a problem in the development of Turkey-France
relations:
“Let’s be honest. First of all, the Armenian problem is not an issue
concerning Turkey-France relations. It is rather about Turkey-Armenia
relations and Turkey’s own history in particular.”
The EU that Turkey wants to join was the built by confronting public and
state history, Debre said, and they believe that Turkey would
understand this and its part of the European project. The French Speaker
also added that it is about “overcoming the conflicts to
build a peaceful unity, respecting human rights, paying attention to the
responsibility to remember, and making peace with one’s own
history.” Meanwhile, the French Parliament approved the so-called genocide
bill in 2001, which led to a long break in Turkey-France
relations.
The French delegation will hold meetings in Istanbul and Ankara during their
visit which was realized with the support of French President Jacques
Chirac. The delegation will meet with Turkish President Ahmet Necdet Sezer,
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Speaker of the Turkish Parliament
Bulent Arinc and Chief of the
General Stuff Hilmi Ozkok. The parliamentary delegation will also meet with
representatives of the Turkey Industrialists and Businessmen Association
(TUSIAD) and visit Galatasaray University in Istanbul on Saturday (February
5).
There is a strong Armenian lobbying group in France and makes effort to
shift French policies towards Turkey. The Armenian diaspora organizations
organize campaigns in order to undermine Turkey’s EU membership.
Source: Zaman and JTW, 4 February 2005
Turkey France and Armenian Issue
2005-02-04 08:34:37