Author: Vanyan Gary

Agence France Presse — English
September 22, 2004 Wednesday 2:28 AM GMT
Europe rendezvous: Art without borders for cultural impresario
STRASBOURG
As Europe forges ever tighter bonds, Dimitri Konstantinidis, whose
vocation makes him the embodiment of a European art without borders,
seems to have been constantly one step ahead.
“I am Greek, and also French from Alsace, but I feel equally at home
in Prague or anywhere else,” says the cultural impresario, and points
— almost accidentally — to his background to prove it.
Born at Kavala, on the Aegean Sea’s northern shore, with Turkey to
the east and the Balkan patchwork of nations to the north, he has
always seen borders as something you cross.
What then could be more natural for this former student of art
history than to settle in the border city of Strasbourg, itself a
cultural crossroads, and create Apollonia, the association of
European contemporary art?
“The urge to travel, to see what’s happening in the next field, came
to me young,” he said. “The chance to move on came when I was a
student, and I took it.”
The Soviet Union seemed to beckon — he was developing an interest in
Byzantine art — but in 1979, aged 19, he opted finally for eastern
France, partly on the recommendation of a Greek friend who was
already living there.
There, working for a regional cultural association while preparing a
doctorate on “the spatial concept in fifth and sixth century icons”,
he found himself rubbing shoulders “with lots of immigrants from
Poland, Italy and Portugal.”
>From a modest background, he could see “nothing cosmopolitan” about
his origins — but then recalled that his family hailed from Trabzon,
the eastern Turkish port city formerly called Trebizonde, “where
Greeks, Turks and Armenians used to live happily together” until
nationalist pressures led to the population exchanges of the 1920s.
Called upon to organise exhibitions of contemporary art, it was to
eastern Europe that he turned for inspiration, ingoring the Berlin
Wall which at that time still divided Europe into antagonist blocs.
Following a two-year break to do his military service in Greece —
“so as not to cut myself off from my country” — he was selected to
head Alsace’s Regional Contemporary Art Fund (FRAC).
Created in 1983, the body was set up to collect works of contemporary
art, largely for educational purposes.
“I realised that Alsace, and Strasbourg, because of their
geographical situation and the presence of the European institutions,
had a particular role to play. I thought I had to do something,” he
said.
This “something” took the form of an “inventory of contemporary
culture of the Eastern European states,” a project funded by the
Council of Europe (one of several European bodies located in
Strasbourg) and featuring 250 artists from 17 countries in a series
of exhibitions.
Not all local deputies were enamoured of Konstantinidis’ efforts to
give the FRAC a “European dimension”, and in 1989 he left to create
his own association, Apollonia, as a “platform for European artistic
exchanges” with a strong focus on central and eastern Europe, the
Balkans and the southern Caucasus.
Since then Konstantinidis has been crossing borders to his heart’s
content, travelling from one country to another to seek out artists
whose works can be exhibited in Strasbourg and elsewhere.
Apollonia’s current show is representative, a collection of
contemporary Polish work themed around “the quest for identity” and
scheduled to travel on to Greece and Poland.
To facilitate cross-border initiatives of this kind, Konstantinidis
is pushing for the creation of a common status for associations that
would harmonise their administrative situation throughout the EU and
“promote cultural pluralism in Europe.”

RIA Novosti, Russia
Sept 22 2004
ARMENIA TO SEND DOCTORS & ENGINEERS TO IRAQ: FOREIGN MINISTER
YEREVAN, September 22 (RIA Novosti’s Hamlet Matevosyan) – Armenia is
willing to send military doctors and engineers to Iraq-but not before
parliament debates and approves the prospect, Vardan Oskanyan,
Minister of Foreign Affairs, said to the media.
Presidents Robert Kocharyan of Armenia and Aleksander Kwasniewski of
Poland signed a bilateral security cooperation agreement, September
6. It envisages an Armenian contingent of fifty-doctors, engineers
and drivers-dispatched to Iraq toward this year’s end or early next
year, to join Polish-commanded coalition troops.
The Armenian government determined to have a contingent in Iraq as
“Armenia feels part and parcel of Europe, however small and remote
from [a greater part of] Europe it may be,” said Serge Sarkisyan,
Defence Minister.
The Communist and Democratic parties are offering bitter opposition,
and qualify the prospect as “a dangerous headlong move”.
The government decision clashes with Armenia’s national interests and
undermines its security. Endangered the worst will be a 25,000 strong
Armenian ethnic community in Iraq, and all ethnic Armenians resident
in other Muslim countries, argue Democrats.
The Dashnaktsutyun political party, on the coalition in office, is
also alarmed with the decision to have an Armenian contingent in
Iraq.
The Armenian-Polish agreement is now for the National Assembly,
Armenian parliament, to ratify. The chance to dispatch peacekeepers
will soon come up for debates, says Speaker Arthur Bagdasaryan. The
matter concerns only a small force-by no means a large contingent, he
reassures.

ANSA Notiziario Generale in Italiano
September 19, 2004
UE: PRODI IN ARMENIA, SPINGERE AVANTI PROCESSO RIFORME ;
ULTIMA GIORNATA DI VISITA REGIONI CAUCASO DEL SUD
BRUXELLES
(ANSA) – BRUXELLES, 19 SET – Nella sua ultima giornata di
visita nelle tre regioni del sud del Caucaso, la prima mai
compiuta da un presidente della Commissione Ue, Romano Prodi ha
invitato l’Armenia ad accelerare l’attuazione di riforme, cosi
come aveva gia’ fatto verso l’Azerbaijan e la Georgia.

“Molto resta da fare per promuovere la democrazia, i diritti
umani e lo Stato di diritto, consolidare le fondamenta per
un’economia di mercato e, soprattutto, risolvere i conflitti
nella regione”, ha detto Prodi, in un discorso pronunciato
davanti a studenti e rappresentanti della societa’ civile
armena, il cui testo e’ stato diffuso a Bruxelles.

Prodi ha ricordato la decisione presa in giugno dal vertice
Ue di invitare l’Armenia, la Georgia e l’Azerbaijan ad aderire
al programma di ‘politica europea di buon vicinato’, destinato a
gettare dei ponti tra l’Ue allargata e i suoi vicini.

La Commissione Ue sta ora preparando un rapporto sulla
situazione dei tre paesi. “Alla fine di quest’anno – ha detto
Prodi – dovremmo avere fatto progressi sostanziali nella
valutazione dei tre paesi della regione”. Il rapporto giochera
“un ruolo chiave” nel definire il piano di azione di Bruxelles
verso ciascun paese. “Pertanto raccomando fortemente l’Armenia
di preparare il terreno per una decisione positiva, facendo fare
al processo di riforme sostanziali passi in avanti nei prossimi
mesi”, ha affermato il presidente. (ANSA).

CUT TREES BUT SELECTIVELY
Azat Artsakh – Nagorno Karabakh Republic (NKR)
20 Sept 04
It happened so that I went to the village post office to make a call
at midnight. On my way I saw several lorries `Ural’ passing through
the central street of the village. All of them were carrying timber in
which I got certain noticing the white circles of logs shining white
under the light of the street lamps. Why carry them at night? The
first person with whom I shared my anxiety was the mayor of the
village. He did not know who does illegal tree felling. But he stated
that several people turned to him for permit to cut the nut trees
belonging to the community. The community council decided to forbid
felling of nut trees belonging to the village community. The community
of the village Togh used the right for ownership and forbade the
felling of nut trees. It is not easy to find out the situation in the
other communities of the country, however, certain work has been done
already. From July 10 to November 1 of 2003 the temporary commission
of the parliament (chairman Karen Adamian, members Maxim Mirzoyan,
Ararat Petrossian, Souren Sarghissian) checked tree felling in the
territory of NKR for legality, and especially felling of the rare and
expensive kinds of trees included in the Red Book. Of special interest
are the conclusion of the commission and the suggestions (during the
checking illegal cases of tree cutting were also revealed). `The
felling of the mentioned kinds of trees was done according to the
order maintained by the NKR government. However, the legislative
regulations for the sphere need further elaboration and accomplishment.’
The conclusion of the commission dwells on the following problems: `a)
there is no Red Book of NKR regulating the sphere, b) in the package
of legislative acts there are no rules for the felling of timber, c)
absence of inventory, mapping and monitoring of forest, enabling to
maintain the kinds and age of trees, situation, the qualitative and
quantitative characteristics of the forest, which does not favour the
effective implementation of legislative acts, d) the distribution of
the special state agencies charged for protection, reproduction and
use of forests and their rights and duties are not clearly regulated.’
The commission suggests the NKR government: a) confirming the Red Book
of NKR and working out the regulations of the NKR Red Book in the
section of forest flora, b) maintain the `Rules of Tree Felling’, c)
maintain state bodies specially charged with protection and
reproduction of forests distributing clearly their rights and
duties’.
The commission also suggests creating an agency for state protection
and maintaining the order of its activities, regulating the activity
of the forest cadastre and state registration of the forest resources,
publish the results regularly, starting with 2004 maintaining the
quota on tree felling, charge the responsible bodies with checking the
permit for correspondence with the number of the cut trees and the
sums paid to the community for tree felling, working out the main
directions of the strategy of forestry policy for 2004-2010. The head
of the department of nature protection G. Grigorian to whom we turned
to for information on the situation of forests, did not hide that the
problem is very serious. Moreover, he is sure that illegal tree
cutting will continue as the control over tree felling is exercised by
the same body which carries out tree felling. Besides, in NKR the
price for timber is several times lower than in Armenia (which is the
case in other spheres of trade as well), and as soon as the prices are
not equal there will be no end to the `hunters’ for cheap
timber. According to G. Grigorian, the problem will be solved if the
function of control is transferred to the NKR State Department of
Environment and Protection of Natural Resources which is, actually,
supposed to carry out this function. The NKR Minister of Agriculture
B. Bakhshiyan does not fully share this opinion. According to him, the
price for timber in NKR should be lower than in Armenia because the
condition of roads is bad and transporting ti mber from one place to
another costs more than in Armenia. And if the prices become equal, we
will never attract any businessman in this sphere. According to
Mr. Bakhshiyan, the wood working companies simply save the forests of
Karabakh where in the last 10 years no felling was carried out, and
therefore there is a large number of trees which need to be felled. He
agreed to G. Grigorian that the function of controlling tree felling
should be carried out by the department of environment and nature
protection, although he thinks that the situation will not change much
as there are no serious violations in the sphere. In reference to
legal felling, the amount of timber is far less than the demand (to
compare, in 2003 20 thousand cubic meters of oak, 16 thousand cubic
meters of beech and 5 thousand cubic meters of other kinds of timber
was demanded. The government permitted to fell 7 thousand cubic meters
of oak, 6700 thousand cubic meters of beech and 1,7 thousand cubic
meters of other kinds of timber). Besides, the amount permitted is
reducing year by year (in 2004 the government permitted to fell 3
thousand cubic meters of oak, 4 thousand cubic meters of beech and 800
cubic meters of other kinds of timber. During six months 1400 cubic
meters of oak, 1000 cubic meters of beech and 41 cubic meters of other
kinds of timber was felled). And nevertheless there is reason for
worry. There is danger in felling the same kinds of trees every
year. The qualitative change of the forest worries the minister of
agriculture as well. What is more, the number of expensive kinds of
trees is decreasing because of diseases rather than felling because,
according to the minister, there are no specialists in the republic.
The head of the department for environment and nature protection
G. Grigorian also stated that in the republic there are no specialists
of geology, mapping, forestry. Is the top leadership of the country
aware of the problem? Maybe we should send young people to Russia,
Germany (where these specialties are highly developed) to study?
Presently it is impossible to implement an important work such as
forest mapping because of the lack of specialists, which was last time
done in 1980. And at last the question whether in the past 15 years
any trees were planted in NKR nurseries or forests. It turns out that
there were attempts which failed. Instead of the three nurseries
working in NKR in soviet times now there will be only one in
Stepanakert. According to the minister of agriculture, next year it is
planned to provide 25 million drams for tree planting instead of 3 or
5 millions of previous years. According to G. Grigorian, when there
were three nurseries in Karabakh (in Martakert, Hadrout and
Stepanakert) only in the state forest resources 250 hectares of forest
was planted. Besides, another 150 hectares of forest was planted in
the collective farms. Such kinds of trees as peer, cypress, maple,
Greek oak, etc, on the verge of extinction need to be protected by the
law (there is the government decision at least on this matter). And if
expensive kinds of trees are to be cut, felling should be done in a
correct way, selectively. Otherwise, we deprive ourselves of the right
to be considered a civilized nation.
SUSANNA BALAYAN.
20-09-2004

Azeri, Armenian leaders vow to keep up talks on envlave stand-off
Agence France Presse — English
September 16, 2004 Thursday 7:31 AM GMT
ASTANA Sept 16 — The presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan on Thursday
promised to keep up dialogue on the bitter stand-off between their
countries over the enclave of Nagorno-Karabach.
Presidents Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan and Robert Kocharian of Armenia
held more than three hours of late-night talks in the Kazakh capital
mediated by Russia’s President Vladimir Putin, but gave few clues as
to what had passed between them.
“We need time — the president of Azerbaijan knows our position
more concretely — the process is continuing in a constructive way,”
Kocharian said at a joint news conference with Aliyev.
“Further development can resolve this question — we discussed various
questions on the path to a resolution,” Aliyev said.
Aliyev had earlier stressed the importance of Thursday’s talks over
the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, which saw the two neighbours fight a
war in the early 1990s and which remains unresolved.
Aliyev has faced calls in his home country to take a bolder stand
on the Nagorno-Karabakh enclave and the thousands of Azeris who have
fled the disputed area.
International mediators had been urging face-to-face meetings between
the two sides, which had faltered during the transition of power in
Azerbaijan from Aliyev’s father Heidar.
In the early 1990s ethnic Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh, a mountainous
territory wedged between Armenia and Azerbaijan, declared their
independence from Azeri rule.
A war followed in which the separatists, with help from Armenia, forced
out Azeri troops and took de facto control of the enclave. The war left
about 30,000 people dead and forced over a million to flee their homes.
Though a ceasefire was signed in 1994, the war has never been
declared over and Azerbaijan has repeatedly threatened to use force
to re-establish its control over Nagorno-Karabakh.

NORTHERN AVENUE RESIDENTS KEEP PROTESTING
A1 Plus | 17:06:28 | 16-09-2004 | Social |
Residents of Yerevan’s Northern Avenue gathered Thursday in front
of the City Hall entrance saying they had been driven from their
apartments and demanding higher compensation for their eviction.
The people were driven from their homes because their apartments were
due to be pulled down for Northern Avenue construction.
They say the authorities don’t give passports to the children reached
16 and don’t register those young men returning home after completing
their compulsory national service duties in order to leave them
without due money.
All protesters say they were duped. They intend to keep struggling. In
their words, their last resort will be collective appeal to foreign
embassies for asylum.

PRESS RELEASE
Armenian National Committee
San Francisco – Bay Area
51 Commonwealth Avenue
San Francisco, CA 94118
Tel: (415) 387-3433
Fax: (415) 751-0617
[email protected]_ (mailto:[email protected])
_www.ancsf.org_ ()
_www.teachgenocide.org_ ()
Contact: Roxanne Makasdjian (415) 641-0525
ARMENIAN-AMERICANS JOIN “SUDAN: DAY OF CONSCIENCE” IN SAN FRANCISCO
San Francisco, CA August 25, 2004 â^À^Ó Armenian-American community members
joined hands with others at San Franciscoâ^À^Ùs Civic Center to raise public
awareness about continuing massacres in Sudan. The event, called â^À^ÜSudan:
Day of
Conscienceâ^À^Ý was organized by the Save Darfur Coalition in tandem with
several
other organizations, including the Bay Area Armenian National Committee, the
Interfaith Council, Human Rights Watch, the Jewish Community Relations, and
the
United Muslims of America. Local Armenian priests from the St. Gregory and
St. John churches also participated it the rally.
In light of the escalating violence and the looming threat of genocide in
Sudan, representatives spoke about the desperate need for united action on all
levelsâ^À^Ôregionally, statewide, nationwide, and globally. Referring to the
recent past, they illustrated the destructiveness of international blindness
to
gross violations of human rights. It was only ten years ago that the genocide
in Rwanda took the lives of 800,000 victims as the world stood idly by
despite the many warning signs of the atrocities. In Sudan, government-backed
Arab
militias, known as the Janjaweed, have been engaging in campaigns to
displace and wipe out entire communities of African tribal farmers. Witnesses
report
that villages have been razed, women and girls are systematically raped and
branded, men and boys murdered, and food and water supplies specifically
targeted and destroyed. There have also been reports of government aerial
bombardments of explosives as well as barrels of nails, car chassis and old
appliances hurled from planes to crush people and property. Over fifty
thousand have died and over a million have been driven from their homes.
Only in
the past few weeks have humanitarian agencies had limited access to a
portion of the affected region.
Representing the ANC, Haig Baghdassarian spoke to the several hundred people
gathered about the Armenian Genocide and traced the bloody history of the
20th century, pointing to the genocides which followed and condemning
international reluctance to take action. “When will we learn that we cannot
tolerate
this to happen time and time again? Perhaps not until, we as Americans, can
tell our Turkish allies, that although we may be friends, we will not allow
them to deny history and escape with impunity for the murder of a nation. And
perhaps, not until, we as Americans can come to terms with our own bloody
past â^À^Ó and the destruction of the indigenous peoples of America.”
“But these noble goals may take years or even decades to achieve, and we
cannot stand by and watch yet another genocide occur, whether itâ^À^Ùs in
central
Europe or in the heart of Africa, or on the very periphery of human
civilization,” said Bagdassarian
Reverend Father Avedis Torossian, pastor of St. Gregory Armenian Apostolic
Church, and Reverend Father Sarkis Petoyan, pastor of St. John Armenian
Apostolic Church were also present to express their solidarity with the “Sudan:
Day
of Conscience”. The peaceful collaboration of the representatives of the
Armenian community with those of the Jewish, Cambodian, and Rwandan
communities
demonstrated how the one common aspect of these groupsâ^À^Ù histories can
unite
them in trying to prevent genocide from becoming a dark chapter in the lives
and history of another people.
#####

Pilots not in EG ‘for health’
By Mariam Harutunian
News24 , South Africa
Sept 14 2004
Yerevan – The Armenian aircrew on trial in Equatorial Guinea on charges
of plotting a coup are guilty of nothing more serious than trying to
support their families, according to relatives waiting anxiously back
home in their former Soviet republic.
The six Armenians were among some 90 suspected mercenaries hauled
in across Africa and charged with plotting to overthrow Equatorial
Guinea’s President Teodoro Obiang Nguema.
But their families say the six are just innocent airmen who were
unwittingly sucked into the affair when – facing unemployment and
hardship at home – they signed up for work flying shipments of freight
around Africa.
“Our husbands are not fortune-seekers and are not coup plotters,”
Agunik Abazian, wife of jailed flight engineer Razmik Khachatrian,
said from her home in the Armenian capital, Yerevan.
Since March her 52-year-old husband, along with his five colleagues,
has been languishing in the notorious Black Beach jail in Equatorial
Guinea’s capital, Malabo.
The Armenians are caught up in what prosecutors say was an audacious
plot to replace President Obiang, who has ruled his oil-rich republic
in west Africa since 1979, with exiled opposition leader Severo Moto.
The Armenian aircrew are alleged to have been part of an advanced
party stationed in Malabo to await the arrival of the main force
of mercenaries.
They are being held in Malabo along with 13 other men from South
Africa and Equatorial Guinea.
The Armenian aircrew in jail in Equatorial Guinea are from a modest
background, say their families.
The average monthly wage is less than R350. Many doctors and university
lecturers make ends meet by driving taxis or selling cigarettes.
Armenia’s struggling national airline has sacked dozens of pilots
and flight crew.
“Our husbands are highly-qualified specialists, but like many good
pilots today in Armenia, they found themselves without any work,”
said Abazian, who has two children.
“Therefore they were forced to search for work far from home. They
certainly did not set out for Africa for the sake of their health.”
The six men are employed by Tiger Air, an Armenian firm which leased
the crew and their Antonov-12 cargo plane to customers in Africa.
They arrived in Malabo in January this year.
Between then and their arrest, they flew once, to the Democratic
Republic of Congo, but returned with the hold empty, the men told a
court hearing.
Abazian said that with the help of the Red Cross, the families in
Armenia had been able to speak by telephone to the men in jail.
She said she spoke to her husband for just one minute, but he said
he was healthy, and that he was innocent.
Armenia’s ambassador to Egypt, Sergei Manassarian, has visited the
aircrew at the prison in Malabo.
He said: “My meetings and contacts in Malabo have strengthened my
conviction that our pilots are innocent and that they wil be released
in the near future.”

Azeri envoy says cancellation of Baku war games not to affect ties with NATO
MPA news agency
14 Sep 04
Baku, 14 September: The USA welcomes NATO’s decision to cancel the
Cooperative Best Effort 2004 exercises that were due to be held in
Baku as part of the Partnership for Peace programme, a representative
of the US State Department has said.
He said America regretted very much the decision to deny Armenian
officers entry visas.
Commenting on the statement by the State Department representative,
the Azerbaijani ambassador to the USA, Hafiz Pasayev, said that
“unfortunately, America, a country co-chairing the OSCE Minsk Group,
did not take into account the position of the Azerbaijani public on
the Armenian issue and the possibilities for a peaceful solution
to the Karabakh conflict”. The diplomat said the cancellation of
the exercises would not damage Azerbaijan’s long-term cooperation
programme with the alliance.

Russian Railways appeals to countries in Caucasus to unblock railroads
RosBusinessConsulting, Russia
Sept 10 2004
RBC, 10.09.2004, Sukhumi 18:25:13.Russian Railways has appealed
to politicians in the countries of the Caucasus to make a decision
to unblock the railroads in the region, Russian Railways President
Gennady Fadeyev declared at the opening of regular service on the
Sukhumi-Moscow route. According to him, the railroads in Abkhazia
had been out of use over the previous 12 years, which has resulted in
a decrease in the volume of passenger and freight transportation to
Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan, causing losses reaching billions of
dollars. “Economic development of any country is impossible without
the development of railway services, as transportation by rail is
the cheapest way to deliver freight,” Fadeyev pointed out.
Only passenger services have so far been opened on the Sukhumi-Moscow
route. However, talks are being held with the government of Abkhazia
to resume freight transportation in 2005. Fadeyev remarked that 18
trains a day used to go via Sukhumi in both directions before 1992.