Author: Vorskanian Yeghisabet

IS SERGE SARGSYAN LESS PREPARED THAN DASHNAKTSUTYUN

Lragir.am
21-09-2007 14:48:32

On the holiday of September 21 Member of Parliament General
Aghabekyan, ARF Dashnaktsutyun, ex-deputy minister of defense, made a
working statement in a news conference at the Hayatsk press club. He
said considering the situation in the region, the possible
developments, aware of the challenges he thinks that only an Armenian
president from Dashnaktsutyun may meet these challenges.

"The challenges, the problems we are facing today, Armenia must meet,
we think only a president from the ARF Dashnaktsutyun is able to meet
these challenges," Arthur Aghabekyan says, noting that he is convinced
of what he is telling. "A person is telling you this who spent three
days at the Square of Freedom in 1988 and realized that there would be
a war in Nagorno-Karabakh. I quit everything, science, cozy life, and
returned to Nagorno-Karabakh", adding that "every member of
Dashnaktsutyun suffers from this disease." "And very soon a large part
of the society will catch this disease that only a president from
Dashnaktsutyun may meet the challenges," Arthur Aghabekyan says.

His words give rise to a logical question. Arthur Aghabekyan has
worked under the supervision of a person who was defense minister, now
is prime minister and wants to be president of Armenia. Does Arthur
Aghabekyan think that as president Serge Sargsyan will not be able to
meet the challenges? In answer to this question of Lragir.am Arthur
Aghabekyan says they have been collaborating with Serge Sargsyan since
the beginning of the war, together they made a lot of decisions, and
were sure those were the right decisions." "The result was the
victory. When I was the deputy minister of defense, we had a closer
cooperation. He was not only my supervisor, we shared our past, and in
discussing questions I was always able to express my point of view,"
Arthur Aghabekyan says, in fact, emphasizing his independence. He says
he has noted earlier that it is going to be difficult to persuade
people that it is an alternative but he also thinks Dashnaktsutyun can
prove there is no alternative to it.

As to the question if Serge Sargsyan is prepared or not, Arthur
Aghabekyan thinks it is important that people elect the president,
independent from who the president is. "If the representatives of the
political forces running in the election, or the presidential
candidates acknowledge and make a phone call or shake hands with the
president elect and congratulate, the climate in the country will
change right away, there will be mutual congratulations. In this
connection, we need a presidential election, and the president who
will be elected must be the president of all the people and not part
of the people. It is not acceptable considering today’s situation,
because I know we are going to face lots of problems," Arthur
Aghabekyan says. He says Dashnaktsutyun will cooperate with every
elected president who will get the vote of people, even if this
president is Levon Ter-Petrosyan. Arthur Aghabekyan said if in the
second round Serge Sargsyan and Ter-Petrosyan run for presidency, he
has already made his choice.

He said Dashnaktsutyun is going to impart the election process with a
new quality and is reluctant to wage a war with any force. Although
Arthur Aghabekyan also says the response to the accusations against
Dashnaktsutyun will come right away.

"Most importantly, this time we will put up a team which will fulfill
its pledges. Each member of this team, each representing a sphere,
will be ready for a discussion with the team of another party," Arthur
Aghabekyan says. According to him, Dashnaktsutyun’s intentions are not
false, and the party’s decision to run in the election is the result
of serious consideration.

Panorama.am

19:09 21/09/2007

Prime Minister: Tomorrow’s Armenia will be better than
today’s

This morning, on the occasion of Armenian Independence
Day, everyone from the government went to Yerablur,
including the president, prime minister, the president
of Karabakh, the Catholicos of all Armenians,
ministers, and other officials. They all paid their
respects to the memory of the fallen freedom fighters
at the cemetery. "I offer my congratulations on the
occasion of this independence day. I wish this holiday
to remain eternal, that the Armenian people celebrate
this holiday for 1,000 years," Serge Sargsyan said to
journalists during an interview. To the question as to
what was being done to strengthen the country’s
independence, he said that it was difficult to go into
details during the holiday, as to what the government
was doing to become stronger and develop. "But
progress does exist, which makes it possible to say
that tomorrow’s Armenia will be better than today’s,"
the prime minister underlined, adding, "we will be
better able to talk about this question after the
government presents the 2008 budget to the National
Assembly. The budget is a very exact document, which
when reading the numbers, is very impressive." To the
journalists curiousity about his opinion about the new
government in Karabakh, he said that time would have
to pass so that it could be seen how well that
government works, and since the new government was
just formed, it would take three-four months to form a
solid opinion. "As always, though, our opinion about
Karabakh’s government will be positive," the prime
minister said, adding, "What do you want me to say? Do
you want me to say that we are assisting, cooperating?
It would be an understatement to talk about that, as
Karabakh is a leading issue for us. In any event, the
population of Karabakh can be confident that all
changes taking place in Armenia can affect their
social condition only in a positive way."

Source: Panorama.am

Foreign Policy In Focus

The Art of Anti-War
Foreign Policy In Focus

John Feffer | September 21, 2007
Editor: Debayani Kar

The future has arrived, but the Futurists didn’t make it.

In the early part of the 20th century, the Futurist movement of
artists in Italy, led by Filippo Marinetti, glorified war as a dynamic
organizing principle for their art work. If art was about energy – and
the raw power of the modern machine age — where could you find more
energy and concentrated machinery than on the battlefield? Art, they
proclaimed in their manifesto, `can be nothing but violence, cruelty,
and injustice.’ Marinetti and his war-worshipping Futurists easily
fell in with Mussolini and the fascists. But, after Nuremburg, few
artists have followed their lead.

This month, at the Istanbul Biennale, the future has arrived in the
form of a very different kind of art. The curator of the Istanbul
show, Hou Hanru of China, begins his exhibition catalogue with an
unadorned statement: `We are living at a time of global wars.’ The
rest of the introduction reads like the agenda of the World Social
Forum. `Most of these wars, conflicts and clashes take place in the
developing world,’ Hou continues. `The centre of the Empire has
ruthlessly exported violence to other parts of the world.’

This narrative does not refer to any specific wars such as Iraq or
Afghanistan. Nor does it suggest anything that might offend the
Turkish hosts of the event, such as Ankara’s preparations for a
possible cross-border incursion against separatist Kurds operating in
the Kurdish area of northern Iraq. Still, the art at the Biennale does
not pull any punches. In the same way that war represented an ideal
organizing principle for the Futurists, anti-war serves a similar
purpose for the Biennale curator and many of the artists that he
selected for the exhibition.

The Istanbul show does not focus exclusively on the issue of war. One
venue, the Textile Traders’ Market, is a complex of classic modernist
buildings designed to promote Turkey’s role as a global economic
crossroads and to update the ancient chaos of the Grand Bazaar
nearby. Another exhibition installed at the Ataturk Cultural Center, a
ravishingly ugly modernist edifice once symbolizing Turkey’s model
ascendancy to world-class nation status, focuses on the failed promise
of utopian architecture.

Nevertheless, some of the most interesting art at the Biennale engages
questions of violence, militarism, and the creativity that arises from
conflict. But a question lingers over the show: does all this anti-war
art add up to a movement that can rival or even replace the Futurists?

Creative Conflict
Much of the anti-war art of the Istanbul Biennale directly comments on
the Turkish experience. Perhaps the most controversial contribution
comes from Canadian-Armenian filmmaker Atom Egoyan, whose powerful
2002 film on the Armenian genocide, Ararat, was also shown as part of
the Biennale.

In his original contribution to the exhibition, Egoyan offers an eerie
reimagining of the life of Aurora Mardiganian, an Armenian teenager
who survived the mass slaughter of her people in Turkey in the early
part of the 20th century. She eventually made it to the United States
where she tried to find her brother, the only other surviving member
of her family. Her story was compelling enough for the early motion
picture industry to dramatize in the 1919 film Auction of Souls, which
turned out to be an early blockbuster. Unable to reconcile the
tragedy of her life with her newfound fame, Mardiganian went AWOL from
the promotional tour before it even began, and the film company hired
seven look-alikes to fill her shoes. In Egoyan’s short film, Aurora,
seven women read portions of Mardiganian’s life, describing the events
leading up to the killing of her mother. In the same space is another
short film, by Turkish video artist Kutlug Ataman, about his Armenian
nanny who can’t recall a key event from her own life. Both films are
painful, slow, horrific, and convey the unalluring reality of the
violence that the Futurists so fetishized.

Construction Site by Huang Yong Ping. Photo by John Feffer
Chinese artist Huang Yong Ping also takes up the challenge of engaging
Turkish life and culture by turning the top of a minaret at an angle
and enclosing it in a cloth fence. Tilted upward, the minaret looks
like an anti-aircraft gun, thus echoing a famous Turkish poem by Ziya
Gokalp (`The mosques are our barracks, the domes our helmets, the
minarets our bayonets, and the faithful our soldiers.’ ). Surrounded
by a cloth fence, the minaret is enclosed as if by a headscarf that
both conceals and reveals.

In Scary Asian Men, Turkish artist Banu Cennetoglu takes what
resembles surveillance photographs of Turkish men. They are small
figures in unremarkable landscapes, relaxing or talking beside the
road that connects the Asian part of Istanbul with the European
part. Turkey is a candidate for membership in the European Union, but
several Western European government leaders have expressed doubts
about including a predominantly Muslim country in the grand European
project. As Cennetoglu suggests, the European governments have
projected their long-held fears of violent Asian men – Ottomans, Huns,
Mongols – onto the unarmed, benign figures of Turkish workers and
peasants.

A Friendly Fire Poster by Jonathan Barnbrook. Photo by John Feffer
Sometimes the Biennale art is quite graphic in its depiction of
violence. Britain’s Jonathan Barnbrook has designed posters that would
not look out of place at an anti-war rally, though their content is
somewhat more ambiguous. The mandala-like cycle of violence depicted
in one poster, of a symbolic Moslem shooting a symbolic Jew shooting a
symbolic Moslem and so forth around in a circle, refuses to assign
primary responsibility to either side in the conflict. Pakistani
Hamra Abbas sculpts life-sized figures in imaginative sexual positions
from the Kama Sutra, and yet the men wield weapons. The AES Group, the
initials formed from the last names of three Russian artists,
contribute a long, mural-like composition, Last Riot, that depicts
hyper-realistic young people of various ethnicities in a kind of
apocalyptic Benetton billboard. The girls and boys in battle fatigues
are on the verge of choking each other, stabbing themselves hara-kiri
style, and clubbing their younger charges and small animals, all
against a montage of recognizable urban landscapes. Their faces reveal
not anger or bloodlust, but merely bored resignation, as if playing a
video game.

Finally, perhaps most subversively, there are the two large plastic
Coke bottles, taped together and fitted with what looks like a timer,
flashing ominously. This homemade Coke bomb sits hidden beneath a
staircase inside the gallery space. There is no nearby label to take
the sting out of the intervention by giving it a name, assigning it to
an artist, or otherwise enclosing it in a safe package called `art.’
It is anonymous, has clear links to the United States and the global
economy, and might go off at any time – to destroy itself and the
Biennale. In security-conscious Istanbul, where political violence is
a recent memory if not a present reality, and in a world where we are
constantly reminded that terrorism is no joking matter, this Coke bomb
is pure effrontery.

Where are the Anti-Futurists?
The Futurists are gone, and no anti-Futurists have taken their
place. Dada briefly coalesced around a group of artists disgusted with
World War I, and some of their art reflected their anti-war
sentiments. But although quite a few artists have taken clear anti-war
positions in their art, no art movement has taken so passionately to
the principle of anti-war as the Futurists once did to war. There are
several reasons for this vacuum. Manifestos are rare in this day and
age. Artists are reluctant to launch world movements. And didacticism
is only intermittently popular in an art world so thoroughly soaked in
irony.

RGB’s War by Porntaweesak Rimsakul. Photo by John Feffer
But there is another explanation as well. In the Biennale installation
RGB’s War, Thai artist Porntaweesak Rimsakul sets up remote-controlled
vehicles topped by army helmets that collide with each other and with
tiny houses filled with the primary colors. From this battlefield
emerges a work of abstract expressionism. The very act of painting
depends on the collision of colors and the use of machines like
brushes reinforces the essential point of the Futurists. Perhaps art
does in fact arise out of conflict, and artists are as fascinated by
technology today as they were in Marinetti’s time.

Indeed, many of the anti-war artists rely on the power of violence to
drive home their points. The Biennale is full of guns, missiles, and
bombs. All of this deadly hardware is alluring, even if the weaponry
is deployed for anti-war purposes. The Futurists may well be dead. But
as long as war and violence continue to hold such sway over our
imaginations, the Futurist ideology will live on in some small way
within us.

John Feffer is co-director of Foreign Policy In Focus
() at the Institute for Policy Studies
().

Boston Globe, United States

Episcopal bishops, archbishop seek a middle ground

Queries, comment offered on issue of gay clerics

The Archbishop of Canterbury during a visit to All Souls Church in New
Orleans yesterday.

By Michael Paulson, Globe Staff | September 21, 2007

NEW ORLEANS – Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, in a last-ditch
effort to avoid a schism in the global Anglican Communion, spent seven
hours yesterday holed up in a posh New Orleans hotel with most of the
nation’s Episcopal bishops, many of whom tried to persuade him that it
is a mistake to define the American church solely by its decision four
years ago to approve an openly gay priest as bishop of New Hampshire.

The unusual conversation took place just days before a Sept. 30
deadline, set by leaders of Anglican provinces around the world, for
the American church to back away from its support for gay rights or
face some unspecified form of punishment. US bishops spent yesterday
morning telling the archbishop how they see the church in the United
States, and the archbishop spent the afternoon asking them questions.

The meetings, which resume today, were closed to reporters, but
participants described them as cordial but pointed. Williams was
scheduled to meet with the bishops again this morning and then to
depart for Armenia; next week, the bishops were expected to decide
whether they are willing to explicitly promise not to approve any more
gay bishops or a blessing rite for same-sex couples, the actions
requested by the foreign Anglican leaders.

Despite deep disagreements among the bishops over theology and
increasing dissatisfaction among some Episcopalians with the Anglican
Communion, none of the 159 bishops in attendance spoke in favor of
walking away from the communion, which is a 77-million member global
coalition of regional churches that trace their roots to the
Reformation and the Church of England.

"The conversation today . . . reflected a passionate commitment to the
vitality of the life of, and ministry of, both the Episcopal Church
and to the Anglican Communion," Bishop Robert O’Neill of Colorado, who
began his career as a priest in Winchester, Mass., said at a press
briefing.

Bishop M. Thomas Shaw of Massachusetts said that he told Williams that
gay rights issues should not depend on approval from the majority of
the Anglican Communion, but urged Williams to recognize that gay
rights supporters, such as Shaw, believe they are acting in a
prophetic way.

"There are certain times in history when you simply have to act – the
majority isn’t going to do it," Shaw said in an interview. "Speaking
truth isn’t just liberal thinking, but it’s something that has a deep
place in biblical literature, in the life of Jesus and the prophets."

Shaw said he also told Williams that it is difficult to seek consensus
in the American church "when these American bishops are going to
Africa and making promises and playing on the fears of the African
church."

Shaw was referring to the fact that Anglican leaders in Kenya,
Nigeria, Rwanda, and Uganda have consecrated American priests,
including the Rev. William Murdoch of Massachusetts, as bishops to
minister to the alienated conservative minority in the United States
who no longer feel comfortable in the Episcopal Church.

The Anglican Communion has been facing the possibility of schism since
2003, when the Episcopal Church approved as the bishop of New
Hampshire the Rev. V. Gene Robinson, who is openly gay and lives with
his longtime partner. The approval, which conservatives said violated
the Bible’s teachings on homosexuality, exacerbated long-developing
tensions over the liberal direction of the Episcopal Church.

The bishops in attendance are so divided that they are not all staying
in the same hotel. The official meeting hotel is the InterContinental,
but Bishop Robert Duncan of Pittsburgh, the leader of the wing of the
church most upset by the Robinson consecration, is staying down the
block at the Parc St. Charles with a handful of other conservatives.

Even though the House of Bishops meeting is scheduled to run through
Tuesday, some conservative bishops are planning to walk out today, as
soon as the archbishop of Canterbury is gone. The conservatives,
including people who have left the Episcopal Church as well as those
who have remained, are planning their own meeting in Pittsburgh next
week to figure out how they might organize themselves outside of the
Episcopal Church.

Hoping to head off one proposal – a two-tiered Anglican Communion in
which the Episcopal Church would have some kind of lesser status if it
could not agree to the majority view on homosexuality – a group of six
bishops has circulated a 98-page document arguing against the idea of
an agreed-upon covenant to which all Anglican provinces would have to
agree or be ostracized; they argue such an agreement would violate the
Anglican Communion’s constitution.

"The covenant is a bad idea," said Joe Morris Doss, the former bishop
of New Jersey. "We should all understand: We became Anglicans for a
reason, and we should now discuss long-range solutions."

In remarks at the opening worship service, Presiding Bishop Katharine
Jefferts Schori decried the increasingly hostile tone of the debate.

"We have lived in this church and in this communion for a number of
years with abundant disdain, violent words, and destructive action
toward those who hold positions at variance with our own," she
said. "None of us is wholly free of blame in this game, for we have
all sought to judge those who oppose us."

Schori began the meeting by offering an olive branch of sorts to
conservatives, naming eight US bishops who could visit dioceses that
do not approve of Schori herself, either because she is a woman or
because she supported the election of Robinson. Of the 110 Episcopal
dioceses in the United States, six have asked for someone other than
Schori to oversee them. The bishops of all of six dioceses opposed
Robinson’s consecration, and in three the bishops do not ordain women.

Conservatives rejected the Schori overture, which a spokesman for the
Pittsburgh diocese, Peter Frank, called "less than what was offered
before and less than what the Communion asked for.

"It’s not going to go anywhere, and the presiding bishop knows that,"
he said.

The only woman named by Schori as a possible alternative visitor,
Bishop Geralyn Wolf of Rhode Island, said in an interview that she
does not expect anyone to ask her to visit because of her gender.
Wolf, who supported Robinson’s consecration, said that in the interest
of keeping the communion together, she believes that the bishops
should issue a clear statement agreeing to the primates’ request that
they approve no more noncelibate gay bishops and that they not
authorize a national rite for blessing same-sex couples.

After meeting with the bishops, Williams yesterday visited an
Episcopal mission, All Souls Church, in the Katrina-devastated Lower
Ninth Ward of New Orleans. Last night, Williams preached to several
thousand people at an ecumenical service in New Orleans’s Morial
Convention Center, where Hurricane Katrina evacuees huddled two years
ago.

Michael Paulson can be reached at [email protected].

© Copyright 2007 Globe Newspaper Company.

RA EMBASSY BUILDING IN OTTAWA TO BE INCLUDED IN LIST OF HISTORICAL AND CULTURAL HERITAGE OF CANADA’S CAPITAL

PanARMENIAN.Net
19.09.2007 18:17 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ September 17 the City Council of Ottawa unanimously
voted for inclusion of the RA Embassy building in Ottawa in the
Heritage List of Canada’s capital. The building will henceforth
be mentioned in the guides. Moreover, the Armenian Embassy will be
granted the possibility to have open houses for tourists, what will
raise the interest towards the republic.

The building was constructed 100 years ago in the style of Italian
renaissance, which is a rarity in Canada. The front of the building
was projected by Canadian architect Werner Nofke.

ELDAR NAMAZOV: IT’S UNACCEPTABLE FOR AZERBAIJAN TO HOLD TALKS WITH KARABAKH WITHOUT PARTICIPATION OF ARMENIA

PanARMENIAN.Net
18.09.2007 12:45 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ "It is unacceptable for Azerbaijan to hold
talks with the Armenian community of Nagorno Karabakh without the
participation of Armenia," independent political scientist, former
assistant of Azerbaijan President, Eldar Namazov said when commenting
on the proposals of the Russian, Yuri Merzlyakov and French, Bernard
Fassier, Co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group regarding the necessity to
bring together the heads of the Armenian and Azerbaijani communities
of Nagorno Karabakh to the talks on the Karabakh conflict settlement.

"The talks should take place between Azerbaijan and Armenia whose
army has occupied Azerbaijani territories. Only after withdrawal of
the Armenian armed forces from our land and refusal from territorial
claims, can we hold talks with the Armenian community of Nagorno
Karabakh within the Azerbaijani State," he said.

"Azerbaijan does not protest against involvement of the Armenian
community in the talks, but insists on the participation of the
Azerbaijani community in the talks. Initially the talks were
attended by the two conflicting sides, Azerbaijan and Armenia and
two interested sides, the Armenian and Azerbaijani communities of
Nagorno Karabakh. However, later the format of talks was changed and
the process was attended by only Azerbaijan and Armenia," he said.

"Currently Armenia considers that the Armenian community of Nagorno
Karabakh should negotiate with not the Azerbaijani community
of Nagorno Karabakh, but the Government of Azerbaijan. "It means
that the status of the Armenian community arises up to the level of
independent state. Such a format is unacceptable for Azerbaijan,"
the political scientist resumed said.

"Azerbaijan will accept talks with Armenian community of Nagorno
Karabakh if only Armenia recognizes the territorial integrity of
Azerbaijan and stands away," said the Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry
Spokesman, Khazar Ibrahim on 17 September, Trend news agency reports.

ARMENIAN-RUSSIAN INTERGOVERNMENTAL COMMISSION HOLDS ITS 9TH SITTING IN YEREVAN

armradio.am
14.09.2007 17:13

September 14 the 9th sitting of the Armenian-Russian Intergovernmental
Commission for Economic Cooperation was held in Yerevan.

The Co-Chair of the Commission, Russian Transport Minister Igor
Levitin said at a press conference following the sitting that the
commodity turnover between the two countries is increasing annually,
considerable raise has been registered as regards investments, this
year the volume of Russian investments will reach $0.5 million.

According to Igor Levitin, the main issue of economic cooperation
between the two states is the transport sphere, although certain
steps have already been taken in this direction. Ferry communication
has been launched, but it does not operate on a regular basis.

The Armenian Co-Chairs of the Commission, RA Prime Minister Serge
Sargsyan noted that an agreement will be signed as a result of the
9th sitting, according to which one of the largest Russian companies
will launch activity in Armenia. The Prime Minister informed also
that deals of larger volume will be concluded at the 10th sitting of
the Commission to be held in Russia.

In Serge Sargsyanï~^’s words, despite the changes in the Russian
Government, his official visit to Moscow remains in force. Attaching
importance to the visit, the Prime Minister mentioned that it will
enable to establish ties with Russiaï~^’s new Prime Minister and
members of cabinet.

–Boundary_(ID_/rj/rdMBLn08oIU3hdrtxA)–

Caucasus Environmental NGO Network (CENN)
T +995 32 75 19 03/04
F +995 32 75 19 05
<mailto:[email protected]> [email protected]
<;

UNEP/WHO project "Demonstrating and Scaling up Sustainable Alternatives to
DDT for the control of vector borne diseases in Southern Caucasus and
Central Asia"

Dear Colleagues,

Let us inform you that, UNEP is involved in a number of joint UNEP/WHO
projects related to support IVM/IPM approaches in several regions in the
world.

This huge regional UNEP/WHO /Milieukontakt project implies safeguard
(repackage and collect) priority quantities of DDT in countries like
Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan. These are in the
framework of Malaria Vector control.

The main idea behind these projects is to convert traditional ‘chemicals
application’ approaches towards a more sustainable approach focusing on
biological and environmental interventions suitable for the particular
region.

As you are aware of, in the past many countries applied DDT in vector
control.

GEF, the Global Environment Facility, is the financial instrument to co-fund
actions which are in line with the objectives of the Stockholm Convention.
According to the Stockholm Convention, Parties should pay attention to the
development and promotion of alternatives to DDT use in vector control.

Though DDT is officially not in use in malaria vector control anymore, the
current government structures in many countries are still partly based on a
"chemicals application" approach. This allows -in principle- the possibility
of reverting to the use of -cheap- DDT in situations where donor funding is
reduced or absent and when emergency situations arise.

Based on POPs knowledge (some countries are in the development or have even
completed their National Implementation Plans – NIPs) and based on previous
contacts (amongst others two workshops held earlier this year in the region)
countries which can be involved in a project can be Azerbaijan, Tajikistan,
Kyrgyzstan and Georgia. All countries have ratified the Stockholm Convention
which is a prerequisite for obtaining GEF funding.

For the development of this Full Sized Project, expertise from WHO, UNEP and
specially recruited consultants will be made available.

Once the Full sized Project will be approved, countries will receive GEF
co-funding to implement activities as described in the project document.

For the current project, main activities envisaged are:

* the demonstration of alternatives to DDT in malaria vector control;

* support national capacity planning in planning and implementation
of IVM/IPM

* cleaning up of some smaller but prioritized stockpiles of POPs
(mainly DDT)

* support existing regional information dissemination mechanisms.

The 4 components are broadly defined in order to allow very country specific
details and wishes to be included at a later stage.

Execution of project activities is envisaged through a group of partners
(including relevant national ministries, local NGO’s, the international
Dutch based NGO Milieukontakt International, and WHO EURO and local
offices).

Contact Agency to GEF is UNEP.

Project duration: The PPG will probably take about 1 year, the Full Sized
Project can take 5 years.

The purpose of this letter is, besides informing you about the project
initiative, requesting your support in order to obtain a formal Endorsment
Letter from the GEF Focal point in your country.

It is expected that the countries will need to provide (in-kind) co-funding
for the execution of the project.

We kindly to support this new project and ask your written approval to

Dr. Elkhan Gasimov, WHO contact person at [email protected] and to GEF Focal
Point is Hussein Bagirov, Minister of Ecology and Natural Resources, at
<mailto:[email protected]> [email protected]

Please Cc this e-mail to Jan Betlem ([email protected] ).

A format for the Support Letter is attached here with (see attachment).

The deadline of submission of Support Letters is 30 September 2007.

Your support is highly appreciated!!!

ROBERT KOCHARYAN LEAVES FOR GEORGIA

Lragir.am
14-09-2007 13:05:09

The Armenian president Robert Kocharyan is soon visiting Georgia
on Mikhail Sahakashvili’s invitation. The speaker of the president
of Armenia Victor Soghomonyan announced September 14 that Robert
Kocharyan’s one-day visit is friendly. The presidents of Armenia and
Georgia will meet in Batumi. Victor Soghomonyan said he is not aware
of the details of the agenda of the presidents’ meeting but he thinks
the entire specter of bilateral relations will be discussed, including
the detention of Armenian citizens at the Georgian border. As to the
construction of a penitentiary in Javakheti, perhaps it will not be
discussed. Recently Member of Parliament Shirak Torosyan from the
Republican faction has voiced concern regarding this penitentiary. He
said the penitentiary would turn Javakheti into a place of exile, a
criminal territory, and the Armenian government must prevent it. The
speaker of the Armenian president said there are penitentiaries in
different places in Armenia, such as Artik, Kosh, Sevan, but these
areas have not become criminal territories. The president of Armenia
does not think the penitentiary is dangerous, and will hardly touch
upon this issue in the meeting with Sahakashvili.

In the news conference the speaker of the Armenian president released
the schedule of the upcoming visits of the president. In early October
Robert Kocharyan will take part in the CIS summit and the summit of
the Collective Security Pact Organization in Dushanbe. In Dushanbe
Eurasian Economic Community will also hold a summit, and the president
of Armenia was invited as an observer since Armenia is an observer
country in this organization.

Robert Kocharyan will have a traditional visit to Brussels where he
will meet with the leaders of European organizations. The visit will
be in mid-October. The president of Armenia was invited to Finland by
the president of this country, and Robert Kocharyan will visit Finland
in early November. More visits to other countries are expected, as
well as visits of other countries’ presidents to Armenia. However,
the timing of these visits is not distinct yet. According to Victor
Soghomonyan, Mahmud Ahmadinejad, the president of Iran, is expected
to visit Armenia this year, but the timing and the agenda of the visit
are to be made distinct through the embassies. Victor Soghomonyan said
the Armenian and Iranian presidents will probably discuss economic
cooperation, as well as other issues.

BAGHDASARYAN MET AMERICAN DIPLOMATS

A1+
[04:50 pm] 14 September, 2007

On September 14, Arthur Baghdasaryan, the leader of the Orinats
Yerkir Party, met with Paul Waller, the director of the Caucasian
Bureau of the US State Department and Ambassador Rudolf Perina,
Charge d´Affaires a.i. of the U.S. Embassy.

The key issues of the discussion were promotion of democracy,
US-Armenia collaboration, the upcoming presidential elections and
regional developments.

–Boundary_(ID_fYKrMSvlC+rd6apMOT+w KQ)–