Author: Vorskanian Yeghisabet

Cubans, Russian continue to dominate in Olympic boxing
.c The Associated Press
ATHENS, Greece (AP) – Experienced teams from Cuba and Russia continued
to impress in Olympic boxing Saturday, with each country sending three
more fighters to the quarterfinals.
Cuba now has 10 boxers in the final eight, while Russia has nine.
Yan Bhartelemy Varela, Yuriorkis Gamboa Toledano and Yordani Despaigne
Herrera all won Saturday for Cuba, while Sergey Kazakov, Georgy
Balakshin and Gaydarbek Gaydarbekov advanced for Russia.
Despaigne will next face Andre Dirrell of the United States in the
75-kilogram category.
Though Americans haven’t fared well against Cuban boxers in the past,
Dirrell owns a win over Despaigne in the Olympic test event in Athens
in May.
“It doesn’t matter who I get in there with,” Dirrell said. “I just
follow my game plan.”
Also, Iraqi boxer Najah Ali lost his 48-kg bout to Aleksan Nalbandyan
of Armenia, ending the improbable run of Iraq’s only Olympic boxer
after just one victory.
Ali was outpointed 24-11 in the second-round match, but he still
provided a dramatic conclusion to his 10-month journey from a job in a
Baghdad furniture factory to the bright lights of Athens, where he
carried the flag of the reconstituted Iraq team.
The diminutive Ali struggled to reach his taller opponent while
falling behind in the first 2 1/2 rounds, but he then cut Nalbandyan’s
mouth with a punch. He spent the final round frantically attempting to
open the cut wide enough to get the Armenian fighter disqualified, but
was unsuccessful despite an exciting chase.
“I only needed one punch – one punch,” Ali said with a shake of his
head.
08/21/04 16:32 EDT

Interfax
Aug 20 2004
Armenia to up cognac exports 15% in 2004
YEREVAN. Aug 20 (Interfax) – Armenia will increase its cognac exports
15% in 2004, director of the Armenian Agriculture Ministry’s
agribusiness development center Armen Davtian predicted in an
interview with Interfax.
Armenia’s annual cognac exports have increased almost 550% since
1999, reaching 10.8 million liters in 2003, Davtian said. The country
exported 5.5 million liters in the first half of 2004, roughly 15%
more year-on-year, he said.
Around thirty countries now import Armenia’s cognacs, and these
exports account for more than 90% of production volume. Russia buys
80% of the cognac Armenia exports.
Davtian said Armenia now has more than ten companies involved in the
industrial production of cognac and cognac alcohol. The biggest are
Yerevan Cognac Plant (owned by the French company Pernod Ricard), the
Armenian-Cypriot company Great Valley and Yerevan cognac, wine and
vodka complex Ararat, owned by the country’s multi-business outfit
Multi Group.

RosBusinessConsulting, Russia
Aug 20 2004
Putin to meet with Armenian President
RBC, 20.08.2004, Sochi 09:33:16.A meeting between Russian
President Vladimir Putin and Armenian President Robert Kocharian will
take place in Sochi today. The sides are expected to pay special
attention to normalizing the situation in the North Caucasus region
and in particular to peaceful settlement of the conflict in South
Ossetia.
In addition, it is planned that the two leaders will discuss
cooperation within the framework of the Collective Security Treaty
Organization and the Eurasian Economic Community, in which Armenia
has an observer status.

Union Network International
Aug 17 2004
Central & Eastern Europe Newsletter – 31
TELECOMMUNICATIONS DEVELOPMENTS IN CENTRAL AND EASTERN EUROPE
Armenia
OTE in licence negotiations OTE, the Greek operator which is the
majority shareholder in fixed-line operator Armentel, for which it
has been seeking a buyer, is to hold negotiations with the Armenian
government in the attempt to resolve outstanding issues. The
government has put off until September 28 the award of a second
mobile licence as a means, it said, of ‘facilitating the conduct of
the negotiations’.
[other countries omitted]

Washington Times, DC
Aug 18 2004
Kurds build own identity
By Julia Duin
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
ERBIL, Iraq – Americans may be vilified in much of Iraq, but in the
15,000 square miles encompassing Iraqi
Kurdistan, wedding parties pose with U.S. soldiers, American
flags are posted proudly on dashboards and officials beg visiting
Americans to tell Washington to establish a permanent military base
here.
“That would send a message to everyone not to do anything to the
Kurds,” said a visiting professor at the 14,000-student Salahaddin
University in this sprawling north-central city.
Thirty years of political oppression, poison gas attacks and
outright genocide by the Ba’athist regime in Baghdad have led
northeastern Iraq’s 4.5 million Kurds to rethink all their alliances.
Some even suggest contacting the Israelis for advice. Although
most Kurdish Muslims instinctively distrust Jews, some say Israelis
would be eager to help bolster a Kurdish democracy in the Middle
East. Jews inhabited Kurdistan starting with the Babylonian exile in
597 B.C. and ending in the 1950s, when many returned to Israel.
Others say Kurds are flirting with Zoroastrianism or atheism, as
Islam is seen as the religion of their Turkish and Arab oppressors.
Evangelical Protestant missionaries who are quietly planting churches
in the major Kurdish cities report flickers of interest. Copies of
the New Testament, or at least portions of it, are available in both
Kurdish dialects, and Campus Crusade’s “Jesus Film” has been on
Kurdish television several times.
The evangelistic Dallas-based Daystar Television Network can be
seen in any Kurdish home with a satellite dish.
The Amman, Jordan-based Manara Ministries, a Christian agency
that conducts relief work in northern Iraq, estimates 200 Kurds have
converted to Christianity in 20 years and that Erbil has at least one
Christian bookstore. Other Christian agencies in the region agree
numbers remain in the low hundreds, but thousands have received
evangelistic literature and have had some contact with Christians.
Kurds have substituted their own red, yellow, green and white
flag in place of the national Iraqi flag on flagpoles everywhere. In
the few places the Iraqi flag is displayed, it is the de-Islamicized
pre-1991 version before Saddam Hussein added “God is Great” in Arabic
to the red, white, black and green banner.
“Some people are blaming Islam for what’s happening to us,” one
college professor mused. “But I think the fault is with the British
who divided our land after World War I. We have tolerated this bitter
reality, but we have never accepted it.”
The Kurdish penchant for independent thinking begins with its
“Welcome to Iraqi Kurdistan” sign at the Iraqi-Turkish border – a
calculated insult to Turkey, which has denied human rights to many of
its 15 million to 20 million Kurds and whose border guards lecture
travelers that “Kurdistan” does not exist.
Kurdistan is an unofficial nation-state encompassing at least 25
million people in the 74,000-square-mile mountainous region
encompassing chunks of Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran. It is the
world’s largest ethnic group without a country of its own.
Kurds were promised a country in the Aug. 10, 1920, Treaty of
Sevres that divided the former Ottoman Empire among Britain, Turkey
and others, and gave independence to Armenia.
However, the treaty drafted in Sevres, France, was ignored by
Kemal Mustafa Ataturk, founder of modern Turkey, who did honor the
1923 Treaty of Lausanne that established Turkey’s present borders but
partitioned Kurdistan into four parts.
Kurds generally were oppressed in all their host countries,
resulting in the establishment of exile communities in Europe and the
United States. Iraqi Kurdistan blossomed after the 1991 Gulf war,
when overflights by British and American fighter jets generally kept
Saddam’s forces at bay.
Today, some Baghdad residents are moving their homes several
hundred miles north to tranquil Kurdish cities such as Dohuk, where
legions of peshmerga – Kurdish militia – patrol the city streets and
man checkpoints on rural routes. The more American – or Western – a
passenger appears to be, the more quickly one is waved on by the
peshmerga. Cars sporting Baghdad license plates or holding Arab
occupants are pulled over and searched.
One Assyrian Christian driver relates how, while conducting
business in Mosul 40 miles south of Dohuk, he was threatened at
gunpoint by insurgents. He managed to talk his way out of trouble.
Asked the reason for the AK-47 assault rifle in the front seat?
“To shoot Arabs with,” he said.
Although danger remains, others are enjoying their new lives.
“I’m 37 years old, but I feel like I am only 1 year old because I
feel freedom now,” said the Rev. Mofid Toma Marcus, an Assyrian
Christian monk who oversees the Monastery of the Virgin Mary in Al
Qosh, a Christian village near the burial spot of the Old Testament
prophet Nahum. “America has given new life to Iraqi people.”
In five years, he said, “Iraq will be better. Under Saddam, we
had no cell phones, no Internet, no interviews with American
journalists. America took 200 years to get to where it is today.”
Al Qosh is one of seven Christian villages stretching north from
Mosul.
“We don’t give permission for Muslim families to live in
Christian villages,” Mr. Marcus said, explaining that Muslims would
gradually turn it into an Muslim-majority village, then institute
Islamic law.
A half-mile down the road is Bozan, a village populated by Yezidi
Kurds who worship a pre-Islamic peacock god linked to Zoroastrianism
and Mithraism. The children play in the town square near a bombed-out
school that the monastery is trying to refurbish.
They run to fetch Elias Khalaf, the headmaster, a dignified man
in a Kurdish-style gray suit with baggy pants, who begs for Americans
to come stay in some of the monastery’s 200 rooms and help rebuild
his school. Missing are all the basics: paint, windows, water, doors,
blackboards, electricity, desks and toilets.
Thirty teachers toil with 1,100 students, sometimes as many as 60
per class.
“We need teachers,” he begs. “We need everything.”
The Yezidis were forced out of their villages 30 years ago by
Arab Iraqis, gaining them back only since the overthrow of Saddam. On
their way out, the Arabs cut the electric lines and poisoned the
wells.
Kurdish cities are filled with unemployed men of all ages idling
in cafes to escape the 111-degree heat. Despite the scorching
temperature, many of the Muslim women cloak themselves in heavy,
long-sleeved jackets, ankle-length skirts and head scarves.
Sulaymania, a city about 80 miles west of the Iranian border
surrounded by hot, rocky, barren hills, has a reputation for free
thinking and slightly more liberal dress codes. It has become a
center for experimental newspapers that operate on shoestring
budgets. The London-based Institute for War & Peace Reporting has an
office in Sulaymania, where it tries to instill journalistic
standards into eager but inexperienced reporters.
One student-run paper is in a tiny third-floor office with no air
conditioning. Cold sodas are brought for the guests, who are told
that the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), which controls the
northwestern tier of Kurdistan, and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan
(PUK), which controls the southeast, exercise Mafialike control over
Kurds. Any newspaper that criticizes the parties, they say, finds
itself banned from local newsstands.
A similar conversation the next day with an Islamic newspaper
reveals how dissatisfaction with the slow pace of change is
everywhere. At a quiet dinner with Kurdish businessmen in the
touristy suburb of Sarchinar, the topic of conversation is the
failure of Kurdish political leaders to encourage Western investment
and the reluctance of American companies to take a chance on the
Kurds.
“If you don’t move quickly here,” one computer technician said,
“the Chinese and the Germans will fill your place.”
The Iranians already have a consulate in Sulaymania, one is told,
while the Americans only have plans for a consulate in Kirkuk,
leaving most of northern Iraq with no official American presence.
Meanwhile, the Kurds already have a functioning airport in Erbil
and plans are to open another one soon in Sulaymania. Iraq has been
on hold for too many years, they say. Gas may be 3 cents a gallon
here but passports are impossible to come by, reducing many Kurds to
learning their English from BBC World telecasts. There is no postal
service.
Plus, any Kurdish public figure working with Westerners knows his
life could be snuffed out at any time. A drive to a lunch interview
with Salahaddin University President Mohammed Sadik in Erbil begins
when two armed bodyguards jump into the passenger seat of his car and
perch on the back bumper.
Their caution stems from the Feb. 1 suicide bombings at the Erbil
headquarters of the KDP and PUK during celebrations for an Islamic
holiday. More than 56 Kurds, adults and children were killed.
The Kurds at this lunch are distraught over U.N. Resolution 1546,
which they hoped would support Kurds’ semi-independent status. But
the resolution was vague, not even mentioning the regional government
for which Kurds have long campaigned. Furious Kurds now refer to L.
Paul Bremer, who served as the United States’ Iraq administrator
after the fall of Saddam, as “Lawrence of Arabia” for selling them
short to Arab rulers who have little experience or taste for
democracy.
“We feel Americans have bargained at the expense of the Kurds,”
Mr. Sadik said. “The worst person they brought here was Mr. Bremer,
who didn’t want to take any advice from the Kurds but who was willing
to bargain with everyone else.”
All the lunch guests scoffed at the notion of “a new Iraq” touted
by the Americans.
“We have nothing in common with the rest of Iraq,” said Kirmanj
Gundi, a Tennessee State professor visiting his homeland. “Why did
Bremer always compromise on Kurdish interests in favor of the
Shi’ites and Sunnis who shoot at them?
“If America supports us, we’d be the most loyal friend in the
region.”
Every Kurd in the room wanted independence. Why, they asked, was
America so quick to recognize Israel 56 years ago but today raises
objection after objection about Kurdish independence.
“When America decided to recognize Israel,” one said, “America
didn’t care about how the 22 Arab countries would react or how the 56
Islamic countries would react. So why should the Kurds care what the
Iraqi government thinks?”

Martirosyan batters Algerian for U.S. win
.c The Associated Press
ATHENS, Greece (AP) – Armenian-born American Vanes Martirosyan
battered Algeria’s Benamar Meskine during a 45-20 points victory in
the 69-kilogram class Sunday at the Olympic boxing competition.
The win gives the American a second-round match with Cuba’s Lorenzo
Aragon.
“I finished like a champion,” said Martirosyan, 18. “I could have
won another four rounds, to tell you the truth. I felt so good out
there.”
Martirosyan showed the power and flair of a contender, dictating the
fight’s pace with a stiff jab and opportunistic combinations. He also
counterpunched effectively while landing more shots to the head than
almost any competitor.
Martirosyan was one fight from elimination at the U.S. team trials in
February, but the two top contenders were disqualified when Andre
Berto threw Juan McPherson to the canvas, injuring McPherson’s
neck. McPherson was medically disqualified, and Berto was banned for
his actions.
Although he caught a lucky break, Martirosyan made the most of it by
earning an Olympic spot in the ensuing qualifying tournaments. Berto
made the Olympics on Haiti’s team.
Martirosyan hoped to meet Berto later in the draw, but Berto was
beaten 36-34 in the evening session by France’s Xavier Noel, a former
world champion.
Berto, whose parents are Haitian, fought well and nearly rallied from
a nine-point deficit in the fourth round, but Noel apparently hung
on. The decision was loudly jeered by fans.
In other bouts, Egypt’s Mohamed Hikal beat Afghanistan’s only boxer at
the games, Basharmal Sultani, 40-12 in the 69-kilogram class. In the
second welterweight class of the night, Oleg Saitov of Russia, trying
to win his third straight Olympic gold, beat Moroccan Miloud Ait Hammi
30-15.
08/15/04 17:40 EDT

ArmenPress
Aug 13 2004
NEWLY APPOINTED POLISH AMBASSADOR HANDED OVER HIS CREDENTIALS TO
PRESIDENT KOCHARIAN
YEREVAN, AUGUST 13, ARMENPRESS: The newly appointed Polish
ambassador to Armenia Tomasch Knotkhen handed over his credentials to
president Kocharian. According to president press services, Robert
Kocharian praised the present level of Armenian-Polish relations
saying that they are developing very dynamically. He underscored the
relations with Poland in the context of European policy of Armenia.
Noting that since May 1, 2004 Poland is a member of European Union,
the president said that Armenia has won a good partner in the face of
Poland within European structures. The sides underscored Armenian
president’s upcoming visit to Poland in September this year.

The Moscow Times
Arts & Ideas
Singer Rebuked
The very afternoon that Filipp Kirkorov was fined for his May outburst, the
pop star lashed out at another journalist in Moscow.
By Rebecca Reich
Published: August 13, 2004
A judge in Rostov-on-Don has fined pop star Filipp Kirkorov 60,000 rubles
($2,050) for a public outburst in late May that spiraled into a media blitz.
Kirkorov lashed out after journalist Irina Aroyan asked him why he performs
so many remakes. “You need to come prepared to press conferences with stars,
and not like you — yesterday walking the streets and, today, here in the
second row,” he retorted. Guards removed the memory card from Aroyan’s
camera and broke her dictaphone.
With tabloids zeroing in on the spectacle, Aroyan took Kirkorov to court for
personal insult. Judge Irina Vladimirova upheld her claim Wednesday,
commenting that Kirkorov tried to damage the journalist’s reputation.
Later that day, however, when Izvestia reporter Anton Pomeshchikov
telephoned the singer for comment, he received much the same medicine as
Aroyan. Interfax reports that the newspaper is planning to sue.
Copyright © 2004 The Moscow Times

YEREVAN MUNICIPALITY PREPARES FOR WINTER IN SUMMER
YEREVAN, AUGUST 9. ARMINFO. Yerevan authorities need to purchase some
1.730 tons of technical salt and 2,800 cubic meters of sand to get
prepared for winter, Vice Mayor of Yerevan Vano Vardanyan told
journalists today.
He said that by present, the reserves of technical salt in the capital
make up some 127 tons, those of sand – only 10% of the necessary
quantity. Besides, to provide road safety and to clean roads, 231 cars
are requires, but only 203 of them are ready for
exploitation. According to Vardanyan, several communities in Yerevan
are expected to buy new equipment by the end of the year, in
particular, it will be snow-collecting lorries. As regards
replenishment of salt and sand reserves, he said: “our experience
shows that it is senseless to purchase such a quantity of salt and
sand by the end of the year, as Yerevan has a plant on production of
salt, so the necessary quantity of this product can be bought there if
necessary. The same concerns sand reserves.”

Glendale News Press
August 9, 2004
‘I felt so awful being there’
Marine Sgt. Baleny Minas talks about her five months at war and how
they have shaped her political beliefs.
By Josh Kleinbaum, News-Press
NORTHEAST GLENDALE – The welcome back sign stretched across the stairway
just inside the front door, and a rainbow of colored balloons littered
the floor. Just outside the door, a balcony overlooked the Chevy Chase
Canyon, Glendale’s bastion of fiscal conservatives and protectors of the
hillsides.
The neighborhood is one of wealth and influence. The Chevy Chase Canyon
is not a hot spot for the Army or Marine recruiters, and the war in Iraq
seems far removed.
Sitting on the back porch of her parents’ house, with the Jacuzzi in
front of her and the garden behind her, Marine Sgt. Baleny Minas seemed
a bit out of place talking about her five months in Iraq. She admitted
that she lives like a princess, quite different from most of the
soldiers with whom she serves. For nearly an hour, Minas talked about
her experiences in Iraq – she returned Aug. 2 and how they shaped her
political beliefs. She vented some frustration, but also toned down her
words, concerned about retribution when her weeklong leave from the
Marines is over.
“I felt so awful being there,” said Minas, who managed test gear for
attack helicopters at a Marine base near Fallouja. “The reasons for the
war have yet to be justified by the administration, and here I am
oppressing a people, much like my people have been oppressed. I’m
Armenian American. We’ve been oppressed. I felt like I don’t belong
there.”
Politics are a strong part of Minas’ life. The daughter of a fiscal
conservative, she always considered herself a Republican, just like her
father. In 2000, she voted for George W. Bush.
Right about that time, she enlisted in the Marine reserves.
“In 2000, [Bill] Clinton was president and the country seemed to be in
the best state,” Minas said. “We were friends with everybody in the
world. I was 20 years old, between junior college and UCLA. I decided
that it’s an opportune time, I’ll go into the reserves.”
In between her one weekend per month and two weeks per year, she started
studying politics. In 2002, she graduated from UCLA with a degree in
political science. She was working toward a master’s degree in public
policy at USC when the Marines activated her reserve unit in January.
She is determined to pursue a career in politics – not necessarily an
elected office – but her political mind-set is quite different from four
years ago. The girl who grew up a Republican now talks like a woman with
liberal ideals.
“I live for politics,” Minas said. “I talk about it all the time. I live
for it all day, I might as well get paid for it.”
Minas held back her criticism of Bush – as Commander in Chief, he is her
boss. Instead, she let her stories tell the tale.
– Tired, overworked troops in her squadron could not sleep because the
generators that powered the air-conditioning units kept breaking.
– The squadron participated in exercises in “nation-building,” when
Iraqis came onto the Marine camp and filled sandbags with the muzzles of
American machine guns trained on them.
– The mortar attacks on the base were part of the job. Sometimes there
were 10 in a day, sometimes a month went by between attacks.
– A pilot, well- respected and popular in the squadron, died from a
gunshot wound to the neck while in flight, the squadron’s only casualty.
“There’s something about being in the military, it’s business as usual,”
Minas said. “You get mortared, and then everybody looks around and says,
‘I’m still alive.’ That mentality, it grows on you. Fear is not an
option.”
While Minas served her time, her family worried. Family friends asked
why they didn’t try to use their money and influence to get her out of
the military. Her brother Shant, fresh out of the Army himself, said
they lived by an honor code.
“If they say you go, you go,” said Shant Minas, whose Army unit went to
Iraq just after his release in April 2003. “Our way of dealing with it,
all of us, we kept ourselves deliberately extra busy the whole time.
We’re just really, really glad to have her back. Words can’t describe
the emotions that we feel, the happiness to have her back. We were
nervous people when she was gone.”
On Sunday, Baleny Minas returned to Camp Pendleton, leaving behind the
comforts of Chevy Chase Canyon. She must prepare the camp for the
arrival of the rest of her squadron, who will not return from Iraq until
early September. Their one-year stint on active duty has already been
extended for a second year, and she has already been told to expect
another trip to Iraq in March.
“I’m honored to serve with the people I’ve served with,” Minas said.
“I’m in an outstanding squadron with exceptional Marines. There’s an
incredible amount of discipline. I just wish these kids actually knew
what they were doing, what’s going on in this war. It’s a silence
campaign.”
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress