Category: News

Hellenic News of America
Dec 29 2004
Op-Ed
The Next Four Years
By Gene Rossides
The next four years will be difficult regarding foreign policy issues
of special concern to Greek Americans for several reasons
First, and foremost, is the fact that President George W. Bush has
retained in his administration the key figures in foreign policy who
have demonstrated a pro-Turkish and anti-Greek and Cyprus bias to the
detriment of U.S. relations with Greece and Cyprus.
Who are the persons in the Bush administration responsible for the
U.S. double standard on the rule of law to Turkey and the U.S.
appeasement of Turkey at the expense of U.S. relations with Greece
and Cyprus?
Leading the pack in the first Bush administration was Deputy
Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz. President Bushʼs decision
to retain Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld means that Mr. Wolfowitz
stays on as Deputy Secretary.
As is well known, Mr. Wolfowitz was the key architect of the war on
Iraq, misleading the American people on the issue of whether the
Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction (WMD),
and thereby also weakening the U.S. worldwide effort on the war on
international terrorism aimed at the U.S. He also led the effort to
equate Palestinian violence in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with
international terrorism aimed at the U.S.
What is not well-known are the misleading statements and outright
lies and falsehoods by Mr. Wolfowitz regarding Turkey. A joint letter
from Armenian, Kurdish and Greek American organizations to President
Bush dated September 4, 2002 detailed Mr. Wolfowitzʼs `false and
misleading statements with serious errors of fact and omission of
Orwellian proportions’ regarding Turkey and (1) Cyprus; (2) human
rights; (3) reliability as an ally; (4) self-reliance; (5) Ataturk;
(6) democracy; (7) the Persian Gulf War of 1991; (8) Turkey and the
Jews; (9) NATO; and (10) its Kurdish minority.
The signatories to that letter were James F. Dimitriou, Supreme
President of AHEPA; Ted Spyropoulos, President, Hellenic American
National Committee; Aram Hamparian, Executive Director, Armenian
National Committee; Kani Xulam, Director, American Kurdish
Information Network; Theodora S. Hancock, Co-Founder, Hellenic
American Womenʼs Council; and me for the American Hellenic
Institute.
Mr. Douglas Feith, Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, also
remains at his important position in the Defense Department. Mr.
Feith, a former registered foreign agent for Turkey from 1989 to
1994, served as the principal for International Advisors, Inc. (IAI),
the registered foreign agent for Turkey. Mr. Feith received $60,000
annually and his law firm received over $100,000 in fees. Mr. Feith
has been described by General Tommy Franks as the `dumbest’ man he
ever dealt with.
Mr. Richard Perle, who resigned as Chairman of the Defense Policy
Board for a conflict of interest with his company seeking war related
investments, initiated IAI and negotiated an $800,000 contract for
IAI with Turkey for 1989 and $600,000 for 1990 to 1994. Mr. Perle was
a paid consultant for IAI for Turkey during this period.
When Richard Perle was the Assistant Secretary of Defense for
International Security from 1981-1987 during the Reagan
Administration, he led the successful effort to give massive grant
military aid to Turkey. Mr. Feith was on his staff at the time.
Weapons supplied by the U.S. were used by the Turkish army against
the Kurds from at least 1984 and are being used to the present time.
Over 30,000 innocent Kurds were killed by the Turkish military. The
use of U.S. supplied weapons against the Kurds, which was well-known,
made the U.S. an accessory to the Turkish militaryʼs crimes
against the Kurds. Messrs. Wolfowitz, Perle and Feith bear
responsibility for the policy of arms to Turkey. The killings of
innocent Kurds lie at their doorstep.
In a comprehensive joint report `Arming Repression: U.S. Arms Sales
to Turkey During the Clinton Administration’ (October 1999), the
World Policy Institute and the Federation of American Scientists
documented the U.S. arms trade with Turkey and its harmful effects on
U.S. interests.
Mr. Perle is still active on Turkeyʼs behalf as a fellow at the
American Enterprise Institute (AEI) and appears regularly on TV and
radio interview programs to discuss U.S. foreign polciy.
Messrs. Wolfowitz, Perle and Feith are commonly referred to as
neo-conservatives who advocate an expansive use of force in U.S.
foreign policy including preemptive war. I prefer a different and, I
believe, a more accurate description. Neoconservative implies a new
conservative. None of these three individuals are `conservatives’ in
the classic definition of a political conservative who believes in
fiscal responsibility, limited government, individual liberties,
preservation of what has been proven useful and the use of force as a
last resort.
The definition I prefer as more accurate is `warmonger’ which
Websterʼs dictionary defines as `one who favors or tries to
incite war.’ All three are warmongers and in the case of Messrs.
Perle and Feith they are also war profiteers.
Ms. Condoleezza Rice, Secretary of State Designate, has been in the
center of all the foreign policy decisions of President Bush. During
the first Bush administration she was the foreign policy person
closest to the President. She will have a far greater influence on
foreign policy than Secretary of State Colin L. Powell.
Ms. Rice, as National Security Advisor, was involved in the betrayal
of Greece in the administrationʼs unilateral decision to
recognize the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) as the
Republic of Macedonia. The U.S. policy had been that we would use the
name FYROM until Greece and FYROM by negotiations determined a
solution to the name issue. The U.S. broke its pledge. It appears
that a staff member of the NSC proposed the change in policy which
Ms. Rice approved as did the State and Defense Departments.
Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs, Marc Grossman, is and
has been the main architect of U.S. policy on Greece, Cyprus and
Turkey these past years. His policies towards Greece, Cyprus and
Turkey demonstrate a sharp pro-Turkish and anti-Greece and Cyprus
bias to the detriment of U.S. interests.
I have written extensively and in detail regarding Mr.
Grossmanʼs harmful actions on (1) U.S. relations with Cyprus
over the years and more recently regarding the undemocratic,
unworkable and financially not viable Annan Plan and his attacks on
the Greek Cypriots and President Tassos Papadopoulos for their
opposition to the Annan Plan; (2) his failure to uphold the rule of
law regarding the Aegean Sea boundary and (3) his failure to take
meaningful action to reopen the Halki Patriarchal School of Theology
illegally closed by Turkey in 1971.
Mr. Grossman is a career foreign service officer and there have been
reports that he may retire in 2005. Letʼs hope so.
In a future article I will discuss actions that the Greek American
community can take in the interests of the U.S. to deal with this
situation.
Gene Rossides
President, American Hellenic
Institute and former Assistant
Secretary of the Treasury

Journal of Turkish Weekly, Turkey
Dec 29 2004
Azerbaijan: ‘If Armenians not Withdraw, We will Try Other Ways’

The possibility of opening the Armenian border has become a big issue
in Azerbaijan in the wake of the European Union’s (EU) decision to
begin negotiations with Turkey on October 3, 2005.
Public opinion in Azerbaijan, where 20 percent of the country is
occupied by Armenians, is against Turkey giving any concessions on
the issue. A spokesman for the Azerbaijani Assembly Murtiz Alesgerov
said, “As long as Armenians do not withdraw from Azerbaijani
territories, the Turkey-Armenian borders should not be opened.” He
added that if international negotiations can’t resolve the issue of
Nagorno Karabagh, they were resolved to regain their territory
through military means.
A group of Turkish journalists went to Azerbaijan at the invitation
of Azerbaijani Deputy Melahat Hasanova. The Turkish journalists, who
met with President Murtiz Alesgerov, focused on developments
regarding the possibility of Turkey opening the Armenian border.
Mentioning that Armenians demanded Turkey to recognize the so-called
genocide and wanted territory, Alesgerov said: “Armenians are
Armenians and the enemy is the enemy; there can’t be anything else.”
The Assembly spokesman supported Turkey’s EU membership and
determined that Turkey’s position would open the door for
Azerbaijan’s accession to the EU. He also disclosed that their only
concerns abut the process was the opening of the Turkey-Armenia
border. Mentioning that Turkey had a policy about the occupied
territories, Alesgerov continued:
“If Armenians do not withdraw the occupied territories, Turkey will
not open the borders towards that country. This issue shapes Turkey’s
main policy. Turkey will be loyal to this issue.”
About 20 per cent of Azerbaijani territories are under the Armenian
occupation and the EU makes little pressure on Armenia to withdraw
the occupying forces while the Brussels try to force Turkey to open
its Armenia borders. There is a strong Armenian diaspora in the EU
states, and the local politicians do not want to lose the Armenian
votes in elections.

ArmenPress
Dec 28 2004
ARMENIAN AMBASSADOR IN UKRAINE PREDICTS GOOD RELATIONS WITH KIEV
KIEV, DECEMBER 28, ARMENPRESS: Armenian ambassador to Ukraine,
Armen Khachatrian, predicted good relations between his country and
the new leadership of Ukraine after Sunday re-run of presidential
elections in which the opposition candidate Viktor Yuschenko defeated
the acting prime minister Viktor Yanukovich. He said his prediction
was based on the fact that Armenia is too striving towards closer
relations with Europe.
“This (good relations with Ukraine) is real, as Ukraine is
likewise interested in Armenia,” he said, citing growing trade
between the two countries. The ambassador acknowledged that the Union
of Ukrainian Armenians called on its members to vote for Yanukovich.
He also said that Armenia has to work a lot to bring political
relations with Ukraine on a new level in view of its defense of
Azerbaijan’s position with regard to Karabagh conflict regulation.
“Ukrainians are very friendly towards the Armenian community and we
have to use its potential,’ he said.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

ArmenPress
Dec 28 2004
OFFICIALS PROMISE IMPROVED TAX COLLECTION NEXT YEAR
YEREVAN, DECEMBER 28, ARMENPRESS: Senior Armenian tax officials
promised Monday to collect all taxes, which were projected by 2004
budget. Armen Alaverdian, a deputy head of state taxation service,
told a news conference that the tax service will collect 142 billion
drams in taxes before the end of the year, 4 billion drams more than
set by the 2004 budget.
He said the outgoing year will see, for the first time, more
collected profit and income taxes than projected. The main focus of
the news conference was on the new order of collection of obligatory
social payments, which is to be carried out beginning next year by
tax service, which the authorities say has a bigger arsenal of means
to collect more than the Social Security Fund that used to do it. For
comparison, next year tax services are supposed to collect 65 billion
drams in obligatory social payments against 48 billion drams, set for
the Fund this year.
According to officials, there are around 60,000 economic and other
entities which have to pay obligatory social payments, but they also
say that a significant portion of them, mainly trade outlets and
firms, specializing in delivery of various services, pay less than
stipulated by the law, hindering a tangible rise in retired age
pensions. They underreport their profits, show lower wages of their
employees and avoid social payments.
According to officials, around half of 60,000 entities show that
their employees’ monthly wage does no exceed 13,000-20,000 drams a
month, though these wages are at least twice higher.
The deputy of the chief taxman also said they will publish the
names of 300 big taxpayers once in three months, beginning next year,
as stipulated by changes in the law on tax service.

ArmenPress
Dec 29 2004
RAILWAY COMMUNICATION BETWEEN ARMENIA AND RUSSIA MAY RESUME LATE NEXT
YEAR
MOSCOW, DECEMBER 29, ARMENPRESS: An agreement signed Tuesday in
Moscow by Armenian defense minister Serzh Sarkisian and Russian
transport minister Igor Levitin, who are cochairmen of a joint
inter-governmental commission on economic cooperation is expected to
give a strong boost to further development of trade and economic ties
between these two countries. The agreement, signed during a regular
meeting of the commission in the Russian capital, envisages
cooperation in energy and transport sectors.
Speaking to reporters after the meeting Igor Levitin said a
ferryboat plying between Georgian port of Poti and Russian port of
Kavkaz will be operational beginning next January or February.
Levitin also said that Armenia’s rail communication with Russia via
Georgia, disrupted by the Abkhaz conflict more than a decade ago,
could resume by the end of next year, before the end of the conflict.
Most likely Georgian officials have revised their position on this
issue as until now they used to say they will allow trains from
Abkhazia to go through Georgia only after thousands of Georgian
refugees from Abkhazia are allowed to go back.
In Moscow Russian and Armenian officials also spoke about granting
Armenian citizens some privileges, particulalry, extending their stay
in Russia up to three months without temporary registration.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

The Jerusalem Post
December 29, 2004, Wednesday
Use people power against genocide
by: Shmuley Boteach
Leaders will always fail to act. We must force them to. The writer, a
rabbi and best-selling author, hosts a daily radio show syndicated on
the Talk America radio network.
Two things were on my mind as I watched Hotel Rwanda, the stunning
depiction of the 1994 Rwandan Tutsi extermination that was the
fastest genocide in the history of the world.
The first was Hollywood, and how I owed it an apology for the many
times I have railed against its degeneracy.
A film this powerful shames the world out of its indifference to the
slaughter of helpless humans and demonstrates the potential of movies
to reach the places photos and words cannot. The second was Bill
Clinton, the great 60’s liberal romantic, who dreamed of becoming
president in order to make the world a better place.
How would he deal with his shame? The movie is more damaging to his
reputation than if Monica Lewinsky had equipped herself with a
handycam.
Though Clinton is never mentioned explicitly in the movie, he is the
ghost that haunts the entire story, the most powerful man on earth,
who not only refused to intervene to save 800,000 people from being
hacked to death but declined to even convene his cabinet to discuss
the crisis.
How would the great liberal hope now face his Nobel- prize winning
friend Toni Morrison, who called him “America’s first black
President”?
Would he still be invited by Oprah Winfrey to talk about his $
12-million autobiography once she focused on the fact that Clinton
had even refused to provide jamming aircraft to block the Hutu Power
radio transmissions that orchestrated the massacres?
The $ 8,500-per-hour cost to the United States was determined by the
president’s administration be too exorbitant, even though, since
10,000 Rwandans were being killed each day, the cost came to $ 20 per
life.
And would Bill Clinton still be a hero to a new generation of
American youth once they found out that eight African nations, fed up
with American inaction to stop the butchery, agreed to send in their
own intervention force?
All they asked from the US was the use of 50 armored personnel
carriers, but the Clinton administration refused to loan them and
instead demanded $ 15 million, leaving the carriers on a runway in
Germany while the UN scrambled to find the money.
While all this happened, an average of 334 poor black Africans were
dying every hour.
THE RWANDAN genocide was unique in the annals of modern genocide
insofar as the world had absolutely no excuse not to intervene.
The Ottoman Turks’ slaughter of 1.5 million Armenians took place
during the fog of the First World War. The same was true of the
Holocaust of six million European Jews, which gave Franklin Roosevelt
the excuse that defeating the Germans was the best way to stop the
carnage.
The Khmer Rouge’s extermination of one third of Cambodia’s seven
million citizens was done in a country that was utterly sealed off
from the rest of the world, thus granting the Western powers
plausible deniability as to its occurrence.
But with the Rwandan genocide, UN commander General Romeo Dallaire of
Canada, one of the few true heroes of this otherwise cowardly tale,
informed the world of both the Hutu preparations for mass murder and
every development once the genocide was in full swing.
The Clinton administration’s response constitutes one of the greatest
abominations of American history.
Not only did the United States refuse to intervene, but, to quote The
New York Times, “it also used its considerable power to discourage
other Western powers from intervening.”
The Clinton administration robbed Dallaire of any ability to protect
the unarmed men, women, and children by demanding a total withdrawal
of all 2,500 UN peacekeepers, only later allowing a skeletal force of
270 because of the strong pressure of African nations.
The administration’s insistence that the UN be withdrawn was taken as
a clear signal by the Hutu Power militias that the West cared nothing
for poor African lives.
>From that time on the fate of the Tutsis was sealed, and the bodies
of hundreds of thousands of children, with their parents’, littered
Rwanda’s rivers and hills.
The Clinton administration’s repellant response only got worse, with
the State Department then prohibiting use of the word “genocide,”
because that would have obligated the US to intervene.
To be fair, I should add that Clinton did go to Rwanda in 1998 to
apologize – though only for three-and-a-half hours, his plane not
even shutting down its engines while he spoke.
True to form, he at least felt their pain.
DECEMBER 9, 2004 was the 56th anniversary of the approval of the
Genocide Convention by the United Nations General Assembly.
But with another genocide taking place in Sudan and the UN refusing
to even pass a resolution condemning it, it is clear the world is
still not ready to prevent entire groups being exterminated.
It is also clear that no country, not even the United States, can be
trusted to prevent genocide.
Even President Bush, the greatest champion of democracy since Winston
Churchill, has thus far done too little to help the wretched people
of Darfur, where about 100,000 have already died.
Which leaves just you and me.
I believe that rather than merely blame world leaders for being
indifferent to genocide, decent people everywhere must take it upon
themselves to coerce their governments into action whenever a
genocide occurs.
There should be a mass strike, along with other acts of civil
disobedience, for two days of every month until the great democracies
take action to stop whole groups being exterminated.
Surely if enough people began to act someone with global influence
will emerge to inspire and orchestrate the campaign. We could shut
down whole countries twice a month until those governments act.
Mass slaughter requires a mass response.
Let’s begin with the Sudan, whom the US and other responsible
governments have already labeled guilty of a genocide.
Let us strike until the Western democracies send troops into the
Sudan to stop the Janjaweed militias, or carry out air strikes
against the Sudanese government that is arming them.

IRNA, Iran
December 29, 2004 Wednesday 7:19 PM EST
Armenian ambassador farewell visit with President Khatami
Tehran, December 29
President Mohammad Khatami said here on Wednesday, “Tehran promotes
security and stability in Caucasus region and demotes foreign
interference there”.
In a farewell meeting with outgoing Armenian Ambassador to Tehran
Gegham Gharibjanian, the president referred to good and expanding
relations between the two countries, adding, “Expansion of bilateral
relations serve benefits of both countries as well as the Caucasus
region.”
Referring to Armenians long history and civilization, the president
called Armenia as an independent and a good neighbor that has always
maintained firm and friendly relations with Iran.
Ambassador Gharibjanian, for his part, called for expansion of ties
in all fields between the two countries.

Scripps Howard News Service
December 29, 2004, Wednesday 12:24 PM Eastern Time
Turkey’s future
SOURCE: The Providence Journal
The European Union crossed a threshold recently that, just a few
years back, would have seemed unimaginable. The members decided that
negotiations could begin on the admission of Turkey to their union.
This is good news for Turkey, which has sought E.U. membership since
1987. But of course, admission is not a matter of mailing an
application to Brussels and awaiting the verdict. Although Turkey has
made substantial progress in the past years toward bringing its
system of governance into alignment with Europe’s, it has a long way
to go.
The Turkish democracy remains strongly influenced by the military,
and the country’s economy is still some distance from basic
free-market principles.
Turkey’s treatment of minorities remains unsatisfactory, its
human-rights record is decidedly mixed, and freedoms of religion and
speech are far from the standards in Europe. Not least, Turkey
continues to deny the history of the Armenian genocide, and the
Turkish army occupies a third of the territory of a member of the
European Union – Cyprus – while refusing to recognize the Cypriot
government. All of these facts are incompatible with E.U. membership.
Talks are expected to last some dozen years, and in that time Turkey
may well transform itself to satisfy the European Union. If so, this
will mark a new day for Turks, and greatly benefit two immediate
neighbors, Armenia and Greece, which suffer from longtime Turkish
hostility and (in Armenia’s case) a devastating economic blockade.
The Turkish government has a sincere desire to move the country
Westward, and the process of E.U. accession should yield innumerable
benefits.
Two questions, however, shadow the process: While the Turkish
government strongly favors E.U. membership, it is not clear that
Turkish citizens do.
The second question is more complex. Turkey sits astride the border
of Europe and Asia, and is a longtime member of NATO, yet whether the
homeland of the onetime Ottoman Empire is “European” is debatable.
Turkey is a very big, poor and overwhelmingly Muslim country: Can it
be integrated into a European economic, political and cultural system
that is now very different from its own? Moreover, Turkey would be
the largest member of the E.U., which is already strained by several
comparatively non-affluent members.
None of these obstacles is insuperable, and while many Europeans have
reservations about Turkey, many others think that Turkish E.U.
membership makes sense. The next years will be a testing time: for
Turkey, for Europe, and for the meaning and future of European
identity and unity.

The Dallas Morning News
December 29, 2004, Wednesday
Religion in the media: A look at recent books and magazines
[parts omitted]
Reader’s Digest (December)
————————–
Four touching stories, all tied to the holiday season, are retold in
“Real People, Real Miracles.”
In “An Unlikely Santa,” Marc Howard Wilson tells of his depression
after leaving a rabbinate in South Carolina and facing long-term
unemployment.
He regained his sanity after playing Santa for homeless children.
“Stumbling across customs and religious boundaries did not concern
me,” and from the experience he realized that “these children were
God’s most fragile gifts to a cold world.”
Another miracle involves an American woman in Paris at Christmas.
Natalie Garibian Peters, missing her family back home, went to an
Armenian church. There, she gave up her seat to an older woman. As
Ms. Peters stood nearby, she was drawn to the woman.
After the service, they introduced themselves and discovered they
were related. The older woman was her aunt, part of the Armenian
diaspora and only temporarily in Paris.
“Auntie” Arev Kasparian cried that she had “been looking for your
father for 30 years. I knew you were someone special. I knew it in
your face.” Ms. Peters said: “I thought I was in France to discover
who I was” but instead, because of “an angel from the past,” her
family was reunited.
_ Robert Plocheck

La Opinion
29 Dic. 2004
Israel Vazquez, un centenario de oro puro;
El mexicano noquea a Artyom Simonyan y retiene la faja supergallo FIB
Ramiro Gonzalez; Enviado Especial
EL CAJON, California.– Israel Vazquez no defraudo a nadie y cerro
con broche de oro su actuacion al noquear anoche al retador armenio
Artyom Simonyan a los .59 segundos del quinto asalto y conservar el
cetro supergallo de la Federacion Internacional de Boxeo (FIB), en el
casino Sycuam.
Vazquez (37-3, 28 nocauts) dejo en claro que no por nada se convirtio
en el monarca numero 100 de Mexico, y que el titulo que capturo
pasado el 25 de marzo al noquear al venezolano Jose Luis Valbuena lo
gano a la buena.
“Quiero dejar en claro que el cetro lo capture en buena lid y no de
pura suerte, y en el 2005 quiero unificar o defender ante los
llamados grandes”, dijo de entrada Vazquez.
La pelea inicio a muy buen ritmo, Vazquez buscando el pleito por
dentro y Simonyan estableciendo la distancia donde mas le convenia.
La derecha rapida del retador (14-0-1, siete nocauts) entro varias
veces sobre el monarca, que ni se inmuto y a la vez descargo otra de
la misma manufactura que provoco un hemotoma abajo del ojo izquierdo
del armenio.
Ambos peleadores venian precedidos de victorias y, aunque tuvieron
cierta inactividad, pronto se encontraron los estilos y por ende la
pelea subio de intensidad conforme corrian los asaltos.
En el tercero, una derecha entro de lleno a la mandibula y lastimo al
retador, que en visible mal estado fue rematado por un gancho que lo
envio a la lona.
Simonyan se levanto y tras recibir una andanada de golpes sobrevivio
ese giro tambien con un corte en la boca.
En el cuarto asalto sucedio lo increible. Vazquez salio por el nocaut
al ver muy lastimado a su oponente, y de buenas a primeras el referi
James Jen Kim detuvo el combate a los 2:20 porque el guante izquierdo
-de color negro- tenia un corte y fueron cambiados por otros de color
rojo.
El cambio fue solo en el campeon, mientras que Simonyan mantuvo los
de color negro. El cambio duro por lo menos 10 minutos.
Termina el suplicio
Para el quinto asalto, Vazquez salio a completar su obra, y tras
derribar a Simonyan con una derecha en plena mandibula, el armenio se
levanto nada mas para recibir castigo innecesario, lo que provoco que
el referi detuviera el combate a los .59 segundos de ese explosivo
asalto.
“Senti que iba a noquear a Simonyan en el cuarto giro, pero por el
problema de guante le di un respiro extra. Es un pugil con mucha
experiencia”, subrayo Vazquez, quien descansara tras trabajar en las
fiestas decembrinas.
“”No me senti muy bien, y creo que mi pegada no me funciono. Me senti
confundido y sin energia”.
Finalmente, en otros resultados de anoche, Francisco Maldonado supero
por decision a Mauricio Bojorquez a cuatro giros en welter, Eddie
Mapula detuvo a Hector Rivera al final de tercer asalto a cuatro en
superligero.