Category: News

Interfax
April 1 2004

Armenia, Iran to sign gas pipeline deal in late April

Yerevan. (Interfax) – Armenia and Iran will sign a final contract in
Yerevan in late April on the construction of a gas pipeline linking
the two countries, Armenian Energy Minister Armen Movsisian told
journalists.

Iran’s Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh will arrive in Armenia to
sign the document.

Movsisian said that the new intergovernmental contract will “bring
bilateral documents signed in 1992-1995 into line with modern
requirements.”

The minister said that the two nations’ talks had also produced an
agreement on the volume of gas supplies and the main parameters of
the gas pipeline.
“The gas pipeline is intended to meet Armenia’s domestic needs,” he
said.

The pipeline’s construction will begin next year and be finished 20
months later. The cost of construction in Armenia is estimated at
about $100 million. The pipeline’s construction in Iran will cost a
little more.

Movsisian described the price for Iranian gas set in the contract as
“more than reasonable.”

The project will involve building new sections into the two
countries’ existing pipelines and reconstructing a number of segments
of Armenia’s gas transportation network.

The minister said that the planned pipeline will allow Armenia to
receive gas both from Iran and Turkmenistan, adding that “at this
stage, we do not see any differences on this issue. Only after the
gas pipeline is built, the economy itself will show whose gas is more
preferable.” Russian Deputy Prime Minister Boris Alyoshin said at the
start of February that the construction of a gas pipeline from Iran
to Armenia is in Russia’s interest. He said that Gazprom may become
the operator of part of the pipeline through Armenia in the future.
He said that Russia is consulting with Armenia on a feasibility study
for the pipeline.

The Iran-Armenia gas pipeline has been on the drawing board since
1992. In addition to the two main participants in the project, other
interested parties include Russia, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, European
Union countries, and China. The European Bank for Reconstruction and
Development has said that it is ready to finance the project.

Armenia and Iran signed an intergovernmental agreement in 1995
establishing the route of the pipeline, which stretches 114 km,
including 41 km in Armenia and 100 km in Iran. The agreement also
sets the price for gas to be transported through the pipeline at $84
per 1,000 cubic meters. The cost of the project is estimated at $120
million.

The possibility of building a pipeline to the Armenian-Georgian
border is also being considered. In this case, the cost of the
project will increase to $306 million and the pipeline will be 550 km
long and have a capacity of 4.5 billion cubic meters per annum.

Turkish Press
April 1 2004

Who Would Gain What From A Solution In Cyprus?
BYEGM: 4/1/2004
BY MURAT YETKIN

RADIKAL- While Ankara’s National Security Council is evaluating
recent development on Cyprus, other countries will hold similar
meetings. Therefore, it would be useful to summarize the expectations
of the parties involved.

The Greek part of Cyprus: This is the party least willing to reach a
solution by May 1. It has scored economic and political progress even
as its Turkish neighbor has stagnated under a political and economic
embargo. It is acting with the assurance of guaranteed European Union
membership. But due to its worries about the sovereignty of the
Turkish side and international pressure, it’s still at the table.

The Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC): Nicosia’s greatest
hope is to gain EU membership and international recognition without
harming bizonality and Turkey’s guarantees. TRNC President Rauf
Denktas’s current stance is negative. The government can be a winner
if it manages to convince its people to approve an agreement.

Greece: If no agreement is reached, the Greek part of the island will
become an EU member, and Athens will be keeping its promise to the
Greek Cypriots. But it would face heavier EU pressure and would be
held responsible for a division in Cyprus and excluding Turkey from
the Union. In addition, the unresolved situation in Cyprus would make
reaching a solution in the Aegean more difficult. This situation
contradicts Greece’s policies of removing any threat from the east
and cutting its defense expenditures.

Turkey: A just and permanent solution in Cyprus will benefit Turkey
in many ways. Firstly, it will remove a real obstacle to Turkey’s EU
membership. Secondly, Anakra will have proved it can work within
Europe’s culture of political pacts. Thirdly, Turkey will be able to
conduct its foreign policy more effectively. Better steps will be
taken in the Middle East, the Balkans and the Caucasus.

Britain: The third guarantor nation for Cyprus will feel better if a
unified Cyprus joins the EU. The Cyprus problem will then be part of
the Union. If these problems end with Turkey’s own membership, this
will mean security and stability in the eastern part of Europe.

The European Union: A solution in Cyprus will boost the arguments in
favor of Turkey’s EU membership. In this respect, Germany’s claim
that Turkey as a secular Muslim country implementing Western
democratic values would constitute a bridge to other Muslim countries
would be strengthened.

The United States: Washington has more than one expectation in
Cyprus. A solution in the eastern Mediterranean could be an example
for the conflicts in Israel-Palestine and Armenia-Azerbaijan. The
solution in Cyprus on land could be an example for the Azerbaijani
land that was invaded by Armenia [upper Karabagh]. The Armenian
diaspora in the US is the only obstacle to such a solution. A Cyprus
deal would help the US convince the Armenians.

Bayside Times, NY
April 1 2004

Queensboro exhibit shows century of global genocide

By Ayala Ben-Yehuda 04/01/2004

Bayside High School student Jenny Mathew reads about the Warsaw
ghetto at Queensborough Community College’s genocide exhibit.
In 1904 about 65,000 Herero cattle herders in Southwest Africa were
wiped out after rebelling against their German colonial rulers. Women
and children were driven into the desert and died of thirst and
starvation, decimating the Herero population.

In 1994 Beatha Uwazaninka had to flee her home in Rwanda when several
of her family members were murdered during a genocide in which
800,000 people were slaughtered in the space of 100 days.

These stories of mass murder 90 years apart from each other are on
display at `1900-2000: A Genocidal Century,’ the newest exhibit at
Queensborough Community College’s Holocaust Resource Center and
Archives.

`As a college student, I didn’t know about all the genocides that
were happening,’ said Sarah Roberts, assistant director for
operations at the center.

`More and more schools are getting more involved with teaching about
genocide and what’s happening today in the world,’ Roberts said.
`It’s really scary out there.’

The exhibit opened Feb. 23 and runs until the end of this year. It
features wall text by the Holocaust center’s director, William
Shulman, defining genocide and describing its use against Armenians
in 1915 at the hands of the Turks, Stalin’s starvation of Ukrainians,
the Holocaust as well as mass killings in Cambodia in the 1970s and
more recent ethnic cleansing in Bosnia and Rwanda in the 1990s.

A chart on the wall depicts lesser-known genocides such as the
Guatemalan army’s killing of 200,000 Mayans from the 1950s to the
1980s and the murder of a million Ibos and other ethnic groups in
Nigeria since 1966.

School groups in Queens have been coming to the exhibit and watching
films on refugees and the Rwandan genocide, said Roberts, whose
Holocaust center is sending mailings about it to schools all over New
York City as well as to churches and synagogues.

Roberts said so far no one who had suffered under one of the
genocides in the exhibit had come up to her during a visit to the
center, but said `I’m hoping I do get that reaction.’

Arthur Flug, a former teacher and chief of staff to Councilman David
Weprin (D-Hollis) and U.S. Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-Bayside), became the
center’s educational outreach director two weeks ago.

`The Holocaust has implications that go beyond the Jewish community,’
said Flug, such as ethnic discrimination and brutality – themes all
too common to the human experience around the world.

The college will mark the 10th anniversary of the Rwandan genocide
with a Genocide Awareness Day on Wednesday, April 28. Scheduled to
speak are Jerry Fowler, director of the Committee on Conscience from
the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., and
abolitionist Maria Sliwa, who will address modern-day slavery in
Sudan.

The Genocide Awareness Day and the exhibit are open to the public.
For more information, call 718-281-5770.

Reach reporter Ayala Ben-Yehuda by e-mail at [email protected] or
call 718-229-0300, Ext. 146.

Toronto Eye Weekly, Canada
April 1 2004

The art of survival

ROGUES OF URFA

Written and performed by Araxi Arslanian. Directed by Rebecca Brown.
Presented by Alianak Theatre Productions. To Apr 4. Tue-Sat 8pm; Sun
mat 2:30pm. Tue-Thu $15; Fri-Sat $20; Sun PWYC. Artword Alternative
Theatre, 75 Portland. 416-504-7529.

If you’ve been diagnosed with a neurological disorder that can cause
lethal stress-induced hemorrhages, acting might not seem the most
obvious — or safest — of career choices. If Rogues of Urfa is
anything to go by, however, that choice was definitely the correct
one for Araxi Arslanian.

The 32-year-old writer-actor recently (and successfully) fended off
AVM — Arteriovenous Malformations — an uncommon brain condition
that caused her to have a number of life-threatening grand-mal
seizures throughout her twenties.

The illness’s impact on Arslanian’s behavior led to her being
expelled from Montreal’s National Theatre School and ostracized by
many of the actors she worked with. This one-woman show is a memoir
of that time, with Arslanian coming to terms with both her ill health
and her ill treatment by friends and family.

That would be enough for a single play, surely, but her own tale is
ambitiously juxtaposed with that of her grandfather, Hovannes. A
refugee from the 1915 Armenian genocide, Hovannes escaped from Turkey
to Canada when, after the ruling Turk majority massacred over a
million Armenian Christians.

It’s a testament to Arslanian’s skill as a playwright that she can
deal with such weighty issues — genocide, brain disease — without
over-simplifying solemnities or guilt-tripping worthiness. She also
provides a virtuoso performance, often humorous, with the actress
ventriloquizing a large cast of characters — from Hovannes’ comrades
and captors to the petty backstage bitches of theatrical Toronto
(actors can be jealous sorts, you may be surprised to learn).

Apart from the fairy tale Arslanian uses to frame the beginning and
end of the play — a woodenly metaphoric device I could have done
without — this is for the most part slick, tragic entertainment.
PAUL ISAACS

AzerNews, Azerbaijan
April 1 2004

Radical group plans to march to Garabagh

The Garabagh Liberation Organization (GLO) plans to march to Garabagh
on May 8 – the day of the occupation of Azerbaijan’s historic city,
Shusha GLO chairman Akif Naghi told AssA-Irada that members of the
radical group planned to march from Baku to Afatli village in Aghdam
District and further carry on the protest action in the
Armenia-occupied lands of Azerbaijan.

GLO intends to involve representatives from international
organizations in the march which is expected to bring together
hundreds of thousands of people. In December 2003, the GLO demanded
that the government of Azerbaijan take drastic measures against
Armenia by May 8 this year.

“If no measures are taken before the deadline, the GLO has the right
to take urgent steps in this respect,” Akif Naghi stressed.

IRNA Iran
April 1 2004

EP says Turkey lagging in reform in many areas

Brussels, April 1, IRNA — Turkey has made many important reforms
since last year in order to meet the political criteria for EU
membership but still needs to go considerably further and rigorously
implement the reforms in many areas, the European Parliament`s
Foreign
Affairs Committee said Thursday in a draft resolution on Turkey`s
progress towards accession.
The resolution calls on the Commission, as part of the
Pre-Accession Strategy, to systematically address the shortcomings in

the rule of law and the democratic deficit in Turkey.
MEPs criticize the continuing influence of the army in politics,
business, culture and education, continuing torture practices and
mistreatment, the intimidation and harassment of human rights
defenders, the discrimination of religious minorities and the fact
that trade union freedom is not fully guaranteed.
The EU itself must also be prepared, say MEPs, for Turkey`s
possible accession and the consequent new geo-political situation for

the EU.
The Foreign Affairs Committee stresses again that settlement of
the Cyprus conflict was an essential condition for progress on
Turkey`s EU membership application.
It also called on Turkey to reopen its borders with Armenia and
promote good neighborly relations with that country.

Baku Today
April 1 2004

Renewed war might enforce sanctions on Azerbaijan

Baku Today 01/04/2004 12:24

Armenian -Azerbaijani conflict over Karabakh might grow into war as
long as Azeri lands are under Armenian occupation, said Azeri defense
minister Safar Abiyev yesterday.
“Azerbaijan is in a state of war, our lands are under occupation. The
danger of the restoration of war exists as long as Armenian armed
forces in our lands, ” said Abiyev.
Azeri political science experts have said, meanwhile, Armenia is
deliberately trying to attract Azerbaijan into the war, as the
renewed military operations can bring economic sanctions upon
Azerbaijan. Not only might the United States impose economic
sanctions on Azerbaijan, but also European countries may enforce
economic restrictions if war restarts , they said.

AzerNews, Azerbaijan
April 1 2004

New chairman of Russian Duma visits Baku

The newly appointed chairman of the Russian Duma (parliament), Boris
Gryzlov paid a two-day official visit to Azerbaijan on March 29.
During the visit, the Russian Speaker held meetings with President
Ilham Aliyev, Prime Minister Artur Rasizada and Speaker of the Milli
Majlis (parliament) Murtuz Alasgarov. Russian-Azerbaijani

relations and development of inter-parliamentary relations were
discussed during the meetings.

Meetings
On Monday, President Ilham Aliyev received a Russian Speaker Boris
Gryzlov. Aliyev noted that bilateral relations were developing
dynamically and all the problems between the two countries had been
solved.

Underlining that Azerbaijan and Russia have also expanded bilateral
economic relations, President Aliyev said that the turnover of goods
between the two countries was increasing yearly, stating that the
Russian-Azerbaijani business forum will be held in Baku shortly.
Stating that the inter-parliamentary working group established within
the Russian Duma will direct its activities towards seeking common
ground, Gryzlov said that prior to the business forum, the working
group was scheduled to meet in Moscow early April. Updating the
Azerbaijani President on the Russian parliament’s activity, Gryzlov
said that today, for the first time, 306 MPs representing the ruling
Yedinaya Rossiya Party are in the Duma. The Russian Speaker said the
Duma had 29 committees which were headed by the MPs from the Yedinaya
Rossiya fraction. “Moreover, the Duma is working democratically. We
adopt a sufficient number of decisions based on the proposals put
forward by other fractions including the left-wing Communist Party of
the Russian Federation,” Gryzlov noted. He also said that the Duma
was carrying out mutual activity and exchanged inter-parliamentary
experience with the Azerbaijani parliament. Regarding Vladimir
Putin’s re-election as President of Russia as the ‘great victory of
the Russian people’, President Aliyev stressed that Putin had made a
great contribution to the democratic and economic development of
Russia. He also underscored that bilateral relations would give
impetus to the development of the two countries in the future. The
expansion of bilateral parliamentary relations was high on the agenda
during the meeting of Boris Gryzlov with his Azeri counterpart,
Murtuz Alasgarov on Monday. Elaborating on Russia’s parliamentary
elections held this February, Gryzlov said that the new composition
of the Russian Duma was comprised of all the democratic political
forces of the country. Underlining that the Russian parliament will
give priority to multi-sided relations with neighboring countries in
the future, Gryzlov said, “We are also very interested in developing
economic relations with Azerbaijan. Therefore, we plan to hold a
meeting of the Azerbaijani-Russian economic commission after the
gathering of the commission’s working group.” Touching upon the Upper
Garabagh conflict, Speaker Alasgarov regarded the occupation of
Azerbaijani lands by Armenia as a serious threat to Russia as well.
Stressing that there is a need for Russia’s support in the resolution
of the conflict, Alasgarov said, “Russia, as a co-chair of the OSCE
Minsk Group, should approach the matter sensitively. We are expecting
Russia to do much work in this respect.”

Kavkaz Center, Turkey
April 1 2004

Georgia overrun by Jews and Armenians?

Georgian Labor Party claims that the days of ‘black tyranny’ have
come to Georgia. In this connection Georgian Labourists are starting
the fight against ‘tyranny of Saakovism’. This is the statement that
leader of the Labor Party of Georgia Shalva Natelashvili made during
a press conference in Georgian capital Tbilisi, which was broadcast
live by a number of TV channels. While speaking about ‘Saakovism’,
Natelashvili was apparently hinting at Saakashvili’s Armenian ethnic
background.

«Laborists are launching the fight against the tyranny of Saakovism»,
Natelashvili said. He claims that «a dark antinational tyranny is
being established in the country, whose goal is to ruin the Georgian
state. Gloomy period is starting in Georgia, when everything that is
left will be sold out», News-Georgia information agency quotes
Natelashvili as saying.

«The period is starting when education will be destroyed, and when
the culture, the faith and Orthodoxy will be defiled. The epoch is
starting when they will try to make a new mass out of us, – an easily
manageable stratum, which will be representing a planned and exported
product of ideology and culture», the Labor leader claims.

News-Georgia reported that Natelashvili claims that «these processes
are run by Jewish and Armenian lobbies from across the ocean». At the
same time the Labor leader mentioned that he does not mean the people
of these ethnic backgrounds, ‘our brothers’ living in Georgia.

But «these plans are not going to come true», Natelashvili promised,
because «national movement of great resistance is starting today».
«Once the Labor Party has raised this banner, it will succeed in
liberating Georgia from these extraneous bodies», the party’s leader
mentioned in his speech.

«The day is drawing near when Georgia will get rid of the
Shevardnadze heritage and of bacilli and parasites bred by Soros, who
wish to rule over the Georgian people by terror, fear and by rigging
the elections», Natelashvili said.

«You are not going to make it. You are doomed. Yesterday and today
are the first days of your political death», – these are the words
which the Labor leader said at the press conference.

News-Georgia points out that at the same time Natelashvili also
claimed that during the March 28 parliamentary elections in Georgia
«voting results were grossly falsified» and «all efforts were made
not to let the Labourists into the country’s supreme legislative
body».

«Mikhail Saakashvili has virtually fulfilled the promise that he gave
that the Labor Party would not be admitted into the Parliament»,
Natelashvili claims.

As he put it, «the system of falsifications has been prepared ever
since the day of the so-called velvet revolution by Soros». At the
same time the leader of Labourists said that the current
parliamentary elections are «illegitimate, and so was the dismissal
of the half of the parliament, elected on November 2, 2003».

«Today Georgia has virtually been privatized by two billionaires:
Soros from across the ocean and Patarkatsishvili locally. This is the
entire political spectrum of Georgia. These two want to turn the
entire Georgia into an area of their business interests»,
Natelashvili said.

He added, «the Labor Party is not the force to yield to anyone or to
sell itself to anyone».

It must only be added that the leader of Georgia’s Labor Party made
this statement virtually at the same time when Washington was
welcoming ‘free elections in Georgia’ and announced it was pleased
with the level of openness and democracy.

Department of Strategic Information,

Kavkaz-Center

New York Times
April 1 2004

Life’s Astringent Taste Can Go Down Smooth
By ELVIS MITCHELL

“Vodka Lemon” just might be the world’s iciest postcard film: you
will never be so happy to sit inside a cozy, theater as when you
watch the actors exhaling clouds of warm breath over the blindingly
white expanse.

But the thicket of relationships that the director, Hiner Saleem, has
created and weaves his cast and camera through is so invitingly
hotblooded and crowded with hilariously melodramatic incident that
the snowbanks are not nearly as forbidding as they initially seem.
Eventually the chilly air becomes a character; it has the astringent
sharpness of the title drink that everyone in the movie downs, and
complains about.

The picture, which will be shown tonight, tomorrow and Saturday as
part of the New Directors/New Films series, starts with an old man
being pulled across the snowy wastes on his bed, an image right out
of a dream. But Mr. Saleem’s gifts come from giving these outlandish
visual statements a grounding in the everyday reality that the
characters experience. He is headed to a funeral, and “Vodka Lemon”
charts the intermingling – marriages, death and sexual complications
– in an Armenian village. Like most of the other New Directors/New
Films offerings “Vodka Lemon” is set in a place that almost makes us
want to applaud for the sheer industry required to get a camera crew
there.

Chief among the citizens is the wily Hamo, played by Romik Avinian.
With a grizzled jaw line one could scratch to start a fire, Mr.
Avinian dominates the picture as if he has finally grown into his
surly, direct charisma. This fine guarded actor anchors the
goings-on. After attending so many funerals, Hamo has begun a
flirtation with a much younger woman, the 50-ish widow Nina (Lala
Sarkissian). She feels a void in her life, and he simply recognizes
now as the time for both of them to move into a new adventure.

The ravaged and impoverished village also must cope with its own
deficits. The support system in place during Soviet rule is long
gone, with several residents fondly griping about the comforts, such
as they were, that the Soviets provided. There hasn’t been much
change; life in this flash-frozen community has gone from minimal to
Spartan, but nostalgie de la boue is still nostalgia.

“We have nothing left but our freedom,” one villager grouses. Mr.
Saleem understands that need is the central motivating force in the
villagers’ lives: for heat, food, emotional humidity and clarity.

Mr. Saleem’s layering does compensate for the lack of formal
structure, though the picture is provisionally set around the shock
waves caused by the imminent wedding of Nina’s granddaughter. But the
picture does not need an elaborately contrived plot. What it has
instead is a neighborly, fresh-air quality; all the doors in the
miniature snow-globe of a town are open, as is the chatter and
curiosity about everyone’s familial intrigues.

The movement from one conversation to another gives a likable freedom
to “Vodka Lemon,” and allows Mr. Saleem to set up a few running jokes
that combine quotidian absurdity with thoughtful melodrama, like the
opening shot of the old man, and a few other freakish outbursts that
have to be witnessed to be believed, and savored. It is an
intelligent gamble on Mr. Saleem’s part; he knows that if he’s not
going to satisfy audiences with convention, he should at least supply
a few entrances as detonation devices.

“Vodka Lemon” could be an Ice Capades version of a Beckett play, with
a group of seasoned though modest hammy actors in complete control.
Their affectlessness gives the movie an atmosphere of
hypothermia-laced surrealism, with shots of drama serving the same
purpose as the vodka; both keep the blood flowing. This movie has an
antic, mordant visual poetry that matches up with the rancor and
feeling in its population’s souls.

VODKA LEMON

Directed by Hiner Saleem; written (in Armenian, Kurdish and Russian,
with English subtitles) by Beatrice Pollet; director of photography,
Christophe Pollock; edited by Theodora Mantzouru; music by Michel
Korb; production designer, Albert Hamarash; produced by Fabrice Guez.
Running time: 88 minutes. This film is not rated. Shown with a
six-minute short, David Licata’s “Tango Octagenario” tonight at 6 and
tomorrow night at 8:30 at the Walter Reade Theater at Lincoln Center,
165 West 65th Street, and Saturday at 9 p.m. at the MoMA Gramercy
Theater, 127 East 23rd Street, Manhattan, as part of the 33rd New
Directors/New Films series of the Film Society of Lincoln Center and
the department of film and media of the Museum of Modern Art.

WITH: Romik Avinian (Hamo), Ivan Franek (Dilovan), Zaal Karielachvili
(Giano), Lala Sarkissian (Nina), Armen Maroutyan (Romik), Astrik
Avaguian (Avin), Rouzana-Vite Mesropian (Zine), Témou (Azad) and
Armen Sarkissyan (Bus Driver).