Category: News

The softer side of Dr. Death
United Press International
March 3, 2004 Wednesday
ROYAL OAK, MICHIGAN
Jack Kevorkian, the Michigan pathologist whose advocacy of euthanasia
embarrassed right-to-die advocates and landed him in jail, has become
a writer.
GlimmerIQs, a soft-bound collection of light verse, serious essays,
paintings, cartoons, musical scores and family photographs — went on
sale Monday for $26 a copy, the Detroit News reported Wednesday.
The book includes an illustrated guide to anatomical mapping and
Kevorkian’s skeptical musings on the low-carb diet craze, among other
topics.
Kevorkian’s book is available via the Internet, glimmeriqs.com or at
the Ariana Gallery in downtown Royal Oak.
Kevorkian is at the Thumb Correctional Facility in Lapeer, Mich.,
where he is in the fifth year of a 10- to 25-year sentence for
second-degree murder.
He was convicted for the injection death of 75-year-old Thomas Youk,
whose final moments Kevorkian videotaped and narrated on CBS’s “60
Minutes” in 1998.
“This book is what’s been keeping him alive,” Ariana Gallery director
Ann Kuffler, a longtime friend and supporter, said Tuesday.

Women call for resignation of Armenian leaders in holiday protest
Associated Press
March 8, 2004 Monday 8:20 AM Eastern Time
YEREVAN, Armenia
Hundreds of women who oppose Armenia’s leadership marched through the
capital on Monday, marking International Women’s Day with calls for
the resignation of President Robert Kocharian and his government.
Carrying flowers and signs reading “Women against arbitrary rule,”
about 1,500 women marched through central Yerevan to the president’s
residence, where they held a rally denouncing the authorities.
Speakers at the rally, which was organized by the Caucasus Mountain
nation’s political opposition, called for the removal of Kocharian and
his government and their replacement by opposition leaders.
Kocharian won a second term in presidential elections a year ago that
sparked mass protests, including nearly daily demonstrations between
the first round of voting in February 2003 and the runoff in early
March.
The opposition alleged widespread violations in both rounds of the
election, including ballot-box stuffing and intimidation of its
activists. The election was followed by parliamentary ballot in which
the pro-government party won the most votes.
In April, Armenia’s Constitutional Court confirmed the results of the
presidential vote but suggested that a referendum be held within a
year to gauge the public’s confidence in the nation’s
leaders. Opposition leaders have pressed for the plebiscite.
International Women’s Day dates back to the Soviet era. Some former
Soviet republics have scrapped the holiday, but in Armenia, Russia and
some others it remains an official holiday and is widely celebrate.

Two arrested in alleged sale of body parts at UCLA
The Associated Press
March 8, 2004, Monday, BC cycle
LOS ANGELES
Two people, including the man who oversees the cadaver program at the
University of California, Los Angeles, have been arrested in
connection with the alleged theft of body parts from the school.
Henry Reid, director of the UCLA program that makes donated bodies
available for medical education and research, was arrested Saturday
for investigation of grand theft for allegedly selling corpses and
body parts for profit.
Reid, 54, who was hired in 1997 to improve the school’s record keeping
of the donated cadavers, was released on $20,000 bail. He has declined
to comment.
On Sunday, Ernest Nelson was arrested for investigation of receiving
stolen property, according to a university statement. The school said
Nelson was not a UCLA employee. Nelson, 46, was jailed on $30,000
bail.
Authorities would say little about the case, but Nelson told the Los
Angeles Times that for six years he acted as a “middle man” who would
retrieve body parts from the UCLA Medical School’s freezer and sell
them to large research companies. He said he did so with the knowledge
of UCLA employees, including Reid.
“I call one of the most prestigious universities in the world, their
director gives me the protocol, I follow that protocol and they charge
me with receiving stolen body parts?” the Times quoted Nelson as
saying.
UCLA attorney Louis Marlin denied that other school officials were
involved. He said Nelson paid for the body parts he took with
cashier’s checks made out to Reid.
The university planned a news conference on Monday.
UCLA planned to seek felony charges against Reid, said Nancy
Greenstein of the university police department.
Former Gov. George Deukmejian agreed Friday to oversee a reform of the
program, which was one of the first in the nation when it was
established in 1950.
The cadaver program receives about 175 bodies each year for medical
research and education. The program first came under scrutiny in 1993
when hazardous medical waste was discovered inside boxes of cremated
human remains.

Panel to examine California prison system
United Press International
March 6, 2004 Saturday
SACRAMENTO
California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has appointed former Gov. George
Deukmejian, a fellow-Republican, to lead a panel on the state’s
prisons.
The panel will recommend short- and long-term fixes of the youth and
adult penal system recently described in reports as racked with
corruption and mismanagement, the Los Angeles Times reported Saturday.
“Go find out how to make this the best system in the country,”
Schwarzenegger said Friday, according to one panel member.
Last month, state-hired experts described the California Youth
Authority, which oversees teenage offenders, as a decrepit, violent
system.
Besides examining personnel, training, discipline, structure and
ethics, the panel will consider whether to close some facilities.
Deukmejian served as California’s governor from 1983 to 1991, during
which time the number of prisons doubled and the number of convicts
rose from 40,000 to more than 100,000.

Corrections Panel
City News Service
March 5, 2004 Friday
LOS ANGELES
Former Gov. George Deukmejian will chair an independent review panel
of the state’s troubled youth and adult correctional systems,
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger announced today. “I can think of no one
more qualified to lead this effort, no one with more integrity and
experience than Governor Deukmejian,” Schwarzenegger said. “It has
been too long since our correctional system has undergone a
fundamental review of its operations.” The panel will produce a series
of short- and long-term goals. “The mission of this inquiry team is to
chart a course of action to turn around the crisis of confidence in
California’s correctional system,” Schwarzenegger said. Deukmejian is
a former California legislator and state attorney general from Long
Beach who helped Schwarzenegger get elected. The announcement comes
after months of bad news for the California Youth Authority and the
adult corrections system. A report last month showed CYA facilities to
be dangerous and filthy with frequent acts of violence among the young
inmates. On Jan. 19, the CYA was back in the news when two boys
committed suicide in their shared cell. On the adult side, Sen. Gloria
Romero, D-East Los Angeles, has attempted to take a closer look at
problems in the prison system. She says she has been threatened as a
result of her actions. After heading a Senate hearing where testimony
revealed an alleged rogue band of correctional officers, she received
a letter filled with non-toxic white powder. Last summer, she received
a death threat involving prison gangs.

Schwarzenegger names Deukmejian to head prison reform panel
The Associated Press
March 5, 2004, Friday, BC cycle
By DON THOMPSON, Associated Press Writer
SACRAMENTO
Former Gov. George Deukmejian will chair an independent review panel
charged with finding ways to “turn around the crisis of confidence” in
California’s youth and adult correctional systems, Gov. Arnold
Schwarzenegger said Friday.
Panel members said they plan a report by June, including
recommendations on prison closures and the future of San Quentin, the
state’s oldest prison that sits on prime development land.
Critics noted “Iron Duke” Deukmejian, who held office from 1983-91,
helped build the state’s prison system into the nation’s largest
during a law-and-order administration.
That system has become Schwarzenegger’s biggest unexpected policy
crisis since he took office after October’s recall election, diverting
attention from his attempts to rein in the state’s massive budget
crisis.
A federal court-appointed monitor found that a prison employee “code
of silence” protects wrongdoers and punishes whistleblowers, and
recommended the Department of Corrections’ former director be charged
with contempt of court.
A series of scathing national experts’ reports criticized the
California Youth Authority as a cruel version of the adult prison
system, unable to meet its responsibility to rehabilitate children
before it’s too late.
And the system’s spending is out of control, routinely exceeding its
budget by hundreds of millions of dollars. A lucrative labor contract
with the powerful California Correctional Peace Officers Association
was the focus of the latest in a series of state Senate oversight
hearings Thursday.
Friday’s announcement came the same day as a sentencing reform group,
the Justice Policy Institute, released a study panning California’s
decade-old “three strikes” law, championed by Schwarzenegger adviser
and former Gov. Pete Wilson, as ineffective and unfair to minorities
and nonviolent offenders.
There are no boundaries on the panel’s recommendations, including
sentencing changes, said Joseph Gunn, who was named the panel’s
executive director. Gunn was executive director of the Los Angeles
Board of Police Commissioners and co-chaired the independent review
panel that investigated the city’s Rampart police corruption case.
He said Schwarzenegger is concerned the youth authority is “set up for
the 1950s and not the 2000s, and maybe they have to be brought up to
modern times.”
When it comes to breaking the alleged “code of silence,” Gunn said,
“This is not something you’re going to change overnight. This goes
back to a whole ethics and culture issue” that may involve wholesale
retraining.
Panel consultants are Robin Dezember, Deukmejian’s former
undersecretary of the Youth and Adult Correctional Agency and Wilson’s
former chief deputy finance director; and George Camp, a former
administrator in the federal, New York and Missouri prison systems,
now with the Criminal Justice Institute in Middletown, Conn.
Schwarzenegger said Deukmejian’s experience as a legislator, state
attorney general and governor makes him the ideal chairman.
“George Deukmejian presided over one of the biggest prison-building
programs in the history of the world, and that’s no exaggeration. His
record on prison reform is not good,” countered Rose Braz of the
sentencing and prison reform groups Critical Resistance and a new
coalition called Californians United for A Responsible Budget.
“We know what kind of reforms are needed” after years of audits,
investigations and reports by experts and blue ribbon panels, Braz
said. “What we need now is the political will to do it.”
Panel members said their charge is to tell Schwarzenegger quickly
which of those recommendations should be accepted, and how they can be
accomplished.
The panel will examine the corrections system’s “ethics and culture;”
organization and operations; safety practices for inmates, employees
and the public; and personnel and training programs.
The panel will report directly to Schwarzenegger as part of the larger
“performance review” his administration is conducting to increase
efficiency and accountability in state government. In that light, the
corrections panel also will look at cutting the system’s costs,
including shuttering prisons.
Braz’ coalition of 36 prison and sentencing reform groups said
Schwarzenegger should close at least three prisons and cancel plans
for a new maximum security facility at Delano if he wants to see cost
savings from the Corrections Department’s plan to trim 15,000 inmates.
That plan relies mainly on returning fewer parole violators to
prison. Department spokeswoman Margot Bach said the training academy
will produce no new classes of correctional officers this year as a
result, concentrating instead on training more parole officers.
On the Net:
California Department of Corrections:
California Youth Authority:
Critical Resistance:

Chessmaster Kasparov Boycott urges Russian election boycott
Agence France Presse
March 2, 2004 Tuesday
MOSCOW
A group of liberal Russian journalists and lawmakers led by chess
grandmaster Garry Kasparov Tuesday urged the public to boycott the
forthcoming presidential election, describing as a farce.
The group called on challengers to President Vladimir Putin, who is
all but certain to be reelected for a second mandate in the March 14
poll, to quit the race.
“Those who are aware of their civic duties and cherish their dignity
as citizens cannot and must not take part in such a farce,” said the
2008 Free Elections group said in a statement broadcast on Moscow
Moscow radio station.
“We call on officially registered candidates to end their
participation in this desecration of the notion of an election, and to
withdraw their candidacies.” it said: “It is not too late to make this
decision and leave the authorities to perform the rest of their
shameful spectacle alone.”
It added: “We call on responsible and free-thinking voters to renounce
voting. One cannot obediently and thoughtlessly offer the authorities
such a mandate for dictatorship as they hope to obtain.”
Kasparov, considered the world’s finest chess player despite losing
the champion’s title to Vladimir Kramnik in 2000, allied himself with
opposition journalists and lawmakers who formed the 2008 Free
Elections group after a landslide victory by Putin’s followers in
parliamentary elections last December 7.
The group said its main goal was to ensure the survival of post-Soviet
democracy after United Russia, a party loyal to Putin, won more than
300 seats in the 450-seat lower house of parliament, enough to change
the constitution.
In its founding statement in January, it said: “We will fight to make
sure that a president is elected in 2008 and that it does not turn out
that the current president extends his term, either for a short time
or forever.”
Liberal candidate Irina Khakamada last month threatened to withdraw
from the presidential race to protest against the lack of any real
competition and called on other candidates to join her, but to no
avail.
lpt/eh/da
Russia-politics-elections-Kasparov

The European Centre for Minority Issues (ECMI)
Schiffbrücke 12, D · 24939 Flensburg, Germany, [email protected]
Tel: +49 (0) 4 61 – 1 41 49 – 0
Fax: +49 (0) 4 61 – 1 41 49 – 19
Web:
ECMI Newsletter No. 33
Spring 2004
——————————————
We introduce. Defusing interethnic tensions and promoting
regional integration – the Javakheti Region of the Republic of
Georgia
——————————————
In November 2003, ECMI was granted funding for its project on “Defusing
interethnic tension and promoting regional integration – the Javakheti
Region of the Republic of Georgia”. By establishing a network consisting of
civil society actors that includes representatives for most ethno-religious
groups as well as government officials in two predominantly Armenian
districts in Georgia’s Samtskhe-Javakheti Province, the project seeks to
improve inter-ethnic relations, to broaden the consultative process of
decision-making, and to increase effective public participation and public
awareness on local governance. The project will promote regional integration
of the region by involving province and state level policy-makers in the
network, thereby creating firmer links between regional actors and central
levels of authority. In conjunction with the network, the project will
enhance the capacity of less advanced regional communities through capacity
building training and community mobilisation efforts in order to encourage
broad participation in the consultative process.
The project grants, amounting to 35,000 EUR by the Danish Ministry of
Foreign Affairs and 35,000 EUR by the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs,
has been provided to cover the initial 3 month project phase. Due to the
revolutionary events in Georgia in November 2003, the initiation of the
project was postponed to February 2004.
We hope you enjoyed this thirty-third issue of the ECMI Newsletter,
and we hope you will remember to tell interested colleagues about it.
If you have any comments or suggestions for improvement of this
newsletter, please contact William McKinney at:
[email protected]

PRESS RELEASE
MARCH 05, 2004
UCLA Armenian Graduate Students Association
Graduate Students Association
c/o Armenian Graduate Students Association
Kerckhoff Hall Room 316
308 Westwood Plaza
Los Angeles, CA 90024
Contact: Gevork Nazaryan
E-mail: [email protected]
Website:
UCLA AGSA hosts academics to discuss current research in Armenian Studies
The UCLA Armenian Graduate Students Association held the second annual,
international Graduate Student Colloquium in Armenian Studies at UCLA on
Friday, February 20, 2004. It drew numerous academics and students from
UCLA as well as local universities who enjoyed presentations on themes from
Classical Literature, the Contemporary History and Politics of
Transcaucasia, Modern Literature, as well as Armenians and Education Issues
in the USA. “I found putting the colloquium together to be a most rewarding
experience and the day itself was not only informative and academically
stimulating, but exciting as well,” remarked Ani Moughamian, a UCLA
graduate student in the School of Education and Project Director of the
2004 colloquium. “We really brought a great group of students together from
so many different places and it was a thrill for me to see how successful
the colloquium was this year in terms of scholarship and camaraderie
between students.”
“It was a pleasure to be able to attend such a wonderful event. The AGSA
members did an excellent job and the colloquium has developed in so many
ways since last year. I can only expect its continued growth in the coming
years and the UCLA AGSA is happy to provide the foundation for the creative
and ambitious graduate students of this and future organizing committees,”
commended Haig Hovsepian, Executive Officer of the UCLA AGSA. He also
expressed his thanks to Dr. Peter Cowe (Professor and holder of the
Narekatsi Chair in Armenian Language and Literature) for his participation
in the organizing committee. “Dr. Cowe helped make the 2003 colloquium a
reality and continued to provide a professional experience for the 2004
organizing committee in its efforts to put together a quality event.”
The first panel of the morning session featured Andrea Scala (Austria) and
Lilit Hovsepyan (Armenia) who presented their works regarding texts by John
Chrysostum and Gregory of Narek, respectively. Andrea hails from the
Armenology community of Italy where, since submitting his abstract in
response to the 2004 call for papers, he received his degree from the State
University in Milan. For Lilit, it was the first time presenting her work
in an academic conference outside of the Republic of Armenia. She happily
relayed that “… it was a good chance to come into contact with other
people [in the field], to make friends, and learn much about the students
and educational system at UCLA.” She also noted that her participation in
the colloquium and the colloquium itself has received positive support and
feedback from her colleagues in Armenia. She looks forward to more graduate
students presenting their work in the coming years.
Leading off the second panel of the day, Ohannes Geukjian (Peace Studies –
University of Bradford, UK) presented a paper on the historical and
territorial dimensions of the conflict in Artsakh. He was joined by Asbed
Kotchikian, a political science doctoral student from Boston University,
who delivered a lecture on the perceived roles of Russia and Turkey in
Georgian and Armenian foreign policy.
“I was excited both about the geographical range of participants in this
year’s colloquium as well as the diversity of disciplines which they
represented within the broad field of Armenian Studies,” expressed Dr.
Peter Cowe. “This is a real indication of the growth and expansion of our
field and is very stimulating.”
His sentiments were echoed by Talar Chahinian, a UCLA graduate student in
the Department of Comparative Literature, who presented her work on
French-Armenian writers in the years immediately following the Armenian
Genocide. “It is very exciting to see graduate students from different
countries and across various disciplines coming together… The colloquium
did a great job of providing a forum for these different voices and also of
providing a space for community building among the participants.”
Talar was joined by fellow UCLA graduate student Tamar Boyadjian (Near
Eastern Languages and Cultures) who presented her latest work exploring the
use of natural imagery by late-19th and early-20th century Armenian poets.
Rounding off the third panel on modern literature was Karen Gharslyan of
the Bryusov State Linguistics University (Armenia) who compared the
literary perceptions of Giambattista Vico and James Joyce as it related to
the Biblical Flood, Noah and his descendent, as well as the role of the
Armenian people in this beginning of humanity.
Though the day’s program was nearing its end by the end of the fourth
panel, the question and answer session that followed was no less energetic
than those that preceded it. Artineh Samkian who presented on the topic of
language use in Armenian private schools expressed her appreciation of the
dialogue between academics in the audience. “I received some important
comments and constructive criticism that will help me to better shape my
project in its ‘final’ state.” Artineh, UCLA graduate student in the School
of Education was joined by Ani Moughamian and Yeprem Mehranian (University
of Massachusetts, Amherst). Whereas Ani presented data on the literacy
achievement of Armenian-American learners of the English Language, Yeprem
delved into the issue of the search for identity and the negotiation
between that of being Armenian and American.
Ramela Grigorian, a graduate student from the Department of Art History at
UCLA noted that a number of this year’s participants had indicated that
they would be returning to their home institutes and students as well as
colleagues to excitedly inform them about the colloquium and the active
Armenian studies community. “How wonderful that a symposium like this has
the power to inspire! I do hope to see more members of the community attend
the conference next year!”
With only a week to rest, the organizing committee is already back to work
and is in the process of drafting the next year’s call for papers. The UCLA
AGSA looks forward to February 2005 and hosting the next Graduate Student
Colloquium in Armenian Studies.
———- Attachment # 1 of 1: 2004 GSCiAS Photographs (3) ———-
– 1 – Photo viewable/download-able at:
– 1 – Caption: Andrea Scala (right – State University of Milan, Italy) and
Lilit Hovsepyan (left – Abovian State University, Armenia) field questions
from the audience following the first panel of the morning on classical
literature.
– 2 – Photo viewable/download-able at:
– 2 – Caption: Members of the audience during the third panel on modern
literature
– 3 – Photo viewable/download-able at:
– 3 – Caption: UCLA AGSA general member, Ani Nahapetian moderates the
question and answer session following the fourth panel of the day
(Armenians and Education Issues in the USA). Seated from left to right are
Ani Moughamian (UCLA), Artineh Samkian (UCLA), and Yeprem Mehranian (U
Mass, Amherst).

09.03.2004 09:02:00 GMT
Armenia posts deflation of 0.6% in Feb
Yerevan. (Interfax) – Consumer prices in Armenia fell 0.6% in
February, owing to a seasonal drop in prices for food and tobacco and
a 0.1%-decrease in service charges, the National Statistical Service
told Interfax.
Nonfood prices were unchanged in February, the service said.
Armenia had inflation of 2.5% in January 2004 and 8.6% in the whole of
2003. The government is targeting inflation of not more than 3% this
year as a whole.