AZERI PARLIAMENT MEMBER DEFIES EU WARNING
Armenpress
Aug 31 2006
BAKU, AUGUST 31, ARMENPRESS: A senior member of Azerbaijani ruling
party has openly defied a warning by Brussels that has voiced alarm
at the mounting risk of open warfare in the EU’s southeast neighbors
– Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan – amid European plans to sign new
cooperation pacts and build new pipelines in the region.
Aidyn Mirzazade, a member of the ruling board of the governing Yeni
Azerbaijan party said his country must increase its military spending
as much as it needs to drive ‘Armenian occupants’ from Azeri lands.
His remarks came as retaliation to Benita Ferrero-Waldner, EU external
relations commissioner’s speech in Slovenian city of Bled during the
‘Caspian Outlook’ international conference where she called on Georgia
and Azerbaijan to give up plans of settling their conflicts by use
of force. “Negative trends are coming together, the combination of
which is, frankly, alarming,” Benita Ferrero-Waldner said in Slovenia
on Monday (28 August), citing a recent upswing in aggressive rhetoric
and arms spending.
“Defense spending is going through the roof,” she stated, adding “there
is a serious danger of the rhetoric lowering the threshold for war”
in reference to the so-called “frozen conflicts” of Abkhazia and South
Ossetia in Georgia and Nagorno-Karabakh in Azerbaijan. Georgia’s
military budget proportionally increased faster than any other
country’s in the world last year, while Azerbaijan has boasted that
its military budget in 2007 will be the size of the total budget
of Armenia.
“We shall never cede an inch of land to Armenians and the major
argument is to have an effective army equipped with modern weapons,”
the Azeri, Aidyn Mirzazade, was quoted by Azeri news agency Trend
as saying.

‘HAYASTAN’ FUND ANNOUNCES ABOUT STRICT SUPERVISION
By Susanna Margarian
AZG Armenian Daily
01/09/2006
“Hayastan” All-Armenian Fund once again touches upon the
construction of North-South highway in Nagorno Karabakh Republic
assuring that the constriction works are continuing according to
schedule. “Construction is being carried out simultaneously I 7
sections of the road. Construction of Kichan-Drmbon’s 5.2 km long
section is in final stage. Construction of several other sections
nears its end,” a statement reads.
During the year of 2006 “Hayastan” Fund has paved 90 thousand sq
meters of the highway. To solve the problem connected with bitumen
importing and to help construction organizations, the Fund has signed
an agreement of $1 million 2 thousand in 2006 as a result of which
1200 tones of bitumen have been imported to Armenia.
“As to the quality of construction, problems can occur in any
circumstance, and if needed the Fund turns to NKR government and other
authorized organs as well as strictly warns contractor companies. In
general, the Fund has made stricter its control over the quality of
the work,” the Fund’s administration states.

THERE ARE SERIOUS OBSTACLES FOR NAGORNO KARABAKH REGULATION
AZG Armenian Daily
01/09/2006
In an August 30 interview with Novie Izvestiya newspaper Karel
de Gucht, OSCE Chairman-in-Office of the and Foreign Minister of
Belgium, stated that the OSCE has to take a number of measures to
settle “frozen conflicts” in the territory of the CIS. “I have met the
leaders of conflicting sides, proposed all possible services but it’s
impossible to settle those conflicts only by the OSCE’s efforts. Our
success largely depends on aspiration and will of the sides,” he said.
Karel de Gucht also underscored that though a window of opportunity
was opened for the regulation of Nagorno Karabakh conflict, essential
success was not marked during the meetings of Armenian and Azerbaijani
presidents in Paris and Bucharest. “There are serious obstacles, and
to overcome them both presidents need wisdom and courage. Belgium’s
chairmanship together with the Minsk Group co-chairs will do everything
advancement of the regulation process,” the OSCE Chairman-in-Office
said.

CONGRATULATORY MESSAGE OF PRESIDENT ROBERT KOCHARIAN ON THE OCCASION OF THE DAY OF KNOWLEDGE
Armenpress
Aug 31 2006
YEREVAN, AUGUST 31, ARMENPRESS: Dear teachers and parents, dear
students, I congratulate you on the occasion of the Day of Knowledge.
Good education has always been a priority for our people. The future of
Armenia is with a comprehensively developed, well educated generation.
Currently, the reformation of the educational system is in the
center of the authorities’ attention. It should be conducted through
a combination of our best traditions and modern trends. Educational
programs must be oriented towards training high class specialists in
fundamental sciences and high technology area.
Special attention should be given to the children with particular
educational needs, and they should not be left out of the educational
process.
I congratulate you once again and wish the students good progress in
their studies, and I wish the teachers success in their gratifying
work.

PRESIDENT KOCHARIAN TO VISIT GERMANY, BELARUS AND KAZAKHSTAN BY THE END OF THE YEAR
By Gohar Gevorgian
AZG Armenian Daily
01/09/2006
Viktor Soghomonian, spokesman for president Robert Kocharian, met
journalists on August 30 to present president’s scheduled foreign
visit for this year. In his words, by the end of this year president
Kocharian will visit Germany, will take part in CIS Summit in Minsk
as well as will pay an official visit to Kazakhstan. Almost as many
presidential visit are expected to take place in Armenia. “Diplomatic
circles discuss French president Jacques Chirac’s official visit as
well as the visits of presidents of Slovenia and Romania,” Soghomonian
said. Concerning Chirac’s visit, the spokesman suggested to view his
visit as manifestation of traditionally friendly relations between
the two states and not to look for political contexts. Journalists
availed themselves of the opportunity to ask Viktor Soghomonian
their questions.
There is no conflict between Robert Kocharian and Serge
Sargsian. Soghomonian turned down rumors about the argument between
Kocharian and Sargsian concerning Prosperous Armenia and Republican
parties. As to the struggle between the parties, Soghomonian thinks
there is no such thing. “There may be discords and contradictions; if
they are absent then there are no different forces.” The spokesman said
that he did not discuss with the president the publication according
to which the president does not want to see Serge Sargsian as his
successor. The spokesman made no forecast about Robert Kocharian’s
political future advising to ask president himself. He only said
that so far there is no consideration about Kocharian joining any
political party. Viktor Soghomonian stated that neither he is going
to join any party citing the principle that Kocharian’s staff should
not belong to any party.
As to Kocharian-Aliyev meeting, Soghomonian said it untimely to speak
about it. “A few days ago the foreign ministers agreed to meet. They
will try to prepare the presidents’ meeting,” he said.
Asked why Armenia does not send peacekeepers to Lebanon, the
spokesperson said that now Armenia is not going to send its forces
as there are several reasons.
“Firstly, the mandate of peacekeeping forces is not finalized
yet, i.e. it is not clear where are the limits of their
activities. Secondly, participation of Armenian peacekeepers in
diverse clashes can be harmful for Lebanon’s big Armenian community.”

ON THIS DAY – AUG. 31
News24, South Africa
Aug. 31, 2006
Today is Thursday, August 31, the 243rd day of 2006. There are 122
days left in the year.
Highlights in history on this date:
1990 – After Armenian Republic’s parliament declares a state of
emergency, 250 militant nationalists give up their weapons.
1290 – Jews are exiled from England by proclamation of King Edward 1.
1704 – Forces of Russia’s Czar Peter the Great take Narva in Russia.
1876 – Turkey’s Sultan Murad V is deposed on plea of insanity and is
succeeded by Abdul Hamid 2.
1886 – In one of America’s worst disasters, 110 people are killed
when an earthquake rocks Charleston, South Carolina.
1888 – Mary Ann Nicholls is found murdered in London’s East End. She
is the first victim of Jack the Ripper.
1900 – British forces under Frederick Roberts occupy Johannesburg,
South Africa.
1918 – Bolshevik troops attack British Embassy in Petrograd, Russia.
1922 – Czech-Serb-Croat Alliance is signed at Marienbad.
1923 – Italy starts a brief occupation of the Greek island of Corfu
after the murder of a boundary delegation.
1935 – United States President Franklin D Roosevelt signs an act
prohibiting the export of US arms to belligerents.
1942 – German general Rommel renews offensive against British at
Alam Halfa in North Africa in World War 2, but is driven back to
original lines.
1947 – The US Investigating Committee recommends that Great Britain
give up control of Palestine.
1957 – Malaysia gains independence as Federation of Malaya.
1962 – Trinidad and Tobago become independent nation within British
Commonwealth.
1971 – Cuba terminates the airlift that has brought 246 000, Cuban
refugees from Havana to Florida since December 1965.
1977 – Rhodesian Prime Minister Ian Smith’s party wins the election and
gains all 50 white seats in parliament. The vote gives Smith a mandate
to negotiate with black leaders on greater political representation
for the country’s six million blacks.
1980 – Polish labour leaders sign agreements with Communist government
establishing for first time in a Soviet-bloc nation the rights to
strike and to establish free trade unions.
1982 – El Salvador defences minister Jose Guillermo Garcia Merino
discloses that the armed forces have suffered 3 657 casualties in a
year; bringing the number of people killed by rightists during the
three-year civil war to more than 35 000.
1986 – Moscow’s secret police hold US news correspondent Nicholas
Daniloff on spying allegations. His wife calls it a frame-up.
1987 – Government and opposition officials in South Korea agree on
revising constitution to clear way for direct presidential elections
and other reforms.
1990 – After Armenian Republic’s parliament declares a state of
emergency, 250 militant nationalists give up their weapons.
1991 – Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan become the ninth and tenth Soviet
republics to declare independence.
1994 – Irish Republican Army declares an open-ended cease-fire in
its 24-year campaign against British rule of Northern Ireland.
1995 – A bomb-laden car explodes in a crowded square outside Algeria’s
national police headquarters, killing 10 and injuring 15.
1996 – Iraq captures Irbil in northern Iraq, a key city inside the
Kurdish “safe haven” protected by US-led forces. It is Saddam Hussein’s
largest military action since the end of the Gulf War in 1991.
1997 – Typhoon Rex veers away from Japan’s main island of Honshu, but
the record rainfall it spawned forces thousands to flee their homes.
Flooding and landslides caused by the rains kill 14 people and
injure 45.
1998 – North Korea launches a new, more powerful long-range ballistic
missile that crosses over Japan’s main island and crashes into the
Pacific Ocean. The test draws strong protests from Japan and the US.
2002 – A Russian Mi-24 assault helicopter is shot down by a missile
in Chechnya. Both of the gunship’s pilots are killed. Chechen rebels
claim responsibility.
2004 – Militants in Iraq kill 12 Nepalese contract workers, in a
gruesome video discovered on an Islamic website, showing one of
them beheaded and the 11 others shot in a methodical series of
execution-style slayings.
2005 – Panicked by rumours of a suicide bomber, thousands of Shi’ite
pilgrims break into a stampede on a bridge in Baghdad during a
religious procession, crushing one another or plunging into Tigris
River. Nearly 1 000 die, mostly women and children.
Today’s Birthdays: Theophile Gautier, French author (1811-1872); Maria
Montessori, Italian doctor and educator (1870-1952); William Saroyan,
US writer (1908-1981); Buddy Hackett, US actor/comedian (1924-2003);
Van Morrison, Irish singer (1945); Itzhak Perlman, Israeli violinist
(1945); Richard Gere, US actor (1949).
Thought for Today: Show me the country in which there are no strikes
and I’ll show you that country in which there is no liberty – Emma
Goldman, American anarchist (1869-1940).

ARMENIANS PROTEST TURKISH PARTICIPATION IN UN PEACEKEEPER FORCE
Deutsche Presse-Agentur
August 31, 2006 Thursday 4:50 PM EST
DPA POLITICS Mideast Conflicts Lebanon Armenians Turkey Armenians
protest Turkish participation in UN peacekeeper force Beirut Some 100
Lebanese-Armenians took part in a demonstration Thursday to protest
Turkish participation in the United Nations peacekeeping force due
to to deploy alongside the Lebanese Army in southern Lebanon.
Media reports have said Ankara could send between 600 and 1,200 men
to join a bolstered UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL).
UNIFIL plans to patrol southern Lebanon, enforcing a fragile ceasefire
that ended a month of deadly Israeli strikes on the country
and rocket attacks by Hezbollah militants against Israel.
The protest took place near UN headquarters in downtown Beirut.
The demonstrators handed a UN official an open letter addressed to
UN chief Kofi Annan.
Lebanon is home to the largest Armenian community in the Arab world,
made up of descendants of survivors of the 1915-1917 massacres
in Turkey.
The Lebanese-Armenian community is estimated to number 120,000,
half of what it was before the 1975-1990 civil war.
Several countries have recognized the massacres as genocide – a term
Turkey fiercely rejects – and Brussels has urged Ankara to face its
past and expand freedom of speech.
Reports say an announcement on the details of the Turkish deployment
could be made when Annan visits Turkey on September 6.
Turkey occupies a unique role in the area, as an overwhelmingly
Muslim nation that nevertheless enjoys the confidence of Israel –
with which it signed a military cooperation agreement in 1996 –
while retaining close ties to nearby Arab states.

SOUTH CAUCASUS CONCERNS
European Report
August 31, 2006
EU External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner said on
28 August in Slovenia that she was looking forward to celebrating
the adoption of European Neighbourhood Policy action plans to boost
economic and political links with Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia
when she visits the region with the Finnish EU Presidency in early
October. But she said that the last weeks and months had shown an
alarming combination of worrying trends in the region, with little
or no progress in settling frozen conflicts’ combined with rocketing
defence spending and increasingly inflammatory rhetoric. ‘Any further
escalation of tension could re-ignite the conflicts with devastating
consequences for the entire region’, she warned.

NAASR CELEBRATES WITH SPECIAL PROGRAMS
Belmont Citizen-Herald, MA
Aug. 31, 2006
The National Association for Armenian Studies and Research (NAASR)
will present an evening of discussion, with pictures and video,
entitled “Searching for Armenia: An Inner and Outer Journey,” at
8 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 12, in the First Armenian Church Auditorium,
380 Concord Ave., Belmont.
The participants in the discussion will be among those who took
part in NAASR’s June 2-18 Armenian Heritage Tour, the first such
trip NAASR has sponsored in over a quarter of a century. (NAASR’s
initial Armenian Heritage Tour in 1967 was the first of its kind in
the United States.) The participants will share their impressions
and recollections, and photos and video from the trip will also be
shared and discussed.
Taking in the Armenian Republic and Karabagh, portions of Georgia,
and much of today’s Eastern Turkey, the 2006 tour was led by Professor
George Bournoutian, a historian at Iona College in New York. Over 20
people accompanied Bournoutian on the tour, many of them visiting
places they had never been before or from which their parents or
grandparents had come nearly a century ago.
Admission to the event is free (donations appreciated). Following the
discussion there will be a reception at the NAASR Center, across from
the church. The bookstore will be open, with a special discount for
the evening of 20 percent off all items.
NAASR will be celebrating its 50th anniversary on Sept. 30. A symposium
on “Armenian-Turkish Dialogue and the Direction of Armenian Studies”
will be held at the Royal Sonesta Hotel in Cambridge, from 9 a.m. until
1 p.m., featuring five leading scholars from various areas of Armenian
Studies. The symposium is open to the public at no charge.
The NAASR Gala Banquet and Celebration of 50 Years will take place
that evening at the Royal Sonesta, with a reception, dinner and a
program that will include a keynote address, a retrospective video,
music and dancing, and surprise announcements. The banquet is open
to NAASR members and non-members alike. Interested parties should
contact NAASR as soon as possible for information on reservations.

TURKISH FOREIGN MINISTRY: WE’LL SUPPORT AZERBAIJAN’S REPLY TO THE MINSK GROUP’S PROPOSALS
Azeri Press Agency, Azerbaijan
Aug. 31, 2006
Turkey’s Foreign Ministry commented on the U.S co-chair of the OSCE
Minsk Group Mathew Bryza’s calling for the parties to the Nagorno
Garabagh to make a trade-off.
A Foreign Ministry official told the APA’s Turkey bureau that
Azerbaijan’s position remains important to them.
“We’ll support whatever reply Azerbaijan gives to these proposals. It
is up to Azerbaijan to accept these proposals. What will happen
if Azerbaijan does not accept these? Would power states invade
Azerbaijan for that? Turkey will never force Azerbaijan to accept
any proposal. We unconditionally support Azerbaijan in this issue,”
the official underlined.