SECOND FLIGHT RECORDER RAISED FROM BLACK SEA AT A-320 CRASH SITE
Interfax, Russia
May 24 2006
MOSCOW. May 24 (Interfax) – The second cockpit voice recorder from
the A-320 Armenian Airlines passenger liner, which crashed into the
Black Sea on May 3, has been recovered, Alexander Davydenko, head
of the Transport Ministry’s Federal Sea and River Transport Agency,
told Interfax.
The flight recorder was discovered at about midnight in a 50-
centimeter thick layer of silt on the seabed, 16 meters from the place
where the first black box had been found, Russian Transport Minister
and chairman of the inter-state commission Igor Levitin told Interfax
early on Wednesday.
“Given a bad weather forecast, the decision was made to lift the
flight recorder during the night,” Davydenko said, adding that the
second black box was raised at 3 a.m. on Wednesday.
The first cockpit voice recorder was recovered on Monday and handed
over to the Inter-State Aviation Committee’s technical commission.
The A-320 Armavia airliner crashed into the Black Sea six kilometers
off the coast of Sochi. All 113 people on board were killed.

OSCE MINSK GROUP CONSULTATIONS TO BE HELD IN BAKU
ITAR-TASS, Russia
May 24 2006
BAKU, May 24 (Itar-Tass) – The Russian, French and US co-chairs of
the OSCE Minsk Group, Yuri Merzlyakov, Bernard Fassier and Stephen
Mann, will discuss in the course of political consultations with
the Azerbaijani leadership here on Wednesday issues related to the
Karabakh conflict settlement.
According to diplomatic sources in Baku, the delegations of the
countries mediators in the conflict settlement are headed by
Russian deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin, French Foreign
Ministry’s Ambassador at Large Pierre Morel and US Deputy Secretary
of State Daniel Freed. The same sources claim that the international
negotiators’ higher status can be explained by the discussion of
“new ideas” of the co-chairmen of the Minsk Group for settling the
Karabakh problem.
Official Baku, adhering to the confidentially principle, has not
commented so far on the nature of ideas that will be brought to
the region by the mediators. It is not ruled out here that they
will discuss during consultations with Azerbaijani President Ilkham
Aliyev and afterwards with Armenian President Robert Kocharyan the
possibilities and dates of talks between the two countries’ leaders.
Last time Aliyev and Kocharyan met in Rambouillet, a Paris suburb,
in February 2006, but failed to reach specific agreements on the
settlement principles.
The Karabakh conflict is believed to be in Azerbaijan “the greatest
obstacle on the way of the political and economic development of the
country and region in general. The country’s top leadership has not
once stressed this.

SECOND FLIGHT DATA RECORDER OF ARMENIAN CRASHED PLANE A-320 FOUND
ITAR-TASS, Russia
May 24 2006
MOSCOW, May 24 (Itar-Tass) – Specialists have found on the bottom
of the Black Sea the second flight data recorder (black box) from
the A-320 airliner of the Armenian Armavia airline that fell into
the sea near the resort city of Sochi on May 3. Efforts to lift
it from the seabed have proved futile so far due to bad weather,
Russian television’s Channel One reported on Wednesday.
The first of the three black boxes of the crashed airbus was lifted
from a depth of 500 metres on Monday. It was recovered from under a
5-centimetre layer of sludge.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

CHILDREN FACE EXPULSION, TO SAVE FRENCH IDENTITY
Julio Godoy
IPS, Belgium
May 24 2006
PARIS, May 23 (IPS) – Five-year-old Mariama could be taken away from
France Jun. 30. By that date all children of illegal immigrants must
leave France, under an order issued October last year.
Mariama is the daughter of a Senegalese couple in Suresnes, 20km
north of Paris. She is among about 30,000 children and youth that the
French police have been ordered to expel, or as officially stated,
to “escort to the borders..”
But that expulsion policy is being contested by school, church, and
municipal authorities, and by many French citizens. The network of
teachers and state school workers ‘Education sans frontiers’ (Education
without borders) has launched a campaign to protect immigrant children.
‘Education without borders’ represents some 130 associations of
teachers and parents. The network has released a declaration ‘We
will shelter and nourish them’, urging French citizens to oppose the
expulsion policy.
“We will not allow state authorities to commit this infamy against
children in our names,” Helène Dugros, a teacher at a primary school
in Blagnac village 800km south of Paris told IPS. Seven of the 15
children in her class are from immigrant families. “I will protect
as many as I can,” she said.
The call is finding widespread support, even though the October 2005
order provides for up to five years imprisonment and a fine of up to
30,000 euros (37,000 dollars) for anyone helping immigrant children.
“I am taking the risk of breaking this law,” Pierre Labeyrie, local
deputy for the Green Party in Toulouse declared. “I will support
immigrant children and their parents, I will give them shelter in my
home, and I will refuse all cooperation with the police.”
Teacher Bruno Leroy says democrats in France have no choice but to
violate the law.
“We will not allow (the authorities) to destroy these children’s
lives. They are our students, our own children’s buddies,” Leroy told
IPS. “They speak our language, they learn at our schools, they have
the very same joys as us, as our children.”
Leroy rejected the argument that the order should be respected because
it has been passed by a democratically elected government.
“If people always would have respected wrong laws formulated by
democratic governments, then blacks in the U.S. would still be
suffering from officially-sanctioned racism,” he said.
Leroy cited the case of Rosa Parks. On Dec. 1, 1955, Parks refused to
obey the segregation law that would have compelled her to give up a
seat in a bus to a white passenger. In so doing, she helped trigger
a fight for civil rights. She died in October 2005.
In France the fight is being taken up by several celebrities. Among
them are filmmaker Bertrand Tavernier, pop musician Mano Solo,
cartoonist Jacques Tardy and educationist Philippe Merieu.
Some municipal authorities are refusing to cooperate with the police.
Deputy mayor of Paris Eric Ferrand who is in charge of schools
declared: “The municipal government of Paris will not provide any
assistance (to police) which could lead to the identification of
children attending schools in the city.” Ferrand urged “all actors
of school life in Paris to refuse cooperation” with the police.
The pursuit of immigrant children is becoming embarrassing for
the police.
Last month a police squad arrived early morning at a hotel in Lyon,
600 km south of Paris, where a group of immigrant children were being
sheltered. Among the children to be expelled was Azerie, seven-year-old
daughter of Armenian parents, and her two elder brothers.
When the police arrived, Azerie simply hid under the bed. The police
chose not to drag her out, and left saying that in such a case they
would have to arrest the mother as well.
French governments of all colours have been expelling illegal
immigrants for the last 15 years. In 2004, the government expelled
about 16,000 people. The number increased to almost 20,000 in 2005,
and is expected to rise to 30,000 this year.
The expulsion of children forms a part of the policy introduced by
minister for the interior Nicolas Sarkozy. Sarkozy, who will be running
for president early next year, has introduced another law this year
toughening conditions for foreigners wishing to settle in France.
The law, which was approved by parliament May 17, tightens control
over bi-national marriages, and on travel for relatives of immigrants
living in France. It establishes new criteria to select immigrants.
Sarkozy, who defended the law saying that France needed to “choose”
immigrants instead of “suffering” them, has been accused of wooing
the right-wing electorate, which won about 15 percent of the vote in
the last election.
Didier Fassin, president of the French medical committee to protect
exiles, has described the new law as “the most restrictive since
World War II, and one that will have grave social and humanitarian
consequences.”
Fassin told IPS that the French parliament has passed five laws on
immigration in less than 20 years, each more restrictive than the
earlier one. “These laws have all aggravated the living conditions
of immigrants and exiles, leading to the degradation of our social
tissue.”
Socialist parliamentarian Bernard Roman accused Sarkozy in parliament
of trying “to seduce the reactionary electorate.” Sarkozy told the
National Assembly: “Immigration is a source of anxiety among our
compatriots, who fear for their security, their jobs and their way of
life.” He said the aim of the new law was to shape “France’s identity
in 30 years.”
As Sarkozy sees it, Mariama will not be a part of that identity —
unless her supporters succeed is saving her from expulsion.
–Boundary_(ID_G9xOksAKBdEglwh5kTh7VA) —

VOICE RECORDER RECOVERED FROM CRASHED PLANE
Irish News
May 24, 2006 Wednesday
Russian searchers have recovered the cockpit voice recorder from an
Armenian passenger jet that crashed in the Black Sea nearly three
weeks ago killing 113 passengers and crew.
Workers using a remote-controlled diving apparatus with a robotic arm
plucked the recorder from the sea floor nearly 1,640 feet beneath the
surface after removing a layer of silt up to two feet thick that had
hidden it from searchers.
The searchers said they hoped to also recover the flight data recorder
soon, which they believe is under silt nearby.
Officials hope the recorders will help determine the cause of the May 3
crash of the Armavia Airbus A-320, which plunged into the sea in heavy
rain and poor visibility as it approached the airport on a flight from
the Armenian capital, Yerevan, to the Russian resort city of Sochi.
“I think that what happened will be revealed,” Tatyana Anodina,
head of the Interstate Aviation Committee, the civil agency that
links Russia with 11 other former Soviet republics, said.
Ms Anodina said the cockpit voice recorder was damaged by the crash
and may have suffered from the harsh conditions beneath the silt.
However, she said she was confident that it would yield information
“very important to investigators”, including voices and other sounds
in the cockpit during the final minutes of the doomed flight.
Ms Anodina said the Interstate Aviation Committee would work with
French investigators and Armenian representatives to retrieve the
data but was usnure when they might have results.
Prosecutors almost immediately dismissed the possibility that
terrorists brought down the plane and officials point to rough weather
or pilot error as the likely cause.
However, officials from the manufacturer Armavia have suggested that
air traffic controllers may be at least partly to blame.
Ms Anodina described the recovery operation as “one of the most
difficult” worldwide.
A device normally used for geological research was brought in last
week for the search but the operation was disrupted by bad weather
until Friday.
When the weather cleared the device first combed a 65ft by 65ft
patch of the sea floor amid the wreckage near the coast where French
specialists had detected signals from the recorders.
The search area was widened after the recorders were not found but
the voice recorder was finally located late on Sunday under silt
in the initial search area after searchers attached a radio-signal
detection device to the apparatus.

THE FATE OF GUAM WILL BE DECIDED BY ILHAM ALIYEV
by Tatiana Ivzhenko
Translated by Elena Leonova
Source: Nezavisimaya Gazeta, No. 101, May 24, 2006, EV
Agency WPS
What the Papers Say Part A (Russia)
May 24, 2006 Wednesday
Energy-rich Azerbaijan as a key player in an alternative to the CIS;
GUAM – the alliance of Georgia, Ukraine, Azerbaijan, and Moldova
– launched its new image and format yesterday. Decisions made
by President Ilkham Aliyev of Azerbaijan could either cement and
reinforce the alliance, or destroy it. Will he choose Russia or the
United States?
The GUAM summit that closed in Kiev yesterday, and the plans announced
there – predictably, not involving Russia – came as no surprise. The
presidents of Ukraine, Georgia, Moldova, and Azerbaijan had planned
this meeting for a long time, and given the obviously pro-Western
course taken by Tbilisi, Kiev, and Chisinau, it wasn’t hard to guess
the meeting’s political direction.
At first sight, only President Ilkham Aliyev of Azerbaijan stood out
from the Kiev Quartet; there seemed to be no reason to suspect him
of lacking loyalty to Moscow. But he did attend this GUAM summit;
what’s more, he arrived before President Viktor Yushchenko’s guests
from Georgia and Moldova. And we can’t rule ought the possibility
that his presence could be decisive. GUAM launched its new image
and format yesterday. Eventually, Aliyev could either cement and
reinforce this with his energy resources, or destroy it. The former
scenario would happen if Baku follows the lead of Tbilisi, Kiev,
and Chisinau in regarding the United States as its chief partner. The
latter scenario would apply if Aliyev decides that alliance with Russia
is more advantageous or more promising. The Azeri leader’s dialogues
with Washington and Moscow have long been described by the media as
“political see-saws.” Aliyev has already shown that he can manipulate
his interlocutors, avoiding direct pressure but cleverly using “the
enemies of his friends” to achieve his own goals.
In March, when President Vladimir Putin visited Baku for the opening
ceremony of Russia Year in Azerbaijan, Aliyev gave Moscow assurances of
loyalty and partnership. At around the same time, Azeri Deputy Foreign
Minister Araz Azimov announced that his country has no intention of
“joining a coalition against anyone, and wishes to establish neighborly
relations with all countries in the region.”
Within a few days, Aliyev met with the presidents of Kazakhstan
and Georgia, promising each of them participation in the
Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil transport project, which bypasses Russia. The
first of these meetings (with President Nursultan Nazarbayev of
Kazakhstan) emphasized the role of the CIS in developing cooperation;
the second meeting (with President Mikhail Saakashvili of Georgia)
emphasized the significance of regional associations like GUAM.
Aliyev followed this up by giving a demonstratively warm reception
to the Iranian defense minister, and then paid a visit to Washington.
Within a few days, Azerbaijan effectively offered its chief partners
some terms that required reciprocal moves. Then Aliyev could examine
the offers and choose an ally.
Judging by a number of Aliyev’s statements, the stance taken by the
United States and Russia on Nagorno-Karabakh regulation plays the
decisive role here.
Sergei Markedonov, department head at the Russian Institute of
Political and Military Analysis, commented as follows on what Aliyev
said in Washington: “To all appearances, Baku’s primary concern is
to restore its sovereignty over the rebel territory, with the help
of a strong ally. The chances of American-Azeri cooperation becoming
stronger depend entirely on the US stance on Nagorno-Karabakh, and
whether Washington is prepared to put some pressure on Armenia.” If
there’s a “breakthrough” on Nagorno-Karabakh, Azerbaijan is prepared
to become more amenable on the Iran issue.
The US government is probably giving some serious thought to this
proposed configuration. At any rate, the impossible became reality
during Aliyev’s visit to Washington: he didn’t receive a single
reminder about human rights abuses or failure to observe democratic
standards, even though courts in Baku were convicting opposition
members even as the Washington talks were under way, and that had
been considered the main issue in American-Azeri relations.
It may be suggested that the topic of resolving “frozen conflicts”
was included among the urgent priority issues on the GUAM summit
agenda at the instigation of the United States. Thus, Washington could
temporarily fill the niche of chief parner and ally, not only for
Azerbaijan, but also for Georgia and Moldova. And Ukraine, in these
circumstances, could aspire to the politically rewarding mission of
“chief peacemaker.”
The twist, however, is that this whole construct is based on
Azerbaijan’s energy resources; presumably, Baku is supposed to use
them to safeguard its partners against pressure from Russia. The
question of whether this is advantageous for Azerbaijan isn’t being
considered as yet – but it could arise at any moment if Russia gives
Azerbaijan an alliance guarantee with regard to Nagorno-Karabakh.
Note that mistrust arose when Russia started withdrawing its troops
from Georgia; Baku started fearing that some of those forces might be
transferred to Armenia. This was one of the major issues at Aliyev’s
talks with Putin.
Judging by the outcome of those talks, Putin didn’t give Aliyev any
assurances. Putin prefers to play his own political chess-games, in
which Aliyev might not be an important piece at all. Based on this
possibility, we might speculate that the Kremlin is simply waiting for
the right moment to intervene in somebody else’s game. In that case,
Aliyev will soon receive a partnership offer he can’t refuse.
He would immediately lose enthusiasm for the United States and its
creature, GUAM – thus threatening the main component of the new
organization: the energy component.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

SECOND BLACK BOX RECORDER FROM CRASHED ARMENIAN AIRBUS RECOVERED
Agence France Presse — English
May 23, 2006 Tuesday 11:56 PM GMT
The second black box flight recorder from an Armenian Airbus passenger
plane that crashed in the Black Sea earlier this month was recovered
from the sea bed overnight,the Russian transport ministry said
Wednesday.
The instrument will give investigators technical details of the doomed
flight, according to the Interfax news agency.
All 113 passengers and crew died when the Armavia airlines Airbus A320,
which had taken off from Yerevan, crashed May 3 during its approach
to Russia’s Black Sea resort of Sochi. Eighty-five of the victims
were Armenians, many of them on family visits.
The other flight recorder, with voice recordings, was pulled out
on Monday.
There has so far been no official word on the possible cause of
the crash.

COCKPIT VOICE RECORDER FROM ARMENIAN CRASH RECOVERED
Airline Industry Information
May 23, 2006
Airline Industry Information-©1997-2006 M2 Communications LTD
The cockpit voice recorder of the Armenian passenger aircraft that
crashed in the Black Sea on 3 May has been located and recovered.
The aircraft, which was operated by Armavia, crashed in heavy rain
and poor visibility as it was approaching the airport in Adler. A
total of 113 people are thought to have died in the crash.
According to The Associated Press, workers were able to use a
remote-controlled diving apparatus with a robotic arm to recover the
recorder from the sea floor.
Tatyana Anodina, head of the Interstate Aviation Committee, reportedly
stated that the cockpit voice recorder had been damaged in the crash
and may have suffered from the conditions beneath the silt.
–Boundary_(ID_MIZiSCxgDAVaVGBSTRJ8Tw)–

ON THIS DAY … IN 1701: CAPTAIN KIDD WAS HANGED IN LONDON FOR CAPTURING ARMENIAN SHIP
The Evening Standard (London)
May 23, 2006 Tuesday
He was born in 1645 in Scotland and spent three decades as an honest,
hardworking ship captain.
Kidd married and settled in New York in 1691 and began working as a
privateer in the Caribbean, essentially attacking foreign ships on
behalf of the British government. In 1695 he was given a free reign
to attack pirate and French ships that endangered British colonial
holdings.
But he was given a crew that included many criminals, including
former pirates. Their voyage was beset by bad luck when their ship,
Adventure Galley, sprang several leaks and an outbreak of cholera
wiped out a third of the crew. The remainder of the ship’s complement
grew increasingly mutinous and Kidd became more violent.
In 1698, he took an Armenian ship loaded with booty, despite the
vessel being British-owned.
When word reached Britain, the British East India Company declared
Kidd a pirate. He was arrested on his return to New York and sent to
London to stand trial for piracy and murder. The belief that he left
behind a buried treasure contributed to his legend.

SACK HER MAYOR
by Paula Maud
Hume Moreland Leader (Australia)
May 24, 2006 Wednesday
HOV Edition
MAYOR Adem Atmaca is calling for a State Government MP to stand down
or lose her position as parliamentary secretary after an inflammatory
attack on Turkey last week.
Jika Jika MP Jenny Mikakos stirred up ethnic divisions within the Labor
Party and the community when she called on the Turkish Government to
acknowledge crimes against Pontic Greeks earlier last century.
Greek-background Ms Mikakos told parliament that more than 353,000
Greeks, 1.5 million Armenians and 750,000 Assyrians died when Turkish
nationalists embraced a “Turkey for the Turks” policy between 1916
and 1923.
“Unlike Germany which has taken responsibility for the Jewish
Holocaust, Turkey has never apologised to its victims,” she said.
Speaking after returning from the Anzac Day ceremony in Gallipoli, Cr
Atmaca said Ms Mikakos should be working in the interests of Victorians
and not other foreign governments. Cr Atmaca, of Turkish background,
said there was no need for hate speeches in parliament and voters in
Jika Jika should ask themselves how Ms Mikakos was serving them by
bringing this subject up.
Cr Atmaca said he would say the same regardless of what ethnic group
was being “attacked”.
“Politicians should be showing that living in harmony is in the best
interests of Victorians,” Cr Atmaca said.
Ms Mikakos did not respond to the Leader’s calls about her speech.