INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON EUROINTERATION TO BE HELD IN YEREVAN JULY 28-29
Yerevan, July 27. ArmInfo. International conference “Eurointegration:
Ways and Mechanisms to Attain Common and Peaceful Neighborhood”
will be held in Yerevan July 28-29.
The event is organized by the International Center for Human
Development, European Integration NGO, Armenian Center for
Trans-Atlantic Initiatives and European Commission.
Attending the conference will be representatives from Armenia, Georgia,
Ukraine, Turkey, Russia, Moldova, Bulgaria and Romania as well as EU,
NATO, OSCE and CE.
The objective of the conference is to present European values,
principles and commitments as guarantees of security and cooperation
in the region. The conferees will discuss the present situation and
the prospects of cooperation in the South Caucasus.-0-

REP. PALLONE URGES SENATE TO BLOCK HOAGLAND NOMINATION
Washington, DC, July 27. ArmInfo. In a July 25th speech on the House
floor, Congressional Armenian Caucus Co-Chairman Frank Pallone (D-NJ)
called on the U.S. Senate to block the nomination of Richard Hoagland
to serve as the next U.S. Ambassador to Armenia, reported the Armenian
National Committee of America (ANCA).
In his remarks, the New Jersey legislator outlined the reasons for
his opposition, notably Ambassador-designate Hoagland’s denial of the
Armenian Genocide and his evasiveness and lack of responsiveness to
Senate inquiries. He also highlighted the failure of the Administration
to respond honestly to communications it held with the Turkish
government concerning the firing of current U.S. Ambassador to
Armenia John Evans over his February 2005 remarks affirming the
Armenian Genocide.
Congressman Pallone closed his speech by noting his “fear that
sending an ambassador to Yerevan who denies the Armenian genocide
would represent a tragic escalation in the Bush administration’s
ignorance and support in Turkey’s campaign of genocide denial. The
State Department has reported to Senate offices that they expect
Ambassador Designate Hoagland to be confirmed during a business meeting
early next week. I would urge the Senate to block his nomination
until this administration recognizes the Armenian genocide.”

WORLD FOOTBALL LEGEND MICHEL PLATINI TO VISIT AMENIA AUG 2
Yerevan, July 27. ArmInfo. The world football legend, French football
player, Vice President of the Football Federation of France, FIFA and
UEFA executive Michel Platini is to pay an official visit to Armenia
Aug 2.
The press service of the Football Federation of Armenia (FFA) reports
Platini to come on the invitation of FFA President Ruben Hayrapetyan.
Platini will meet with Hayrapetyan and will attend the ceremony of
opening of small artificial turf football fields in Yerevan’s Avan
and Kanaker-Zeitun communities.
To remind, FFA and UEFA are implementing a Small Football Fields
project. Armenia will get 1 mln Swiss francs under the project through
the Hat Trick investment program. The key requirement of the project
is that each beneficiary national association should open at least 40
small football fields. As of today there are 2 such fields in Yerevan.
Platini will also meet with Armenian state and public figures.-0-

Armenian government to send humanitarian aid to Lebanon
Public Television of Armenia, Yerevan
26 Jul 06
On an instruction from Armenian Prime Minister Andranik Markaryan,
the Armenian government has discussed the possibility of rendering
humanitarian aid to Lebanon. The meeting made a decision to help the
Lebanese people with medicines, tents and equipment.
After the government’s decision, it will be possible to send
humanitarian aid by a Yerevan-Aleppo charter plane tomorrow. The work
that is being carried out to move ethnic Armenians to Armenia was
also discussed at the meeting chaired by Minister for Territorial
Administration Ovik Abramyan.
So far, about 550 ethnic Armenians have arrived in Yerevan from
Lebanon and 54 from Israel. It is expected that another 120 people
will arrive in Armenia tomorrow. Most of them are Armenian citizens.
Foreign citizens are also arriving in Armenia. Fifty-one foreign
citizens have already applied to the migration agency for temporary
asylum. Forty-nine of them are from Lebanon and two from Israel.
Taking into account the increase in the number of people arriving
in Armenia from the Middle East, as well as the fact that not all
of them have relatives in Armenia, the meeting decided to discuss
possible assistance to them as well.

Karabakh leader, British baroness discuss bilateral ties
Arminfo
27 Jul 06
Yerevan, 27 July: The president of the Nagornyy Karabakh republic,
Arkadiy Gukasyan, received a delegation led by the deputy speaker of
the British House of Lords, Baroness Caroline Cox, today.
During the meeting, the president expressed his gratitude to the
baroness for her 61st visit to Karabakh and noted the role of
her traditional visits to the republic, which have allowed Artsakh
[Nagornyy Karabakh] to make many friends and companions, the Karabakh’s
presidential press service told Arminfo.
In turn, Cox informed Gukasyan about the programme of her organization
(?Aid: Confidence-Building) to train doctors and nurses in Artsakh and
spoke about her speech at the British House of Lords on the destruction
of Armenian monuments by Azerbaijanis in Jugha [Azerbaijani exclave
of Naxcivan].
At the request of participants in the meeting, Gukasyan answered a
number of questions concerning the current socioeconomic situation
of Nagornyy Karabakh , as well as prospects of further development.

Turkish court acquits author of charges of turning people against military service
AP Worldstream; Jul 27, 2006
A court on Thursday acquitted a Turkish author and journalist of
charges of turning people against military service for defending the
rights of a conscientious objector in her weekly magazine column.
The court ruled that Perihan Magden’s article amounted to “heavy
criticism conveyed within the scope of freedom of expression” and
did not constitute a crime.
Magden was among a string of writers and journalists to stand trial
for expressing opinions, despite pressure from the EU _ which Turkey
hopes to join _ to scrap repressive laws and improve freedoms.
In her column, published in the weekly Yeni Aktuel magazine in
December, Magden defended conscientious objector Mehmet Tarhan who
was sentenced to a record four-year term in a military prison for
disobedience after refusing to wear his military uniform. She argued
that Turkey needed to establish a civilian service as an alternative
to compulsory military conscription.
Conscription in Turkey is obligatory for men over 20, and the country
does not recognize the right to conscientious objection. Objectors have
also been prosecuted on charges of turning people against the military.
Magden faced up to three years in prison had she been convicted.
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government has said it has no
plans to change such laws, saying where appropriate the charges are
eventually dropped and defendants are acquitted.
EU officials argue, however, that even if the charges are dropped the
threat of prosecution remains as a deterrent against people wishing
to express opinions.
Late last year, a Turkish court dropped charges against Orhan Pamuk,
one of the country’s most famous novelists, who faced trial on charges
of insulting “Turkishness” for commenting on the mass killings of
Armenians by Turks around the time of World War I. The charges were
dropped for technical reasons amid intense international pressure.

The lesson of Suez has not yet been learned
The Scotsman – United Kingdom; Jul 27, 2006
George Kerevan
THIS week, 50 years ago, the Egyptian leader Gamal Nasser announced
to cheering crowds that he was nationalising the Suez Canal. This
sparked off a chain of events that led inexorably to Britain, France
and Israel invading Egypt. There are good reasons why the anniversary
of this extraordinary little war is being underplayed half a century
on, except of course in Egypt.
For one, having invaded Egypt and captured the canal, the Brits were
forced into instantaneous and ignominious retreat after America’s
President Eisenhower threatened to sink the pound. The British prime
minister, Anthony Eden, whose idea the whole adventure had been,
was humiliated and soon driven from office.
The Israelis drew the sensible conclusion that they could only rely
on themselves for security. Meanwhile, Nasser, whose utter military
incompetence had just lost him the first of many wars, turned defeat
into political victory and became the hero of the Arab masses.
Now that British troops are back in the business of invading Arab
states, and Israel is slugging it out with Hezbollah in Leb-anon, are
there any lessons we can still learn from the Suez debacle? The main
one is that the use of force has to be very well judged, otherwise
you end up in a bigger mess than when you started.
Looking back on Suez in 1956, it is obvious that the British hadn’t
a clue what their own end game was. Having captured the canal,
it suddenly became blindingly obvious that there was no neat exit –
except the first boat home. Were we hoping somebody nicer than Nasser
would just pop out of the woodwork, or were we going to bring back
King Farouk from exile?
That’s not to say we should romanticise Gamal Nasser, who happily
recruited ex-Nazis – actually, they were anything but ex – to help
run his military, in the hope of throwing the Jews into the sea. And
Nasser’s pan-Arab nationalism was premised on ignoring the rights
of the ancient ethnic minorities of the Middle East – Jews, Assyrian
Christians, Armenians, Druze and Copts.
But in retrospect, Nasser seems to have been more bluff than
action. Without Suez, we might have turned Egypt into another India –
wary of the West, non-aligned but not a threat. Especially if we’d
accepted Egyptian ownership of the canal and funded the Aswan Dam. As
it was, when Nasser died in 1970, Egypt quietly slipped back into
the western orbit.
Here’s my worry about what’s happening in Lebanon today: like Suez,
we don’t have a political end game for when the shooting stops. Britain
waded into Egypt in 1956 with no idea how to get out. Lebanon in 2006
is different in that Israel did not start the fight. But I fear the
Israelis are making it up as they go along, which is just as risky.
Hezbollah is the armed proxy for the Iranians, who now dominate
politically the crescent running from south Lebanon through Syria to
Shiite Iraq. The Israelis, whether you like it or not, are trying to
give Hezbollah and the Iranians a bloody nose before they get too
bumptious and start making use of their strategic hold over a big
chunk of the world’s oil.
It was inevitable that Hezbollah would eventually provoke the Israelis
into defending themselves. Once the die was cast two weeks ago,
when Hezbollah unilaterally started firing rockets and kidnapping
Israeli hostages, the Israelis had little choice but to go in and
do something about it. The problem, as I see it, lies in the tactics
the Israelis have been forced to employ.
WITH aid from the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, Hezbollah has turned
south Lebanon into a series of minefields and fortifications, forcing
the Israelis to resort to air strikes to wear the enemy down rather
than embark on a costly frontal assault. Unfortunately, even with
precision-guided bombs, this is next to impossible to achieve, never
mind the fact that the Israelis lack the local intelligence to know
where Hezbollah elements are hiding. As a result, we have seen a lot
of buildings blown up, and hundreds of thousands of people fleeing as
refugees. But, as of yesterday, Hezbollah’s capacity to fire rockets
seemed unimpaired.
Hezbollah cannot be let off the hook through an unconditional
ceasefire. That would hand it a victory we will live to regret in
Iraq as well as Israel. But equally, Israel cannot have extended time
merely to drop more bombs in the hope that they hit something.
Israel has not grasped the significance of the changes in the Middle
and Near East brought about by the rise of Iran. The game is no
longer one of Israel using its military strength against a divided
and incompetent Arab world. It is now facing a new Persian Empire,
which is an altogether more dangerous foe, especially if Tehran
acquires nuclear weapons. Israel cannot win that fight alone.
Which is why there has to be a political solution to the Lebanese
crisis as soon as possible, and that has to come from America. It
should be the most important thing on President Bush’s agenda. I fear
it is not.
The Lebanese state has to be persuaded to disarm Hezbollah. Syria has
to be pressured into breaking with Iran (in return for discussions
over the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights). The Arab world – which is
no friend of Hezbollah or Iran – needs to be convinced that if it
supports Hezbollah being neutralised, America and Britain will put
a Palestinian state at the top of their agenda.
Suez in 1956 was a military success and a political failure. Lebanon
2006 is running the risk of being both a military failure and a
political one.

Iranian embassy in Armenia urges UN to prevent Middle East crisis
Arminfo
27 Jul 06
Yerevan, 27 July: The embassy of the Islamic Republic of Iran
[IRI] to Armenia today issued a statement calling on the UN and the
international community to take emergency measures for preventing
the crisis in the Middle East.
The incessant hostilities in the Middle East generated disappointment
of the nations in the capability of the international community to
establish peace and stability, reads the statement by the IRI embassy
to Armenia obtained by Arminfo news agency today.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

British baroness pays another visit to Nagornyy Karabakh Republic [NKR]
Arminfo, Yerevan
26 Jul 06
Stepanakert , 26 July: British Baroness Caroline Cox arrived in the
capital of the Nagornyy Karabakh Republic [NKR] today.
Cox, who has been visiting Karabakh regularly since the start of the
war with Azerbaijan, told reporters that her regular visits to Karabakh
pursued humanitarian aims, a special correspondent of Arminfo reported
from Stepanakert. She added that every time she visited Karabakh,
she was accompanied by people who wish to get a real impression on
this country and inform the world of the
truth about it.
There are doctors, teachers and students with Cox on the visit. The
delegation is to meet the president of the NKR, Arkadiy Gukasyan,
and the foreign minister, Georgiy Petrosyan.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Azeri leader, UN official pleased with cooperation
Trend news agency
27 Jul 06
Baku, 27 July, Trend correspondent S. Agayeva: Azerbaijani President
Ilham Aliyev today received the executive director of the UN World
Food Programme, James Morris, Trend news agency reports.
The head of state talked about the economic development of Azerbaijan
and the occupation of Azerbaijani territory by Armenia. He noted that
the existence of more than one million refugees and displaced persons
is the main problem of Azerbaijan.
The president also spoke about the steps of the Azerbaijani government
to improve the life of refugees and displaced persons. He thanked
the WFP management for aid provided to those people.
Ilham Aliyev expressed the hope that cooperation with this organization
will continue.
James Morris also pointed out the high level of cooperation between
the organization and the Azerbaijani government and expressed his
confidence that this cooperation will continue to develop.