24 OF PARTICIPANTS OF ANTI-ARMENIAN DEMONSTRATION INITIATED BY PANTURKISTS IN TAVRIZ ARRESTED

Noyan Tapan
Armenians Today
Mar 07 2006

TABRIZ, MARCH 7, NOYAN TAPAN – ARMENIANS TODAY. At the February
26 meeting with the journalists, Colonel Haghighi, Commander of
the law-inforcement bodies of Tabriz, gave explanations about the
anti-Armenian demonstration in front of the building of the Armenian
National primacy building of Atrpatakan held on the same day in Tabriz.

The illegal demonstration was initiated by Panturkist groupings. As the
“Alik” Tehran daily informs, referring to the information of the Tabriz
“Mahde Azadi” daily, the law-inforcement bodies of Tabriz, defending
the minority of the Tabrizian Armenians and holding up the danger
threatening the rights of the population, arrested 24 demonstrants and
gave the cases instituted against them to the law-enforcement bodies.

FOR FIRST TIME, ANTI-MIGRANT GROUP INVESTIGATED FOR INCITING ETHNIC HATRED

Union of Councils for Jews in the Former Soviet Union, DC
March 7 2006

For the first time, a member of the Movement Against Illegal
Immigration has been detained on charges of inciting ethnic hatred.

According to a March 7, 2006 report by the Regnum news agency,
Aleksey Safin, the head of that organization’s Kaliningrad branch,
has been arrested on incitement charges after police searched his
computer and found allegedly illegal materials on his computer which
Mr. Safin used to maintain the regional branch’s web site. The local
branch is not officially registered, making its prosecution easier.

Although not mentioned in the report, the Movement Against Illegal
Immigration first came upon the scene when it was linked in the
media with anti-Armenian violence in the Moscow region city of
Krasnoarmeysk a few years ago. Since then, under the leadership of a
former Pamyat activist, it has grown into one of the leading far-right
organizations in Russia. Last November, it played a major part in
a far-right march in Moscow which featured extremist nationalist
rhetoric against migrants and Jews. No incitement charges were filed
against participants in that march.

AZERBAIJANI AND ARMENIAN FORCES FACE OFF
Ayinde O. Chase – All Headline News Staff Writer

All Headline News
March 7 2006

Baku, Azerbaijan (AHN) – As a result of ongoing tensions Azerbaijani
and Armenian forces got into a heated exchange of exchange of heavy
gunfire and mortars along their border late Monday and early Tuesday.

The barrage of fighting took place on several points along their
border, and sparked some of the most intense fighting in months.

Azerbaijan authorities report the death of one soldier while
another one is in critical condition. Armenian officials also report
several-wounded behind their lines as well.

The two countries remain at odds over the status of Nagorno-Karabakh,
an ethnic Armenian enclave within Azerbaijan, with fighting occurring
over a so called no mans land the two countries are in dispute over.

YEREVAN, BAKU SHOULD SET KARABAKH SETTLEMENT TIME – OFFICIAL

ITAR-TASS, Russia
March 7 2006

YEREVAN, March 7 (Itar-Tass) — The leaders of parties to the conflict
should set the Karabakh settlement time, U.S. Deputy Assistant
Secretary of State Matthew Bryza for European and Eurasian Affairs
said in Yerevan on Tuesday.

He said the United States was ready to do its best for the soonest
Karabakh settlement.

He disagreed with the opinion that the recent meeting between the
Armenian and Azerbaijani presidents in the Paris suburb of Rambouillet
was a failure. The sides were close to an intermediate agreement in
Rambouillet, and their inability to do that does not mean that the
process is in a deadlock, the diplomat said. He said that final steps
are always very difficult and require determination of the leaders.

Normalization between Armenia and Turkey will become a necessary
and natural consequence of the Karabakh settlement agreement, the
official said. He said that normalization of the Armenian-Turkish
relations was discussed at every meeting of American administration
members in Yerevan and Ankara.

Bryza said that his Tuesday meeting with Armenian President Robert
Kocharyan was very constructive.

RUSSIA, U.S. DISCUSS “FROZEN” CONFLICTS, BILATERAL RELATIONS

RIA Novosti, Russia
March 7 2006

WASHINGTON, March 7 (RIA Novosti) – Russia’s foreign minister and
the U.S. secretary of state put on a generally united front despite
recent differences Tuesday after talks on a variety of global issues,
including the “frozen” conflicts in the former Soviet Union.

Condoleezza Rice said that she and Sergei Lavrov had discussed a
number of important issues, including the Iranian nuclear crisis,
the Middle East and the conflicts in Nagorny-Karabakh, a region in
Azerbaijan with a predominantly Armenian population, and in the
self-proclaimed republic of Abkhazia in Georgia. Both conflicts
erupted after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Rice said the United States was satisfied with relations with Russia,
although she expressed concern over what she termed were certain
negative developments in the country. Washington has often criticized
Moscow for allegedly “backsliding” on democracy and failing to observe
human rights.

Lavrov said the talks in the U.S. capital “were productive and
important for the future development of relations” between the two
countries, but added that Moscow was concerned about U.S. position
on Russia’s accession to the World Trade Organization.

“The U.S. is the only country that has not reached a WTO agreement with
Russia and has not abolished the notorious Jackson-Vanik amendment,”
Lavrov said.

The Jackson-Vanik Amendment links U.S. trade benefits, known as Normal
Trade Relations (NTR), to the emigration and human rights policies
of communist or formerly communist countries.

The Russian minister said the solution of the issues that had been
discussed during the talks would largely influence the interaction
between Russia and its partners in the Group of Eight industrialized
nations.

St. Petersburg, Russia’s second city, will host the next G8 summit
in July.

“We have certain differences over the ways to pursue our goals,
but our final aims coincide, in my opinion,” Lavrov said referring
to the non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, the fight
against international crime, drug-trafficking and terrorism, and the
development of global trade.

OSCE OFFICE LAUNCHES ESSAY COMPETITION FOR ARMENIAN STUDENTS ON GENDER ISSUES

Organization for Security and Co-Operation in Europe (OSCE)

March 7 2006

YEREVAN, 7 March 2006 – The role of women in decision-making will
be the theme of a student essay competition that will be launched
tomorrow by the OSCE Office in Yerevan.

Organized in co-operation with the Centre for the Development of Civil
Society, the event inaugurates a gender activities month, linked to 8
March, International Women’s Day, and will end on 7 April, celebrated
in Armenia as Beauty and Motherhood Day.

“The essay contest will inspire hundreds of students, teachers and
parents and help focus on women’s rights and the role of women in
Armenia’s public and civic life,” said Ambassador Vladimir Pryakhin,
Head of the OSCE Office.

“This project is one of the few country-wide initiatives that aims
to promote gender education and awareness through outreach to young
Armenians, especially in the regions of the country.”

As in the previous contests, this year’s event will be organized in
nine regions of Armenia. The award committee will select 27 regional
winners and three national winners, who will receive prizes at a
ceremony to be held in Yerevan on 10 April.

Earlier this year, the OSCE Office initiated an International
Co-ordination Group on Gender Issues, an informal forum of the main
international actors in the gender field in Armenia, to enhance
the exchange of information and co-ordination of gender-related
initiatives.

US STATE DEPARTMENT CONSIDERS AZERBAIJAN SHOULD USE INCENTIVES TO DEVELOP NON-OIL SECTOR

Today, Azerbaijan
March 7 2006

The US State Department today issued the “Azerbaijan 2006 Investment
Climate Statement”.

The statement says that a long running and unresolved conflict with
Armenia over Nagorno Karabakh has left Azerbaijan with approximately
800,000 refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs) and the
problem of refugees and IDPs constitutes an enormous burden on
economic and democratic development. However, as a result of the
state policy aimed at poverty reduction and regional development
pursued in Azerbaijan in 2005, the country has achieved high
macroeconomic indicators. As a continuation of this process in 2006,
Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is forecasted to be as high as 30%
this year. In addition, the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline project,
which will significantly stimulate general development of the country,
is planned to be completed in 2006.

The statement notes that the government of Azerbaijan officially
welcomes foreign direct investment, realizing that it plays a vital
role in development of the countrys economy. The Law on Protection
of Foreign Investments permits foreign direct investment (FDI) in
any activity open to a national investor unless prohibited by law.

Prohibited areas include those relating to national security and
defense.

It is also said that under Azerbaijani law, foreign investors may
participate in the Azerbaijani market through joint ventures with
local companies, establishment of subsidiaries wholly owned by foreign
investors, and representative offices and branches of foreign legal
entities.

The section “Performance Requirements and Incentives” of the statement
says that Azerbaijan has not yet developed effective incentives to
attract foreign investment, other than the incentives provided by
Production Sharing Agreements in the oil and gas sector, APA informs.

Another section in the statement is about corruption. This section
states that corruption is a significant deterrent to investment in
Azerbaijan, especially in the non-energy sector. Laws and regulations
that exist to combat corruption have not been effectively enforced. A
new anti-corruption law came into force in January 2005. However,
Azerbaijan made little progress on implementation of this law in 2005.

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US AMBASSADOR TO ARMENIA RECALLED EARLIER FOR USING EXPRESSION “ARMENIAN GENOCIDE”

Today, Azerbaijan
March 7 2006

Pro-Armeninan “The California Courier” newspaper writes that the
cause is that American ambassador mentioned that genocide policy was
pursued against Armenians in the period of the Ottoman Empire.

John Evans has already informed the Armenian authorities that his
diplomatic mission is over earlier, APA informs.

The US Senate has defined a new ambassador to Armenia. He is the US
ambassador to Tajikistan Richard Hoagland.

A year earlier during the meeting with Armenian community in San
Francisco, John Evans referring to the so-called “Armenian genocide”
said that it can be recognized.

“I regard the event as an act of genocide. No American official has
ever denied this fact. I think it will not bring honor to Americans to
play with words concerning this issue. I know that everything should
be called by their names. However, the US policy has not changed. We
have military relations with Turkey in the framework of NATO. The
Armenian genocide was the first genocide that was committed in the
20th century. I assure you that we shall seriously deal with this
issue,” John Evans said.

Seeing that his statements caused serious dissatisfactions, John Evans
told a news conference in the US Embassy, Yerevan, that his statements
were unofficial, and did not represent official stance of his country.

“In my meeting with Armenian community, I said that US stance
concerning the Armenian tragedy remains unchanged. I used the
expression of “genocide” but this expression belongs to me -John Evans
only not a politician. However, I must admit that my statements were
not needed that time,” he said.

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EVEN IN THE WEST, FREE SPEECH IS NOT AN ABSOLUTE RIGHT
By Maura Jane Farrelly
06 March 2006

Voice of America
March 7 2006

New York

Freedom of speech has been a hot topic in the news lately. It is
one of the pillars of Western society, but, as newspaper editors in
Europe recently learned, free speech is a concept some people in the
world believe ought to be limited.

Riots in predominantly Muslim countries over the publication of
religiously offensive cartoons have caused some to assert that the
debate is one of “The West versus The Rest.” But even in Western
societies, the right to express oneself is not absolute.

Next month, for example, America’s Public Broadcasting system, or
“PBS,” will air a documentary called “The Armenian Genocide.” It will
explore the circumstances surrounding the deaths of an estimated 1.2
million Armenians who lived in the Ottoman Empire during and after
World War I.

The overwhelming consensus among Western scholars is that these deaths
constitute the first genocide of the 20th century. But the Turkish
government disputes that conclusion, saying the deaths were not
the result of state-sponsored extermination, and cannot, therefore,
be called “genocide.”

Following the documentary, PBS plans to air a 25-minute panel
discussion that includes two scholars who embrace the widely dismissed
view of the Turkish government.

“We’re certainly concerned about this, and we feel this program really
has no place on public television,” says Elizabeth Chouldjian of
the Armenian National Committee of America, which has called on PBS
not to broadcast the panel discussion. “Just as one would not give
equal time to Holocaust deniers to get up on PBS and talk about their
incorrect views,” Chouldjian says, “similarly one shouldn’t cloud the
issue and misguide viewers by bringing known genocide deniers to this
type of equation.”

British historian David Irving holds his book “Hitler’s War” when
arriving at a court in Vienna, on Monday, Feb. 20, 2006.

PBS did not respond to VOA’s requests for an interview. But Elizabeth
Chouldjian’s assertion that the network would never give airtime to
deniers of the Jewish Holocaust has captured some people’s attention,
particularly in light of the recent conviction of David Irving, the
British historian who was sentenced in Vienna to three years’ jail-time
for breaking an Austrian law that forbids denial of the Holocaust.

According to Robert Kahn, a professor at Brooklyn Law School who
has written extensively about laws governing Holocaust denial,
free speech in the West is not an absolute right. It is tempered,
Kahn says, by a complex system of legal and self-imposed censorship
that’s almost always derived from a society’s history.

Brooklyn law professor Robert Kahn specializes on legal restrictions
on holocaust denial “The countries that tend to have the laws that
specifically ban Holocaust denial — France, Germany, and Austria —
either participated in the Holocaust or had serious problems with
collaboration,” he says. “Even though the United States and Canada
have large Jewish communities, and have survivors and people who
experienced the Holocaust, it’s not the same type of thing.”

It is not illegal in the United States to deny the Holocaust, just
exceedingly undiplomatic, given the number of survivors who came to
this country after the war, and no one who wants to enjoy mainstream
credibility would ever do it. That does not mean, though, that speech
in America is without any legal restrictions. Robert Kahn says there
are a number of state and federal laws that limit expression.

“There are some types of speech, like cross burning, which, when
done to intimidate, are illegal,” Kahn says. “In a lot of states,
particularly in the U.S. South, you’re not allowed to demonstrate
while wearing a mask. These rules are basically connected up with the
role of the (Ku Klux) Klan in American history, and tend to show that
societies are very concerned about speech that talks about prior acts
of racism…they have committed.”

But it is not just negative, or “ugly” history that causes some
western societies to impose official and unofficial limits on free
speech. Professor Kahn points to the fact that no major American
newspapers chose to publish the cartoons of Mohammed that generated
controversy when they were distributed throughout Europe. “The United
States is a religious country and understands the idea of respecting
or disrespecting someone else’s religion,” he says. “Whereas you
could make an argument that Europe is much more secular, and that
therefore the idea that you would run something that profanes the
Prophet is not as big a deal.”

Meanwhile, PBS has not announced any plans to cancel its broadcast
of the panel discussion, which was taped in early February, and is
scheduled to air on April 17th.

/2006-03-06-voa48.cfm

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

BUDAPEST COURT TO MAKE A SENTENCE IN REGARD TO AZERI OFFICER ON 13 APR
Author: E.Javadova

TREND Information, Azerbaijan
March 7 2006

The Budapest court will make a sentence in regard to Azerbaijani
officer Ramil Safarov on 13 April, Trend reports quoting Adil
Ismayilov, the Azerbaijani lawyer of the defendant.

According to Ismayilov, the expert report was heard out at the sitting
held on 7 March. “Experts were invited to the sitting and their report
was heard out. Examination was set thrice in relation to psychological
state of Safarov and all three expert reports contradict to each
other. This time experts confirmed report of the first examination,
showing that Safarov was sane person during commitment of the
incident, as well as at present time. The expert, made the second
expert report, also participated in the sitting. In accordance with
this expert report, Safarov was regarded as medium-sane. Nevertheless,
the experts, made the third expert report, were not invited to the
sitting. In accordance with the third expert report, Safarov was
insane during the incident and at present time, but the judge did
not take it into consideration,” Ismayilov noted.

According to Ismayilov, during the last sitting the court investigated
contradictions between the reports and accepted the first one. The
judge addressed to sides with will to sum up the sitting.

“The lawyer of Safarov in Budapest informed the judge that she was
not ready for making speech and must to get some documents.

Therefore, the judge put the next sitting till 4 and 13 April. He
said that the sentence will be made on 13 April after delivery of
speeches,” Ismayilov noted.

It should be mentioned that Safarov is accused of murder of Armenian
officer Gurgen Markarian.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress