RA PRESIDENT TO SPEAK AT THE SPRING SESSION OF NATO PARLIAMENTARY ASSEMBLY
ArmRadio.am
11.05.2006 13:18
RA President Robert Kocharyan will deliver a speech at the session
of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly, which will be held May 26-30 in
Paris. The official website of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly informs
that speeches will be delivered also by Minister of Internal Affairs
of France Nikola Sarkozi and Defense Minister Michelle Aliot Mary.
Presidents of Georgia and Azerbaijan Ilham Aliev and Mikhail
Sahakashvili are also expected to deliver speeches at the session.
The closing ceremony of the session will be attended by NATO
Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Shcheffer and other high officials of
the alliance.
To remind, last week Presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan received
invitations to participate in the spring session from President of
NATO Parliamentary Assembly Pierre Lellouche.

“CHELIKEN” VESSEL OF THE RUSSIAN MILITARY FLEET TO JOIN THE SEARCH WORKS IN SOCHI
ArmRadio.am
10.05.2006 11:21
“Cheliken” vessel of the Russian Military Fleet will join today the
search works in Sochi to investigate the deep waters.
French colleagues will join the Russian search group. They have
brought corresponding facilities to search for the black boxes of
the crashed plane.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

TURKEY HOPES FRANCE WILL NOT CRIMINALIZE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE DENIAL
Anatolia news agency
10 May 06
Ankara, 10 May: “Turkey wishes the French legislators not to approve
a draft law which would make ‘the denial’ of the so-called Armenian
genocide a crime,” Turkish Foreign Ministry spokesman Namik Tan said
on Wednesday [10 May].
Responding to a question at a weekly news conference, Tan said French
administration was sensitive on this issue, stating that the issue
required a process in which calm reactions should be given.
“It should not be the desire of anybody to cause uneasiness in
a climate in which our rooted relations were being improved,”
he remarked.
Asked about Turkey’s reaction against the remarks of Canadian Prime
Minister Stephen Harper describing baseless Armenian allegations
as “genocide”, Tan said: “There has been assessment process in our
ministry to determine the steps that would be taken on this issue. We
carry out necessary consultations with other related institutions.”

KARABAKH MEDIATORS HAVE “INTERESTING IDEAS” – AZERI FOREIGN MINISTER
Trend news agency
10 May 06
Baku, 10 May: The Azerbaijani and Armenian foreign ministers
are expected to meet the co-chairmen of the OSCE Minsk Group in
Strasbourg. The meeting will take place within the framework of the
session of the Council of Europe political committee on 18-19 May,
a source at the Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry has told Trend.
Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov said that the
co-chairmen have some “interesting ideas” about the peaceful settlement
of the Nagornyy Karabakh conflict. The minister also said that after
the discussions, it will become clear if the presidents of Azerbaijan
and Armenia need to meet again.
The two presidents may meet in late May at the meeting of the NATO
Parliamentary Assembly in Paris.

TURKISH MPS WARN FRENCH COUNTERPARTS OVER ARMENIAN GENOCIDE BILL
Anatolia news agency, Ankara
10 May 06
Paris, 10 May: A Turkish parliamentary delegation met on Wednesday
[10 May] French National Assembly Speaker Jean-Louis Debre.
Turkish Parliamentary delegation, comprising Mehmet Dulger and Musa
Sivacioglu from Justice and Development Party (AKP); and Onur Oymen
and Gulsun Bilgehan Toker from the main opposition Republican People’s
Party (CHP), is currently in Paris to lobby for rejection or withdrawal
of the bill which would make “the denial” of the so-called Armenian
genocide a crime.
Following their meeting with Debre, the Turkish delegation met French
parliament foreign affairs commission chairman Edouard Balladur.
Speaking to AA [Anatolia] correspondent following the meetings,
CHP MP Onur Oymen said, “we have explained the harsh reaction of the
Turkish people. We have attracted the attention to the calls in Turkey
to boycott French goods.
We had the opportunity to convey them that relations would be harmed
in case the bill becomes a law.”
Meetings of the Turkish delegation will continue on Thursday.
Turkish parliamentarians will make references to previous statements
of the French executives and historians that the “parliaments can
not write history and the history should be left to historians” and
want French parliamentarians to be consistent with their previous
statements.
Proposal of the Socialist Party will be discussed on 18 May. The bill
should be approved in the Senate in order to become a law.

KARABAKH MEDIATORS SEEKING FEEDBACK TO NEW PROPOSALS – RUSSIAN MEDIATOR
Trend news agency
10 May 06
Baku, 10 May: The co-chairmen of the OSCE Minsk Group expect Baku
and Yerevan to react in Strasbourg to the proposals made during a
recent visit to the region by the French co-chairman of the OSCE
Minsk Group, Bernard Fassier, the Russian co-chairman of the group,
Yuriy Merzlyakov, has told Trend.
“Some new proposals”, as well as more specific details of the previous
discussions, were submitted to the Azerbaijani and Armenian leaders on
behalf of the OSCE Minsk Group during Fassier’s visit, Merzlyakov said.
“I think that it was a very important visit after our (OSCE Minsk Group
co-chairmen’s) meeting in Moscow to finally agree on the proposals,”
he said.
The Russian diplomat said that both sides will carefully examine the
ideas that will be agreed later.
Merzlyakov said that he was not ready to comment on the possible
meeting of the Armenian and Azerbaijani presidents. The co-chairmen
will work on this issue, he said.

AZERI PRESSURE GROUP BLAMES INTERNATIONAL CRISIS GROUP FOR PRO-ARMENIAN BIAS
Azerbaijani news agency APA
10 May 06
Baku, 10 May: The Karabakh Liberation Organization [KLO] issued
a statement today condemning the remarks of the Caucasus project
director of the International Crisis Group [ICG], Sabine Fraizer,
on the settlement of the Nagornyy Karabakh conflict, the KLO press
service has told APA.
The statement says that the ICG’s approach to the settlement of
the conflict favours a defeatist peace. The ICG has been promoting
Armenia’s political ideas from the very beginning, and therefore,
is demanding that the peace talks continue, it said.
The KLO also said that it is unacceptable to deploy peacekeeping troops
in this process: “By using tension on the front line as an excuse,
Sabine Fraizer is trying to distract public opinion in Azerbaijan from
the war and has achieved this in some way. Since Armenia started the
war against Azerbaijan, peacekeepers can be deployed only along the
border between the two countries.”

TURKISH DELEGATION LEAVES FOR FRANCE TO BLOCK ARMENIAN GENOCIDE ISSUE BILL
Milliyet website, Istanbul
10 May 06
A Turkish parliamentary delegation has left for Paris nine days before
France passes a bill calling for the penalization of anyone who says
“an act of genocide did not take place against the Armenians in the
past”. The delegation is composed of AKP [Justice and Development
Party] members Mehmet Dulger, head of the Turkish Grand National
Assembly Foreign Relations Committee, and Musa Sivacioglu and CHP
[Republican People’s Party] members Onur Oymen and Gulsun Bilgehan
Toker. It will explain the harm the bill might cause in France’s
relations with Turkey if it is passed.

DOES ARMENIA NEED A MINISTRY OF CULTURE?
Panorama.am
16:25 10/05/06
One-time minister of Armenian culture Hakob Movses has a direct
answer to the question. “Armenian Ministry of Culture is an unneeded
structure.” He says that basing his considerations on the peculiarities
of the Armenian culture.
Armenian Revolutionary Party member Ruben HOVSEPYAN, however, does
not agree. “Ministry of culture is necessary to regulate cultural
centers,” he says. R.
Hovsepyan, however does not approve the fact of party membership of
the ministry of culture.
Hakob Movses expresses his dissatisfaction with the fact that the
sector is affiliated to parties through the ministry. He quotes
international experience saying that some countries lack at all any
agency on culture regulation. “Only those countries need ministry of
culture which culture is civilized,” he says. He brings an example
of the Armenian theaters, which are state-sponsored but in fact are
properties of general producers.

AUTHORS OF TURKISH GOVERNMENT REPORT ON MINORITIES ACQUITTED OF “INCITING HATRED”
Benjamin Harvey
AP Worldstream
May 10, 2006
A Turkish court ruled on Wednesday that the authors of a
government-ordered report on minorities were not guilty of “inciting
hatred and enmity” when they said Turkey should grant more rights to
Kurds and other minorities.
Professors Ibrahim Kaboglu and Baskin Orhan faced up to five years in
prison after their report angered nationalists, who feared recognition
of minority rights in Turkey could lead to the country being broken
up along ethnic lines.
A state prosecutor had demanded that the professors, who both worked
for the state Human Rights Advisory Council, be punished for their
remarks deemed “inflammatory.”
The professors’ 2004 report urged the government to change its policy
and recognize Kurds as a distinct minority. Turkey says that all
Muslims in the country are Turks.
Until 1991, the Kurdish language was banned and even now broadcasting
in Kurdish is strictly limited by the government.
The European Union, which Turkey hopes to join, has demanded that
Turkey improve its treatment of minorities. The push for enhanced
rights, especially for Kurds, has faced opposition in a country still
battling autonomy-seeking Kurdish rebels in its southeast.
The fight with the rebels, who would like to establish an autonomous
region in a chunk of Turkey’s east, has claimed more than 37,000
lives in the past two decades.
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has pledged to improve the
situation with government investment in the largely poor Kurdish
southeast.
But the prime minister angered many Turks earlier this year when he
traveled to the Kurdish-majority city of Diyarbakir and acknowledged
that Turkey had made mistakes in the past in dealing with what he
called its “Kurdish problem.”
There are an estimated 14 million Kurds _ about 20 percent of Turkey’s
population of 71 million _ in Turkey, though exact numbers are
difficult to come by because the government does not keep statistics
that classify Kurds as a separate minority.
Kaboglu and Oran’s rights report had also suggested that Turkey give
equal rights to non-Muslims, who are barred from jobs in the police
and Foreign Ministry, and from becoming military officers.
Unlike Kurds, Christians and Jews are recognized as minorities in
Turkey, but nationalists question the loyalty of non-Muslim Turks,
particularly those of Greek or Armenian descent.
Kaboglu, one of the authors of the report, called the case against him,
“a shame for Turkey.”
The court on Wednesday also dropped charges against the two professors
for allegedly insulting the judiciary when they criticized the charges
brought against them. The Anatolia news agency reported that the
Justice Ministry, already under criticism for prominent freedom of
expression cases like the one against novelist Orhan Pamuk, refused
to approve those charges.