TREND Information, Azerbaijan
April 29 2006
Armenia should look forward for future not keeping past memories-
PACE chairman

Source: Trend
Author: Z. Ibrahimli

29.04.2006

In order to normalize its relations with Turkey Armenia `should look
forward for future not keeping past memories,’ the chairman of the
Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), Rene Van der
Linden told in exclusive interview to MediaMax.
`The fact that both Armenia and Turkey are members of the Council of
Europe allows MPs from both countries to meet and hold joint
discussions. I think that if you live in the same region and you
don’t have any open relations in trade, economy, culture you are not
benefiting your own countries in the first place. You can not create
a stable future in the region if you are isolated from your
neighbors.’
`If you are looking for a solution you will find it. Though, you will
never find a 100% solution. Compromise is always a must as both
sides have their own arguments and if you will only stay on your own
principles and feelings it won` t be possible to find appropriate
peaceful solution for future,’ Van der Linden said.

Boston Herald, MA
April 29 2006
Genocide’s lesson timeless
By Adam Strom/ As You Were Saying
Saturday, April 29, 2006
To prevent mass violence and genocide, we will need to summon the
commitments of new generations around the world. Here, education in
schools and in broad public venues holds the best promise.

On April 24, 1915, the Ottoman Turk government began rounding up
Armenian intellectuals and community leaders and executing them. It
was the first phase of what soon became a full-fledged genocide –
more than a million Armenians would eventually die and nearly every
Armenian would be driven from Turkey.

In the United States and Europe, journalists, politicians and
ordinary people who knew of the horrors and outrages in Turkey’s
Anatolian desert wrestled with how to respond. Most simply averted
their eyes. Others, unable to remain silent in the face of the
growing atrocities, challenged tradition by boldly proclaiming that
responsibility for human life does not stop at national borders.
Their solutions set important precedents for international law. In
fact, the phrase `crime against humanity,’ made famous as one of the
counts at the post-Holocaust Nuremberg trials, was first used to
describe the massacres of Armenian civilians in the spring of 1915.

To many who had followed the bloody history of Turkey’s campaign
against its ethnic minorities, the impunity enjoyed by those who had
ordered and carried out the killings was unbearable.

Raphael Lemkin, a Polish Jew and a law student, was one of them.
Lemkin confronted one of his law school professors, `Why is the
killing of a million people a lesser crime than the killing of a
single individual?’ His professor used a metaphor to explain that
courts did not have any jurisdiction: `Consider the case of a farmer
who owns a flock of chickens. He kills them and this is his business.
If you interfere, you are trespassing.’ But, replied an incensed
Lemkin, `the Armenians are not chickens.’

Lemkin dedicated the rest of his life to finding a way to make
sure that the law would recognize the difference. In 1944 Lemkin
coined the word `genocide’ and later he drafted the United Nations
Convention on Genocide. The convention was ratified on Dec. 9, 1948,
one day before the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human
Rights. The ratification was too late for Lemkin’s own family, many
of whom were murdered in the Holocaust.
In the 20th century more people died through genocidal violence and
state-sanctioned murder than in wartime combat. The 21st century is
not looking much better. The violence now taking hundreds of
thousands of lives in Darfur is a vivid reminder of how little we
learned from the last 100 years.

To prevent mass violence and genocide, we will need to summon the
commitments of new generations around the world. Here, education in
schools and in broad public venues holds the best promise. Students
can learn about the failures of democratic accountability that so
often precede atrocity. Communities can learn about the dangers of
blind obedience and about the power of bystanders to become what
author Samantha Power calls `upstanders,’ speaking out against hatred
and violence.

Even today, 91 years after the start of the Armenian genocide,
the Turkish government and others seek to deny that the crimes ever
occurred and some argue that teachers need to `tell both sides of the
story.’ These denials just deepen the effects of the crime; they
allow today’s generation – and generations going forward – to ignore
the truth and, in so doing, learn nothing from it.

They pave the way for new genocides by disarming all of us, by
not providing us with the knowledge we need to recognize the
conditions that might create genocidal behavior and to see clearly
when genocide begins.

In April our calendar is stained with the memory of the
anniversaries of four genocides – the Armenian Genocide, the
Holocaust, the Cambodian Genocide and the Rwandan Genocide.

Facing History and Ourselves believes that by facing history
honestly, without distortions or denial, we can educate a new
generation to realize Lemkin’s vision.
Adam Strom is director of research and development for Facing History
and Ourselves, an international nonprofit organization that was
founded in Brookline 30 years ago. As You Were Saying is a Herald
feature. We invite readers to contribute pieces of 600 words. Mail to
the Boston Herald, P.O. Box 55643, Boston, MA 02205-5643, or e-mail
to [email protected]. Submissions are subject to editing and
become Herald property.

Burbank Leader,CA
April 29 2006
Language credential in bill
The Assembly Education Committee on Wednesday approved Assemblyman
Dario Frommer’s legislation seeking to include the Armenian language
in the single-subject foreign language California Subject Examination
for Teachers.
California has the largest Armenian population outside of Armenia yet
there is no program for teachers who want to be credentialed in the
Armenian language, said Frommer, a Democrat who represents Burbank
and Glendale.
If the bill passes, it would better equip teachers in districts with
large Armenian populations and spur interested students to study the
Armenian language in high schools, colleges and universities, he
said.
The Glendale Unified School District reported that it had 3,904
English language learners who speak Armenian primarily, making up 49%
of the district’s total English language learner population.
Assembly Bill 2913’s expansion of the test’s single subject teaching
credential to include the Armenian language will permit high schools,
colleges and universities to offer the Armenian language as a course
in the curriculum and will guarantee that those courses will be
taught by teachers credentialed in Armenian.
The first Armenian test must be administered by Sept. 1, 2009,
according to the bill.
Riding a fast track to teaching credential
State Sen. Jack Scott, a Democrat who represents Burbank, Glendale
and La Cañada Flintridge, is urging those interested in shifting
their professional abilities into teaching by participating in a
“fast-track” teacher- credentialing exam.
One exam is scheduled for June 10 and another for Aug. 5.
The registration deadline for the June exam is May 11.
Aspiring teachers can dramatically reduce the time to earn a teaching
credential by passing the Teaching Foundations Exam also known as the
Early Completion Option. Prospective teachers must prove they have
knowledge of their subject. The exam will be conducted statewide for
candidates in math, English and other subjects.
Those who want to take the science test may only participate at a
reduced rate in order to set statistical passing scores for this
exam.
The science exam is normally $155 but the first 100 people who sign
up for June 10 will be offered a reduced rate, Scott said.
Many people would make wonderful teachers, but are discouraged by the
time and expense of teacher training, Scott said.
Taking the test can cut the time to get a credential from two years
to several months, he said.
Scott’s SB 57, which passed in 2001, included creation of the
fast-track process.
The law requires that all teacher internship programs approved by the
California Commission on Teacher Credentialing offer this early
completion option.
Would-be teachers are able to bypass most teacher education courses
by enrolling in an approved university or school district intern
preparation program.
For information on the Early Completion Option exam, e-mail Michael
McKibbin at the Commission on Teacher Credentialing: mmckibbin@
ctc.ca.gov. The Commission’s website address is
Illegal immigrants cost millions annually
Los Angeles County Supervisor Michael Antonovich, whose district
includes Glendale, Burbank and the foothills, reported that nearly
100,000 children of illegal immigrants collected nearly $23 million
in Aid to Families of Dependent Children funding in Los Angeles
County in January 2006 — or nearly $276 million annually.
Antonovich said 98,703 children of 57,458 undocumented parents
received aid in January 2006 — for a total of 156,161 immigrants. If
incorporated into a city, it would be the 6th largest city in the
county.
While legal immigration is a positive influence on our culture and
economy, illegal immigration has had a devastating impact on the
county, Antonovich said.
Antonovich made his statements while meeting with Congressional
representatives in Washington, D.C., to provide information regarding
the impact illegal immigrants have on our county, Tuesday.
Candidate forum to be held Monday
The Glendale Homeowners Coordinating Council will host a discussion
featuring the four candidates running in the June 6 primary for the
43rd District Assembly seat.
The candidates’ forum will be held at 7 p.m. in the board room at the
Glendale Unified School District’s administration center, 223 N.
Jackson St.
The four candidates in the running are Republican Michael Agbaba,
Democrats Paul Krekorian and Frank Quintero and Libertarian Steve
Myers.
Dreier honored for extradition work
Rep. David Dreier, a Republican who represents La Cañada Flintridge
and La Crescenta, was honored Sunday by Justice for Homicide Victims
Inc. for his work to bring about a change in Mexico’s extradition
policy.
Justice for Homicide Victims is the action arm of the California
Center for Family Survivors of Homicide Inc.
Dreier was presented with the Victim’s Outstanding Service Award by
Executive Director Marcella Leach.
Dreier said he was humbled by the honor.
In 2004, Dreier traveled to Mexico to meet with Mexican officials,
including the Mexican Supreme Court justices, to urge a change in
their extradition policy.
He argued that Mexico should extradite suspects accused of violent
crimes in the United States even if they face life in prison.
In November 2005, the Mexican Supreme Court reversed a previous
decision banning such extraditions.

The Free Lance-Star, VA
April 29 2006
Faith groups rally in D.C. to ‘Save Darfur’
A displaced Sudanese mother and child wait in a dispensary run by the
French organization Action Against Hunger in South Darfur. Religious
leaders will rally on the Mall tomorrow for the refugees.

Faith groups unite for action in Darfur
By NATASHA ALTAMIRANO
Religious leaders of different faiths will stand together in the
nation’s capital tomorrow for a basic tenet that crosses theological
and political lines: human rights.
Representatives from dozens of Christian, Muslim and Jewish groups
will unite for “Save Darfur: Rally to Stop Genocide” on the National
Mall.
“God does not challenge us to speak out just for Christians–he
challenges us to speak out for the human rights of all people,” said
the Rev. Richard Cizik, vice president for governmental affairs for
the Washington-based National Association of Evangelicals.
“If there’s one thing that we can all stand together and say as faith
leaders and as citizens, it ought to be this.”
Cizik, who lives in southern Stafford County, is on the executive
committee of the Save Darfur Coalition, which organized the rally.
The Sudanese government has killed more than 300,000 people in the
Darfur region in western Sudan. An estimated 3.5 million refugees
depend on foreign aid for survival, according to the coalition.
“The world stood silent in the face of Armenian, Jewish, Cambodian
and Rwandan genocide,” said Cizik, who will lead the rally’s opening
prayer. “Nothing on the global agenda is more urgent than rescuing
Darfur’s people from a campaign of extermination.”
Inaction on previous genocide is a major reason Darfur has become
such an important issue to the Jewish community, said said Julie
Weingrad, assistant director of the Jewish Community Relations
Council of Greater Washington.
The council has $45,000 for humanitarian aid in Darfur, Weingrad
said.
“A lot of people look back to the genocide in Rwanda and think, ‘I
wish I had done more, so I’m going to do more now,'” she said.
Experiencing the reality of genocide through the Holocaust is another
reason Jews have played an active role in the Save Darfur campaign.
“It’s something that’s affected someone in almost every Jewish
person’s family,” Weingrad said.
Like all people of strong faith, the Jewish community feels an
obligation to social justice.
“There’s a very strong sense that, as Jews, we need to participate in
‘tikkun olam’–it literally means ‘repairing the world,'” Weingrad
said.
The rally culminates a 22-city tour to raise public awareness of the
situation in Darfur and to pressure Bush administration officials and
congressional leaders to intervene.
The event also marks the end of the “Million Voices for Darfur”
campaign to generate 1 million postcards urging President Bush to
take action in Darfur.
More than 500,000 electronic and hard-copy postcards have been
signed. They will be delivered to government officials tomorrow.
Other religious leaders scheduled to speak include the Rev. Richard
Land, president of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and
Religious Liberties Commission; Rabbi Steve Gutow, executive director
of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs; and Cardinal Theodore
McCarrick, archbishop of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of
Washington.
Imam A. Rashied Omar with the Kroc Institute for International
Studies at Notre Dame University, former Sudanese NBA basketball
player Manute Bol and refugees from Darfur also will be there.
They’ll be joined by Academy Award-winning actor George Clooney; Sen.
Barack Obama, D-Ill.; and House of Representatives Minority Leader
Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., among other political leaders.
For details, visit savedarfur.org/rally.

American Chronicle, CA
April 29 2006
Irish Famine Education and the Holocaust ‘Straw Man’
James Mullin
April 28, 2006
When I first contacted Dr. Paul Winkler, Executive Director of the
New Jersey Commission on Holocaust Education, and asked him to
consider adding the study of the Great Irish Famine to the state
curriculum, he asked me if I was claiming Genocide. I said I wanted
the teachers and students to make up their own minds. He agreed with
that approach.
On Feb. 11th, 1996, a full seven months before New Jersey became the
first state to approve a curriculum on the Irish Famine, the Sunday
Telegraph of London published an article, `US Schools Say Irish
Famine was Genocide’.
As expected, the Telegraph article was filled with misrepresentation,
willful errors, and sentences like: `Hard-line Irish-American
Nationalists have been increasingly vocal in their demands that the
Famine be recognized as a Genocide’.
Still, it was surprising to read that, `the issue has divided the
Irish-American community, with some moderate groups concerned that
comparing the famine with the Nazi-inspired Holocaust will cause
offense to Jews.’ I had not made, nor had I heard of any such
comparisons; in addition, I had an excellent working relationship
with the Commission, some of whose members were death camp survivors.
The Holocaust comparison theme appeared again in an October 16th,
Sunday Times (Dublin) article, `American Pupils Told Irish Famine was
Act of British Genocide’. It said that, `British diplomats in America
are dismayed at the portrayal of the Irish famine as a genocide
comparable to the mass extermination of six million Jews by the
Nazis.’ Who was responsible for this `portrayal’?
Since I subscribed to the Irish People, Irish Voice, Irish Echo,
Irish Edition, and Irish Democrat, (London) and I had not read or
heard of anyone making any such comparisons, I concluded that the
analogy was a propaganda device called the `straw man’. Rather than
answer to credible evidence of genocidal acts during the mass
starvation, the British would argue that the `Famine’ was not a
genocide because it was not the Holocaust.
In October, 1996, New York Governor George Pataki signed an education
law mandating instruction on the mass starvation in Ireland. He was
attacked in a Sunday Times of London editorial entitled, `An Irish
Hell, but not a Holocaust’.
Here was the propaganda masterstroke full blown. The Times editorial
said, `It is true the British government does not come out
particularly well from the tale…but to compare, as Mr. Pataki has
done, its policy with that of Hitler toward the Jews is as
unhistorical as it is offensive. (Not least to the Jews, the tragedy
of whose Holocaust is necessarily lessened by comparison with an
Irish catastrophe that was neither premeditated nor man-made.) To
mistake these human errors and shortcomings for a Nazi-style policy
of deliberate racial extermination is absurd.’
So absurd that this `straw man’ argument could easily be knocked
over.
Governor Pataki had not mentioned the Holocaust in his speech on
signing the bill into law, nor had his subsequent press release. The
comparison was based on the simple fact that the newly signed Act
added the words, `the mass starvation in Ireland from 1845 to 1850′,
to state education law which mandated instruction on `human rights
issues, genocide, slavery and the Holocaust.’
British Ambassador John Kerr then carried the misrepresentation to
the highest diplomatic levels, by attacking Governor Pataki in a
letter he released to the press. It said: `It seems to me rather
insulting to the many millions who suffered and died in concentration
camps across Europe to imply that their man-made fate was in any way
analogous to the natural disaster in Ireland a century before. The
Famine, unlike the Holocaust, was not deliberate, not premeditated,
not man-made, not genocide.’ Who drew the analogy, and for what
purpose?
On March 10th, 1997, the Washington Times Magazine, Insight, carried
a full-page editorial, `You say Potato, They say Holocaust’,
illustrated with a photograph of a potato wrapped in barbed wire. It
attacked Governor Pataki and the whole idea of Irish famine
education. `The Holocaust was Hitler’s inhuman policy to eradicate
Jews in Germany and from his Thousand-Year Reich. To equate the
potato famine with that barbarism makes Pataki a contender for the
title of `The Greatest Liar in America.’ The British-fabricated
analogy was proving itself stronger than the truth, and it made
better copy.
On Aug. 26th, 1997, the Boston Globe opposed Irish Famine education
in a staff-written editorial entitled, `Unnecessary Curriculum Bill’.
`As the Tolman bill is now worded’, the Globe said, `teachers might
be encouraged to treat the Irish famine on the same level of moral
depravity as the Armenian genocide and the Holocaust. That would be a
misreading of the historical record. While the British approach to
the mass starvation was often brutal, arrogant and unfeeling. No
state-run death camps disfigured the Irish countryside.’ Did
thousands of homeless, starving people, ruined hovels, and mass
graves `disfigure the countryside?’
The argument that classroom discussion of the mass starvation should
be discouraged because British criminality did not match the
barbarity of the Nazis during the Holocaust is a pervasive and
virulent virus imbedded in every dose of propaganda against Famine
education. The perpetrators hope to convince everyone that because
the Famine was not the Holocaust, it could not have been genocide.
Instead of the British being forced to explain massive commodity
exports during mass starvation, Irish Famine education activists were
left to defend a `Famine is Holocaust’ argument they never made.
On September 17th, 1997 the Washington Post published `Ireland’s
Famine Wasn’t Genocide’ It was written by Timothy W. Guinnane,
associate professor of economics at Yale University, and author of
The Vanishing Irish: Households, Migration, and the Rural Economy in
Post-Famine Ireland. It said, in part:
`Several states have mandated that the Great Irish Famine of
1845-1850 be taught in their high schools as an example of genocide,
sometimes in courses originally intended for the study of the
Holocaust… The reinterpretation of the famine as genocide has not
been well received by scholars who study the Irish famine. Those who
view the famine as genocide claim either that the government
engineered the crisis or that its reaction to the blight promoted as
many deaths as possible. …But does the government’s inadequate
response to the famine constitute genocide? The contrast with the
Holocaust is instructive. The Nazis devoted considerable resources to
finding and murdering Jews. The regime’s stated intention was the
elimination of the Jewish people. Nothing like this can be claimed
against the British government during the Irish famine. The British
government’s indifference to the famine helped cause thousands of
needless deaths, but it was indifference nonetheless, and not an
active effort at systematic murder… To call the famine genocide
cheapens the memories of both the famine’s victims and the victims of
real genocides.’
While the Holocaust is the best documented, most systematic, ruthless
and brutal genocide of the 20th century, it is not the definition of
genocide. Since the United States and Britain are parties to the 1948
Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide,
the definition that applies is contained in Article II:
`In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts
committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national,
ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: (a) Killing members of
the group; (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of
the group; (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of
life calculated to bring about its phyisica1 destruction in whole or
in part; (d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the
group; (e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another
group.’
Francis A. Boyle, Professor of International Law at the University of
Illinois, with experience arguing on matters of genocide before the
International Court of Justice in The Hague, wrote to the New Jersey
Commission on Holocaust Education on May 2, 1996, saying, in part:
`Clearly, during the years 1845 to 1850, the British government
pursued a policy of mass starvation in Ireland with intent to destroy
in substantial part the national, ethnical, and racial group commonly
known as the Irish People.’
Professor Boyle’s legal opinion concludes that Britain’s actions
violated sections (a), (b), and (c) of Article II, and therefore
`constituted acts of genocide against the Irish People.’
On April 26th, 1849, one hundred years before the Genocide Convention
was signed, the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, the Earl of Clarendon,
wrote to the Prime Minister, John Russell, expressing his feelings
about the lack of aid from Parliament:
`I do not think there is another legislature in Europe that would
disregard such suffering as now exists in the west of Ireland, or
coldly persist in a policy of extermination.’
Clarendon’s words make it clear that Britain would also be guilty
under the definition of Genocide provided by Richard L. Rubenstein in
his book The Age of Triage: Fear and Hope in an Overcrowded World: “A
government is as responsible for a genocidal policy when its
officials accept mass death as a necessary cost of implementing their
policies, as when they pursue genocide as an end in itself.”

Orange County Register, CA
April 29 2006
Foreign trade offices could make comeback
A Register investigation exposed how the offices inflated accounts of
their economic impact.
By BRIAN JOSEPH
The Orange County Register
SACRAMENTO – Three years after they were written out of the state
budget, foreign trade offices are back, with lawmakers and Gov.
Arnold Schwarzenegger working to revive the programs even though
they’ve never been able to prove their value.
The California Legislature in 2003 eliminated the Technology, Trade
and Commerce Agency and its 12 trade offices across the globe after
an Orange County Register investigation exposed how the offices
inflated accounts of their economic impact. The Register found
offices taking credit for any business deal in which they were even
remotely involved, resulting in at least $44.2 million in false or
overblown claims in one report alone.
Since then, legislators and private trade groups annually have tried
to resurrect the programs to no avail, but this year could be
different. Three bills in the Senate and another in the Assembly have
emerged from hearings this month with some momentum as legislators
from both parties are signaling renewed support for trade offices.
“This is a big push,” said Assemblyman Greg Aghazarian, R-Stockton,
who was carrying a bill for the governor that would have opened one
office in Mexico and two in Asia. It died in the Assembly Committee
on Jobs, Economic Development, and the Economy this week along with
three other trade office bills.
He is now co-authoring, with committee chair Juan Arambula, D-Fresno,
and several other Assembly members, a bill that wouldn’t directly
establish trade offices, but rather calls for the state to develop an
overall trade strategy, then determine whether trade offices could
play a role.
“The goal is to re-establish trade offices, but do it the right way
this time,” Aghazarian said.
Schwarzenegger has not taken a position on Arambula’s bill, but his
deputy assistant press secretary, Darrel Ng, said expanding trade
remains a priority for the governor and “He believes trade offices
are a component of that.”
In the Senate, the three bills there call for the private funding of
trade offices, with public disclosure of contributors on the Web and
a $10,000 limit per quarter. Like many lawmakers, Sen. Kevin Murray,
D-Los Angeles, who has two bills that would establish offices in
Seoul, Korea and Johannesburg, South Africa, views private funding as
a solution to the concerns about the previous programs.
“The problems we had previously had to do with cost effectiveness,”
he said. “This is not an issue because we’re not using state funds.”
Trade experts, however, see potential problems with privately funded
offices carrying California’s stamp of approval. With someone else
controlling the purse strings, they worry private contributors could
control offices bearing California’s name. Lawmakers counter a trade
office without the California seal would carry no weight with
potential business partners.
Said trade consultant Jock O’Connell: “If they’re producing a public
good, they should be publicly financed.”
O’Connell and other experts aren’t convinced trade offices produce
any public good. California exports increased by nearly $7 billion
last year, to $116.8 billion, the second-highest on record, according
to the Public Policy Institute of California. Howard Shatz, a
research fellow for the institute, said closing the offices has had
little impact.
“Somehow trade offices are viewed as being very important, but
there’s just not evidence that they are,” he said, noting academic
research is inconclusive on what trade offices accomplish. It appears
they don’t have much an economic impact, good or bad.
“The jury is out as to the value that these offices have,” said
Michael White, editor of the CalTrade Report, an online magazine
covering international trade as it relates to California. He said
lawmakers don’t understand the dynamics of international trade.
“They’re going to produce a mandate to reopen trade offices,” White
said, “and they’ll think they’re accomplishing something.”
What the Legislature should do, experts say, is create an
international trade agency in California that would coordinate all of
the state’s programs. Otherwise, the trade offices are on their own,
without direct oversight or leadership. O’Connell said Arambula’s
bill, which first examines the state’s role in international trade,
then considers trade offices, is a “big” step in the right direction.
Experts are also concerned the Legislature hasn’t solved all of the
problems under the previous program. Before they were shut down,
trade offices were broadly taking credit for any deal in which they
were even remotely involved under criteria that “but for” the
involvement of the trade office, the deal would not have taken place.
“Has the ‘but for’ problem been solved yet?” Shatz asked. “If we’re
not solving that up front, we’re probably setting ourselves up for a
repeat.”
Other questions remain. When the trade offices were eliminated in
2003, the Legislature reserved the power to establish a privately
funded office in Armenia as part of a political move by a lawmaker
facing re-election in a district with a large Armenian population. It
took from 2002 to 2005 to collect the necessary funds and it won’t be
until 2007 when the Legislature receives a report on the success of
the Armenian office and its oversight.
There’s also the question of whether the Legislature is duplicating
efforts by Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante, who, in his role as chairman of
the California Commission for Economic Development, has established
nine unofficial trade offices, in places like Mexico City and Taipei.
These offices, which are financed and staffed by local organizations
under an agreement with the lieutenant governor, were some of the
first efforts to fund trade offices with private dollars.
THE DEBATE
Proponents want to start state-backed trade offices that are
privately funded, with full disclosure of funders on the Internet.
Opponents say it’s risky to put California’s stamp of approval on
something it does not control through funding.

Déjà vu
The state’s 12 foreign trade offices were eliminated in 2003, but
bills proceeding through the Legislature now could lead to new ones.
AB 2601: By Assemblyman Juan Arambula, D-Fresno, and several other
Assembly members of both parties. In the process of being amended.
Would require the Secretary of Business, Housing and Transportation
to study the state’s potential role in international trade then
develop an overall trade strategy, including, possibly, trade
offices.
SB 1513: By Sen. Gloria Romero, D-Los Angeles. Would require the
Secretary of Business, Transportation and Housing to study the
desirability of trade offices, then produce a strategy for the
Legislature if there is a need. Stipulates private funding for trade
offices, with donations limited to $10,000 per quarter. Requires
donations to be posted on the Web.
SB 1525: By Sen. Kevin Murray, R-Los Angeles. Would create a
privately funded trade office in Johannesburg, South Africa.
Donations limited to $10,000 per quarter. Donations posted on the
Web.
SB 1529: By Sen. Kevin Murray, R-Los Angeles. Would create a
privately funded trade office in Seoul, Korea. Donations limited to
$10,000 per quarter. Donations posted on the Web.

North Shore Sunday, MA
April 29 2006
The Turks talk back
By Barbara Taormina/ Staff Writer
Friday, April 28, 2006
When it comes to Armenia , Turkey has always told a different story.

Many Turks believe that the current push to have the world
recognize the Armenian genocide is an attempt to force Turkey to pay
reparations and to annex the eastern part of the country to
present-day Armenia.

According to Turkish literature, the estimate of 1.5 million
Armenian deaths is exaggerated. Instead the Turks claim 700,000
Armenians were killed or died of starvation and disease during World
War I in eastern Anatolia.

But Turkish histories also point out that more than 2 million
Turks and Muslims died during the same time frame. And they say many
were massacred by the Armenians, while others died during the war
fighting Armenians and Russians.

Demir Delen, a Turkish writer who now lives in Canada, has been
trying for years to counter the claim of an Armenian genocide.
According to Delen, Armenian revolutionaries joined forces with the
Russians in an attempt to take advantage of a chaotic political
situation during the final years of the Ottoman Empire.

Delan says the attempt to relocate the Armenians was an attempt
to create some order and stability inside Turkey.

Like other Turks writing about the early 20th century history,
Delen claims many of the sources and documents supporting the claim
of an Armenian genocide are fake.

“Armenians, in their attempts to convince the world opinion about
the existence of a genocide perpetrated against them during the First
World War, resort to forgeries and falsifications,” he writes.

“It is ironic that Armenians accuse anyone who opposes their
allegations of a so-called genocide by exposing the historical facts,
as ‘rewriting history,'” says Delen. “Yet Armenians are rewriting
history more than 80 years later, in parliaments of western countries
and in the legislatures of several states and provinces in the U.S.
and Canada where they have a considerable population, by lobbying,
donating to election campaigns and influencing politicians.”

North Shore Sunday, MA
April 29 2006
See no evil
By Barbara Taormina/ Staff Writer
Friday, April 28, 2006 – Updated: 07:01 PM EST
People might not always know how to define genocide, but they know it
when they see it.

And yet, there have always been problems with the Armenian
genocide, a brutal stretch of early 20th century history during which
1.5 million Armenians were beaten, shot, hung and herded on long
death marches into the Syrian desert by a Turkish government bent on
seizing a strategic piece of land and creating a Pan-Turkish empire.

Armenian genocide

The Turks talk back

The Turks say it never happened. They admit the Armenians
suffered a huge death toll between 1915 and 1918, but they say the
deaths were due to a civil rebellion and the vast destruction left in
the wake of World War I. Despite the photographs, the news reports,
the eyewitness accounts and the stories of survivors, the Turks have
fought the charge of genocide since the United Nations accepted the
term and declared it an international crime in 1948.

Those denials were stepped up last week as Armenians the world
over held commemorative services to mark the 91st anniversary of the
genocide and to remember those who died and those who survived. And
in Massachusetts, people are watching the debate on the Armenian
genocide play out on a local, state and federal level.

Apo Torosyan, an Armenian artist and filmmaker who now lives in
Peabody, says Turkey has buried the truth of what happened to the
Armenians because they don’t want the national stigma.

“They are trying to cover up their shame,” says Torosyan, whose
grandparents died of starvation during the genocide. “I would be very
ashamed. This was a very systematic murder.”

Torosyan and others also feel the Turkish government is
determined not to acknowledge anything that could leave it open to a
flood of lawsuits seeking billions of dollars in reparations.

And because Turkey now plays a strategic role in a turbulent part
of the world, few people, particularly those in the U.S. government,
want to rock the boat by demanding that Turkey accept responsibility.

Torosyan understands that politics have dictated how the story of
the Armenian genocide is being told. But like others, he believes
denial is the final act of any genocide. And like others he believes
the truth about Armenia and those who died will eventually be
acknowledged and accepted.
The politics of denial

As a kid, Mary Foley remembers people she didn’t know would
sometimes visit her home to talk with her parents.

“My mother used to tell me go into the bedroom and play,” recalls
Foley, the sister of former Peabody Mayor Peter Torigian

As she grew older, Foley realized the visitors were Armenian
immigrants looking for clues or scraps of information about people
who may have escaped Turkey and survived the genocide.

Foley’s father left Armenia for the United States in 1912, the
year before the killings and deportations started. Her mother, who
was a child at the time, lost her family and managed to survive with
the help of Turkish families who took in and hid Armenian orphans.

But those Turks who helped took a huge risk, says Foley. Homes
were searched and if any Armenians were found, the entire household
would be killed.

Years later, when she was 94 and suffering from Alzheimer’s
disease, Foley says her mother would sometimes call out in Armenian,
“They came, they came, they came.” The tears would roll down her
cheeks as she relived the terror of hiding from Turkish death squads.

“These aren’t stories that people can make up,” says Foley. “How
could the Turks deny these things happened?”

But Foley knows that politics have interfered with the way
history is being remembered and told. For years, American political
leaders have been walking a fine line between acknowledging the
suffering of the Armenians and placating the Turkish government by
going easy on the blame. It’s a difficult balancing act.

Just ask Deval Patrick, a Democratic candidate for governor, who
took a visible seat at an Armenian memorial service at the State
House last week. Patrick made sure he had time to attend after the
Boston Herald reported he had ties to lobbyist Bernie Robinson, whose
Washington-based firm, the Livingston Group, has been working for the
Republic of Turkey on its campaign to deny or downplay the Armenian
genocide.
According to the watchdog group Public Citizen, the Turks have paid
the Livingston Group more than $9 million to fight a congressional
amendment recognizing the Armenian genocide and to help steer $1
billion in U.S. aid to Turkey, even though American troops are barred
from using Turkish soil as a staging area for Iraq.

Patrick’s Democratic opponent Tom Reilly wasted no time racking
up a few political miles with the incident.

“Anyone who would try and undermine the history and the truth of
what happened to the Armenian population, I certainly would be
disappointed in that. I certainly would not want to have anything to
do with that,” Reilly said.

On a national level, the Armenian sidestepping has been
bi-partisan. Both presidents Bill Clinton and George Bush have
refused to sign on to the Armenian Genocide Resolution, which would
formally recognize the suffering of the Armenians.

“There are congressmen and senators who support the Armenian
people,” says Foley. “But on the whole, America likes to ignore it
because the Turks have been allies for many years.”

Not only did the United States have military bases in Turkey
during the Cold War, the country’s strategic location and its role as
a moderate Muslim country make it a critical ally to American
interests in the Middle East.

“It’s wrong, but no one want to make enemies of the Turks,” says
Foley.

And while the American stand against acknowledging the Armenian
genocide is difficult, Torosyan says it’s not only the national
response that Armenians find troubling.

Israel, which also depends on alliance with Turkey, has also
refused to formally recognize the genocide, says Torosyan.

The Israeli position has been that the question of the Armenians
should be left to the historians, not the politicians.
Spinning the story

Denying or rewriting history takes some effort, but it seems the
Turks are doing their best and succeeding, at least inside of Turkey.

“This history has been fabricated by the Turkish government,”
says Torosyan. “Their history has been written by the politicians,
not the historians. They are rewriting history to their own benefit,
not to the benefit of humanity.”

According to Torosyan, the Turkish government archives have been
purged and all documents that trace the official program of
deportation and killing are gone.

“It’s like a jigsaw puzzle where all the pieces in the middle are
missing,” says Torosyan. “There are a few pieces on the sides, but
that’s all that’s left.”

As for events that captured the world’s attention, the Turkish
government has done its best to spin them. For example, the Turks say
episodes during which Armenian professionals and intellectuals were
rounded up and killed were a necessary step to quell an internal
rebellion.

The Turks also brush off the post-war trials of those who led the
Armenian genocide. Although several key Turkish leaders were tried
and executed for their role in the Armenian genocide, the Turks now
say those trials were political showmanship, the result of political
infighting between the pre- and post-war government.

And the Turks don’t appear satisfied with rewriting just their
own history books.

Late last year, the Assembly of Turkish American Associations, a
student and two teachers sued the Massachusetts Board of Education,
claiming it had censored history and interfered with the right of
speech. The state has curriculum guidelines for teaching students
about human rights and genocide. But it has refused to include in its
material links to Turkish government-sponsored Web sites that deny
the Armenian genocide.

According to Harvey Silverglate, a Boston civil rights lawyer
representing the plaintiffs, the suit isn’t about being on one side
or the other – it’s about censorship. Silverglate says students
should be able to look at different historical sources and come to
their own conclusions about what happened to the Armenians.
Members of the state board of education have argued that the Web
sites in question are not academic sites.

Torosyan agrees and says those Web sites are just Turkish
propaganda. He believes the information that has survived speaks for
itself.

“Denials are denials,” he says. “You could never have a
curriculum that denies the Holocaust. People have a right to speak up
and not tell lies and not tell man-made history.”

But Torosyan, who is a member of the International Association of
Genocide Scholars, is also doing his part to contribute to the
history through his artwork and through two short films, “Discovering
My Father’s Village – Edinick” and “Witness,” both of which feature
survivors of the Armenian genocide and an analysis of events.

The Turkish government hasn’t taken kindly to those who buck
their trend of retelling the story. In recent years, there have been
several high-profile cases of writers and journalists who have been
imprisoned for publishing accounts of the Armenian genocide.

Torosyan, who had a display of his artwork at the annual memorial
service in Peabody for Holocaust survivors this week, explained the
cost of telling his stories to those who stopped by his exhibit.

“This,” he said as he pointed to copies of his films, “is why I
can never go back.”

Boston Herald report Kevin Rothstein contributed to this story.
E-Mail Barbara Taormina at [email protected].

Voice of America
April 29 2006
Bush and Aliyev Discuss Oil and Democracy
By Scott Stearns
Washington
28 April 2006

Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev (left) with President Bush
President Bush welcomed the leader of Azerbaijan to the White House
for talks Friday about democratic reforms and energy supplies.
The former Soviet republic has substantial oil and natural gas
reserves that the Bush Administration sees as central to reducing
European dependence on Russian supplies. Azerbaijan has also been an
important Muslim ally in the fight against terrorism, with troops in
Iraq and Afghanistan.
But the nation also has human rights and governance issues, with the
U.S. State Department saying President Ilham Aliyev’s administration
engages in corruption, political repression, and mistreatment of
prisoners.
President Bush sought to address both sides of that relationship in
his Oval Office meeting with President Aliyev, thanking him for
supporting U.S. military operations while pushing for further
democratic reforms at home. “We talked about the need for the world
to see a modern Muslim country that is able to provide for its
citizens, that understands that democracy is the wave of the future,
and I appreciate your leadership, Mr. President,” he said.
President Aliyev has been waiting for this White House meeting since
his widely criticized 2003 election. He denies allegations of
corruption and vows to continue reforming Azerbaijani politics. “I
consider this instrumental in the future development of Azerbaijan as
a modern, secular, democratic country. We share the same values. We
are grateful for United States assistance in promotion of political
process, process of democratization of our society and very committed
to continue that cooperation in the future,” he said.
Energy was also on the agenda. A 17-hundred-kilometer long pipeline
from the Caspian Sea through Georgia and Turkey is expected to bring
millions of barrels of Azerbaijani crude oil to market when it comes
on line later this year.
President Bush says Azerbaijan has a very important role to play in
helping the world achieve energy security.
President Aliyev thanked the U.S. leader for his support. “We are
very grateful for the leadership of the United States in promotion of
the energy security issues in the region, in assisting us to create a
solid transportation infrastructure which will allow for the
development of full-scale Caspian oil and gas reserves and deliver
them to the international markets,” he said.
President Aliyev said the men also discussed the disputed region of
Nagorno-Karabakh, which has been controlled for more than 10 years by
its majority ethnic-Armenian population.

Interfax News Agency
Russia & CIS General Newswire
April 28, 2006 Friday 7:18 PM MSK
Karabakh will never be part of Azerbaijan – Armenian minister (Part 2)
STEPANAKERT April 28
Nagorno-Karabakh will never be a part of Azerbaijan, said Armenian
Foreign Minister Vardan Oskanian.
“I don’t know what status the Nagorno-Karabakh republic will have,
but I know for sure what it will not be, namely, Nagorno-Karabakh
will never be within Azerbaijan. This is absolutely impossible,”
Oskanian said speaking at the Nagorno-Karabakh State University in
Stepanakert.
Oskanian is on a working visit to Stepanakert to hold consultations
with the leadership of the self-proclaimed republic.
“The wheel of history cannot be turned backwards, and all that
Azerbaijan is saying about granting Nagorno-Karabakh a highest
possible level of autonomy within its borders should not be taken
seriously,” he said.
The Armenian diplomatic corps sees its task in ensuring international
recognition of Nagorno-Karabakh’s independence, although this is
“quite a difficult problem,” Oskanian said.
The foreign minister also called the creation of a comprehensive
security system for the Armenian people an important component of
Armenia’s foreign policy. In this context, he particularly mentioned
strategic partnership with Russia, with which Armenia has a bilateral
agreement on mutual assistance in case of aggression against either
party.
Talking about possible compromises that Armenia could agree to in the
negotiations on settling the problem of Nagorno-Karabakh, Oskanian
said “no concessions can be made” as regards Nagorno-Karabakh’s
sovereignty, security, and permanent land communication with Armenia.
Armenia is open to discussing any other issues concerning the
consequences of the conflict on condition that Azerbaijan recognizes
the Nagorno-Karabakh people’s right to self-determination, Oskanian
said.
The only reason why Nagorno-Karabakh is not involved in the
negotiating process between Baku and Yerevan is Azerbaijan’s refusal
to maintain dialogue with Nagorno-Karabakh, the minister said.
Nagorno-Karabakh is formally a province of Azerbaijan populated
mostly by ethnic Armenians, control over which Baku lost in a bloody
conflict with Yerevan in the 1990s.