Turkey “uneasy” about US parliamentarians’ resolutions
Anatolia news agency
16 Sep 05
ANKARA
Turkey has stated that it felt uneasy over adoption of two resolutions
acknowledging the so-called Armenian genocide by the Committee on
International Relations of the US House of Representatives.
The Turkish Foreign Ministry stated on Friday [16 September] that the
US acting assistant state secretary for legislative affairs, Matthew
Reynolds, sent a letter the day before to the Committee on
International Relations chairman, Henry Hyde, stressing Turkey’s
importance for the United States.
“Turkey welcomed the letter which stated that the US administration
was against the adoption of these resolutions and an Armenian
resolution which is brought onto agenda of the House of
Representatives general assembly can harm Turkey-US relations,” noted
the ministry.
“On the other hand, Turkey believes that in the next period US
congressmen will show the responsibility appropriate to Turkish-US
relations. Turkey also expects that these resolutions would remain in
committee level and would not be submitted to the general assembly,”
said Turkish Foreign Ministry.

British baroness vows to continue aid to Nagornyy Karabakh
Public Television of Armenia, Yerevan
15 Sep 05
[Presenter] More people should visit Nagornyy Karabakh in order to
understand why the Armenians cannot accept Azeris [forced to leave the
region during the conflict] back, the deputy speaker of the British
House of Lords, Baroness Caroline Cox, has said. This is the 60th
visit of the baroness to Artsakh [Karabakh]. She has visited the
conflict zone during the most difficult years.
[Correspondent] Paying 60 visits to the same country means being in
true love with it. The baroness has been with the Artsakh people
during the hardest days of the conflict and now she is proud to see
the development of this liberated country.
[Caroline Cox, speaking in English with Armenian voice-over] People
who come to Artsakh for the first time do not believe that there was a
war a few years ago. I am proud to see that things are being restored
quickly and a democratic country is being built.
[Correspondent] The baroness never comes alone. Every time she comes,
she brings along many people from various countries of the world.
[Cox] It worries me that the international community does not
understand why the Armenians cannot accept Azeris back. Every time I
come, I bring along new guests to introduce them to true history and
to explain that the Armenians are the owners of this land.
[Correspondent] Caroline Cox came to Artsakh as part of a pilgrimage
with a delegation of 20 people from the USA, UK and Switzerland.
[Passage omitted: guests speak about Karabakh]
The guests were impressed how war veterans are treated. The
international Christian peace organization opened a rehabilitation
centre in Stepanakert seven years ago with the help of Caroline Cox,
where many war veterans are being treated. The sponsors are working to
improve the centre and Caroline Cox has a special role in helping the
centre, which was named after her.
The baroness said that she will continue to render assistance to
Artsakh and to pray that the international community finally
recognizes the independence of Nagornyy Karabakh.
Narine Agabalyan, Artur Nersesyan, “Aylur”, Stepanakert.
[Video showed the speaker of the Nagornyy Karabakh republic, Ashot
Gulyan meeting Caroline Cox, Cox’s visit to the rehabilitation centre]

The Messenger, Georgia
Sept 16 2005
Armenia and Georgia agree to waive vehicles payments
Armenia and Georgia have agreed on a mutual waiver of payments for
vehicles crossing each other’s borders, Armenia’s Transport and
Communication Minister Andranik Manoukyan said at the Armenian
Parliament, ARMINFO reports.
He said that the agreement was concluded during talks in Tbilisi in
early September and will be submitted to the Armenian National
Assembly for approval.
Georgia – Energy – Regions

AzerTag, Azerbaijan
Sept 16 2005
X-Sender: Asbed Bedrossian
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PACE SUB-COMMITTEE ON HUMAN RIGHTS HOLDS ITS PARIS MEETING
[September 16, 2005, 13:47:51]
On September 15 in Paris took place a meeting of the Sub-committee on
human rights of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe,
reported AzerTAj’s France-based correspondent.
The meeting has focused on the election of high commissioner of the
Council of Europe, the agenda of next meeting of the Sub-committee
and the new membership in the European Committee against torture.
Azerbaijan’s MP Rafael Huseynov has expressed at the meeting position
of our country. Mr. Huseynov has also submitted to the meeting new
documents on the demographic disaster in the conflict zones and youth
problems.
The MP said in an interview with our correspondent that another two
documents will submit to the next meeting and now is collection of
signatures for these documents underway. `These documents are not
important only for Azerbaijan, its necessary also for all European
community. Military conflicts’ presence is cause of concern of the
European and the world countries. Because a grave consequences of
these conflicts are source of dangerous for youth and today the
Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict and Armenia’s policy of aggression
against Azerbaijan have sometimes been tragically for youth’ said
Rafael Huseynov.

NOVRUZ MAMEDOV: IF YEREVAN LEAVES THE NEGOTIATIONS, BAKU WILL FIND A
POSSIBILITY TO TALK TO THE ARMENIANS OF NAGORNY KARABAKH
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Arminfo 16 Sept.05
“If Yerevan leaves the negotiations, Baku will find a possibility to
talk to the Armenians of Nagorny Karabakh.” Head of the Foreign
Relations Department, Azerbaijani Presidential Executive Staff, Novruz
Mamedov told Trend, commenting on the statement by Armenian Foreign
Ministry Press Secretary Hamlet Gasparyan on Armenia’s unshakable
position on the Azerbaijani initiative to the UN “On the situation in
the occupied territories of Azerbaijan.”
Press Secretary Gasparyan is reported to state earlier that Armenia
will leave the negotiations for Karabakh conflict’s resolution and
Baku will have to negotiate with Stepanakert if Azerbaijan raises any
issue at the UN.
Mamedov thinks the above statement nothing but a diplomatic maneuver
showing the “deep concern of Armenia.” It means that the position of
Azerbaijan has considerably strengthened and that it is supported by
international organizations and separate states, Mamedov says. At the
same time, he thinks “it is not easy to deviate from the negotiations.
The lands are occupied and negotiations are in process. Armenia is in
a deadlock. If Armenia really intends to leave aside of the
negotiations, and if Yerevan officially states that it deviates from
the Karabakh issue, we shall find a possibility to deal with the
Armenians of Nagorny Karabakh,” Mamedov says.
To note, Azerbaijan made a relevant initiative to the UN at the
previous session of UN General Assembly. Then, the issue was postponed
by an agreement under which an OSCE fact-finding group visited the
territories under control of NKR.

Swiss-sponsored festival challenges Armenian traditions
By Vahan Ishkhanyan
ArmeniaNow reporter
;AID=1084&lng=eng&IID= 1043
Can an Armenian woman be anointed priest?
If she is a bisexual feminist poet performing in a Yerevan night club,
yes. Agabian¹s viewpoint doesn¹t wash with Armenian tradition.
At The Club, American-Armenian Nancy Agabian acted out her poetry
Wednesday night in themes that challenge Armenian traditions and push
limits of toleration in a conservative society.
The performance art was part of the ³One Step² program of feminist
events sponsored by the Swiss Utopiana Organization ().
Standing on a blue yoga mat, a basin, washcloth and teacup (with
broken handle) in front of it on the floor, Agabian sings an excerpt
from church liturgy while doing a swimming exercise. Parallel to it is
a recital: ³A good friend has asked me to be the godmother to her
baby. It was a surprise; I never thought in my life I would ever be a
godmother. Suddenly, I¹m supposed to safeguard a child¹s moral and
spiritual upbringing. I don¹t exactly know how I¹m going to do
this. You see, I don¹t go to church.²
Agabian anoints herself priest in her ³Water and Wine² performance
³baptizing² herself as godmother with a new morality. It is a faith
where the Armenian identity and sexual orientation – inadmissible for
the Armenian community – the fate of the family and a woman¹s
liberation from Eve¹s sin are combined.
About 30 people filled the trendy art café for the performance, which
was interpreted by ³Bnagir² Internet literary journal editor and poet
Violet Grigoryan.
Agabian prepares slippers from American newspapers, then a priest
hood, and the text tells the story of her family¹s women – of her
grandmother, who was rescued and cared for by Arabs during the
massacres; and of family disputes, where her mother was always under
her father¹s dictatorship.
It is a story in which the Church is a symbol of a woman¹s slavery in
the Armenian community, because of its conservative ways.
³I never wanted to go to church when I was a child, to be tortured by
boredom with the indecipherable Classical Armenian, incessant,
depressing music and suffocation by incense, the most horrifying part
was standing in front of the bearded Der Hayr who towered and glowered
above me in his glittering brocade outfit as he pressed a
wine-drenched piece of the wafer onto my tongue. I stopped going to
church once I became an adult. Every time I returned with my family, I
seethed at the spectacle, the way women did not participate in the
service except to sing in the choir and the way that women had to wear
lace doilies on their heads since they are inherently sinful like
Eve.²
The poet, who lives in New York, tells about a day, in 2002, when she
brings her lesbian girl-friend of Armenian decent to an Armenian
church where ³all I wanted to do was kiss her, to swish my lips and
tongue around hers.² The urge to kiss in the church, she says, was a
desire to have an impossible wedding ceremony, an aspiration to bypass
the church law and establish a new law.
(New law or old, it is a rare thing that a woman speaks publicly in
Armenia about her “alternative” sexuality.)
Agabian, 37, has published one collection of poems entitled ³Princess
Freak². The text of ³Water and Wine² is from her yet unpublished book
³Me As Her again².
Last year ³Bnagir² () published in its ninth issue
translations of Agabian¹s poetry, due to which she was invited to
participate in Utopiana¹s festival.
“I knew Nancy through her poems and I did not imagine her to be like
this. It was a surprise for me to see her so small and seemingly
defenseless,² said Grigoryan. ³A desire to protect her rises inside
you. But after her performance I suddenly felt that this tender
creature herself was defending us, Hayastantsis.²
There was a time when Agabian distanced herself from the Armenian
community, which did not accept her sexual orientation. However, after
she was 30, she against started to communicate with Armenians in New
York learning about an organization of Armenian homosexuals. She
believed that the Armenian community needed modernizing: ³To be a
woman and an Armenian is the same to me, because I got my Armenian
identity from Armenian women. Now I know that I myself have a lot to
give to the Armenian community and receive a lot from it.²
In New York Agabian organized ³Gartal² club, where writers with
different views connected to each other through being Armenians,
gather.
The organizer of the festival, Stephan Kristensen, says that one of
their goals is to over come fears prevailing in society, such as for
example women¹s fear to remain unmarried, the fear of being feminist,
the fear of creating homosexual communities and many other fears that
are typical of both women and men.

A1+
| 15:28:41 | 16-09-2005 | Politics |
IS TODAY BETTER THAN YESTERDAY?
«What does rejecting the Constitution mean? It means that the 1995
Constitution will continue in vigor», this perspective does not please the
secretary of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation Parliamentary fraction
Hrayr Karapetyan.
The members of the ARF have their subjective attitude towards the first
Constitution, «We all know that the Constitution was made for the
authorities only, let alone the conditions in which it was adopted – closed
newspapers and prohibited opposition (ARF)».
Today the ARF which forms part of the coalition think that it is the most
convenient moment to realize the Constitutional reforms. «Both Manouk
Gasparyan and Artashes Geghamyan think it is a good version, the only
problem is that we should not adopt it under Robert Kocharyan. Everyone says
that we should adopt it as quickly as possible», said Mr. Karapetyan
forgetting that the year 2005 is somehow like the year 1995: there are
parties which are suppressed in a more «civilized» way by the authorities,
and there are closed TV Companies – «A1+» and «Noyan Tapan».
Nevertheless, according to Mr. Karapetyan, there is a weak point in the
draft resolution: the main aim of Armenia, that is the creation of a United
Armenia, is not stipulated, «After the Great Patriotic War Germany announced
its main aim – two unite the two Germanys, and they reached their aim»,
added the ARF fraction secretary.

A1+
| 13:05:36 | 16-09-2005 | Official |
ARMENIA COMDEMNS
The RA Prime Minister Andranik Margaryan signed in New York the
International Convention `About Elimination of Nuclear Terror`.
The members of the convention, according to the document, condemn all
the terror acts, whoever might realize them, including those which put
the friendly relations between nations and countries at hazard and
threaten the territorial integrity and security of countries.

A1+
| 12:53:39 | 16-09-2005 | Official |
NEW-YORK MEETINGS
Today RA Prime Minister Andranik Margaryan will make a speech at the UN
Assembly General. RA Foreign Minister Vardan Oskanyan will make a speech on
Sunday, September 18. And yesterday Vardan Oskanyan met in New York several
high-ranked officials.
On Thursday, the Foreign Minister met with Benita Ferrero-Waldner, European
Union Commissioner for External Relations and European Neighborhood Policy.
They spoke about the ENP. The Minister briefed the Commissioner on the
current state of negotiations regarding the Nagorno Karabakh conflict.
Minister Oskanian also met with George Lacovou, Minister of Foreign Affairs
of Cyprus. They discussed regional issues as well as cooperation in
international organizations. Later, Minister Oskanian met with Ahmed Aboul
Gheit, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Egypt. Minister Oskanian presented to
Minister Aboul Gheit President Kocharian¹s letter of congratulations to
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. The two discussed developments in the
Middle East, and in the Caucasus.
Minister Oskanian spoke with Pierre Chevalier, Belgium¹s special envoy to
the OSCE. The Minister explained Armenia¹s cooperation with the OSCE at
various levels, expressing Armenia¹s appreciation for OSCE support in
various areas, including democratic development, regional development. The
Minister briefed Ambassador Chevalier on the ongoing Karabakh talks and
prospects for a resolution.
In the margins of the UN General Assembly, the Francophonie Association held
a high level meeting. Minister Oskanian participated in the meeting which
focused on ways the developed world can help the developing world to
alleviate poverty.
The Minister also held a working meeting with OSCE Minsk Group US co-chair
Ambassador Steven Mann.

Armenpress
ARMENIAN FM, PM TO ADDRESS UN GENERAL ASSEMBLY SESSION
NEW YORK, SEPTEMBER 16, ARMENPRESS: Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian held
several bilateral meetings on his first working day in New York, where he is
accompanying Prime Minister Andranik Margarian to the 60th anniversary of
the UN General Assembly.
On Thursday, the Foreign Minister met with Benita Ferrero-Waldner,
European Union Commissioner for External Relations and European Neighborhood
Policy. They spoke about the ENP. The Minister briefed the Commissioner on
the current state of negotiations regarding the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.
Minister Oskanian also met with George Iacovou, Minister of Foreign Affairs
of Cyprus. They discussed regional issues as well as cooperation in
international organizations. Later, Minister Oskanian met with Ahmed Aboul
Gheit, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Egypt. Minister Oskanian presented to
Minister Aboul Gheit President Kocharian’s letter of congratulations to
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. The two discussed developments in the
Middle East, and in the Caucasus.
Minister Oskanian spoke with Pierre Chevalier, Belgium’s special envoy to
the OSCE. The Minister explained Armenia’s cooperation with the OSCE at
various levels, expressing Armenia’s appreciation for OSCE support in
various areas, including democratic development, regional development. The
Minister briefed Ambassador Chevalier on the ongoing Karabakh talks and
prospects for a resolution. In the margins of the UN General Assembly, the
Francophonie Association held a high level meeting. Minister Oskanian
participated in the meeting which focused on ways the developed world can
help the developing world to alleviate poverty.
The Minister also held a working meeting with OSCE Minsk Group US
co-chair Ambassador Steven Mann. Meantime Prime Minister Margarian met with
Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmedinejad. Government press service said the two
men assessed highly friendly bilateral relations between Iran and Armenia.
Margarian was quoted as saying that Armenia and Iran have no political
problems, and that their economic ties were developing steadily. Margarian
also praised Iran’s balanced policy towards Armenia since it became
independent, saying it played a positive role in terms of bringing stability
to the region.
Ahmedinejad was quoted as saying that friendship with Armenia stems from
Iran’s political course. He also stressed the need for boosting bilateral
trade. The same day Margarian signed on behalf of Armenia the International
Convention on Elimination of Terrorist Nuclear Actions.
Margarian also met UNICEF executive director. Prime Minister Margarian
will address the General Assembly on Friday, September 16, and Foreign
Minister Oskanian will do so on Sunday, September 18.