FIVE SOLDIERS OF NKR DEFENSE ARMY KILLED AND SEVERAL INJURED IN ACCIDENT
STEPANAKERT, NOVEMBER 24. ARMINFO. Five militaries of NKR Defense Army
were killed and several were injured in a road accident in Mardakert
region, NKR, last Sunday. The NKR Defense Ministry confirmed this
information to ARMINFO.
A lorry transporting soldiers from bath-house to the military unit
turned over. An investigation is initiated on the fact. The details
have not been provided yet.

Vardan Oskanian: Azerbaijan Should Concentrate On Processes Within Framework Of Minsk Group
Noyan Tapan
YEREVAN, 24.11.04. Armenia’s position regarding putting the issue of
“occupied” territories of Azerbaijan to the agenda of the UN General
Assembly sitting on the demand of the latter is clear enough, this
step taken by Azerbaijan is wrong and they will understand this in
the future. Vardan Oskanian, RA Foreign Minister, declared this
during the November 23 press conference.
According to him, Armenia isn”t anxious about the issue of adoption
of the resolution connected with the above-mentioned territories. “We
are anxious about the political process around the issue of
settlement of Karabakh conflict. If such a resolution passes in UN
Armenia can”t continue bilateral negotiations with Azerbaijan any
longer.”
The Minister mentioned that if after the adoption of the resolution
in UN Azerbaijan is ready to hold negotiations with Nagorno Karabakh,
Armenia will continue participating in the negotiations, but
Azerbaijan should hold the main negotiations with the Nagorno
Karabakh authorities.
As for the possibility of adoption of such a resolution, Vardan
Oskanian mentioned that judging by the UN site, only Turkey has been
supporting Azerbaijan by now. “I think this is significant, we should
wait for the results.”
According to him, Azerbaijan mainly accentuates the issue of
settlement of the so-called “occupied territories.”But neither
Armenia nor Nagorno Karabakh have any problem with a mission of the
observer. “Azerbaijan itself hampered implementation of such
missions. Today Armenia has no such problem, on the contrary, we have
always invited the international community to come and estimate the
situation on the spot. Such a mission is also beneficial for us,
Armenians, in order that we should straightly raise the questions of
residents of Shahumian, Getashen, as some of them are forced to live
in these territories at present.”
Meanwhile, as Vardan Oskanian emphasized. the very Minsk Group has
the corresponding mandate for holding such a monitoring and Armenia
and Nagorno Karabakh are ready to assist to implementation of such a
mission within the framework of this group. “But it’s not up to UN to
decide the issue of the mission.”
According to the Minister, if Azerbaijan seriously treats the issue
if negotiations and wants to achieve positive results it should
refuse of such accents and concentrate on the processes taking place
within the framework of the Minsk Group.

Soren Albert “Al” Toroian dies; well-known in public relations
By JOHN M. MCGUIRE
Of the Post-Dispatch
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Nov 24 2004
They called him “Soup” because he loved the steamy liquid, and in a
sense, he was a bowl full of interesting behaviors.
The son of Armenian immigrants who grew up in the city’s Baden
neighborhood, Soren Albert Toroian dropped out of Beaumont High
School in his freshman year. But within a decade, Al Toroian found
not only a pursuit, but a passion. He attended the University of
Missouri’s journalism school on the GI bill and emerged in just three
years with a bachelor’s degree that sent him into a career in public
relations. Over nearly a half-century he became one of St. Louis’
best-known and beloved PR practitioners.
Mr. Toroian fronted for many causes, but he was a character in his
own right – a man who not only loved soup, but also cheap cigars,
poker and gin rummy.
His friends and associates remembered him as a man who worked
tirelessly on behalf of his clients, but was never tiresome in the
way he went about it. “He was a straight shooter,” said Raymond A.
Deffry, of Clayton, a former newspaperman here and a longtime public
relations employee at the old McDonnell Douglas Corp.
“Al loved journalists,” said Patrick E. Gauen, an assistant metro
editor at the Post-Dispatch. He considered them friends, not just
targets for a pitch.
“He was as proud of his children as a father could be, and great
supporter of all young talent,” Gauen added, noting that his daughter
Diane Toroian Keaggy is a Post-Dispatch reporter.
Toroian Keaggy said that her father’s “proudest moment came when he
talked history for three hours with former President Harry S Truman
on a train from St. Louis to Sedalia.”
PR and schmoozing was Mr. Toroian’s life. He started with the National
Society of Public Accountants, and then went into his own PR business,
followed by working for railroads, such as the old Missouri Pacific
and Wabash.
In 1961, Mr. Toroian began 12 years as a vice president and account
executive for the old Winius-Brandon advertising and PR agency,
followed by a stint with the Missouri Botanical Garden.
“I’d known Al since he was working for the Wabash Railroad, and he was
an outstanding man who I think was a man of integrity, a man whose
word was his bond,” said George Killenberg, a former Globe-Democrat
managing editor.
Twenty years ago, Mr. Toroian hired Killenberg’s daughter, Susan
Killenberg McGinn, and she became a member of the Washington University
public affairs office, where Mr. Toroian spent his final 20 years in
public relations. He retired in June 1994.
“His contribution to the success of the university – both in St.
Louis and across the nation – was an important component in the
institution’s rise to greater recognition,” said M. Fredric Volkmann,
vice chancellor for public affairs.
Along with his daughter, Diane, among the survivors are another
daughter, Rosanne Toroian, of New York; a brother, Haig Toroian,
of Santa Cruz, Calif.; and his former wife, Delores Schnietz, who
married Mr. Toroian in 1967. They were divorced 29 years later but
remained devoted friends.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

UN General Assembly starts discussions on Upper Garabagh
Assa-Irada, Azerbaijan
Nov 24 2004
The UN General Assembly launched discussions on Upper Garabagh
on Tuesday.
Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov stated that the OSCE
Minsk Group is working toward the Upper Garabagh conflict resolution
and stressed Armenia’s unlawful policy of settlement in the occupied
Azeri lands.
“750,000 Azerbaijanis have been driven out of their homes in Upper
Garabagh as a result of ethnic cleansing amidst the ongoing talks
between Azerbaijan and Armenia. Besides, the mass settlement of people
in the occupied lands of Azerbaijan continues and we are well aware
of this.”
The Minister said that four resolutions adopted by the UN Security
Council on unconditional withdrawal of Armenian armed forces from
the occupied lands of Azerbaijan remains a basis for the conflict
resolution.
Azerbaijan’s observance to the ceasefire over the last 10 years shows
that Baku gives priority to a peaceful settlement, Mammadyarov added.
The UN General Assembly is expected to vote on a resolution on Upper
Garabagh after the discussions complete.*

Trial of Azeri officer accused of murdering Armenian serviceman starts
Assa-Irada, Azerbaijan
Nov 24 2004
The trial of Azerbaijani officer, senior lieutenant Ramil Safarov,
charged with murdering an Armenian serviceman Gurgen Markarian,
started in Budapest, Hungary on Tuesday.
Asked by the judge if he wanted to change his plea, Safarov said that
in making the previous statement, the questions were asked in English,
and therefore, he misunderstood them. The Azeri officer said that for
this reason he would like to re-enter his plea in his native language.
An acquaintance of the murdered Armenian officer, who testified at
the trial as a witness, said that Safarov had allegedly threatened
to kill other Armenian officers as well.*

Pressure group to launch series of protests against Armenian’s visit
Assa-Irada, Azerbaijan
Nov 24 2004
Baku, November 23, AssA-Irada — The Garabagh Liberation Organization
(GLO) will start a series of protest actions in Baku starting on
Wednesday in protest against the Armenian parliament members’ intended
participation in the NATO Rose Roth seminar due in Azerbaijan late
in November.
The GLO chairman Akif Naghi said that the party will not notify the
local press of the venue for the protest actions ahead of time. He
said if Armenians arrive in Baku, the GLO will resort to all means
to prevent the NATO seminar from taking place.
On Tuesday, a group of the pressure group members distributed leaflets
to people in various public places of Baku calling once again for
showing a firm position on the issue and thwarting the Armenians’
visit.*

WB allocates $20m loan to Armenia
Assa-Irada, Azerbaijan
Nov 24 2004
The Yerevan office of the World Bank (WB) said last week that the
Bank allocated a $20 million loan to Armenia in order to assist in
reducing poverty in the country.
The loan, which is allocated for 40 years, with 10-year grace
period and annual interest rate of 0.75%, will go to expansion of
microeconomic sphere, reduction in social risks as well as to stepping
up rights to property and state administration, the office head Roger
Robinson has stated.
The Dutch government is expected to grant 4.3 million euros for the
purpose as well. Robinson appreciated the fact that the funds to be
allocated for education in Armenia will exceed military expenses.
A delegation headed by the WB representative Christian Peterson
visited Baku last week to discuss implementation of the State Program
on Poverty Reduction and Economic Development in Azerbaijan.
Allocation of a $20 million loan to Azerbaijan was discussed with
the Azerbaijani government during the visit as well.*

EUROPEAN ARMENIAN FEDERATION
For Justice and Democracy
Avenue de la Renaissance 10
B – 1000 BRUXELLES
Tel: +32 (0) 2 732 70 26
Tel./Fax: +32 (0) 2 732 70 27
E-mail: [email protected]
Web:
PRESS RELEASE
For Immediate Release
November 24th, 2004
Contact: Talline Tachdjian
Tel.: +32 (0)2 732 70 27
AZERBAIJAN ATTEMPTS TO PUT AN END TO NAGORNO-KARABAKH PEACE PROCESS AT THE
UN
Brussels, Belgium — Azerbaijan and Turkey introduced a resolution this week
asking the United Nations General Assembly to condemn the so-called Armenian
colony created in the territories under Armenian control. Armenia has
invited the Chairmen of the Minsk Group to conduct an inquiry in the field,
both in the regions under Armenian control and the ones under Azerbaijani
control, in order to verify the Azeri allegations.
The three Co-Chairs of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in
Europe (OSCE) Minsk Group – France, USA and Russia – tasked to mediate the
Nagorno-Karabakh conflict by OSCE, tried without success to date to persuade
the Azerbaijani President to withdraw the resolution.
During former votes, Turkey used its status as President of the Islamic
Conference to bear strong pressure on member countries in order to ensure a
favorable vote to the resolution. Many countries have abstained from the
votes to date, and General Assembly debate on the resolution is expected
soon.
The European Armenian Federation notes that France joined the Presidency of
the Minsk Group in 1997 to establish peace, but also with the intention of
representing Europe, which did not have great influence in the region until
that time. “It balanced the Russian and American interests in the region,”
explained Hilda Tchoboian, Chairperson of the European Armenian Federation.
Over the past several years, Azerbaijan has rejected a number of proposals
put forward by the OSCE Minsk group including the “Common State” option in
1998. Former President Heider Aliyev walked away from commitments made in
Paris and the Key West summits during talks with Armenian President Robert
Kocharian.
The European Armenian Federation notes that since assuming power, the
current Azerbaijani president, Ilham Aliev, has continuously discredited the
OSCE process, threatening to resolve the Karabagh issue militarily.
“The UN resolution submitted by Azerbaijan and Turkey, coupled with another
current initiative being taken up at the Council of Europe, are both deadly
blows to the negociation process initiated by the Minsk Group” declared
Tchoboian.
The European Armenian Federation remains concerned that the disintegration
of the Minsk peace process will exclude Europe of any active role in the
South Caucasus, at a time when the European Union has just included this
region in its new neighborhood policy. It affirms that the end of the
process could introduce a new period of instability in the region.
In its recent call to the Heads of State and Governments of 25 countries of
the European Union, the Convention of European Armenians, which met in the
European Parliament on October 18th and 19th, denounced the disturbing role
that Turkey played in the Nagorno-Karabakh peace process.
Today the European Armenian Federation calls upon the European Union
Presidency and all countries members of the European Union to block this UN
resolution in the name of peace and stability in this sensitive region.
####

OSCE MINSK GROUP FAVORS DISPATCHING FACT-FINDING MISSION TO KARABAGH
ArmenPress
Nov 24 2004
YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 24, ARMENPRESS: Armenia’s Permanent Representative
at the UN, Armen Martirosian, rebuked Azerbaijan for taking a draft
resolution “on the situation on occupied territories” to the UN General
Assembly’s consideration on November 23, which he said was done under
the guise of “urgency”, but was not based on any substantiation and
any factually correct information.
He said the inclusion of a new agenda item on the matter did not
enjoy the support of an overwhelming majority of the Assembly and
was opposed by the Minsk Group Co-Chairs, who have been dealing
with the conflict in and around Nagorno-Karabakh for 12 years now,
who had unequivocally stated that the move did not meet the required
criteria of urgency and importance, and was counterproductive as well.
He said that, although presenting the draft under consideration
as a balanced document that did not interfere in the Minsk Group
mediation, Azerbaijan had attempted to give one-sided answers to
almost all the elements of the negotiation package, namely the
status of Nagorno-Karabakh, the issues of Azerbaijani refugees and
internally displaced persons and the territories themselves, trying
also to present its resolution from the perspective of human rights
and humanitarian law.
“A country which has violated these laws in the first place with
meticulously planned and systematically carried out massacres of
Armenians in its capital Baku, cities of Sumgait and Kirovabad (Ganja)
from 1988 to 1990 during peacetime, tries to cloak its own actions
by selectively applying international humanitarian law”, he said of
Azerbaijan. He said the draft resolution limits the application of
the return of refugees to “the area of conflict” and to ethnic Azeris
only, conveniently leaving out the rights of over 400,000 Armenians
under the same laws, particularly those from the immediate conflict
zone from Shahumain, Getashen and northern Martakert, whose homes
were fully confiscated and populated by ethnic Azeris.
Despite its continued calls for the observance of humanitarian
law, it was Azerbaijan that consistently hindered any kind of
international involvement or operation in Nagorno-Karabakh, thus
violating those laws, as well as relevant Security Council resolutions,
he continued. Azerbaijan also spotlighted Nagorno-Karabakh as being an
alleged safe haven for all possible sorts of ills, yet when authorities
there and Armenia invited international fact-finding teams to verify
the nature of those allegations, Azerbaijan had created all kinds of
obstacles, hindering the mission’s dispatch.
Martirosian said Azerbaijan also tried to formalize its totally
baseless allegations by misrepresenting the tenor of Security Council
resolutions and selective interpretation of international laws. It
avoided mentioning one major international legal principle in the
current resolution: the right of peoples to self-determination. That,
despite the fact that the exercise of that right was at the core of
the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.
Further, Azerbaijan “conveniently forgets” that the Council resolutions
mentioned “local Armenian forces” and called for unimpeded access
for international relief efforts, and restoration of economic,
transport and energy links to the region. Indeed, Azerbaijan had never
implemented those particular provisions of the Council resolutions
it so frequently mentioned.
With the resolution under consideration today, Azerbaijan tried
to dissect the so-called occupied territories from the package
of negotiations, he said. However, it failed to admit that those
territories had come under the control of Nagorno-Karabakh Armenians
as a result of the war unleashed by Azerbaijan in an attempt
to stifle the peaceful drive of the people of that region for
self-determination. Given the military suppression in the region in
the very recent past and the war mongering rhetoric of the Azerbaijani
leadership, the issue of those territories could not be resolved
unless there was a resolution on the status of Nagorno-Karabakh,
and security guarantees were provided.
He said that Nagorno-Karabakh had never been a part of an independent
Azerbaijan. The people of Nagorno-Karabakh had proven their right to
live freely and securely on their own territory both legally — through
a referendum conducted in 1991 — and by defending that right in a war
unleashed against them by Azerbaijan. While peace should be achieved
first and foremost between Nagorno-Karabakh and Azerbaijan, Azerbaijan
was not interested in the peaceful resolution of the conflict. It
had rejected or walked out on every single peace proposal made by
the Minsk Group. The present motion aimed at further torpedoing those
ongoing negotiations and in diverting the international community’s
efforts into parallel processes, which would allow it to maneuver
between them without committing to a final settlement of the conflict.
After introducing the relevant draft resolution Azerbaijan’s
foreign affairs minister Elmar Mamedyarov said still 11 years
ago the Assembly had considered the issue of the occupation of
the territories of his country, and had expressed support for the
efforts of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe
(OSCE)-led Minsk Group (Co-Chaired by France, United States and the
Russian Federation), aimed at settling the conflict in accordance
with the norms and principles of international law. Since then,
the OSCE-led negotiations had yielded both successes and failures,
and a host of Security Council resolutions adopted in response to the
occupation of Azerbaijan’s territories remained the principle basis
for settlement of the conflict with Armenia.
He said the occupation of a significant part of Azerbaijan’s
territories and the resultant heavy humanitarian burden had obviously
made Azerbaijan the country most interested in bringing about an
effective peace as soon as possible. Azerbaijan’s consistent adherence
to a ceasefire over the past decade had demonstrated that it preferred
peaceful settlement of the conflict for the benefit of the entire
region, he said.
Susan Moore of the United States, speaking on behalf of the co-Chairs
of the OSCE’s Minsk Group (United States, France and the Russian
Federation), said the issue before the Assembly was one in which
the OSCE and the Minsk Group had been actively involved in, with a
view to finding a lasting solution to the situation prevailing in
the occupied territories of Azerbaijan. She said the Minsk process
had already produced positive results. It had made proposals to the
parties and was now awaiting a response to those proposals before
proceeding to the next stage.
In that light, she welcomed the efforts of the international community,
through the Assembly, noting that any actions taken by that body
and others were helpful and, therefore, welcome. Stressing that no
efforts should be spared in the search for a peaceful resolution of
the problem, she said serious consideration should be given to the
dispatching of a fact-finding mission, and urged the parties to take
necessary steps to facilitate the OSCE’s efforts.
The Assembly was then informed that action on the draft resolution
on the situation in the occupied territories of Azerbaijan would be
taken at a later date.

PARLIAMENT CHAIRMAN URGES OPPOSITION TO STOP BOYCOTT
ArmenPress
Nov 24 2004
YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 24, ARMENPRESS: Armenian parliament chairman
Arthur Baghdasarian called again on the opposition urging it to end
its several-months long boycott of parliament ‘s work and return to
legislature at a moment when it is discussing bills of key importance,
“that will guide Armenia’s economic, political, cultural and scientific
progress in the next decade.”
In his annual report to the parliament, Baghdasarian said the absence
of the opposition in the parliament could not be justified any longer.
He once again reiterated the readiness of the ruling coalition,
first voiced last May, to engage in dialogue with the opposition
“to seek jointly ways out of a range of very pressing problems.”
“I think it is high time for the opposition to revise its style of
work and get involved into the country’s and parliament’s work,”
he said, adding that apart from parliament’s boycott there are other
ways of political struggle.
Opposition lawmakers have been refusing to attend parliament since
February in protest of last year’s re-election of president Robert
Kocharian in a vote, which they claim was marred by widespread
irregularities. They say they want to change the law on referendums
so a vote can be held to learn whether Armenians have confidence
in Kocharian.