Persian Journal

Iran News
Iran, Armenia Call for Expansion of Mutual Ties

Jun 24, 2004, 04:32

Head of Armenian presidential office Artash Tumanyan and his entourage
conferred here Tuesday with Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi on issues
of mutual interest, IRNA reported.

According to the Information and Press Bureau of the Ministry of
Foreign Affairs, Armenian minister of energy along with the country’s
deputy minister of transportation and telecommunication were also
present in the meeting. At the meeting, the two sides reviewed
expansion of economic and commercial cooperation. Describing the
current level of political relations as satisfactory, Kharrazi voiced
satisfaction over the outcome of Iran-Armenia Economic Commission
meeting and hoped to witness further expansion of economic and
commercial cooperation to a desirable level.

Calling the two sides relations as very significant, he expressed the
hope that both sides would take more firm steps to broaden economic
cooperation. He said the two sides’ economic cooperation would help
restore regional security. The Armenian envoy, for his part, described
bilateral economic activities as `fruitful’ and said the already
reached agreements between the sides would have positive impacts on
mutual relations.

Implementing macro-economic plans will have positive results on ties
between the two countries as well as those in the region through the
restoration of security and stability in the region, he said adding
that the countries in the region through a sincere cooperation can
prevent the interference of foreigners and their influence on regional
developments. The Islamic Republic of Iran is a stabilizing force in
the region, he noted. North-Corridor is a strategic project in which
Iran plays a very significant role, he concluded.

The Georgian Messenger
Wednesday, June 23, 2004, #115 (0639)

Connecting Georgia with Turkey
By M. Alkhazashvili

The possible construction of a railway connecting Georgia and Turkey
creates new prospects for the two countries as well as for the transit
function of the South Caucasus as a whole. If the project goals of an
inexpensive, efficient, international transit route are achieved, the
turnover of goods on Georgia’s railways will sharply increase. But
before any of this can happen, Georgia needs to mobilize a vast sum of
money.

President Mikheil Saakashvili discussed the issue of constructing a
Georgia-Turkey railway during his May visit to Turkey. When he
traveled to Tbilisi on June 14-15, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliev
also expressed his support for the project.

Two possible routes for the Georgia-Turkey railway are under
discussion: Kars-Akhalkalaki, which has been on the drawing board
since the Shevardnadze administration, and Rize-Batumi, which
Saakashvili was able to propose following the fall of Aslan
Abashidze’s regime in Adjara. Although the Kars-Akhalkalaki plan is
more familiar and well studied, its construction faces numerous
challenges due to the jagged mountainous terrain of the region. This
project requires not only the construction of a 35km stretch from
Akhalkalaki to Kurtkale on the Georgian-Turkish border and a further
92km line from there to Kars, but also the upgrade of the existing 160
km single line branch from Akhalkalaki to Tbilisi. The Rize-Batumi
option may thus prove the more viable.

If a railway connecting Georgia and Turkey is created, the South
Caucasus’ role as a transit corridor between Europe and Asia will
greatly increase and bring tremendous profits. But given the $700-800
million cost of the project, finding the financing necessary for this
project will be a stiff challenge for the government, even if
Azerbaijan and Turkey allot significant sums towards the project.

The idea of constructing a Georgia-Turkey railway has caused great
concern in Armenia, which feels itself even further isolated from
regional transit projects. It should be pointed out that in the Soviet
period, there existed a railway connecting Turkey with the South
Caucasus – the Kars Gyumri line – but owing to the Karabakh conflict
and the less than cordial relations between Armenia and Turkey, it has
been out of operation for more than a decade. A few days ago reports
surfaced that Turkey may open its border with Armenia and restore
Kars-Gyumri. Clearly, if this is true, the issue of constructing a
Georgia-Turkey line will all but be removed from the agenda. But it
remains to be seen whether there is any real prospect for the
restoration of Kars-Gyumri or whether this report was merely a
reaction to the Georgia-Turkey railway idea.

Israel National News
They Already Got Their “Right of Return”
by Steven Plaut
Jun 23, ’04 / 4 Tammuz 5764

Try to imagine what the world would be like if Israel had granted the
“Palestinian refugees” who fled from Israel in 1948-49 the right to return
to Israel. Not to the West Bank. Not to the Gaza Strip. But to Israel within
its pre-1967 borders.

Imagine a situation in which Israel agreed to allow tens of thousands of
Arabs who fled from the battle zones of the Israeli War of Independence the
possibility of returning to Israel, in many cases to the very homes they had
abandoned during the fighting. Imagine how the same world, currently
obsessed with achieving a “right of return” for “Palestinian refugees” were
forced to acknowledge that Israel had already granted the possibility for
tens of thousands of these refugees to return to Israel, in many cases
decades ago. What would the world then have left to bash Israel about? What
would the anti-Semites have left to scream about, or the crowd claiming to
be “anti-Zionists but not anti-Semites”, who only enjoy seeing “Zionist”
children mass murdered, or the self-hating leftist Jewish anti-Semites?

Well, hold on to your shtreimel, because I have a whopper of a revelation to
make to you. Israel did grant the “Palestinian refugees” the right to return
to Israel!

Let us back up a bit. In 1947-48, the United Nations proposed partitioning
“Palestine” into a Jewish and an Arab state of approximately equal sizes.
The Jews accepted the plan, and the Arabs rejected it. When the British
Mandate over “Palestine” was ended under the UN decision, the Arab states
attacked the newborn state of Israel, tried to annihilate it and its
population, and at the same time gobbled up most of the territory that the
UN had allotted to become a Palestinian Arab state.

The territory that became Israel had never been a Palestinian Arab state,
ever. Most of the Arabs in “Palestine” had migrated in from neighboring Arab
countries after the 19th-Century start of the Zionist Jewish immigration,
taking advantage of the influx of capital, the availability of jobs and of
services, like hospitals. In other words, the Arabs of “Palestine” in 1948,
exactly like the Jews, were by and large people from families who had been
in the country for three generations or less.

During the fighting in the 1948-49 war, thousands of Arabs living in the
territory that became Israel fled. The main reason they fled was that they
understandably wanted to put some distance between their families and the
battle zones. At the same time, they were ordered by the Arab political
leadership to leave the territory of Israel. Why take my word on this?
Listen to Arab sources:

“The Arab States encouraged the Palestine Arabs to leave their homes
temporarily in order to be out of the way of the Arab invasion armies.”-
Falastin (Jordanian newspaper), February 19, 1949

“The Arab governments told us: Get out so that we can get in. So we got out,
but they did not get in.” – from the Jordanian daily A-Difaa, September 6,
1954

“The Arab armies entered Palestine to protect the Palestinians from the
Zionist tyranny, but instead, they abandoned them, forced them to emigrate
and to leave their homeland.” (emphasis added) – Abu Mazen, erstwhile “Prime
Minister” of the Palestinian Authority, in “What We Have Learned and What We
Should Do”, published in Falastin Al-Thawra, the official journal of the
PLO, in Beirut, March 1976.

And there are scores of other Arab sources confirming this.

So, how many Arabs fled? The number has become enormously distorted over
time by the Bash-Israel Lobby and by Arab propagandists and their
apologists, who usually claim between 500,000 and a million. A more
realistic estimate is between 300,000 and 450,000, based in part on Arab and
UNRWA sources themselves
(). Most of these refugees
ended up in some of the twenty-two sovereign Arab states, including those
Arab countries from which they had migrated into “Palestine” in the late
19th and early 20th centuries in the first place. In other words, the
“refugees” went back to their earlier homelands in Lebanon, Syria and
Jordan. It was a sort of “right of return.”

At the same time, the Arab states carried out a near-total ethnic cleansing
of around a million Jews, who had been living in those lands since Biblical
days, in many cases, before these states had Arab populations
(). The Jews from Arab countries
left behind far more property than did the Palestinian Arab refugees
(). Most of these Jewish
refugees were resettled in Israel.

In the years immediately after World War II, there were more than 50 million
refugees: Poles, Germans, Indians, Pakistanis, Hungarians, Chinese,
Japanese, Koreans, etc., etc. They were all long ago resettled and
forgotten, all except for the “Palestinian refugees”. How come?

Because for decades, the Arab aggressor states found it convenient to
utilize the “refugees” as a political and military weapon against Israel,
not only of propaganda and spin, but of terrorism
(). “Palestinians”
inside Arab states were trained as terrorists and sent out to murder. At the
same time, there was enormous incentive for the Arab locals in the countries
into which the refugees had entered to pretend also to be “Palestinian
refugees” ().
After all, the UN and other agencies were handing out free food and perks to
anyone pretending to be a refugee from “Palestine”. (For further information
and documentation, see )

Unlike all those many millions of other people considered refugees in the
late 1940s, the “Palestinians” were the only ones for whom the “right of
return” to their previous homes was considered an entitlement. The reason
was not a selective affection for Palestinians, but a selective hostility
towards Israel and Jews. Those demanding the wholesale “return” to Israel of
Palestinian “refugees”, including the countless thousands of
non-Palestinians pretending to be Palestinian refugees, had one goal in
mind, the eradication of Israel.

Israel would have been insane to allow itself to be inundated with real and
make-pretend Palestinian “refugees”, this in a tiny sliver of land the size
of Maryland, at the same time that the 22 Arab states have territory-galore
stretching from the Atlantic Ocean all the way to Central Asia. The
Palestinian Arabs and their sponsors had tried to annihilate Israel and
failed. Just like the infant United States, which refused to allow any of
the tens of thousands of Tory Loyalists expelled by the patriots to “return”
to the United States after the War of Independence, Israel was entirely in
its rights to refuse to allow the “return” of masses of “Palestinians”,
whose migration was being demanded by those seeking to liquidate Israel via
a demographic flooding.

There is just one little wrinkle though.

Israel did let the Palestinian refugees return. Tens of thousands of them
were quietly allowed to return to Israel, in many cases to their original
homes, once the fighting in 1949 subsided. Many continue to be admitted
today within the framework of “family reunification” agreements.

>From 1948 until 2001, Israel allowed about 184,000 “Palestinian refugees” or
their families to “return” to Israel proper (Jerusalem Post, January 2,
2001; see also Ha’aretz, December 28, 2000). These are in addition to about
57,000 Palestinians from Jordan illegally in Israel, towards whom the
authorities are turning a blind eye (Ha’aretz, April 4, 2001). They are not
migrating to the West Bank, not to Gaza, but to Israel inside its pre-1967
“Green Line” borders. In the Camp David II meetings in 2000, Israeli leftist
Prime Minister Ehud Barak rather insanely offered to allow another 150,000
“refugees” to enter Israel as part of a peace accord. The PLO’s response was
to launch pogroms and four years of atrocities, because the number was
finite. (See also )

The demand for a “right of return” by Palestinians to Israel is no doubt the
most absurd political demand floating anywhere around the planet. There is
already an Arab state in two thirds of Mandatory Palestine, named Jordan,
and most of its population is Palestinian Arab. The Oslo Accords and
Israel’s Camp David II offer would have created a second Arab state in
Palestine, in the West Bank and Gaza, as part of a comprehensive peace
settlement. Any “Palestinian” from anywhere could have moved to “Palestine”
or to Jordan, within the framework of such a peace, the same way any Jew who
wishes to may immigrate to Israel, or any Armenian may immigrate to Armenia,
and Greeks from the Greek Diaspora are automatically welcomed in Greece.

The PLO and the Islamofascist states backing it demand that in addition to
establishing a second Arab state in Palestine within the framework of any
peace settlement, Israel itself must also be converted into a third Arab
Palestinian state, via unlimited massive immigration of people claiming to
be Palestinians. Benjamin Franklin, who opposed granting even a dime in
compensation to the Tory refugees expelled from the United States during the
War of Independence, would be splitting his sides laughing.

But the most Orwellian absurdity of all is that Israel long ago did grant
the right to “return” to Israel itself to tens of thousands of “Palestinian
refugees”. Did this earn Israel the world’s gratitude for its uniquely
generous gesture? Did the world denounce the Arab fascist states who ignored
this generosity, and continued to seek Israel’s destruction militarily and
the genocide of its population? Do today’s bleeding hearts and recreational
compassion posturers, pretending to feel uncontrollable pain and caring for
Palestinian refugees, even know about the limited “right of return” granted
by Israel over the past decades?

Hindus have never been returned to Pakistan, Moslems from Pakistan have not
been returned to India, ethnic Germans were not returned to their pre-war
homes in Czechoslovakia, Poland, Russia or Romania, Japanese have not been
returned to Manchuria, Greeks have not been returned to Anatolia, Jews have
not been compensated for the billions they left behind when ethnic cleansing
of Jews in Moslem countries took place, and Tory Loyalists were never
returned to New England. But tens of thousands of “Palestinian refugees”
were granted by Israel what none of these others received.

It is time to say enough is enough. The only remaining reasonable plan
regarding those still claiming to be “Palestinian refugees” is simply –
“Foggedaboutit.”

Azat Artsakh – Republic of Nagorno Karabakh (NKR)
June 23 2004

OFFICIALS OF ARMENIA AND NKR DENIED

Top officials of Armenia and Nagorni Karabakh denied the news that the
American co-chairman of the OSCE Minsk Group Stephen Mann during his
latestvisit to Yerevan (June 3) unofficially discussed with the
president of Armenia the question of returning three regions
controlled by the Karabakh armed forcesto Azerbaijan as a manifestation
of good will. In particular, in the interviews to the radio station
`Liberty’ this news was denied by the prime minister of Armenia
Andranik Margarian and foreign minister Vardan Oskanian, as well asthe
speaker of the National Assembly of Nagorni Karabakh Oleg Yessayan. ‘I
do not think that such discussions ever took place,’ stated Oleg
Yessayan and added that `if Karabakh did not agree to return five
regions for opening the railroad Yerevan-Baku, it would be naiv to
think that Karabakh would agree to return the three regions’.

PANARMENIAN.
23-06-2004

Azat Artsakh – Republic of Nagorno Karabakh (NKR)
June 23 2004

NEW CENTRAL OFFICE OF `ARTSAKHBANK’

On June 20 the official opening of the new office of `Artsakhbank’
took place in Stepanakert. At the ceremony were present the president
of NKR Arkady Ghukassian, prime minister Anoushavan Danielian, high
officials, members of parliament, members of the government, guests
from Armenia and abroad, representatives of the world of business.
Among the honourable guests were the president of the Central Bank of
the Republic of Armenia Tigran Sarghissian, representative of the
principal shareholders of `Artsakhbank’ CJSC, member of theboard
Arden Selefian. The president of the administration of `Artsakhbank’
Kamo Nersissian thanked the principal shareholders Vardan Simakesh
and Hrach Kaprielian for providing excellent conditions for the
personnel of the bank, the NKR authorities for their constant
assistance, and the Central Bank of Armenia for effective
cooperation. He presented the activity of the company in the recent
years. Being one of the main financial links in the NKR economy and
the only Armenian resident trade bank functioning in all the regions
of NKR `Artsakhbank’ greatly contributes to the implementation of the
main strategic economic programs, fulfills certain functions of the
central bank the first of which is serving the budget. Through the
bank also foreign investments are involved in the economy of Artsakh
promoting the general development of different spheres of industry
and enabling to create new jobs. The rising fiscal rates are the
evidence to the effective activity of the bank in the recent years.
Revenues grow year by year, this year by the data of May 1 the assets
of the bank totaled 16.3 billion drams against 2.9 billion drams in
2000, banking capital 2 billion drams against 1 billion drams in
2000. Only in 2003 the bank issued 11 billion drams of loans to legal
and natural persons and in the last three years the circulation of
loans surpassed 27 billion drams. Issuing of consumer and mortgage
loans tends to develop. Being a shareholder of the company `Armenian
Card’ `Artsakhbank’ has started a wide-scope activity directed at the
organization of service by international plastic cards. In the
nearest future the bank will enter the international market `Forex’
through the system of `Reiter’.Â

NIKOLAY BAGHDASSARIAN

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Azat Artsakh – Republic of Nagorno Karabakh (NKR)
June 23 2004

REPAIRS OF DADIVANK VESTIBULE

On June 17 the scientific council of the NKR agency for study of
historical environment and preservation of monuments discussed the
project of reconstruction of the vestibule of the monastery of
Dadivank. The head of the agency S. Sarghissian informed that the
project was accepted which means that the reconstruction works will
start this year as there is already a benefactor ready to fund the
reconstruction of the vestibule. The author of the projects of
reconstruction of the small domed church, the cathedral and the
church vestibule of Dadivank monastery architect Samvel Ayvazian said
the reconstruction of the cathedral started last year and will be
completed at the end of the current year. As to the small domed
church, its reconstruction will start only after the removal of the
frescoes which the former director of reconstruction works, painter
Armen Mnatsakanian willfully did himself in the church. There is
already the decision of the scientific council and the permission of
the head of the Artsakh diocese of the Armenian Apostolic Church
Parghev Martirossian for the removal of the fresco.

SUSANNA BALAYAN

Kazakh lower house approves CIS antiterror document

Interfax-Kazakhstan news agency, Almaty
23 Jun 04

ASTANA

The Majlis (the lower house) of the Kazakh parliament approved at a
plenary sitting today the ratification of the protocol approving the
provision on the procedure for organizing and holding joint antiterror
exercises in CIS member states.

The document was sent to the parliament’s Senate (the upper chamber)
for further consideration.

Presenting a relevant draft law to the Majlis deputies, the first
deputy chairman of the Kazakh National Security Committee, Vladimir
Bozhko, noted that Kazakhstan would ratify the document “without
reservation”, although four of the 10 CIS states that signed the
document earlier had ratified the document with reservations.

The provision on the procedure for organizing and holding joint
antiterror exercises in the CIS member states was signed in Chisinau
by Azerbaijan, Armenia, Belarus, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan,
Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan and Ukraine on 7 October 2002.

The provision “provides for joint efforts from the sides to thwart
terrorist activities, as well as to secure the release of hostages, to
render explosive devices harmless and to wipe out terrorist groups and
so on”, the Majlis’s committee for international affairs, defence and
security stated in conclusion at the plenary sitting.

The document also provides for the joint training of special
antiterror formations during exercises.

In accordance with the provision, the antiterror centre, which was set
up under a decision from the CIS heads of state in 2000, will
coordinate the issue of organizing and holding antiterror exercises.

In order to control directly the special antiterror formations during
joint exercises the interested side will set up a supervising body to
define the procedure for holding the exercises, including the use of
forces and special means.

The document also mentions that interference with the holding of joint
exercises is allowed only by instruction from the head of the
interested state.

AZERI PRESIDENTIAL AIDE CONDEMNS PROTEST AT ARMENIAN PRESENCE AT NATO MEETING

Assa-Irada, Baku
23 Jun 04

BAKU

The head of the public and political department at the presidential
administration, Ali Hasanov, has commented on the radical steps by the
KLO (Karabakh Liberation Organization) against the arrival of Armenian
military officers in Baku within the framework of NATO’s Partnership
for Peace programme.

He said that any protest actions should be held within civilized
norms. The protest against the Armenians’ arrival should not have
involved the smashing of the hotel doors and windows and storming of
the conference room. The official said that the public stance on this
issue was understandable, adding that however, radical steps were
unacceptable. Hasanov stressed that the Azerbaijanis were cultured
people and said that international legal norms should in no way be
violated.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

ARMENIAN MINISTER UNHAPPY ABOUT IMBALANCE IN US MILITARY AID

Arminfo
21 Jun 04

YEREVAN

There is a disparity between US military aid for Armenia and
Azerbaijan, Armenian Foreign Minister Vardan Oskanyan has told
Armenian Public Television.

This is explained by the fact that Azerbaijan is closely cooperating
with the USA in the military field, and if Armenia also shows a strong
desire to intensify this cooperation, then it cannot be ruled out that
the aid for Armenia will be increased, he said.

The matter, the minister believes, is about the (Armenian)
complementary policy: “We are deepening cooperation with one country
and are trying to establish cooperation with the other, complementing
the security sphere.” “At the current stage, we are pleased with the
existing level of military cooperation with the USA,” the foreign
minister said. “This issue has been resolved politically, but it has
not been clarified in practice. We have a chance to balance all
these. So, there are chances and it remains to show a desire,” he
said.

At the same time, the minister said that Armenia would continue
debating the issue with the USA. “I think, we shall be able to manage
this, by expanding relations with the USA in this sphere to eventually
achieve financial parity between Armenia and Azerbaijan,” the foreign
minister said.

He believes that it is necessary to conduct discussions with the
Defence Ministry, to find out about our needs and spheres this aid is
channelled into and whether we need aid in this sphere. “After all,
one of the components of the US military aid is combating terrorism
and stepping up border security, and we should correctly assess our
requirements in this direction which could be in keeping with the
tasks facing the USA,” the minister said.

PRESS RELEASE
Canadians For Sustainable Development In Armenia (CFSDIA)
Antoine S. Terjanian, Coordinator
5, Nicol Street
Ottawa, CANADA
Tel: 613-748-0676
Fax: 613-748-0676
E-mail: [email protected]

CAMPAIGN TO GET CANADIAN HELP FOR ARMENIA

Ottawa, June 23, 2004 – Canadians For Sustainable Development In
Armenia (CFSDIA) has launched the second phase of a campaign to
persuade the Canadian Development Agency (CIDA), an agency of the
Canadian Federal Government in charge of Canadian foreign aid, to
reverse a 2003 decision to terminate bilateral aid to Armenia. “The
CFSDIA is mobilizing support among all Armenian-Canadians concerned
about the future of Armenia. A non-partisan group, CFSDIA’s 23
workgroup volunteers come from all sides of the politico-religious
spectrum and are located in Canada’s five major urban centers” said
Antoine Terjanian, coordinator of the workgroup.

Armenia is enduring dire economic circumstances. Over 55% of the
population live below the poverty line and unemployment is similarly
very high. Yet CIDA has cut the meagre allocation it had for Armenia
even before the completion of the Paul Martin Government’s foreign
policy review scheduled for this fall. “All informed
Armenian-Canadians are intent on doing their utmost to ensure our
government helps Armenia in this very difficult period. We are
confident that Armenian-Canadians mobilised for this initiative during
the closing stretch of the federal elections on June 28 can make a
difference” said Mr. Terjanian.

During the first phase of this campaign, leaders of Armenian
organizations in Canada, from all sides of the politico-religious
spectrum, sent letters to Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin, urging
him to reverse the CIDA decision. Federal Cabinet Ministers were also
approached individually. “So far our concerns have not been answered”
said Mr. Terjanian. CFSDIA has therefore decided to make public the
absence of a Canadian bilateral aid program to Armenia. “We have
called on all Armenian Canadians to become active during this election
campaign. …Armenian-Canadians are approaching candidates to express
concern for Canada’s lack of bilateral help to Armenia in these
extremely difficult times” said Mr. Terjanian. Similarly
Armenian-Canadians and friends of Armenia in Canada are being urged to
write similar letters to the “Prime Minister, Parliament Hill,
Ottawa”.

Most important, we are urging all Armenian-Canadians to vote in this
important election.