A1 Plus | 14:54:35 | 20-04-2004 | Social |
DALMA GARDENS WILL BE SEIZED
Dalma Gardens’ renters have today assembled at Municipality again. Their
problem is not settled, the territories will be taken away and the tenants
demand to prolong the contracts by 25 years.
Karen Davtyan, head of Department Real Estate Management of Municipality,
says there is a special decision of Government under which a part of gardens
is to remain as a green area and the rest will serve other purposes.
Mr Davtyan informed they follow the above decision. “Policemen have come
today with tractors to destroy our green territories”, renter Azat
Khachatryan says. Then they left warning to raze the green zones if the
appropriate decision wasn’t produced the next day.
“No Court accepts any document on Dalma Gardens to launch legal
proceedings”, renter Yntsa Hovhannissyan says.
Tenants assure policemen have today blocked the roads to Leningradyan street
and Hrazdan Sport Complex to hamper the renters to come to their gardens.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

A1 Plus | 16:14:44 | 20-04-2004 | Politics |
AGAIN ARRESTING
Norq Commune policemen have today visited the house of Colonel Gegham
Harutyunyan, ex Deputy Defense Minister and member of “Republic” Party
political board, and summoned him to the police department. Then he was
accused of ribaldry. {BR}
Law-enforcement bodies tried to take Harutyunyan to Court to subject him to
administrative amenability. He refused to go to Court without an advocate.
Gegham Harutyunyan is now in Norq Police Department.
It is to remind that at April 13 night Harutyunyan was arrested in
“Republic” Party Office and taken to temporary cell.
But then he was released. His party-men call today’s arrest as a preventive
measure for the rally to be held tomorrow.

A1 Plus | 17:10:23 | 20-04-2004 | Politics |
“SUPREME SOVIET” PRETENDING TO BE NEUTRAL
Ruben Torosyan, Chair of “Supreme Soviet” MP Club, does not agree to power
change as the way for solution to the problems. He thinks the legislative
field is to be regulated thus making the superiors act within law.
It is to state this organization has been reminding Authorities since 1997
that numerous vote frauds were committed during both presidential and
parliamentary elections. It now announces that the body called “Political
Coalition” is anti-constitutional etc.
“Supreme Soviet” has put more than 100 claims to Court. But Court set only
one of them going.
Organization Chair confessed his club doesn’t manage to achieve something.
But he also said his club won’t join Opposition considering its activity
beyond law.

A1 Plus | 20:42:39 | 20-04-2004 | Politics |
NEGOTIATIONS WITHOUT PRECONDITIONS
Opposition and Coalition were to meet today by the Intelligentsia
initiative. But the meeting didn’t take place though there was preliminary
agreement between Opposition and Coalition representatives.
National Democratic Union Chair Vazgen Manukyan said during the conversation
with us an impression was created that Robert Kocharyan didn’t allow
Coalition to meet Opposition.
Tigran Torosyan, Parliament Vice-Speaker and Republican Party Vice-Chair
refuted the stance at the talk with us saying they had met Robert Kocharyan
at 10:30 AM, the meeting had lasted for 1 hour and it couldn’t hamper the
dialogue with Opposition.
Torosyan doesn’t either accept the standpoint by Opposition that Coalition
doesn’t decide anything. Mr Torosyan told us they decide their actions.
According to Torosyan, the reason of dialogue failure were demands of
Opposition, Viktor Dallaqyan in particular, concerning discharge of some
officials /Defense Minister and Kocharyan’s pre-election headquarters chief
Serj Sargssyan and General Prosecutor Aghvan Hovsepyan/.
Torosyan said Coalition is ready for dialogue and negotiations but without
preconditions.

A1 Plus | 18:49:29 | 20-04-2004 | Politics |
YEREVAN AGAIN BLOCKED
It is hard to enter Yerevan from Vanadzor City today. People who managed to
get Yerevan say Lori District policemen have blocked 2 highways from
Vanadzor to Yerevan – Vanadzor-Aparan-Yerevan and Vanadzor-Sevan-Yerevan.
Policemen stop all the cars, even taxies and private ones. They try to find
why people come to Yerevan. They ask people if they are going to partake in
the rally on April 21.
If law-enforcement bodies don’t believe explanations, they start carrying
campaign convincing people not to partake in the rallies.

A1 Plus | 21:18:28 | 20-04-2004 | Politics |
KOCHARYAN CONSOLING ANDRANIK MARGARYAN
Robert Kocharyan doesn’t intend to dissolve Parliament and Government.
Kocharyan announced this after touring along Yerevan today.
“We will work in this political team together at least till the coming
parliamentary elections, 3 years”, he said.
Robert Kocharyan didn’t read PM Andranik Margaryan’s statement in the press
saying if Kocharyan dissolved Government, PM would thank him and join
Opposition.
Why do rumors on dissolving Parliament or Government spread? “To create
distrust atmosphere among Coalition and between President-Prime Minister
relations”, Robert Kocharyan said.

US MEDIATOR, MINISTER OF NKR DISCUSS TALKS FORMAT
Mediamax news agency
20 Apr 04
YEREVAN
The foreign minister of the Nagornyy Karabakh Republic (NKR), Ashot
Gulyan, has told the US co-chairman of the OSCE Minsk Group, Steven
Mann, about the need for the direct participation of Nagornyy Karabakh
in the talks.
The meeting between Gulyan and Mann took place in the evening of 19
April at the permanent mission of the NKR in Yerevan.
At Mann’s request Gulyan spoke about the NKR’s position on settling
the conflict and about the economic and domestic political situation
in the NKR.
Mann confirmed the firm intention of the USA to continue to seek the
resolution of the Karabakh conflict through the OSCE Minsk Group. He
said he will visit Nagornyy Karabakh during his next visit to the
region.

International Herald Tribune
Development bank looks east to aid poor nations
Eric Pfanner IHT Tuesday, April 20, 2004
LONDON With the most advanced economies in the former Communist bloc set to
join the European Union next month, the multinational bank that was set up
to aid the transition to capitalism said Monday that it would pay greater
attention to poorer countries farther to the east.
The agency, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, will not
immediately cease operations in the eight Central and Eastern European
countries that, along with Malta and Cyprus, are set to join the EU on May
1. But in those countries, the bank’s “role should naturally fall away over
the years to come,” said Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain, who addressed
the agency’s annual meeting in London on Monday.
The development bank, which operates in 27 countries, said Monday that it
had created a new program aimed at increasing its lending in seven of the
poorest ones – Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, the Kyrgyz Republic, Moldova,
Tajikistan and Uzbekistan – where more than 50 percent of the population
lives below the poverty line.
In those countries, governments are too indebted to raise new financing, and
foreign investors are often unwilling to enter, given the myriad risks – not
least, in countries such as Uzbekistan, where George Soros and other
investors have complained of a woeful human rights record. Meanwhile, the
terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, and the subsequent ouster of the Taliban
regime in Afghanistan – which borders on two of the seven countries,
Tajikistan and Uzbekistan – heightened the awareness in some Western
capitals of the strategic importance of former Soviet Central Asia, in
particular.
Jean Lemierre, the bank’s president, who was elected to a second four-year
term on Monday by the bank’s board, said the bank would step up its efforts
to finance small businesses, cross-border trade and small-scale
infrastructure projects, among other things.
“The bank is ready to take on the financial as well as reputational risk as
we seek to invest more in countries at the earlier stages of transition,”
Lemierre said.
The bank said it aimed to increase its combined investment in the seven
countries to about E150 million, or $181 million, a year from the current
E90 million. Because its investments typically result in additional
private-sector activity, the bank said it expected the overall effect to be
greater than that.
The bank will take on added risk in part by adhering to local law, rather
than international law, in some of its investments in the seven countries.
Bankers said that should not pose a threat to the bank’s financial health
because the activities in the seven poorest countries account for only a
fraction of the its overall investments; the bank made E3.7 billion worth of
new investments last year.
Yet new lending in the seven poorest countries had actually been dwindling.
By 2002, said Michael McCulloch, a consultant to the bank on its new
initiative, these countries were actually paying more to service previous
commitments to the bank than they were receiving in new investment flows.
In the relatively well-to-do Eastern and Central European countries that are
joining the EU, the agency has typically invested in large projects, often
in cooperation with private-sector lenders. With their financial markets
gained in depth and breadth, domestic and regional banks lend to smaller
borrowers. But the seven poorest countries have few lenders willing to
finance projects in the E500,000 to E2 million range, the bank said, yet
these will be crucial to the development of their economies.
As the bank shifts its emphasis a bit to the east, its horizon is growing.
Jean-Claude Juncker, the chairman of its board of governors and prime
minister of Luxembourg, urged other governors to complete the process of
accepting Mongolia as a country of operation for the bank. The United
States, among others, has already approved Mongolia as a country of
operation.
International Herald Tribune
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Boston Globe, MA
April 18 2004
REMEMBERING THE HOLOCAUST —
Contemporary artist Apo Torosyan is among area artists participating
in an interfaith commemoration of the Holocaust at 3 p.m. today at
Peabody Veterans Memorial High School.
Torosyan, of Peabody, presents “My Story — Everybody’s Story,” his
display about the Armenian genocide and his family’s history.
Born and raised in Turkey, Torosyan is the son of an Armenian father
and Greek mother who lost many family members in the genocide of
1915. The calamity has greatly influenced his art.
In addition to an art exhibit, the event includes a talk by
Christopher Mauriello, professor of history at Salem State College,
titled “From Memory to Hope: Myths of the Holocaust in American
Public Life.”
Ceremonies for survivors and an interfaith memorial service follows
at 4 p.m. The Holocaust Center Service Award will be presented to
Sandy Weitz.
On Thursday, Torosyan presents his video “Discovering My Father’s
Village” at Peabody City Hall during ceremonies commemorating the
Armenian genocide. The 11 a.m. event will be hosted by Peter
Torigian, former mayor of Peabody. Call 978-532-3000.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

San Francisco Chronicle, CA
April 18 2004
Our Editors Recommend
[parts omitted]
The Daydreaming Boy by Micheline Aharonian Marcom (Riverhead; 224
pages; $23.95): Micheline Aharonian Marcom’s second novel focuses on
the aftermath of the Armenian genocide and revolves around the
experiences of one man: Vahé Tcheubjian, a middle-class Armenian
businessman in 1960s Beirut. Tcheubjian and his wife appear to have
an idyllic life, soaking up the sophisticated culture that marked the
pre-civil war city as the “Paris of the Middle East.” But inside,
Tcheubjian is an emotional train wreck, racked by memories of escape
from the genocide that killed his family and years endured in a
brutal Armenian orphanage. Marcom’s seamless, ethereal prose is
suffused with raw emotion; there is heartbreak on every page, but
also hope.