ISSUES CONNECTED WITH JAVAKHK ROADS AND DRAFT LAW ON GEORGIAN EDUCATION
DISCUSSED IN AKHALKALAKI
AKHALKALAKI, December 20 (Noyan Tapan). Issues connected with the
improvement of Javakhk roads and the draft law “On the Georgian General
Education” were discussed at the Javakhk second forum of the European
Commission on Minorities Issues (ECMI), which was held in Akhalkalaki
on December 15.
According to the “A-Info” Agency, in his report Nodar Inasaridze,
Coordinator on the Samtskhe-Javakheti region of the Department on
Georgian Roads, spoke about the road construction expected in the
region in 2005, in particular, the overhaul of the Tbilisi-Tsalka-
-Akhalkalaki-Kartsakh (the Turkish border) highway. Inasaridze
also mentioned that the repairs of the Akhaltskha-Akhalkalaki,
Ninotsminda-Zhdanovka (the Armenian border) highways will be primary in
2005. As for the roads of local importance, according to Inasaridze,
no essential changes are expected here because of the absence of
money. Participants of the forum expressed dissatisfaction with the
state of internal roads, as well as on the occasion of non-cleaning
of roads in winter. Participants of the forum don’t believe the words
especially regarding the repairs of the roads connecting Georgia
with Armenia.
In her report Seda Melkumian, the Executive of the Committee on
Educational Issues, presented in detail the conclusions of their
committee after the discussion of the draft law “On General Education
of Georgia”. She said once again that according to this draft law,
all the Armenian schools are exposed to danger of closing. Bela
Tsipuria, the Deputy Minister of Education and Science of Georgia,
made a speech then, she said that the reports on the closing of the
non-Georgian schools in Georgia are false rumors, and misundersanting
arouse after the wrong translation of the draft law. But the Deputy
Minister failed to disperse the suspicions of the population of
Javakhk. The written variant of the law is only in Georgian, which
is incomprehensive for almost all the participants of the forum. The
long discussion gave no result in this issue, it only registered that
the approval of such a draft law may have dangerous consequences.