Author: Chakhmakhchian Vatche

Detroit Free Press
Feb 25 2005

CANDID COURTROOM: No-nonsense jurist cast into spotlight by NBA brawl

BY L.L. BRASIER
FREE PRESS STAFF WRITER

District Court Judge Lisa Asadoorian had a warning for the rowdy
national media and basketball fans who crowded into her courtroom not
long ago to watch as five Indiana Pacers players were charged with
assault.

ABOUT JUDGE LISA ASADOORIAN
Age: 40

Residence: Rochester.

Family: Single. Her mother, sister and brother live in the area.

Education: Bachelor’s degree in criminal justice, Michigan State
University; University of Detroit Law School.

Background: She is a former Oakland County assistant prosecutor and
magistrate. She is so adamant about the dangers of driving under the
influence that she sends everyone who appears before her on a drug or
alcohol conviction to tour the county morgue.

Hobbies: Likes spending time with her extended family. She keeps
treats in a desk drawer for visiting nieces and nephews.

What she drives: 2002 Jeep Grand Cherokee.

“I am a blunt person,” she said.

Then, she showed just how blunt.

Ticking off her fingers, she told spectators what they were allowed
to do in her Rochester Hills courtroom: “Sit, stare and breathe.”

Camera crews quieted. Reporters turned off cell phones. Onlookers
stopped whispering. The diminutive judge with the wild mop of hair
and stern voice was holding court on national television, and there
was no doubt who was in charge.

Asadoorian, who otherwise might have whiled away her years on a
relatively unknown district court bench in a largely peaceful Detroit
suburb, is enjoying her national debut as the get-tough jurist
overseeing the cases of five basketball players and five fans charged
in the Nov. 19 melee at the Palace of Auburn Hills.

The courtroom action could be more fun to watch than the brawl.

Tall players. Short judge. Fabulously wealthy, pampered superstars
facing a firebrand with demanding ways who tends to point her finger
when she lectures. This is a woman who, a few months into her
judgeship, issued a ruling an attorney did not like, prompting him to
storm out of her courtroom. She leaped off the bench, black robe
flying, and chased him down the hall, chastising him and demanding
that he return. He did.

“She is very aggressive, very passionate,” said John Skrzynski, a
senior Oakland County prosecutor who worked with Asadoorian when she
was an Oakland assistant prosecutor in the mid-1990s. “If you were in
a fight with her, you knew it.”

Asadoorian is expected to get lots of airtime as the cases wend their
way through the courts. The Palace brawl, aired around the world, and
the subsequent fallout, including the criminal charges, have garnered
the attention of Court TV, ESPN and the national networks, and the
interest isn’t expected to diminish.

More court action will come today — the first of a series of
deadlines set by Asadoorian — as attorneys for the five players file
motions by the end of the day. Ron Artest, Stephen Jackson, Anthony
Johnson, David Harrison and Jermaine O’Neal face misdemeanor assault
charges and are due back in court April 6. Trials could begin this
spring.

Some of the attorneys will question whether Asadoorian should have
been assigned all of the Palace cases simply because she was assigned
the first one, that of Flint-area fan Bryant Jackson, who is accused
of tossing a chair. In their motions, the attorneys will ask that the
Pacers’ cases be reassigned in a blind draw of all three judges on
the 52-3 District Court bench.

Asadoorian has indicated that she will not consider typical,
first-time offender programs for the defendants, none of whom has a
prior record. Such programs often allow convictions to be expunged or
defendants to plead guilty with the understanding that their
punishment will be limited.

“I happen to like Lisa Asadoorian. She is always attentive and polite
and conscientious, even if I may disagree with her rulings from time
to time,” said attorney James Burdick, who represents Pacer forward
Jackson. Burdick and wants his client’s case reassigned to a blind
draw. “Besides that, my client is innocent.”

Asadoorian, in keeping with court rules, declined to discuss the
cases while they are pending before her.

The attorneys, should Asadoorian deny their requests to reassign the
cases, can take the matter to a higher court.

If Asadoorian is flustered by the national attention and television
cameras, she has not shown it. “I’ve got a face for radio,” she
deadpanned during a recent interview.

And she has not changed her courtroom demeanor one whit.

Sometimes she is so formal as to seem haughty.

“Welcome, citizens,” she might say as she begins her morning session.

Other times, she is so informal, it unnerves the deputies who guard
her. She has left the bench during a hearing, taken off her robe and
perched on the end of the defense table to talk to teens before her
on drug or alcohol problems.

“I want them to know that I believe in them. That I am not their
friend, not their mother, that I’m their judge, and that I believe
they can do what they have to do,” she said.

Off the bench, she can be hilariously funny. During the recent
investiture ceremony of her close friend, newly elected Oakland
County Circuit Judge Cheryl Matthews, Asadoorian offered this advice
to the new judge as several hundred people listened:

“You can’t say to an attorney in your courtroom who is arguing
nonsense, ‘Don’t bring that pile of crap in here, sprinkle it with
sugar and try to tell me it’s an Eskimo Pie.’ No, you have to say,
‘The court does not feel inclined to entertain that motion.’ ”

“She is the funniest person I know,” Matthews said. “And she is the
most intensely loyal person I know.”

Asadoorian’s strong temperament — “I can’t think of anything that
scares me” — is what led her to become a prosecutor and then
eventually to challenge incumbent 52-3 District Judge Ralph Nelson in
2000, a move considered ill-mannered in the staid politics of
judicial circles. Incumbents, the unwritten and unspoken rule goes,
have the job for life.

She said her large, extended Armenian family gave her the support she
needed for success in life. She was close to her maternal
grandparents, both Armenian immigrants, and was raised by a single
mother who taught her a sturdy work ethic.

She offers up a simple explanation of how she runs her court:

“No one comes to court because they want to. So somebody has to take
charge and make sure things run efficiently. That’s my job — to let
the people know I’m in charge.”

TO CEDE TERRITORY MEANS TO BETRAY

A1+
24-02-2005

Today `Defense of liberated territories’ public initiative spread a
statement regarding Armenian Defense Minister’s interview with Yerkir
Online.

`Recent interview given by Defense Minister Serge Sargsyan was
resembled a speech of the person who is going to assume the power in
the country. However it lacked demonstrative self-confidence and
contained anxiety and cautiousness. Probably it was caused by the
outside pressure directed first of all to the liberated territories of
Karabakh.

The Defense Minister reiterates that these lands appear as a security
zone and will be returned sooner or later and does not demand either
`a wider corridor ‘ or `common border’ as additional
concessions. Besides, he plans to guard the `vulnerable’ borders with
the help of peacekeepers, thus confirming his readiness for
concessions.

`Defense of liberated territories’ public initiative considers the
statements on possible territorial concessions as betrayal, especially
if they are made by the Defense Minister. The involvement of foreign
armed forces in the Armenian-Azeri relations and dislocation of bases
jeopardizing security of the neighbor states at the bank of River
Araks are also inadmissible.

”We reiterate that in the minds of the Armenian people the Karabakh
problem cannot receive international solution while only the power
enjoying the nation’s support can resist anti-Armenian proposals on
the conflict settlement”, the statement says.

ARAM I speaks of Armenian Genocide at WCC

21.02.2005 11:43

YEREVAN (YERKIR) – In his report to the Central Committee of the World
Council of Churches (WCC), which meets once a year, His Holiness Aram
I referring to the Armenian Genocide, said: “This year my church and
people will commemorate the 90th Anniversary of the Armenian
Genocide. During the First World War in 1915, one-and-a-half million
Armenians were massacred by the Ottoman-Turkish government according
to a well-devised and systematically executed plan.

Although my generation did not directly experience the tragic past,
the Armenian Genocide has had a strong impact on our spiritual and
intellectual formation. The past haunts the victims; we cannot free
ourselves from the past unless that past is duly recognized”.

This reference was made in the context of His Holiness’ analysis of
the question of forgiveness and reconciliation. He said: “The
acceptance of truth is the sine qua non condition for forgiveness. The
past must be confronted boldly and be challenged responsibly.

Neglecting the past with its wounds will not help to build a new
future. When the memories are not healed, they hold us hostage to the
past; when they are healed, through confession and forgiveness, they
empower us to rebuild relationships, promote mutual trust and
acceptance, and engage in a processof transformation. Unhealed
memories cause violence, hate and fragmentation.

Forgiveness, as a response to confession, is a determining factor in
the healing and reconciliation process. Through forgiveness, we accept
each other in truth and justice. Forgiveness is costly; only
confession must lead to forgiveness, which is a pre-condition for real
healing and reconciliation”.

The Jamestown Foundation
Eurasia Daily Monitor

ARMENIAN GOVERNMENT PRESSED TO REIN-IN LAWLESS OLIGARCHS
By Emil Danielyan

Friday, February 18, 2005

The Armenian authorities have been under domestic pressure in recent
weeks to end what many see as the virtual impunity enjoyed by the
country’s tiny class of millionaire businessmen with close government
ties. The Armenian version of post-Soviet “oligarchs” are widely hated
— and feared — for their utter disregard of laws and conspicuous
wealth that contrasts with the country’s widespread poverty.

The ruling regime has heavily relied on the oligarchs to manipulate
elections and bully its political opponents, making it doubtful that
any serious action will be taken to rein them in.

Still, the authorities had to do something after a late-night gunfight
in a Yerevan suburb on February 4 between two criminal groups left at
least one person dead and several others seriously wounded. It was the
most massive shootout reported in the Armenian capital in a decade,
involving, according to newspaper reports, hundreds of gunmen. Some of
them were said to be personal bodyguards of several of the oligarchs
who hold seats in parliament.

The incident reportedly stemmed from a dispute over control of a local
minibus service, a highly lucrative business activity that is the
exclusive domain of senior government officials, their cronies, and
loyal businessmen. It seems to have raised President Robert
Kocharian’s eyebrows, with police making dozens of arrests and
confiscating large quantities of weapons. Yet the key question of
whose business interests were behind the mafia-style clash remains
unanswered.

Local newspapers were quick to draw grim conclusions. “Much of the
political power in Armenia is concentrated in the hands of criminal
business . . . and illegal armed groups belonging to it,” the
pro-opposition daily Aravot wrote on February 9. Golos Armenii, a
paper that staunchly backed Kocharian during the last presidential
election two years ago, was even more outspoken: “The
semi-presidential form of governance in Armenia is coming to an end
and will be replaced by absolute oligarchy, the rule of a few
individuals . . . The executive and legislative branches are, in
essence, already intertwined with the oligarchs and controlled by the
latter.”

Armenian tycoons are typically individuals with a high school-level
education who made fast money during the turbulent 1990s and now have
extensive business interests dependent on government support. For
example, one of them, Samvel Aleksanian, enjoys a de facto monopoly on
imports of sugar and flour to Armenia, while Russian citizen Mikhail
Baghdasarov has the exclusive grip on fuel supplies. Both men are
believed to operate under the “tutelage” of Defense Minister Serge
Sarkisian, Kocharian’s most trusted lieutenant.

The oligarchs like to flaunt their wealth, living in ridiculously big
villas and roaming the streets in motorcades made up of several SUVs
with almost identical license plates. Many Armenians would agree that
traffic lights are essentially non-existent for them.

In fact, just one week before the infamous shootout, one such
behemoth, the hugely expensive civilian version of the U.S. army’s
Humvee vehicles, crashed into three other cars on a busy street
intersection near downtown Yerevan at a high speed, killing two
people, and injuring several others. The police have reported no
arrests so far and are reluctant to name the Hummer’s real owner.
There are only 11 such cars in Armenia.

What makes the oligarchs particularly important for the regime is the
fact that they usually hold sway in a particular area of the country
through their businesses and local quasi-criminal elements. They are
able to bribe and intimidate local voters and resort to other election
falsification techniques. Ballot box stuffing was commonplace during
the 2003 presidential election, which Western observers described as
undemocratic. But the criticism did not prevent many tycoons from
themselves getting “elected” during the equally disputed parliamentary
polls held a few months later.

Another common feature of the Armenian super-rich is the burly and
mostly unarmed “bodyguards” that accompany them at every turn. The
men’s most visible characteristic, a shaven head or a short haircut,
has brought a new political meaning to the word “skinhead” in Armenia.

The authorities needed their services last spring when the Armenian
opposition tried unsuccessfully to force Kocharian to resign with a
campaign of street protests. Scores of riot police stood by and
watched as two dozen well-built thugs smashed photojournalists’
cameras after trying to disrupt an opposition rally in Yerevan on
April 5, 2004. Opinion differed only on which powerful individual
employed them.

Two of the assailants subsequently received a slap on the wrist when a
Yerevan court fined them after a parody of a trial. One of the
defendants was also a key participant in the February 4 gunfight,
according to media reports. This man is now reportedly under arrest
pending trial. His possible imprisonment would touch only the tip of
the iceberg, however, as none of the big fish is likely to end up
behind bars.

“Everybody is scared,” Golos Armenii noted alarmingly. “The oligarchy
controls everything and as the [next] elections approach it will
increasingly tighten its stranglehold on political forces in order to
avoid surprise developments.”

(Golos Armenii, February 12; Haykakan Zhamanak, February 12; Aravot,
February 9).

—

Armenian opposition MP warns president against running for third term

Mediamax news agency
18 Feb 05

Yerevan, 18 February: The Armenian president intends to use
constitutional amendments in order to provide himself with the
right to be elected for a third term in office, the secretary of the
parliamentary faction of the opposition Justice bloc, Viktor Dallakyan,
said in Yerevan today.

Addressing the National Press Club today, Viktor Dallakyan said that
the opposition is fully determined to “transform” the referendum on
constitutional changes into a referendum of confidence in the Armenian
president, Mediamax news agency reports.

“The opposition Justice bloc will struggle on to achieve a change of
the authorities in Armenia and will cooperate with all the political
forces who are ready to fight for the restoration of constitutional
law and legitimate authorities,” Dallakyan said.

He also said that the Justice bloc will continue boycotting sessions
of parliament until the ruling coalition accepts the opposition’s
demands to conduct a referendum of confidence in the authorities.

CIS defence system disintegrating, CIS “slowly dying”, says Russian paper

Nezavisimaya Gazeta, Moscow
14 Feb 05

The collective defence system of the Commonwealth of Independent States
has begun to rapidly disintegrate, according to a Moscow daily. The
Commonwealth, as a transitional entity between USSR republics and
post-Soviet sovereign countries, is slowly dying, it said, and
collective military relations are no exception. The countries form
their military relations not in accordance with the model established
in the 1990s, but in accordance with their national interests, the
paper said. The following is text of report by Vladimir Mukhin:
“Farewell To Arms! Collective Arms…. Russia’s CIS partners are
rapidly dismantling the common defence space” published by Russian
newspaper Nezavisimaya Gazeta on 14 February:

The CIS collective defence system has begun to rapidly
disintegrate. The first evidence of this is the imminent
abolition of the CIS Staff for Coordinating Military Cooperation
[ShKVS]. Nezavisimaya Gazeta has learned from informed sources at the
Russian Defence Ministry that after long and intensive consultations
Moscow finally accepted Astana’s proposal to abolish this supranational
body. The structure, which has tried throughout post-Soviet history
to do at least something to regulate military relations between the
CIS state, is breathing its last.

That this decision may be made at the CIS summit to be held in Kazan
in August 2005 was confirmed for Nezavisimaya Gazeta by Col-Gen Leonid
Ivashov, vice president of the Academy of Geopolitical Issues, who
was behind the creation of the ShKVS and for a long time headed the
CIS Council of Defence Ministers secretariat and the Russian Defence
Ministry main international military cooperation directorate. The
general himself sees this step as “extremely erroneous and damaging;
one that significantly weakens Russia’s positions in the post-Soviet
space”. As you know, Russia has hitherto opposed the abolition of the
ShKVS and even at last November’s Council of Ministers it initiated
support for the body on the part of other CIS republic – first and
foremost, the Central Asian republics and Armenia. Now we have a
U-turn, as they say. Why?

The answer to this question is provided to some extent by the
heads of various CIS structures and post-Soviet republics’ military
ministers. “No single Eurasian security space currently exists,” CIS
General Secretary Nikolay Bordyuzha believes. “It remains fragmentary
and diffuse and to some extent internally contradictory, since some
of its elements not only fail to harmonize, but compete with one
another.” In order to avoid this, in his opinion, “it is necessary
to delimit spheres of influence in matters of safeguarding collective
security between existing integration structures in the region – CIS,
the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, the Eurasian Economic Community,
the Collective Security Treaty Organization [CSTO] and others”. That
is, Bordyuzha diplomatically avoids mentioning the abolition of
military structures within the CIS (ShKVS and Council of Defence
Ministers), but clearly singles out his own structure, the Collective
Security Treaty Organization, which could be the “engine-room for
integration processes in the CIS space”. Kazakh Defence Minister
Mukhtar Altynbayev is even more emphatic. Like President Nursultan
Nazarbayev, he believes that “instead of an ineffective ShKVS and
ineffective Council of Defence Ministers a CIS states’ Security
Council should be set up, operating within the framework of the
CIS”. This idea has already been partially supported by Belarusian
Defence Minister Leanid Maltsaw: His proposal is to disband the ShKVS,
but keep the Council of Defence Ministers secretariat.

But only six of the 12 post-Soviet countries (we can rule the Baltic
countries out right away) are members of the CSTO. They, let us say,
will be “engine-rooms of integration”, but what are the others to
do? The CIS Security Council, if set up, cannot be an “engine-room”
either, since there are still no integration processes in the
post-Soviet space.

It has to be said that the Commonwealth, as a transitional entity
between USSR republics and post-Soviet sovereign countries, is
slowly dying. And collective military relations are no exception. The
countries form their military relations not in accordance with the
model established in the nineties, but in accordance with their
national interests. And this is evidently an objective process. That
the CSTO military staff is more effective than the ShKVS is an
illusion. For instance, within the CSTO there is already a nucleus of
countries united by their own coalition forces in Central Asia. There
is a single grouping of Russian and Belarusian forces in the western
CIS and Russian and Armenian forces in the south. All these groupings
have their own command and control staffs and only at a pinch could
they be united under the CSTO flag. At the same time, the recent
10th anniversary of the formation of the CIS combined air defence
system showed that many post-Soviet countries have common interests
in defending their air borders. Of course, the CSTO states are
the backbone of the countries. But there is rivalry and there are
problems even among them. For instance, Kyrgyzstan, a CSTO member,
is clearly lagging behind integration processes within the framework
of the formation of the combined air defence system. Its air defence
chief, Col Vladimir Valyayev, was not even at the celebratory session
of the combined air defence system countries’ coordinating commission,
which discussed plans for 2005. But Ukraine and Uzbekistan, which, as
you know, are not CSTO members, have shown an interest in these events.

Kazakhstan is active, as ever, having proposed CIS air defence forces
exercises not only at the Russian firing range, as has happened in
the past, but at its sole Sary-Shagan military firing range. Ukraine
has already taken the bait by severing the contracts with Moscow for
firing exercises in Ashuluk (Astrakhan Region) and is now preparing
an intergovernmental agreement on firing exercises at the Kazakhstani
range. So we find military-technical competition between CSTO allies
– Astana and Moscow. And Astana is clearly winning in this case,
since its firing range is both considerably bigger and obviously
more attractive financially. But this demonstrates once again the
fact that military relations are being built not in accordance with
the CSTO and ShKVS organizations’ models, but in accordance with the
interests of the CIS states’ military structures.

Moscow traditionally provides military equipment and services for
CIS combined air defence system states at their own domestic prices,
largely taking it upon itself to provide the military infrastructure
(airfields, test sites, headquarters), train personnel, and so
on. All it gets in return is unhealthy competition between military
firing ranges, “semihostile” blocs (remember GUUAM [Georgia, Ukraine,
Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan, and Moldova]), and purchase of armaments and
military hardware from and training of CIS armed forces’ officers in
NATO countries (as Ukraine will now be doing and Georgia is already
doing).

“Collective staffs and collective defence bodies have run their course
in their present form also because Russia has not finally decided on
it own principles, and its own ideology in mutual relations with the
CIS countries,” Academician Vladimir Popov of the Academy of Military
Sciences believes.

According to the analyst, the ShKVS has run its course. It had already
been halved in 2004 and the 55 officers that remain are not calling
the shots – they are clearly ineffective. But this does not mean
that the staff should be destroyed. Its staffers might well take
up theoretical work, developing blueprints, identifying threats,
and planning joint measures in Moscow’s interests. Indeed it was the
ShKVS that devised documents defining the content of such concepts
as CIS collective defence and security.

Moreover, the ShKVS is in Moscow. The Russian capital provides a
base for work and tackles the everyday problems of offices from CIS
countries. And it pays extra for communication, for lighting, and so
on. And he who pays the piper should call the tune.

Russian, Armenian foreign ministers discuss Nagorno-Karabakh

Interfax
Feb 17 2005

YEREVAN. Feb 17 (Interfax) – The problem of Nagorno-Karabakh was the
focus of the first part of Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov’s
negotiations with his Armenian counterpart in Yerevan.

“The ministers discussed the Nagorno-Karabakh settlement problem.
Practical aspects of the development of bilateral cooperation,
political dialog, and trade-economic relations were also the center
of attention,” Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Alexander Yakovenko
told journalists on Thursday.

Russian, Armenian foreign ministers praise “strategic partnership”

ITAR-TASS news agency, Moscow
17 Feb 05

Yerevan, 17 February: Relations between Russia and Armenia are
“those of partners and allies, be it in the sphere of the economy,
security or other spheres”, the head of the Russian Foreign Ministry,
Sergey Lavrov, has said today in Yerevan at talks with his Armenian
colleague, Vartan Oskanyan.

“We are interested in seeing stability in the region and therefore
the settling of conflicts in post-Soviet space meets the interests
of our countries,” Sergey Lavrov stressed.

He reported that during the talks the sides “will discuss all
bilateral issues on the agenda and also the fulfilment of accords at
the highest level”.

For his part, Vartan Oskanyan noted “Russia’s leading role in the
coming-to-be of Armenia”. In his words, “relations between Moscow
and Yerevan stand at a very high level and are in the nature of a
strategic partnership”.

“We do not have any political disagreements but we have common
interests both in the region and on global issues,” the head of the
Armenian Foreign Ministry stressed.

In Oskanyan’s view, “Sergey Lavrov’s visit to Yerevan will serve
as a stimulus for the further development of partnership between
our countries”.

Former Lebanon Premier Hariri Killed in Beirut Blast (Update6)

Feb. 14 (Bloomberg) — A bomb blast in the road by Beirut’s seafront
hotel district killed former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri in
the center of the capital, his office said today.

Hariri, a billionaire businessman-turned-politician, was dead on
arrival at the city’s American Hospital, the state-run news agency
said. Nine people died and more than 100 were injured in the blast,
the agency said on its Web site. The explosion left a crater at least
two meters deep and 10 meters wide.

“This is an irrecoverable loss,” Marwan Iskandar, a Beirut- based
economist, said in a telephone interview. “Rafik Hariri believed in
Lebanon’s economic revival and helped attract international investments
to the city center, the place where the bomb was placed today.”

The bomb’s devastation is the biggest since the end of the Lebanese
civil war in 1990, in which close to 100,000 people lost their
lives. The blast sent glass shards flying three blocks from its center,
according to a witness contacted by Bloomberg News.

Hariri, who was 61, served five times as Lebanon’s prime minister and
spearheaded the country’s postwar reconstruction effort, pushing the
country into debt. He had a close relationship with Saudi Arabia’s King
Fahd and France’s president, Jacques Chirac. He clashed with Syria,
which has about 15,000 soldiers in the country, before stepping down
last year.

Syrian Troops

Hariri resigned in October because of differences with Lebanon’s
Syrian-backed president, Emile Lahoud. The U.S. and France last year
co-sponsored a United Nations resolution on Lebanon demanding that
Syria withdraw its forces from the country.

Bashar al-Assad, Syria’s president, condemned the killing, calling it a
“terrible crime,” according to the state-run Syrian Arab News Agency.

Al-Jazeera and other televisions stations showed video of burning
cars, including one with a man on fire trying to get out, and large
rubble-strewn areas. Two former ministers were injured in the blast,
Agence France-Presse reported. At least 20 cars were set on fire in
the blast, the Associated Press said.

Hariri is credited for attracting Arab investors and tourists to
Lebanon, which has a debt equal to more than 160 percent of gross
domestic product.

“His death could lead to a flight of capital, ruin the tourism industry
and put pressure on the Lebanese pound,” Iskandar said.

The former prime minister was the majority shareholder in Solidere,
the country’s biggest real estate company. Solidere turned war-torn
downtown Beirut, the center of fighting during the 15-year civil war,
into a tourist and commercial district.

HSBC Building

HSBC Holdings Plc’s head office in Lebanon was damaged in the blast,
according to the bank’s Dubai spokesman, Steve Martin. About 100
people work in the head office, he said. No one was hurt.

“All our staff are accounted for,” Richard Beck, an HSBC spokesman
in London, said. “There are no injuries although there may be some
issues of people with minor cuts.”

He said the damage to the building, which is located near the hotels,
is superficial and “there is no reason to believe that HSBC is
a target.”

Born in the southern city of Sidon to a poor family, Hariri was a
Sunni Muslim with seven children, according to his Web site. Hariri,
who grow up in poverty, moved to Saudi Arabia in 1965 to work as a
school teacher, where he made his fortune by rebuilding palaces for the
Saudi royal family. He made a fortune in construction in the kingdom
and owns Saudi Oger Ltd. He and his family are worth $4.3 billion,
Forbes magazine said last year.

The Lebanese government declared three days of official mourning.

REPRESENTATIVES OF COUNTRIES FOUNDED CAUCASIAN REGIONAL ECOLOGICAL CENTER MET IN BRUSSELS

YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 12. ARMINFO. The meeting of representatives of
Armenia, Georgia, Azerbaijan and the ES, the countries founded the
Caucasian regional ecological center, took place in Brussels on
February 8-9, 2005. Deputy minister for ecology Samvel Papyan headed
the Armenian delegation there.

As ARMINFO was informed in the press-service of Armenia’s Foreign
Ministry, the members of the meeting were acquainted with the results
of five-year work and determined the key directions of both the
further activity and the co-operation sphere. Issues on the center’s
activity and implementation of measures for effectiveness increase
were discussed, too. Papyan in his speech noted the necessity of
regional co-operation in the sphere of ecology and proposed to create a
work-group, which will prepare a reform package on center’s structures
and present it at the next meeting in the summer of 2004. The meeting
participants discussed a possibility of combination of the new European
neighboring policy with the center’s activity, as well as a possible
involving of private enterprises in the implementation of the regional
ecological programs. -r-