Author: Chaltikian Arsine

`A Karabakh Tale’ included in Golden Apricot program

07-07-2007 14:54:36 – KarabakhOpen

The film `A Karabakh Tale’ by Susanna Sayan (written by Harut
Mansuryan, director Levon Kalantar) made in the framework of the
project of Internews Armenia and Stepanakert Press Club was included in
the program of the authoritarian international film festival. In June
the film was ranked among the best five films on the festival of the
International Academy of Television and Radio `Air Casket’ held in
Yerevan.

PanARMENIAN.Net

PACE President said there is no progress in Karabakh settlement
04.07.2007 19:01 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Progress in not fixed in the Nagorno Karabakh
conflict settlement process. Work for formation of public opinion for
a peaceful resolution is not carried out, PACE President Rene van der
Linden said at a meeting with RA NA speaker Tigran Torosian, the RA NA
press office reported.

Characterizing the assessment as exact, Mr Torosian said the most
important index in the Karabakh settlement is the opinion being formed
in Armenia, Karabakh and Azerbaijan. This index shows that no one in
Armenia or Karabakh propagandizes war and hatred towards another
nation. However, the situation is quite different in Azerbaijan. This
fact can be proved by the recent visit of Armenian and Azeri
intellectuals to Yerevan, Stepanakert and Baku. The initiative was
welcomed in Armenia and Karabakh. Azerbaijan met guests with protest
actions and sharp criticism. All this conflicts with PACE resolution
1416, which says that war and hatred must not be propagandized.

International organization will promote resolution of the conflict at
the time when they give an objective assessment to the issue,
according to Tigran Torosian

When touching upon the Armenian-Turkish relations, the PACE President
said closed doors do not lead to positive results.

In this respect, Tigran Torosian said, the Council of Europe has the
possibility to engage in the issue, for both Armenia and Turkey and
CoE members and are obliged to build relations on the basis of
European values.

Reuters AlertNet, UK
July 4 2007

INTERVIEW-Georgia asks EU to solve "ethnic cleansing"
04 Jul 2007 12:17:15 GMT
Source: Reuters

By Michael Stott and Margarita Antidze

TBILISI, July 4 (Reuters) – The European Union needs to help solve
"one of the most forgotten ethnic cleansings of the 20th century",
the mass expulsion of Georgians from their lands in the pro-Russian
territory of Abkhazia, Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili told
Reuters in an interview on Wednesday.

More than half the population of Abkhazia, a sliver of land bordering
the Russian Black Sea coast, fled their homeland after separatists
broke free from Georgian control in 1992 and fought a war against
Tbilisi.

The Abkhaz now run the war-scarred province from the city of Sukhumi
— just along the coast from the Russian Winter Olympic candidate
city of Sochi — enjoying tacit support from Moscow.

The region’s unilateral declaration of independence has not been
recognised by any foreign government and it remains politically and
economically isolated.

Saakashvili appealed to the world community not to turn a blind eye
to the plight of thousands of Georgians who cannot return to their
homes in Abkhazia. The region is effectively sealed off by a buffer
zone controlled by Russian peacekeepers.

"What we’ve got there is 80 percent of the population thrown out and
you’ve got people there who are openly saying they will not let
people go back," he said, speaking in English.

Figures on how many Georgians and other non-Abkhaz peoples such as
Armenians and Greeks lived in Abkhazia before the war are disputed.
Most sources say the population has fallen from more than 500,000 at
the start of the 1990s to under 200,000.

"We have people there on the ground who believe ethnicity is reason
enough to kill people, to drive them out from their homes",
Saakashvili said.

"What we need … is a strong stance from the international community
that people should be allowed to go back".

EUROPEAN PARTICIPATION

Saakashvili said United Nations efforts in the region had been
"pretty disappointing", so Georgia was now pinning its hopes on the
European Union.

"That’s why we want to engage more and more European participation in
that part of the world," he explained.

International police could ensure a safe right of return for refugees
and once they returned and met their former neighbours again, mutual
understanding would improve, he said.

"It was one of the most forgotten ethnic cleansings of the 20th
century", he said. "How do you change it? By applying the soft power
of the 21st century."

Saakashvili said he also believed that "people power" — the same
force which saw him swept to office in a 2003 uprising which toppled
the previous government — could solve Georgia’s other territorial
conflict in the province of South Ossetia.

War in that region, located in central Georgia not far from the
capital Tbilisi, also led to a breakaway local administration
declaring independence from Georgia in 1992, again without
international recognition.

A recent outbreak of violence in the region has stirred concern that
war could break out again but Saakashvili said he was committed to
resolving the situation peacefully.

"There is no military solution to this situation," he said.

Most of the local population were now switching sides and starting to
talk to the central government in Tbilisi because they understood
that there was no alternative, he added.

"We see desperate attempts by some local representatives of security
services trying to block this process but they will not succeed,"
Saakashvili said, in an apparent reference to Moscow.

"The universal solution to all these kinds of situations is to give
more democracy," he said. "We should give the say to the people."

NKR PRESIDENT’S ADVISOR THINKS DISCUSSIONS DEDICATED TO DOMESTIC POLITICAL PROBLEMS OF KARABAKH MUST NOT BE ORGANIZED IN YEREVAN

arminfo
2007-07-03 13:23:00

The NKR president’s advisor Arman Melikyan said over the discussion of
the topic "NKR presidential election: a view from Yerevan", organized
by the "Kavkaz" analytical centre in the office of the Russian news
agency "Regnum".

He also added that discussion on the NKR presidential election is
evidence of either distrust in ability of the people of Karabakh to
elect their leader or an attempt to impose pressure and meddle in
domestic affairs of the republic. prospect of the Karabakh conflict
settlement and to the problem of refugees resettlement. But at the
moment we have got an impression of the third states meddling in our
affairs,- Melikyan said. He at least admits that the acting parties
of Armenia might initiate such round tables but not foreign mass
media or analytical centres.

After the statements made in rather emotional tone, the NKR president’s
advisor Arman Melikyan, accompanied by perplexed look of Armenian
journalists, left the press-conference hall of the Caucasus office
of the Russian news agency Regnum.

LEVEL OF RELATIONS BETWEEN ARMENIA AND FRANCE CAN BE WELCOMED

PanARMENIAN.Net
02.07.2007 13:26 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ The Armenia-France relations are completely
satisfactory, French Ambassador to Armenia, Mr Serge Smessov said in
an interview with PanARMENIAN.Net. "This fact can be proved by the
visit of French President Jacques Chirac to Armenia last fall and the
visit of Armenian leader Robert Kocharian to Paris in February. Our
ties are not limited to relations between the executive powers. They
are developing between the legislative structures at the level of
National Assemblies and Senate as well. I should also mention the
significant role of regional administrations and Mayors of Armenian
and French towns in developing cooperation," Ambassador Smessov said.

"MARTIAL STATEMENTS OF AZERBAIJAN ARE OF DECLARATORY CHARACTER," FLORENCE MARTIROSIAN SAYS

Noyan Tapan
Jul 2, 2007

YEREVAN, JULY 2, NOYAN TAPAN. The martial statements of Azerbaijan
are more of declaratory than of concrete character. They are, really,
dangerous. This information was provided to a Noyan Tapan correspondent
by Florence Martirosian, a member of the international consultation
council of the "Geopolitical Affairs" journal and a researcher of
the Paris-Sorbonne University.

According to her, the main goal of the martial statements of Azerbaijan
is to promote the idea that Karabakh is not finally lost. In her
opinion, the loss of a territory is a serious problem for any country,
and the politicians of Azerbaijan are trying to mitigate this problem
with aggressive statements. "I am sure that making such statements
is not a solution of the problem," Florence Martirosian mentioned.

She believes that the Karabakh conflict will be settled through the
establishment of democratic orders in the whole territory. Florence
Martirosian believes that the existence of a powerful opposition and
of different opinions, as well as the equality of everybody in front
of the law in the country should be attached importance in order to
reach democracy.

Florence Martirosian considers it necessary for Nagorno Karabakh to
take part in the negotiation process. "The essential essence of the
principle of self-determination is that the representatives of the
self-determining nation should take part in the negotiation process,"
she said.

GEORGIAN FLAG RAISED OVER AKHALKALAKI
By Vladimir Socor

Eurasia Daily Monitor, DC
July 2 2007

Akhalkalaki military base The flag of Georgia has been flying
over the Akhalkalaki military base since June 27, with Georgian
troops moving onto the base to replace the last Russian troops. The
commander of the Group of Russian Forces in the Transcaucasus (GRVZ),
Maj.-General Andrei Popov, and Georgia’s First Deputy Defense Minister,
Maj.-General Levan Nikolaishvili, signed the handover documents on
that day, as Russian troops completed the evacuation of materiel from
the sprawling base.

Fixed assets handed over to the Georgians include 196 buildings on an
area of 128 hectares as well as a nearby combat training range. The
last 150 Russian troops left on the eve of the official handover. The
evacuation of materiel and troops began in late 2004 on an ad-hoc
basis and continued from mid-2006 onward in accordance with an agreed
timetable. The Russians have completed it three months ahead of the
October 2007 deadline.

While some of the materiel and troops have been evacuated to Russia,
a considerable quantity of hardware has been transferred to the
Russian base at Gyumri in Armenia — a move that raises concern
in Azerbaijan. The Russian arsenals at Gyumri are steadily growing
through transfers of heavy weaponry from Russian bases in Georgia.

The Georgian-Russian agreements prohibit the transfer of that weaponry
to Armenian forces by Russia. However, compliance with the ban and
indeed the actual basing location of that hardware, once it reaches
Armenia, is difficult to verify.

The Imperial Russian Army built the Akhalkalaki base in 1910 from
an earlier military outpost near the Ottoman border. The base was
expanded to accommodate up to 15,000 Soviet troops during the Cold
War. Its missions included launching offensive operations into Turkey
in the event of actual war.

After the Soviet Union’s collapse, the Akhalkalaki base became the
main employer and for the local ethnic Armenian-majority population
and main buyer of goods and services. Russian authorities in Moscow
and in the theater instigated local Armenians at times to demonstrate
against the closure of the base and even to block the evacuation
path of military convoys. However, such incidents stopped in 2006
when Russia began implementing its agreement with Georgia on the
withdrawal of Russian forces.

The evacuation process continues from Russia’s base at Batumi, where
800 Russian soldiers remain. Under the withdrawal schedule, the ninth
railroad train left Batumi on June 28 for Russia and the tenth is
scheduled to leave at the beginning of July for the Russian base at
Gyumri in Armenia. The materiel aboard these trains includes tanks,
various types of armored vehicles, and artillery systems as well as
infantry equipment. Ten more trains and one more motor convoy are to
be sent from Batumi until the end of 2007. The base is due to close
before the end of 2008.

>>From 1991 through 2005, Russia stonewalled the negotiations on
troop withdrawal, attempting to prolong its presence at Akhalkalaki
and Batumi indefinitely. Even after the signing of the 1999 Istanbul
agreements on troop withdrawal, Russia wanted at least another decade
to close these two bases and demanded hundreds of millions of dollars
as compensation for relocating the troops and materiel in Russia. The
only Istanbul commitment that Russia fulfilled on time was the handover
of the Vaziani base and airport near Tbilisi in 2001.

The 2003 regime change in Georgia and the reestablishment of
effective Georgian sovereignty in Ajaria changed the negotiations
fundamentally. Moscow understood that the location of Akhalkalaki
and Batumi, deep inside Georgian territory, meant that the bases
could be isolated and even blockaded if Russia refused to honor its
obligation to close them down. This realization — as well as the
loss of real military value of these bases — led Moscow to agree to
evacuate them. The withdrawal process is governed by the May 30, 2005,
Joint Statement and March 31, 2006, implementing agreements, which
were signed, respectively, by Russia’s Minister of Foreign Affairs
Sergei Lavrov and Ground Forces Commander-in-Chief Colonel-General
Alexei Maslov, with Georgia’s then-minister of foreign affairs Salome
Zourabichvili and then-first deputy defense minister Mamuka Kudava.

These documents stipulate a precise timetable for withdrawal, with
interim deadlines to be met (see EDM, June 3, 2005; April 4, 2006).

On Christmas Day, December 25, 2006, the last personnel of Russia’s
garrison in Tbilisi and the rump GRVZ Headquarters pulled out of
Georgia’s capital and of the country altogether. That move brought
to a close more than 200 years of the Russian garrisoning of Tbilisi.

The imperial Russian army under General Ivan Lazarev occupied Tbilisi
in November 1799, using the easy invasion route from Ossetia. The
sprawling ex-GRVZ complex is located on prime real estate grounds in
downtown Tbilisi, in proximity to the main government institutions
(see EDM, January 2).

As part of its 1999 commitments, enshrined in the CFE Treaty’s Final
Act at that year’s Istanbul summit, Russia was to close the Gudauta
base, evacuate the personnel and equipment, and hand the base over
to Georgia by July 1, 2001. However, Russia retains the base to the
present day, albeit with a reduced garrison (see EDM, June 18). While
giving Russia due credit for evacuating the Batumi and Akhalkalaki
bases and the Tbilisi headquarters — even ahead of the 2005-stipulated
deadlines — Georgia calls for complete fulfillment of the CFE Treaty
and Istanbul Commitments regarding the Gudauta base.

VARDAN OSKANIAN: DE FACTO NKR IS ALREADY INDEPENDENT, IT ONLY REMAINS
TO CONFIRM THIS DE JURE, THROUGH NEGOTIATIONS

YEREVAN, JUNE 29, NOYAN TAPAN. The Armenian Foreign Minister, Vardan
Oskanian, at the June 29 press conference, stated that the official
bellicose statements of Baku are an obstacle in the settlement of the
conflict. He said that with their statements the sides should promote
and not hamper the process of settlement.

In V. Oskanian’s words, the document, which is being discussed during
the negotiations over the Nagorno Karabakh settlement, includes all
principles related to the settlement. In particular, this is the issue
of Nagorno Karabakh’s status, territories, and refugees. The Minister
also mentioned that the document contains points which are unacceptable
for both sides.

In connection with the possibility of reaching a deadlock situation in
the negotiations process, he mentioned that nothing should be excluded.
At the same time, V. Oskanian stated that everything possible should be
done to ensure progress in the issue of the settlement.

As regards the issue of possibly giving independence to Kosovo and the
impact of that decision on Nagorno Karabakh’s fate, the Minister
stated: "If Kosovo is given independence, it is not excluded that the
international community can declare that it will no longer consider
issues connected with nations’ right of self-determination. And, unless
they give independence to Kosovo, this is also dangerous for us. We
should take into consideration the fact that the Nagorno Karabakh
Republic is already independent, it only remains to confirm this de
jure, through negotiations."

V. Oskanian did not agree with the opinion that no progress has been
registered in the negotiations process on Nagorno Karabakh settlement
today, compared with 1997. "Unequivocally, this is not so. Today the
core of the negotiations is the issue of Nagorno Karabakh’s status,
which should be solved through a referendum," the Armenian Foreign
Minister said.

4 TEAMS FROM ARTSAKH WILL PARTICIPATE IN PAN-ARMENIAN GAMES

KarabakhOpen
28-06-2007 15:01:22

The idea of Pan-Armenian Games was proposed by a young Soviet diplomat
Ashot Melik-Shahnazaryan in 1965. At that time he could not fulfill
his idea. In 1995 Ashot Melik-Shahnazaryan declared his intention to
found the Pan-Armenian Games.

The first Pan-Armenian Games were held in 1999, from August 28
to September 5. The delegations of 62 cities of 23 countries
participated. The torch of the games was lit at the temple of
Garni. The second games were held in 2001, from August 18 to 26. The
games included 9 events, futsal and swimming were added. Sportsmen
from 86 cities of 29 countries participated.

This year the Pan-Armenian Games will be held from August 16 to 26.

According to the NKR Ministry of Education, Culture and Sport, the
teams of Stepanakert, Shushi, Martakert and Kashatagh will participate
in the games.

100 sportsmen from Artsakh will participate in the competitions
of chess, volleyball, basketball, table tennis, tennis, badminton,
athletics and football.

JOURNALIST TO BE TRIED FOR "DEGRADING STATE"

IFEX, Canada
International Freedom of Expression eXpress
4439/
June 27 2007

Country/Topic: Turkey
Date: 27 June 2007
Source: IPS Communication Foundation (BIANET)
Person(s): Haci Bogatekin
Target(s): journalist(s)
Type(s) of violation(s): legal action
Urgency: Threat

(BIANET/IFEX) – A case in the district town of Gerger, in the province
of Adiyaman, southeast of Turkey, illustrates how the Turkish
government has been indecisive and contradictory in dealing with
freedom of expression.

Public Prosecutor Sadullah Ovacikli dismissed a case against journalist
Haci Bogatekin, who wrote an article about a flea epidemic, in which
he criticised the government. The article, entitled "Flea, Pig and
Agha", was published in a local newspaper on 7 December 2006.

Ovacikli had cited the "Observer-Guardian" versus United Kingdom and
the "Prager-Oberschlick" versus Austria cases, which had been taken
to the European Court of Human Rights, as precedents for his decision.

However, three months after the dismissal, the same prosecutor’s
office started a trial against the same journalist over a similar case,
citing Article 301 of the Turkish Penal Code.

In an unsigned article published on 10 March 2007, entitled "Turkey
Has Made a Mistake", Bogatekin said: "The government has made a
mistake. Where and when? Yesterday, in the East and Southeast. And
then in Istanbul. In Maras, in Sivas. Today, in Trabzohn, Istanbul,
Mersin and the Southeast . . . "

The journalist is now on trial for "degrading the state". The court
case will begin on 25 July at a penal court in Gerger.

Bogatekin said in a 3 April statement to the prosecution: "I did not
write the article with criminal intent. As a journalist, I tried to
criticise some of the mistakes the government made in the past and
recently." However, his statement did not prevent him from being
prosecuted.

Bogatekin argued that he had presented his thoughts in order to
show that the repetition of mistakes would blight the future of the
country. In his article, he held the government responsible for "the
death of millions of Armenians and Syriac Christians in the East and
Southeast, after that the death of the Alevi in Dersim, then the Greek
Orthodox in Istanbul with the September movement, and more recently
the death of hundreds of people in Maras, Malatya, Corum and Sivas".

In the previous case against Bogatekin, related to the article in
which he had also criticised the government’s hygiene standards,
the prosecution dismissed proceedings, arguing that "although freedom
of expression was exaggerated to a certain extent, the article even
containing some provocations, and some of the expressions used were
polemical in nature, the expressions were used to support an objective
statement, and they are not considered an unfounded personal attack".