Author: Chaltikian Arsine

AzerNews, Azerbaijan
May 6 2004

Azerbaijan concerned by Uzbek company’s activity in Upper Garabagh

Deputy Foreign Minister Araz Azimov has denied the reports that the
Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry had allegedly sent a letter of protest
to Uzbekistan.

Confirming the fact that Azerbaijan has sent a letter to Uzbekistan,
Azimov said the letter contained no protest, but rather a request.
The Azerbaijani government’s letter came after one of the Uzbek
mobile communications providers signed a contract with the officials
of the so-called Upper Garabagh Republic to launch activity in this
region.

In the letter, Tashkent was requested to take appropriate measures
against the Uzbek company and inform the Azerbaijani side on the
matter.

ARMENIAN COALITION LEADER SLAMS OPPOSITION OVER ITS METHODS

Hayots Ashkarh, Yerevan
5 May 04 p3

Text of Vahan Vardanyan interview with chairman of the parliamentary
group Republican Party of Armenia (RPA) Galust Saakyan in which he
criticizes the opposition in the light of the Council of Europe
resolution on Armenian issues by the Armenian newspaper Hayots Ashkarh
on 5 May headlined “I consider that betrayal”

(Hayots Ashkarh correspondent) Mr Saakyan, do you expect any changes
in the working style of the opposition after the resolution published
by the Council of Europe?

(Galust Saakyan) At the moment no. Our opposition colleagues will have
a theme connected with the resolution for discussing it during ten
days. But I think they understood that the Council of Europe is not
the political bureau of the USSR or Lenin’s mausoleum, so that they
can come and conduct revisions after complaining about the
authorities.

In fact, they were given an answer to the problems that were being
speculated more than a year. First of all, it was fixed that a vote of
confidence was only a proposal but not a decision of the
Constitutional Court. At the same time it is obvious that European
structures accept the results of the presidential and parliamentary
elections and there is no problem to revise them. The call for
dialogue, fixed in the resolution, is not principally a new thing
either. We have been saying the same for a year, but unfortunately
there is still nobody to listen to us.

Let us see what final conclusion our opposition colleagues will make
after the CE resolution. Today there is still a tendency to say what
they were saying before. But it is really becoming boring for the
society. It is unacceptable that by their working style in some sense
they are opening a door for interference by foreign forces in the
domestic political life of the country. Naturally, this cannot but
cause a counteraction.

(Correspondent) You accuse the opposition of making our country
vulnerable to foreign forces? But in its turn the opposition denies
this, especially an accusation that during recent PACE session they
cooperated with the Turkish-Azerbaijani delegation.

(Saakyan) Nobody says that there are not people with fair intentions
within the opposition. We also do not say that they especially went
and made an arrangement with the Turks and Azeris. But during the
discussion of the Armenian issue, the Turkish and Azerbaijani
delegations demonstrated serious proactivity. And representatives of
our opposition were those who put this issue forward. The decision
was adopted with difference of only six votes, and it is principally
clear that the problem of putting on the agenda a matter on the Turks
and Azeris voting was a decisive one. If our opposition colleagues did
not put forward this problem, they could not make use of the
situation. I condemn this phenomenon. Not only specific persons but on
the whole opening of the door to foreign interference. I consider that
betrayal.

(Correspondent) By giving such an assessment does the coalition not
close an opportunity for dialogue? (Saakyan) No, it does not. We said
many times that we are ready to talk but without preconditions. By
means of their actions the opposition transferred the political
developments to the judicial field when implementing any action they
come across the law. I agree that we should start a reverse process:
to discuss political problems in the political field and find
decisions. But nevertheless the coalition is not the opposition’s
nurse, so they always call for agreement to their demands, always call
for a dialogue and they always refuse because of some reason. If they
are going to continue their actions with illegal manifestations, the
law should act here. By the way, it is also mentioned in the
resolution of the CE that the opposition must not demonstrate
violence, that is, it should act within the framework of the law. All
this is becoming silly. They organize rallies, then they tell the
people to go home and come at the decisive day. This is a working
style which will be exhausted sooner or later.

Permanent Mission of the Republic of Armenia
to the United Nations
119E 36th street, New York, NY 10016
Tel.: 1-212-686-9079
Fax: 1-212-686-3934
E-mail: [email protected]
Web:

May 5, 2004

PRESS RELEASE

Armenia’s Re-election to the UN Commission on Human Rights

On May 4, 2004 the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC),
New York, unanimously re-elected Armenia to the Commission on Human Rights
(CHR). Thus, Armenia will continue its membership in the Commission for
three more years after its current term is over on December 31, 2004. So
far, Armenia has been the only country from the South Caucasus to be a
member of the CHR.

Armenia considers the promotion and protection of all human rights and
fundamental freedoms as a cornerstone for international peace, security
and development. During its ongoing term Armenia is bringing its active
participation to the deliberations of the Commission and has extended its
support and co-sponsorship to more than 150 resolutions adopted by the
CHR. As a newly independent country with only 12 year-old experience in
international affairs, Armenia has been able to formulate a balanced
approach to the country-specific resolutions, taking into consideration
both its national interest and universal values. Given its strong
attachment to the principle of the punishment of the crime of genocide,
Armenia has continuously introduced resolutions signifying the importance
of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of
Genocide and emphasising the need for its universal application.

Commission on Human Rights, composed of 53 States, is the major UN body to
deal with human rights issues. It is entrusted to elaborate human rights
standards and to monitor their implementation. During its regular annual
sessions the Commission examines a wide range of human rights issues:
civil and political rights, as well as economic, social and cultural
rights. The main themes include the right to self-determination, the right
to development, human rights of women, children, minorities, displaced
persons, etc. The Commission particularly focuses its attention on
violations of human rights in specific countries or territories and on
situations of specific human rights violations worldwide. It considers
such issues as torture and detention, freedom of expression, religious
intolerance, as well as the issues of relationship between globalisation,
poverty, terrorism and human rights.
[END]

ARMENIAN OPPOSITION RALLY STARTS, DEBATING EUROPEAN TALKS

A1+ web site
4 May 04

The opposition rally has started on Freedom Square on time. All the
opposition leaders are on the original stage.

The key topic of the rally is the events in Strasbourg (the session of
the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe). The opposition
finally has an opportunity to inform public of the course of the
debates on the the issue of the domestic political situation in the
country, and also about the fact that the Turkish and Azerbaijani
delegates did not participate at all in the debates and in the voting.

Asked if the rally will be a decisive one, the spokesman for the
political Justice bloc, Ruzana Khachatryan, said that they were
deciding something at every rally.

According to preliminary information, a procession will take place
after the rally. However, it is not known in what direction the crowd
will head.

ARMENIAN OPPOSITION RECURRENT RALLY GATHERED SEVERAL THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE IN
YEREVAN

16.04.2004 20:01

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Despite rainy weather several thousands of people joined a
rally organized by the united opposition at the depository of ancient
manuscripts of Matenadaran. To note, this time it is held not on the Liberty
Square as planned before, because of a measure dedicated to the Day of
Police, which has been arranged in the Theatre and Ballet Hall. Opposition
leaders, namely deputy representing Justice bloc Shavarsh Kocharian,
National Unity party leader Artashes Geghamian and some others stated that
in spite of “the authorities’ violence and persecution did not subdue the
will of the opposition and it still intends to urge the resignation of
President Robert Kocharian”. That is why many of them noted of symbolic
nature of the rally. However the opposition leaders refrained from making
any concrete statements regarding their further plans.

PRESS RELEASE
Department of Armenian Studies, Haigazian University
Beirut, Lebanon
Contact: Ara Sanjian
Tel: 961-1-353011
Email: [email protected]
Web:

NORA ARISSIAN LECTURES AT HAIGAZIAN UNIVERSITY ON SYRIAN MEMOIRS ON THE
ARMENIAN GENOCIDE

BEIRUT, Wednesday, 14 April, 2004 (Haigazian University Department of
Armenian Studies Press Release) – On Friday, 19 March 2004, the
Department of Armenian Studies hosted Dr. Nora Arissian, who delivered a
public lecture entitled “The Armenian Genocide in the Memoirs of the
Syrians.”

Syrian-born Arissian is a graduate of Damascus University and received
her Ph.D. from the Institute of Oriental Studies at the Armenian
National Academy of Sciences in Yerevan. She currently works in the
Embassy of the Republic of Armenia in Damascus and is the author of “The
Armenian Calamities in the Syrian Mind: The Position of Syrian
Intellectuals toward the Armenian Genocide,” published in Arabic in
Beirut in 2002. This book presents and analyzes the views and attitudes
of 43 contemporary Syrian thinkers on the Armenian Genocide (historians,
writers, journalists, political figures, etc.), almost all of whom
condemn what befell the Armenians during the First World War.

Arissian emphasized the importance of Syrian primary documents and
periodicals in analyzing the Armenian Genocide in the Ottoman Empire
during the First World War. These sources, however, have not to date
been accorded by Armenian Genocide scholars the importance, she thinks,
they deserve, especially in comparison to data emanating from European
and American governments, organizations and individuals.

Syria was not an independent, sovereign entity at the beginning of the
twentieth century, said Arissian. It did not, therefore, have diplomatic
or official documents, through which we can analyze today an official
Syrian standpoint toward the ongoing Armenian Genocide of 1915. That is
why the memoirs and oral testimonies of individual Syrians are even more
important than usual to understand the popular attitude toward these
massacres and deportations. These sources can also help us explain the
causes behind and the events of the Genocide from an Arab viewpoint.

Arissian said that Syrian Arabs today are largely sympathetic to the
Armenian plight during the Genocide. This attitude is partly conditioned
by the pan-Turkist ideology prevalent in the Ottoman Empire at the time,
which also aimed at the forced Turkification of other non-Turkish
elements in the empire, including Arabs. Arab intellectuals explain the
Genocide committed by the Young Turks as the “logical conclusion” of
earlier anti-Armenian massacres and other instances of violence in the
Ottoman Empire.

Arissian classified the various Syrian sources on the Armenian Genocide
currently available into four broad categories:
a) Newspapers published by Syrians both inside the country and in exile.
Arissian’s research has uncovered 500 articles making extensive
reference to Armenians and their suffering in 33 different political
periodicals published between 1877 and 1930. (She is now compiling these
articles into a book which will be published in Lebanon soon.)
b) The oral testimonies of actual witnesses of the Armenian Genocide.
Arissian has recorded the testimonies of 25 Arab witnesses, all born
between 1880 and 1919, including some who were the children of Armenian
women deportees. The information they provided was useful as regards the
various regions from which the Armenians had been deported as well as
the relationship of the Syrians with the Armenian deportees.
c) The oral testimonies of the children of Arab tribesmen who witnessed
the Genocide. Arissian described her interviews with the sons of the
governor in 1915 of the region of Sabkha (40 km south-west of Rakka),
the chief of the Arab al-Jarba tribe, the leader of the Kurdish al-Malla
tribal confederation, and with the writer, Abd al-Salam al-Ujayli, whose
father was a village headman and a director of deportations in the Rakka
region in 1915.
d) The published memoirs of political, cultural and other public
figures. The discussion of the latter formed the last and most extensive
part of Arissian’s lecture.

Arissian argued that the published memoirs of the writer and politician
Fakhri al-Barudi (1889-1066), the revolutionary activists Fawzi
al-Qawuqji and Ahmad Qadri (1893-1958), as well as the Ottoman diplomat
Amin Arslan (1893-1958) make only passing references to the Armenians
when discussing the characteristics of the Young Turk regime in the last
years of Ottoman rule. The lecturer dealt in more depth, however, with
the works of the politician Fares al-Khuri (1877-1962), the lawyer and
political activist Fayez al-Ghusayn (1883-1968) and the cultural and
public figure Muhammad Kurd Ali (1876-1953). Al-Khuri dwelt at length on
the murder of his fellow Ottoman parliamentarians of Armenian descent,
Krikor Zohrab and Vartkes, and its repercussions in the Ottoman
Parliament. Al-Ghusayn was briefly imprisoned as a political opponent by
the Young Turk regime during the war years and finally escaped to join
the rebel forces of Sharif Husayn in Arabia. Al-Ghusayn has a number of
writings that describe the Armenian deportations and massacres, the most
significant of which is a series of articles entitled ‘The Massacres in
Armenia,’ which was first published in the Egyptian periodical
al-Muqattam and was then reissued as a 62-page booklet. In various books
that he compiled, Kurd Ali in turn described the Armenian Genocide, the
forced migration of Armenians to Syria and tried to analyze the
possibility of the acculturation of these Armenian migrants into their
new milieu. Finally, Arissian also mentioned in this last part of her
lecture that another Syrian author, Yusif al-Hakim (1879-1979),
described in his memoirs, ‘Syria and the Ottoman Period,’ the massacres
against the Armenians in Cilicia and the neighboring northern districts
of modern Syria during the failed counter-revolution of 1909, which
aimed to return Sultan Abdulhamid II to power as an absolute monarch.

During the question-and-answer session that followed, Arissian admitted
that young Syrian Arabs are not generally aware of the sources she has
researched and the information that they contain, but she expressed
commitment and some optimism that Armenians must strive to spread the
appropriate knowledge and help form a favorable public opinion.

Haigazian University is a liberal arts institution of higher learning,
established in Beirut in 1955. For more information about its activities
you are welcome to visit its web-site at <;.
For additional information on the activities of its Department of
Armenian Studies, contact Ara Sanjian at <[email protected]>.

Caucasus Stability Under Threat as Armenia’s Kocharian Faces Opposition,
Azerbaijan’s Aliyev Issues Fighting Talk

WMRC Daily Analysis (World Markets Research Centre Limited)
April 15, 2004

By Dario Thuburn, WMRC Perspective

Significance

President Robert Kocharian’s government in Armenia is looking in trouble
and the Nagorno-Karabakh dispute between Armenia and Azerbaijan
increasingly fragile.

Implications

Domestic political pressure at home may push Kocharian’s government
into a more confrontational attitude towards Azerbaijan, with a
pre-emptive attack against an increasingly threatening enemy a
possible worst-case scenario. Azerbaijan’s Aliyev will also seek to
escalate tensions in the fragile stand-off as a way of putting
pressure on Turkey not to lift its blockade on Armenia.

Outlook

If Turkey lifts its blockade on Armenia, Russia’s leverage over the
country will be seriously diminished and regional economic development
will be boosted but this is only likely to happen over the
medium-term.

The question of what effects Georgia’s ‘rose revolution’ in November
2003 and the sweeping changes that have taken place in that country
will have on Georgia’s neighbours Armenia and Azerbaijan is fast
rising in prominence. In Armenia, the opposition has consolidated and
has made clear its specific intent of toppling President Robert
Kocharian’s strong-arm rule through a series of relatively large-scale
demonstrations that are ongoing. In Azerbaijan, newly installed and
relatively inexperienced President Ilham Aliyev has softened some
aspects of the authoritarian system in place but also signalled a more
nationalistic and tough attitude towards Armenia over the
Nagorno-Karabakh dispute. The region as a whole has come under the
international spotlight because of its rising importance as a source
and transit route for oil and gas from the Caspian sea.

Political Pressure

After international criticism of a crackdown on opposition
demonstrations by the Armenian authorities, most notably from the US
and the Council of Europe, Armenian President Robert Kocharian
yesterday said he was prepared to talk to opposition leaders who have
vowed to oust him from power. The opposition is questioning the result
of Kocharian’s re-election in March, which was deemed flawed by
international observers. So far they have limited their protest action
to recourse to the country’s Constitutional Court and boycotts of the
country’s parliament but, most probably inspired by the ‘rose
revolution’ in neighbouring Georgia, they have now embarked on a more
confrontational strategy, bringing thousands of disaffected people out
into the streets of the Armenian capital Yerevan. Police used water
cannons to break up an anti-government demonstration earlier this week
and dozens of police and protesters were reported injured, with
several opposition activists detained.

International Influence

The stand-off between government and opposition in Armenia is clearly
not only an issue limited to the country’s borders. The revolution in
Georgia could not have taken place without the implicit backing of the
international community, particularly the US, for opposition leaders
against President Eduard Shevardnadze. Then Russian Foreign Minister
Igor Ivanov tried and failed to broker a last-minute compromise
between Shevardnadze and his pro-Western opponents. Despite the
rhetoric of strong personal relations between new Georgian President
Mikhail Saakashvili and Russian President Vladimir Putin it is clear
that Georgia’s orientation is now more firmly pro-Western and the
country is slipping from Russia’s sphere of influence. Russian foreign
policy hawks are intent that the same should not happen in Armenia,
which has been traditionally strongly pro-Russian and where Russian
business plays a major role. Putin today urged Kocharian to uphold
stability and the rule of law amid the protests – a statement that
implied backing. The US State Department, on the other hand, expressed
‘concern’ and appeared to criticise the Armenian authorities’ handling
of the protests (see Armenia: 14 April 2004: US Criticises Armenian
Authorities for Demo Crackdown).

Fragile Peace

The confrontation could also have a negative impact on the delicate
‘frozen conflict’ with Azerbaijan over the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh
territory, which is currently occupied by pro-Armenian forces. Open
armed conflict was brought to an end through international mediation
in the early 1990s but low-intensity confrontation on the front line
has been ongoing and there is no formal peace agreement in place
between Armenia and Azerbaijan, with stability largely ensured by a
balance of forces on the ground. This balance is now under
threat. Azerbaijan is due to reap massive financial rewards from the
oil and gas windfall over the next few years, which it could use to
increase its military capability. The US, for one, has promised
defence assistance and Azerbaijan has been receiving training and
assistance from Turkey for several years now (see Azerbaijan: 6 April
2004: Azerbaijan is Better Prepared for War, National Television
Reports and Azerbaijan: 15 March 2004: US Steps Up Military Presence
in Azerbaijan, Pressures for Reforms).

Fighting Talk

Political rhetoric in Azerbaijan, which still faces the socio-economic
fall out of tens of thousands of internally displaced people from the
conflict has also been more combative recently, particularly as the
failure of high-level peace negotiations between Presidents Aliyev and
Kocharian has become increasingly clear. In an address to the Turkish
parliament yesterday. Aliyev said ‘Azerbaijan will liberate its own
territory whatever the price’. This is the kind of rhetoric that will
appeal to domestic populism and hawks in the establishment but it is
also a warning to Turkey not to lift its blockade on Armenia, which
has been in place since 1993. For his part, Kocharian in Armenia may
see the Nagorno-Karabakh issue as a helpful distraction to his
domestic political troubles, particularly as parts of the defence
establishment reckon a pre-emptive strike on Azerbaijan, before the
country has a chance to build up military might, would be beneficial.

Implications and Outlook

The dogs of war in the South Caucasus are not yet loose but it is
clear that the effects of momentous political change in Georgia, a
groundshift in Turkey’s foreign policy and the region’s rising
prominence on the energy map have the potential to undermine
stability. While it is still difficult to see the Armenian opposition
coming to power in the short-term, Georgia-style, the potential for an
escalation of tensions between Armenia and Azerbaijan is high. Turkey
too may change the complex geopolitical map of the region by lifting
an economic blockade on Armenia as a way of improving its standing
with the European Union, though this is only likely to happen over the
medium-term. The regional economic effects will be massive. The World
Bank estimates that the lifting of both the Azerbaijani and Turkish
blockades could increase Armenia’s GDP by as much as 30-38%. The
Turkish-Armenian Business Council has estimated that bilateral trade
could reach US$300m per year with the lifting of the blockade, a
drastic rise from the current US$70m. It would also lessen Armenia’s
dependence on Russia and therefore the influence of Russian politics
and business over the country, as well as undermining the mafia
structures that have profited from limited import routes and smuggling
over the past decade.

In the short-term, the ousting of President Robert Kocharian in
Armenia is possible. This would bring a more youthful, less corrupt,
but also more populist, leadership to power in a similar way to
Georgia’s new government. The likelihood is lessened however because
of Russia’s far stronger influence in Armenia, the power of mafia
structures within government, the opposition being less consolidated
and organised and the country being far less strategic than Georgia
for the international community. An announcement of the lifting of a
blockade between Turkey and Armenia is possible, though restrictions
are likely to be removed only gradually over the medium-term. In any
case, the risk of renewed conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan over
Nagorno-Karabakh is increased.

MSNBC
Europe
Cheapest places on earth: Armenia
Why should you plan a visit here? Besides being ultra-affordable,
Armenia offers an interesting glimpse of what happens to a culture
when East collides with West

The 12th century Armenian Apostolic cathedral Khorvirap is in the
foreground of snow-covered Mount Ararat in Khorvirap, Armenia
Photo: Misha Japaridze / AP

By Robert Kurkjian
Updated: 6:21 p.m. ET April 06, 2004

April issue, Budget Travel magazine – Its not a place that most people
automatically think of heading: just east of Turkey and north of
Iran. Armenia’s unusual position, pinioned between Arab and Western
cultures, has given it a dynamic, 3,000-year-old history, although
independence for the current republic dates only to its messy breakup
from the U.S.S.R. in the early 1990s. Being tucked into a corner of
the world, however, has its price advantages.

Strong coffee, 28″: Have it served in a demitasse, at one of the
hundreds of sidewalk cafis in Yerevan, the capital. In the summer
and fall, you can’t walk more than a block without passing a
street-side café where you can sit all day, even with just a
single cup. It’s considered rude to ask patrons to leave.

Free: The country’s ancient monuments, erected when Armenia was
ruled by, at various times, the Romans, Byzantines, Persians, and
Ottomans. The stone-arched cathedral at Echmiadzin dates back
1,700 years, and the spectacular Khor Virap Monastery, from the
17th century, overlooks the frosted peaks of Mt. Ararat, where
Noah’s ark came to rest.

A loaf of freshly baked bread, 20c: You want a full meal with it?
Figure on spending two or three dollars at most. Khorovats, barbecued
pork, is the country’s most popular dish.

A bottle of good wine to go with your meal, $2: Vintners in the
Armenian version of Napa Valley, the wine-growing regions of Areni and
Geytap in the southwest of the country, bottle mixed vintages while
you wait and charge as little as $1.

A kilogram (more than two pounds) of fresh-picked organic tomatoes or
cucumbers, 20c: In summer, produce is sold along the roads of the
Ararat Valley just outside Yerevan. Huge bags of apples and apricots
are about 20c, too.

A subway ride in Yerevan, 12c: That’s the new, inflated price; the
fare was less than 10c a year ago. Spring for a private cab ride
within the city center for about 85c, or hail a minivan, to cover
longer distances across town, for about 18c. Planning to see the
countryside? A bus from the capital to Stepanakert, a city 224 miles
away in the tiny, self-autonomous region of Karabagh, is only $3.

A museum ticket, 18c: There are dozens of state-operated museums, such
as the National Art Gallery, which under the Soviets was the
third-largest collection in the U.S.S.R. The country’s bounty of
artifacts dates to the infancy of Christianity and earlier.

Color film, $2.50: To process 24 pictures (the countrys common
fire-red poppy fields are a popular subject), the price is about the
same.

For $30 or less, a night at one of Yerevan’s Soviet-era hotels
(no-frills). A Western-style hotel (cable TV, gym) runs more like $130
– a stay of five nights would cost about what most Armenians make in a
year.

Copyright © 2004 Newsweek Budget Travel, Inc.

CIS security chief, Armenian official discuss cooperation

Arminfo
9 Apr 04

YEREVAN

The head of the Armenian National Security Service, Karlos Petrosyan,
the secretary- general of the Collective Security Treaty Organization
(CSTO), Nikolay Bordyuzha, and the CSTO deputy secretary-general,
Valeriy Semerikov, discussed regional security today.

The press service of the Armenian National Security Service told
Arminfo news agency that the meeting had discussed military and
political issues, changes in the operational situation and the
development and intensification of military cooperation within the
framework of the CSTO.

Opposition held sit-in Armenian capital ahead of another rally

Mediamax news agency
10 Apr 04

YEREVAN

The Armenian opposition does not see any more opportunities to realize
the change of power in the country by means of holding a referendum on
confidence in the president, one of the leaders of the opposition
Justice block, Albert Bazeyan, said in Yerevan today.

The opposition leaders met today their adherents, who are staging a
sit-in on Freedom Square in Yerevan, Mediamax’s correspondent
reports. About 150 opposition activists are on Freedom Square at
present.

Albert Bazeyan said that the opposition had practically refused the
idea of holding a referendum on confidence in the authorities and
demanded the unconditional resignation of Armenian President Robert
Kocharyan. According to him, this decision was made after the ruling
coalition, which has a majority in the Armenian National Assembly,
rejected yesterday the opposition’s proposal to put the issue of
holding a referendum on confidence in the authorities on the agenda.

The regular meeting of the Armenian opposition will be staged on
Freedom Square at 1800 today. The leaders of the Justice block and the
National Unity party stated that mass protest actions will continue
unless the president resigns.