‘NO CASES OF ARSON RECORDED’
AZG Armenian Daily
30/06/2006
On June 28, field assistants of Andrzej Kasprzyk, representative of
OSCE chairman for Nagorno Karabakh, carried out a monitoring upon the
request of Karabakh authorities. No cases of arson were recorded during
the monitoring. To remind, Azerbaijanis continually make a fuss about
the Armenian side setting fire to Azeri forests. The monitoring was
carried out along the Armenian-Azeri contact line and in the sites
of alleged fires.
NKR VICE FM DISCUSSES ISSUES OF HOLDING MONITORING ON AZERBAIJAN-KARABAKH CONFRONTATION LINE WITH ASSISTANTS OF PRIVATE REP OF OSCE HEAD
Arka News Agency, Armenia
June 28 2006
STEPANAKERT, June 27. /ARKA/. NKR Vice Foreign Minister Masis Mailyan
and assistants of the office of the Private Representative of the OSCE
Chairman-in-Office (PROC) discussed the issues of holding monitoring
on the Azerbaijan-Karabakh confrontation line, the press service of
the NKR Foreign Ministry reported.
Mailyan expressed satisfaction with the fact that the OSCE office
positively responded to the initiative of the NKR FM to hold monitoring
in the frontier zone to give an actual evaluation of the situation and
make sure that Baku makes false declarations about alleged burning
of frontier settlements in the territories that are currently under
the control of the NKR.
During the meeting, OSCE Chair-in-Office’s Field assistants Peter
Key (UK) introduced newly-appointed field assistant of the OSCE PROC
Hunter Folk (Germany) to Mailyan.
RENE VAN DER LINDEN: "PACE SPECIAL GROUP WILL DEBATE ON FIRES IN NK"
Today, Azerbaijan
June 28 2006
The Council of Europe Secretary General Terry Davis wished that the
Nagorno Karabakh conflict be resolved by peaceful way soon and stressed
the importance of both parties taking interest in the resolution.
The Secretary General stated these while responding to the question
of an Armenia journalist in the news conference in the frames of the
PACE Summer Session.
As APA reports, Mr.Davis stated Azerbaijanis also lived in Nagorno
Karabakh alongside with Armenians and regretted for the delay of the
resolution of the conflict.
"This conflict should be taken serious, and solution ways should be
found as soon as possible. However, use of force by any parties is
unacceptable. Both sides already suffered loss of life during these
years, and I denounce these," Terry Davis said.
PACE President Rene van der Linden also held a pres conference.
Responding to the question of APA Europe correspondent regarding recent
massive fires in the occupied Azerbaijani territories set by Armenians,
the PACE President said the issues of preventing fires in forests and
massive fires will be discussed at the sitting of the Summer Session
June 30.
Mr.van der Linden also said PACE special group will debate the issue
on fires in Nagorno Karabakh. He noted that it would be advisable
if rapporteur for Nagorno Karabakh conflict Rassel Johnston in his
report touches on the issue of preventing these fires.
"Such cases caused by one of the parties to the conflict are very
unpleasant," Rene van der Linden said.
The PACE President considers happening of such cases due to the lack
of dialogue between the parties.
URL:
THE PALESTINIAN GENOCIDE
Andy Martin
Political Gateway, FL
June 28 2006
(WASHINGTON, DC) (June 28, 2006) Israelis invaded Gaza today,
ostensibly seeking to "rescue" Corporal Gilad Shalit but in reality
seeking to unleash their blood lust for vengeance against the
Palestinian people. The Israeli fuhrers are outraged at the way
a hapless band of Islamic extremists have demonstrated Israel’s
impotence to the world.
Nothing is more central to Israelis than their constant preening
about their self-proclaimed "superpower" status, their "secret"
nuclear arsenal, and the idea that President Bush has promised to
shed American blood to protect Israel’s conquests in the Middle East.
So when a small band of Palestinians exposes Israeli impotence,
punishment must be imposed on the entire Palestinian People.
Unfortunately for peace-loving Israelis, their leaders’ wrath
is self-destructive and self-destroying. The Israeli government
manufactures anti-Semitism and anti-Israel activism at a breakneck
pace. Today’s events crystallize the counterintuitive nature of
Israel’s slow death and suicidal impulses.
We begin with the basic, the obvious, the unavoidable: being a soldier
puts you at risk. By the very act of putting on a uniform and being
stationed in a military encampment a solider is at risk and in harm’s
way. When Palestinians set up rockets, they get attacked. The Israelis
bomb them. Palestinians likewise attack Israelis for occupying to
their nation. There is tragic but ineluctable symmetry in all of
this killing.
Americans in Iraq are attacked and killed, merely because of their
uniformed status. Every general knew invading Iraq would cost lives.
Only Vice president Dick Cheney thought otherwise. But, no one forces
anyone anywhere to wear a uniform, not here, not there, not anywhere.
Indeed, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s own son is a refusenik,
someone who refuses to perform military service in the Israeli
wehrmacht (he’s no fool).
Another obvious truth is that captured soldiers must be rescued.
There is nothing wrong with that. It is part of the ethos of military
loyalty and unit solidarity. But Israelis and their fellow travelers in
the Bush Administration have been watching old tapes of the rescue at
Entebbe (Uganda), long past the sell-by date of that ancient mission.
Entebbe involved the rescue of helpless civilians hijacked and held
in Uganda. Israelis launched a dangerous mission and succeeded. The
result was heroic status for the rescuers, and the enduring myth that
rescuing people is Hollywood-style easy.
Rescues are not. Just ask former president Jimmy Carter about his
rescue mission in Iran. Or the Americans who led the unsuccessful
rescue at the Hanoi Hilton.
On the other hand, when North Koreans took an entire ship hostage,
the U. S. S. Pueblo, the United States did not invade North Korea
and launch a war, and the men were eventually released. The U. S.
Military leadership realized that even in the face of an obvious
act of war, the nation’s greater interests must prevail. And so the
Pueblo’s crew waited.
President Bush faced the same choice when the Chinese recently took an
American surveillance plane captive. He waited; and the crew came home.
Gaza and Corporal Shalit should have been no different. In Gaza and
occupied Palestine there are no TV dramas or Hollywood potential to
fuel the rescue of captured personnel. Fighting in Gaza is deadly,
and ultimately self-defeating. Shalit knew that. He was a solider.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice properly counseled patience
in the wake of Corporal Shalit’s capture. Israel rejected her wise
advice. Arrogance and emotion triumphed over reason and the Israeli
national interest.
Here we should consider the lessons of history. When the Turks
slaughtered Armenians in World War I, there was no "genocide"
because the word genocide had yet to be invented. When Nazis began
slaughtering Europe’s Jews, it was not genocide. The term still had
not been invented.
The term "genocide" was created by Raphael Lemkin in 1943. Genocide
became an international term of law with the United Nations’ adoption
of the Convention on Genocide in 1948. Retrospectively, we now realize
that the concept of genocide could be applied to the Armenian slaughter
or the massacre of European Jews by the Nazis.
Today the civilized world’s only practitioners of genocide are the
Israelis. Golda Meir was known for her comment that Palestine was
seized "by a People without a land," because it was "a land without a
people." Actually, "people" had inhabited the land mass of Palestine
since the dawn of civilization. The concept of a "land without a
people" was a racist and genocidal concoction that Meir used to
justify Israeli expansionism.
The insanity continues. Instead of using its overwhelming military and
economic strength to make peace with its neighbors, Israel continues
to make war, hoping against hope that evil methods and evil minds
can triumph over the logic of history and the solidarity of the world
community. It can’t happen.
In his typically understated style Palestinian President Mahmoud
Abbas today accused Israel of "crimes against humanity" for invading
Gaza. While today’s invasion is undoubtedly a crime against humanity,
the attack on Gaza is more; it is part of an orchestrated Israeli
campaign of genocide against the Palestinian people.
And, unlike people in the time of the Armenian slaughter and Nazi
massacres we cannot pretend that genocide has not yet been invented.
We are all witnesses to the Palestinian Genocide.
In today’s attacks, hundreds of thousands have lost electricity;
public health is endangered. Food was already perilously low.
Infrastructure has been damaged beyond repair. All this for Corporal
Shalit?
What did the Palestinian people do to deserve these attacks? Why aren’t
they justified in retaliating against Israel and Israelis, and engaging
in mutual rounds of destruction until there is truly no people and
no land in the territory of these two warring groups? Hollywood has
a precedent for this: War of the Roses, a divorce drama of two people
intent on self-hate and self-destruction.
Who destroy each other.
Whenever I write a column that compares Israelis to Nazis I get a
spate of pro-Israel hate mail, castigating me for comparing the two.
But I state unhesitatingly that making war against an innocent civilian
population caught in the midst of a war is a Nazi-style atrocity and
a crime against humanity. Genocide.
Civilians did not take Corporal Shalit prisoner, and they can’t
release him. What does blowing up a Gazan bridge or power plant do
to advance the corporal’s freedom? Nothing.
So there must be another explanation for the fury of the Israeli
junta in Tel Aviv. There is: genocide.
When Italy attacked Ethiopia, the League of Nations stood silent. The
word remained mute at the growing evidence of the Nazi holocaust.
Today we watch Israeli storm troopers savage a helpless civilian
population under the pretence and pretext that they are conducting a
"rescue" mission. Once again the world is shamed. And once again,
Israelis continue along the path to their own inevitable demise.
In war, there are prisoners, attacks, and death. Soldiers know that.
They accept those risks. If Israel claims it is at war, it must act
as though it is a nation at war, both respecting limits on civilian
casualties and the endangerment of its troops. The fact that Israelis
cannot be trusted to conduct war ultimately means that this "nation"
cannot be trusted to be a nation. Israelis are in the process of
conducting the eventual and inevitable genocide of their own people
and their own nation.
And as the United States sits silently by and aids and abets in this
suicidal calumny against a civilian population, we are as guilty as
the Israelis whose blood-soaked fingers are carrying out the rape of
Gaza. And we wonder why they hate us. And we wonder why we will be
targeted again. And we wonder why the world looks with scorn on our
own Israeli-style campaign in Iraq. Yes, we really do wonder.
In closing, I affirm that the life of every soldier is precious. A
uniform should be worn with great pride. But the life of a nation is
even more precious. Generals must sometimes send their troops into
danger and death. But in elevating Corporal Shalit’s life to extreme
proportions Israel has debased and endangered the Israeli state and
taken another steps towards its demise. Unfortunately, as Israeli
Abba Eban once said, "The Israelis have never missed an opportunity
to miss an opportunity." Oh, Eban said that about the Palestinians.
War of the Roses.
ARREST AS MEASURE OF RESTRAINT CHOSEN AGAINST ALL THOSE ACCUSED OF MILITARY SERVICE EVASION IN 2005
Noyan Tapan
Jun 28 2006
YEREVAN, JUNE 28, NOYAN TAPAN. In 2005, Armenian courts examined 76
cases against 76 persons under Article 327 of the RA Criminal Code:
evasion from regular military service or training excercises. In all
cases, arrest was chosen as a measure of restraint.
Spokeswoman for the RA Prosecutor General Sona Truzian stated this
when responding to NT correspondent’s question about why arrest as a
measure of restraint was chosen with respect to the editor-in-chief of
the newspaper "Zhamanak Yerevan" Arman Babajanian. She said that the
matter concerns a crime that poses a public danger of high degree –
evasion from regular military conscription, so no other measure of
restraint could be chosed in the given case.
PACE: AZERBAIJAN EXPERIENCES SERIOUS PROBLEMS WITH DEMOCRACY
PanARMENIAN.Net
27.06.2006 18:18 GMT+04:00
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ The hot debates on Azerbaijan’s fulfillment of
obligations to the Council of Europe were not much different from
the previous ones.
Rapporteurs Herkel and Gross again said Baku neglects its commitments
to the CoE. They also pointed out to the unwillingness of the
authorities to conduct democratic elections and secure rights and
freedoms of the citizens.
Gross said the authorities try to justify the problems available
by the presence of refugees and consequences of war. They think
that if they have oil they can neglect the laws and the opinion of
the international community. This was the reason for the falsified
parliamentary election in 2005 and similar election in May 2006.
During the debates some parliamentarians from Eastern Europe and
Turkey supported Azerbaijan and offered to recognize the Azeri
delegation mandate.
As for the speeches of the Azeri delegation members, they were
remarkable with emotionality and absence of arguments. The speeches
assured that the Council of Europe should understand that Azerbaijan
is a young state and he should be assisted but not criticized.
With majority of votes the resolution and recommendations submitted
by Gross and Herkel were adopted. The rapporteurs said Azerbaijan
experiences serious problems with democracy and fundamental freedoms
such as elections, freedom of speech and other fields. In spring
2007 the PACE will again revert to the commitments to be fulfilled by
Azerbaijan. Till that time the PACE will proceed with the monitoring
of all the spheres of life, reported Turan.
OSCE TO HOLD NEXT MONITORING OF CONTACT LINE BETWEEN KARABAKH AND AZERI ARMED FORCES
PanARMENIAN.Net
27.06.2006 13:51 GMT+04:00
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ According to the mandate of the OSCE
Chairman-in-Office the recurrent monitoring of the contact line between
Karabakh and Azeri Armed Forces is planned June 28. The OSCE monitoring
will be held in the west of Yusifjanly village of Agdam region on
Tuesday. Imre Palatinus and Harry Eronen, field assistants to the
special envoy of the OSCE Chairman-in-Office, will hold monitoring
in the Azerbaijani side of the frontline. Yuriy Aberle, Gurter Fork
and Peter Key, special envoy’s field assistants, are in charge of
monitoring in the Armenian side of the contact line, reports Trend.
CATHOLICOS VISITED THE HISTORICAL ISLAND OF THE SEA OF MARMARA
A1+
[06:45 pm] 23 June, 2006
During the visit to Turkey Catholicos of All Armenians Garegin II paid
a visit to the island Heypel together with Patriarch of Constantinople
Bartholomew I and Patriarch of Armenians of Constantinople Archbishop
Mesrop Mutafyan. They visited the Greek Orthodox church of Holy
Trinity and the famous theological seminary.
The Catholicos of All Armenians prayed for the re-opening of the
seminary which was closed down by the Turkish authorities in 1970s. His
Holiness mentioned that the Armenian Church always supports his sister
churches in their misfortunes.
The Armenian and Greek delegations visited the historical library of
the island and got acquainted with the monastery complex.
GERMAN TV REPORTERS IN NAGORNY KARABAKH TO SHOT TWO SHORTS ABOUT
EVERYDAY LIFE OF KARABAKH PEOPLE
Stepanakert, June 23. ArmInfo. German TV reporters are currently in
Nagorny Karabakh to shot two shorts about the live and the people of
the region.
ArmInfo’s special correspondent to Stepanakert reports the first film
will tell about women-fighters of Karabakh war, the second about
the post-war restoration in Nagorny Karabakh. In an interview to
Artsakh Public Radio, TV reporter Thomas Iberg said the films will be
demonstrated on 2 popular Germany TV channels. German audience want
to know about the everyday life in Nagorny Karabakh and the post-war
restoration, T. Iberg said. The TV reporters met with local officials,
the participants of Karabakh war, youth, as well as visited the
Museum of Military Glory and the Missing. Documentary records made
by Karabakh journalists in the course of the military actions will
be used in the films.
SERGE SARGSIAN TO LEAVE FOR MINSK TO PARTICIPATE IN SITTINGS OF COMMITTEE OF CSTO SECURITY COUNCILS SECRETARIES AND COUNCIL OF DEFENCE MINISTERS
Noyan Tapan
Jun 20 2006
YEREVAN, JUNE 20, NOYAN TAPAN. The delegation headed by the Secretary
of the National Security Council under the Armenian President, the
RA Defence Minister Serge Sargsian on June 21 leaves for Minsk in
order to participate in the sitting of the Committee of Secretaries of
the Security Councils of the Collective Security Treaty Organization
(CSTO) and the sitting of the Council of the CSTO Defence Ministers. NT
was informed about it from the spokesman for the RA defence minister
Colonel Seyran Shahsuvarian.