Author: Maghakian Mike

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

MARY DANIELYAN LECTURES AT HAIGAZIAN UNIVERSITY ON THE CONTIBRUTION OF
TOROS TORAMANIAN TO THE STUDY OF ARMENIAN ARCHITECTURE

BEIRUT, Friday, 9 July, 2004 (Haigazian University Department of
Armenian Studies Press Release) – Mrs. Mary Danielyan lectured at
Haigazian University on “The Contribution of Toros Toramanian to the
Study of Armenian Architecture” on Thursday, 10 June, 2004.

Danielyan is a graduate of the Yerevan Polytechnic Institute and worked
after 1973 as an expert on the reconstruction of historical monuments in
the Soviet Armenian Ministry of Construction and later in the Board for
the Preservation of Historical and Cultural Monuments. She was chief
architect, author or project manager of numerous reconstruction projects
of historical monuments in Armenia, including Garni, Makaravank,
Goshavank, Zvartnots and Noravank. From 1999 to 2003, Danielyan was the
chief architect of Zvartnots. Since 2003, she has been project manager
in the Architecture and Engineering Section of the Holy See of
Echmiadzin. She has also published a number of scientific articles on
some of these restoration projects.

Danielyan began her lecture by providing a biography of Toros
Toramanian, whom she described as a “talented artist and theoretician,
who acquainted the world with Armenian architecture.” Toramanian was
born in 1864 in the town of Shabin Karahissar, then part of the Ottoman
Empire. He graduated from the Constantinople Lyceum of Fine Arts and in
the next few years designed a number of private residences for the rich,
as well as public buildings in Constantinople, Bulgaria and Romania.

Danielyan said that the lack of studies on Armenian architecture had
troubled Toramanian since his student days. In 1902, he accepted an
offer from Garo Basmajian in Paris to take part in an expedition to the
medieval Armenian capital of Ani, which was then part of the Russian
Empire. Toramanian participated in the excavations that the Russian
Caucasologist Nicholas Marr was conducting in Ani and was awed with what
he saw. Toramanian later took his research notes to Prof. Jozef
Strzygowski in Vienna. In 1918 the latter published a two-volume work,
Die Baukunst der Armenier und Europa [The Architecture of the Armenians
and Europe], acknowledging his debt to Toramanian. In 1921, Ani was
annexed to Turkey, and Toramanian could not return there to continue his
research. He asked Strzygowski in 1925 to return his notes, but to no avail.

When a committee was established in 1923 to preserve Soviet Armenia’s
historical monuments, Toramanian became its chief expert and
participated in the reconstruction of parts of the Echmiadzin cathedral.
He also compiled the inventory of the Division of Architecture in the
History Museum of Armenia. Toramanian died in 1934. His published works
include a number of studies on the churches of Zvartnots, Gagikashen and
Tekor, as well the historical and cultural monuments of the Aragatsoyn
and Shirak regions, including the medieval church at Yereruyk.

The second part of Danielyan’s lecture focused on Toramanian’s
contribution to the study of the Church of St. Gregory the Illuminator
or Zvartnots, the magnum opus, according to speaker, of medieval
Armenian architecture. The name Zvartnots, she explained, means ‘the
abode of angels.’ The church was built by the Catholicos Nerses III of
Tayk in 642-662, a period which also witnessed the first Arab invasions
of Armenia. The site chosen was believed to be the place where King
Trdat had met St. Gregory the Illuminator, who converted Armenia to
Christianity, after his release from the dungeon at Khor Virap. A
smaller church had existed in that same place before the seventh
century. The initial plan of Nerses III was to build not only a new and
bigger church, but also a city nearby. The latter part of his dream did
not materialize. The Church of Zvartnots has two altars, one of which
was constructed in Byzantine style in 652 to enable the Emperor
Constantine to receive communion in this new church according to
Chalcedonian traditions. The Church of Zvartnots stood for 300 years.
With its attendant constructions, it was the seat of the Armenian
Catholicos for some time, and Nerses III is believed to have been buried
within its compound.

Toramanian first participated in the excavations of Zvartnots at the
invitation of the Rev. Father Khachig Dadian in 1904. Toramanian was
highly impressed by Zvartnots. He said that although Zvartnots was not
as large as the Church of Hagia Sophia in Constantinople or the Pantheon
in Rome, its architectural style was highly original and it could,
hence, compete with Hagia Sophia through its high artistic traits.
Toramanian was unhappy, however, with Dadian’s unprofessional methods in
excavating the site. The latter frequently used dynamite to transport
the large pieces. That same year, Toramanian presented his own
reconstruction of Zvartnots. It was based on a newly discovered model of
the Church of St. Gregory the Illuminator (Gagikashen), constructed by
King Gagik I in Ani in the tenth century. Gagikashen was reputed to have
been built in the Zvartnots style. Toramanian’s theory was immediately
criticized by Dadian and Ter Sargsian, a renowned architect from St.
Petersburg. After Toramanian’s death, his main critic was the architect
Stepan Mnatsakanian. Most experts in Armenian architecture do accept,
however, the validity of Toramanian’s proposed reconstruction; Danielyan
described it as Toramanian’s magnum opus.

Today, only five percent of the church’s original structure survives,
said Danielyan. Following its destruction, the stones were used for a
variety of purposes by people living in its vicinity. In the year 2002,
the Lincy Foundation financed the partial reconstruction of this
monument, based on Libarid Sadoyan’s plan, which had been approved in
1986. Moreover, the Hayastan All-Armenian Fund funded a separate project
to survey and digitalize all 2050 stone fragments still standing in the
Zvartnots compound. All these fragments now have their own ID cards,
forming an archive consisting of 30 volumes or 56 CDs.

The second part of Danielyan’s lecture was accompanied by a slide show
of both archival and recent pictures related to the excavations and
reconstruction of Zvartnots.

In a very lively question-and-answer session that followed the lecture,
Danielyan answered a variety of questions related to local and foreign
influences in the architectural design of Zvartnots, the causes of its
destruction and the various signs carved by masons on stones used during
construction, as well as the bas-relief of a Zvartnots-type church on
the door of Sainte Chapelle in France, Toramanian’s international
stature, the whereabouts of his notes used by Strzygowski, etc.
Danielyan told the audience that three years ago Toramanian’s
granddaughter had sold all of her grandfather’s remaining archives to
the Armenian Board for the Preservation of Historical Monuments. These
archives are now being catalogued, and the Armenian National Academy of
Sciences is planning the publication in three volumes of Toramanian’s
scientific works. The Church of Zvartnots itself cannot be reconstructed
according to internationally agreed criteria, for very few of its
original stones remain in place.

Danielyan’s lecture on Toros Toramanian was the first in a series of two
to be held at Haigazian University. Her lecture tour to Beirut was
initiated by Haydjar, the Association of Armenian Professionals
(Architects and Engineers) in Lebanon.

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]>.

KavkazCenter.com
11 07 2004 Sun. 22:18 Djokhar Time

Ossetia-Georgia: war on the horizon?

After America supported the peaceful transition of power from former
Georgian president Eduard Sheavrdnadze to young oppositional group headed by
charismatic leader Mikhail Saakashvili, US Secretary of State Colin Powell
called for immediate withdrawal of the Russian troops from Georgia and was
insisting that Georgia’s future must be free from Russian intervention.

Russia is worrying about it, figuring that the actions of the West are
interference into its domestic affairs, even though Moscow is missing the
fact that former Soviet republics are really former republics.

The latest events in Georgia have shown that the confrontation between
Georgia and its autonomy, South Ossetia, are unlikely to end just with angry
escapades or reciprocal invectives. If Russia gets involved in the active
confrontation, the danger that the war might spread towards the South
Caucasus will become very real.

Judging by Moscow’s first indirect reaction, the Kremlin will not be
standing aside if war operations in South Ossetia resume. But still, there
is no complete guarantee that Moscow made its final decision not to give up
that republic. So far you never know what pressure factors on Moscow
Washington may have yet.

Nevertheless, in Russia you can already hear some calls for integrating
South Ossetia into the Russian Federation. But Georgian central government
in Tbilisi is hoping for the Western states, which are for having Ossetian
autonomy as part of Georgia. Not only the West, which Georgia views as the
key arbitrator, is an intermediary in the exchange of views on the Ossetian
issue.

There is Turkey as well. Russian government does not trust the steps that
Turkey has been taking, such as «The Caucasus Security Agreement» signed by
Turkey and Georgia, which claims «with no superfluous diplomacy» (as Russian
sources put it) that not only Russia has the right to be present in the
Caucasus.

It is a known fact that in order to retain their influence in the Caucasus,
Russians have been using the disagreements artificially fomented by Moscow,
and provoking interethnic conflicts. The hand of Moscow is clearly seen in
the conflicts between Azerbaijan and Armenia, Ingushetia and North Ossetia,
North Ossetia and Georgia (in South Ossetia), between Georgia, Abkhazia and
Adjaria, between Karachaevans and Cherkesians, etc.

Depending on the situation, the opposing sides are provided with mercenaries
and weapons borrowed from the Russian army. Russia is trying to retain its
influence and its military presence in the Caucasus while making someone
else do the work and making it look like Russia itself is standing aside.
All kinds of methods and options are used for that purpose.

Thus, Russia’s puppets in South Ossetia are already voicing the Kremlin’s
instructions that Russia is allegedly staying away from the Caucasus
problems and left their allies to the mercy of fate. According to Moscow’s
scenario, if war operations resume, South Ossetian breakaway government in
Tskhinvali will get assistance from unrecognized pro-Russian republics and
from a number of «subjects of the Russian Federation» in the North Caucasus.

North Ossetia, Abkhazia, Transdniestria (de-facto independent pro-Russian
area near Moldova, Dniester River region), and Stavropol and Kuban Cossacks
(Southern Russia) will come to the rescue to help South Ossetia.

«South Ossetia has agreements about military aid with Abkhazia and
Transdniestria, as well as with Ters and Kuban Cossacks», Director of
Swedish-based Center for Strategic Research «Central Asia and the Caucasus»,
Murad Esenov, told RBC Daily.

President of Transdniestrian Moldovan Republic, Igor Smirnov, has already
made an official statement.

«In case of aggression we will not be standing aside, we will provide
comprehensive aid to our brothers, including military aid», Transdniestrian
leader told journalists.

Military storages in Transdniestria have huge amounts of ammunition, so the
help from Tiraspol (capital of Transdniestria) cannot be underestimated. So,
the new Georgian-Ossetian war may actually develop into an international
conflict right away.

Out of the latest events around South Ossetia we must also mention the
address of Tskhinvali’s leadership (South Ossetia) to Moscow with the appeal
to let the republic be integrated into Russia. Russian Council of Federation
reacted to this appeal. The Council of Federation `expressed concern with
the escalation of tensions and aggravation of the situation in the zone of
the Georgian-Ossetian conflict».

Russian parliamentarians mentioned that the «aggravation of the situation in
South Ossetia caused tension mounting all across the Caucasus» and offered
Georgian government in Tbilisi (Georgian capital) to «take all measures
necessary to implement the plans of combined control commission, dated June
2 this year». It should also be reminded that this is when the decision was
made to have Georgian troops pulled out of the territory of South Ossetia.

Speaking before the journalists, Chairman of the Council of Federation
Sergei Mironov stated that Russia is for Georgia’s territorial integrity,
but Russia still believes that all conflicts should be resolved peacefully.

Thus, on behalf of Moscow the Council of Federation virtually pointed
Georgia at the danger in changing the status quo of South Ossetia and the
danger in Georgia’s attempts to establish its control in that republic. It
means that South Ossetia still remains under the military patronage of
Russia.

Ahmad of Ichkeria,
for Kavkaz-Center
2004-06-11 00:15:11

Pravda, Russia
July 7 2004

Margelov on CFE ratification

18:34 2004-07-07
The Conventional Forces in Europe Treaty (CFE) ratified on Wednesday
by the Federation Council (upper house of parliament) allows Russia
to preserve military presence in Armenia and Ukraine, Federation
Council international committee head Mikhail Margelov told RIA
Novosti.

“The treaty complicates disguised and quick deployment of combined
arms groups and hinders starting the so-called classic wars on
European territory,” he said.

Speaking about the ratified CFE, Margelov said the document envisages
mutual inspections and consultations of the countries that joined it,
which provides a possibility to develop military cooperation between
Russia and NATO.

Speaking on the delay in Baltic states’ accession to the adapted CFE,
Margelov said this situation “will fix the existence in Europe of the
so-called gray zones.” This, in the Russian senator’s opinion, “will
testify to NATO’s intention to build up armaments directly on Russian
borders,” which will provoke a relevant reaction of Moscow and entail
distrust.

Mikhail Margelov concluded that Russia is interested in the adapted
CFE and expects from its Western partners and neighbors loyalty to
European security principles.

Palm Beach Post, FL
July 3 2004

Hastings seeks presidential role in European-U.S. body

Larry Lipman, Palm Beach Post Washington Bureau
Sunday, July 4, 2004

WASHINGTON — Rep. Alcee Hastings thinks he can offer an alternative
voice for the United States in its dealings with Europe. Later this
week, he may get the chance.

The six-term congressman from Miramar whose district includes part of
Palm Beach County, is one of the leading candidates to become
president of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Organization for
Security and Cooperation in Europe, a group established in 1991 of
lawmakers from 55 countries. The election will be held Friday at the
assembly’s summer meeting in Edinburgh, Scotland.

A Democrat who has been at odds with the Bush administration’s
unilateral approach to foreign policy, Hastings said he would not
“rail against the United States” if he becomes the Parliamentary
Assembly president. He would, however, “provide a counterweight to
some of what the Europeans are hearing from this administration.”

For example, Hastings believes the Bush administration has given the
cold shoulder to emerging democracies such as Lithuania in the former
Soviet bloc.

After a half-century under communism, Lithuania and other former
Soviet countries are finding their way into the European community
and adjusting to democracy, “but they’re not going to have an instant
Americana-western style democracy overnight,” Hastings said. “It’s
going to take time.”

Instead of virtually ignoring such emerging democracies, Hastings
said lawmakers from more established democratic countries should work
with their counterparts in Lithuania and elsewhere to strengthen and
support their efforts.

Hastings said he’d like to meet with the president of Belarus to
encourage that country — a presumed haven for unaccounted-for
nuclear weapons and illicit gun-running — to move toward a
democratic government.

“The approach that America takes right now is that Belarus is off the
map,” Hastings said. “We need to understand that they need help, and
it isn’t just criticizing them or standing off that’s going to make
the difference.”

Hastings also believes the United States should take a more accepting
approach to the International Criminal Court, which was established
in 1998 by a treaty known as the Rome Statute. So far, 94 countries
have ratified the treaty. The United States is not one of them.

He said he understands the administration’s concern that “American
soldiers could be tried by people not favorable toward us,” but he
believes exemptions could be made for American military while still
participating in the court.

“It doesn’t look good for us not be be included,” he said.

Has Republican backing

One of the Parliamentary Assembly’s major roles is to promote free
elections. Something Hastings said he would play an active role in
pursuing if he is elected. The assembly president selects delegations
of lawmakers to monitor elections throughout Europe, particularly in
the emerging democracies. The president also appoints delegations to
mediate disputes between countries, such as the conflict Azerbaijan
and Armenia are engaged in over the territory of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Hastings, who is one of the assembly’s nine vice presidents elected
to serve for staggered three-year terms, said one of his top
priorities would be to strengthen the relationship between members of
Congress and members of European parliamentary bodies. One way to do
that, he said, would be to have frequent transatlantic conference
calls among lawmakers, rather than having the groups wait for the
four regularly scheduled assembly meetings each year.

“My whole commitment is to strengthen the transatlantic
relationship,” Hastings said.

He also wants to continue the efforts of outgoing assembly President
Bruce George, a British member of Parliament, to establish a
relationship between the organization and the United Nations.

If elected, Hastings would be the first American and the first member
of a country’s ethnic minority to become the assembly president.

Although he is a Democrat, Hastings has the backing of the
Republican-led American delegation. House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert
wrote a letter to all assembly members last month urging them to
support Hastings.

“Never one to retreat from a challenge, Alcee Hastings possesses an
instinctive ability to identify solutions and build common ground for
their implementation,” Hastert said in his letter.

Could aid local businesses

Although the job would require him to make at least eight trips to
Europe next year, Hastings said becoming president would make him a
more valuable congressman and could boost South Florida.

Hastings is a senior member of the House Intelligence Committee and
the ranking Democrat on its subcommittee on terrorism and homeland
security. He said the travels to Europe would allow him to discuss
intelligence and security concerns with his European counterparts as
well as American personnel in those countries.

The travels also would give him a chance to identify business
opportunities in developing European countries, which he could pass
on to South Florida companies, he said.

Having an American at the helm will be important next year when the
assembly holds its summer meeting in Washington, the first time ever
in the United States, Hastings said. If he’s elected, he would make
sure that Hastert is invited to address the assembly. He’d also
invite the president of the United States — regardless of whether
that is George Bush, whom Hastings opposes, or John Kerry, whom
Hastings supports.

Although he’s confident about his chances, Hastings is philosophical
about the outcome. He faces at least one declared candidate, Michel
Voisin, a member of the French National Assembly who unsuccessfully
ran in 2002, and possibly a second, Kimmo Kilgunene, a member of the
Finnish Parliament.

“It’s just an honor to be able to compete at that level and… if I
am defeated, aw shucks, I got further than any other American. No
other American has ever sought the office before.”

Newsday (New York)
July 4, 2004 Sunday
NASSAU AND SUFFOLK EDITION

BY STEPHANIE MCCRUMMEN. STAFF WRITER

On Sundays, Josephine and Richard Cawley would often trade their
everyday worries for long drives east, with no particular destination
in mind.

They’d leave their house in Williston Park and head toward the end of
the expressway, beyond houses and traffic and loud things, and when
time came to fork north or south, they usually picked north.

Soon, they were speeding past open fields and the quiet gray of the
Long Island Sound.

They felt an affinity for it. They made the drive again and again.
Then one day Richard Cawley saw that a motel they often passed was
for sale, a one-story strip of 15 rooms along North Road, facing the
water. He decided to take early retirement from the phone company,
and at the end of June 1994, he and Josephine bought the place.

During summer months, they moved into one of the rooms while they ran
the motel, and soon, a novel feeling settled over Josephine.

“Strangely enough – you wouldn’t understand … ” she began,
apologetically. “I’m from England and my husband’s from Ireland.
We’ve been here 40 years, but up until 10 years ago, I never felt at
home on Long Island. I never felt at home until I came here. For the
first time, I felt settled.”

What Josephine Cawley found was what generations of Greek and
Armenian families have found at the unassuming motel they book solid
summer after summer: the paradox of a temporary place that feels
familiar, like home.

“They come here because it reminds them of where they came from,”
Josephine said of her guests, and herself.

Since the Cawleys’ Sunday drives, the North Fork increasingly has
become like the tonier South Fork: real estate prices have
skyrocketed as people from Manhattan have bought summer homes.
Wineries have flourished and some art galleries, and now Greenport
has a boutique hotel that offers reflexology and herbal bath
treatments. Billy Joel bought a place.

But Cawley’s Southold Beach Motel is much as it has been since the
1950s. It is all yellow siding and 15 screen doors that open to a
deck with chairs facing the water. And if its blue is not as bright
as the Aegean in Greece or Lake Sevan in Armenia, if the green does
not roll over hills as in Josephine’s England, North Fork summers at
Cawley’s are pleasingly pale and unfold like a ritual.

The Armenians, mostly from New Jersey, come starting this weekend,
and August belongs to the Greeks, mostly from Astoria and elsewhere
in the city. The Cawleys estimate that at least 75 percent of their
guests are regulars.

Soon, there will be Nick, who books the same room the same three days
of the week, every week, summer after summer. There will be the
painters and diamond dealers and the man Josephine knows as the
red-headed Greek. They will sit all day under an umbrella on the
coarse sand of Southold Town beach, play cards and fish for smelts
with nets cast into the Sound.

At night, as cars brush past on North Road, they will get dressed up
and cook the catch in the yard behind the motel. They will offer some
to the Cawleys, and the Cawleys will politely refuse, and the sky
will turn orange.

“We’ve got beautiful sunsets,” Josephine said. “They’ve been written
about.”

Last week, she and Richard, who met 37 years ago at a dance hall in
Queens, were getting things ready for another season. Josephine
walked around to the backyard, where white lawn chairs were still
tilted against tables, and where she had planted a garden of
marigolds and impatiens and a pink tea rose she had transplanted from
her house in Williston Park.

Richard gave it to her in 1971, she was saying, just after a long
strike at the phone company that had left him out of work. “He said,
‘If they survive, we’ll survive,'” Josephine said.

This August, the Cawleys will have paid off their mortgage on the
motel. Richard Cawley says that Josephine always wanted a home by the
water, and now she has one, at least during summer.

GRAPHIC: Photo by Howard Schnapp-Richard and Josephine Cawley at
their motel, where Josephine said she finally “felt settled.”

Public debate on Turkey to come

01.07.2004 – 09:01 CET | By Honor Mahony

EUOBSERVER / THE HAGUE – The Dutch EU Presidency has pledged to be fair
on the question of whether Ankara is ready to start EU membership
negotiations amid concerns that the EU may not be ready for Turkey.
“The Netherlands feels a responsibility to make sure that our decision
is well-reasoned and rock-solid”, said Dutch prime minister Jan Peter
Balkenende on the eve of the Dutch EU Presidency.
While the European Commission will decide in the autumn whether Ankara
has met the political criteria for joining the 25-nation block, Mr
Balkenende says this is just one of two types of debate that will take
place.
The Dutch leader said that discussion on the political criteria is
“technical”.
The second discussion amongst the European public is likely to centre
around whether “an Islamic country belongs to Europe”.
However, the Dutch are insisting that this debate, as well as whether
the EU is actually ready for a country the size of Turkey, should not be
additional criteria.
“We need fair play … the rules of the game are clear”, said Mr
Balkenende referring to the fact that if the European Commission decides
that Ankara is ready, it will then be up to leaders in December to
actually decide, on the basis of the report, to open negotiations
without delay.
Late debate
With French leadership ambivalent on Turkish EU membership, the
opposition Christian Democrats in Germany actively opposing it and the
Austrians also making negative sounds, the Dutch do feel that a debate
will come – it is just later than it should have been.
Referring to 1999, when EU leaders actually decided to give Turkey
candidate status, Dutch Europe minister Atzo Nicolaï said, “that was the
time for debate”.
He added, “I think the leaders knew what they decided but the public
didn’t know”.
However, it is too late for the “principle debate” of whether Turkey
should join the EU, he concluded.
“We have to realise Turkey has to be ready and the European Union has to
be ready”.
Mr Nicolaï also conceded that there is a risk that the planned Dutch
referendum on the Constitution, which is set to happen in the same
timeframe as a decision on Turkey, may be linked to the issue.
“That is always a risk”, he said.

Radio Free Europe, Czech republic
June 30 2004

Media Groups Slam Government Over `Unpunished’ Attacks On Journalists

By Ruzanna Khachatrian
30/06/2004 14:15

Armenia’s leading media associations demanded on Tuesday that the
authorities respect freedom of speech, accusing them of failing to
identify and punish the perpetrators of unprecedented violence
against journalists that covered recent opposition demonstrations.

`We again demand respect for the public’s right to receive and the
journalists’ right to spread information and prevention of any
attempts to infringe on them,’ said a joint statement released by the
Yerevan Press Club, the Armenian Union of Journalists, the Committee
to Protect Freedom of Speech and the Armenian branch of the U.S.
Internews organization.

The statement dismissed as a `farce’ the trial earlier this month of
two men who were fined 100,000 drams ($185) each for taking part in
the April 5 attack on photojournalists present at an opposition rally
in downtown Yerevan. They were part of a larger group of burly men
that tried to disrupt the protest, throwing eggs at its organizers
and setting off firecrackers. The thugs, who reportedly work for
government-connected wealthy individuals, went on to indiscriminately
smash most of the video and still cameras that caught their faces.
Dozens of police officers led by General Hovannes Varian stood by and
refused to intervene.

`Neither the investigating body nor the court showed a desire to
protect the journalists’ right to collect and disseminate
information, not to mention the fact that the imposed punishment was
not commensurate with the deed,’ the media groups said.

`We expected that there will be other revelations and trials but
nothing has been done over the past period to identify the
perpetrators of the other violent acts,’ they added, pointing to the
beating by the police of four journalists covering the brutal
break-up of the April 12-13 protest near President Robert Kocharian’s
Yerevan residence.

One of those journalists, Hayk Gevorgian of the `Haykakan Zhamanak,’
says that Varian, who is the deputy chief of the national police
service, personally stole his camera before ordering subordinates to
attack him. Gevorgian spent two weeks recovering from severe injuries
sustained during the beating. Ashot Melikian of the Committee to
Protect Freedom of Speech deplored the fact Varian has faced no
official inquiries or any disciplinary action over the allegations.

The joint statement also urged Armenian journalists to close ranks in
the face of what its signatories see as a government effort to
further curb press freedoms in the country. According to Boris
Navasardian, chairman of the Yerevan Press Club (YPC), the Armenian
media community must consider violence against a single journalist an
affront to free speech.

The Armenian media’s coverage of the recent standoff between the
government and the opposition was scrutinized at a seminar held by
the YPC on Tuesday. Levon Barseghian, chairman of the Asparez Club of
journalists in Armenia’s second city of Gyumri, described it as
largely `distorted,’ singling out local television stations for
criticism.

`TV and radio stations seem to have an invisible bar which they are
not allowed to cross in order to speak more freely and criticize the
authorities, especially Robert Kocharian,’ Barseghian told the
seminar. He was particularly scathing about the Kocharian-controlled
state television’s coverage of the confrontation, denouncing it as
`adverse and disastrous.’

In Navasardian’s words, this situation makes even more urgent the
reopening of A1+, Armenia’s sole major private network that was often
critical of the authorities. A1+ was controversially forced off the
air more than two years ago. The authorities have since resisted
strong international pressure for its reopening. The continuing ban
on A1+ is the main reason why the Armenian media was recently rated
`not free’ by Freedom House, a New York-based human rights group, for
the second consecutive year.

Addressing the Council of Europe last week, Kocharian disputed
assertions that Armenia’s electronic have lacked diversity and
pluralism since A1+’s closure and urged the Strasbourg-based
organization to remove the issue from the agenda of its ongoing
monitoring of his administration’s human rights record.

But Navasardian disagreed, saying that A1+’s return to the airwaves
is `the only chance to have an independent electronic media outlet in
Armenia.’ `Journalists or a group of journalists do not have the
resources and the political cover to set up such a television
channel,’ he said. `That is the reason why we talk so much about
A1+.’

Turkey Offers To Help Solve Armenia, Azerbaijan Dispute

DefenseNews.com
29 June, 2004

BY BURAK EGE BEKDIL

ANKARA — Turkey seeks to assume the role of mediator between Armenia
and Azerbaijan in an effort to resolve the dispute over the
Nagorno-Karabakh region,
Turkish officials here said.

Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul met June 28 with his Armenian
counterpart, Vartan Oskanian, on the sidelines of the NATO summit in
Istanbul. Oskanian told reporters that Yerevan is serious in its efforts
to improve relations with Ankara, and Gul said Turkey is willing to
reciprocate.

A senior Turkish diplomat told DefenseNews.com on June 29 that Turkey’s
initiative for mediation between Armenia and Azerbaijan had been
welcomed by both countries.

“It will take time, but this is a good start,” he said. “Both the
initial Azeri and Armenian reaction were positive to our initiative.”

NATO has been discussing a project for launching a Caucasus Stability
Pact, but the continued tension between Azerbaijan and Armenia over the
disputed territory has blocked progress.

Turkey says normalization of its ties with Armenia – its only neighbor
with which Ankara has no diplomatic relations – depends on Armenia’s
withdrawal of troops from Nagorno-Karabakh, an enclave in Azerbaijan
under Armenian occupation for the last decade.

The Daily Star, Lebanon
June 28 2004

American University of Beirut awards honorary degrees

By May Habib
Special to The Daily Star

When Vartan Gregorian arrived in Beirut from Tehran 54 years ago, he
had $50 in his pocket, couldn’t speak Arabic or English and did not
know a single person in the country.

On Saturday, Gregorian, the head of the Carnegie Corporation in the
US and an acclaimed philanthropist and educator, returned to receive
an honorary doctorate from the American University of Beirut.

Gregorian’s first English teacher in Beirut, Antoine Kehyaian, was
present at the ceremony to see his former pupil.

“As a student I used to tell Antoine, ‘Don’t worry, one day I will
get a degree from AUB,'” said Gregorian, who has received honorary
degrees from 15 universities. “I had to spend 50 years in the
wilderness in order to earn this.”

Along with Gregorian, the mathematician Sir Michael Atiyah, famed
cellist Yo-Yo Ma and journalist Peter Jennings also received honorary
degrees.

AUB President John Waterbury said this year’s recipients
“demonstrate, almost to perfection, the coupling of specialization
and achievement to lifelong involvement in other fields.”

Upon leaving Beirut, Gregorian – who also delivered the commencement
address Saturday – went to Stanford University in California, where
he earned his bachelor’s degree in 1958 and his doctorate in history
in 1964. After teaching at various universities in the US, he became
founding dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences at the University
of Pennsylvania and eventually became the provost.

After leaving the University

of Pennsylvania, Gregorian headed the New York Public Library,
raising an unprecedented $400 million for its revival.

Never content to remain too long in any position, he left the New
York Public Library in 1989 to become president of Brown University.
He then left Brown for the philanthropic Carnegie Corporation in
1997.

Gregorian advised students at the ceremony to “get really rich” so
they can donate money to AUB in the future.

“There are not many AUBs in the world, especially this part of the
world,” he said. “You owe it to AUB and the Lebanese to keep this
beacon of learning and light shining.”

Sir Michael Atiyah, whose work in string theory has been awarded
numerous medals, also commended AUB for creating cultural links that
“straddle space and time.” Atiyah, the son of a Lebanese father and a
Scottish mother, grew up in Sudan and attended Victoria College in
Cairo. He was knighted in 1983 and was awarded the rank of commander
in the Order of the Cedars by the Lebanese government in 1993.

Atiyah helped AUB develop its Center for Advanced Mathematical
Studies and is the chairman of the center’s International Advisory
Committee.

Jennings, who came to Lebanon in 1972 as the ABC News bureau chief in
Beirut, said that AUB – founded by US missionaries – is “one of the
greatest things the US has done in the Middle East.” He said that at
a time when the US government is challenged by winning the hearts and
minds of the region’s people, “at AUB the great ideas of the US come
together.”

Waterbury joked that he would try to keep secret that the hugely
successful Jennings did not finish high school and does not have a
university degree.

“We forgive you Peter for your early dismissal of our product,”
Waterbury said.

Yo-Yo Ma, a concert cellist since the age of 9 and a 14-time Grammy
winner, closed the ceremony with a piece from Bach. “I know I was not
invited here for my speaking skills,” he joked, holding up his cello.

Al-Qa’idah might threaten major oil pipeline – Azeri security chief

Azad Azarbaycan TV, Baku
25 Jun 04

[Presenter] The National Security Ministry has obtained information
about acts of sabotage being prepared on the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan
pipeline, Minister Namiq Abbasov has told ATV. Being more specific,
the minister said that Al-Qa’idah is involved in the terrorist threat.

[Reporter] The country’s special services have information that
international terrorist groups are planning sabotage on the
Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline. National Security Minister Namiq
Abbasov said that Al-Qa’idah was also mentioned in this connection.

[Namiq Abbasov] We have such reports. This is quite possible. There
are quite a few opponents of Baku-Ceyhan. All kinds of threats against
it are quite possible.

[Reporter] The general did not rule out that Al-Qa’idah members could
be hiding in occupied uncontrolled territories. He said that it would
be irresponsible to dismiss possible sabotage on the Azerbaijani
section of the oil pipeline. But the minister stressed that special
services were carrying out the necessary measures in order to prevent
this.

Mr Abbasov also commented on the problem of the two Armenians who left
Armenia for Azerbaijan and are seeking asylum in a third country. The
problem will be settled very soon, the minister said.