Author: Nahapetian Lilit

Sun-Sentinel.com, FL
Feb 15 2009

‘Skeletons’ author Bohjalian coming to Coral Gables, Palm Beach

By Chauncey Mabe | Books editor
February 15, 2009

For most of his career, Chris Bohjalian has been considered a woman’s
novelist ‘ not surprising for a writer who came to national attention
in 1997 when Oprah Winfrey selected his fifth work, Midwives, for her
televised book club.

That’s started to change with Skeletons at the Feast, published last
year and now out in paperback. His first attempt at a historical novel
dramatizes the suffering of Jews and Germans fleeing before the
advancing Soviet army in the final months of World War II.

"A number of readers were surprised and gratified I was trying
something new, even if the experience was too brutal for some of my
female readers," Bohjalian says. "But I have a lot more male readers
than I used to have. Men found this book."

Women who can tolerate the depictions of privation and suffering will
find a love triangle at the novel’s core: An aristocratic young
Prussian woman, a Scottish P.O.W. and a dashing Jewish man posing as a
Nazi officer, all struggling to survive.

"I wanted to explore the complicity of the average German in the
Holocaust," he says. "That’s the only thing I knew going in."

Bohjalian’s ideas come to him unbidden ‘ he’s never finished any of
his 12 books wondering what to write next ‘ but sometimes the
gestation period is long. The inspiration for Skeletons at the Feast
came in 1997, when a friend at his daughter’s kindergarten in Vermont
asked him to read a grandmother’s diary.

"She was part of the Prussian exodus fleeing the Soviet advance at the
end of the war," he says. "I was writing contemporary novels then, so
I shared the diary with Random House. They said it was interesting but
nothing new."

Meanwhile, Bohjalian steadily produced best-selling novels about
ordinary, often small-town folks under extraordinary pressure. But he
never wrote with an eye toward keeping up the stratospheric popularity
of Midwives.

"Oprah’s selection was the greatest commercial and professional
blessing, a gift," says Bohjalian, 48. "But trying to write to
maintain that kind of attention wouldn’t be fun. I start writing at 5
a.m. If a book’s exciting me, it’s easy to get up. If it’s not, I drop
it."

Besides, readers are smart. Bohjalian says they would know right away
if he tried to fake it.

"I’ve talked to enough book groups to know they can tell if you’re
trying to phone it in," he says. "They’ll turn away. There are so many
books and authors out there."

Bohjalian’s novels ‘ The Double Bind, The Buffalo Soldier, Before You
Know Kindness, among them ‘ defy categorization. Too well written to
be mere popular fiction, Bohjalian’s books are too popular to gain
acceptance as literary novels. He gets rave reviews but, as he jokes,
seems in little danger of winning a National Book Award.

"My brother told me I’m a ‘tweener,’" Bohjalian says. "He said I fall
between genres. I knew exactly what he meant. I don’t mind. It means
my readers don’t expect formula from me. I’m not constrained by reader
expectations."

In 2006, Bohjalian read Armageddon, Max Hastings’ history of the last
year of World War II. Remembering the diary, he asked the woman who
wrote it, by then 77 and living in Portland, Maine, for permission to
base a novel on it.

"I told her, ‘It won’t be exactly your story, but you’ll see it before
publication,’" Bohjalian recalls. "She said fine. So I started looking
up all the Holocaust survivors and Germans I could find. I was off and
running."

The diary gave Bohjalian the time, setting and circumstances, and two
characters, a 16-year-old girl and her mother. None of the other
characters in his book appear in the diary. The cast "exploded" once
he started talking to survivors.

"The stories people had ‘ no time was more brutal," he says. "But
there were also astonishing acts of kindness. All the people I
interviewed were 70 to 90. They survived because some angel parachuted
into their lives."

A New York Times and Publishers Weekly best-seller, Skeletons at the
Feast did well with critics too.

Margot Livesey, writing in The Washington Post, called it "a deeply
satisfying novel, one that asks readers to consider, and reconsider,
how they would rise to the challenge of terrible deprivation and
agonizing moral choices."

Bohjalian says writing about the Holocaust may show him the way to
write about the biggest tragedy in his own family history, the
Armenian genocide. He’s already tried it once ‘ one of the 400-page
manuscripts he abandoned.

"I started a novel that was set in Turkey in 1913 and South Beach in
the present day," Bohjalian says, laughing as he adds, "It’s a
terrible book. My God, is it bad. It’s the kind of train wreck where
you don’t even want to look for bodies."

Maybe, he muses, the family stories from his father and aunt were "too
close to home. Maybe I just needed more gray hair, or less hair, to
approach material of this gravitas. Maybe at 40 I just wasn’t old
enough to work my way into material this important."

Meanwhile, Bohjalian jokes, the 21st century has made him a "dinosaur"
on not one but two counts. In addition to novels, he has written a
weekly column for the Burlington Free Press since 1992.

Books and newspapers, the very definition of "old media."

"My world is pretty wonderful," Bohjalian says by phone from Vermont,
where he lives with his wife, the photographer Victoria Blewer, and
their daughter. "But as a novelist, I’m not exempt from the challenges
of the digital age. Maybe I’ll become a waiter."

While many of his generation can’t imagine being without a book at
their bedside, Bohjalian says, younger readers, their attention fixed
on computers, TV shows, cell phones or video games, can go weeks
without reading.

"It’s not that they’re illiterate," he says. "But they approach text
differently. They read blogs and posts online."

But if fewer people are reading the old-fashioned way, those who do
are more passionate than ever. Bohjalian finds them in book groups.

"Three or four times a week I’m on speaker phone with book groups," he
says. "That’s the change the digital age has placed on
novelists. We’re no longer disembodied faces on a book jacket.

"Thanks to digital technology, readers can connect to novelists as
people. They can ask us questions. We’re neighbors."

ures/lifestyle/sfl-arts0215bohjaliansbfeb15,0,6744 844.story?page=2

PanARMENIAN.Net

Putin: relations with Ankara priority for Russia
14.02.2009 14:58 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Russia’s Premier Vladimir Putin said Friday that
Turkey was among their priorities in Russian foreign policy.

Speaking to reporters before meeting with Turkish President Abdullah
Gul, who is on a four-day formal visit to Russia, Putin said the trade
volume between the two countries rose each year and reached 32 billion
USD. He said Turkey became Russia’s top foreign trade partner.

Also speaking to reporters, Gul said two countries had strong
cooperation in many areas noting that Putin made great contributions
to Turkey-Russia relations.

Gul expressed his belief that bilateral relations would be further
enhanced and invited Putin to Turkey, World Bulletin reports.

YEREVAN SPEAKS FOR ENDING DOUBLE TAXATION WITH UK

ARKA
Feb 11, 2009

YEREVAN, February 11. /ARKA/. Official Yerevan proposes signing an
agreement with the United Kingdom on ending bilateral double taxation,
Chief of the RA Presidential Staff Karen Karapetyan today told UK
Ambassador to Armenia Charles Lonsdale.

Karapetyan expressed a hope that eliminating double taxation would
boost bilateral trade and economic cooperation, the RA president’s
press service reports.

Karapetyan and Ambassador Lonsdale greatly appreciated the political
dialogue between both countries. They touched upon bilateral
cooperation issues, as well as the current negotiations over the
Karabakh conflict and ways to tackle the global financial crisis.

POLITICAL SCIENTIST MANVEL SARGSIAN: BY MAKING A GREAT STIR OVER FOREIGN POLICY AUTHORITIES CONCEAL DOMESTIC PROBLEMS

Noyan Tapan

Feb 11, 2009

YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 11, NOYAN TAPAN. "The amendment of Articles 225
and 300, RA Criminal Code, made the condition of the authorities
more complicated in connection with the "case of the seven," Manvel
Sargsian, an expert of the Center for National and International
Studies, said at the February 11 press conference. According to
him, the Council of Europe demands disclosing the real authors of
the murders committed during the March 1 mass actions and removing
accusations on those crimes from opposition activists’ case. "It means
that the whole investigation carried out so far should be announced
illegal. Unless the court is able to prove the accusations brought by
Articles 225 and 300, one can conclude that the state of emergency
announced from March 1 to 21, 2008 was illegal," the political
scientist said.

As M. Sargsian predicted it, the authorities will not completely amend
the above mentioned criminal articles for the court to find even if
some corpus delicti in the seven oppositionists’ actions. According
to him, unless the court makes any exact decision by March 1, the
passions will flame up at the rally, but unless there are provocations
by the Police, there will be no disorders, either.

The political scientist also said that at present an attempt is
made to present through television that allegedly the authorities
are engaged in solving too serious problems in the foreign political
sphere. Indeed, according to his observation, the authorities try to
conceal their domestic problems by making a great stir over foreign
policy.

ASTROPHYSICS: REPORTS OUTLINE ASTROPHYSICS RESEARCH FROM R.M. AVAGYAN AND COLLEAGUES

Science Letter
February 10, 2009

"Modern concepts of the universe support the assumed existence of a
nongravitational source, known as dark energy, for which epsilon +
3 P< 0 (where epsilon is the energy density and P is the pressure),"
scientists in Yerevan, Armenia report (see also Astrophysics).

"This ensures accelerated expansion of the universe. This paper
examines a tensor-scalar variant of the theory of gravitation with
a conformally coupled scalar field," wrote R.M. Avagyan and colleagues.

The researchers concluded: "Various cosmological models are examined
and the possible evolutionary development of the universe with
accelerated expansion is discussed."

Avagyan and colleagues published their study in Astrophysics
(Cosmological model with a conformally coupled scalar
field. Astrophysics, 2008;51(4):565-574).

For more information, contact R.M. Avagyan, Erevan State University,
Academy GS Saakyan Dept. of Theoret Physics, Yerevan, Armenia.

Publisher contact information for the journal Astrophysics is:
Springer, Plenum Publishers, 233 Spring St., New York, NY 10013, USA.

MEETINGS OF THE DELEGATION HEADED BY GORAN LENNMARKER IN THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY

National Assembly of RA
Feb 10 2009
Armenia

On February 9 the President of the National Assembly of the Republic
of Armenia Mr Hovik Abrahamyan received the delegation headed by
the President Emeritus of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly, OSCE
PA President’s Special Representative on Nagorno Karabakh Mr Goran
Lennmarker.

Welcoming the guests RA NA President Mr Hovik Abrahamyan highlighted
the activity of the OSCE Minsk Group in the process of peaceful
settlement of Karabakh conflict, highly assessing in this context
the unbiased and objective report. Mr Abrahamyan reaffirmed the
position of the Armenian authorities that the peaceful settlement
of the problem has no alternative, and drew attention once again
to bellicose announcements of Azaerbaijan, which proved that
in the neighbouring country they didn’t want to see the problem
resolved, otherwise they would try to prepare the society for the
peaceful settlement of the problem. Coming to the negotiations as
supporter of the peaceful settlement of the Azerbaijani authorities
they continue the war threats and appeals, hatred campaign in the
country. The RA NA President considered important the steps directed
to the peaceful settlement of the problem, the agreement achieved
in Saint Petersburg during the meeting of the Presidents of Armenia
and Azerbaijan: accepting as a basis for negotiations the ‘Madrid
principles,’ signing of the Declaration on Nagorno Karabakh conflict,
the declaration adopted by the Foreign Ministers of OSCE 56 member
countries in Helsinki, within the World Economic Forum of Davos the
meeting of the RA President Mr Serzh Sargsyan and the President of
Azerbaijan Mr Ilham Aliyev in the city of Zurich, Switzerland.

Mr Abrahamyan stressed that declaring the Euro Integration as
political priority Armenia was interested in the rapid and peaceful
settlement of the problem based on concessions, which would promote
the implementation of the reforms directed to the strengthening
of democracy in the country more deeply. To the RA NA President’s
conviction, Armenia should have good neighbourly relations with all
the neighbours, and the initiative of RA President Mr Serzh Sargsyan
of inviting the President of Turkey Mr Abdullah Gul to Armenia
was its best example. Mr Abrahamyan noted that Armenia repeatedly
announced about its willingness of cooperation without preconditions,
considering impermissible that Turkey having intention to become EU
member would have close borders with its neighbouring country. In the
respect of regional development, highlighting the peace and stability,
Mr Abrahamyan noted that because of the events, which occurred in
South Ossetia the economy of Armenia had loss of 650 m USD.

In the settlement of Karabakh problem Mr Abrahamyan highlighted the
role of the parliament, noting that the National Assembly should be
the tribune, where discussions could be held with the participation
of political forces, NGOs over the peaceful resolution of Karabakh
problem. In this context the development of parliamentary diplomacy
was also highlighted.

Agreeing with the approaches of the RA NA President on the settlement
of the problem Mr Lennmarker welcomed the efforts of Armenia directed
to the peaceful settlement of the problem, noting that the events over
South Ossetia in August showed that problems should be resolved only
through peace, ensuring the regional security. To the conviction of
OSCE PA President Emeritus, the Karabakh problem should be settled
within the framework of OSCE Minsk Group.

Regarding the resolution of Nagorno Karabakh problem Mr Göran
Lennmarker noted with optimism that "golden opportunity" was created
for the settlement of Karabakh conflict this year, which would be
based on the compromises. To his conviction, the settlement of the
Nagorno Karabakh conflict would have an enormous impact on the whole
region of the Southern Caucasus. He also highlighted the expansion
of the parliamentary cooperation in Southern Caucasus countries,
noting that the existing relations should be strengthened through
parliamentary diplomacy and dialogue, to which greatly promoted also
the European Union Eastern Neighbourhood programme. In the context
of regional integration and cooperation Mr Lennmarker considered as
progress the initiative of inviting the President of Turkey to Armenia,
which in his opinion, would have positive continuation. Considering
impermissible the existence of close borders Mr Göran Lennmarker
noted that the European Union decided its external borders.

At the meeting other issues were also discussed.

The Chairman of the NA Standing Committee on Foreign Relations Mr Armen
Rustamyan had a meeting with the delegation headed by the President
Emeritus of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly, OSCE PA President’s
Special Representative on Nagorno Karabakh Mr Göran Lennmarker.

During the talk Mr Armen Rustamyan emphasized the important role
of the European Union, assessing it as a reliable structure for
all countries. In the region in ensuring stability and peace,
in Mr Rustamyan’s opinion, the EU can have important contribution
with its adopted values. To the Committee Chairman’s observation,
this structure uniting the European countries has things to do
in the region for having united system of security in the region,
where there won’t be separating lines, and every country will have
higher level of security. Both Mr Lennmarker and Mr Rustamyan spoke
about impermissibility of resolving the conflicts through military
means noting as a precedent the regional last Russian-Georgian
clash. According To Mr Armen Rustamyan, we should learn a lesson; the
negotiation process of the conflicts’ resolution has no alternative,
especially the interest of different countries is great in the region,
and any clash can develop to a bigger one.

The Chairman of the NA Standing Committee on Foreign Relations said
that in the previous year he noticed positive changes in the settlement
of the Karabakh problem: the Moscow Declaration on the solution of the
conflict exclusively through peaceful means was signed. According to
the speaker, the negotiations on Karabakh problem should be continued
only within the framework of OSCE Minsk Group, and the resolution
of the problem in other structures or formats is not realistic. In
order ro activate the regional cooperation Mr Rustamyan considered
important and necessary the participation of the European Union.

In this context Mr Göran Lennmarker spoke about the implementation of
the Eastern Neighbourhood or Partnership programme, which proposes a
new quality of relations of the South Caucasus countries with EU. The
President Emeritus of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly noticed that he
repeatedly criticized not very active policy pursued by the European
Union in this region. According to the European guest, the regional
cooperation will also promote the resolution of the conflicts. Speaking
about the Karabakh conflict Mr Lennmarker underlined the importance of
mutual compromises. Referring to the consultation held at the end of
the year by the President of the republic on Karabakh with political
forces and NGOs, Mr Armen Rustamyan noticed that the resolution
will be not only by the consent of the authorities but also by the
people. As Mr Armen Rustamyan characterized, the conscience of the
settlement of the problem through peaceful means and negotiations,
coming to an agreement through compromises existed in our society,
which, however, we couldn’t say about the Azerbaijani side. As Mr
Armen Rustamyan assessed, in sowing trust between conflicting sides the
EU has an important role. In response Mr Göran Lennmarker expressed
willingness for support.
–Boundary_(ID_dIgSPXDzhfRcPynMLzsw5Q)–

MOSCOW REACTS TO US BUILDUP IN AFGHANISTAN
By F. William Engdahl

Online Journal
Feb 6, 2009, 00:34

Moscow has correctly assessed that the announced Obama troop buildup
in Afghanistan has no relevance to the stated aim of combatting the
‘Taliban,’ but rather with a new attempt by the Pentagon strategists to
encircle both Russia and China in Eurasia in order to retain US global
military dominance. It is not waiting for a new policy from Washington.

Rather Russia is acting to secure its perimeter in Central Asia through
a series of calculated geopolitical moves reminiscent of the famous
Great Game of more than a Century ago. The stakes in this geopolitical
power game could not be higher — the issue of world war or peace in
the coming decade.

Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman
Admiral Mike Mullen are asking Obama to double US troop presence
in Afghanistan.

Both Gates and Mullen said that while they’re thinking about the war
in Afghanistan in terms of a three- to five-year time frame, their
immediate goals are ‘unclear.’ That’s highly revealing. It is clear
from the deliberate pattern over months, despite vehement protest
from Pakistan’s government, of US bombing attacks on villages inside
Pakistan, allegedly to hit Taliban targets, that the US intends to
widen the conflict to Pakistan as well. What could be the possible aim?

Militarily, adding 30,000 more US troops to Afghanistan could never
secure peace in that war-torn tribal region. It has been documented
that many of the groups whom the US command labels ‘Taliban’ are in
fact armed bands controlled by local warlords, and not ideologically
close-knit Taliban cadre in any sense. By labelling them Taliban,
Washington hopes to convince its NATO allies such as Germany to send
their troops to fight in an unwinnable war. Afghanistan presently
has an estimated 40 percent unemployment and some five million living
below the poverty line. It has been ravaged by more than four decades
of continuous war.

Adding a mere 30,000 more for a total of 60,000 US troops in
Afghanistan where the current killing rate for US soldiers is running
15 times above that in Iraq, is ludicrous. According to the official
US Marine Corps counterinsurgency guidelines, to run a countrywide
counterinsurgency strategy with the absolute minimum force levels
required by US Army and Marine Corps doctrine, the US would need
almost 655,000 troops, or an escalation roughly 600,000 troops higher
than the force levels in the proposed Gates strategy. In fact the
US strategy as it now appears seems to be a replay of the gradual
escalation strategy the US pursued in Vietnam in the early 1960s.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, whose foreign policy guidance,
as that of her husband, is virtually20indistinguishable from the Bush
faction’s, has just convened a dinner discussion of leading policy
experts on Afghanistan and South Asia. It included Defense Secretary
Gates, CENTCOM commander Gen. David Petraeus, and National Security
advisor Gen. James L. Jones. It follows the appointment of former
Ambassador, and hawk, Richard Holbrooke as the State Department’s
Special South Asia Envoy.

In January 2008, more than a year ago, present National Security
adviser to Obama, General James Jones headed a private Afghan Study
Group which recommended drastic steps to ‘revitalize’ the war in
Afghanistan.

Revitalize a war whose goals have not even been clearly formulated? Not
surprisingly, Moscow suspects another agenda is at work when Washington
puts such heavy concentration strategically on the issue of the
forgotten "war on terror" in Afghanistan, a region with no discernable
direct national security implications for the United States or NATO
member countries. No conceivable combination in Afghanistan, a failed
state if there ever was one, could threaten a war of aggression
abroad. The tribal warlords around President Karzai seem to be
struggling just to maintain their heroin export flows at record levels.

Moscow’s response

Not surpisingly, the Kremlin has reacted to the US plans for Central
Asia.

The president of Kyrgyzstan just flew to Moscow where he received
promises of debt relief and billions of dollars in aid. Kurmanbek
Bakiyev was told he would get a write off of Kyrgyzstan’s $180
million debt to Russia, a $2 billion discounted loan and $150
million in financial aid from Russia. On the occasion, President
Bakiyev announced plans to close a US air base crucial to the war in
Afghanistan. Kyrgyzstan has been home to the only remaining US base
in the strategically crucial region to Afghanistan’s north.

After the Bush administration declared its "war on terror" and
announced plans to strike Afghanistan to root out the arch evil Osama
bin Laden from the caves of Tora Bora in 2001, Washington secured
air force basing rights in both Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan.

At about that same time, it covertly began preparing to unleash a
series of US-financed ‘regime change’ Color Revolutions in Georgia (The
Rose Revolution, in November 2003) and Ukraine (Orange Revolution in
2004). It tried and failed in Belarus as well as Uzbekistan. A glance
at a map of Eurasia makes clear the pattern of those pro-NATO efforts
was to militarily encircle the territory of Russia, especially as at
the time Washington believed it had the government of Kazakhstan in
its pocket with military training agreements and Chevron’s large oil
investment in Tenghiz.

Once Washington announced in January 2007 that it would station
strategic missiles and advanced radar systems in Poland and the
Czech Republi c to ‘defend against rogue missile attack from Iran,’
as I detail in my soon-to-be-released book, Full Spectrum Dominance:
Totalitarian Democracy in the New World Order, then-President Putin
told the Munich Wehrkunde conference in February 2007 that the true
target of the US ‘missile defense’ strategy was not Iran but Russia.

Similarly, today the US insistence the Afghanistan military buildup is
about the Taliban, rings equally hollow. That’s clearly why Moscow
is acting to secure its borders from a US militarization of the
entire Central Asian region. Oil and gas pipeline routes are a major
consideration, including US wishes to build a natural gas pipeline
from Turkmenistan to India that would deprive Russia’s Gazprom of a
vital component of its current gas supply.

The prime objective of the Afghan escalation however, is to draw a new
‘iron curtain,’ this one between the two formidable Eurasian powers
with the only capacity to challenge future US global dominance: Russia
and China. Should the two former rivals firm up their cooperation
not only in raw materials and industrial economic trade, but as well
in the military cooperation sphere, as Obama campaign foreign policy
adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski has stated, the combination would present
a devastating threat to America’s global hegemony.

Now the decision, aided by the help of generous Russian financial
concessions, to abruptly cancel US Air Force landing rights at
Kyrgyzstan’s Manas Air Base deals a devastating blow to US Great
Game’s grand strategy to encircle the key powers of Eurasia — China
and Russia.

When Washington tried to use its various NGOs to foment a Color
Revolution in Uzbekistan in 2005, the country’s not-so-democratic
president, Islam Karimov, demanded the US evacuate its air bases,
repatriate US Peace Corps volunteers, and most NGOs were shut down and
foreign media banned. Karimov moved to firm his frayed ties with Moscow
at the time. Today Washington is reported to be feverishly trying
to reestablish itself in Uzbekistan, but the sudden cancellation of
base rights in Kyrgyzstan deals a new devastating blow to the entire
Eurasian encirclement Great Game strategy.

With the major NATO supply routes to Afghanistan going through Pakistan
from the Port of Karachi, and strikes on those supply lines increasing
by the day, the Pentagon is eagerly searching to find alternative
supply routes to the North. Militants just blew up a key bridge in
Pakistan’s strategic Khyber Pass.

The securing of alternate Afghan supply routes is at least the official
explanation. Unofficially, it would also provide the pretext to beef
up US military presence in Central Asia. Now, with the loss of Manas
Air Base, a gaping hole in the Washington Great Game ‘Mach IV’ has
been left.

To further complicate20Washington’s strategy, Moscow is moving to
firm up defense cooperation ties across former Communist states in
Central Asia.

A Central Asia answer to NATO?

The announcement by Kyrgzystan President Bakiyev that he was cancelling
US basing rights came during his visit to Moscow February 4 for a
summit meeting of the formerly moribund Collective Security Treaty
Organization (CSTO), a security grouping comprising Armenia, Belarus,
Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. They
reportedly agreed to set up a collective rapid reaction force to
‘counter military aggression, international terrorism, extremism,
crime, drug-trafficking and deal with emergency situations.’ Clearly
the US plans for a major military build-up in Afghanistan were high
on the agenda as well.

The CSTO was established in 1992 to serve as a basis for maintaining
some dialogue between Moscow and her former Soviet republics after
their declared independence, Russia’s so-called ‘near abroad.’

Today the level of talks is taking on a quite new seriousness as
US encirclement operations clearly are seen as a threat to all the
Central Asian republics. The CSTO lists its major security ‘threats’
as Pakistan and Afghanistan. The decision to create a truly collective
force with a permanent location and a united command would propel
the alliance to a new level.

Russian President Medvedev announced the decision to20form the
collective regional CSTO Rapid Reaction Force: ‘I would like
to emphasise the importance of this decision to establish rapid
reaction forces. It’s aimed at strengthening the military capacity
of our organisation.’ He claimed the new response units would ‘not
be less powerful than those of NATO,’ adding that ‘the reason behind
the creation of the collective forces of operative functioning is a
considerable conflict potential which is accumulating in the CSTO
zone.’ Translated from the Russian, that means the US strategic
build-up in and around Pakistan and Afghanistan.

At the same time as it hosted the CSTO summit, Russia hosted a
meeting of the so-called Eurasian Economic Community in Moscow,
EurAsEC. That group consists of Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan,
Russia and Tajikistan as full members. EurAsEC, established in 2000,
also involves Armenia, Moldova, and Ukraine which hold observer status.

They discussed establishing a $10 billion joint assistance fund
to deal with the effects of the global economic crisis, as well as
establishing an international hi-tech technology exchange center and
implementing various innovative projects in member countries.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev captured the vulnerability of
Washington’s exposed hypocrisy in Afghanistan when he told the press
after the Moscow summit, ‘We are ready for full-fledged and equal
cooperation on security in Afghani stan, including with the United
States.’ That of course is the last thing the Pentagon strategists
wish to hear.

F. William Engdahl is author of "A Century of War: Anglo-American
Oil Politics and the New World Order" (Pluto Press) and "Seeds
of Destruction: The Hidden Agenda of Genetic Manipulation"
( ). His new book, "Full Spectrum Dominance:
Totalitarian Democracy in the New World Order" (Third Millennium
Press) is due for release in late Spring 2009. He may be reached via
his website:

ARMENIAN LOBBY TAKING ACTIVE STEPS TO GET GENOCIDE RECOGNIZED IN U.S.

Trend News Agency
Feb 4 2009
Azerbaijan

The Armenian National Committee of America called on ethnic-Armenian
U.S. citizens to send a letter to President Barack Obama and
senators urging them to recognize the "Armenian Genocide," Haber 7
reported. "We are optimistic about the recognition of the genocide
under the new administration," Illinois Senator and Co-Chair of the
Armenian-U.S. Friendship Group Mark Kirk said. In April 2008, the
Armenian lobby intensified its efforts to achieve the recognition of
the 1915 events. Armenia claims the Ottoman Empire committed genocide
against its people in 1915. Kirk said efforts must be strengthened to
get the genocide recognized and called on ethnic-Armenian U.S. citizens
to be more active. "We have more strength now under the new Congress
and government," the senator said, adding that the U.S. Department
of State and Defense Department are likely to impede the recognition
of the genocide. "We must begin to work now and submit the relevant
bill," he said. Kirk recalled the statements made about the genocide
during Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s election campaign, adding
that he wonders what she will say now that she holds this post.

Kirk expressed hope that the number of people supporting the Armenian
claims will increase and their voices will be heard under the new
president.

SERZH SARGSYAN: WE SHOULD ACHIEVE INTERNATIONAL RECOGNITION OF NAGORNO KARABAKH PEOPLE’S SELF-DETERMINATION RIGHT

Noyan Tapan

Feb 2, 2009

ZURICH, FEBRUARY 2, NOYAN TAPAN. "Armenia’s position on
Nagorno Karabakh settlement is exact and unequivocal: we should
achieve international recognition of Nagorno Karabakh people’s
self-determination right. You can be sure of it: we do not set another
task before us. And the tales some people tried to tell that allegedly
for some purposes and yielding to some pressures we can make one-sided
concessions in the Nagorno Karabakh problem do not correspond to
reality. We cannot sacrifice our national goal, our general purpose for
solving these or those secondary problems," RA President Serzh Sargsyan
stated during the meeting with representatives of Armenian community of
Switzerland in Zurich at the end of his working visit to Switzerland.

Touching upon his meeting with Turkish Prime Minister in Davos and
the problem of Armenian-Turkish relations, he said: "As a result
of the meeting we instructed the Foreign Ministers to continue
the negotiations. And I think establishing normal and civilized
relations between two neighboring states without preconditions
is in our interests. I want it to be clear to everybody here as
well. Establishing relations with Turkey does not mean forgetting
the Genocide, establishing relations with the Turks does not mean
subordinating our national interests to some problems. We have always
said, and now we reiterate that: to establish diplomatic relations
with Turkey without preconditions, to open the borders, to create
an intergovernmental commission, then to discuss any issue existing
between our two states, our two peoples."

TIGRAN SARGSYAN: STATE HAS NO RIGHT TO MAKE INVESTMENTS IN RISKY SECTORS

Noyan Tapan

Feb 2, 2009

YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 2, NOYAN TAPAN. A consultation on problems and
development prospects of Armenia’s construction sector was conducted
by the prime minister Tigran Sargsyan on January 31. The heads of
interested ministries and departments, experts of construction sector
and heads of organizations in the private sector participated in
the event.

The prime minister said that in recent years construction was one
of the driving forces of Armenia’s economic development, and its
volumes and growth rates greatly contributed to the development of
other branches of the economy. However, in recent period a decline
was recorded in the sector, which, according to T. Sargsyan,
was conditioned by a reduction in invetsments as a result of the
global economic crisis. Under current conditions the prime minister
underlined the importance of the role of the state and its policy aimed
at promoting economic growth and creating new jobs. He stated that the
construction sector is now in the center of the government’s attention
and it is necessary to use the sector’s capacities to the full.

"Our strategy in this situation is quite a simple and comprehensible
one: the state should increase its expenditures for job creation. These
expenditures that we are increasing should be justified because
the state has no right to make investments in risky sectors. As the
international experience shows, the expenditures on infrastructures are
the most efficient and justified ones. These are road construction,
irrigation system, drinking water, the formation and construction of
infrastructures in agricultural sector," the prime minister noted.

As NT was informed by the RA Government Information and PR Department,
T. Sargsyan announced that the government plans to do construction
work of 250 million USD in the earthquake zone. In his words, these
are large volumes an it is envisaged using construction capacities
for the restoration of the eartquake zone. At the same time, in the
prime minister’s opinion, this is not enough and more attention should
be paid to the opportunities of private investments.

Presenting their opinions and proposals, the representatives of the
private sector attached special importance to the problems that exist
at the design, examination and licensing stages of construction,
the decline in the number of qualified experts, the purchase of new
construction equipment and re-equipment of the old one, the problems
with receiving credits, the necessity to improve the legislation in
order to solve a number of problems, etc.

Summarizing the results of the discussion, T. Sargsyan in particular
said that the presented situation shows that there are no construction
development programs which would contain answers for solution of
all the indicated problems, the expert capacities of the sector are
insufficient.

and there is a problem related to implementation of training programs
which can be solved through programs on technical assistance by the
respective international organizations. Noting that they are prepared
to provide these resources, the prime minister instructed the minister
of urban development and the minister of economy to submit brief
reports on the technical assistance necessary for developing the given
sector which will also form a basis for conducting negotiations with
the interested international organizations on this issue.

By another instruction, the above mentioned ministers in cooperation
with the experts who participated in the discussion and the
representatives of the construction organizations must develop and
present a program on development of construction sector.