Author: Tamamian Anna

A1 Plus | 19:10:29 | 22-03-2004 | Social |

PARENT AWARENESS PROGRAM

Parents’ awareness program worked out by a group created by on UNICEF
initiative is now being put into reality in Armenia’s province of
Gegharkunik. The project’s aim is to provide the parents whose children don’
t attend kindergartens.

Education Ministry official Robert Stepanyan says 80 percent of the republic
children don’t get preschool education.

One of causes is unemployment – most jobless parents prefer to educate their
kids themselves.

Besides, there are regions in Armenia having no preschool facilities. 338
kindergartens have been closed in the republic over the last decade.

Education Minister Sergo Yeritsyan says the ministry intends to reach
considerable results by taking proper measures.

—
http://www.a1plus.a,

Turner Adds Three to Raiders’ Staff

.c The Associated Press

ALAMEDA, Calif. (AP) – The Oakland Raiders added three assistant
coaches to complete Norv Turner’s staff on Saturday, including USC
quarterbacks coach Steve Sarkisian.

Sarkisian, a 29-year-old former BYU quarterback, will coach Oakland’s
quarterbacks in his first NFL job. Martin Bayless was hired as a
special teams assistant and Jeff Fish was named the Raiders’ strength
and conditioning coach.

Bayless was a defensive assistant for the Carolina Panthers last
season. Fish was a strength and conditioning coach at Missouri.

Turner also said John Morton, the Raiders’ senior offensive assistant,
will coach the tight ends next season.

02/28/04 15:22 EST

THE DAILY TELEGRAPH(LONDON)
March 19, 2004, Friday

Kasparov matched with boy wonder

By Malcolm Pein

THE line-up for the Reykjavik Rapid is now complete after the Open
tournament ended in a six-way tie for first place at the Reykjavik
City Hall. Five players qualified to join the 11 invited to take
part, who include the former world champions Garry Kasparov and
Anatoly Karpov, and England’s Nigel Short.

Of the eight players tied in the open on 6.5/9, Vladimir Epishin of
Russia, Igor Nataf of France, Jan Timman of Holland and Levon Aronian
of Armenia qualified, and Stefan Kristjansson of the host nation also
made it through to the main event.

A blitz tournament held to determine seeding saw Kasparov placed
second after losing to the Armenian Levon Aronian. The 13-year-old
sensation from Norway, IM Magnus Carlsen finishes in 15th place to
produce the dream first-round pairing between the world number one
and the world’s most precocious talent – Carlsen is already a
GM-strength player.

The full line-up (in world ranking order) is: 1 GM Garry Kasparov
2831 Russia; 2 GM Nigel Short 2702 England; 3 GM Anatoly Karpov 2682
Russia; 4 GM Alexey Dreev 2682 Russia; 5 GM Emil Sutovsky 2666
Israel; 6 GM Levon Aronian 2648 Armenia; 7 GM Johann Hjartarson 2640
Iceland; 8 GM Peter Heine Nielsen 2638 Denmark; 9 GM Vladimir Epishin
2633 Russia; 10 GM Jan Timman 2578 Holland; 11 GM Hannes Stefansson
2572 Iceland; 13 GM Margeir Petursson 2540 Iceland; 14 GM Helgi
Olafsson 2504 Iceland; 15 IM Magnus Carlsen 2484 Norway; 16 IM Stefan
Kristjansson 2404 Iceland.

Most of the Icelandic players have given up full-time chess and gone
into such fields as banking and law, but they are still a threat.
Johann Hjartarson is a former WCC Candidate.

Nataf got through by winning his last two games in the Open. The
Frenchman is a King’s Indian aficionado and does not fear the loss of
the dark squared bishop because of the closed nature of the position
after 15f4.

After 19g5 threat of g4 is imminent and the Black attack is clearly
quicker, hence the response 20.g4 but that does not solve all White’s
problems. 27.Be1 was an error because 27.Bg1 would have kept both f2
and e3 under control.

With Rf8 coming, White panics and gives up a pawn, but this only
serves to improve the Black position. 28.Rh4 would have been better.

R Pogorelov – I Nataf

21st Open Reykjavik (8)

King’s Indian Classical

1 Nf3 Nf6 2 c4 g6 3 Nc3 Bg7 4 e4 d6 5 d4 0-0 6 Be2 e5 7 0-0 Nc6 8 d5
Ne7 9 b4 Nh5 10 Re1 f5 11 Ng5 Nf6 12 f3 Kh8 13 Be3 Bh6 14 Nf7+ Rxf7
15 Bxh6 f4 16 c5 Neg8 17 Bg5 h6 18 Bh4 Rg7 19 Bf2 g5 20 g4 fxg3 21
hxg3 Nh5 22 Kh2 g4 23 Rh1 Qg5 24 fxg4 Nhf6 25 Qc1 Nxg4+ 26 Kg2 Qg6 27
Be1? Bd7 28 c6 bxc6 29 dxc6 Bxc6 30 Bxg4 Qxg4 31 Qe3 Rf8 32 Bd2 Rf4
33 Rae1 Qg6 34 Qd3 Rg4 35 Rh3 h5 36 Reh1 Nf6 37 Kf1 Rxg3 38 Rxg3 Qxg3
39 Qxg3 Rxg3 40 Rh4 Rg4 41 Rxg4 hxg4 42 Bg5 Kg7 43 Kf2 Kg6 44 Be3 a6
45 Kg3 Bxe4 46 Ba7 Kf5 47 Bb8 d5 48 Bxc7 d4 49 Nd1 Nh5+ 50 Kf2 g3+ 51
Kg1 Nf4 0-1

Nataf
p p p p p 8 p p c p p p p p p o ) p n o – m p p p p o b p p p p p p ‘
p d

Pogorelov

Final position after 51Nf4

FACTBOX-Factbox on Adzhara region

LONDON, Mar 17 (Reuters) – Georgia offered the rebel region of Adzhara
an olive branch of talks on Wednesday but kept up an economic
stranglehold on the territory.

Here are basic facts about the Adzhara region in Georgia:

Adzhara has a population of 400,000 and is located on the coastline of
the Black Sea in the southwest of Georgia.

The capital, Batumi, is a large oil refining centre which supplies
Georgia and neighbouring Armenia. After Georgian President Mikhail
Saakashvili was prevented from entering the region this weekend,
Georgian troops cut rail and road access, forcing the 200,000
barrel-per-day oil terminal to stop loading oil.

The region declares itself to be autonomous although it’s status has
not been resolved since Georgia declared independence in 1991 after
the collapse of the Soviet Union.

The president of Adzhara, Aslan Abashidze, is backed by Russia which
keeps a controversial Soviet-era military base outside Batumi, seen as
leverage against Georgia.

Adzhars are ethnic Georgians but unlike most Georgians, who are mostly
Christian, the Adzhars are Muslims after centuries of Turkish
occupation, which ended in the 19th century.

03/17/04 12:20 ET

EU parliament presses Turkey on human rights

BRUSSELS, March 17 (Reuters) – Turkey must improve its record on human
rights and the rule of law before European Union member states start
talks with Ankara on adopting EU laws, the European Parliament said on
Wednesday.

Turkey has been trying to join the EU for decades, and has faced
consistent calls to remedy human rights abuses. The bloc is due to
decide by the end of this year whether to set a date when accession
negotiations may begin.

The entry of any new member state requires the approval of the
parliament, but the assembly’s Foreign Affairs Committee made clear
Ankara had a long way to go — even though the Union is committed to
its eventual membership.

Deputies “criticised the continuing influence of the army in politics,
business, culture and education, continuing torture practices and
mistreatment, the intimidation and harassment of human rights
defenders, the discrimination of religious minorities and the fact
that trade union freedom is not fully secured,” they said in a
statement.

Deputies noted Turkey had made many important reforms since last year
to meet the membership criteria, and praised the government’s
political will to improve conditions, while saying reforms could only
be judged by how they were implemented.

Members of the parliament called on the EU’s executive Commission to
press Ankara on these issues.

“The Commission should, as part of the pre-accession strategy,
systematically address the shortcomings in the rule of law and the
democratic deficit,” the statement said.

The Foreign Affairs Committee insisted that settlement of the Cyprus
conflict was “an essential condition for progress” in Turkey’s
membership bid, and also urged Ankara to open its borders with
Armenia.

Cyprus has been divided since 1974 when troops from Turkey occupied
the north of the island in response to a coup in Nicosia engineered by
the junta then ruling Greece.

The United Nations is brokering reunification talks bringing together
Greece, Turkey, and Greek and Turkish Cypriots, to try to unite the
island before it joins the EU on May 1.

Turkey has no diplomatic relations with Armenia, independent since the
break up of the Soviet Union in 1991.

Armenians say 1.5 million people were killed in a 1915-1918 campaign
to expel them from eastern Turkey, calling it genocide, a charge
Turkey denies.

03/17/04 11:46 ET

French ambassador named Georgian foreign minister

TBILISI, Georgia (Reuters) – Georgia’s President Mikhail Saakashvili
picked France’s ambassador in Tbilisi to be his foreign minister
Thursday, saying he had cleared the appointment with French President
Jacques Chirac.

Saakashvili said 51-year-old Salome Zurabishvili, a descendant of 19th
century Georgian writer Niko Nikoladze, was a diplomat of
international standing whose family had emigrated to France early in
the 20th century.

He told a news conference he believed the appointment was
“unprecedented in the history of diplomacy.” Diplomats are normally
expected to remain loyal to their own country and not take up jobs in
foreign governments.

He said he would grant her Georgian citizenship in addition to her
French passport, a dual status the constitution allowed in special
circumstances.

Zurabishvili has worked in the United States, the European Union and
NATO and headed the international department of France’s national
security general secretariat until taking up her post in Georgia.

After the fall of communism, many people whose families had migrated
to Western Europe and the United States returned to their Eastern
European roots. A U.S. lawyer, for instance, served for a short time
as foreign minister in Transcaucasian neighbor Armenia in the 1990s.

Saakashvili himself is a U.S.-trained lawyer who led a bloodless coup
last November that brought down veteran leader Eduard Shevardnadze, a
former Soviet foreign minister.

Saakashvili won a landslide election victory in January and promised
to integrate the republic into NATO, the European Union and the
European mainstream.

03/11/04 14:14 ET

The World is a co-production of the BBC World Service, PRI and WGBH Boston.

Books — The World
Thusady, March 11, 2004

The Burning Tigris: The Armenian Genocide and America’s Response
Author: Peter Balakian
Publisher: HarperCollins
ISBN: 0060198400

Available from Public Broadcasting One

The poet and memoirist Peter Balakian has written a passionate,
well-researched history of the first modern genocide and the various
American reactions to it. `Who today, after all, speaks of the
annihilation of the Armenians?’ Hitler asked, setting in motion the
Final Solution for the Jews in Europe. Balakian makes clear the
continuing costs of the Turkish government’s attempts to erase the
memory of this tragedy-which we must nevertheless remember. As the
Turkish poet Nazim Hikmet said to himself in a famous poem:

The Armenian citizen has not forgiven the slaughter of his father in
the Kurdish mountains. But he loves you, because you also won’t
forgivethose who blackened the name of the Turkish people.

What this history reveals is that there can be no forgiveness without
a full accounting of the crime-a reckoning the American government can
andshould demand.

IRNA Iran
March 12 2004

Georgian armenians take part in Iranian armenians spring games

Isfahan, March 12, IRNA — Head of Isfahan`s Ararat Sports Club
Robert Shyjanian told IRNA of Friday the the Georgian armenians will
take part at the 13th Athletic Competitions of the Iranian armenians.

Shyjanian added, “The Georgian armenian athletes will participate
with one five-member team at the Iranian armenians` spring games,
competing only in track and field competitions.”
The five-day 13th Athletic Competitions of the Iranian armenians,
sponsored this year by Isfahan`s Ararat Sports Club will begin on
March 18th.
The games, also known as the Iranian armenians spring athletics,
are held in two main sections of men and women`s athletes, in which
the athletes compete in football, basketball, field and track,
volleyball, and table tennis contests.
The men`s games include football, basketball, table tennis and
field and track events, and the women`s games include basketball,
volleyball and field and track competitions.