ITAR-TASS News Agency
TASS
April 28, 2006

Putin, Kocharyan discuss Russian-Armenian cooperation by phone

The Russian and Armenian presidents, Vladimir Putin and Robert
Kocharyan, had a telephone conversation on Friday, the Russian
presidential press service said.

Putin and Kocharyan discussed central issues of Russian-Armenian
cooperation, including “further strengthening of interaction in the
multilateral format,” the press service said.

Putin and Kocharyan also focused on the agenda of future contacts.

ITAR-TASS News Agency
TASS
April 28, 2006

Police give details of attack on policemen in south Moscow

MOSCOW, April 28

Police have established the details of an attack on a police patrol
in southern Moscow early on Friday, in which two policemen were
killed, law enforcement sources have told Itar-Tass.

They said occupants of an apartment house in Kirovogradskaya Street
had called the police and reported that calls for help could be heard
from one of the apartments. A police patrol was rushed to the site to
check.

“A family of Armenian nationals lives in the apartment where six
Georgian nationals rushed in early in the morning. Most likely it was
a criminal account-settling,” the source said.

According to eyewitnesses, when the criminals saw a police car, they
staged an ambush in the apartment. When the policemen entered the
apartment, they opened fire with automatic weapons.

Both policemen, a senior lieutenant and a senior sergeant, died at
the site, the sources said. Six attackers climbed out of the window
and disappeared.

Moscow police have launched an all-Moscow operation trying to seize
the criminals.

South China Morning Post
April 27, 2006 Thursday

Oil-addicted Americans feeling the pinch at the pump

Anger at rising travel costs is fuelling a political row as the US
pays the price for its excesses, says Markus Gaertner

Karapet Galajyan is angry. “This is crazy,” the Armenian-born taxi
driver complained as he rushed his passenger from the Los Angeles
International Airport to a glitzy Beverly Hills hotel.

While navigating the congested six-lane Highway 405, Mr Galajyan
recalled his latest painful experience at one of the city’s countless
petrol stations. The 42-year-old had just filled the tank of his
minibus taxi, paying US$3.19 per gallon – 16 per cent more than he
paid a month ago.

The average price for regular unleaded petrol in the US is now
US$2.91, and over US$3 per gallon in Washington DC, Los Angeles and
New York, according to the American Automobile Association (AAA).
“How am I supposed to feed my family?” asked Mr Galajyan. “Each time
I stop at a petrol station, the prices have gone up again.” After oil
prices reached an all-time high of more than US$75 per barrel on
April 21, the “pain at the pump” seems to have reached a climax for
the oil-addicted Americans.

Escalating prices have sparked public outrage, prompted a
mud-slinging match between Republicans and Democrats in Washington,
and put oil executives back in the hot seat. US news channels are
dedicating almost as much coverage to the public outcry as they did
to the Iraq war in the early stages.

Incidents of consumer anger have made headlines across the country,
including the killing of a petrol station owner in Alabama last week
by a driver attempting to steal US$52 worth of petrol.

Across the country, drivers are scouring the internet for the
cheapest petrol stations. The online competitive intelligence service
Hitwise reported that, in the past month, searches for
petrol-price-related terms have risen by 300 per cent.

Search words such as “electric cars” registered increases of up to
2,900 per cent. Websites such as are reporting
dramatic traffic increases.

Americans are increasingly switching to public transport. Washington
DC’s Metrorail, the capital area’s train system, had the
sixth-busiest day in its history last Thursday. In Salt Lake City,
passenger numbers are up 50 per cent on the 30km light-rail system.
Pawnshops report much higher traffic with customers who need cash for
the petrol pump.

The relentless surge in prices is not only threatening to exhaust US
consumers. It has become US President George W. Bush’s latest
headache and the hottest topic for the mid-term elections later in
the year. The timing couldn’t be worse, with the entire House of
Representatives and one-third of the Senate facing elections in
November.

In the past couple of days, Democrats, who are the minority in both
chambers of Congress, made high petrol prices the subject of their
appearances. Last Saturday, Senator Bill Nelson of Florida said in a
weekly radio address that the president’s policies amount to
“billion-dollar giveaways to the oil companies”. Democratic Senator
Charles Schumer from New York called the surging petrol prices a
“wake-up call” for America.

Republicans were quick to respond on this emotional and sensitive
topic. House Speaker Dennis Hastert and Senate Republican leader Bill
Frist sent the president a letter on Monday, calling on him to
conduct an intense investigation into whether there is any
price-fixing, collusion, gouging or other anti-competitive practices.

Mr Bush has offered remedies to the situation on national airwaves
almost daily since the oil price reached its record high. On Tuesday,
he announced that he would free up oil that was added to the nation’s
emergency reserves and waive rules that were creating bottlenecks in
US petrol markets.

The Strategic Petroleum Reserve, located in salt caverns deep
underground along the US Gulf coast, serves as an emergency supply in
the event of a sudden disruption from producers or refiners. The
government has been adding an average of 25,000 barrels of oil per
day to the reserve so far this year. The US imports about 10 million
barrels a day.

Democrats blasted Mr Bush after his announcement. Congressman Eliot
Engel, a New York Democrat, said the president “offered a piecemeal
approach”. Mr Bush also ordered the Justice Department to check for
possible price manipulation.

Last weekend, he visited California, home of the highest petrol
prices in the nation, in order to promote his initiative on
alternative fuels. Mr Bush again branded America’s oil addiction as
harmful to the economy and national security. The US needs to import
60 per cent of the oil it consumes.

After some months of relief, oil executives, who were questioned
before a joint Senate committee hearing on energy prices after
Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, were back in the hot seat. The
combined 2005 earnings of Exxon Mobil – the world’s biggest oil
company – BP, Royal Dutch Shell, Chevron and Conoco Phillips topped
US$111 billion. In an April 6-9 Washington Post/ABC News poll, 70 per
cent of US adults said the recent petrol price increases were causing
them financial hardship.

The outrage over oil and petrol prices is more than just another
embarrassing subject in a scandal-ridden presidency.

“Record-high petrol prices are enforcing a growing sense that this
country is headed in the wrong direction,” said David Gergen, an
adviser to five former US presidents. Already widespread anger over
the administration’s handling of the Iraq war and the latest efforts
to criminalise illegal immigrants have sent the president’s approval
ratings to new lows.

“We’re going to have a tough summer,” admitted even Mr Bush, who
warned consumers last weekend that prices were likely to go even
higher in the coming months.

The high prices are also threatening US industries that have been
struggling for years. Two of America’s five biggest airlines, Delta
Air and Northwest, are in bankruptcy proceedings. Delta filed for
Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection last September and has tried to
eliminate US$1.9 billion in annual costs. The company has had US$12.3
billion in losses since 2000.

High petrol prices have also deepened the crisis of Detroit’s leading
automobile companies. They slashed sales of General Motors and Ford’s
petrol-guzzling SUVs. General Motors CEO Rick Wagoner is struggling
to recover from a US$10.6 billion net loss last year after Toyota and
Honda increased sales. General Motors’ share of the US market slid to
26.2 per cent last year, the lowest since 1925. Last year, for the
first time, Toyota produced more cars in the US than General Motors.

The petro-political fears are sparked by several factors.
Contributing to the record prices is the instability in the Middle
East and uncertainty over supply from oil-rich nations. Supply
concerns in Nigeria, still recovering from an uprising among farmers,
are another factor. Increasing competition from China and India has
contributed for some time already.

Independent oil experts such as energy trader Boone Pickens are not
sure whether the oil price rage will calm down any time soon.

On Tuesday, Mr Pickens said at the 2006 Global Conference, organised
by the Milken Institute in Los Angeles, that for the foreseeable
future demand for oil would outpace supply because production could
not expand beyond 85 million barrels a day.

The reasons for that, according to the hedge fund manager from
Dallas, are dwindling reserves and a big question mark over new ones
with significant size.

Agence France Presse — English
April 28, 2006 Friday 5:07 PM GMT

US and Azerbaijan leaders discuss Iran, democracy, energy issues

WASHINGTON, April 28 2006

US President George W. Bush met Friday with his Azerbaijan
counterpart Ilham Aliyev for talks that centered on Iran, energy
issues and the need for the Central Asian state to implement
democratic reforms.

“We talked about the need for the world to see a modern Muslim
country that is able to provide for its citizens and that understands
that democracy is the wave of the future,” Bush told reporters after
the meeting.

He added that the two men had also discussed the nuclear standoff
with Iran and that he had assured Aliyev of Washington’s “desire to
solve this problem diplomatically and peacefully”.

Azerbaijan shares a 600-kilometer (380-mile) border with Iran and as
such is considered an important ally to the United States. Aliyev,
however, has made clear that his country would not take part in any
possible military operations against its neighbor.

The 44-year-old leader, who had sought the White House meeting since
taking office in a widely criticized election in 2003, said he hoped
to strengthen bilateral relations and welcomed Washington’s
assistance in exploiting Caspian oil and gas reserves.

“We are very grateful for the leadership of the United States in
promoting energy security issues in the region, in assisting us to
create a solid transportation infrastructure which will allow us to
develop full-scale Caspian oil and gas reserves and to deliver them
to the international markets,” he said.

Tapping into Azerbaijan’s important oil and gas reserves are seen by
Washington as a way of offsetting European dependence on Russian
energy supplies.

A 1,760-kilometer (1,100-mile) long pipeline with an annual capacity
to carry 50 million tonnes of crude oil from the Caspian Sea off
Azerbaijan through Georgia to the Turkish port of Ceyhan is expected
to begin operating this summer.

Aliyev said he had discussed in his meeting with Bush the issue of
the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh, which has been controlled
since the early 1990s by its majority ethnic-Armenian population, and
hoped for a peaceful resolution to the conflict.

His visit to Washington has raised eyebrows in many circles, with
critics pointing to Azerbaijan’s poor human rights record and charges
by various groups — including anti-corruption watchdog Transparency
International — that the country is one of the most corrupt
worldwide.

But analysts say the Bush administration has no other option but to
befriend Aliyev, and point to Azerbaijan’s oil and gas riches and its
strategic location as the driving factor behind the warm welcome he
received at the White House.

During his four-day visit to the United States that ends Friday,
Aliyev played down concerns about human rights in his country but
pledged to continue implementing democratic reforms.

He said he was very satisfied with his visit to Washington and hoped
for continued cooperation with the United States on various fronts,
including Iraq and Afghanistan, where Azerbaijan has contributed
troops.

Newsday (New York)
April 28, 2006 Friday
NASSAU AND SUFFOLK EDITION

Lost in his native Cuba

BY JOHN ANDERSON. SPECIAL TO NEWSDAY

(1 1/2 STARS) THE LOST CITY (R). Andy Garcia’s lopsided idyll about
the Havana of his boyhood and the Cuba of his dreams. With Bill
Murray, Dustin Hoffman, Inés Sastre, Tomas Milian. Written by G.
Cabrera Infante. Directed by Garcia. 2:23 (violence). At the Sunshine
Cinemas and AMC Empire, Manhattan.

When ethnic pride comes in the door, filmmaking savvy seems to jump
out the window. Two examples: Atom Egoyan’s Armenian genocide soaper,
“Ararat,” and Roman Polanski’s Warsaw ghetto melodrama, “The
Pianist,” movies wherein gifted directors were reduced to lumber
salesmen by the weight of history and the memory of their mothers.

Add to this lackluster list “The Lost City,” which was clearly a
labor of love for Andy Garcia, and for the rest of us will simply be
laborious (ta-dum). Born in Cuba, Garcia became part of the
post-Castro exodus at age 5, and “The Lost City” seems like a film
he’s been nursing in his bosom since he first sighted Miami. His
intentions are admirable, Fidel Castro being indefensible. But his
primary purpose is pushing an agenda, so the movie becomes
indefensible.

Why Garcia and screenwriter G. Cabrera Infante decided to make “The
Lost City” into a melange of “The Godfather” and “Casablanca” is
anyone’s guess. (Why would Garcia remind us he was in “Godfather:
Part III”?) Garcia plays Fico Fellove, owner of the club El Tropico
and the eldest of three brothers – each of whom will follow a
different path in the Cuban revolution. Luis (Nestor Carbonell) joins
a bourgeoise insurrection that wants to topple President Fulgencio
Batista (Juan Fernández) without handing the country over to the
untrustworthy Castro. Ricardo (Enrique Murciano) will go completely
native, adopting the khakis and beard of a true believer and turn on
his own family. (His resemblance to a movie Judas – the old Judas –
has got to be intentional).

Fico is apolitical, devoted to the music that both his club and the
movie showcase. But he’s forced, naturally, into taking a stand.

“The Lost City” might have been a tidy, well-wrought story with 45
minutes cut, but it is bloated beyond redemption. Despite
invigorating performances by Bill Murray and Dustin Hoffman – the
latter as Meyer Lansky, the former as a kind of comedic Greek chorus
in shorts – the film is so transparent in its sentiments that it
can’t be taken seriously.

Once Castro comes to power, the cruelty goes nationwide. So does the
stupidity: A Castro functionary (Elizabeth Peña) orders Fico to ban
saxophones from his club, because the sax was invented by a Belgian
and Belgium had a shameful record in Africa.

Nowhere near the attention is paid to the crimes of the U.S.-backed
Batista, which is what got Castro his foothold to begin with. But
“The Lost City” isn’t history. Nor is it very good filmmaking.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Moscow News (Russia)
April 28, 2006

LATEST STABBING DEATH A MYSTERY

By Julia Duchovny The Moscow News

The brutal knifing death of an ethnic Armenian student in a crowded
subway station Saturday afternoon sent shockwaves through a society
already weary with allegations of xenophobia and the debates that
rage around it.

The media has been quick to report attacks against non-Russians,
making them appear more frequent in the last months, while rights
groups warn of growing nationalist tensions across the country. The
act of violence itself is often buried beneath speculations of
various political motivations, and the incident involving Vigen
Abramyants was further complicated by conflicting reports among
police, witnesses, and family.

Racial Hatred or Teenage Spat?

According to initial reports, Vigen (also reported as Vagan)
Abramyants, 17, waiting with friends in the middle of the platform at
central Moscow’s crowded Pushkinskaya Station, when a gang of about
20 young men in black with shaved heads attacked the group, targeting
Abramyants and stabbing him in the heart. The attackers then
dispersed, while Abramyants died in the arms of a friend before help
arrived.

The story changed Monday, however, as police announced that they had
captured a suspect who confessed to the killing. Denis Kulagin, 17,
was said to have been among the group of friends Abramyants had been
waiting with. According to police reports, Kulagin came to the
station with his girlfriend, Zhanna Nefedova, and was waiting for a
group of football fans. Abramyants was in that group and said
something insulting to Zhanna, after which Kulagin allegedly stabbed
him with a knife. “We can definitely say that the killing occurred as
a result of a disagreement,” a police source was quoted by the
state-owned RIA Novosti news agency as saying, “and there was no
racial motivations in this case.”

Some Russian media immediately denounced the official version as
incorrect. The Gazeta daily reported that investigators had a tape of
video surveillance in the station depicting a group of young people
standing on the platform, with one of the individuals suddenly
falling to the ground. The daily quoted the Abramyants family’s
attorney, Simon Tsaturyan, as saying that prosecutors refused to show
him the tape, claiming it did not exist. Izvestia cited the same
tape, but said that the recording showed no signs of skinheads.

But another problem was that there was no knife. The Izvestia daily
reported visiting Zhanna’s family and learning that police had raided
their apartment searching for the weapon. More troubling still was an
interview given by Kulagin’s mother, Olga, to the Komsomolskaya
Pravda tabloid, alleging police pressure. “We were given a choice,”
she reportedly said, “either Denis goes to jail for fifteen years for
a racially-motivated murder, or he gets less if it was over a common
dispute. They promised a suspended sentence…

I insisted that Denis sign the confession that the conflict arose
because of the girl. Then when I got home I realized I had broken his
life.”

The account given by Zhanna’s mother, Olga Nefedova, in an interview
published by Izvestia strangely coincided with Olga Kulagina’s.
Nefedova reportedly did not allow journalists to talk to her
daughter, but recalled how Zhanna spoke of a group of skinheads
looking for a victim. Nefedova denied that Kulagin really killed the
student, and said he told Zhanna to run when the attackers approached
them. Zhanna never actually saw Abramyants getting stabbed, but told
her mother she saw a knife in one of the attacker’s hands.

By Wednesday, police told news agencies they were investigating two
versions of the incident, and could not rule out either Kulagin’s
involvement, nor a racially-motivated attack by skinheads. Kulagin,
who, despite being a minor, was interrogated without an attorney or
his mother present, withdrew his confession.

Subway Fury or Provocative Rumor?

Moscow police were already on heightened alert the weekend of the
killing. Hitler’s birthday is April 20, while two football matches
were being hosted in the city, which tend to draw crowds of rowdy
fans onto public transportation. By Monday, Russian newspapers and
blogs were awash with reports of football hooligans beating up
non-Russians on the Moscow subway. Official reports confirmed another
killing, meanwhile: a Tajik was stabbed to death.

But in another incident Saturday, a few Muscovites reported over the
Internet of being in the middle of a hooligan attack as a group of
young people stormed into a subway car and began beating up
passengers. According to one witness, one of the most seriously
injured victims was a man of non-Russian ethnicity. But there were
several aspects that made the entire story suspect. After the
Gazeta.ru online newspaper ran it, the two witnesses who had first
written about the story in Livejournal deleted their posts.
Meanwhile, the subway police told Gazeta.ru they had heard nothing
whatsoever of the incident. Despite a long thread in Gazeta.ru’s
forum describing similar incidents all over the city, some
journalists became wary that some of these reports were part of a
disinformation campaign – echoing long-time conspiracy theories among
nationalist bloggers that attacks against non-Russians were nothing
but a propaganda campaign to discredit Russia itself.MN

PARLIAMENTARY HEARINGS

Azat Artsakh, Nagorno Karabakh Republic [NKR]
27 April 2006

On April 21 parliamentary hearings entitled “The Karabakh Problem:
Prospects of Settlement” were held for the first time in NKR.
Independent from what responses from the international community the
proposals on the Karabakh problem voiced in the parliament and the
conclusion based on the statements of the parliamentary factions and
groups will receive, the debates were an opportunity to bring together
the political forces and NGOs to express their standpoint freely.

Although the approaches of the NKR NGOs were definitely different,
they had a common opinion on principal points. The concern about the
fate of the Karabakh people was outlined in the statements of
speakers. The approaches of the representatives of political forces
were similar with regard to the recognition of the right for
self-determination of the people of Karabakh and the engagement of
Karabakh in the negotiations. NKR Foreign Minister Georgy Petrosyan
said currently proposals are offered during the negotiations, which
suggest efforts for eradication of the consequences of the war rather
than the settlement of the conflict based on the rights of the people
of Karabakh.

According to the foreign minister, the aspirations and interests of
great powers are clearly outlined in the region. He is convinced that
the mediators are trying to push Azerbaijan to make concessions to
settle the issue in the framework of territorial integrity of
Azerbaijan, and the Armenian party to accept greater compromises. This
is a circumstance, which shifts the settlement of the problem to the
military plane. Emphasizing the importance of working out a clear
concept by the Armenian party to reach the international recognition
of NKR, Armen Rustamyan, Chair of the Committee of External Relations
of the Armenian National Assembly, said, “We should enable the
international community to discern the non-constructive standpoint of
Azerbaijan,” emphasizing the importance of moving the international
community to a level of positive neutrality. Armen Sargissian, the
head of the parliamentary group ARF-Movement 88 of the NKR National
Assembly, emphasized the importance of recognizing NKR as a full-right
party in the settlement process. “Nagorno Karabakh is a subject of the
talks, not an object. The engagement of Karabakh is necessary, and
Armenia should act as a guarantor of the rights of NKR and promote its
international recognition,” said Armen Sargissian, emphasizing the
building of a democratic state with all its institutions as part of
the strategic plan.

Member of Parliament Arthur Tovmassian, Hayrenik Party of NKR, says
the calls of Azerbaijan for a military and political change are caused
by the lack of confidence between the parties. He thinks that the
potential of Armenians all over the world should be used for the
settlement of the Karabakh problem, both parties should be invited to
organize various meetings for the settlement of the issue, using all
the possibilities of democratic diplomacy. “It is not something new
that Azerbaijan has greater economic resources, but economically
powerful does not necessarily mean strong and effective. I think
Azerbaijan will lose more territories in case it wages a new war,”
said Arthur Tovmassian.

Emphasizing the importance of working out a common concept as a
result of the parliamentary debates, Vahram Atanessian, the head of
the NKR National Assembly Faction of Democracy, said the involved
parties should be concerned about the militaristic calls, statements
about territorial integrity and proclaiming of a murderer Man of the
Year; in this context the international community should give an
adequate assessment. Vahram Atanessian believes that it is possible to
undertake elimination of the consequences of the war only after the
international recognition of NKR. Hrant Melkumyan, the leader of the
Communist Party, said the return of liberated territories, Azerbaijani
refugees and deployment of peacemaking forces in the region are
unacceptable. The deputy leader of the Movement 88 Party Gegham
Baghdasaryan said the format of the talks between Armenia and
Azerbaijan has distorted the essence and status of the conflict over
Nagorno Karabakh. “It is not a secret that in the course of years
Nagorno Karabakh was forced out of the talks. Moreover, it has become
an object while it used to be a subject,” he said. The chair of the
NKR NA Social Committee Arpat Avanessian asked the chair of the RA NA
Committee of External Relations Armen Rustamian, “Are you aware of the
deeper nuances of the presently ongoing negotiations and to comment on
Mr. Oskanian’s statements about compromises.” Armen Rustamian assured
that the information he gets during the consultations with the
president and foreign minister of Armenia is enough to form a full
picture of the talks. For the statements of the Armenian foreign
minister (particularly, after the talks in Rambouillet), it was
mentioned that Azerbaijan’s standpoint on two principle questions
(namely, the status of NKR and guarantees of security) is not
flexible, and Armen Rustamian believes Azerbaijan will hardly
recognize the right for self-determination of the people of
Karabakh. In answer to the Armenian Member of Parliament Hmayak
Hovanissian whether NKR Foreign Minister Georgy Petrossian possesses
enough information about the process of settlement, Georgy Petrossian
assured that sufficient information on the talks is acquired through
various channels. At the same time, he emphasized that unlike the
political forces of Armenia, the political parties of NKR do not
interfere with the internal political affairs of Armenia and have
always displayed an adequate and interested approach with regard to
the settlement of the Karabakh issue. In conclusion, the chair of the
NKR NA Committee of External Relations Vahram Atanessian published a
document based on the joint statements of the groups and factions of
the NKR National Assembly, which says, “The groups and factions of the
NKR National Assembly define the Karabakh-Azerbaijani armed
confrontation of 1991-1994 as Azerbaijani aggression against
proclaimed NKR, the actions of Nagorno Karabakh as an application of
the indivisible right of people for self-defence under Article 51 of
the UN Conventions, and the current reality in the conflict area as
the consequences of the Azerbaijani aggression. The recognition of
democratic NKR will become an important factor of regional stability
and security.”

NVARD OHANJANIAN.
27-04-2006

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

ARMENIA TREE PROJECT
65 Main Street
Watertown, MA 02472
Toll-free: (866) 965-TREE
Email: [email protected]
Web:

PRESS RELEASE
May 1, 2006

Bilezikian Family Foundation Supports Expansion of Backyard Nursery Program

— $50,000 Grant Jumpstarts ATP’s Spring Reforestation Program in Getik
River Valley

WATERTOWN, MA–With the support of the Bilezikian Family Foundation of
Massachusetts, Armenia Tree Project (ATP) was able to continue the expansion
of its Backyard Nursery Program in the Getik River Valley this spring. The
project was initiated in Aygut village with 20 families in 2004, and now has
330 families in four villages growing seedlings.

This spring, ATP was able to purchase 95,000 seedlings from 118 families,
and hire 45 workers to plant them into the forest. This was made possible
largely as a result of a $50,000 grant from the Bilezikian Family
Foundation.

Families are able to significantly increase their annual income by growing
seedlings.
`When we began our Backyard Nursery Program we looked for an area that would
benefit most from our reforestation efforts,’ stated ATP Executive Director
Jeff Masarjian. `We started with the knowledge that deforestation was linked
to poverty. We knew that in addition to planting trees, we had to provide
people with a steady income, so they could meet their basic needs.’

`In two years we have grown from helping 20 families learn how to start
their own tree nurseries to now providing a stable income for 330 families
who are also creating a successful and renewable source of tree seedlings
for the degraded hillsides around their villages,’ noted ATP founder Carolyn
Mugar. `ATP has found a way to create reliable `micro-enterprise’
partnerships with these families, and we are grateful to the Bilezikian
Family Foundation for providing the support to bring their work to
fruition.’

The Bilezikian Family Foundation was established by Charles and Doreen
Bilezikian of Hyannis, MA. The foundation assists programs on Cape Cod and
other parts of Massachusetts such as the Home for Little Wanderers, and is a
major supporter of hospitals and schools in Armenia and Artsakh, primarily
through the Armenian Missionary Association of America.

ATP was founded in 1994 with the vision of securing Armenia’s future by
protecting its environment and restoring its degraded forests. ATP advances
Armenia’s socio-economic development by mobilizing resources for large-scale
reforestation, community-based tree planting, environmental education and
advocacy, and rural development through job creation. With the establishment
of the Mirak Family reforestation nursery and expansion of the Backyard
Nursery Program, ATP is working toward the goal of planting over one million
trees in 2006.

PHOTO CAPTION: Anoush Gezoughyan participated in ATP’s Backyard Nursery
Program by growing 600 maple seedlings that were purchased and planted in
the forests around her village in the Getik River Valley of northeastern
Armenia

PROGRAM THAT FOSTERS INTEGRATION OF DISABLED PEOPLE

Azat Artsakh, Nagorno Karabakh Republic [NKR]
27 April 2006

Since November 1, 2005 the Association of Disabled People of Armenia
“Pyunik” has implemented a program of social tolerance and integration
of disabled young people in the society, supported by the Ministry of
Social Security of Armenia. The latter is aimed at public awareness of
the problems of disabled people, establishment of tolerance towards
disabled people, especially young people, which would greatly foster
the integration of disabled people in the society. In the framework of
the program Pyunik has organized round-table meetings in the regions
of Armenia. On April 21 a round-table meeting was held in Stepanakert.

At the meeting were present representatives of NGOs dealing with the
problems of disabled people, officials of the Ministry of Education,
Culture and Sport, Minister Kamo Atanessian. Hakob Abrahamian, the
president of the Pyunik Association, presented the activity, goals and
problems of the association. In particular, he said the association
was established in 1989 for relief of children who became disabled
during the earthquake of Spitak in 1988. The association’s donors are
the Armenian President’s Fund and the government, the Diaspora
communities, various charity organizations, as well as Aznavour to
Armenia, the International Red Cross, the Norwegian Council of
Refugees, US and UK Embassies to Armenia, USAID, the International
Rehabilitation Foundation, and other organizations. The goal of the
association is physical, social and psychological rehabilitation of
disabled people. The association uses sports to achieve these. Since
1989 2000 disabled people have participated in 20 summer and winter
camping, organized by the association. The organization makes efforts
to develop swimming, windsurfing, weightlifting, archery, basketball,
tennis, mountain skiing, etc. among the disabled. Armenian disabled
people participated in the windsurfing contest in England and Spain in
1994 and 1995. Besides, the association deals with the rights,
education, prosthetic services, employment of the disabled. Since 2004
the organization has been implementing the program of workshop of
repair of wheelchairs. Since 2002 the association has been carrying
out a program of leisure of children under 12. For future plans, the
president of the association pointed out assistance to disabled people
to get higher and vocational education, creation of jobs for them,
expanding the scope and improving the level of services. It is planned
to reconstruct the centre of sport, culture and recreation, which will
have specially equipped gyms, classrooms and labs. Hakob Abrahamian
expressed willingness to cooperate with similar organizations in
Nagorno Karabakh and encouraged to extend their proposals, speak about
their problems and obstacles.

Minister of Education, Culture and Sport Kamo Atayan thanked Pyunik
for their activity in NKR, and said that hopefully their cooperation
will facilitate the integration of disabled people in Artsakh. The
director of the Rehabilitation Centre Vardan Tadevossian said several
people from Artsakh wish to participate in the wheelchair marathon
Yerevan-Echmiadzin on May 28 and the Armenian festival of disabled
people in late May. He also assured that the cooperation will produce
positive results and will facilitate the integration of disabled
people in Karabakh.

LAURA GRIGORIAN.
27-04-2006

Agence France Presse — English
April 27, 2006 Thursday 3:22 PM GMT

Ethnic Armenians, Tajiks urge Russia to stop racist violence

MOSCOW, April 27 2006

Ethnic Armenians and Tajiks living in Russia on Thursday called for
action against the rising number of racist murders in the country,
five days after a youth of Armenian origin was killed in the Moscow
subway.

“Today we need civil solidarity and we must develop a plan of action
to prevent xenophobia” from spreading in the country, said Ara
Abramian, president of the Armenian Union of Russia, which represents
some two million Russians of Armenian descent.

“We want our children not to be afraid to go out in the street after
six o’clock in the evening,” Abramian told a news conference in
Moscow.

Along with representatives of the ethnic Tajik community, they called
for a peace march against the racist violence which they claim
Russian society has been ignoring and that Russian authorities often
fail to identify as racially motivated.

Last Saturday’s murder in the subway in the center of Moscow was “the
sixth murder of an Armenian in Russia since January,” Abramian said.

Govkhar Djurayeva, the head of a human rights group called
Tajikistan, representing nearly one million people from the central
Asian country living in Russia, stressed the need for action against
skinheads, extreme right-wing youths “who spread fascist messages
over the Internet”.

The attacks by bands of skinheads, often labelled as “hooliganism” by
Russian authorities, generally target people from the Caucasus and
the former Soviet republics of central Asia, as well as from African
and Asian countries.