ArmenPress
Feb 2 2005

ANOTHER US ARMENIAN BIDS FOR HAYFILM STUDIO

YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 2, ARMENPRESS: Gevork Gevorkian, the director of
Hayfilm (ArmenFilm) studio told Armenpress a US-based businessman of
Armenian origin has offered to pay $1.5 million for the studio and
pledged to invest another $100 million to make it a contemporary
laboratory for production of films.
Gevorkian said none of his employees is against privatization, as
“it is very difficult to shoot films in conditions which the studio
offers.” He said out of 15 cameras only one works and that one was
presented to it by Charles Aznavour 15 years ago.
Gevorkian has been director of the studio since 1992. He said the
program presented by Khachikian meets their expectations, both in
what regards its modernization, wages, improvement of the studio’s
territory, training of the personnel and so. The restoration project,
designed by another US-based Armenian, envisages that in five years
the studio would develop into a modern movie-city.
Two other businessmen of Armenian origin, Gerard Cafesjian from
the USA and Ara Abrahamian from Russia have submitted their bids. The
first proposed $600,000 for the studio and $5 million in investments
and the second $1 million and $ 6 million in investments.
Hayfilm movie studio is located on 33.4 hectares just outside
Yerevan.

AzerTag, Azerbaijan
Feb 2 2005

PREMIER OF AZERBAIJAN RECEIVES RUSSIAN FOREIGN MINISTER
[February 02, 2005, 17:45:00]

On February 2, Artur Rasizade, Prime Minister of the Republic of
Azerbaijan, has received the delegation headed by the Russian foreign
minister Sergey Lavrov.

Noting that the relations between the two countries are high level in
all fields, head of the Azerbaijan Government especially underlined
dynamic development of economic links. He said volume of goods
turnover between the two countries have increased in one and a half,
and the meetings of the inter-governmental commission is regularly
held. After Vladimir Putin has come to power in Russia, after his
talks with the nationwide leader of Azerbaijan Heydar Aliyev, the
ties between the two countries have acquired higher level. And
currently, there is no unsolved problem between the two countries.
Recently, the negotiations on questions of delimitation of borders
will commence.

Speaking of the economic achievements, on the ongoing reforms, the
premier stated the major problem is the unsolved Armenia-Azerbaijan,
Nagorno-Karabakh conflict which impedes more effective development of
the Country.

Sergey Lavrov, highly estimating the development level of partnership
ties of the two countries, gave a positive assessment to the talks
between heads of foreign policy departments of the two countries.

Ambassador of Azerbaijan Republic in Russia Ramiz Rizayev took part
at the reception.

AzerTag, Azerbaijan
Feb 2 2005

AZERBAIJANI DEPUTY FOREIGN MINISTER: TERRITORIAL COMPROMISE IS
UNACCEPTABLE
[February 02, 2005, 21:08:18]

On February 2, at the `Europe’ hotel was commenced a two-days
workshop under the aegis of NATO ` Economics, security and defence:
the security aspects of the macroeconomic stabilization and
structural reforms including a management of the defence resources’.

The workshop have been attended by representatives NATO members
countries, partners of the organization and diplomatic corps in
Azerbaijan.

NATO secretary general’s deputy on the regional, economics and
security issues Patric Hardown said that it is a second workshop in
the region. As he noted Azerbaijan and Georgia are two most
developing countries in the South Caucasus region, as well as in the
world. According to reports of the EBRD the given countries have
expanding the economy and cooperation with both countries is very
important for NATO.

Deputy Foreign Minister of Azerbaijan Araz Azimov has noted that
organizing of the workshop in Azerbaijan showen a great interest of
NATO to our country. As he said, the economic development is
necessary for providing of security and these issues is interrelated.
Mr. Azimov also has speaking of the integration of Azerbaijan into
Euroatlantic structures, taking by government measures for membership
in WTO, for reduction of poverty and regional development.

As regards the Armenian-Azerbaijan, Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, Mr.
Azimov has remind of inadmissibility of the compromise on territorial
issues. He said that PA of COE has adopted in January a document
which once again confirmed the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan.

Then representatives of the several countries has gave a reports.

The workshop is continues.

AzerTag, Azerbaijan
Feb 2 2005

MEETING OF FOREIGN MINISTER OF AZERBAIJAN AND RUSSIA
[February 02, 2005, 17:44:35]

On February 2, Elmar Mammadyarov, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the
Republic of Azerbaijan, met with his Russian counterpart Sergey
Lavrov, who paid an official visit to Azerbaijan.

Azerbaijani Foreign Minister, welcoming his Russian colleague,
emphasized the relations of friendship and cooperation between the
two nations. He also stressed close and cordial personal relations
between the two heads of state.

Foreign Minister Lavrov agreed with this statement and expressed his
hope that the ties between Russia and Azerbaijan will continue to
develop comprehensively.

The two sides exchanged views on certain aspects of bilateral
relations, such as further increasing trade volume, intensifying
partnerships between regions of the two countries, developing
cultural cooperation, etc. In this regard, the Ministers broadly
discussed plan of actions for the upcoming `Year of Azerbaijan in
Russia’, as well as the perspective for 2006 to be the `Year of
Russia in Azerbaijan’.

Minister Elmar Mammadyarov and Minister Sergey Lavrov spoke about
various aspects of cooperation on the Caspian matters, where both
sides re-affirmed their commitment to resolving remaining issues
among the five littoral states in the spirit of constructive
cooperation based on the principle of medium line.

Other issues of mutual interest discussed by the sides included
reform on the UN, future perspectives of OSCE and CIS activity.

Special attention was paid to the ways of settlement of the
Armenia-Azerbaijan, Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, especially to the
activity of the OSCE Minsk Group, of which Russia is a co-chair.

After the meeting, Elmar Mammadyarov and Sergey Lavrov briefed for
media representatives and answered their questions.

Assa-Irada, Azerbaijan
Jan 28 2005

`Armenia stands poor chance at deceiving fact-finding mission’

BAKU

The OSCE fact-finding mission will stay in the occupied Azerbaijani
territories for ten days at the most, Deputy Foreign Minister,
President’s special envoy on the Upper Garabagh conflict, Araz
Azimov, told a news conference on Friday.
The mission will start its work in the Kalbajar district and proceed
according to a map it will receive, containing all the data related
to the territories settled by Armenians.
Azimov said that there are no reasons for concerns over possible
attempts by Armenians to hide the territories that Azerbaijan
considers important and that they stand a poor chance at deceiving
the mission. He said that the mission representatives will be
responsible for visiting those areas and expressed confidence that
they will properly fulfill their duties.
Azimov said that upon conclusion of the visit, the OSCE mission will
compare the data it collects with the materials presented by
Azerbaijan and prepare a relevant report. The document based on these
facts, after being considered by the OSCE Minsk Group, will be
further submitted to the OSCE Permanent Council in Vienna.*

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Useless-Knowledge.com
Feb 1, 2005

A Citizen Of The World

By Alexander Antonarakis
Feb. 1, 2005

A recent article was written agreeing with the toughts of an Austrian
Ethnologist in the 19th Century that modern greeks are not greeks, or
as the ethnologist put it “not a drop of blood of the ancient greeks
runs in the modern greek nation”. I thought it wold be more
appropriate to provide a response to Thomas Keyes.

Greek History is very large (4700 years), and it is impossible for
there not to have been mixing of populations. If you spoke to any
greek nowadays, they have the knowledge that they are not 100% pure
descendants of the ancients. They have the acceptance of the
procession of events throughout history. Yet it is quite naive to
think that all the nations in which greeks prevailed contributed
largely to the bloodline. The largest change in greek bloodline was
the Dorian Invasion which provided new ideas and architechture to the
Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations, creating a new hellenic heritage
which sread all over the agean initially. There were different city
states or kingdoms such as
Athens/Sparta/Thebes/Macedonia/Ionia/Crete/Byzanti um/Pontus, etc.
Later, after the colonization periods of the east and west
Mediterranean, Alexander spread the hellenic heritage until the
Indus. Yes, here there was large mixing of populations of Sogdians,
Bactrians, Persians, etc…but how many of these made their way back
to the Aegean? These greeks have become the bloodlines of modern
Iran, Pakistan, Afganistan, etc. In Egypt also there was some mixing,
but at the time of Mark Anthony, and later during the Golden Age of
Monastisism in Egypt, the copts and greeks lived comfotably with each
other, YET retained a heritage during the arab and ottoman invasions.
Over 100,000 and more greeks were expelled by Naser in 1955 from
Alexandria.

Now for the Slavic invasions into the Pindud mountains, yes we all
know that happened, but we do not know how much. Also, the greek
speaking Byzantium was definately not centered around modern day
greece. All of asia minor was crawling with hellenes. 2 million of
these finally made their way back to the Agaean in 1922. We all know
that we have some slavic blood, as the slavs know that they have
greek blood. The fact always remains that on the whole, tha greek
population was largely always greek with small additions here and
there.

As for Turks and Jews, we know that the Jews do not mix well with any
race. For the turks, it is also known that a convert to islam could
not turn back to christianity…the penalty was death. Many
christians such as greeks, slavs, and armenians retained their
religion as their genetic heritage. There is a huge amount of
christian blood in modern day turks, yet not nearly as significant in
the balkans and armenia/georgia.

Italians affected our bloodline slighlty in the cycladic islands,
corfu, and crete. But if you think, much of italy, especially the
south was part of byzantium until the 10th century, so much of their
bloodline is also hellenic or byzantine roman. Germans during the
world war definately did not affect our bloodline in anyway! And
black africans such as ethiopians did come to the Aegean in small
numbers.

The conclusion of this article is that the modern day Hellenes have
the most genetic heritahge than any other peoples in Europe and the
middle east (except maybe the jews in israel). We do not have direct
100% heritage of course from Homer and Socrates to Justinian and the
Comnenus family, but we do carry a large part of their body, be it
physical or mental. We are the closest peoples to the ancient and
byzantine hellens. Yet as Socrates said, “I am not an athenian, not a
greek, but a citizen of the world”…we should not fight on who
represents who, we should be proud of what we are, and of what we can
achieve in the future for our race, and for Europe in the World.

RIA Novosti, Russia
Feb 2, 2005

LAVROV PUZZLED BY U.S. ASSERTIONS THAT RUSSIA’S ENGAGEMENT IN
SETTLING CIS CONFLICTS IS NOT INTENSIVE ENOUGH

BAKU, February 2 (RIA Novosti) – Russian Foreign Minister Sergei
Lavrov said he had not heard of a U.S. State Department official’s
statement that Russia had not paid much attention to settling
conflicts in the post-Soviet space.

Mr. Lavrov was pressed for comments on U.S. Undersecretary of State
Elizabeth Jones’ statement at a press conference in Baku.

“I have not heard of this statement,” said the minister.

“But I do find it strange as being a facilitating party, Russia is
engaged in the settlement of practically all conflicts in the
post-Soviet space,” said Mr. Lavrov.

Mr. Lavrov recalled that Russia, along with the United States and
France, was a co-sponsor of the settlement process (between
Azerbaijan and Armenia) over Nagorny Karabakh.

“Over the past 2-3 months Russia has been working intensively within
the (OSCE) Minsk Group along with the U.S. and France, and we will
hopefully achieve considerable progress soon,” said the minister.

Mr. Lavrov also pointed to Russia’s intense efforts to settle
conflicts in Abkhazia, South Ossetia, and Transdniestria (the
self-proclaimed republics on Georgian and Moldovan territories
respectively). Mr. Lavrov said the parties to the conflicts would
fulfill their obligations and thereby they would hopefully stabilize
the situation there.

Speaking about settlement efforts in Transdniestria, Mr. Lavrov said
Russia had made a greater contribution to the settlement process than
the other parties involved. Mr. Lavrov believes a memorandum and the
stability pact proposed by Moldovan President Vladimir Voronin will
produce a positive result if signed by the parties to the conflict.
Mr. Lavrov believes this is “the only appropriate way to settle the
conflict.”

Global Politician, NY
Feb 2, 2005

Does Turkey Belong In the European Union?

2/2/2005

By Antero Leitzinger
Turkey applied for membership in the EEC as early as in 1970s, when
she had been indisputably and for a long time a democratic market
economy, one of the founding members of the Council of Europe, and a
country with a decent record on human rights, compared with the
military dictatorships of Greece, Spain and Portugal, let alone the
countries of Eastern Europe. The upheavals of Southern Europe in the
mid-1970s, the intensified internal political situation of Turkey,
and the military regime of early 1980s, as well as the surprising
membership of Greece in the Western European community sidelined
Turkey for two extra decades to wait for acceptance.

Finally during Finland’s chairman period in 1999, Turkey was finally
accepted as an applicant country for the European Union. This
encouraged Turkey to make legal reforms, which have been carried out
for three years now, despite the hard economic crisis. Guerrilla war
in the Kurdish districts is past now, and on 30th Nov. 2002, even the
last province was officially returned to normalcy. The PKK has
abolished itself, and the death penalty of the PKK leader Abdullah
Öcalan has been changed into life imprisonment. Turkey’s prisons have
been reformed according to the EU norms, lots of inmates have been
amnestied, and previously used parts of the criminal law have been
overruled. In allowing media and school teaching in Kurdish
languages, Turkey has exceeded France and Sweden in the progression
of her minority policy.

However, Turkey has traditionally had dedicated enemies in Europe. As
early as in 1800s, conservative Christian and idealist liberal civil
movements, acting on behalf of the Christian minorities of the
Balkans, were organising lecture and newspaper campaigns and
demonstrations against Turkey. The ancient Greece was adored under
the banners of philhellenism (1821), and medieval myths were revived
by telling horror stories of the “Bulgarian atrocities” (1876). The
propaganda war culminated in the after-play of the First World War in
1920s, but was again revived from 1965 onwards, on the initiative of
third generation Armenian emigrants of France and America, who were
inspired and directed by Soviet Armenia.

Nowadays it is hard to believe that Turkey could anyhow get released
from the constant criticism by human rights organisations, since
criticising Turkey has become the lifeline of many of them. For many
international human rights organisations, regular campaigns against
Turkey have become the most successful kind of activity, and Turkish
illegal immigrants willingly participate them in order to base their
asylum applications. International organisations, researchers and
media outlets are using Turkish extremist groups as their sources,
but the credibility and relevance of the information they provide is
very low. For this reason, the criticism against Turkey often repeats
echoes from years away. In its latest issue, Der Spiegel (50/9th Dec.
2002) added to its article on Turkey a picture of a Kurdish
demonstration from 1992.

Turkish asylum seekers still refer to the destruction and evacuation
of frontier villages in mid-1990s. Although repatriation of these
villages has been started, the Human Rights Watch report predicts the
return to fail, because it would be too late without EU support (i.e.
many who have moved to cities, are reluctant to return to the
periphery).

Neue Zürcher Zeitung (28th Nov. 2002) tells that torture became more
common in Turkey during the short military reign of 1980s. After that
the government tried to get rid of the phenomenon by sending the
cruel policemen from cities to the countryside, which, however,
spread the problem especially to the Kurdish districts. Accusing the
policemen was made difficult by a law that demanded acceptance of the
superior to rise a court case. The fact that many trials were taking
more than five years caused that many accusations became obsolete.
The new government has suggested a legal reform that would correct
these problems, and enable overruling existing verdicts on political
crimes.

Against this background we have to understand the interest of the
Turks in the question, whether they are Europeans in the others’
eyes, or if they fall outside Europe already in principle. When the
Westernisation that has prevailed in Turkey for 80 years becomes
questioned by other Europeans, the nationalist and pan-Islamic
alternatives become stronger. Same kind of development was
experienced already in early 1900s, when the originally liberal Young
Turks changed into ferocious nationalists and rushed into the First
World War. In today’s Turkey, many people think that if the EU will
turn her back to Turkey, Turkey must turn towards Arab countries,
Iran, the Caucasus, and Central Asia. In co-operation with Pakistan,
Turkey could develop her own nuclear weapon. The successful military
co-operation between Turkey and Israel would be endangered. The
300-year rivalry between Turkey and Russia over the borderlands would
intensify.

Turkey is a bit poorer than Romania, when the GNP per capita is
compared, but the reason is the very rapid growth of Turkish
population. It is estimated that after 10 years there will be 90
million inhabitants in Turkey, more than in Germany. In one way or
another, that will compensate the shrinking population of Europe and
Russia. Chronic inflation plagues the Turkish economy, but economic
growth has been strong for a long time, and there is plenty of
potential. Unemployment (8,5 %) is lower than in most of the
countries of Eastern Europe, and industrialisation is more developed
than in Bulgaria and Romania. (Der Spiegel, 50/9th Dec. 2002)

Political Islamisation of Turkey would influence Europe especially
through the 2,5 million Turkish-originating immigrants residing in
Germany. It is hard to imagine how the EU could isolate herself from
Turkey and the Middle East. The EU can, however, choose, whether she
will passively surrender to be a side theatre of the problems of the
Middle East and the whole Islamic world, or whether it takes an
active initiative to support moderate Muslims and Turkey in her
relations to her neighbours.

It is expected that the attitude towards Turkey, the Turks, Muslims
and foreigners in general, will become a hot election issue in the
election of the German state of Hessen in February. Both radical
right and radical left oppose the EU membership of Turkey. The
present red-green government has tried to balance between the views
and the former Bundeskanzler Helmut Kohl had a Turkish
daughter-in-law. Compared to these, future seems more controversial.
Already half million of the German Turks have German citizenship, and
their votes for the left and for the Greens was decisive in favour of
the present government in last national election.

Antero Leitzinger is a political historian and a researcher for the
Finnish Directorate of Immigration. He wrote several books on Turkey,
the Middle East and the Caucasus.

NTV MSNBC, Turkey
Feb 2 2005

Turkish parliament to discuss Armenian genocide claims

The parliament’s committee for harmonisation with the European Union
invited Armenian societies and unbiased Armenian and Turkish
historians to attend the session.

February 2 – The Turkish parliament’s committee for harmonisation with
the European Union has announced that it will investigate claims by
Armenians that the Ottoman Empire committed acts of genocide against
its Armenian citizens during World War One.

Ali Riza Alaboyun, the deputy chairman of the parliamentary
committee, said that some Armenian groups have agreed to the discuss
the issues and settle the Armenian genocide claims that have been
levelled at Turkey by many groups and organisations.
`I do not believe that in our history there is anything to be
ashamed of,’ Alaboyun said. `There is lack of information. We shall
take the initiative in hand and have an unbiased assessment of events
occurring away from us.’
Onur Oymen, a member of the opposition Republican People’s
Party who also sits on the committee, said that Armenians distribute
publications targeting Turkey on the genocide claims and that Turkey
should make sure to send out material refuting the allegations.
The decision to discuss the Armenian claims comes on the 90th
anniversary of the alleged Armenian genocide. In April this year, the
parliaments of a number of countries are to hold a vote on whether to
recognise the allegations against the Ottoman Empire, with the
so-called genocide also to be commemorated by massive events staged
by the Armenians.

AzerTag, Azerbaijan
Feb 2 2005

ARMENIA CONSIDERS IT HAS SUFFERED DIPLOMATIC FAILURE ON KARABAKH
QUESTION
[February 02, 2005, 18:19:32]

Political forces of Armenia are concerned with the situation
developed around settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh problem, and
consider that Armenia has suffered diplomatic failure. The question
is that actually all key forces interested in peace settlement of the
Nagorno-Karabakh problem, have declared necessity of solution of this
problem within the framework of territorial integrity of Azerbaijan.
In particular, it proves to be true also acceptance by PACE of the
resolution on Nagorno-Karabakh, and visiting by representatives of
OSCE of the Nagorno-Karabakh region, statements of the US Department
of State and the president of Iran Mohammad Khatami, and also
statements of the Prime Minister of Turkey Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

So, in his interview, the head of Democratic Party of Armenia, Member
of Parliamentary fraction “Justice”, the former adviser of the
president of Armenia on external questions Aram Sarkisian has said to
the Russian news agency “REGNUM” that the reason of such diplomatic
failure of Armenia is that Kocharian and Oskanian have underestimated
the President of Azerbaijan. `However, actually, Ilham Aliyev in
short time has developed and has carried out precise program on
creation of the whole coalition of reliable partners’, A. Sarkisian
has told. In his opinion, all statements of President Ilham Aliyev
for one million refugees and 20 percent of the occupied territories
have found the form of political line, which have received approval
of the international community. Armenia, Sarkisyan has noted, has
lost partners in the Karabakh problem and is in isolation. `And here,
even Russia will not support us, stresses Sarkisian, as Russia is a
pragmatic state which is starting with its interests’.

In opinion of the oppositionist, a way out is carrying out of
extraordinary presidential elections in Armenia and giving the
authority to hands of people, `allocated trust of people’.