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Category: Southern Caucasus

  • U.S. HELSINKI COMMISSION TO HOLD HEARING ON HUMAN RIGHTS AND DEMOCRATIZATION IN AZERBAIJAN

    U.S. HELSINKI COMMISSION TO HOLD HEARING ON HUMAN RIGHTS AND DEMOCRATIZATION IN AZERBAIJAN

    234 Ford House Office Building
    Washington, D.C. 20515-6460
    Hon. Alcee L. Hastings, Chairman
    Hon. Benjamin L. Cardin, Co-Chairman
    For Immediate Release    		 www.csce.gov
    Media Contact: Lale Mamaux
    202.225.1901
    July 24, 2008

    (Washington, D.C.) Congressman Alcee L. Hastings (D-FL), Chairman of the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe (U.S. Helsinki Commission) and Co-Chairman Senator Benjamin L. Cardin (D-MD), will hold a hearing entitled, “Human Rights and Democratization in Azerbaijan.” The hearing will be held on Tuesday, July 29 at 3:00 p.m. in room B-318 of the Rayburn House Office Building.

    Azerbaijan has one of the fastest growing economies in the world and plays a pivotal role in diversifying sources of energy. A moderate Muslim country, Azerbaijan enjoys good relations with the United States. On human rights, however, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the Council of Europe have numerous concerns, including freedom of the media, political prisoners and the conduct of elections.

    With an upcoming presidential contest in October, Azerbaijan has an opportunity to hold an election that meets OSCE commitments, as well as implement other reforms. The hearing will examine the state of human rights and democratization in Azerbaijan and discuss how U.S. – Azerbaijan cooperation could help promote advances.

    WITNESSES

    The Honorable David Kramer, Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor

    His Excellency Yashar Aliyev, Ambassador, Republic of Azerbaijan

    Mr. Chris Walker, Director of Studies, Freedom House

    **Additional witnesses may be added

    The Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe, also known as the Helsinki Commission, is a U.S. Government agency that monitors progress in the implementation of the provisions of the 1975 Helsinki Accords. The Commission consists of nine members from the United States Senate, nine from the House of Representatives, and one member each from the Departments of State, Defense and Commerce.

  • Turkey, Georgia, Azerbaijan launch joint rail link

    Turkey, Georgia, Azerbaijan launch joint rail link

    By Hatice Aydogdu

     

    KARS, Turkey, July 24 (Reuters) – Leaders of Turkey, Georgia and Azerbaijan launched a railway project between the three countries on Thursday, building on links already forged by gas and oil pipelines.

     

    At a railway station in the eastern Turkish border town of Kars the presidents of the three countries held a ground breaking ceremony for the $290 million Turkish section of the railway.

     

    The three countries are already linked by the BP-led Baku-Ceyhan oil pipeline and the Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum gas line but trade links between Turkey and the Caucasus region are limited.

     

    Turkish President Abdullah Gul, Georgia’s Mikheil Saakashvili and Azerbaijan’s Ilham Aliyev placed three sections of railway track on a large map of the region in a symbolic launch of the project as confetti showered down.

     

    A tender last September for construction of the 76-km (47-mile) Turkish stretch of the railway was won by the Ozgun Yapi-Celikler joint venture with a bid of $289.8 million, the lowest of 14 bids.

     

    The project involves new track construction and renewal of existing track, and is expected to be completed in 2011. (Writing by Daren Butler; Editing by Jon Boyle)

  • Turkish stretch of railway linking Turkey, Georgia, Azerbaijan launched

    Turkish stretch of railway linking Turkey, Georgia, Azerbaijan launched

    ANKARA, Turkey: The Associated Press – The presidents of Turkey, Georgia and Azerbaijan have launched the construction of the Turkish stretch of a railway linking their nations.

    The US$600 million rail line will connect the Azerbaijani capital, Baku, with the eastern Turkish city of Kars, via the Georgian capital, Tbilisi.

    The project is one of several linking oil-rich Azerbaijan and Central Asia with Turkey and European markets while bypassing Russia.

    A groundbreaking ceremony in Kars Thursday marked the start of the 50 mile (76 kilometer) Turkish section of the 110 mile (180 kilometer) railroad.

    “We are launching the iron Silk Road,” Turkey’s Abdullah Gul said. “It will link China in Asia to London.”

    The Silk Road was an ancient Asian trading route. The railway will be operational in 2011.

    Source: International Herald Tribune, July 24, 2008

  • Armenian spy killed on Azerbaijan border, says Baku

    Armenian spy killed on Azerbaijan border, says Baku

    20 July 2008 | 00:54 | FOCUS News Agency

    BAKU. Azerbaijani soldiers overnight killed a suspected Armenian intelligence agent who tried to cross the border, Azerbaijan’s defence ministry said Saturday in a statement.

    The incident occurred in a village in Azerbaijan’s north-western Tovuz region, the ministry said, adding that two other intelligence agents fled.

    Armenia and Azerbaijan remain locked in a tense stand-off over the enclave of Nagorny Karabakh, where ethnic Armenian forces took control during a war in the early 1990s that killed thousands and forced nearly a million people on both sides to flee their homes.

    A ceasefire was signed between the two former Soviet republics in 1994 but the dispute remains unresolved after more than a decade of negotiations, and shootings are common. Up to 16 soldiers were killed in a clash last month.

    Nagorny-Karabakh is a 4,400-square-kilometre (1,700-square-mile) enclave surrounded by Azerbaijan.

    Source: www.focus-fen.net, 20 July 2008

  • Union of Enlighteners of Turkic World Established

    Union of Enlighteners of Turkic World Established

    Kazakhstan, Almaty, 11 July /corr. Trend News R.Mashadihasanli / Constituent conference of Union of Enlighteners of Turkic World took place in Almaty.
    The conference was attended by the representatives of Turkey, Kyrgyzstan, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Turkish Republic of North Cyprus. Academician Haji Kheyrulla was elected as the Chairman of the Union, and the professor of Gazi University of Turkey, Ismet Chetin, candidate of philological sciences, editor-in-chief of the newspapers TURKEL and Veten, Ramiz Mashadihasanli and professor Murat Tuzunkhan ( Turkish Republic of North Cyprus) were elected deputy chairman.

    The goal of establishing the Union of the Enlighteners of Turkic World is to combine world-known people, being engaged in history, literature, science and skill, to strengthen relations between the Turkic-speaking states.

    The correspondent can be contacted at: trend@trend.az

    Source: trendaz.com, 11.07.08

     

     

  • Dashnaks Leader Uneasy Over Armenian Overtures To Turkey

    Dashnaks Leader Uneasy Over Armenian Overtures To Turkey

    Rustamian

    By Anna Saghabalian

    A leader of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (Dashnaktsutyun) reiterated on Wednesday his party’s misgivings and unease about President Serzh Sarkisian’s diplomatic overtures to Turkey.

    Armen Rustamian warned that Turkish President Abdullah Gul will face street protests by Dashnaktsutyun if he accepts Sarkisian’s invitation to visit Yerevan and watch the first-ever match between the two countries’ national soccer teams to be played on September 6.

    “We must not allow Turkey to create an illusion about the existence of relations [with Armenia,]” he told journalists. “This is all it wants.”

    Rustamian said Dashnaktsutyun, which is a junior partner in Armenia’s governing coalition, would “remind” Gul of the 1915 Armenian genocide and other problems existing between the two nations. “We have the right to express our protest within the civilized norms,” he said. “We are currently thinking about what forms it could take.”

    The Armenian and Turkish governments raised new hopes for the normalization of the historically strained relations between their nations shortly after Sarkisian took over as Armenia’s new president in April. Official Yerevan responded positively to Ankara’s offer of a “dialogue.” As well as inviting Gul to pay a first-ever visit to Armenia by a Turkish head of state, Sarkisian signaled last month his government’s readiness to agree, in principle, to the creation of a Turkish-Armenian commission of historians that would study the mass killings of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire.

    Sarkisian’s predecessor, Robert Kocharian, rejected the idea floated by Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan in 2005, saying that the highly sensitive issue must be addressed by the two governments, rather than historians. In an interview late last month, Kocharian faulted Sarkisian for extending the extraordinary invitation to Gul welcomed by the United States.

    Rustamian agreed with Kocharian’s stance, while playing down the significance of the invitation. “If I were the president I wouldn’t invite him,” he said.

    Rustamian, who also chairs the Armenian parliament’s foreign relations committee, insisted at the same time that there are no “strategic differences” within Armenia’s leadership on how to improve relations with Turkey.

    Successive Armenian governments have stood for an unconditional normalization of Turkish-Armenian relations, saying that the two countries should establish diplomatic relations and open their border before tackling their outstanding problems. Dashnaktsutyun has traditionally favored a harder line that makes Turkish recognition of the genocide a necessary condition for a Turkish-Armenian rapprochement.

    (Photolur photo: Armen Rustamian.) 

    Wednesday 23, July 2008