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| December 1 - 6 |
Incumbent President Robert Kocharian
will face up to fourteen challengers in the upcoming election set
for February 19. The deadline for submission of applications to Armenia's
Central Election Commission (CEC) passed at 6:00PM local time today.
In the upcoming weeks each nominee will have to collect at least 35,000
signatures for official registration as presidential candidates in
the first half of January. Also this week, the CEC officially limited
financing for each candidate's campaign to pre-election funds of no
more than $103,000. Campaign donations are limited to roughly $350
for individuals and $860 for businesses. Financing by foreign citizens,
the Armenian government and charitable or religious organizations
is illegal.
According to the Armenian Sociological Association (ASA) and other
observers, only four nominees are capable of posing a serious challenge
to the incumbent. They are: Artashes Geghamian of the National Unity
Party, non-party candidate Raffi Hovannisian, Stepan Demirchian of
the People's Party and Vazgen Manukian of the National Democratic
Union. A recent ASA survey found that close to a third of all respondents
have already decided to vote for Kocharian, with the top opposition
candidates polling between five and ten percent. Close to a half of
all respondents said they are undecided or inclined not to vote.
Over the past two weeks, Kocharian's nomination received endorsements
from the Republican, Country of Law (Orinats Yerkir) and Democratic
Liberal (Ramkavar Azatakan) Parties, the Armenian Revolutionary Federation
(Dashnaktsutiun) and several organizations comprised of local self-government,
business and humanitarian leaders.
"Considering the disarray in opposition ranks, it is not overly optimistic
to expect Kocharian to receive over 60 percent in the first round,"
said one pro-presidential analyst. The opposition "alliance" of 16
parties, established earlier this year around their commonly espoused
goal to unseat Kocharian, has produced nine nominees. Another factor
playing to Kocharian's advantage is that ex-President Levon Ter-Petrossian
refused to accept the nomination of the former ruling Armenian Pan-National
Movement.
Below is the list of nominees and their affiliation, arranged in the
order of application to the CEC:
Stepan Demirchian People's Party
Aram Karapetian Constitutional Rights Union
Paruir Hairikian Self-Determination Union
Artashes Geghamian National Unity Party
Robert Kocharian Unaffiliated
Raffi Hovannisian Unaffiliated
Ruben Avagian United Armenians Party
Vazgen Manukian National Democratic Union
Garnik Margarian Socialist Armenia Union
Aram Sargsian Democratic Party
Aram Harutiunian National Accord Party
Arshak Sadoyan Union of National Democrats
Vladimir Darbinian Communist Party
Aram Sargsian Party of the Republic
Petros Makeyan Democratic Fatherland Party |
December
1 - 6 |
Funds raised in Armenian Diaspora
communities and Armenia last week will allow for completion of almost
half of the 102-mile long North-South highway in Karabakh, Hayastan
All-Armenian Fund officials said. Of the total $5 million raised,
over $260,000 came from Armenia and Nagorno Karabakh. Fund officials
said the increase in domestic philanthropy reflected strengthening
of the local business class. Earlier this year, several businessmen
from Armenia funded a $450,000 housing project in the town of Spitak.
The Karabakh highway is the fund's biggest project to date and requires
$25 million in funding, with $12 million raised so far. |
December
1 - 6 |
Armenia's Deputy Foreign Minister
Rouben Shugarian paid a six-day visit to Israel last week for political
consultations with counterparts in the Israeli government. Plans for
exchanging resident ambassadors were among topics discussed. Foreign
Minister Vartan Oskanian cautioned that there were no immediate plans
to open an embassy in Tel Aviv, although Israel has emerged as one
of Armenia's top trading partners. Israel is also home to one of the
oldest Armenian Diaspora communities.
Shugarian's visit is expected to set the stage for improved bilateral
ties. Israel's refusal to acknowledge the Armenian Genocide and renewed
concerns over the security of Armenian lives and property in the Holy
Land have created tensions earlier this year. The Armenian Patriarchate
issued a statement last week reporting that the Israeli Army has ended
its efforts to confiscate much of the Patriarchate's Baron Der property,
located between Jerusalem and Bethlehem. Earlier this year, Israeli
plans to build a security fence through the ancient olive grove and
centuries-old retreat for Armenian clergy led to protests by Armenian
and international organizations. The Israeli fence will now run along
Baron Der's southern perimeter affecting only a narrow strip of the
property. Israel will also compensate the Patriarchate for the damage
already caused to Baron Der. |
December
1 - 6 |
Armenia is more developed than all
of its neighbors, but lags behind Russia, Belarus and the Baltic States
in terms of social and economic development, a United Nations study
released last week reported. The Human Development Index (HDI) compares
countries according to life expectancy, education level, productivity
and income. Norway, Sweden, Canada, Belgium and Australia are at the
top of the index and together with fifty other countries have what
the UN terms as "high human development." Armenia is 76th, Georgia
- 81st, Turkey - 85th, Azerbaijan - 88th and Iran - 98th on the scale.
Their designation is defined as achieving "medium human development."
An Armenian Foreign Ministry official said this week that he objected
to classification of Armenia and other post-Soviet states as "developing
countries." Speaking at a conference held at the UN office in Yerevan,
Artak Apitonian said that their economic structure and educational
level differentiates them from typical developing countries. They
should therefore be more accurately considered as a separate group
of "countries in transition." |
December
1 - 6 |
The Georgian government last week
came under strong pressure from BP, Azerbaijan, Turkey and the United
States to quickly approve the proposed route of the controversial
Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline, Georgia's Environment Minister Nino
Chkhobadze admitted this week. "We gave in to the pressure [because]
the investors were threatening to pull out of the project altogether,"
she said.
The latest pipeline-related controversy focused on the plan by the
BP-led consortium to route the pipeline via Georgia's Borjomi valley,
the source of the country's prized mineral springs. The consortium
categorically refused suggestions to lay the pipeline via a shorter
route through the Armenian-populated Akhalkalaki area. BP's Azebaijan
chief executive David Woodward said the oil that will traverse the
pipeline belongs to Azerbaijan and the latter will never agree to
send its most prized asset through an area with an Armenian population.
Georgia's President Eduard Shevardnadze has described the proposed
pipeline as his country's most important achievement since independence.
Nevertheless, he pledged to withdraw from the contract should the
pipeline damage the Borjomi ecology. The head of the Azerbaijani State
Oil Company Natig Aliyev claimed that re-routing of the Georgian section
of the pipeline would postpone its construction by over a year, double
the cost and put the project's viability in question.
BP now plans to begin building the Baku-Ceyhan pipeline next spring
with its own funds. An international coalition of environmentalists
and human rights activists is fighting the effort to obtain some $2.1
billion in credits from taxpayer-funded international financial organizations.
Meanwhile, the British government will launch a major effort to train
Georgian forces in anti-terrorism techniques, including pipeline security,
some time next year. |
December
6 - 13 |
One hundred and forty-four member
countries of the World Trade Organization (WTO) agreed this week to
admit Armenia to the world body, following years of negotiations.
Prime Minister Andranik Margarian, who arrived in Geneva, Switzerland
for the WTO General Council vote, called it an "historic occasion."
WTO Director-General Supachai Panitchpakdi said the accession was
a "decisive milestone" on Armenia's path to economic liberalization
and market reform. The European Union Trade Commissioner Pascal Lamy
praised Armenia for its "remarkable resolve to finalize negotiations
over the past few months."
News reports suggest that the accession became possible after Turkey
dropped its delay tactics vis-୶is Armenia's application. Armenia,
meanwhile, pledged not to put up hurdles to a possible future accession
of Azerbaijan, which is only now beginning its negotiations with the
WTO. Both Azerbaijan and Turkey refuse to establish economic relations
with Armenia until the Karabakh conflict is settled. Turkish officials
have said that Armenia's inclusion in the WTO will not force them
to reassess their decade-long policy.
Armenia will officially become a WTO member thirty days after its
National Assembly ratifies the accession protocol, agreed to by the
Armenian government and WTO negotiators. The Foreign Affairs Committee
Chairman Hovanes Hovanisian said the parliament will take up the issue
at a special session before the end of the year. No strong opposition
is expected. The government has reportedly succeeded in placating
the agriculture lobbies by negotiating a postponement until 2008 on
the introduction of a value-added tax on agricultural products demanded
by WTO. Armenia already has a liberal trade policy and most of its
taxes and tariffs, which are among the lowest in the region, will
not be affected.
Government officials and analysts in Armenia agree that admission
to the WTO in itself does not guarantee improved economic performance.
Both countries with successful market economies such as Estonia, Latvia
and Lithuania, and struggling Georgia, Kyrgyzstan and Moldova, are
among the former Soviet Union republics that have already joined the
WTO. Armenia sees better export opportunities as the most important
benefit of accession. At the same time, Armenian manufacturers will
be expected to continuously improve their product quality in order
to successfully compete both at home and abroad. |
December
6 - 13 |
The private sector of the Armenian
economy continues to make substantial gains, with the National Statistics
Service reporting double-digit increases this week in the Gross Domestic
Product (GDP) and in exports. Between January and October 2002, GDP
growth reached 12 percent, including 15 percent in industrial production
and 3 percent in agriculture. Energy generation continued to drop,
down nearly 4 percent for the year. Trade indices continued a sharp
climb, with the overall turnover up 21 percent, exports up 51 percent
and imports up 9 percent. But the trade deficit continued to be large
- almost $360 million for the past ten months. Jewelry and cut diamonds
accounted for more than half of all exports, with food and metallurgy
products coming a distant second and third. Rough diamonds, fuels
and equipment topped the list of imports. Belgium, Israel, Russia,
Iran and the United States remain Armenia's top trading partners. |
December
6 - 13 |
Armenia marked the anniversary of
the catastrophic 1988 earthquake late last week. The earthquake took
the lives of an estimated 25,000 people, leaving over half a million
homeless and causing billions of dollars in damages. President Robert
Kocharian and Prime Minister Andranik Margarian attended memorial
ceremonies for the victims in Gyumri and Vanadzor, respectively, while
Nagorno Karabakh President Arkady Ghoukasian led a similar commemoration
in Stepanakert.
Due to programs financed in large part by USAID and the Lincy Foundation,
4,900 families will have received housing by the end of this year
and as many will move into new homes in 2003. Armenian officials believe
that the earthquake area rehabilitation program will finally be completed
next year, and are beginning to draw up plans for accelerated economic
development in Shirak, Lori and Aragatsotn provinces. Unemployment
rates in the earthquake-affected areas are among the highest in Armenia,
and there is concern that many local workers now employed in construction
may be left without work when the relief effort ends. |
December
13 - 20 |
Chief of the U.S. European Command
and Supreme Commander of the NATO forces in Europe General Joseph
Ralston visited Yerevan this week to discuss ongoing preparations
for NATO-led multinational exercises which will be held in Armenia
next June. Meeting with President Robert Kocharian, other senior officials
and the press, the NATO commander noted the "tremendous progress"
achieved in Armenia's relations with the alliance in the past two
years. Ralston also recalled the important assistance provided by
Armenia to the U.S.-led campaign in Afghanistan, including over flight
rights, intelligence information and all other help requested by the
United States. While senior Armenian officials say that they do not
plan to seek full membership in NATO in the near future, they view
the continued cooperation with the alliance as key to the country's
national security strategy. Plans are now underway for the deployment
of an Armenian peace-keeping unit, trained with the help of Greece.
Also, last month Armenia became an associated member of the NATO Parliamentary
Assembly. |
December
13 - 20 |
The U.S. Peace Corps director Gaddi
H. Vasquez was in Yerevan over the weekend to sign a Memorandum of
Understanding with the Ministry of Education and Science on expanding
the organization's activity in Armenia. Vasquez became the first acting
director to visit Armenia, where the Peace Corps has worked since
1992. Over the past decade, 335 Peace Corps volunteers have worked
in Armenia as teachers and consultants. One of the recent volunteers,
now the Armenian Assembly of America Assistant Grassroots Director
Zach Brevis, used his U.S. farming experience to work as an agribusiness
consultant. "In addition to being introduced to an ancient and fascinating
culture, my Peace Corps experience helped establish a personal connection
to what I consider to be America's most devout ally per capita - the
people of Armenia," he said. |
December
13 - 20 |
The recently appointed Turkish Foreign
Minister Yasar Yakis said that the new Turkish government of the Justice
and Development Party (AKP) would work to improve relations with all
its neighbors, including Armenia. In a television interview last Sunday
he reportedly said, "we will consider Azerbaijan's concerns when
establishing relations with Armenia, but if our economic interests
require to establish relations with Armenia we must do so." Turkey
has refused to establish any relations with Armenia, since its independence
in 1991. Several successive Turkish governments conditioned the ties
to an abandonment of the international campaign to affirm the Armenian
Genocide and satisfaction of Azerbaijani demands in the Karabakh conflict.
For its part, Armenia has been ready to normalize ties without preconditions.
Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian this week welcomed the news that
Turkey's new government was ready to establish friendly relations
with all of its neighbors. Oskanian added that improved relations
with Armenia would contribute to Turkey's prospects for the European
Union (EU) membership. The EU decided last week that it would conduct
a new review of reform in Turkey in 2004, and depending on progress
could begin membership negotiations the following year.
Reacting to the Turkish announcement, the Azerbaijani media was quick
to secure a new pledge of Turkish support this week. An Azerbaijani
journalist was reportedly told by Prime Minister Abdullah Gul that
no plan for normalization of relations with Armenia was on the agenda.
He was also quoted as saying, "One false move against Azerbaijan
might lead to the collapse of any Turkish government."
Meanwhile, addressing a Washington-based Turkish lobby group last
week, the U.S. Under Secretary of State Mark Grossman encouraged efforts
to improve Armenian-Turkish relations, including public diplomacy.
One such effort was underway in Istanbul last week. The Armenian-Turkish
women's communication groups, including prominent public figures from
both countries, held its first meeting to explore ways to develop
economic ties in the absence of diplomatic relations. The indirect
trade between the two countries is estimated at tens of millions of
dollars. |
December
13 - 20 |
By all available pre-election opinion
polls, the incumbent President Robert Kocharian continues to maintain
his lead. Media focus centers on whether this advantage is strong
enough for an outright victory by Kocharian and if opposition groups
will be able to agree on a joint candidate.
According to pollsters, whom the opposition describes as pro-government,
Kocharian's support is now around 30 percent. With an anticipated
50 percent voter turnout, this lead can potentially translate to a
60 percent first-round victory. Opposition's own polls, however, put
the incumbent's support at only about 20 percent of respondents, i.e.,
with the same assumed turnout, Kocharian would collect less than 50
percent, necessitating a run-off against the strongest challenger.
The extent to which the existing fourteen presidential challengers
can consolidate remains unclear. One of the opposition's most vocal
parliamentary leaders and one of the few not to seek a nomination
himself, the National Democratic Party (AZhK) Chairman Shavarsh Kocharian
called the abundance of candidates the "number one obstacle for [the
opposition's] victory." Speaking at a press conference last weekend,
the AZhK leader insisted that he had "well-grounded hopes" that a
single opposition candidate is still a possibility. Some consolidation
of the opposition is indeed anticipated. Shavarsh Kocharian himself
indicated in the past that he might support Stepan Demirchian, who
is also likely to get the endorsement of former Prime Minister and
Party of the Republic Chairman Aram Sargsian.
The National Unity Party Chairman Artashes Geghamian, seen as one
of Kocharian's strongest challengers, published a paid op-ed last
week urging Demirchian and other "honest people" in the opposition
to back his bid. Geghamian's campaign manager Aghasi Arshakian said
earlier that Demirchian would be offered the chairmanship of the parliament
should he support Geghamian. Meanwhile, leaders of the Socialist Armenia
Union and Communist Party, which gave their tentative support to Geghamian
last month, appear to have second thoughts and nominated their own
candidates.
One of the nominees, a veteran of Armenian politics, Chairman of the
Self-Determination Union Paruir Hairikian hinted this week that he
might withdraw and back another candidate. Hairikian came fifth in
the 1998 elections, polling about 5 percent, but his party faired
worse in the 1999 parliamentary elections, failing to meet the 5 percent
threshold required to enter parliament. Observers believe that out
of all the nominees, Hairikian is most likely to endorse Raffi Hovannisian.
Hovannisian is in turn seeking support from Demirchian and Sargsian.
Campaign headquarters of most of the fifteen presidential nominees
reported this week that they were close to collecting the 35,000 signatures
required for them to officially register as candidates with the Central
Election Committee (CEC). Spokesman for the Kocharian campaign Vahagn
Mkrtchian said earlier this week that they have already collected
90 percent of the necessary signatures. According to the CEC election
schedule, all nominees must submit the collected signature lists by
6:00 PM on December 31. |
December
13 - 20 |
A former government official Murad
Bojolian, charged with supplying sensitive information to Turkish
intelligence, was found guilty this week and sentenced to ten years
in prison by a Yerevan court. The prosecutors said that Bojolian,
who worked in mid-level positions in the Foreign Ministry (1991-93)
and the President's Office (1996-98), was recruited in 1999, when
he no longer had access to state secrets. Bojolian's lawyer plans
to appeal the verdict. The sentencing was strongly criticized in the
Turkish media. |
December
13 - 20 |
President Robert Kocharian ordered
this week a start to a sweeping restructuring of the Ministries of
Internal Affairs and National Security. As a first step in the reform,
plans for which were reported by the local press last June, the presidential
order relegated the ministries to the level of state agencies. Subsequent
overhaul is expected to unite the two former ministries' investigation
directorates into a single State Investigations Agency. The Ministry
of Internal Affairs would also transfer most of its public safety
responsibilities to local governments, while its interior forces are
to be transformed into the National Guard. The National Security Agency
would focus on intelligence and counter-intelligence. The restructuring
also aims to put an end to reported government infighting for control
of the ministries. Presidential spokesman Vahe Gabrielian said this
week that reform would prevent the agencies' meddling in politics,
limiting them to their professional responsibilities. |
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