The Rise of the Russian Empire: Russo-Armenian Relations

[Illuminator]

Re: The Rise of the Russian Empire: Russo-Armenian Relations

Because you began posting pictures and information exclusivly from RIA Novosti and Russia Today immediately after you registered here. I guess it simply was wishful thinking on my part. Thank you for your reply, nonetheless. Good to have you here, North Pole Resident. Please continue posting relevant information.

Why were you wishing that someone from RIA Novosti or Russia Today was posting here?

Any special reason?

[crusader1492]

Re: The Rise of the Russian Empire: Russo-Armenian Relations

According to this article, the average Azeri (as exemplified by the quoted dumb xxxxx) looks not only at Armenians as their enemy, but also Russians.

Let's hope it stays this way.

From: Joshua Kucera Subject: The Cult of Heydar Aliyev Posted Tuesday,
May 20, 2008, at 1:27 PM ET

__________________________________________________ __________________________

GANJA, Azerbaijan--In the State History Museum of Ganja, Azerbaijan's
second city, there is a painting called "A Great Voice Rises From
Moscow." It shows an ethereal being plunging a fiery sword into
a chaotic city full of rioters. Clearly, there is a message here,
but for the life of me, I can't figure out what it is.

"This is in 1990, when Russians and Armenians were attacking our peopleand we said, 'Heydar Aliyev, come help us,' " explains my guide, Ulker,
a second-year university student in history. But I don't understand
the sword and who is holding it, I say. "This is God saying, 'Enough,'
" she explains.

That painting is subtle compared with one in the next room that
features a bare-chested Mikhail Gorbachev peering over the turret of
a tank that he is driving across a map of Azerbaijan.

Gorbachev--who is portrayed as hairy as a gorilla--is thrusting a
long spear at Baku, the capital. From outside Azerbaijan's borders,
sharks and wolves attack from various directions.

"This one is about how everyone attacked us like animals," Ulker
explains.

By most measures, Azerbaijanis shouldn't have this victimization
complex. Their economy is the fastest-growing in the world, and with
vast, recently discovered reserves of oil and gas off the Caspian
Sea coast, they (unlike most of the neighbors) have largely been able
to run their country without interference from the United States or
Russia, both of which are eager to curry favor with the government
rather than strong-arm it.

But Azerbaijan still smarts from the humiliating loss of nearly 20
percent of its territory, including the former autonomous region of
Nagorno-Karabakh, to its enemies, the Armenians. Aliyev, who died
in 2003 and was succeeded by his son, Ilham, skillfully manipulated
this humiliation to build his personality cult into one of the most
extensive in the world.

Today, Azerbaijan is full of Heydar Aliyev boulevards, parks, statues,
and billboards. Every history museum has at least one room devoted to
Heydar Aliyev, and every major town has a museum devoted exclusively
to him. An American who taught in Azerbaijan tells me that the school
curriculum is similarly Heydar-heavy.

Throughout the museum in Ganja, a simple narrative explains the
country's recent history: Armenia attacked Azerbaijan without
provocation, Russia schemed behind the scenes to help the Armenians,
and no one in the world was on Azerbaijan's side. Then Heydar Aliyev
came to lead Azerbaijan into the era of peace and prosperity it
currently enjoys.

"All people love Heydar Aliyev," Ulker says. "Before, we used to be
poor. Now we are rich. He doesn't think about his family; he only
thinks about the Azerbaijani people," she says.

Ulker asks whether I'd been to Armenia and whether I liked Armenian
people. "Of course. They're good people, like everywhere," I say. She
is shocked: "No! They killed our people." I say that Azeris killed
Armenians, too. "No, they didn't," she insists.

I expected the anti-Armenian propaganda. But what surprises me is
how many anti-Russian elements the narrative contains. The standard
villain is "the Armenians and Russians," always paired together. In
the room on World War II, Ulker explains how Azerbaijan sent people
to fight fascism and Moscow took 80 percent of Azerbaijan's oil.

"Before, the Russians took all our oil and gave it to other countries,
and we were poor. Now we're independent, and we can sell the oil
ourselves," she says.
Over-the-top propaganda notwithstanding, most Azerbaijanis do seem
to like Heydar Aliyev. Even his critics admit that he was shrewd and
highly intelligent and that his strong hand was what Azerbaijan needed
in the chaos of the early 1990s, during which he succeeded two feckless
post-Soviet presidents at a time when many observers doubted Azerbaijan
could survive as an independent country. And most people, while rarely
as devoted as Ulker, don't admit any reservations about him. They do,
however, seem faintly embarrassed about the abundance of memorials.

"When he was ruling the country, he didn't let this cult of personality
get too out-of-hand," says Eldar Namazov, a former top aide to Heydar
Aliyev who broke with the president in the late 1990s and now heads
a small opposition political party. "He was smart, and he knew what
he was doing."

"But the people in charge now aren't as smart. They're going too far,
and now people are laughing at it," he says. He describes a fountain
in Baku, which, at its grand opening, spouted a wall of water on which
was projected a movie of Heydar Aliyev saying, "The independence of
Azerbaijan will be forever." Namazov laughs at the memory. "I wouldn't
believe it if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes," he says.

The current regime has concerns about its legitimacy, and the
celebrations of Heydar Aliyev are a way of shoring up their authority,
one Western diplomat tells me. He says the government is tying the
broad national agenda that Heydar Aliyev established--secularism and
a Western orientation--to the personality of Aliyev, who is regarded
by most Azerbaijanis as the founder of their nation.

"Ataturk is everywhere in Turkey, and he represents secularism and
democracy. Here it's the same thing: Heydar Aliyev represents a secular
government and an orientation toward the West," the diplomat says.

The proliferation of Aliyev memorials across the country is not
ordered from the top, both the diplomat and Namazov say; overzealous
local officials are to blame.

"Power is pretty much concentrated at the top here, and local officials
understand that to curry favor with the central government they can
put up these statues and parks," the diplomat says.

Namazov tells me the narrative that I saw in the Ganja museum is one
that Heydar Aliyev himself established. "He had a standard story that
he told a million times whenever he met international officials or
journalists. If the person was new in the region, he told the long
version, which took maybe an hour. If the person knew what he was
doing, he got the short version, which was 15 or 20 minutes."

"There were several key episodes in the story," he says. Heydar Aliyev
was invited to go to Moscow to be part of the Soviet government, but
he didn't want to go. If he hadn't been from a Muslim republic, he
would have been premier of the Soviet Union. Gorbachev schemed against
him. He left the Communist Party as a protest against Soviet policy
on Nagorno-Karabakh. He then went back to Nakhcivan, his hometown,
to be a private citizen. After the first two disastrous governments of
independent Azerbaijan, "the people" demanded that he come to Baku and
lead them. As president, there were two assassination attempts and,
again, "the people" saved him.

"He also told this story around Azerbaijan, and this is the same
story you see today--maybe with some embellishments," he says.

"Like the sharks."

[skhara]

Re: The Rise of the Russian Empire: Russo-Armenian Relations

This is not really news but I think its very amusing. He share likes an american Penis in his mouth.

(Gary Kasparov and the Flying Penis)
http://ru.youtube.com/watch?v=vbnySBqioB0

Bwuahahaha

[North Pole]

Re: The Rise of the Russian Empire: Russo-Armenian Relations

Because you began posting pictures and information exclusivly from RIA Novosti and Russia Today immediately after you registered here.

Well, RIAN and RT are the only 24/7 Russian news services in English language that I know of. There are also the Voice of Russia and TASS, of course, but I like RIAN better.

Voice of Russia - Voice of Russia

TASS - http://www.itar-tass.com/eng/

I guess it simply was wishful thinking on my part. Thank you for your reply, nonetheless. Good to have you here, North Pole Resident. Please continue posting relevant information.

Armenian, I think you can contact them and invite someone to this forum.

RIA Novosti INTERNET PROJECTS DEPARTMENT

Foreign-Language Web Division

Head - Alexei Ilyichev, tel.: +7 (495) 645 64 95, [email protected]

DEVELOPMENT DEPARTMENT

Tel.: +7 (495) 645-6405, 645-6502
Fax: +7 (495) 637-2746
E-mail: [email protected]

http://en.rian.ru/about/contacts.html

And RT has a forum, by the way - http://russiatoday.com/forums



And how about Pravda? http://english.pravda.ru/

[North Pole]

Re: The Rise of the Russian Empire: Russo-Armenian Relations

In first foreign visit, Medvedev spotlights China

Russia's new President Dmitry Medvedev travels to powerful neighbour China this week in the centrepiece of his first trip abroad since taking office. The 42-year-old president, who took office in place of Vladimir Putin on May 7, will visit energy-rich ex-Soviet Kazakhstan on Thursday before travelling to Beijing on Friday, the Kremlin said.
Source: http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5..._IKoy0eZmcgMtQ

Russia, China close to deal on ESPO oil pipeline branch

22/ 05/ 2008

What a great news for Russia and China. The USA, on the other hand, has to start a war to get oil....

MOSCOW, May 22 (RIA Novosti) - State-owned Russian oil firm Rosneft and China's CNPC are in the final stages of talks to build an oil pipeline branch from Russia's Far East to China, Russia's president said Thursday.

"We have a basic agreement on this [branch]... We hope that all the main provisions, the main parameters for future cooperation will be agreed," Dmitry Medvedev said in an interview with Chinese journalists ahead of his visit to China, set for May 23-24.

Under an agreement signed between China National Petroleum Corporation and Transneft, the oil pipeline operator, the construction of the pipeline branch will be funded by China.
The ESPO pipeline is slated to pump up to 1.6 million barrels of crude per day from Siberia to Russia's Far East and then on to China and the Asia-Pacific region.

The pipeline's first leg, estimated at $11 billion, was expected to be commissioned in December 2008. However, Transneft said in February that the commissioning of the project would be delayed from late 2008 to late 2009.
The second leg will stretch for 2,100 kilometers (1,304 miles) from Skovorodino to the Pacific. It will pump 367.5 million barrels of oil annually. The capacity of the Taishet-Skovorodino pipeline, being built as part of the project's first leg, is also expected to increase to 588 million barrels from the initial 220.5 million bbl.

http://en.rian.ru/russia/20080522/108111646.html

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev during an interview with Chinese journalists in Kremlin.







Source - http://kremlin.ru/sdocs/news.shtml#201121

[Azad]

Re: The Rise of the Russian Empire: Russo-Armenian Relations

Russia, China close to deal on ESPO oil pipeline branch

Iran had the same deal with China few years ago with their natural gas.
Our American policy makes me sick. We are handing the Superpower status to China. With a smile. Bush and his con should be tried for treason.

[North Pole]

Re: The Rise of the Russian Empire: Russo-Armenian Relations

Iran had the same deal with China few years ago with their natural gas.

Which is good. Right, Azad?
Can you tell me more about that deal?

Our American policy makes me sick. We are handing the Superpower status to China. With a smile. Bush and his con should be tried for treason.

I really am confused here....
What does American policy have to do with this Russia/China deal? And why are you accusing Bush of treason? Did he help to strike the deal?

_______________________

上合组织联合反恐军演 SCO Russia China Anti Terrorism Exercise

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kxu1VJkzn9Q

And this is how CNN Spins 2007 Russia China Anti Terrorism Exercise:
ANTI-AMERICAN ALLIANCE! RUSSIA & CHINA DEEPEN TIES

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xcWE6ranRqM

[Azad]

Re: The Rise of the Russian Empire: Russo-Armenian Relations

North Pole

"In 2006, China signed oil and gas contracts worth over $100 billion with Iran. China is heavily involved in developing the huge Yadavaran oil field. “If completed, the deal will allow China to buy 150,000 barrels (24,000 m³) of Iranian crude a day at market rates for 25 years as well as 250 million tons of liquefied natural gas (LNG). Under an initial agreement signed by the Sinopec Group in October 2004, China could pay Iran as much as $100 billion for the stake and the purchases of oil and gas over 25 years.” [6]"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ministry_of_Petroleum_of_Iran

North Pole, I am Armenian and I do live in the US (for now). It is definitely very good to see Russia gaining its power status it lost ... except I would like to see Russia be facing West and not East. I would like to see the change happen from our end in the US to create a friendly rapprochement with Russia and Iran. Instead China is playing the card that the US should be playing. The US should dump turkey/israel for sure and use the new Iranian friendship to tame the Saudis and israel.

[Armanen]

Re: The Rise of the Russian Empire: Russo-Armenian Relations

I would like to see the change happen from our end in the US to create a friendly rapprochement with Russia and Iran. Instead China is playing the card that the US should be playing. The US should dump turkey/israel for sure and use the new Iranian friendship to tame the Saudis and israel.

For as long as the u.s. is a zog nation, its policy towards Russia, China, Iran, israel, saudi arabia, pakistan, etc. will not change.

[North Pole]

Re: The Rise of the Russian Empire: Russo-Armenian Relations

Armenian, your info is fantastic. Thank you.

But you post it so aften that one issue presses down another which makes it "difficult" to comment on each event.
Most definitely, I will express my opinion about Russian nationalists (not the so-called "Russian neonazis" as you put it) but later on since we have a major event in Russian foreign policies - Medvedev's visit to China.

Let me just say that what some Russian nationalist do is very ugly, of course.

Russian neonazis demonstrate

The people on the picture, Armenian, which you posted are not some neo-Nazis, but just Russian patriots protesting the gay parade in Moscow.
This picture was taken from the russianspy.com - http://www.russianspy.org/wp-content...s-vs-gays2.jpg

Russians Protest Against Gay Parade in Moscow

About 200 protesters, including flag-waving communists or old women carrying religious icons, held a “Russia March” in the centre of the capital at which some denounced the gay parade as a “satanic act” - a phrase used by Mayor Yuri Luzhkov himself. In another part of the city, about 200 right-wing activists, many with shaved heads and tattoos, protested against the planned parade.

http://www.russianspy.org/2007/05/26/russians-protest-against-gay-parade-in-moscow

Last year Moscow mayor Luzhkov banned that parade, calling it Satanic. And I sure do agree with his decision.

From BBC:

Moscow bans 'satanic' gay parade

Luzhkov: Gay propaganda "unacceptable"
Moscow mayor Yuri Luzhkov has said he will never allow a gay rights parade in the Russian capital.
Speaking to reporters, Mr Luzhkov described such events as "satanic".
Moscow banned a gay march in 2006, citing the threat of violence. People who ignored the ban were beaten up by counter-demonstrators and arrested.

Source - http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6310883.stm

Aborted gay parade in Moscow



Moscow authorities refused to allow a gay pride parade set for May 27, saying the event would interfere with the rights and interests of other citizens.However, gay rights activists tried to stage a protest in the center of Moscow on May 27 and present a petition to Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov requesting the Russian capital's authorities to lift a ban on the parade.



Following attacks and arrests of protesters at the demonstration, Pink News quoted Peter Tatchell as saying: "The Moscow police gave right-wing extremists a more or less free hand to attack Gay Pride marchers. Despite many of us being battered left, right and centre, the police only arrested a handful of the assailants."
MORE PHOTOS - http://en.rian.ru/photolents/20070528/66198616.html



So I think that to present Russian nationalists as some neo-Nazis is misleading and rediculouse.
Soviet Union actually fought AGAINST the Nazis during WWII sacrificing 27 million of its people many of whom were Russians.