Armenian Georgian Relations

[KarotheGreat]

Re: Armenian Georgian Relations

Yes I found it on youtube and really liked it so I wanted to share it with you guys. How have you been akhper? It's been a while since we've talked.

I'm good a little busy almost examns and how are you doing, and I know it's been long since we talked

[Armenian]

Re: Armenian Georgian Relations

Crisis of Faith: Armenian identity threatened in Tbilisi

The Supreme Body of the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin is going to call an emergency consultation on the “Georgianization” of the Armenian Surb Norashen Church in Tbilisi, Karen Elchyan, Chairman of the Armenian Center of Cooperation of Georgia, said on May 19. According to him, the Armenian community of Georgia is ready to act, however it is still waiting for the decision of the Armenian Apostolic Church. As Elchyan said, the problem with Armenian churches in Georgia is not new, however this question is always frozen. “They made us keep silent promising that the problem would be solved. We did not protest when the pavilion and orchards were being destroyed, but today the Armenian church is being encircled with a concrete fence on the pillars of which there are Georgian crosses.”

In recent days Tbilisi has witnessed the start of the last stage of “Georgianization” of the Armenian Norashen church situated in one of the old areas of the city in Leselidze Street (formerly Armenian Bazaar), in the same yard with the Georgian (former Greek) Orthodox “Jvris Mamis Monastery” Church. Beginning on May 15, a group of workers led by Georgian Orthodox Church priest Fr. Tariel Sikinchelashvili, the prior of the neighboring church, have actively constructed a concrete-metal fence with wicket-gates from the rear part of the church thus building on and completing the fence along the whole perimeter of the church. In doing so, they use all kinds of Georgian symbolism in the form of the Georgian cross. According to Fr. Tariel, “Georgian liturgy in the church will start no later than in a month after all interior repairs inside the building itself finish.”

Tombstones with Georgian inscriptions suddenly appeared in the yard of this church still in 2005. Soon, the tombstones were neatly arranged in the immediate proximity of the church walls. At the same time, Armenian tombstones situated on the other side of the church became targets of vandalism as Armenian inscriptions were blotted out from them. It was then that the Georgian priest Tariel said: “The land is ours, the church is ours and we do whatever we want and what we are told to do, and in general leave us alone, we are tried of you…” It was in 2005 that the Georgian Times newspaper (24.02.2005) published an article replete with phrases like: “Armenians do everything for Georgia to fail as a state”, “Had Armenians had enough funds, they would have taken our language from us”, “I cannot remember a case when an Armenian did good to Georgia”, etc.

The anti-Armenian hysteria raised by Georgian media around the Norashen church had as its consequence the following paragraph in the US State Department global report (November 8, 2005) on the state of religious freedom concerning Georgia: “Many problems among traditional religious groups stem from property disputes. The Roman Catholic and Armenian Apostolic Churches have been unable to secure the return of their churches and other facilities that were closed during the Soviet period, many of which later were given to the GOC by the State. The prominent Armenian church in Tbilisi, Norashen, remains closed, as do four other smaller Armenian churches in Tbilisi and one in Akhaltsikhe.”

An excerpt from the report of Georgia’s Ombudsman presented to the country’s parliament on December 23, 2005 is noteworthy in this regard: “At this stage the Diocese of the Armenian Apostolic Church in Georgia is raising in a most radical way the issue of the return of the Norashen church in Tbilisi and Surb Nshan church in Akhaltsikh… The issue of Norashen church is particularly urgent. Before the Soviet period the church belonged to the Armenian Apostolic Church. In the Soviet period it housed a science academy library. On February 15, 1995, by the decision of the Patriarchy, the church was consecrated as “Our Lady Good News” church in which an orthodox liturgy was performed, to which the Armenian side expressed its protest. The Georgian Patriarchy had to leave the church, but it did not let the Armenian Church have it. Norashen church does not operate today.”

The problem with Norashen church is known since 1989. It was then that upon the initiative of the future first president of the republic, Zviad Gamsakhurdia, Georgians intensified and expanded their activities towards this church for the purpose of turning it into a Georgian Orthodox church.
The culmination of the activities was in 1994 when unrest started among Armenians after there was news about all major books having been removed from the church archives. The latest events show that Norashen may suffer the fate similar to that of another Armenian church – Karmir Avetaran, which once was the tallest (40 meters) Armenian church of Tbilisi until it was destroyed in 1989. Elchyan said recently that “a solution to the church issue is the issue of the future existence of the community.” “Ignoring this problem will put the community in a very unenviable situation. We need to feel we are not alone, however nothing has been done in this direction yet,” Elchyan said.

The organization’s chairman also made a supposition that Surb Norashen church is likely to have already been ceded to the Georgian side, simply they don’t publicize the matter. “Apparently, they wanted to settle everything quietly, however they will have to do something after we’ve raised the noise.” “The encroachment of the Georgian leadership on another Armenian church, Norashen, once again proves official Tbilisi’s hostility not only to the Armenian state, but also the Armenian people, their entho-culture and religious monuments on the whole,” political analyst Hrant Melik-Shahnazaryan said. “The loss of the Armenian Norashen church will unequivocally lead to the loss of the Armenian community of Tbilisi,” he said. “And it will be followed by the ultimate degradation and de-ethnization of Samtskhe-Javakheti. We hope that [Supreme Patriarch] Karekin II will show himself as a genuine Catholicos of All Armenians and will not leave Tbilisi Armenians cheated and abandoned in their struggle.” Some observers think long-term prospects of Armenian-Georgian relations may be outlined as early as next week.

Source: http://www.armenianow.com/?action=vi...D=1188&lng=eng

[Կարմիր Բ]

Re: Armenian Georgian Relations

I am not sure if you are joking. Even Russia does not do that in todays political environment.

We must gain access to the Black Sea.

[skhara]

Re: Armenian Georgian Relations

We must gain access to the Black Sea.

Yeah one way or another.

[Lernakan]

Re: Armenian Georgian Relations

I'm good a little busy almost examns and how are you doing, and I know it's been long since we talked

I'm busy as well only two busy months left and then I will go on holiday to Armenia. Are you going to Armenia this summer? Good luck with your exams.

[robertik1]

Re: Armenian Georgian Relations

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9564

Georgia, Washington and Moscow: a Nuclear Geopolitical Poker Game

by F. William Engdahl

Global Research, July 12, 2008

The Caucasus Republic of Georgia as nations go does not appear to be a major global player. Yet Washington has invested huge sums and organized to put its own despot, Mikhail Saakashvili, in the Presidency in order to close a nuclear NATO iron ring around Russia. Now US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is in Tbilisi making sharp statements against Moscow for supporting the independent neighbor states of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, in essence blaming Moscow for an imminent war Washington has incited in order to bring Georgia into NATO by the December NATO Summit.

The Western media has either ignored the growing tensions in the strategic Caucasus region or has intimated, as suggested by Condoleeza Rice, that the entire conflict is being caused by Moscow’s silly support of "breakaway" republics Abkhazia and South Ossetia. In reality, a quite different chess game is being played in the region, one which has the potential to detonate a major escalation of tensions between Moscow and NATO.

Since the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact in 1991, one after another, former members as well as former states of the USSR have been coaxed and in many cases bribed with false promises by Washington into joining the counter organization, NATO.

Rather than initiate discussions after the 1991 dissolution of the Warsaw Pact about a systematic dissolution of NATO, Washington has systematically converted NATO into what can only be called the military vehicle of an American global imperial rule, linked by a network of military bases from Kosovo to Poland to Turkey to Iraq and Afghanistan. In 1999, former Warsaw Pact members Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic joined NATO. Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, and Slovakia followed suit in March 2004. Now Washington is putting immense pressure on the EU members of NATO, especially Germany and France, that they vote in December to admit Georgia and Ukraine.

The Georgia-Abkhazia military picture

The present escalation of tensions in the region began in May when Abkhazia said it had shot down two Georgian drones over its airspace. The announcement came two weeks after Georgia accused Russia of shooting down an unmanned drone over Abkhazia, which Tbilisi considers its sovereign territory. Moscow has denied involvement.



Russia has administered a peacekeeping contingent in Abkhazia and South Ossetia since bloody conflicts in the 1990s, and sent additional troops to Abkhazia recently to deter what it calls a planned Georgian military offensive. The two sides, Georgia and Abkhazia, have been in a state of suspended conflict since 1993, when Abkhaz separatists, backed by Russian forces, succeeded in driving the Georgians out of the province. Tbilisi claims sovereignty over Abkhazia and South Ossetia and refers to both as "breakaway republics." In 2001 Georgian troops joined with anti-Moscow Mujahadeen-trained Chechyn soldiers from neighboring Russian muslim province of Chechnya to mount a military attack, unsuccessfully, against Abkhazia.

In an analysis of what a possible military clash, short of nuclear war between Russia and NATO might look like, the Russian government’s RIA Novosti military commentator, Ilya Kramnik, laid out the array of forces on both sides. In late 2007, the Georgian Armed Forces had about 33,000 officers and men, including a 22,000-strong army that comprised five brigades and eight detached battalions. These units had over 200 tanks, including 40 T-55 and 165 T-72 main battle tanks that are currently being overhauled.

Kramnik says that the Georgian military faces a 10,000-strong Abkhazian Self Defense Force with 60 tanks, including 40 T-72s, and 85 artillery pieces and mortars, including several dozen with a 122-152-mm caliber and 116 armored vehicles of different types, numerous anti-tank weapons ranging from RPG-7 rocket launchers to Konkurs-M anti-tank guided missiles (ATGMs). The Abkhazian Navy has over 20 motor boats armed with machine-guns and small-caliber cannons.

But most decisive, as was shown in the experience of the 1992-1993 Georgian-Abkhazian conflict, even small units can resist superior enemy forces in mountainous areas for a long time. Consequently, the outcome of any hypothetical conflict would depend on the aggressors' level of military training and the influence of third parties, primarily Russian units from the Collective CIS Peacekeeping Force. Georgia's Armed Forces are notoriously corrupt and poorly trained. Although the United States has trained several crack Georgian units in the last few years, the fighting effectiveness of all other elements is uncertain. There are no trained sergeants, and troop morale is running low. Only about 50% of the military equipment is operational, and coordinated operations in adverse conditions are impossible.

The Abkhazian Armed Forces pack a more devastating punch because they would resist an aggressor that has already tried to deprive the republic of its independence. And Abkhazian units are commanded by officers trained at Russian military schools. Many of them fought in the early 1990s. Most analysts agree that the combat-ready Abkhazian Army does not suffer from corruption. Moscow has recently beefed up the local peace-keeping contingent. Neighboring Caucasus states including North Ossetia side with Abkhazia and are ready to take on Georgia.

Moscow’s possible strategy

Moscow has stepped up ties with the two small republics against the backdrop of Georgia’s NATO bid and Western recognition of Kosovo's independence from Serbia. Russia, however, has not formally recognized Abkhazia or South Ossetia.

Moscow has long backed Abkhazia's de facto independence however. It has granted Russian citizenship to many of its residents and recently legalized economic ties with the separatist republic. For Russia, the conflict provides a source of leverage on both Abkhazia and Georgia. The more Georgia seeks to distance itself from Russia, the more Russia throws its weight behind Abkhazia.

However Georgia under Washington’s man, strongman President Mikhail Saakashvili—a pretty ruthless dictator as he recently showed against domestic opposition—refuses to back off its provocative NATO bid.

Georgia is also a strategic transit country for the Anglo-American Caspian oil pipeline from Baku in Azerbaijan through Georgia to the Turkish port Ceyhan. As well, the Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum gas pipeline has been key to Azerbaijan as an alternative to the control of the Russian state monopoly Transneft in order to convey its oil and gas resources toward the West. The entire Caucasus is part of what can be described as a new Great Game for control of Eurasia between Washington and Russia.

As the Moscow Times sees it, "One way to disrupt Georgia's NATO aspirations would be to heat up the conflict in Abkhazia to a level that would make it unacceptable for the Western alliance, which acts by the consensus of all members, to offer membership. Georgia's leadership could be escalating tensions in hope of prompting Abkhazia and Russia to make a move that would leave the West with no chance but to intervene.

"Regardless of the motivation, whoever is stoking the conflict must realize that they are playing with fire. This brinkmanship can lead to a full-fledged war. Georgia would probably lose a war if Russia backed Abkhazia, while Russia would lose its hope of becoming a benign global player and would risk seriously straining its ties with the European Union and the United States."

Rice adds gasoline to the fire

The Bush Administration is adding gasoline to the fire in the Caucasus. In Tbilisi on July 10 the US Secretary of State, Rice, told the press, "Russia needs to be a part of resolving the problem and solving the problem and not contributing to it. I have said it to the Russians publicly. I have said it privately."

The effect of her comments, blaming Moscow for the escalating tensions, is to signal US support for the Georgia side in their efforts to force Russian troops form South Ossetia and Abkhazia.

This past May Abkhaz President Sergei Bagapsh said he was willing to conclude a military treaty with Moscow similar to that between USA and Taiwan. "Abkhazia will propose to Russia the signing of a military treaty that would guarantee security to our republic," Bagapsh stated. "We are also prepared to host Russian military bases on our territory within the framework of this treaty. I would like to emphasize that this would not go against the precedents already existing in international practice. For instance, this treaty could be analogous to the treaty between the US and Taiwan."

Just as Moscow refuses to recognize the sovereignty of Kosovo, so Washington refuses to admit the sovereignty of Abkhazia. In May a senior US State Department delegation was in Abkhazia meeting with local Non Governmental Organizations there as well as the President. In the past, from Serbia to Georgia to Ukraine, Washington intelligence agencies have used various NGOs, the US Congress-financed National Endowment for Democracy, the CIA-linked Freedom House and Gene Sharp’s misleadingly-named Albert Einstein Institution to steer a wave of regime changes which became known as "Color Revolutions." In each case the new regime was pro-Washington and anti-Moscow as in the case of Saakashvili in Georgia and Viktor Yushchenko in Ukraine. Both countries begin seeking NATO entry after the success of the US-financed Color Revolutions.

In all this Washington is definitely playing with potential nuclear fire by escalating pressure to push Georgia and Ukraine into NATO. The Foreign Minister of the Czech Republic, Karl Schwarzenberg on July 8 signed an agreement allowing US deployment of special radar facilities on Czech soil as part of the top secret US "missile defense" it alleges is aimed at rogue missile threats from Iran. As even former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger recently pointed out, the Bush Administration’s categorical refusal to pursue the 2007 counter-offer of then-President Vladimir Putin to station US radar at the Russian leased reconnaissance facility in Azerbaijan instead, was a provocative mistake. It makes abundantly clear that Washington is aiming its military strategy at the dismantling of Russia as a potential adversary. That, as I have written previously, is a recipe for a possible nuclear war by mis-calculation. Rice’s latest Caucasus and Czech visit only added to that growing danger.

* F. William Engdahl is author of the book, A Century of War: Anglo-American Oil Politics and the New World Order and is finishing a book, provisionally titled, The New Cold War: Behind the US Drive for Full Spectrum Dominance. He may be reached via his website, www.engdahl.oilgeopolitics.net

[crusader1492]

Re: Armenian Georgian Relations

KARS-AKHALKALAKI RAILROAD: CONSTRUCTION STARTS WITH BLOODY DEVELOPMENTS

The dramatic events that occurred in Javahk on the eve of the official launch of the construction of the Kars-Akhalaklaki railroad testify to the fact that the Turkish-Azerbaijani peaceful economic initiatives are going to end in a bloody battle for us, the Armenians.
It is more than obvious that the conflicts which started in Akhalkalaki on June 17, prior to the beginning of the construction of the Kars Akhalkalaki railroad, are the result of the primitive provocations initiated by the Georgian intelligence services. They pursued a goal to demonstrate the Georgian government’s decisiveness in realizing the construction of the railroad on the territory of Javahk.

Therefore, no matter to what extent the methods of struggle chosen by the ‘United Javahk’ company corresponded to the new developments in the region, the activists of the organization could not but act as ‘scapegoats’ in the given spectacle.

This testifies to the fact that starting the construction of the Turkish section of the Kars-Akhalkalaki railroad is fraught with the threat of introducing ‘highly-explosive’ elements in the situation of the region, which is tense, as it is.

Georgia is in the focus of Russia’s serious political-military pressures which will reach their culmination before December 2008, a period when the official Tbilisi anticipates obtaining full rights to NATO membership. And it is not absolutely accidental that at the time when the Georgian, Azeri and Turkish Presidents were laying the foundations of the new “Silky Road” in Kars on the 24th of July, large-scale military trainings were being held in the countries situated to the north and south of Georgia.

The existing situation makes the Armenian leadership avoid the temptation of making hasty assessments on the recent developments. However, it is necessary to keep in mind that there has never been any serious economic and technical justification for the construction of the Kars-Akhalkalaki railroad. This is a lever of political pressure against Armenia. The high-flown words delivered by the top figures of Georgia, Turkey and Azerbaijan are, as a matter of fact, a simple veil for the whole civilized world.

With the purpose of “embellishing” them more, the Turkish President announced in Kars that the given project was open to all the countries of the South Caucasus. Along with the hint obviously directed to Armenia, Turkey and Azerbaijan implicitly remind about the well-known preconditions they have imposed on our country.

So what “open projects” do the Turks and Azeris speak about in a situation when Armenia is offered to put aside its historical recollections and achievements in order to participate in them? Clearly, such propaganda show is initiated with the purpose of maintaining “one’s own image” in the atmosphere of the non-official Armenian-Turkish relations which have livened up recently.

Thus, before the year 2011, a time when it is planned to hand over the Kars-Akhalkalaki railroad for operation, the territory of Javahk may serve as a means for exerting pressure upon Armenia and organizing political provocations. The Azerbaijani company which has undertaken the responsibility of carrying out the construction will be certainly involved in such provocations as this may serve as a tool for spoiling the Armenian-Georgian relations.

The Turkish intelligence services will also initiate active work in Javahk in an attempt to drive a wedge in the Armenian-Georgian relations, speeding up the return of the Turkish-Meskhets.

Georgia in turn will find itself in an ambiguous situation because, by making its territory a theatre of geo-economic experiments containing obvious elements of bluff, it will sooner or later have to taste the bitter fruits of such tricks.

Moreover, no matter how much the countries launching the construction of the Kars-Akhalakalaki railroad may try to advertise the economic “advantages” of their project, it is becoming more and more obvious that they will need new financial resources for accomplishing the activities in time. Today, it is already clear that the project will “swallow” 600-700 million US Dollars instead of the previously announced sum of 400 million US Dollars, but the expenses will not be limited to that.

Disguising the construction of the Kars-Akhalkalaki railroad behind the signboard of a large-scale economic program, Turkey is introducing elements of internal tension in the region. And the following question comes up: who is it advantageous to? Armenia and the Armenian diplomacy are required to do their utmost to prevent the launch of the construction of the Kars-Akhalkalaki railroad from developing into a proper occasion for clashes and arrests in Javahk. It is necessary to win time, at least till the end of the current year when certain clarifications are expected both in the Russian-American relations and in Georgia’s plans for NATO membership. It is also quite possible for such clarifications to be accompanied by the weakening of the current tension around Abkhazia and South Osia.

In conditions of the current unfavorable geo-political developments, the most important thing to do is not to become a “party” to the “competition” of the interested superpowers and at the same time, win their approval with regard to the issue of raising the blockade of Armenia. This will be followed by the moment when they will attach importance to the role and significance of the Armenian factor in suspending Turkey’s program aimed at invading the South Caucasus.

We believe that at the beginning of 2009, Armenia and the Armenian diplomacy will be given the opportunity to undertake active and initiatory steps for overcoming the circle of blockade and provocations resulting from the construction of the Kars-Akhalkalaki railroad.

VARDAN GRIGORYAN

[robertik1]

Re: Armenian Georgian Relations

Javakh will be free! Freedom or death!

[Armenian]

Re: Armenian Georgian Relations

Armen Ashotyan: Georgia may find itself between Azerbaijan’s Scylla and Turkey’s Charybdis

Georgia is engaged in a number of projects pointed at Armenia while the latter would never venture such projects, an Armenian parliamentarian said. “Armenia maintains neutrality in the Russian-Georgian relations. Now, it’s important to know whether Georgia’s policy against Armenia is imposed from outside or it’s the republic’s own goal. I am hopeful that it’s an imposed policy. Georgia risks to find itself between Azerbaijan’s Scylla and Turkey’s Charybdis,” Armen Ashotyan, member of the RA parliament and the Republican Party of Armenia, said during a Yerevan-Tbilisi TV space bridge. “It’s also important to clarify where the Kars-Baku railroad will lead. Will it stretch toward Russia and Iran or will it become a train ferry with Central Asia.” He also said that it’s at least naďve to position Kars-Baku as a regional and secure o project. “Armenia is concerned about it own interests while Georgia doesn’t understand that it isolates Armenia on orders from Azerbaijan and Turkey,” Ashotyan said.

Source: http://www.panarmenian.net/news/eng/?nid=26742

[Federate]

Re: Armenian Georgian Relations

I'm not sure if this petition was posted here already but please do sign it to urge Georgia to stop its criminal actions against the ethnic Armenian population of Javakhk. Thanks!

http://www.gopetition.com/online/21024/sign.html