Elusive Respite - June 1992 by Armenian International Magazine

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Gover Story

Passageto Artsakh

But at what cost? How long can it be held and what of Azniretaliation? AIM reporterTony Halpin is back in Armenia getting answers.

SpecialReport

Gasting a Blind Eye

Whatdo the Los Angeles riots reveal about the psyche of anotherminority group-the Armenians. Has the community failed to talk with its multi-ethnic neighbors?

lnterview

lran's Man in Yerevan

Bahram Ghasemi, kan's charg6 d'affaires in Yerevan, discusses the Islamic Republic's present and future relations with Armenia.

Business

Gigar

Kings

"Thou weed, who art so lovely and fair and smell'st so sweet," wrote Shakespeare. Armenian cigarmakers agree.

Art

Abuse of

Power

Sonia Balassanian's installations question the oppressive forces of politics and gender.

Monuments

Relics in

Ruin

Thousands of ancient Artsakh monuments, churches andkhachkars are in shambles after7O years of brutalizationand neglect.

Publishers' llote Letters 3O Days

Faces

4 5 7 I

Film Ideas Book

Cover Design: Vahe Fattal Cover Photo: Rouben Hangasafan

25 27 39

/\lll I

From the Editor "The reason we read AlM

hbll.h.d

AlI, lnc.

EDlf OR.l]{ClllEF:

for coverage of subjects none of the other Armenian media

touches." That was just one of the comments our May cover story sparked. We knew it, but did not at all mind hearing it from you. Armenian music-what it is and isn't and why- these are just some of the questions

left untouched by our community press. Thereis alonglistofissueswhichaffecteachofus inone way oranother. Andalthough we have not begun to cover all of them, we have assigned quite a few touchy topics to various writers. But, surprise, surprise. The same things we like reading about, we don't like talking about. Even those able to facilitate investigation into and about sensitive topics are often unwilling to do so. So, what's the big deal, you say? Why should principals be willing to talk about salary discrepancies between themselves and their staff? Why should husbands who have been found guilty of spousal abuse be forthcoming? Each is a party to the process. Go get your information somewhere else. Our writers try. They try to get it from the people who are involved in reforming the messy system. What is sad-and scary-is that these 'advocates' themselves are unwilling to talk.

Should we be talking about the unpleasant-and thus far hidden-side of our communities? What is to be gained by rocking the boat? What if leaders here in the Diaspora, or colleagues there in Armenia, are displeased by what we say? What if these ills are just the tips of icebergs, and by scratching the surface... You get the idea. l,eave it alone. Don't talk about it, because, by talking about it you (that is we) might make it worse. Never mind that each such thought process is solidly based on the premise of I-knowbest. Fascism-some might call it. Nevermindthatthis assumescomplete ignoranceoftheworld: Thereis, afterall,more thanone source of information-they may take more time and resources toreach, butttrey are there. And finally, most injuriously, this thinking continues to assume that we as a people are less able to think, argue, discuss-publicly and collectively-than the rest of our brothers (and sisters) on this planet. By continuing to convey information and stimulate ideas, AIM would like to prove them wrong.

Vartan Oskanian EXEGUTIYE EDITOn: Salpi Haroutinian Ghazarian tALACliaG EDIIOR: Ratfi Shoubookian (English) IA]{AGIiac EDIIOB: lshkhan Jinbashian (Armenian) EDITOBIAL COXSULIAIT: Minas Koiaian

EDEOR EIEBEUS: Charles Nazarian

DIRECTOB OF OPEBATIONS: Michael Nahabet

GOilTnIBUTlllG EDIIORS: Kevork lmirzian;

Ara Kalaydjian; Haig Keropian; O- Keshishian;H. Sassounian; Taline Voskeritchian AnTS EDITOB: Neery Melkonian (Santa Fe) IEDIGAL EDIIOR: Vicken Babikian (Boston) SIAFF WRIIEBS: Tony Halpin, Viken Borberian ASSIETAI{I EDITOB: Katherine Chiljan COiITRIBUIORS: Gerard Libaridian, Florsnce Avakian, Moorad Mooradian, Armen Aroyan, Gilda Kupelian, Linda Kirishiian, Christopher Aiamian, YvetteHarpootian, Gerry S. Grabor, Michasl Mastarciyan, Lola Koundakjian, Susan Pattie,

GOBFESPOIDEXIS: Washlngton: Zanku Armonian, Chlcago: Sonia Derman Harlan Detrolt: Simon Payaslian Boaton: Arlo Payaslian San Flanclsco: Janet Samuelian ilontlral: Gulizar J. Mardirossian London: Ani Manoukian Parl3: Armineh Johannes, Khatchik Kschian Brussels: Kevork Oskanian Vienna: Sebouh Baghdoyan Am3terdam: Arssn NazarianTokyo: Sonia Katchian Amman:AraVoskian

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Armenians constitute a majority." While this statement is true, it is far from being the complete truth. It also tends to create an

impression on the uninformed public that "here is a segment of Azerbaijani land in which the Azeri people permitted the Armenians to settle and proliferate, only to grow eventually into a menace demanding secession." Such statements have actually been made by Azeri officials visiting neighboring countries, painting a distorted and false picture of "ungrateful Armenians" creating trouble for

"peace-loving country like Azerbaijan." Although the historical facts are plain to all Armenians and most well-informedreaders, they are not known to a vast majority of people in the world. Unfortunately, Westem media have not bothered to devote enough time and space to this sensitive and important aspect of the problem. Neither the Voice of Americanorthe BBC have everdealtwith its historical background. Time and Newsweek a

Karabakh numbers Azerbadani Foreign Minister Hussein Sadykov states that Karabakh constitutes one-fifth of Azerbaijani territory (Cover Interview, April). The minister either does not know the geography ofhis own country orhe is very weak in elementary mathematics.

Indeed, Azerbaijan covers an area of 86,000 sq. km., whereas Karabakh has an area of 4,400 sq. km., and thus covers only one-twentieth of Azerbaijani territory. Gabriel Basmajian, M.Sc., M. Ing. Monlreal, Canada

Freedom to self.question Salpi Ghazarian's article, "Brave New World" (Cover, February), was a well-measured and counterbalanced essay on the "winds of change" blowing overthe Diaspora. The critical situation of the last 20 years has finally reached its climax; now it is the moment to settle the foundation of a real and living Diaspora, to think about it as an interdependent (neither dependent nor independent) entity in regards to Armenia. But interdependence cannot be conquered with rheto-

rics and promises; it requires serious selfcritiqism and long-term strategies. I hope to see

more articles on this heated issue.

Advice such as "It is about time writers like Ms. Ghazarian stop using theirpens and start using theirpockets tohelp Armenia and Karabakh..." (lrtters, April) is very dangerous, for they really mean-"Don't think or ask, everything is O.K." And because few things areO.K., the policy ofmagisterdixitis the worst thing we can do today. If freedom is the main gift of the Western word, let us start to use it effectively. Vartan Matiossian Buenos Aires, Argentina

Facts and the media Regarding your article, "The Media and The Message" (Media, January), Western news media refer constantly to Karabakh as the "region belonging to Azerbaijan in which

magazines have been reporting events

with-

out going any further than mentioning the usual qualifying phrase. "a mountainous region in Azerbaijan where Armenians constitute8O7o of the population." Period. Dr. B.Boghossian, M.8., Ch.B., FRCS Baghdad, Iraq

Responding to letters In his letter about the question ofthe port

April), Mr. Ishak Alaton does not mention that the post-war govemof Trabzon (Letters,

ment of Germany recognized, apologized and indemnified the Jewish victims of the Nazis. His Turkish Govemment has done nothing of the sort. On the contrary, the Turkish Govemment still denies the Armenian Genocide with all kinds of excuses and falsifi cation of historical facts. Mr. Alaton was not in Turkey in 19l5; I was. If he wants to pursue his ideas of forgetand-forgive, first he should convince his govemment to allow the shipping to Armenia of the food that Armenians in Turkey have already collected but are not allowed to send. The same is true forotherhumanitarian help by foreign organizations. Friendship is a two-way street. With continuous denials of the Genocide because it fears it will be asked to indemnify the 1,500,fiD victims, Turkey is not helping the

forgerand-forgive process. President Ozal' s latest remark, "We should squeeze the Armenians alittle," wasinhuman.Therecannot be any peaceful relations between the two peoples unless the Turkish Government adopts a more friendly attitude. As for the port ofTrabzon, all Turkey has to do is to ship the goods to Armenia and the otherex-Soviet republics and retum the trucks

with other merchandise for export through Trabzon. If improvements are to be made in the port of Trabzon, others have to do it without Armenian money. The strategic lo-

cation

of Armenia in this transportation AIM, June 1992

scheme is a very strong bargaining chip.

Mr. H. Hovnanian became a victim of

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circumstances when he agreed with President Ter-Petrosyan to negotiate for the port ofTrabzon as an outlet for landlocked Armenia. He has done wonders for his countrymen but he showed a lack of diplomatic foresight before his last visit to Turkey and Armenia. Taking his attomey, Van Krikorian (another nice guy), to Turkey with him was a mistake because Krikorian was actively in-

volved in promoting the Armenian Genocide Resolution in the U.S. Congress. Would Mr. Alaton still like to come to the United States to lecture Armenians? Nishan Nercessian

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We appreciate Mr. Alaton's intention to try to bring Armenia and Turkey toward a friendly cooperation, but seen through apolitical lens we find it somehow simplistic. Furthermore, Mr. Alaton is overlooking one major fact in his argument, namely that the post-Nazi German govemments haveplainly acknowledged their historical part in the Holocaust, showing an undeniable sense of responsibility toward the Jewish people. Turkey, on the other hand, has so far only denied the occurrence of the Armenian Genocide as well as its occupation of Armenian territories.

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seems as

if Turkey

and Azerbaijan are

arrogated themselves the right to choose both negotiating teams. This paradox is due to the refusal of the

two govemments to rccognize the legitimacy of the Republic of Karabakh, even though its people declared their indepenKarabakh are pursuing their right of selfdetermination, in accordancewith Article 2l of the United Nations Universal Declaration

surface sooner or later.

By accepting these rights, it seems obvious that the parliament and the duly elected president of Karabakh are the righful and sole representatives of is people. The president of Armenia has come to terms with this fact; he admittedly neither controls nor rep-

The comment given by Bulent Akarcali, Turkey's delegate at the recent Conference of Mediterranean countries in Athens, is

noteworthy. [n response to reporters' questions regarding the Armenian Genocide, Akarcali said: "...The answer to these questions should be left to historians and not to

oversimplifyit. Ant rani g Aatav our, Kev ork Kahtas

Rhein-AraxGflm:ifftffii#

popular vote. The Armenian people of

of HumanRights.

resents the people or the self-defense army

the Karabakhrepublic. If the violence is to end and a political solution is to be found, it seems crucial that

governments of Russia, Turkey, Azerbaijan and other international bodies recognize the legitimacy of Karabakh's elected officials, or at least allow them to be included in negotiations, as it is the will of

the

their constituency that is in question. Germany As anArmenian, Iwas muchdisappointed and outraged to read Mr. Karokin Goncu's

letter (lrtters, March). Shame on your staff for printing such an "inferior" letter.

POLICE OFFICER RECRUIT Serve and protect in a community with a large Armenian population. $3,144 per mo. (inc. PERS)

at it once again, although not necessarily in collaboration, with regards to the conflict between the Republic of Azerbaijan and the [self-proclaimed] Republic of Karabakh. Ankara and Baku view the conflict as one between Azerbaijan and Armenia. They persistently state that negotiations must take place between representatives from these two republics, while refusing to accept representatives from Karabakh. Thus, they have effectively done what Edward Said has repeatedly criticized Israel for: they have

But Turkey has effectively blocked the way to the establishment of bilateral relations with is preconditions. The Genocidequestion and that of the occupied territories will re-

2032n241m 8008428450CI 8m2433154USA

A paradox in the Gaucasus

dence and elected their own parliament by

temational connections, we expectMr. Alaton to see the problem in its integrity and not to 25Tf,FIIX)R

Armenians are not crows. The Artsakh people are fighting for freedomand fortheirhomeland, while Azeris are trying to grab the "loaf'which was granted them by Irnin and his gang in 1923. Ashot Hovsepian Washington, D.C

The Armenian govemment has taken the very bold step of initiating talks with Ankara.

politicians..." As an experienced businessman with in-

ONECOM}IERGIALPI,AZA

I agree that we have to avoid all kinds of conflicts in the region and get on with economic development, but the letter describes Turkey and Azeris as scarecrows, and we

The origin of ttre author is somewhat questionable. The letter reflects Turkish propaganda. Mr. Goncu trumpets lines like

"7 million Azerbaijanis," "Karabakh

Azerbaijan's intemal problem" and "Turkey would not stay out of this conflict." Armenians for many centuries have not feared such words, and would not do so now.

AIM, June 1992

*",,,,1f il;,ilxif,iii,

Bridge over Araks' waters The

15,000-strong Armenian commuhas committed, through its Prelate, Bishop Aghan Baliozian, the $US 2 million necessary to construct a bridge over

The bridge not only links the two neighbors who share a 60-km border, but it will also provide Iran with a shortcut to Europe. And for Armenia, through Iran, this will be a

the Araks River linking Armenia and Iran. Until then, a 70-meterlong pontoon bridge, which spans a part of the river which is 12 feet deep, was erected from the Nurdowr region of Iran, 100 kms. from the Julfa border, to Meghri in Armenia in a surprisingly short month.

much-needed path to the outside world.

nity of Australia

Prime Minister Gagik Harutunian attended the formal opening ceremonies of the temporary bridge on May 14. Agreement to erect the Meghri bridge was reached during the visit ofPresident Levon Ter-Petrosyan to Iran inearly May.

Gharge of the first brigade Catholicos Vazgen I, Prime = a

Minister Gagik Harutunian and

other govemment officials watched with pride as about

300 soldiers, clad in khaki and battle fatigues, assembled on

the sunny parade ground of Yerevan's central square on May 28 to the trumpeting of a brass band to take an oath of allegiance to their country. Theirblack berets bore the redblue-orange colors of the Armenian flag. The event was

part of the ofircial Independence Day celebrations. Defense Minister Y azgen

Sargsyan said very few soldiers had received training so far, but Armenia was aiming for a "small, strong andmobile" peacetime army of 30,000. In wartime, he said, the tiny country would also draw on reservists. "These young men who are now taking the oath have not taken part in military opera-

AIM, June 1992

tions on the border with Azerbaijan, and for the moment will not do so," Sargsyan said. "God grant that there will be no need for that. But if the need arises, of course they will do their best to fight as well tomorrow as they T are parading today."

Mandela's Principle Even whilefloundering andfalling short

in its attempt to come to the aid of its beleaguered kinsmen in Azerbaijan, the Turkish government had more egg on its face last month when South African leader

Nelson Mandela refused to accept the "Ataturk Intemational Peace Prize." In a

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statement issued in Johannesburg, the African National Congress (ANC) said its leader would not accept the Ataturk Peace Prize, and, "has no intention of visiting Turkey." In April, the Ataturk Peace Prize com-

mittee declared Mandela the winner of the l99l award and invited him to collect the prize at a May I 9 ceremony.

The ANC statement did not say why Mandela would not accept the prize, but a Foreign Ministry official in Istanbul speculated that it is because the award was last year presented to former Turkish President Kenan Evren, who successfully led a military coup 12 years ago and who had been often criticized forhis regime's human rights abuses.

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Meanwhile, the govemment in Ankara tried toplay down Mandela's refusal. Prime Minister Suleyman Demirel, who heads the Peace Prize committee, expressed his shock

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Ercan alternately suggested it was because a clash of events. The ANC statement said that Mandela has devoted his life to the service of "democracy, human rights and the abolition of repression," and that the "decision is by no means the expression of adverse feelings toward Kemal Ataturk, the founderof modem Turkey." Mandela was released two years ago, after spending 27 years in South African prisons forhis anti-apartheid activism.

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The Little Station That Gould SovietUnion. Ashtarak, a small town one hour from Yerevan, is an unlikely venue for what is claimed to have been the first private televi-

ing, there was still a big difference between what we were showing and the programs on central television. "If central TV did not want to broadcast programs about Karabakh, forinstance, then we would. Government television did not want to show nationalist programs, so students came to Ashtarakto see them and went back to Yerevan to spread the news. "We were abletodo this because we kept a neutral position," he explained. "Representatives of all the parties could come here and

sion station in the Soviet Union. Such a grand status does not come easily to mind as you enter the primitive studios on the third floor

talk to the people through television-Communists, Dashnaks, anyone. We didn' t

ramshackle building. But the company's founder and driving force, Vahram Bosinian, is easily recognizable as belonging to that fearless breed of

refuse any of the parties."

innovators who tested glasnost to destruc-

sions, said Bosinian, town officials tried to halt broad-

By TONY HALPIN

I ! II

misht not be CNN but Ashtarak Cable has its own special place in ,1. history oi broadcasting. tfcan be counted among the milestones on the road to freedom of speech in the former

f.t&irion

tion. What began disguised as an aftempt to improve reception of the state television signal has evolved into a full-fledged station with ambitions to challenge the monopoly of the central TV channel. It was a project veiled in secrecy and fueled by ingenuity. "When we started the ideain the spring of 1987, we knew that the government controlled all the media and nobody could hope to create a private television station," said Bosinian, smiling in recollection. "So, we told them we were building a tower to receive television signals more clearly from Yerevan. "When the station was ready, and we could not keep it secret any more, I informed the Ashtarak authorities. There was a huge scandal-they all told us 'it's nonsense, nobody gave you permission for a television

station."' The furor rose to the upper levels of Armenia's Supreme Soviet, whose chairman c:rme prsonally to Ashtarak in January 1989 to order Bosinian to close the studios. The f,irst private TV station under commu-

nism looked beaten. But the powers-that-be had reckoned without the viewers.

"The people of Ashtarak rallied to help me," said Bosinian. 'They wrote requests to the Armenian government and the Soviet govemment to allow ttre station on the air. We fought for nine months to reopen these studios." Finally, in October 1989, the authorities relented, allowing the station to start broadcasting again but under strict political censorship.

'They would come and check all the programs before they were aired," said Bosinian. "However, even with them check-

Bosinian.

All of this is achieved with a full-time

staff of just 34, in addition to numerous

enthusiastic young freelance writers and artists.

The 40-year-old former aviation radio engineer, who once worked at Yerevan's Zvartnots airport, does not lack ambition. He hopes to conquer the airwaves in a different fashion in September, by launching a national broadcast service from Ashtarak, pit-

ting three channels in direct competition with the state network. One channel will show political and general information programs, the second will offer concerts, humor and light entertainment, and the third will be thrown open for all Armenia's political parties to broadcast their views, said Bosinian.

Even under supervision, offi cial tolerance sometimes

snapped. On several occa-

by ordering the electricity company to cut off the casts

power.

Ashtarak Cable Televrimprovi-

sion is a triumph of

sation. Bosinian pointed out

a console that came from Ukrainian television and an

editingunitthatwasb.roughr

rrom Lrtnuanla-all tne t3f;l[1f,:t?LGavane equipmentcame from friends and contacts at state television stations in different republics of the old Union. A lotof it also camebroken and had to be hxed by Bosinian. Even so, start-up costs amounted to 1.8 million rubles and Bosinian estimates the station has cost 30million rubles to date. His was the first cooperative to secure a bank loan to launch the project, and the station's 7,000 cable customers pay 25 rubles a month for the service. A one-time connection fee of 190 rubles is also charged. Though he does not expect to be in profit for another three years, he insisted "we will stay in business." A telephone call intem.rpts the interview; it is a customer asking if they can repeat a film shown recently. This happens all the time, says Bosinian; people feel tlnsis their television station. Seven days a week, 18 hours a day, the channel offers a mix of films, self-produced shows and news. "About l0 hours a day are our own programs. We have some for women, special programs for children, and ones about our city and places of interqst in the republic .There are programs about international events, about the constitution and new laws, and ones about theater featuring some of our artists. "Our national life is like theater," grinned

AIM, June 1992

Harutvunian durins tapins at the

With a potential viewing audience of more than two million, the station will be supported by paid advertisements, making this the first full-commercial television channel. Bosinian is banking on mass audience appeal and leaner production costs to help his station win out against the state channel, and keep it independent ofpolitical influence.

"We often get offers of financial help, directly or indirectly, because people know of our financial diff,rculties. Then we learn that the suggestions come from political organizations or parties," he said. "We don't want to be dependent on any political group, because we want to give the people information from each party and from a neutral standpoint. Some sort ofjoint venture with an organization that understands

how important our work is would be welcome, just to enlarge our income. But that partnership would have to be strictly economic, notpolitical." The original cable service in Ashtarak willremain, offering "the bestprograms" for afee. ButBosinian clearly has his eyes on the ether. Just as CNN changed the face of American broadcasting, Ashtarak Cable

Television may yetprove tobe the sparkfora communications revolution in Armenia.

Passage to Artsakh By TONY HALPIN

his was the moment Artsakh Armenians had fought for four years to see-an open road between their embaftled enclave of Nagomo-Karabakh and Armenia. The fust convoy to use the "humanitarian corridor" across Azerbaijan entered former enemy territory at dawn from the Armenian border city of Goris. A column of 62 trucks loaded with food and fuel from Yerevan headed for Stepanakert, Karabakh's bomb-damaged capital, accompanied by police patrols, jeeps and assorted cars. Dozens of fedayees rode along, many heavily armed, but there was no resistance. Instead of tension, the mood was one

triumphant celebration. But the question was on everyone's mind-how long would the corridor through Azerbaijan remah open? Bombing of the Khojaly airport from Agdam had resulted in the closure of that airport twice in three months. With no planes flying into Khojaly, what little supplies reached the area by air now had to come by land transport over the new corridor.

Everybody expected a military counter-attack. Few people in Stepanakert believed the war was over. "The Azerbaijanis are not going to accept the current situation," said Georgy Petrosian, Karabakh's new president. "But we iue as prepared as possible to defend the freedom which we have declared and which now as a people have achieved." The caravan drove first to Lachin, a town at the foot of the Karabakh mountains which had been taken from Azerbaijani troops two days earlier, clearing the way for the corridor. As the vehicles climbed the twisting mountain road through Lachin, it was clear that the city was deserted and devastated. Buildings bumed throughout the town, with many homes already destroyed by fire or shelling. Clothes and other possessions lay in the streets where fleeing Azeris had abandoned them in panic. The charred remains of two corpsesone ayoung soldier, the other unrecognizable as human exceptforthe twisted fingers of one hand-lay unnoticed at the side of the road. A collapsed bridge, which forced the trucks to cross a riverbed, was the only obstacle met by the road train as it strung its way along ffeacherous mountain paths for three torturous hours. The convoy made an easy target but the Armenians' casual confidence suggested they knew no Azerbaijani attack would come. Finally they reached Shushi, the principal Azerbaijani fortress stormed by Armenians l0 days earlier as they begantheirbreakout from afour-yearblockade by Azerbaijan. Three bumed-out tanks littered the road, the Armenian one garlanded with flowers by victorious moumers. In the valley below lay Stepanakert, which for three months had suffered deadly barrages of Grad missiles rained down from a Shushi now eerily quiet, except for the cracking of fres still buming in some buildings. Formerly a pretty resort town known for fresh air and mountain scenery, it resembled a set from a Vietnam movie. A sign on a bumedout building exhorted: "Let's make Shushi the exemplary resort

city." People from Stepanakert milled about in the streets, some to loot, others to reclaim homes lost when Armenians were expelled from Shushi in 1988.

The main hotel was gutled by

fre, and three young

soldiers

assigned to guard it were instead prizing open a telephone box for the coins inside. Dozens of other buildings, including the local mosque, had become blackened shells. In a practice followed by both sides in this bitter conflict, headstones in a Muslim graveyard had also been systematically destroyed. In the Armenian church, high on a hill, a portrait of Christ had been propped up with rocks on the altarplatform and more than 500 rubles placed in a munitions box in front of it by

soldiers. Candles flickered

in little

alcoves at the sides

the

cavemous building, which was otherwise bare of decoration.

Stacked in a tall pile outside were empty wooden cases for Grad missiles, which the Azeris had stored close to the church. Armenians say Shushi had always been their city until

30,000 people.

a 1920

gradually became dominated by Muslims after Stalin transferred Karabakh from Armenia to massacre

Azerbaijan.

AIM, June

1992

A provisional committee had already been formed to repopulate Shushi's empty streets with Armenians. Deputy chairman Mikhail Khachaturian says the 2,415 formerresidents will get homes first, then refugees driven out of the Azerbaijani capital, Baku, and finally people from Stepanakert made homeless by the

shelling.

Rebecca Martirosian, 4l , and her mother Arshaluys Amirjanian, 75, had wasted no time in finding their old home which, miraculously, had escaped damage. "We were deportedon atank fromhere in 1988," said Martirosian, who has lived in a Stepanakert hostel since then. "We aregoing to live in our house again. All the people who lived in Shushi are going to retum. It's our

right." She and her mother, a resident of Shushi for more than 60 years, had often looked at their old town through binoculars from Stepanakert, eight kilometers to the north. "We were patiently waiting forShushi to be Armenian again," said Martirosian. Himself a native of Shushi, Khachaturian felt "bom again" when Armenians took con-

It is a road for life." He said the trucks had brought enough flour to increase rations from one kilogram per adult per month to three.

The convoy did not bring something for everyone. Staff in the matemity hospital, housed in the basement of the bomb-damaged Supreme Council building, was not expecting any medicines or supplies.

Theyarewithoutallbutthemostprimitive equipment, critically short of bandages and have no painkillers. The only warmth comes

from a small stove in which the hospital administrator cheerfully admitted buming "whatever we can get our hands on, even all our archives, to get heat." Dr. Zoya Torossian, the head gynecologist, said most of the babies were bom underweight and premature. Many of the mothers are so malnourished, she said, they cannot produce milk to feed theirnew children, yet the hospital has no baby formula. Five abortions take place for every baby born at the hospital. So far this year,220 babies have been delivered there, and between 230 and

trol here on May 8. He blamed much of the damage to buildings on Azeris setting fire before fleeing. But at least one official in Stepanakert put the blame partly on Armenian soldiers afterthe fighting had ceased. Small groups of Armenians cheered and

raised clenched fists in defiant relief as the convoy traveled the last four

miles Stepanakert. Hundreds more gathered in the city's mah square to see the trucks roll in, proving that the way was

:;:;:;:::: each month.

...i:inffii$'.1

:Gfiffiffii# .li.tl:. ]Effi:#,# Uili c$ffi$r,,,

.:fiffiHffii ...ililffi$ l t*li#1il1

:,,:,,:::, TOfOSSian.

Dianna Gulnazarian

had given birth the previ-

,::.,r," ousday,twomonthsearly, :,:irrf::r to a 5.5 Pound babY girl, ,,

..'fH#iIIfH[,r*i,..,

r:::::, Marianna. NearbY, Rita

r::,:r,:i: Melkonian,a30-year-old :iiti,iii: Baku refugee, sat debili.r,:::iir: tated on her bed after hav-

world.

The population here hid in basements for months to escape the missile attacks, which devastated many of the buildings. Daily life has gone on without electricity, light, heat or running water, and officials say food supplies were almost exhausted when the drive to break the blockade began. Since May 10, presumably in retaliation for Shushi, Azerbaijan has also tumed off gas supplies to the city for the first time, forcing residents to cut down trees for fire-

basements; there's no

food, gas or electricity, i;:i,::ii: and they don't feel they i:::::i::: can raise their children in such conditions. There is ;:::::::rt no baby food," said Dr.

at last open to Armenia and the outside

,,ii iiir:;:,:,

ing given birth to twins two days earlier while her

village was being bombed from Agdam. Doctors saved her and one of her babies, weighing 5 pounds. The other twin died. There are no incubators for these children, and no electricity to run them even if

will live or not," said Oleg

there were, since the hospital has no generator. The president's office two floors above has a generator, providing light and power foratelevision, butthe govemment needed it "to see what is going on in the world," said Dr. Torossian without apparent resentment. Though the hospital was not expecting anything from the convoy, she said, the arrival of the trucks was a psychological boost forthe people of Stepanakert. But, she added, "we are afraid that the road is going to be blocked again." Karabakh President Petrosian, who took office after the death of his predecessor,

Yessayan, prime minister of the self-proclaimed Republic of Karabakh. "This corridor is not about capturing another's territory.

Artur Mkrtchian, asserted that the convoy had brought no weapons through the corridor, but it was impossible to verify this. He

wood with which to cook. But now the convoy had brought supplies and a measure of hope that the worst might be over. "It's beautiful, we have been waiting for this for so long," said Rita Tevorzian, 27, a Baku refugee who watched the trucks pull in. "The opening of this corridor answers the

question

of whether the Armenians

Karabakh

AIM, June

1992

said they acted to take Shushi and Lachin a "siege" which had placed the survival of the people ofStepanakert at risk. "Personally, I had my doubts that we would ever be able to recover Shushi," he said. "Butourwill totake it was strongerthan their will to defend it. We were recovering our city and they were defending a foreign because the blockade has tumed into

city."

He estimated between 40 and

Azerbaijanis were killed in the takeover, from a total force of between 600 and 2,0fi) soldiers. Petrosian declinedto sayhow many

Armenian soldiers took the city. He also seemed at a loss to say what the Armenians would do with Lachin, which no one disputes is in Azerbaijan. "We are waiting for proposals from the Azerbaijani side," he said. They might have come during peace talks

which were called by the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe before the Armenians registered military successes. Expected to have opened in Minsk, Belarus, on June 23, this may be the opportunity the Azeris are waiting for to repeat their thus-far

tentatively offered exchange: Nakhichevan for Karabakh. How else to explain the odd insistence in much of the Western media in late May about military encounters between Armenians and Azeris in 'Nakhichevan an enclave in Armenia.' Nakhichevan, itself a product of boundary arrangements fabricated by Stalin in l924,has long been depopulated of its Armenian inhabitants and is now an autonomous republic that could serve as Turkey's link to Azerbaijan and the restof the Central Asian republics.

But Azerbaijan did not wait for Minsk. in

June brought a fresh onslaught on villages

eastem Karabakh. The Permanent Mission United Nations charged that Azerbaijan has resorted to chemical war[are. How else to explain the loss of the entire Shahumian region and neighboring villages within the space ofa week? Indeed, these and other attacks proved to be the mai[ sticking point at peace talks in to the

Rome in mid-June. Although both parties agreed that a monitoring group was needed, they did not agree on where this group should go.

Azerbaijan did not wait for a decision. to a statement by Armenian President Levon Ter-Petrosyan, Azerbaijan has begun to take control ofsouthem areas of Armenia and to liquidate the Armenian border with Iran. According to Ter-Petrosyan, the concentration of Azeri motorized, artillery forces and armored battalions near the the Meghri borderregion of Armeniaclearly indicate that these plans have become state policy. In light of the Treaty of Collective Security, CIS troops may be called upon to carry out their obligations in regards to member state Armenia.

According

Aftershocks intheGaucasus asm formilitary intervention in Nakhichevan was quite widespread in thosepolitical circles,

BY STEPHAN ASTOURIAN he territorial link by way of the Lachin corridor between the Republic of Armenia and the selfproclaimed independent Republic of Mountainous Karabakh has altered significantly-at least in the short run---the nature ofthe Karabakh issue. The conquest of Shushi at a time when President TerPetrosyan had just concluded a cease-fire agreement with an Azerbaijani representative in Tehran, underthe aegis

oflran, and the

opening of the Lachin corridorhave put the Yerevan govemment in an unfavorable diplomatic situation. First, forcible border alterations in the former Soviet Union seem not to sit well with the Western powers, as evidenced by NATO

May

condemnation

the advances

the

Karabakh Armenian self-defense forces and pressure at the Conference and Security and Cooperation in Europe meeting in Rome to

withdraw those troops from Lachin and Shushi and to demilitarize those areas under CSCE supervision. Second, Iran has condemned Armenia

for its actions against Nakhichevan

and

wamed against any border modifications there. tn addition, it has characterized developments in the Lachin region as "unhelpful"

for the resolution ofthe Karabakh issue. Generally, the Tehran govemment is facing growing internal pressure from various groups to alter its pragmatic and balanced

foreign policy toward Armenia

and

Azerbaijan. Muslim elements want han to support Azerbaijan, for they feel Islamic solidarity should be a guiding principle in foreign relations. In addition, some Iranian Azerbaijanis, mostly Tabrizi students for the time being, would like their country to support their northem brothers. These intemal pressures are counterbalanced, however, by the concem with which Tehran views what it calls Turkish "expansionism" in northem Iraq and Azerbaijan.

Third, Turkish foreign policy in the Caucasus is perhaps less immune from the infl uence of intemal politics than that of Iran,

though geopolitical considerations play, by necessity, a decisive role in its shaping. For

example, Prime Minister Suleyman Demirel's relatively moderate stand toward Armenia has been faced with the rhetorical---or real-anti-Armenian proclamations of right-wing politicians, including President Turgut Ozal, as well as inflammatory articles in the daily press. Although enthusi-

especially during the clashes along the border of the enclave with Armenia beginning May 18, it subsided considerably following the May 20 waming by Russian Marshal

Yevgeny Shaposhnikov, military commander of the Commonwealth of Independent States forces, that any third-party intervention in the Karabakh conflict would lead to a world war. To be sure, Armenia's decision a week earlier to join a collective security agreement at Tashkent with hve other CIS republics, including Russia, must have contributed to the Russian commander's unusually frank declaration.That Azerbaij an chose to stay out of those talks altogether further helped the Republic of Armenia.

Does the

Yeltsin-Demircl declaration

mean that Russia

might cireuitously help the Azeris stabilize the military situation?

Yet, Russian policy with regard to the Armeno-Azerbaijani conflict may not be so simple.AweekafterMarshal Shaposhnikov's waming, Turkish Premier Demirel met with Russian President Boris Yeltsin to discuss the situation in Karabakh and Nakhichevan. They concluded their discussions by stating their "readiness to take part in any action aimed at regulating the situation." Does this declaration mean that Russia might circuitously help the Azeris stabilize the military situation? After all, by balancing and regulating the military successes and defeats of the conflicting parties, not only does Russia get more leverage on both Armenia and Azerbaijan but also ingratiates Turkey, with which it has substantial economic and other interests. Could the May 27 announcement of the withdrawal of Russian fioops from Nakhichevan's border with Turkey and the

delivery @y CIS troops pulling out of Azerbaijan) of I fi) tanks and dozens ofheavy guns to the Azerbaijani army be indications of such strategy? Indeed, reports emanating from circles close to the Armenian Foreign Ministry and from the press suggest that Russian forces from the 23rdregiment ofthe 4th army participated in the recent Azerbaijani advances innorthern Karabakh which began June 12. Despite the denial of the Russian defense minister, these forces acted as mercenaries, by order of either their Moscow superiors or local officers. Moreover, the new tanks were put to immediate use by the Azerbaijanis against Nagorno-Karabakh on June 16.

On the whole, predictions are difficult, fluidity of the military situation, the potential collaborative scenarios and the election of Popular Front leader Abulfez Elchibey on June 7 as president ofthe Republic of Azerbaijan. It remains to be seen whether Elchibey will try to carry out, as president, the political program that was his as leaderofthe Front. Thatpolitical platform which advocated breaking away from the given the

or Iranian Azerbaijanis, and adopting a "Turkist" orientation was pregnant with far-reaching consequences. If faithfully pursued, these policies may result "southem"

in the reconsideration of the Russian and Iranian positions toward the Republic of Azerbaijan and tensions between Iran and Turkey. From the perspective of the population of Mountainous Karabakh, it seems reasonable to argue that the support of the Armenian govenrment must essentially be continued and the military status quo in the enclave must be maintained if there is to be some chance of a fair and enforceable intemational agreement. And without such an agreement, no secure and decent life for the population of Mountainous Karabakh may be envisaged in the near future.

Stqhan Astourian is a historlan speclalizing ln modern Armenian and Caucasian history and politics.

Neighborhood Armenians help clean up a Hollywood shopping center damaged by looting and arson during the riots.

really seemed to care about the social impli-

was economics, the politics

of the Rodney

"We lived in the Ottoman Empire as a

major civil mess. "During the riots, Armenians had two choices," said psychologist lrvon Jemazian. "They could either identify with blacks as a minority group or with whites. They did neither because they felt alienated from the mainstream. I know Armenians who didn't

King verdict or a combination of both that triggered the outbreak of violence. Where did Armenians fit in L.A.'s posr riot self-assessment? Nowhere outside their

minority in forced isolation," said officer

cations of

care who was

killing who."

Jemazian said that a number

of Arme-

nians from the Middle East experienced minor shock. A few toted guns to defend their

stores in Hollywood and downtown, but most were plain ambivalent on the issues of class and race. Even in Glendale, where Armenians make up I 8percentofthecity's I 80,000population, there was minimal interest in the riots. Glenfew areas in Los Angeles dale was one County without a curfew, and even the YMCA was open at night to a handful of diehard swimmers.

Despite the relative calm in Glendale, police there received hundreds ofcalls from concemed residents over a period of three days.

"Only one was Armenian, and that was a friend who calls quite often," said community relations officer, Chahe Keuroghelian. Meanwhile, plumes of smoke covered the city; waves of looters raided mini-malls; legions of volunteers helped clean L.A.'s littered streets and experts argued whether it

fortress enclaves.

Keuroghelian. "In the countries of the Middle East that same seclusion continued. We built community organizations and a whole structure accordingly. Then we moved those substructures to othercountries. And because

we managed to survive, we think that

sequestered, inward-looking lifestyle has been the backbone of our survival. I don't think that's really justified. The more we cooperate with and learn about other communities, the better it is for everyone." Keuroghelian's efforts to draw first-generation Armenians into the mainstream have met resistance. He said immigrant Armenians accused him once of'spying' on the community, but he continues to chip away at the divisive wall that separates the ghetto

from the outside world. Similar efforts have seemingly shaped L.A. into a multicultural city, but that banner-tattered by the riots-has done little to woo immigrants into the mainstreamorto foster understanding between ethnic groups. In recent years, misunderstanding between America's ethnic groupshas increased dramatically. A numberof reports issued by the Los Angeles County Commision on

Human Relations show that hate crimes escalated throughout the county from four reportedincidents in l98l to 167 in 1989. The victims cover seven ethnic and racial

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FeonPartamian,sbakeryfrlspareddamagethroughvigilanceofpatronsandemp|oyees. groups, with more than 90 percent of the iecide's religious hate crimes committed against Jews and nearly two-thirds of racial hate crimes reported bY blacks. There were 351 suchcrimes documented in 1991 or a E percent increase over the record level in I 990. No anti-Armenian hate

crimes were reported until 1987, but the commission counted 13 Armenian victims in 1 99 I or 3 .7 percent of the incidents . "There hai been a general decline in civility," said Eugene Momell, director of the Commission on Human Relations. "We seem to be a less concerned andcompassionate society."

More specifically, vigilant reporting, an

"Armos smell like shit." "I was happy with the American reaction," Aghourian said. "They were all supportive, but only one Armenian called. "I told a local Armenian paper and they said, 'we don't want to get involved in that.'

My wife went to the church on Central and they said 'go talk to the police.' They called from the City of Glendale to help clean the graffiti, but from the Armenian side there was nothing." Nothing really serious happened in another hate crime incident that involved a black man and an Armenian, said Glendale

resident Krist Mardirossian.

But

Mardirossian, who was arrested and pled no contestin acriminal case, was convictedand sentenced to 7 1 0 hours of community service after he made threatening racial slurs and violatedthecivil rights ofKenneth Patterson, according to court records. 'There were a lot of racial words like I was

nigger," Patterson said. "He said that I

increase in L.a..'s crime rate, demographic shifts and the recession have all contributed to a souring ofethnic and racial relations. In Glen-dale, where thousands of Middle Eastem and Soviet immigrants settled in the '80s, five racial hate crimes were reported by Armenians lastyear. One of theminvolved a baker in Montrose, a traditional and Anglo enclave that falls inside politically conserva-

didn't belong in Glendale. It happened so long ago. I don't want to think about it." in a tragic twist of irony, this is not the

Aghourian walked to his two-month-old

toes as anchors

tive

Glendale. When owner Razmik

Oven Fresh Bakery on the moming of July 26,l99l,he*frozze in shock." Racial epithets were scrawled on the windows of his bakery with wax so that he could not wash them off. He used a razorblade to scrape offKKK and satanic signs and other expressions such as

only hate crime incident documented by

police in which Armenians have pitted themselves against other minorities ior trespassing their ethnic turf. Some of these Armenians have spent more than half oftheir lives overseas and look at their ghetGlendale

securitY.

'"The apple cart is very stable until the next wave of outsiders or immigrants come into a neighborhood," said Glendale Police Agent Christopher L,oop. "It's a territorial ani turf issue. Human beings have to have a place that theY can call home."

Nearly 300,0fi) Armenians consider Los Angeles their home. Many of them have found it easy to avoid members of other ethnic groups by staying safely inside their churches and schools. Others, threatened by displacement-after having left their own country because of war-lash out at His-

panics, Koreans and blacks. "Whenimmigrants come to this counffy, they don't have a sense ofbelonging," Loop said. "They're faced with insecurities." A lot of those insecurities were reinforced during the apocalyptic L.A. riots. And as a

result, America today is more ethnically

Td./

you rteel ail-lfu

balkanized than it was before. "How seriously are Armenians awme of race relations?" asked Sonia Harlan, an educator in Chicago. "I'm talking about relations and the need for relations with blacks and Hispanics. Armenians have dismissed them the the way they would dismiss some neighborhood Arabs, Persians or Russians.

bnk /aa qn 6"f

Sometimes,

really wonder

they think

about it and see the differences?

"When you're productive in the mainItream, the mainstream pitches in to help, because you're sharing values."

A beacon of coexistence Inside this urban mess stands a perfect

A y'ame-town lcranch.

paradigm which leaves no room for suipicion or racial crime. It hassurvived five break-ins the last years, defying the neighborhood's crack dealers, hustlers and graffiti-marred walls. Unlike a Korean-owned market across the street that was ransacked and chaned by looters, Partamian's Bakery was spared ttre fury that swept through much of Los Ange-

l,/ertoieler'ATtrls nheru lou nead 7ilo,r. Loan< ?ou c-qn /tt)€ oi-(h.

les.

The bakery survived the riots with the help of manager Mark Naulls who patrolled the bakery every four hours while nearby

{avin6r *h.-f neke 7ou rma rle.r. And more qArders -th.a

stores went up in flames. The area was once an Armenian colony, but today Armenian presence in the neig[r-

borhood is scant.

ihe r{anCor4 o^e.s. €*r1 4ine.

l€on

Partamian and his

family somehow opted to stay and built

friendly bonds with the chroniially unemployed and homeless, who regularly traipse into his store. Partamian calls them by their flrst names and subsidizes theirmeals. "I don't see color when I do business,,'he said. "I don't have that problem."

In the chaos, Naulls, who is black, swung

into action. He reached out to partamian\

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patrons to defend the store. A handful responded and held vigil in the dark ofnight. They shooed away potential looters until tensions fizzled. "In the retail establishment you treat everyone with respect," Naulls said. ..That has helped Mr. Partamian remain in the area. That level of respect he puts out there is returned tohim inkind. That's thekeyreason why the bakery was spared."

Eaa

BankAmcrica Corporation

Member FDIC

AIM,

June 1992

With reporting by Michael Krikorian

Making Peace By TONY HALPIN

Bahram Ghasemi, 36, is charg6 d' affaires in Yerevan

for the Islamic Republic of Iran, which opened its embassy in Armenia on April 30. Formerly kan's ambassadorto heland, Ghasemi graduated in economics and international law from Tehran University. He worked as a journalist before joining kan's Foreign

Ministry lOyearsago.

There is no competition of any kind between han and Turkey. Whether Turkey is pursuing any competition, I don't know. There is no pointto acompetition, they are one of the mostpowerful countries in the region and they have very wide opportunities. Besides, a number of countries have emerged in the region lately which appear to be our new neighbors, and from a historical viewpoint they do express amicable feelings and a willingness to ccioperate with Iran. We express the same willingness to them. These countries face difficulties in the economic field. These countries will decide for themselves with which foreign countries they can have the most favorable cooperation. All of them should be given the chance to decide their own future.

Relationswith Armenia have developed veryquickly. How do you see the future? There doesn't seem to be any reason for these relations not to be promising. Tehran expects and wishes to establish friendly relations with all its neighbors, and I think the same readiness is expressed by

AllI: ln what areas are the strongest ties likely to develop between Armenia and lran?

GHASEMI: One of the main policies of the Iranian governmentis to establish friendly and mutually beneficial relations with its neighbors. Armenia appears to be a new neighbor, taking into account the long history of relations between the Armenian and lranian peoples. It is for this reason that we should establish good relations, and we envisagecollaboration withArmenia in allfields---economic, political and cultural, which might be mutually convenient and profitable. I especially mention the economic field of cooperation, which will be rather extensive, taking into account the geographical position of the two countries. Throughlran, Armenia may reach the Persian Gulf ports as well as the sea* while Iran may reach the Black Sea via Armenia. Industrial and financial cooperation in banking is also expected to be realized, as we have signed an agreement to establish an Iranian bank in Yerevan.

Why has han been so active in trying to resolve the

problem of Nagomo-Katabakh?

Iran has undertaken this serious endeavor because of an acute political necessity-the Iranian govemment's conviction that stability is needed in the region. Both Armenia and Azerbaijan addressed Iran with requests to mediate in the conflict, and the governrnent of Iran was trying to do its utmost to reach relative peace in the region. Both parties were trying to help Iran in its attempts to mediate. However, there were forces, political forces, which were not positive about peace being installed in Karabalir. At any rate, we express hope that peace and stability will retumto that region.

How has lran reacted to the opening of a coridor between Karabakh and Armenia? From the beginning, we held the opinion that any military activities would pose obstacles on the path of the process of reaching stability in the region. We appealed to both parties to refrain from expanding military activity, so as to make useofpeaceful methods of resolving the conflict. Any military operation undertaken by one of the parties can result in aresponding military action whichmay bring unpredictable consequences.

Did you see it as a reiection of lran's efforts that the fall of Shushi took place at the same time as peace talks in Tehran? No, I can't say that. It's impossible to put it that way, because the agreement reached in Iran was predetermining certain points upon which we can probably expand. Both parties are considering very seriously the attempts of kan to mediate in the conflict.

llan and Turkey are widely perceived to be in compe.

tition in this region. ls that how you see it?

lranian Charg6 d'Affaires Bahram Ghasemi the Armenian govemment. If no very serious cause for deterioration emerges, thenrelations between thetwo countries are sure todevelop

evenfurther.

Would there be any reason for such a deterioration? In general, I don't see any obstacles; what I see is positive. It only depends on the general political situation in the region. I can't help mentioning the political instability which now damages the region [and] may, at some point, influence the relations between the countries. Once peace and stability are restored, mutual relations can develop very rapidly and progress may be viewed in the multidimensional economic ties between the two counffies. Stability is the main guarantee for the development of those relations. We were in a state of warforeightyears and thatwarwas, in a way, forced upon kan. And we can feel a critical situation in any region, since we do have experience of a critical period.

Are you saying you feel that aame sense of a

critical

situation here? I feel that the situation in the region is not stable ofcourse, but you should be aware that I am not going to compare in any way the present situation in the region with that in lran during the Iran-Iraq war and during the Gulf War. I only wanted to say ttrat a crisis may afflect the general political and economic life of any region in the world. It can' t be denied that a crisis is present here. All political forces involved should do their utmost to calm the situation down and bring the conflict to its ultimate solution.

AIM, June 1992

Gurtain Rises on ArmenianGinema Wll the GoldenAge ofthe Silver Screen Dawn in P o st - S ov iet Arme nia

By GIIRISTOPHER ATAMIAN une marks the first time that the American Film Institute will pay special tribute to a national cinema during its annual Los Angeles Film festival. Armenia received the designation

Minister of Culture Mikayel Stamboltsian.

Stamboltsian has since authorized the WestLos Angeles actress to sell and distribute movies made by Armenfilm abroad. Now she is trying to woo Hollywood to independentArmenia. "We have the facilities, we have the talent, now all we need is the

recently in part through the efforts of actress Nora Armani who wants

promote

Festival l0 years ago. "The event was exteremely successful

and had a large following," he says. "I thought that given Armenia' s independence, it was only htting that we should hold an-

other."

Armani's eyes light up when she talks about the future of Armenian film, but she admits that a lot of work still needs to be done in promotion, production and preservation. Promotion is what she has been doing plenty of in recent months. She beteves foreign crews will flock to Armenia because of its diverse landscape and cheap shooting rates. Several foreign production companies have already approached her, she says.

"It's dirt cheap to shoot there-I

i would say one-quarter to one-fifth of i:: ii whatitwouldcostinHollywood." ii. Meanwhile, the Los-Angelesii based Friends of Armenian Film

films made in the former Soviet re-

funds to pay for some of tle costs to ship the festival entries from Arme-

public.

nia to America. Whether these efforts

is but several held internationally that will make people dis-

The festival

one

cover the hidden secrets of Armenian cinema. This year has al-

a muchtribute in La

j. film. The Armenian National Ii

Rochelle, France. And 1993 will mark the pinnacle of exposure when the Pompidou Center in

Paris launches

tional market will depend a lot on and other festivals. Armani also says she is ,. working to preserve Armenian

iii: the AFI

ready seen touted

Fitm Archives date back to I 905

and contain a comprehensive library that requires constant upkeep and restoration. French

its

"R6trospectif du Cin6ma Arm6nien." The AFI Festival will expose critics and popular audiences to films that otherwise would not be seen by the viewing public. Thatexplains in part the enthusiasm

in the state-owned

Armenfrlm Studios in Armenia. She says that shooting Ara Emjakian's Deadline In Seven Dayslastyear convinced her that she wanted to work in Armenia as much as possible. While surveying the small Armenianfilm industry, Armani metDeputy

I,,

has already lent

t,i,

effort and Armani plans

to the

tocanvassothersfor

help.

FirstonArmani's agenda, however, is the AFI festival.

The festival includes works by 150

the

Armenian film industry and to cover part of the festival' s promotional expenses. Los Angeles-based actress Armani steers the committee. Armani, who says the committee's role is to introduce the Armenian film community to the outside world, made business connec-

Minister of CultureJacquesLang

F ii ii

work will be viewed by an increasing number of people outside the old Sovietbloc. A "Friends of Armenian Film" committee formed last year to

raise money in support of

1,|,,

Eit. his support Eli. restoration

of Armenian hlmmakers whose

tions while filming

will help

Armenia's fledgling film industry carve out a niche in the interna-

i i Manana Melkonian and Nora Armani during shooting of Ara Erniakian's Deadline in Seven Dayg Andrey Podoshian and Galya

Novents in Suren Babayan's Electric Shock

exposure," she says. A lot of that exposure could come this summer during the AFI festival organized by

Ken Waschin. Waschin, director of AFI, held a similar tribute at the London Film

AIM, June 1992

directors who will present films from all parts oftheglobe. The Armenian selection covers documenta-

ries, classical films, psycho-thrillers and reli-

gious epics.

includes

works by directors Vigen

Chaldranian, Ara Ernjakian, Haroutiun Katchatrian, Noune Hovhannisian and Davit Safarian, in addition to the internationally

acclaimed Paradjanov clas sic, Thc Color of Pome g ranates.

It is clear from the press screenings that the new Armenian directors are intelligent,

form a symbolic balancing act ----on one side lies death, on the other survival. Slowly the camera dims and pale lights begin to flicker-the harvesters are buming the wheat stalks to fertilize next year's crop. The flickers grow larger and tum into fire, menacing in sound and size. The danger has passed. Or has it really?

hard-working, talented and, most

importantly, they have something to say. What they may lack in Hollywood production values, they make up in craftsmanship and in soul. Vigen Chaldranian' s The Voice in the Wilderness is a powerful religious epic about

ttPomegranates" in new colol Differing both in tone and subject matter, the screening of Paradjanov's Director's Cut of Nran Guyne (The

i i i1

anArmenian medieval monk from Yerzenga who travels the world in search of the transcendental truth.

Suren Babayan's Eiecrnc

i:',,"J'#Hftl ?['.'? -:ffi

lfl

Color of Pomegranates) is an event of interest to film scholars, amateurs and students alike. Unlike the version audiences have seen, the Director's Cut

is much more

iti The images themi selves are among the

Freudian protagonist, Babayan's hero plays a year-long game of Fort-Da with a key to a room that holds the secrets to a mysterious event from his childhood. Noune Hovhannisian' s short documen-

most surreal in film

history and display the Oriental beauty of me-

tary, Day, draws a parallel between the depiction of a day in the life of urban Armenians and the caged life of animals in a

nearby zoo.

new group of directors is without doubt Haroutiun Katchatrian,

will

present

quick movie-making formu-

been

It is but one example of the unlimited possibilities of cinema once it is freed from the shackles of money and a rigid studio las.

system.

Armenian film is by economic necessity distinct from what American viewers are accustomed to seeing on the screen, and therefore the standards by which they are judged are very different. The Armenian

les on the life of Armenians living in Georgia's Djavakhk region. The film won the Sesterce d'Argent

filmmaker-like

Prize at the 2lnd Annual Nyon Film Festival in Swit-

bound by

i:i

constant action. He can slowhiscameraandshow the detail of human life and action.

lt only for this reason, ilj i' the AFI public screenings in ' Hollywood from June 18 to I July 2 are worth the visit. Anyone who comes into contact with the soft-spoken

northern Armenia. Using documentary footage and real time, Return to the Promised Land depicts the daily life of ordinary people who live

the

lobotimizing demand for

life of a family of in a depopulated

under persecution. The fi lm is a cycle of life and deathof men attached to the Earth and to its beauty. It ends with the villagers' first festive gathering since the massacres when a group of tightrope walkers per-

his counterpart in Rus-

sia, Asia and Europe-is not

zerland. In Retum to the Promised lnnd, a film caught somewhere between documentary and fiction, Katchatrian shot 80 minutes of footage without a word of dialogue. The movie begins with the massacres of Armenian families in Sumgait in 1988 and traces the

village

Paradjanov'sfilmmaking vapid,

i:r 6"6.r Hollywood's

screenedattheCannes, Venice, Moscow and Paris film festivals. White Town is one of his features to be showcased in t os Ange-

arduous and displaced refugees that resettles

Nran Guyne a tragic love story presented

and dancers.

three movies at this year's AFI festival.

His films have

dieval Armenian song tradition.

and

as an interior poem. It is intercut with organic and aesthetic images of pomegranates, fi sh, instruments

The most powerful presence of this

who

expres-

sionistic and lyrical.

Top to bottom:

Haroutiun Katchatrian's Wind ot Emptinessand Return

wisdom of these directors, some of whom will be present at the festival, will instantly be convinced that they are worthy of support and encouragement.

tothe Promised Land, Davit Safarian's l-ost Paradise, Sergei Paradjanov's Dircctor's Cut The Colot ol Pomegranates.

Christopher Atamian ls

lilm in Los Angeles

AIM, June

1992

New York.based

film scholar now linishing his graduate work in

HuntingforWotds S

arki s S hmnv onian' s Que s t for H i s M ot he r

ucked away in the hills of Berkeley. Califomia. is a man on a mission: To rediscover the roots ofthe Armenian language. Pecking at a computer keyboard, pouring over yellow-

HrachiaAjarian's 1935 fourvolume dictionary, Hayeren Armadagan Pararan, which provides definitions and to his research:

paged volumes, he declares that spoken, modem Armenian is as far from the way the original language sounded as the moon is from the earth. To find the lost "language structure," he has been studying ancient designing computer software to make the searcheasier. "This quest is my way of seeking out my Armenian identity," says Sarkis Shmavonian' Armed with degrees in linguistics, Near Eastem studies, and a Ph.D. in Russian history, he applies all his skills to the job. In the 5th Century B.C., the Armenian language had an "integral structure" of a rype

He finds additional tools in history, as recorded by such ancients as the 8th-Century B.C. Greek poetHomer. He alsouses Sanskrit, a literary language of classical and medieval India, documented before the 4th Century B.C. and said to be the oldest survivor of Indo-European languages. A special stack ofbooks is fundamental

By LISETTE B. POOLE

Greek, German and Latin, among others. He

Tb n g

about 15,000forms of Armenian word structures; andNor Parkirk H aigazian Lezvi (The

word wet," he declares. "Rule number one of Armenian linguistic methodology is that Indo-European 'w' becomes 'g' before a vowel," he explains. Another example, kin or gin, meaning woman in Armenian, is parallel to Greek gyne, also meaning woman, he says. That's theroot ofthe English word gyne colo gy.More than 60 such examples in the languages denote close contact before eitherhad formed

its own particular identity. Shmavonian can go on for hours citing the etymology--{eri-

vation

of words-precise rules of recon-

struction and phonological correspondence to other languages, Iike early German and Celtic. Through philology-the science of structure and development of a languagehe also explains changes that occurred over centuries.

is also

o E

found today only in modem Russian and German. By 350 B.C., a "big wedge of Iranian crept into the language and broke down those structures," says Shmavonian. More changes occurred later, and in the last 30 years "different layers of sounds and speed have been added," he explains. The

only dialects which still conserved something of the original pronunciation----characteiz,ed by sharp fluctuating tones-were heard in the now-Turkish territories of Bitlis and Mush, west of [,ake Van.

Shmavonian and most conservative

Westem linguists maintain that Armenian is part of a larger Indo-European language

family, which 5,000 years ago

sPread

throughout Europe and all the way to southeast kan and India. A few adventuresome linguists posit that lndo-European was ole of iix forms of a parent language spoken in various ways from North Africa and the Middle East to Japan. Published research speculates that the "Mother Tongue" (also called hoto-Human, or Proto-World) may have been spoken 150,000 years ago in Africa and fanned across the globe, parallel to

the archeological and anthropological hypothesis that are descended from a sub-Saharan

family.

Shmavonian leaves mundane debate on this theory to colleagues. "My greatest wish is to beam back into the 5th Century B.C. with a tape recorder and lots of battery cells," he says. 'T could capture the sounds and intonations of Armenians." Since time travel has not been perfected' he uses old reference books and dictionaries for clues. Scores line wooden shelves in his study, and more are piled neatly on his table.

Shmavonian: seeking cultural identlty in the etymology of words New Dictionary of the Armenian Language), compiled in 1837 by Catholic monks, the Mekhitarian Fathers, which records the classical language and its usage.

"Reconsfiucting the original Armenian language involves scrutinizing structure, phonetics, and adopting athinking pattemof that time to move along," he saYs. The intricate sounds ofthe language fascinate Shmavonian as much as My Fair Lody's Professor Higgins---he can detect where a speaker leamed the language. "East of Lake Van, you would refer to the ground as getln. Westof thatdemarcationyou would say kedin," he says with a grin. "Do you know where they both come from? From the word get, meaning river in Armenian and having a common ancestry with the English

AIM, June

1992

For aficionados of the Armenian lan-

"I have uncovered the original word which corresponds exactly to the English wotd wheel.Its etyguage, he has a special gem.

mology does not exist in Ajarian's fourvolume dictionary." This discovery is cause for excitement to him, because the wheel was a principal artifact of Indo-Europeans, and thus important in the language. To find the word, he went back in time. tn

Sanskrit it was cha-kra; in Old Iranian, cftakhr a i in ancient Greek, kuk - I o s; in Old Norse, hjol and hv6l; in Old English itwas hweol.

Thus, the tndo-European proto-form 5,000 years ago was hue-la,voL Because, as a general rule, Armenian has full reduplication in

sounds with a Pattern of 'e' and 'o', Shmavonian deduced that the Armenian

Planning tovisit

RANC

proto-form would have b*n h,vel-hpol. "However, by applying phonetic rules and taking into account that the 'l' sound developed into a 'gh' we have the word: Jghugh," he says proudly, detailing with pen and pad.

to spend some time in the French

capital:p[RIS

"The first

We offer you accomodations in our furnished studios

JUSTOFFTHE

CHATPlS.ELYSEES.

H'ffi;*Him "Mysre?rest second'kw'becomes WiSh iS to beam back #l#:*flrf}j: This intO the 'o'.

cent on the

Rooms include kitchen, television, telephone.

'kw'

ing, he says. "I have completed 85 percent of the job, with codes and all. Some time this year I will be done." He reckons his reconstructions of Armenian vocabulary before the Iranian incursion 2,400 years ago are

fiffi$i:;f$"# cannot

Sth

Century B.c.

aspirate'ch'

standnexttoadark ; i ; I 'l' (the linguistic I -I equivalentoftheAr- til*-rEl, menian letter ghad) f '"

Monthly rate: $1,300

Minimumstay: lmonth Contact:

YEZEGUELIAN

with

I I fl

IrroI.]lEE-l$ rules,itlosestheas- lg ". pirationandbecomes 7rytl an inaspirate '"h' or

INC.ARMENIAN

des Ghamps

D-

in tater modem l Westem Armenian:

Elysees Paris 75(Xr8,

jj'

jlhol or jghogh jshush!' The modem

ffi::?'*Hl

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,jiJ far

aboutlfi)years.

ffl;

".","ty,1",:'" as inscriptions

:T:',:l#tfjff; make no mistake,

i Il_= finguistsdoachieve * Ilj thiimuch." Shmavonian 1,,, *li

sinceitviolatessound

34Avenue

il?:T:","::,,#1:,7

cites the Hiuite language as an ex-

ample-it

was pre-

dicted theoretically generations betwo -it

fore was actually discovered.

-*rf&*',*,&8+

_ a tape feQQl.dgl ahd brs

His interest in linguistics and his .ooi. go

back to his

*lffiffi:y".ffi battefy CellS... Jiailwnorrtaian I could capturcthe lT-'Im * H: "0ffi;['n"'#j." rules he "hub")

how

clan

how the

explain current

SOUndS and

intOnatiOnS Of

Armenia;;.;' fffl"lffiilflffi: lel erek. Armenian

Before an 'r', the

Educcilion Bring AIM to;rour clossroom

where issues of inbre$ b fie Armenion community ond he world con be studied', serve to fo ci

shorryor hor!Order compl imenlnry copies of

"AlM ForEdwofion" ftro teocherpu knor.

Colh I-8q>736

3A$

Tuscan make

!T,",il:i"ii:&il;

Armenian witli his

drop. Also, a vowel at the beginning of a

communication and sometimes language

litote

mutuol understrcnding. Ld

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Commerce between neighbors required

discussed, queslioned ond

finolly,

dialect

family, who were originally from Kharpert, I westemArmenia.Languageledtocuriosity I word. ] of culture and history. tn time, Shmavonian Armenian originally had few 'a's and no I became an established antiquarian in Berke'v's, he notes. [n the Middle Ages, an 'f I ley.Hisbookstorefeaturesworksofscholarsound was added to the alphabet to incorpo- ] ship in history, science, medicine, classical rate foreign words. I philosophy and pre-1900 rare volumes. Some scholars of the history of modem I Though he admits to rather liking the Armenian believe that in thJ;ly igrh c;;: | ,".,n;'ii?t ;l#rtil'ilffi;s#;Atm tury, two national Armenian languages were I dedicates to his subject----eight to l0 hours a created-Eastemandwestem-byinrellec- I day with "no weekends offl'-is entirely tuals who fashioned them according to I professional. prevalent French, Turkish and Russian mod| He notes that "amateur" carries no stigma els. At that time, all three languages were I in the field of linguistics and points out that consideredelegantanddenotingclass. I this century's greatest breakthrough in the words, elements of grammatical con- ] subject was made by an architect,-tr,ticnaet structionandspeedofpronunciationflowed I ventris, who cracked the unknown ancient from one culture into another through battles I script Linear B and showed it to be an archaic and trade, Shmavonian explains. I stage of Greek. must precede an

AlMfor

't' will

Fiorentine

adaptation which brought about changes of structure, he notes. His persistence in uncovering detail after detail of Armenian language is remarkable. Indeed, his research is valuable not only to Eastem and Westem linguists, historians and anthropologists but to two computer firms as well. These cater to scholars and have approached him for the program he is design-

AIM, June 1992

"Good linguistics is a discipline for which one possesses an inbom aptitude," he says. "Lacking the special talent, no amount of training can overcome the defect. Good linguistics requires intuition above all, like good geology, good mathematics, good chess, or good code breaking."

Lisette Poole is a frequent contributorto AlM, basd in San Francisco.

AG B U/AYA I 3

ft NAI/ASARTIAN

llth Noilh Americun 0lympic Gumes JULY l8'26,1992

Upin

hoke

By HASMIK HARUTUilIAiI

AIM, June 1992

he dictatorship of Fidel Castro may have reduced all aspects ofCuban life to a gray, monotonous level of

survival.

unique symbol of

Westem affluence, however, continues to flourish in the very heart of the Caribbean island. The world's best cigar, the Havana, grows on Cuba's westem shores, where the soil is reddish and volcanic. Here, the favorable winds, the soil's humidity, and themoderate rays of the sun all cooperate to fumish the perfect setting for the cultivation of one of the world's best-known objects of pleasure. "I must have been bom in a cigar leaf,"

Based in Geneva, Vah6 G6rard and his father are known as the "Cigar Kings ot Europe."

cigars today, the G6rards specialize in the cultivation, production and sale of the most expensive Cuban cigar, the Cohiba, which is manufactured by hand in very limited numbers.

Recognizing the revenues which the export of cigars would bring to the country's economy, the 1959 Cuban revolution left the cigar industry fairly intact. Cuba annually produces 3fi) million cigars, 80 million of which are exported, bringing in revenues of 50 million dollars. Fidel Castro, a great lover of the Cohiba, was initially opposed to its export. After he quit smoking in the 1980s, he tumed over its production and exporttoall ofEurope, except Spain, to the monopoly of the G6rards. This arrangement has proven to be very beneficial to the gradually weakening

economy ofCuba. "The G6rards revolutionized the world of Havanas," says loyal client Piene Salinger, White House press secretary during the Kennedy Administration and now ABC Eu-

ropean colrespondent. Others refer to the G6rards as the "Cigar Kings of Europe" or the "Jewelers of the Cigar." "For some 30 years, our family has devoted itself to the production of tobacco," says Vah6 G6rard, who joined the company l0years ago, after an apprenticeship with the Alfred Dunhill Company. "I have always lived in this atmosphere-for three generations, all my family has been involved in the tobacco industry and I gained my expertise and knowledge from my family. No school oruniversity can teach the history of thecigar or its cultivation." His father, who refuses to give his flrst name, concurs. For G6rard senior, who emigrated from Lyons, France, almost 30 years ago, his son is like the student who has surpassed his master. Twice a year, Vahe travels to the shores of Cuba, first to supervise the harvest and laterthe delicate process of wrapping each individual cigar by hand.

jokes Vah6 G6rard, 31, proprietor with his fatherofthe Swiss-basedfirm G6rardPdre Et Fils. In the world of Havanophiles, the G6rards

are considered Europe's Number

One "cigariers." Theirboutique, discretely tucked away in the shopping arcade of Geneva's luxurious Noga-Hilton, is known by all cigar lovers of the world. At the dawn of the century, the best cigars

of the British Empire carried the name of Alfred Dunhill. Later, the company of Zino Davidoffelevated the cigar industry to new heights of perfection, say experts.

The world's largest producer of Cuban

"Our company does not sell cigars, but ratherthe sensibilities which accompany it," he affirms. "The cigaris the symbol of the art of living, a revered and tasteful moment in theeveryday business of living," he adds. He sees the cigar as a "genuine instrument of communication" between men, and believes that by the end of the century it will play the same role for women. Vah6 G6rard became the youngest consulting intemational expert of Havana cigars at age 25, when Cubatabaco, the island's state tobacco monopoly, endowed him with the title.

The senior G6rard, an enthusiastic supporter of anti-smoking campaigns, believes that the cigar and the cigarette are completely antithetical. "The cigarette is ameans of selfpoisoning, while the cigar is aclean, natural

AIM- June 1992

Tobacco Leaves and Book Sleeves GT]IDE DE L'AMATEUR DE HAVANE Selected and presented by Gâ&#x201A;Źrard Pire et Fils Solar-Verlag,, 1990,255 pp, 160 francs

With a preface by French film star and cigar aficionado Philippe Noiret, this tiny guide opens new horizons to Havanophiles with expert analysis and commentary by the top specialists of Cuban cigars-Vah6 G6rard and G6rard senior. Elegantly illustrated andproduced, it is an encyclopedia of practical tips, with an informative survey of the geography and the process

of planting and

se-

lection of Cuban tobacco. It includes a discussion of cigar-

making and a directory of 25 brands of Havanas. Eachofthe 165 listingsdescribe the cigar's aroma and taste at combustion, characteristics, cold taste and advice. The French-language guide, which took two-and-a-half years to complete, has already sold 10,000 copies. The Spanish edition is to appear soon, while the English is in the plans. TH E GOU RM ET GU ID E TO by Paul

C IGARS

B.K.Garmirian

C edar P ublications, I

990

l46pp,$29.95 hardback Paul Garmirian recognized a void in the field ofcigars, and solved the problem in much the same way a college professor would together with personal reflections

on how his taste matured throughout his extensive travels. The easy-to-read Gourmet Guide discusses cigar history and manufacturing, storing, aging and is an

excellent primer

in cigar selection for

novice and expert alike. Garmirian covers the full range of Havana cigars and also presents an exhaus-

tive examination of cigarsavailable inthe United States.

Now in its third printing, the guide

also presents juicy tidbits such as which

cigarto smoke aftera light lunch, guides to the proper cigar for your size (based on height and weight) and

customs (in Japan, don't smoke a cigar bigger than your boss's!). Spanish and French translations in the

making. I

pleasure, uncontaminated by chemicals. "Compare the smokers of cigars and cigarettes," he observes. "Cigarettes are smoked at moments of tension, while the cigar is consumedlanguidly aroundacalm cup, when the smoker is in a good mood. Cigars elevate the spirit and create a unique, ethereal state of mind. kr short, the cigar is not smoked; it is relished." A good Havana cigar needs to go through 92 manual operations, he confirms. The frst floor of Geneva's stately Noga-

Hilton is the main exhibition hall of the G6rards. From all over the world, lovers of the cigar-Arab sheikhs, political leaders, stars of music, film and television as well as humble connoisseurs----converge on this plush setting to sample what some consider one of the world's most pleasurable objects.

But Vah6 G6rard-professionalism being one of his most striking qualities-is careful not to indulge the names of his clients. Discretion is the golden rule of the company. The G6rards believe that the pleasures of the cigar must be communicated and they inspire their Geneva visitors. In fact, Vah6 G6rard is well-versed in the qualities which determine the subtle varieties of the cigarsilkiness, flavor, elasticity of the wrapping, color, and buming qualities. Some are "gently woven,"others "supremelytastefu 1," while

others still are "womanly." While learning the trade at Alfred Dunhill, he picked up the typically British habit of holding a Havana next to one's ear md rolling it between the fingers to test its humidity (it should not crackle). But he dismisses

hocus-pocus

all

the so-called rules about how a Havana should be cut, litand smoked. If the visitor would like to partake of this

I-ewis Carroll-like heavenly fantasy, then the father and son will graciously accompany you to the mysterious underground treasury of their glorious exhibition halls, which are reminiscent of the vaults of Swiss banks. Here the visitor will view thousands of cigar boxes, meticulously classified and kept un-

der controlled climactic conditions

18 degrees Centigrade and 807o humidity. Some kinds ofcigars are kept in these surroundings for only a few months, others for up to 12 years, before being offered todiscriminating clients. Some 60 privileged customers have special safes where the G6rards mature a selection of their finest Havanas. Generally, cigars must be delicate and silky, revealing the botanical origins on the leaf. A visit to the Geneva headquarters of the

G6rards is ardvelationof theG6rardfamily's dedication and discrimination. It is also an invitation to the imagination, to travel to another historical era, another land. Listening to the G6rard family, ttre visitor is momentarily transported to March 15, 1492. Ol that day, the ships of Christopher Columbus

first landed on the unknown, fiery shores of Cuba where the native Indians smoked a miraculous plant which gave out abundant whiffsof smoke. T 32

MindYourP.Grs By IRENE I|OSALLI

ighting a special cigar, opening a fine boule of wine or champagne, all represent the pursuit ofthe good life," says cigar smoker for 30 years, Paul Garmirian. He has puffed away at his cigars working tkough his doctorate in intemational politics, teaching, playing guitar, and managaing a real estate firm in Mckan, Virginia. Little didheknow thathis particularpassion, shared by his father, would lead to authoring a bestseller on cigars and devel-

ing acidity, saltiness and harshness. Then he concentrated on the three primary factors (beyond the aging of tobaccof the wrapper (the outside leaf layer), the binder and the filler. For the latter, he selected three different vintages, all ofthem five years old. Now connoisseurs arepuffing P.G.'s (his initials) with the same delection as the prized Havana-made cigars, which match their exquisite, subtle aroma. The non-Havana blend, now quite acclaimed, was launched over a year ago.

Manufactured in the Dominican Repub. are made precisely to their

lic, P.G.'s cigars

oping his own cigar line, P.G.'s.

"In my early fascination with cigars, I developed ahabit

of joning down my impressions after enjoying a few specimens from a particular box," he says. "The fluctuations which existed in cigars were not too different from those that one could find in wines, regarding quality and aroma. This made itforme all the more exciting in researching, finding and enjoying good

wines and cigars."

Knowing everything about joys of the cigar, Garmirian wanted to share his passion. the

After tasting and comparing bunches and bunches ofselections and combinations for over

years, he published Tfte

Guide to C i gars tw o years ago. Though only available in tobacco shops, such as the renowned Davidoff in New G ourmet

York, it sold like hot cakes, and still does, as it enters its third edition. "As I was looking for a title to my book, I did Garmirian: "Fluctuations in qualityand aromawhich exist not have to struggle too hard to in cigars are not too diflerent from those in fine wines." convince myself that the best way to enjoy a cigar is the association we creator's instructions. He collaborated with make with a fine gourniet meal. Hence the the best factory there and the best "torcedors" title, "The Gourmet Guide to Cigars." Apart (those who roll the cigars), and is his own from the fascination with good cigars, we quality control department, never failing to also look forward to their enjoyment as the check and sign each box of cigars before apotheosis of a fine meal." shipping out to over 30 tobacco stores in the While exploring the ideal non-Havana United States and Canada. No wonder his blend, Garmirian finally found it in the Doline is so appreciated. minican Republic. This discovery inspired P.G.'s Gourmet Series includes the P.G. him to create his own line of cigar which Corona and Corona Grande, the P.G. would have the same attributes and qualities l,onsdale, the P.C. Number I and Number 2, ofthe best Havanas available. It took a long the P.G. Churchill, and the P.G Belicoso, all time to obtain the full body, titration and precisely designed according to ttre standard flavor Garmirian sought. After tasting all dimensions and tradition of Cuban cigars. kinds of tobaccos, he started by elimination: P.G.'s can be described as woody, subtle, putting away any leaves susceptible to givsmooth and slow-buming, with excellent

AIM, June 1992

handmade construction. The finish is given by a very scarce, rich and oily medium-todark reddish brown Colorado wrapper. "The first Havana I ever smoked, at the age of 16, was offered to me by my father

who enjoyed the fact that he now had

companion with whom to share his hobby." His father, Kevork Garmirian, is a renowned contractor who contributed to the urban development of Beirut, and a philantropist as well. Among other gifts, he built the Boghos Garmirian school in Antelias and financed the publication of the art book, M onume nt s of Armenian Arc hitec ture.

Though his son's sense of construction was limited to the cigar, father and son both share the art de vivre and a quest for excellence which they constantly cultivate. Currently there is a revival of this refined spirit, evidenced by flourishing cigar clubs, which often feature him as a guest-speaker. Cigars are connected with style, elegance and moderation. "Incontestably, there is a great deal of romance associated with cigars. From the time of the Spanish colonists in the New World in the latter part of the 15th Century, to the current cigar smokers, there has been an incredible fascination with cigars. Apart from the strong sense of camaraderie which exists among cigar smokers, sharing one's experiences with them makes it all the more

enjoyable."

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985, Nazareth's Smoking l.ounge was bom.

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occurs when the feminine is absent from the humanpsyche. The immobility of Balassanian's figures combined with the repressive lighting recreate----even ifjust for an instance-the fear of a victim confronted by the harsh reality of interrogation. And even though the dignifted posture of her figures might hint that women naturally endure pain and suffering differ-

entlyfrommen, Balassanian's anxietydrama makes the viewer identify with victims of oppression in ways that go beyond considerations ofgender, race

In many ways, Balassanian is an excep-

tion among Armenian artists. The diverse

postrnodemist approaches of the past de-

cades-in architecfure, music, performance or the plastic arts--*rave remained predomi-

nantly absentfrom the artistic considerations of mainstream Armenian diasporan culture. This is not surprising, considering the overall conservative attitudes-lack of respect for what is different and fear of change--that guide our community lives. The resulting creative stalemate is truly

ics which have excluded the articulation of what is known as the plight of the Significant Other. Balassanian was not always politically conscious as an artist. One of pre-revolutionarykan's foremost abstract painters and the youngest member of a famed group of TehranArmenianpoets-NorEj (New Page), she left the counEry in the '60s to pursue higher education. She was "no longer challenged" by the perimeters of the existing art scene, she says.

_ After completing

orreli-

.? Institute, she returned to 5 tehran. The Iranian Revo3 lution in 1979 marked a de-

pa.tu." point

for

F Balassanian, who felt that ' abstract painting did not

courses (forinstance, women of developing countries and Western gender politics). Balassanian builds her visual narration upon the rich

energy of her

her

d WAfromNewYork'sPran

gion. Through provocation, Balassanian offers a reconciliation to the conffadictions that stem from the meeting of two or more cultural dis-

sufficiently reflect her exis-

tential quest. This search culminated in her 1980 exhibit, "Hostages: A Diary,"

own

at the

multicultural experience, to

Elise Meyer Gallery in

New York. The show fea-

remind us that art can ques-

tured a series ofcollages in-

tion oppressive forces oflife. In the smaller back room, Balassanian has installed a dozen fu se boxes at eye level, each containing a close-up

corporating images from news media, Persian calligraphy and the repetition ofa

young

photo of the artist blindfolded (herself a hostage),

woman's captivating eyes

expressing her outrage atthe

photograph

of a

eroding human condition in

staring at us through rectan-

Iran and the U.S. hostage

gular holes. As the viewer moves, her gaze, lit by an out-of-sight bulb, follows. Suddenly, the viewer becomes the observed, like in

saga.

But

harsh light of judgment.

At ttris point, the viewer begins to question: Who is she? Where

1982 installation

is this faceless

blunedby uncertainty.

was not until

Balassanian came to be described as a significant artist for her "unending struggle to create new ways to synthesize politics and art." The

the previous room, under the

authority? Our urge to touch these women or help them out of their predicament is

"Black Black Days" that

the

Franklin Fumace in ttYC *Veiled Figures," a mixed installation from "The Other Side"' 1991

Are we prepared to "see" who is undemeath that garb? Are we ready to'listen" to what she might have to say? After all, hasn't mankind just begun to carry the burden of wrath heapedon ourplanetin the name ofprogress, misuse of human intelligence and technology? Over the years and with an alchemist's devotion, Balassanian has ftansformed the parched desert of the diasporan Armenian experience into a fertile site. As Geoffrey Young points out in an essay on "The Other Side:" "Foreigners, ethnic minorities and women can find their champion in Balassanian, foras a woman bom and raised in a foreign culture, she knows firsthand what slights and invisibilities the out-

sider feels in this deeply competitive, socially networked and racially stratified society."

was an environmental tribute to death-an omniPresent political reality in the

MiddleEast.

Yet, unfortunate, because it is precisely through postmodem artistic discourse that members of various underrepresented groups have come to mediate the concems and voices of their respective communities. Chilean pho-

tographer Alfredo Jaar, Chicano painter Rupert Garci4 native American mixed-media artist Jimmie Durham, diasporan Indian sculptor Anish Kapur are among the many ffansnationalists whose creative endeavors,

while rooted in their own cultures, resist ghettoization and introduce alternatives to the centuries-old domination of Westem

cul-

turalhegemony. These artists borrow from post-World War tr critical theories such as simulation, appropriation and deconsfiuction to intervene with the prevailing modernist aesthet-

AIM, June 1992

it is a mistake

cxegorirze, Balassanian as a political artist' As one author observed: "Her message cannot be reduced to a slogan, and we would be looking in vain for any ideological reference. Her commitment is to humanity and to art, which is the sublime manifestation of the spirit that makes us human." Perhaps this factor is more immediately felt inreading herpoetry, where warmth and eroticismcaress our senses as ifthey werethe

incamate voices of Gorky's surrealist imagery. But it is ultimately through the visual medium, especially in the artist's instinctual drawings of vulnerable human figures, that one rediscovers an ancient remedy to heal the anesthetized and tivialized perceptions of thepostrnodem Other Side.

r 37

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G randmothers of Perestroi ka MOTHERSANDDAUGHTERS By ElenaBonner Translated from the Russian by AntoninaW. Bouis Alfred A. Knopf, New York 1992,349pp,$23

because of intense grief, possibly springing from their early conflicts. So difficult was

By GATHERINE A. FITZPATRTK ith these memoirs and other recent publications of Elena

ofnannies. Ruf displayed the peculiar asceticism of the communists of the day, withholding affection from her daughter and calling her "ugly," disdaining potted geraniums and

Bonner' s contemporaries like

their relationship that Elena felt Ruf was the stepparent rather than Gevorg. Ruf was so

caugtrt up

Courses, the harvests, the committees, ttrat

she completely left the household and childraising cares to her mother and a series

Yury Orlov and Ludmilla Alexeyeva, we are beginning to recover the real history of the Soviet Union, too long the property of the archvillains so fascinating to icholars, and rarely the province ofthe ordinary victims who often became heroes. The Communist terror of the '20s and '30s has been particularly neglected; the Anne Franks of Stalin's holocaust have been undiscovered.

Ms. Bonner's child's-eye view of the delights and horrors ofthe '30s accounts for the iurious feasibility and tenacity of communism. Privileged by Soviet

party duties-the Worker's

standards,

Elena's extended family was swathed in large apartments, dachas and special food parcels. Her father headed personnel in the Comintern (Communist lntemational); her mother worked in the Moscow Party Committee; her mother's childhood friends ruled in the dreaded OGPU (secret police); a classmate dated Stalin's son. The effect is rather homey; as for many of her generation, the faces of the leaders were so familiartoElena from parades and posters that they seemed

"likefamily." Elena barely knew her natural father,

Irvon Kocharian. His mother, Gertselia Tonunts, had fled from Shushi to Turkestan when Armenians were being killed during the civil war. Gertsilia's sister nursed Elena as an infant and her first language was Armenian. Elena's life-long nickname, "Lusia," came from the Armenian name Lusik. Many did not realize that the well-known Caucasian Bolshevik Gevorg Alikhanov was actually Elena's stepfather; he had asked her mother not to tell his relatives. Since they married when Elena was still a toddler, she loved him as a real father; he affectionaGly called her "Lusia-djan" and "aghchik." Although Elenaconsiders herself a memberof the Russian intelligensia, her background gave her a passionate lifelong commitment io Armenia and the sufferings in Karabakh. Elena'smother, Ruf Bonner, camefroma Jewish family; she witnessed the horror of the suicide of her father, Grigory Bonner, after a business failure. Upon Ruf s death in 1987, Elenawas movedtowritehermemoirs

Christmas trees

"bourgeois,"

When the family lived in a residential hotel for Comintem officials, La Pasionara and Togliatti were guests and Tito played chess with Elena's father. Elena witnessed the scoldingpurgemeetings in theirbuilding's "little redcomer." Afterthe murderof Sergei I 934, her father' s colleagues began to disappear. By 1937, one by one, the neigh-

Kirov in

bors were being hauled away to the secret police, and ominous wax seals appeared o1 their doors. Eerily, the family awaited their turn, and finally Elena's parents were ar-

rested, turning her into what poet Ilya Ehrenberg called one of the "strange orphans." Perhaps these losses explain themystery of why Elena remained free of vengefulnessoverher

mother's harsh atti-

and

snatching away

"subversive"

included her own parents.

tude, and how she resumed a loving rela-

the

tionship with Ruf after she retumed from

Causasian adventure

stories

that

Elena

the camps.

sneaked home to read. (Her father, by contrast,

Selectivity

good

bolists.) Once, when

frequent italicized

ElenahadanemergencY stomach operation, she

seized

her

flash-forwards sometimes steal the thunder of later chapters, or are obscure, motivated only by free association. They make us wish for a second

mother's

party card and hid it un-

der her hospital pillow

to force her mother to visit her rather than attend a party conference.

Ruf

obsession

with the party only served to make Elena more rebellious. When authorities canceled

politically suspect Mardi Gras festival for which Elena had been saving for treats, she flung her money into the garbage, prompting her grandmother to comment with approval: "Armeniancharacter."'From then on," writes Elena,' 'Armenian character' became both

thehighestmeasure of punishment and atthe same time an acknowledgement of my right to do something as I saw fit"' Ifithad notbeen forthe grandmothers of the Soviet Union, there could never have been aperestroika. While their own children raged in revolutionary fervor, they kept alive prerevolutionary cultural values as they rais{ iheir grandchildren. Elena's maternal grandmother, "Batanya" (BabushkaTatyana), was the central influence ofher life, proving what

her husband, Andrei Sakharov, once told her: "You were born of your grandmother, even though you had an Armenian character." Batanya's favorite word was decency; she constantly provided various distant relatives and stray acquaintances who fell from offrcial favor with residence permits' food andjobs. Elena quickly carne to understand

thai the "they" whom her grandmother scomfully blamed for ruining everything AIM,June 1992

and

sequencing make for the best biographies. Here Ms. Bonner disappoints;

taught her to love Armenian poets and the banned Russian Sym-

volumetodeveloPthe parts ofher life as an army doctor, aWorld Health Organization physician in Iraq and a young woman who joined the party in 1965. The whirl of piercing early vignettes (retrieving a forgotten berry-basket after a perilous hike across a railroad bridge; eaming a teacher's nickname of 'tollegium of advocates") provide some insights into Elena's latercharacter. But some sensations of child-

hoodareeitherinscrutableorbanal tooutsiders, although they may define an era. Unfortunately, such a large cast of characters (afamily tree wouldhave helped) and

frequent disruptions of the narrative needlessly perplex. This jumbled assemblage (vividly translated by Antonina Bouis) does succeed at the psychological level, since horrible life tragedies do have a way of dislodging from time to overshadow everything before and after. In the end, Elena has been uue to her enigmatic epigraph: "If you ask me, 'Did this happen?' I will reply, 'No.' If you ask me, 'Is this true?' I will say, 'Of course'." Catherlne A.

Fi@atrlck is a human rtghts

activlst+onsultant and Buasian tranatatot tivlno in llew York City. A rc@nt publication te hir translation olihe Futurc Belongs to

Fredom

by Eduard Shevardnadze.

Witnessesto History By SHAHEN MKRTCHIAN Photos by Roupen Mangasadan

cattered throughout the region of Nagomo-Karabakh, also known as Artsakh, are thousands of Ar-

menian monuments-scientifi-

cally ancient churches, monasteries with their adjacent structures, khachkars (stone carvings shaped in the form of crosses with delicate

filigree designs), tombstone mark-

ers and

obelisks, ancient inns, princely pal-

ace-fortresses, ruins of buildings constructed

for the production and protection of fortresses, bridges and monuments dedicated to the liberation movement of the Armenian people. The overall numberof historic and arnhi-

tectural monuments in Artsakh exceeds 1,600, although the numbers are incomplete, since there has been no formal scientific counting of the monuments. A substantial percentage was built throughout the Middle Ages. This period produced the crowning achievements of Armenian architecture. According to scientistV.A. Hakobian

of St. Petersburg, the l3th Century monastery of Gandzasar is "the encyclopedia of Armenian architecture;" the monastery of Gaghivank (lsr, 5th and l3th centuries) is the "oldest preserved Christian monument in the

world;" the 4th Century monastery of

Amaras, destroyed and rebuilt time after time; the monastery of Gchavank (5th and l3th centuries), built in the architectural style of the Bagratuni Dynasty'scapital city, Ani; the monastery of Okhte-Dmi (6rh-7th centuries) built similar in style to the unique creation of the early Christian era-the monastery of Avan-Hripsime; the largest church ever constructed in the Caucasus, the Surb Amenaprkich of Shushi, or the majestic 19th Century temple of Ghazanchetsuts, or the subterranean palaces in one of the world's largest caves in Azokh or Vorvan. That these and other monuments are authentically Armenian have been positively affirmed by historians. It is also affirmed by

the silent testament of tens of thousands of Armenian inscriptions on the walls of these historically and architecturally incomparable structures. Rich in uniquely regional details (which gave birth to the Artsakhian School of Armenian architecture), these monuments also share many similiarites with the traditional national styles which evolved in various historical periods in greater Armenia. During the more than 70 years of Soviet rule, the monuments of Artsakh were not only neglected but also subjected to systematic ruin and destruction. The great majority 40

was not included in the historical preservation lists of the central govemment. Moreover, the leadership in the former Soviet Republic of Azerbaijan, which administered the autonomous region, declared the monuments of Artsakh and the surrounding

the,y covered it up again and at the very tip affixed a sign with the slogan, "Glory to SMKK (socialist party)." "The dead devour the living" was the

opinion of Azeri engineerK. Saidov who, in one of his articles, called on his compatriots to vandalize Armenian tombs. His exhorta-

tion led to a large-scale desecration of six historic cemeteries. The same fate has befallen the churches of Agouletsots and

Armenian communities "dangerous religious hothouses ofthe past, where harmful ideas are being preached," and concluded that "they are not worth our attention and, more specifically, our funds." Thus, during the last 30 years, especially since the advent of the Artsakh Movement, the destruction of the Armenian monuments were planned and massive.

Hundreds destroyed In Artsakh itself, 167 churches, l8 monasteries, 120 old cemeteries, 47 Armenian dwellings have been deto-

nated, toppled, ruined and totally wrecked. Around I ,600 khachkars and

inscriptions were broken, forever lost and converted to building materials. Some 23 ancient monuments were bulldozed, the area flattened and converted to agricultural lands. In therecently depopulated Armenian villages, the tombstones of the Armenian cemeteries were defiled and

broken to pieces. Explosives were used in the caves of Mets Tagher, Tsetsakhach and Azokh, and the towns

of Amaras and Kaghankatuik. Various constructions affiliated with the

monasteries

Grchavank,

Khetavank, Arakial, Ghamishvank, Tarkmanchats were destroyed. A well was dug under the ancient foundations of Dadivank as a deliberate attempt at the eventual destruction of the monument. Armenian artifacts, discovered during excavations. were hidden or sold. For example, in 1968, during the

excavation

of the cave of

Azokh,

Azerbaijani archaeologists came upon a secret dwelling where they found numerous Armenian manuscripts, church implements, valuable instru-

ments-the wealth of Amaras

and

Gachavank hidden in the Middle Ages,

probably to safeguard against the Turkish invasions of Ak-Koyunlu and Kara-Koyunlu. It has been 23 years since the above treasure trove was discovered, but the incalculable find is either under lock and key or has disappeared. In another instance, Azeris made no mention of discovering a buried Armenian church at the lower valley of Varanda River, near the modem town of Fizouli. Instead,

AIM, June 1992

Meghretsots, as well as the monastery of Kusanants.

The widespread destruction and pulverization of khachkars is the most painful to acknowledge. All the khachkars and hun-

dreds of other monuments from 9th to 14th centuries in the valleys of Khachen, Karkar, Tartar, in the vicinity of Darpas and Havaptuk monasteries, in the ancient places of Meraktz,

Tzenra Nahatak cemeteries and the surrounding areas have been either removed or destroyed by using explosives. The structures in the historic districts of Vaikunik and Berdadzor, now populated by Azeri Turks, are indeplorable condition. Manypublic and

of monuments, including two bridges

(

l2th-

chapels (l3th -

17th l3th centuries), three centuries) numerous khachkars, graves and villages which have not yet been studied or even photographed, have been destroyed and theirpieces strewn in the dam of Sarsang.

Negligence of Soviet authorities The indifferent attitude of the central govemment and the republics toward the

Armenian monuments in the city of Shushi are in horrible condition. At first rather timidly and then more brazenly, the leadership of Azerbaijan has wiped off the face of the earth more than 7,000 monuments since 1960, rapidly replacing them withmatch-box-like structures. Adding insult to injury, in the last few a more perjurious approach by distorting the historical

years Azeris have undertaken

Clockwiselrom top: A khachkarfrom Gandzasar, a vlew of the monasiery itself, the monasteryol Amaras, the ruins of an abandoned church in Hadrout, the main church of the Dadivank monastery, and the fortress ol Askeran.

private buildings are built enttely or partially by stones taken from Armenian monuments. Their owners are proud that their

"properties" contain broken khachkars, tombstones and other inscribed stones. Tens

treatment

historic monuments in

Azerbaij an encourages the criminal elements who, lured by the treasure hunt, demolish the monuments, defile and loot the graves, utilizing all available technological methods.

AIM,

1992

picture of Shushi, claiming it and the entire Artsakh region as theirs. Shahen Mkrtchian is the author otThe Historical Monuments ol Karabakh. Translated by ltlarine Arakeliants.

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ROUTINC

ROUTING

RC}UTTNG

ROUTING

EVN.SOF-JFK

IFK-SOF-EVN

EVN,SOF-JFK-I-AX

LAX-JFK-SOF-L,VIIJ

FOR MONTREAL/OTTAWA REFER TO NE'W'YICRK FARtrS.

. Flights operate every

For further inlormation

Sunday & Wednesday.

and/or reservations contact

Levon Travel at 213.871.8711 or

. Business Glass available.

1.800.445.3866

r Travel available from Europe

Air $ervices at 310.854.8570 or 1.800.527.5657

Hlaximum stay 60 days.

LEVON EXPRESS

other US cities. o lnlant fares available.

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