Armenian government seeks funding for refugee housing

The Armenian government unveiled on 21 August a new project to provide permanent homes for some 4,000 low-income families who fled neighboring Azerbaijan from 1988 to 1990 during the early years of the Karabakh conflict, RFE/RL's Yerevan bureau reported. But Department of Refugee Affairs and Migration head Gagik Yeganian said Yerevan can raise only $5 million of the estimated $20 million cost, and hopes international aid organizations will provide the balance. LF
ARMENIA DENIES OPENING FIRE ON LINE OF CONTACT

Armenian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Dziunik Aghajanian denied on 21 August that Armenian forces opened fire at Azerbaijani troops on the morning of 19 August, according to Arminfo on 21 August, as cited by Groong. Azerbaijani media reported that the Armenian troops had fired on Azerbaijani positions in Tovuz Raion, thwarting routine monitoring by OSCE personnel of the Line of Contact (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 20 August 2003). AFP on 20 August quoted an unnamed Armenian Defense Ministry official as saying that the shots came from Tovuz, while Aghajanian said the weapons used in the cease-fire violation were of a type that Armenian forces deployed along that section of the Line of Contact do not use, according to ITAR-TASS. OSCE special representative Andzrej Kasprczyk, who was monitoring the Azerbaijani side of the Line of Contact on 19 August, traveled to Yerevan on 21 August to discuss the incident with Armenian officials, ITAR-TASS reported. LF