Word: armenia
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...villages will be a serious setback to perestroika, his program of economic restructuring. The political aftershocks are already severe. Even before the tragedy, Armenians distrusted Gorbachev because of his rejection of their territorial claims to Nagorno-Karabakh, a largely Armenian enclave embedded in neighboring Azerbaijan, a blood enemy of Armenia. The earthquake only heightened the Armenians' anger, and that prompted a furious Gorbachev to describe the airing of nationalist grievances at such a time as "immoral." His words, however, had little effect...
Although in most cases the Soviets seemed remarkably adept at cutting red tape to get foreign disaster teams into Armenia, unexplained tie-ups cost time and possibly lives. Baxter International Inc. of Deerfield, Ill., assembled a flying medical lab, including 20 special dialysis machines to treat victims of crush syndrome whose kidneys had been affected, but four days passed before visas arrived. A Japanese offer to send an earthquake rescue team was rejected without explanation, as was a Turkish proposal to send helicopters and cranes. An American plastic and reconstructive surgeon, Claude Frechette, who arrived shortly after the earthquake, says...
...people apparently viewed the disaster as an opportunity to steal. Pravda said more than $400,000 in pilfered goods had been recovered and 150 looters had been arrested. But 20,000 tents bound for Leninakan disappeared. To prevent looting, a midnight-to-5 a.m. curfew was imposed throughout Armenia, and troops patrolled the streets of Leninakan. TASS reported that a man was arrested in Kirovakan for stripping watches and earrings from the dead. Soviet soldiers were seen removing boots from the dead and trying them on for size. "We shouldn't hide the fact that all kinds of scum...
...Soviet press and officials have been questioning the clearly inadequate construction techniques and materials that may have caused many buildings in Armenia to collapse on their inhabitants. During his visit to Armenia after rushing back from New York City two weeks ago, Gorbachev asked a television interviewer, "Who is to blame for the fact that in the concrete blocks there is too little cement but more than enough sand? This means the cement was stolen. By whom?" Leonid Bibin, deputy chairman of the state building committee, launched an investigation into why so many of the more recently built homes collapsed...
Americans did not spare themselves. Washington sent eight planeloads of official aid, plus a U.S. Air Force C-141 carrying supplies that left from Italy. Private donors gave millions of dollars' worth of supplies and equipment that required more than twelve planes to ferry them to Armenia. Industrialist Armand Hammer donated $500,000, and Chrysler Corp. Chairman Lee Iacocca announced a fund drive. In Chicago, one of five major Armenian population centers around the U.S., the local community raised more than $800,000 and collected 20,000 lbs. of supplies, from blankets to medicine. The Armenian Relief Society raised more...