Ban Ki-moon plans trip to Armenia at the end of April

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon plans to make his first official visit to Azerbaijan and Armenia and a second visit to Georgia at the end of April, a source from the UN Secretariat told on Thursday.

The source could not give the exact dates, but said the trip would be made shortly after the signing ceremony for the Paris Agreement convened by Ban Ki-moon on April 22.

Secretary-General’s spokesman Stephane Dujarric neither confirmed nor denied the information on Thursday.

On March 11, Georgia’s First Deputy Foreign Minister David Zalkaliani said Ban Ki-moon was planning an official visit to his country.

“The Georgian Foreign Ministry is paving the way for this visit, it is a working process, the concrete date will become known shortly,” he told reporters, marking the importance of the visit for Georgia.

Ban Ki-moon visited Georgia in June 2007, making a short stopover in Tbilisi on his way from Afghanistan to Europe and meeting with the then president, Mikhail Saakashvili.

According to information on the website of the UN Secretariat, Ban Ki-moon has never visited Azerbaijan and Armenia since he took office in 2007.

Emil Lazarian

“I should like to see any power of the world destroy this race, this small tribe of unimportant people, whose wars have all been fought and lost, whose structures have crumbled, literature is unread, music is unheard, and prayers are no more answered. Go ahead, destroy Armenia . See if you can do it. Send them into the desert without bread or water. Burn their homes and churches. Then see if they will not laugh, sing and pray again. For when two of them meet anywhere in the world, see if they will not create a New Armenia.” - WS