Author: Ani Basmajian

“Fascinating eternity”: Chinese national costume brand Jixiang Zhai eyes global fashion market

Ani Basmajian

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 14:29,

BEIJING, JULY 26, ARMENPRESS. National costumes are much more than clothing: they express culture and identity or a period of time in history.

Many designers and garment manufacturers often look to these traditional costumes for inspiration.

In China, Chinese clothing describes both the traditional hanfu and modern variations of indigenous Chinese dress shaped through its dynastic traditions.

Jixiang Zhai, a traditional costume designer based in Beijing, was founded in 2002 by Yang Fann, a young fashion designer who came up with the idea while touring Europe. Fann’s goal was to promote Chinese clothing.

Jixiang Zhai Beijing store manager Xi Nana told ARMENPRESS that the Chinese traditional clothing is very popular among young people and has prospects in the international market.

“I can say that there is growing interest among Chinese women – both teenagers and adults – for the traditional clothing. Wearing our clothing, the young people are trying to become part of our history,” Xi Nana said.

The store manager says that Jixiang Zhai clothing bear the peculiarities of different dynasties.

“The Chinese traditional clothing has fascinating eternity in it. It has the chance to become a part of world fashion,” Xi Nana said.

Sports: European U-18 Championship։ Armenia lose

Ani Basmajian
NEWS.am
Armenia –

Armenian U-18 Men’s Basketball Team met the Moldovan team in the second round of the European Championship (Division C) and was defeated with the score 69:82.

In the first round Armenian team defeated the team of Gibraltar with the score 81։64.

Armenia will face Azerbaijan tomorrow.

Armenia toponyms to be written with Azerbaijani ones in Azerbaijan documents

Ani Basmajian
NEWS.am
Armenia –
12:03, 20.07.2022

Azerbaijan is changing the procedure for restoring documents registered in Armenia. In particular, it is with respect to place names.

When records of civil status acts developed in Armenia are restored, names of places will from now on be written in accordance with Azerbaijan’s historical toponyms by taking into consideration recommendations of Azerbaijan’s National Academy of Sciences; this has been reflected in the relevant decision of the Azerbaijani Cabinet of Ministers, APA reports.

According to the decision, if it is impossible to obtain the record of the act of civil status developed in a foreign country or the information about its existence, the Azerbaijani registration departments or consular offices restore the record of the act and issue the relevant certificate. Azerbaijani registration departments or consular offices send information about the restoration of the act record of civil status to the registration body where the original act record is—but with the exception of Armenia.

Armenian Government to provide aid to Yazidi refugees, displaced Kurds and Assyrians in Iraqi Kurdistan

Ani Basmajian
Public Radio of Armenia
Armenia – July 14 2022
July 14, 2022, 17:13

 1 minute read

The Government of Armenia will provide assistance to Yazidi refugees, internally displaced Kurds and Assyrians in camps in Iraqi Kurdistan, member of the Armenian National Assembly Rustam Bakoyan informs on Facebook.

The Government decided today to allocate 80,000 USD to the Consulate General of Armenia in Erbil for the purpose of purchasing necessary goods and distributing aid in the amount of $100 per person.

The remaining 30,000 USD of the total amount will be allocated for the purchase of heaters (fujika) and blankets for Yazidi and other minority refugees living in various camps.

“We all know the difficult conditions in which the national minorities live and survive in the entire Kurdistan region,” Bakoyan said, adding that “the need for humanitarian assistance is always there as long as a number of problems remain unresolved.”

Mirzoyan, Garibashvili discuss the issue of facilitating the process of transit cargo transportation through Georgia

Ani Basmajian

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 13:42,

YEREVAN, JULY 16, ARMENPRESS. Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan and Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili expressed satisfaction with the high level of Armenian-Georgian relations based on centuries-old friendship between the two peoples, expressing confidence that the further activation of political dialogue and official mutual visits will contribute to the strengthening of multi-sectoral cooperation between the two countries, ARMENPRESS was informed from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Armenia.

Ararat Mirzoyan noted that further development of relations with Georgia is of strategic importance for Armenia.

The importance of taking appropriate steps to strengthen economic cooperation was emphasized and the work of the Armenian-Georgian intergovernmental commission was highlighted. Issues related to the facilitation of the process of transit cargo transportation through the territory of Georgia and the expansion of transit opportunities were discussed.

During the meeting, the interlocutors discussed a number of issues of regional security and stability.

Ararat Mirzoyan expressed gratitude to the Georgian side for hosting the meeting of the Foreign Ministers of Armenia and Azerbaijan and for Georgia’s willingness to contribute to peace and stability in the region.

The sides exchanges ideas on the normalization of relations between Armenia and Azerbaijan.

Aliyev accuses Russia of failing to fulfill "promise" on Karabakh

Ani Basmajian
PanARMENIAN
Armenia –
– 14:33 AMT

PanARMENIAN.Net – Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev has declared that “Armenia refuses to fulfill its obligations to Azerbaijan under the Declaration of November 2020,” and that “the problem could not be resolved even after receiving a promise from the Russian Defense Ministry.”

Aliyev maintained on Friday, July 15 that one of the problems for Baku was the presence of Armenian troops in Nagorno-Karabakh, “which must leave the region in accordance with the agreements.”

He noted that a high-ranking official of the Russian Defense Ministry (Aliev did not name them or their position) visited Baku several months ago and promised that “this clause of the agreement” would be fulfilled by June, RBC reported citing his office.

“But it is already the middle of July today, this issue has not been resolved yet,” the President of Azerbaijan stressed.

The Azerbaijani President added that Russia is a party to the agreement, but “does not force” Armenia to comply with the requirements, which are “clearly indicated” in the document.

Azerbaijan has not yet fulfilled the clause of the agreement on Karabakh, according to which all prisoners of war must be returned. Baku refuses to return Armenian prisoners of war.

Armenia and Azerbaijan foreign ministers hold first meeting since 2020

Ani Basmajian

By Euronews 

The foreign ministers of Armenia and Azerbaijan met in Georgia for their first bilateral meeting since 2020 when thousands died in a conflict over control of Nagorno-Karabakh.

The meeting between Armenian foreign minister Ararat Mirzoyan and his Azerbaijani counterpart Jeyhun Bayramov in Tbilisi comes months after Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan met in Brussels.

The pair met to “advance discussions” on a peace treaty between the countries.

“This is the first meeting between the ministers, and we hope that it will bring in a result,” Aliyev said on Friday.

However, the atmosphere was tense ahead of the meeting in Tbilisi, as several armed incidents have recently taken place along the border between the two countries, including a shootout on Friday night.

After the meeting, Armenia’s foreign ministry released a statement that said the pair discussed “a wide range of issues”.

“The parties discussed the implementation of the agreements reached [by the leaders of the two countries] and discussed possible future steps,” the statement said.

Mirzoyan also called for the release of Armenian prisoners currently held by Azerbaijan since 2020 and an investigation into the whereabouts of missing people.

Armenia and Azerbaijan have fought in two wars since the Soviet Union collapsed.

In 2020, more than 6,500 people died in six weeks of fighting.

The conflict eventually ended after Russia brokered a ceasefire agreement under which Armenia ceded large parts of Nagorno-Karabakh — a territory nestled between the two countries — while Moscow deployed around 2,000 peacekeepers to oversee the truce.

However, Russia stepped back as the primary mediator after it invaded Ukraine in late February, and the European Union has taken over the role since.

https://www.euronews.com/2022/07/16/armenia-and-azerbaijan-foreign-ministers-hold-first-meeting-since-2020

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Turkish Press: Armenian, Turkish leaders hold rare phone talks

Ani Basmajian
Turkish Minute
By

 Turkish Minute

 –

  

The leaders of Armenia and Turkey pledged in a rare call Monday to build on a nascent process aimed at normalizing travel, trade and diplomatic relations between the arch foes, Agence France-Presse reported.

The two sides issued identical statements saying Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan “stressed the importance of the bilateral process of normalizing relations between the countries.”

The call came after Ankara and Yerevan on July 1 made a breakthrough during talks in Vienna where their diplomats agreed to open the countries’ shared land border to third-country nationals and begin direct cargo flights.

“The leaders expressed hope that the agreements reached on July 1 will be implemented in the nearest future,” the joint statement said.

The two countries have never established formal diplomatic relations and their shared border has been closed since the 1990s.

Their relationship is strained by World War I-era mass killings of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire, atrocities Yerevan insists amount to a genocide.

But in December, the two countries appointed special envoys to help normalize relations — a year after Armenia lost to Turkey’s ally Azerbaijan in a war for control of the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region.

Azerbaijan used the help of Turkish combat drones to recapture most of the contested territory that had been under ethnic Armenian control since the 1990s.

In February, Turkey and Armenia resumed their first commercial flights in two years.

The land border between the two countries has remained closed since 1993 however, forcing trucks to transit through Georgia or Iran.

Meta’s Multilingual Translation Machine Struggles with Armenian, Greek, Oromo, and Others: Here’s Why

Ani Basmajian
TECH TIMES
July 7 2022
Urian B., Tech Times , 02:07 am

The owner of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, Meta Properties released a 190-page opus describing its latest efforts when it comes to machine translation. Although it was capable of translating 202 languages, there were a few of them that the translation machine really struggled on.

According to the story by ZDnet, the opes described how the state-of-the-art translation machine was able to learn different languages that were considered “low resource” languages. The opus described the company’s latest effort in machine learning for languages with low resources.

The languages that were considered “low resource” were the following::02

  • West Central Oromo – spoken in the Oromia state of Ethiopia

  • Tamasheq – spoken by several parts of Northern Africa and even in Algeria

  • Waray – spoken by the Waray people of the Philippines

The report coming from Meta researchers was uploaded to Facebook’s AI research website. The study also came with a blog to provide more thorough information to better understand what Meta is doing.

As written in their mission statement the “broadly accessible machine translation system” is capable of supporting around 130 languages while they aim to increase that number all the way up to 200.

As reported by ZDNet, Meta is still open-sourcing its data sets as well as neural network model code on GitHub. They are also offering a massive $200,000 award to those that decide to use their technology outside.

The company has also partnered with the owners of Wikipedia, the Wikimedia Foundation, in order to provide a much better translation of Wikipedia articles. ZDNet notes that Meta uses automated methods in order to compile a data set of different bilingual sentence pairs for all their target languages.

The sets included some interesting statistics including the fact that there are 1220 language pairs in total or about 2440 directions for training. The 2440 directions equal to over 18 billion total sentence pairs and the majority of the pairs actually have much fewer than a million sentences and are considered low-resource directions.

The authors reportedly use the data to be able to train the NLLB neural net as well as employ a particular hand-crafted data set of transactions that are expected to be built by human translators.

Read Also: Netflix Continues to Lose Subscribers with Shrinking Market Share! Amazon Prime Video 1% Behind?

The whole human element called the NLLB-SEED data set turns out to be quite important. As written “despite the considerably large size of publicly available training data, training on NLLB-Seed leads to markedly higher performance on average.”

Meta is not the only one trying to chew on these gigantic data sets as Google scientists could also be unveiling something similar when it comes to multilingual effort. The research had low results when trying to study Greek, Armenian, Oromo, and other languages.

Armenpress: Ambassador of Armenia presents credentials to the President of the Dominican Republic

Ani Basmajian

Ambassador of Armenia presents credentials to the President of the Dominican Republic

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 21:10, 8 July 2022

YEREVAN, JULY 8, ARMENPRESS. Anahit Harutyunyan, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Republic of Armenia to the Dominican Republic (dual accreditation, residence in Ottawa) presented credentials to the President of the Dominican Republic Luis Rodolfo Abinader Corona on July 6.

ARMENPRESS reports the Facebook page of the Armenian Embassy in Canada informs that during the private conversation following the official ceremony President Abinader congratulated Ambassador Harutyunyan on the appointment of first ever Ambassador of Armenia to the Dominican Republic and expressed hope that the she will invest all her efforts in developing relations between the two countries and peoples and enriching the bilateral agenda.

Ambassador Harutyunyan, for her part, thanked for the warm reception and assured that during her mission she is ready to maximally develop relations between the two countries in all areas of mutual interest. The interlocutors attached particular importance to cooperation in the field of tourism and high technologies.