Former Pyunik player Hugo Firmino, who moved to Ararat Armenia, is announced Armenia's best footballer of the 2021/2022 season.
He scored 58 points, according to the official website of the Armenian Football Federation.
Second place with 56 points went to forward Serges Deble ("Pyunik", "Ararat"), followed by fullback Hrayr Mkoyan ("Ararat").
ZANGILAN, Azerbaijan, June 29. The UK is considering the issue of providing additional funds to assist the demining process in Azerbaijan’s Karabakh region [liberated from Armenian occupation in the 2020 Second Karabakh War], the UK Ambassador to Azerbaijan James Sharp told Trend.
"The UK is pleased to assist Azerbaijan in the demining process. It's great to see that some territories have already been cleared of mines. We are always looking for new opportunities to provide more funding in this direction. I hope that we will announce new funding soon," Sharp said.
According to him, the UK has already allocated 500,000 Pound sterling ($608,000) to United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) to support the Azerbaijan National Agency for Mine Action (ANAMA).
The UK’s companies provide Azerbaijan with technical advice, non-technical services, and mine action standards, the diplomat noted.
"We continue to encourage both sides to accelerate the peace process. We also support the EU's efforts to assist Azerbaijan and Armenia in this process. This is a very long process, but we are already seeing positive changes that have not been seen in the last 30 years," Sharp added.
BAKU, Azerbaijan, June 28. A number of statements made by Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan at an online press conference on the normalization of Armenia-Azerbaijan relations, on June 27, cast doubt on the country's desire to establish lasting regional peace, Trend reports referring to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Azerbaijan.
According to the statement, the fact that the leader of the country, which has been keeping the part of Azerbaijan's territories under military occupation for almost 30 years, accuses Azerbaijan of pursuing a blockade policy during these years, does not fit into any legal and moral framework.
"Azerbaijan has been the initiator of the normalization process between the two countries since the liberation of its territories, despite the aggressive policy of Armenia. It was the President of Azerbaijan who proposed signing a peace agreement on the basis of strict adherence to the principles of international law at the post conflict stage," stated the ministry.
Moreover, the Azerbaijani side laid out the basic principles on which the agreement should be based. If Azerbaijan wanted a war, as Pashinyan claims, these steps would probably not be needed. If Azerbaijan wanted a war, it would not have made great efforts to rebuild the lands destroyed by Armenia for 30 years.
The Azerbaijani side not only makes verbal statements on the delimitation of borders between the two countries, opening of all communications in the region and signing of a future peace agreement, but also implements own statements through its actions. It was the Azerbaijani side that has said that the establishment of normal relations in the region would be beneficial to Armenia. The fact that the Armenian side finally realized this and the Prime Minister’s statement that “the opening of communications is beneficial for Armenia” attracts attention as a new approach of Armenian leadership, said the statement.
The statement also noted that Armenia sends sabotage groups to the Azerbaijani territories, doesn't withdraw its illegal armed groups, and delays the opening of communications, thereby grossly violating the requirements of the trilateral statements.
"The Prime Minister of Armenia, without elaborating on the specific situation he refers to, claims that "the Azerbaijani side boycotted the meeting at least once". If we start listing the meetings that have been proposed so far with the participation of international mediators in the post-conflict phase and were violated by Armenia under various pretexts, the list will be very long," the ministry emphasized.
As the statement noted, if Armenia really wants peace, it must show its political will and take specific steps towards it.
13:12, 29 June 2022
YEREVAN, JUNE 29, ARMENPRESS. Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan met today with French counterpart Emmanuel Macron in Madrid, Anadolu reports.
The meeting was closed for the press.
The meeting of the Turkish and French Presidents was organized on the sidelines of the NATO summit in the Spanish capital.
Erdogan is also expected to meet with US President Joe Biden today in the evening.
15:32, 29 June 2022
YEREVAN, JUNE 29, ARMENPRESS. Secretary of the Security Council of Armenia Armen Grigoryan met with Vincent Braconier, the Diplomatic Adviser to the Minister of the Armed Forces of France, the Office of the Security Council Secretary said.
During the meeting the sides discussed regional security-related issues and their possible developments, in the context of which Armen Grigoryan presented Armenia’s approaches on ensuring regional security.
The sides also discussed the bilateral cooperation prospects in security field.
17:21, 29 June 2022
YEREVAN, JUNE 29, ARMENPRESS. The Parliament of Armenia elected Anna Vardapetyan as the new Prosecutor General of Armenia.
The voting was held in a closed format.
70 MPs participated in the voting and all voted in favor of her candidacy.
Anna Vardapetyan has been nominated by the ruling Civil Contract faction.
The opposition factions did not participate in the voting.
The swearing-in ceremony of the new Prosecutor General will be held on September 15.
Since March 2, 2020, Anna Vardapetyan has been serving as assistant to the prime minister of Armenia.
The term of office of Prosecutor General Artur Davtyan ends on September 16.
Armenia’s currency continues to get stronger against the dollar, causing alarm among exporters. But the rise doesn’t seem to have done anything to suppress inflation or the prices of imported goods, leading to a heightening overall economic crunch in the country.
By June 30 the dram was trading at 407 to the dollar, up from the roughly 480-to-the-dollar rate it has hovered around for years. The dram has been steadily gaining value since March, when an influx of Russians into Armenia and a move to buy Russian gas in rubles rather than dollars led to an increase in hard currency in the country.
A group of business associations issued an open letter on June 24 calling on the government to take action to rein in the dram.
The rise in the dram “both in the short and long run has a huge negative impact on the Armenian economy, especially on export-oriented companies and related sectors, making sales more difficult and, at times, affecting their competitiveness in foreign markets,” the letter read. It said that exporters of food and drinks like wine, cognac, juice, and other agricultural products are selling at below cost in order to not lose customers, “which for obvious reasons can not last long.”
The IT sector also has been badly hit, as it depends heavily on customers abroad. The rise in the dram has weakened foreign investment in Armenia, as well, “as it is necessary to make 20 percent more foreign currency investment to achieve the same result, which in the long run will lead to great economic losses,” the associations argued.
The government has so far not taken any action. On June 14, the central bank decided to keep the refinancing rate unchanged, at 9.25 percent. It cited the need to control inflation, which has remained persistently high even as the currency appreciation should be making imported products cheaper.
Inflation is currently running at about 9 percent, and will likely continue to rise before dropping to 8 percent by the end of the year, Chairman of the Central Bank Martin Galstyan told reporters.
"There is a huge increase in international prices for essential commodities. Wheat prices, for example, are at an all-time high because of the Russian-Ukrainian war," he said. Rent, too, has spiked as a result of an influx of Russians due to the war, and landlords trying to take advantage as a result.
Exporters, meanwhile, have been hit by another blow: the closure of the road linking Armenia to its main market for agricultural products, Russia.
The Stepantsminda-Lars highway in Georgia was closed on June 27 after heavy rains, stranding trucks full of Armenian fruits and vegetables destined for Russian shops.
“Various reports suggest that the road maintenance work may take one or two weeks. Now is the most active period for agricultural exports, so even a few days of delay will cause great damage to exporters and farmers,” economist Suren Parsyan posted on Facebook. “With the closure of the Upper Lars checkpoint, the devaluation of the dollar and the rise in fuel prices, exporters have already suffered great losses and will simply not sustain another blow; they will go bankrupt.”
The heaviest hit have been apricot exporters, as it’s high season for the fruit in Armenia. One apricot farmer from the village of Pshatavan posted on Facebook urging Armenians to buy apricots as farmers can’t export them. “Because Lars is closed, export companies are refusing to buy apricots and the fruit is rotting,” he wrote.
PanARMENIAN.Net - The government is planning to raise the minimum wage from the current 68,000 to AMD 75,000 a month beginning from January 1, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan told a Cabinet meeting on Thursday, June 30.
The Prime Minister said the elderly will also receive higher pensions from the beginning of next year, although he failed to provide more details.
Pashinyan noted that the country's tax collections exceeded budget estimates by AMD 47 billion, which enables the government to plan certain social programs for next year.
Starting from January 1, it is planned to increase childcare allowances for kids under 2 years old to AMD 30,600 instead of the current AMD 28,600. According to Pashinyan, all mothers should receive childcare benefits, regardless of where they live and whether they are employed or not.
Azerbaijan's President Ilham Aliyev speaking with the Russia's foreign minister during their meeting in Baku, Azerbaijan, June 23, 2022. (Russian Foreign Ministry via AFP Photo)
The Zangezur corridor, which will provide a connection between the western regions of Azerbaijan and its Nakhchivan exclave, is already becoming a reality, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev said on Wednesday.
Speaking at the 6th Summit of the Caspian littoral states, Aliyev said: “After the victory in the Great Patriotic War and the settlement of the conflict with Armenia, Azerbaijan began to carry out large-scale work on the reconstruction and restoration of Karabakh and East Zangezur, as well as the development of international transport links. The Zangezur corridor is already becoming a reality.”
Zangezur was part of Azerbaijan until the Soviets gave the region to Armenia in the 1920s. This move resulted in Azerbaijan losing its direct overland route with Nakhchivan.
Following the completion of the railway, Azerbaijan will be able to reach Iran, Armenia and Nakhchivan uninterruptedly by train. The railway will also link Turkey with Russia through Azerbaijan.
“Today, Azerbaijan is one of the important transport and logistics centers of Eurasia,” Aliyev continued. “Our country plays an important role in the development of East-West and North-South international transport corridors. We strive for the efficient use of the Trans-Caspian international transport route.”
Aliyev announced that the eighth meeting of the North-South International Transport Corridor Coordination Council is also planned to be held in Azerbaijan this year.
Efforts for reconstruction and enhanced transport routes with regional countries come after a major territorial dispute between Azerbaijan and Armenia has been resolved to a great extent, with the two countries aiming now to sign a peace agreement.
Relations between the two former Soviet countries have been tense since 1991 when the Armenian military occupied Nagorno-Karabakh, a territory internationally recognized as part of Azerbaijan, and seven adjacent regions.
New clashes erupted in September 2020, and the 44-day conflict saw Azerbaijan liberate several cities and over 300 settlements and villages that were occupied by Armenia for almost 30 years.
A tripartite agreement was brokered by Russia to bring an end to the war in November 2020.
12:57, 30 June 2022
YEREVAN, JUNE 30, ARMENPRESS. Pensions will rise in Armenia from January 1, 2023. The minimum wage will also increase from 68,000 drams to 75,000 drams, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said at the Cabinet meeting today.
“We came to a conclusion that we should increase the child care benefit for children up to 2 years of age. It should be increased from 28,600 drams to 30,700 drams. We also should provide child care benefit (up to 2 years of age) to all mothers, regardless of place of residence, be she from rural or urban settlement, and also regardless of whether she is working or not. But for those working in rural settlements, that benefit will be paid double, which means that they will get that benefit in the amount of 61,400 drams starting January 1”, the PM said.