Author: Jane Topchian

 19:45,

YEREVAN, DECEMBER 22, ARMENPRESS. Kyrgyzstan will partially change the design on the country's national flag, with a corresponding law signed by President of Kyrgyzstan Sadyr Japarov, said his press service on Friday.

The law on amendments to a law "On State Symbols of the Kyrgyz Republic" was adopted in order to improve one of the main state symbols of Kyrgyzstan: the country's flag, according to the service.

The adopted law changed the shape of the sun's rays on the flag of Kyrgyzstan from wavy to straight.

 12:13,

YEREVAN, DECEMBER 16, ARMENPRESS. Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s spouse Anna Hakobyan, together with their daughter Arpi, visited on December 15 the Amasia Children’s Arts School in Shirak Province.

Students from the painting and embroidery classes presented their work. Hakobyan watched the painting process in the class and talked with the students. She then participated in a concert program featuring vocal-instrumental and dance performances.

Principal Jemma Manukyan briefed Anna Hakobyan on the school’s future plans.

The Amasia Children’s Arts School was founded in 1964. It is currently functioning in a newly renovated building.

 10:14, 6 December 2023

YEREVAN, DECEMBER 6, ARMENPRESS. The U.S. continues to engage with Azerbaijan to urge them to seek a durable peace with Armenia, U.S. State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller has said.

Speaking at a press briefing, Miller said that Assistant Secretary of State James O’Brien’s upcoming trip to Azerbaijan doesn’t mean that the U.S. is backpedaling from its policy that, as O’Brien himself said earlier in November ‘nothing will be normal with Azerbaijan after the events of September 19 until we see progress on the peace track’.

“No, not at all,” Miller said when asked whether O’Brien’s trip is a departure from newly announced policy. “We never said that we’re not going to continue to engage with Azerbaijan. That would be against our interests as the United States of America. We think it would be against the interests of peace and security in the region for us to just drop all of our diplomatic engagements with Azerbaijan. We continue to engage directly with both Azerbaijan and Armenia to make clear – for example, in the case of Azerbaijan – where we have concerns. We’ve been concerned with the recent trend of detaining journalists. We continue to urge them to respect the human rights and fundamental freedoms of all, something that I’ve spoken to from this podium in the past. And we also continue to engage with them to urge them to seek a durable peace with Armenia, and that’s something that will continue to be the focus of our diplomatic engagements.”

Miller added that human rights is always on the table for the United States of America when they have these sorts of diplomatic engagements.

 14:55, 6 December 2023

YEREVAN, DECEMBER 6, ARMENPRESS. Chief of Staff of the Prime Minister’s Office Arayik Harutyunyan has met with Head of the Delegation of the European Union to Armenia, Ambassador Vassilis Maragos.

Harutyunyan thanked Ambassador Maragos for the efforts aimed at intensifying partnership and expressed hope that the mutual commitment to deepen Armenia-EU cooperation will contribute to the swift implementation of expected initiatives, Harutyunyan’s office said in a readout.

Speaking about the problems of the forcibly displaced persons of Nagorno-Karabakh, Harutyunyan attached importance to the EU’s continuous support for addressing the needs of the refugees.

Harutyunyan and Maragos exchanged ideas about the course and prospects of cooperation between Armenia and the EU, and discussed the regional developments, security developments and the course of the reforms undertaken by the Armenian government. In this context, the sides discussed strategic communication, the imperative of introducing and developing it as an institution and looked into the opportunities and mechanisms for studying and localizing the best experience of the EU.

Chief of Staff Arayik Harutyunyan presented the Crossroads of Peace project to Ambassador Maragos and said that the government of Armenia expects effective support from all international partners in implementing this important regional initiative.

An agreement was reached to jointly make efforts to make the current Armenia-EU partnership more effective.

 19:38, 6 December 2023

YEREVAN, DECEMBER 6, ARMENPRESS. Border delimitation process between  Armenia and Azerbaijan will be complex and lengthy, Deputy Prime Minister of Armenia, Mher Grigoryan said during the question-and-answer session with members of the government in the National Assembly.

“The delimitation process will be quite complex and prolonged; this is obvious. There seems to be a mutual understanding that the delimitation process will be carried out solely on the basis of documents having legal significance. Additionally, we will work with maps that are not pictures or map-like diagrams, but actual topographic maps. For example, the 1975 map, which should be carefully studied. There will not be a single meeting after which we will come and declare that the delimitation process is completed. This is simply impossible,” said the Deputy Prime Minister.

Grigoryan emphasized the importance of the fact that the parties share a common understanding of the process, its significance and the approach to work.

 Addressing the outcomes of the latest working meeting between the commissions of Armenia and Azerbaijan on delimitation issues, the Deputy Prime Minister mentioned that they had  agreed to establish a working protocol that would outline the institutional process of the work.

The Deputy Prime Minister didn’t provide substantive details from the latest meeting, as it wasn't discussed, including matters related to enclaves and exclaves.

 17:14, 7 December 2023

YEREVAN, DECEMBER 7, ARMENPRESS. On December 5-6, on the sidelines of his working visit to Tunisia, Deputy Foreign Minister of Armenia Vahan Kostanyan had a meeting with Nabil Ammar, the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Migration and Tunisians abroad of the Republic of Tunisia.

During the meeting, the Deputy Foreign Minister touched upon the relations between the two countries, briefed on the current situation in the South Caucasus, and also conveyed to Minister Ammar the invitation of Minister of Foreign Affairs of Armenia Ararat Mirzoyan to visit Armenia, the foreign ministry said in a readout.

Following the meeting, the first Armenian-Tunisian political consultations took place between the delegations headed by Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Armenia Vahan Kostanyan and Mounir Ben Rjiba, the Secretary of State to the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Tunisia.

During the consultations, the interlocutors thoroughly touched upon bilateral political and economic relations. Agreements were reached on deepening cooperation in the spheres of education, culture, tourism, civil aviation, healthcare, high technology and other areas of mutual interest.

The sides also touched upon issues on regional and international security.

Deputy Foreign Minister Vahan Kostanyan briefed his counterparts on the vision of the Government of the Republic of Armenia on achieving stability and peace in the South Caucasus, the "Crossroads of Peace" project aimed at stimulating regional communications, as well as the actions of the Government of Armenia to address the rights of forcibly displaced persons resulting from the ethnic cleansing in Nagorno-Karabakh.

During the working visit, the sides signed a memorandum on political consultations between the Foreign Ministries of Armenia and Tunisia, as well as an agreement on the establishment of a visa free regime for diplomatic passport holders.