Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan is in the Netherlands for an official visit.
A new $110 million tech center will be built in Yerevan.
The Armenian village of Tigranashen was never part of Azerbaijan, says former Armenian Human Rights Defender Arman Tatoyan.
11:38, 12 May, 2022
YEREVAN, MAY 12, ARMENPRESS. The Russian Federal Agency for Air Transport has extended restrictions on flights to 11 airports in the southern and central part of the country until 3:45 am Moscow time May 19, 2022, TASS reports citing the agency’s statement.
The restrictions concern the airports of Anapa, Belgorod, Bryansk, Voronezh, Gelendzhik, Krasnodar, Kursk, Lipetsk, Rostov-on-Don, Simferopol, and Elista.
“Russian airlines are recommended to carry passengers by alternative routes using the airports of Sochi, Volgograd, Mineralnye Vody, Stavropol, and Moscow. The remaining airports of the Russian Federation operate as normal”, the agency added.
Russia closed part of its airspace in the country’s south for civil aircraft on February 24 amid the special military operation in Ukraine.
The Yerevan Court of General Jurisdiction has rejected a motion to arrest a police officer whose car struck and killed a young pregnant woman while escorting Nikol Pashinyan’s motorcade in Yerevan.
The 29-year-old woman, Sona Mnatsakanyan, was hit by a police SUV while crossing a street in central Yerevan on April 26. Its driver, Aram Navasardyan, did not stop after the accident to help the victim.
Raffi Aslanyan, a lawyer representing the victim’s family, could not provide any information on the court decision, saying they had learned of it from media reports.
He found it difficult to say on what grounds the court had rejected the motion for arrest. “However, the failure to arrest the man from the beginning and charge him for fleeing the scene as well as taking action only after 15 days most probably led to such a decision,” he told Panorama.am.
Raffi Aslanyan reiterates that the aggrieved party will consistently strive to ensure that the criminal case goes to trial.
Protests erupted in Yerevan on Sunday with the opposition demanding Pashinyan’s resignation accusing him of plotting to cede to Baku all the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region.
Demonstrations continued Monday and there were chaotic scenes on Tuesday in central Yerevan where police detained dozens of people as groups of protesters blocked traffic on all main streets.
The country’s interior ministry said in a statement that “206 demonstrators were detained” in Yerevan and several provincial cities.
These are the worst protests since elections last September, highlighting continued bitterness over Pashinyan’s leadership during a war in 2020.
Armenia and Azerbaijan have been locked in a decades-long dispute over Karabakh, Azerbaijan’s Armenian-populated region.
The enclave was at the centre of a six-week war in 2020 that claimed more than 6,500 lives before it ended with a Russian-brokered ceasefire agreement.
Opposition leader and parliament vice speaker Ishkhan Saghatelyan said: “Pashinyan is a traitor and permanent street protests, which are mounting, will force him to resign.”
He announced a protest rally for Tuesday evening in Yerevan’s central Square of France where thousands rallied against Pashinyan on Sunday and Monday.
One of the protesters, 57-year-old blacksmith Sergei Hovhannisyan, said: “Nikol must go, he will go, because he is a symbol of defeat and Armenia has no future with such a leader.
“He is ready to give away Karabakh for which we have shed our blood,” he told AFP.
Opposition parties accuse Pashinyan of plans to give away all of Karabakh to Azerbaijan after he told lawmakers last month that the “international community calls on Armenia to scale down demands on Karabakh”.
Under the Moscow-brokered deal, Armenia ceded swathes of territory it had controlled for decades and Russia deployed some 2,000 peacekeepers to oversee the truce.
The pact was seen in Armenia as a national humiliation and sparked weeks of anti-government protests, leading Pashinyan to call snap parliamentary polls which his party, Civil Contract, won last September.
Ethnic Armenian separatists in Nagorno-Karabakh broke away from Azerbaijan when the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991. The ensuing conflicts claimed around 30,000 lives.
(AFP)
https://www.france24.com/en/asia-pacific/20220503-armenia-detains-hundreds-of-anti-govt-protesters-as-opposition-calls-for-pm-to-resign
10:59, 3 May, 2022
YEREVAN, MAY 3, ARMENPRESS. For already 7 years, the USAID-funded Civic Engagement in Local Governance (CELoG) Program has been supporting the increase of civic engagement in decentralization and local self-government reform in Armenia.
It provides citizens with reliable information and strengthens civil society’s capacity to promote effective, accountable and participatory local governance.
The program has been a platform for dialogue between government and residents of the communities.
USAID Project Management Specialist Arthur Drampian said during the ARMENPRESS Podcast program that the program has achieved all its original goals ever since its inception in 2014, and in 2018 additional goals were set.
Drampian said that the cooperation between 6 organizations as part of the program resulted in achieving rather tangible results.
The Program is implemented by a Consortium of local organizations led by the Communities Finance Officers Association (CFOA) in cooperation with the partner organizations: the Information Systems Development and Training Center (ISTDC), the Yerevan Press Club (YPC), the Asparez Journalists’ Club (AJC), Eurasia Partnership Foundation (EPF), and the Caucasus Research Resource Center-Armenia (CRRC).
Drampian said that there was a need for a dialogue platform in 2014 when the territorial and administrative reforms were announced.
“An open and simple conversation around all questions was much needed. There were several questions, concerns, and the residents of the communities had to be given the chance of engaging in an open dialogue with each other, with the community leadership, with representatives of the government and parliament, to collect all opinions and present them to the decision-makers, so that they’d be able to draft the reforms accordingly and implement the merging in a way that the risks get reduced with maximum benefits,” Drampian said. He attached importance to the fact that the program prioritized the involvement of youth.
In 2014, four InfoTuns were already launched under previous programs of the USAID. The InfoTun is a resource center where the youth come together to discuss various issues concerning their communities, learn media-literacy, civic journalism, watch films, engage in discussions and learn about volunteerism.
Another 6 InfoTuns were opened during the 7 years of the CELoG program. Now, one InfoTun functions in every province across Armenia. CELoG program is completed, but the InfoTuns will continue functioning.
Another notable initiative of the program is the School of Local Democracy, a mobile school which is moving from province to province. Participants learn leadership skills, human rights, community service, local self-government and other subjects.
The School of Local Democracy is now registered as a foundation and will continue to work.
“I want to say that we’ve had so many achievements during these 7 years that it is difficult to mention them all, but we can say that the CELoG program left a very serious legacy. I can confidently say that these programs developed a new culture in our communities. The residents and especially the youth in the communities understood and believed that it is possible to be involved in solving community issues, present clear demands and implement a number of reforms in their own communities,” Drampian said.
Podcast host: Gayane Gaboyan
Photos: Hayk Badalyan
11:15, 4 May, 2022
YEREVAN, MAY 4, ARMENPRESS. Karen Trchunyan, Deputy Minister of Education, Science, Culture and Sports of the Republic of Armenia, is a promising young scientist, Doctor of Biological Sciences, and professor. He is an author and co-author of over 50 articles published in international science and technology repositories. The number of references to his studies is approximately 1300, H-index fluctuates within the range of 21-23, depending on the repository – Google Scholar, Web of Sciences, Scopus. Karen Trchunyan is one of the participants in the ADVANCE grant program by the Foundation for Armenian Science and Technology (FAST) and is engaged in a research project in the realm of biotechnology.
How did you make a decision to pursue science?
I used to dream of becoming an aircraft designer as I was fond of airplanes and anything related to them. I still like to study airplanes. We’ve got immense scientific traditions, both from paternal and maternal sides, and I represent the third generation of the scientific family. I, too, decided to carry on with the family tradition. My paternal grandfather Hambardzum Trchunyan worked in the Yerevan Computer Research Development Institute (known as the Mergelyan Institute) and had left Russia for Armenia with Sergey Mergelyan and other friends and had become one of the founders of certain scientific directions in the institute. My maternal grandfather Weller Vasilyan was the first biophysicist who defended his PhD dissertation in Armenia. Interestingly enough, I also studied and graduated from the Department of Biophysics of the Faculty of Biology. He ran the Scientific Research Institute for Plant Protection, being engaged in the creation of efficient biological ways to fight pests.
There is a curious pattern in fact; the research we’ve been conducting turns out to be related to both of my grandfathers’ scientific activities to a certain extent. One is of agricultural orientation, as was my maternal grandfather’s, while my paternal grandfather was a chemist who studied the interaction of certain metals and hydrogen. Both fields appeared to come together in me, completely by chance.
Did you have a role model of a scientist in the family? How did you envision a scientist?
In order to become a scientist, you’ve got to eagerly love what you do. The image of a scientist in my family was embodied by my father Armen Trchunyan who was also a biologist and created a notable scientific school, continued by his students, including me.
A scientist for me is a person who invents the new, contributes to the humanity with their hard intellectual work, builds an international network, visits foreign countries, shares experience, takes part in scientific debates. I have also gone through plenty of hardships in that respect; you need to prove and support your viewpoint with facts in scientific debates, whilst there are world-famous scientists who you need to illustrate and prove your viewpoint to, making them accept it.
Could you recall such an experience?
In 2010 our scientific team proved that the hydrogenase enzyme in intestinal villi is convertible and can work both ways. By that time, various international scientific research teams had proven the enzyme to work one way only and didn’t want to accept the fact. Our research data on hydrogenase conversion was a crucial event in biology and biochemistry. I first travelled to Germany with a research grant where I introduced our discovery to my supervisor Gary Sawers, who is a renowned specialist and has devoted all his life to enzyme research. Imagine a scientist from Armenia, claiming they have proven the opposite, though it was an addition to the before existing knowledge rather than an antagonistic discovery. The supervisor’s greatness consists in not turning anything into antagonism, but in welcoming additions and elaborating on the knowledge. To our great delight, he came to accept it. We have been collaborating for a long time so far and our approach has been welcomed by Gary Sawers, as well as other renowned scientists. There are serious specialists in our scientific fields in the world – Michael Adams from the University of Georgia, USA, Gary Sawers from Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg in Germany, Rudolf K. Thauer from the Max Planck Institute in Frankfurt, and many other scientists whom we talked to and tried our best to comprehend each other’s approach, so to say, with a pen and paper or at the board. To our delight, they accepted our evidence and approach of ours, which is quite hard to get as you’re not a member of one of the best laboratories in the world to increase your chances to be right. As they say, knowledge wins in the end. In case you’re right, the result is there, even after having to overcome constant hardships. Indeed, there might be cases when you get the result, though it doesn’t get to be welcomed, for instance, out of envy as science is highly competitive.
Anyway, I enjoy such scientific debates as they give birth to the truth. Debates might be heated at times, but that’s merely because you want to have a say in science.
Unlike the rest of the interviewed scientists, you hold a state position as well. How do you manage to combine?
My educational background in natural sciences and being a scientist help gain confidence and freedom. That’s because science and the system you’ve passed through enable you to know your own mind, to be able to say yes or no in terms of administration. I coordinate the field of higher education, implementing my expertise and experience in day-to-day communication, both personal and job-related.
Due to my current business with a state position, the intensity of scientific activity has dropped, though I do keep on with it at the expense of my spare time, having published and still publishing scientific articles meanwhile. I do not view science as a job, it is rather a passion. Once you’ve passed a certain path, definite expectations are shaped not only on the local but also on the international level. Therefore, I am highly consistent in scientific results as our team has its niche in the world and everybody expects new studies and new results from us.
What was the most impressive discovery for you in your field?
My icon is Nobel Prize winner Peter D. Mitchell as he is one of the discoverers of the core principle of life. His discovery is extremely stimulating for me. Mitchell tried to comprehend how life works, how energy is generated, where it comes from, and how it is synthesized. Here is his book (reaches out to a book on the desk), sent to our laboratory personally by him. Given the fact he made his discoveries in the 1970s when none of the modern equipment was available, they become much more valuable. I like his approach of not only experimenting in order to get evidence but also hypothesizing possible mechanisms in nature to find evidence. Currently, we are trying to figure out whether fermentation occurs and works on the key principles of Mitchell’s theory and, if so, how they work. We’ve had much success in this, in 2019, after a lot of painstaking work, we published an article in a well-known journal Trends in Biochemical Sciences, referring to the principles of Mitchell’s chemiosmotic theory.
Would you please share your experience of participation in the ADVANCE grant program?
It is a highly riveting program as it establishes interdisciplinary connections among team members. The research team formed within the framework of the program does not focus on a single specialization. Instead, it makes use of the valuable knowledge of specialists from diverse realms. We used to do teamwork previously but this is interdisciplinary teamwork. We might know each other as individual scientists but had never got the chance to collaborate. I strongly believe that both international and Armenian science needs to be based on cooperation, emphasizing the development of our local science. The ADVANCE program is notable also because the team is led by world-famous scientist professor Garabed Antranikian (Germany) who shares his experience. The project we have selected cannot have instant results as it requires long-running experiments. Through the program, we managed to bring together diverse views and approaches within a single project, which is a huge contribution in terms to the formation of scientific culture in Armenia and among Armenian scientists.
What would you tell a child eager to become a scientist?
Never regret and never give up on your dreams.
Has there been any turning point in your career?
As I went in for chess and had quite good results, was a Category 1 player, I was considering a career in chess at some point. The 8th and 9th grades appeared to be that very turning point when I had to decide whether to become a professional chess player or to enter university. I gave up chess and opted for biology.
What motivates you to get up in the morning?
First off, that’s natural, I can’t help but wake up. If viewed philosophically, we get up to create or do something new. Moreover, when a person is engaged in education or science, educating and passing on knowledge to the younger generation becomes an indispensable part and the driving force of life.
What could be regarded as a career peak for you?
In case me and my research team achieve the goals, we’ve set and make the discovery we intend to, it would truly be our career peak. The reason is the research we’ve been conducting is of practical and universal significance. Hopefully, it will get to be appreciated with much-coveted scientific awards.
Previous interviews of the “10 questions to a scientist” series are below:
Nothing brings as much joy to a person as the feeling of the reward of a scientific result. Ani Paloyan
The story of Anoxybacillus karvacharensis found in the geothermal spring of Artsakh as a source of inspiration. Diana Ghevondyan
In an American lab 20 years ago I felt like in a Hollywood movie. Anna Poladyan
Science excelled all jobs because it is perspective: Sargis Aghayan
The easiest way to change the world is to do science: Sona Hunanyan
PRESS RELEASE: Armenian Communities Department of the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation Avenida de: Berna 45-A, 1067-001 Lisboa, Portugal Contact: Vera Cunha Telephone: (351) 21 782 3658 Web: gulbenkian.pt: Antonio Feijo takes over the position of president of Galust Külpenkean Foundation On May 3, 2022, Professor Antonio Feijo took charge of Galust Külpenkea. The position of the president of the foundation. he was elected president on December 15, 2021 at the plenary meeting of the Foundation's trustee body. Antonio Feijo was a non-executive member of the Board of Trustees of the Foundation in 2018. since the date He is the first president who specializes in social studies in received his doctorate from Brown University (United States) in 1985, specializing in English and North American literature. On the same topic he received his master's degree from the State University of New York at Albany (1979). Feijo is a lecturer at the University of Lisbon (English Studies and Literary Theory section). Previously, he was from the School of Arts and Sociology at the University of Lisbon director, among many other high administrative positions. English, American and numerous books and articles on ventriloquist literature is the author. among other works, he also translated Shakespeare and From the works of Oscar Wilde. In his inauguration speech, Antonio Feijo emphasized that Galust Külpenkea The foundation is a "charitable institution that embodies it the legacy that Galust Sargis Külpenkean left for his time and his century the unique person. any person who manages the Foundation is obliged to observe it the lasting nature of heritage". The former president, Ms. Isabel Mota, received a standing ovation from the Foundation for his 26 years of service, chairing it for the past five years. -- Professor António Feijó assumed the mandate of President of the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation on May 3, 2022 during an official public ceremony. He was elected to the post by the Board of Trustees on December 15, 2021. António Feijó has been a non-executive member of the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation Board since 2018. He is the first President with a Humanities background and holds a PhD in English and North American Literature from Brown University (USA, 1985), and a MA in English and North American Literature from the State University of New York at Albany (1979). He is a Full Professor at Lisbon University (Department of English Studies and the Programme of Theory of Literature). He was the Director of the University’s School of Arts and Humanities, and has held other senior administrative positions. He is the author of several books and essays related to English, American and Portuguese literature, and has translated William Shakespeare and Oscar Wilde into Portuguese, among other literary works. In his inaugural speech as President, António Feijó highlighted that the Foundation is “a philanthropic institution which embodies the legacy left behind by a rare larger-than-life individual of his times and of his century: Calouste Sarkis Gulbenkian.” He added, “any person who leads the Foundation at any given moment has the duty to protect the perpetual nature of that legacy.” The former President, Isabel Mota, was honoured with a standing ovation for her 26 years of service to the Foundation, the last five of which were as President. -- END --
Turkish and Armenian envoys for the normalisation of ties between the two countries have reaffirmed their goal of “achieving full normalisation.”
“The special representatives reaffirmed the declared goal of achieving full normalisation between their respective countries through this process,” the Turkish Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Tuesday.
It came after the third meeting of Turkish and Armenian envoys in the Austrian capital Vienna.
The envoys discussed the possible steps that can be taken for tangible progress in normalisation, the statement said.
Türkiye’s Ambassador, Serdar Kilic, and the Deputy Speaker of the Armenian Parliament, Ruben Rubinyan, “reiterated their agreement to continue the process without preconditions,” it added.
Kilic was named as Türkiye’s special envoy to discuss steps towards normalisation with neighbouring Armenia on December 15, 2021. Three days later, Armenia appointed its own special representative, Rubinyan.
Mending ties
The first round of talks was held in Russia’s capital, Moscow, on January 14, with both parties agreeing to continue negotiations without any preconditions.
The Turkish and Armenian envoys met for the second time in Vienna on February 24.
Also, a historic bilateral meeting took place between the Turkish and Armenian foreign ministers on the sidelines of the Antalya Diplomacy Forum in Türkiye on March 12.
As part of the efforts, Türkiye and Armenia have also resumed commercial flights as of February 2 after a two-year hiatus.
The two countries have been divided on a range of issues, including the 1915 events in the Ottoman Empire and Armenia’s occupation of Karabakh in 1993.
Since then the land border between Türkiye and Armenia has been closed.
On October 10, 2009, the two neighbouring countries signed a peace accord, known as the Zurich Protocols, to establish diplomatic relations and open the border, but failed to ratify the agreement in their respective national parliaments.
Relations between Ankara and Yerevan entered a new phase in the fall of 2020 with the end of the second Karabakh war, which lasted 44 days and in which Türkiye helped Azerbaijan recapture its territory.
This article has been adapted from its original source.
Armenian-founded customer experience platform DISQO today announced the acquisition of Feedback Loop, Inc. Feedback Loop’s SaaS technology empowers fast and easy consumer feedback for product and marketing professionals, from early-stage discovery to ideation and design. The acquisition accelerates DISQO’s mission to build the most trusted platform that fuels brand growth by connecting consumers’ sentiments to their online behaviors. With the addition of Feedback Loop, DISQO facilitates aq comprehensive understanding of brand, product, and customer experiences for any organization, from SMBs to enterprises.
Rob Holland, CEO of Feedback Loop and former GVP of Oracle Data Cloud, has been named EVP, General Manager of Feedback Loop at DISQO. Approximately 50 new team members will join DISQO, bringing the global headcount to more than 500 people.
The acquisition follows DISQO’s recent Series B funding round which it closed as part of its plan to further scale the capabilities and reach of its customer experience (CX) platform. With digital transformation, brands large and small have been disconnected from their customers, forcing them to make decisions based on ambiguous signals. DISQO is solving this by giving brands direct access to their customers, so they can not only understand what customers think, but also what they do online.
With the addition of new agile customer feedback and analytics capabilities, any client can now validate products, features, and marketing before bringing them to market. Tens of thousands of new SMB and mid-market clients can now access DISQO’s platform, expanding upon its current hyper-growth enterprise business.
“Organizations often lack the access and tools needed to make the right data-driven decisions for their customers, especially medium-sized and small businesses,” said Armen Adjemian, Co-Founder & CEO, DISQO. “Traditional CX platforms have limited users within organizations and only enable customer experience feedback from existing customers. DISQO is expanding the power of CX by empowering all decision-makers, from SMBs to large enterprises, to understand customer experiences, everywhere, with existing and prospective customers.”
Some of Feedback Loop’s current clients who will benefit from the acquisition include the Ad Council, Comcast, Experian, Farmers Insurance, Humana, NBCUniversal, Utz, Caribou Coffee, and Uber. These companies and others will be able to gather faster, more accurate feedback via access to DISQO’s platform and by leveraging DISQO’s multidimensional customer profiles and measured digital behaviors.
“One of the biggest pain points in business is the inability to get immediate customer feedback when decisions have to be made,” said Rob Holland, EVP, General Manager of Feedback Loop. “With our agile feedback technology, DISQO is amplifying the voice of the customer in all decisions, from product innovation to advertising and everything in between.”
DISQO’s platform currently fuels customer understanding for more than 300 blue-chip brands, 125 of the world’s largest market research firms, 35 leading advertising agencies, and more than 20 media platforms. Utilizing applications for market research, advertising measurement, and customer feedback, these clients create a breakthrough understanding of consumers’ lifestyles, preferences, beliefs, and habits.