16:53,
YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 14, ARMENPRESS. Minister of Defense of Armenia Suren Papikyan on February 14 held a meeting with French Ambassador Olivier Decottignies.
In a statement, the minister said he discussed with the French envoy the “current course of the cooperation in the defense sector and issues pertaining to regional security.”
13:41,
YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 15, ARMENPRESS. Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has confirmed his participation in the Nuclear Energy Summit to be held in Brussels in March 2024, according to the Ambassador of Belgium to Armenia Eric De Muynck.
“A nuclear energy summit will be organized on March 21 in Brussels and Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has already confirmed his participation,” the Belgian Ambassador said in an interview with Armenpress when asked on possible bilateral visits between the two countries. “He will be in Brussels during that time and will have the chance to meet with representatives of the Belgian government.”
Following the International Atomic Energy Agency’s Atoms4NetZero initiative, leaders from around the world will gather at a Nuclear Energy Summit in Brussels in March to highlight the role of nuclear energy in addressing the global challenges to reduce the use of fossil fuels, enhance energy security and boost economic development.
Hosted jointly by the IAEA and Belgium, the Summit will take place on 21-22 March 2024.
Co-chaired by IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi and Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo, it will be the highest-level meeting to date exclusively focused on the topic of nuclear energy, which is attracting growing interest from many countries because it can both help to cut the consumption of fossil fuels while meeting rising demand for low-carbon dispatchable electricity.
Under a recently-awarded EU grant contract, the Winnet Goris Development Foundation is offering support to elderly displaced people from Nagorno-Karabagh.
The project focuses on 100 displaced people in Goris, offering hygiene packages, light meals, medical care, support equipment and socialisation through weekly activities such as cooking, crafting, and social events. The project also plans to renovate the elderly care centre and equip it with necessary furniture and appliances.
Since September 2023, the EU has provided over €12.5 million in assistance to address the urgent humanitarian needs of the most vulnerable displaced people in Armenia. At least 2,500 elderly displaced people have already benefited from EU support across Armenia.
Find out more
Press release
https://euneighbourseast.eu/news/latest-news/armenia-eu-support-for-elderly-displaced-from-nagorno-karabagh/
12:54, 6 February 2024
BUDAPEST, FEBRUARY 6, ARMENPRESS. Hungarian President Katalin Novák has welcomed Armenian President Vahagn Khachaturyan in Budapest.
The official welcoming ceremony took place at the Kossuth Lajos Square.
Khachaturyan is due to hold a meeting with his Hungarian counterpart.
As part of the official visit, the Armenian President will also meet with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban and Speaker of Parliament László Kövér.
The Armenian President will visit the Heroes' Square to commemorate fallen troops.
A meeting with the local Armenian community is also scheduled.
17:55, 6 February 2024
BUDAPEST, FEBRUARY 6, ARMENPRESS. Hungarian President Katalin Novák, at a joint press conference with her Armenian counterpart Vahagn Khachaturyan in Budapest, underscored the positive dynamics in Armenian-Hungarian trade relations.
"We are pleased to see Hungarian companies, such as the airline 'WizzAir,' operating in Armenia.
We have observed a positive dynamics in our trade relations. Since 2022, there has been a significant increase in the export of Hungarian goods to Armenia.
During 2003-2022, trade and economic turnover increased from 2.6 million dollars to 29 million dollars," Novák said.
10:10, 8 February 2024
YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 7, ARMENPRESS. Most of the deaths in 2023 were caused by cardiovascular diseases just like in 2022, according to official data released by the Statistical Committee.
A total of 24,305 people died in Armenia in 2023, which is 2,387 less than in 2022.
Cardiovascular diseases claimed the lives of 12,973 people in 2023, and 14,239 in 2022.
5,089 deaths were caused by cancerous tumors (5,141 in 2022), 2,090 by respiratory diseases (2,363 in 2022), 1,181 by gastrointestinal diseases (1,138 in 2022), 147 by infectious and parasitic diseases (148 in 2022) – which includes 34 HIV-related deaths (20 in 2022), 437 by endocrine diseases (398 in 2022), 1,066 by disease and mortality external causes (1,258 in 2022), 45 by COVID-19 and other viruses (812 in 2022), and 1,277 by other diseases (1,195 in 2022).
198 people committed suicide in 2023. The number was 188 in 2022.
11:39, 8 February 2024
YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 8, ARMENPRESS. Authorities have achieved over 95% success in enforcing the ban on illegal fishing in Lake Sevan, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has said.
Speaking at the Cabinet meeting on Thursday, PM Pashinyan praised the police force patrolling the lake.
PM Pashinyan said that the government succeeded in ruling out illegal fishing in Sevan by more than 95%.
“I am saying over 95 percent because over the course of the ban, law enforcement agencies still revealed a couple of cases of illegal fishing. But this is the first time in the history of the third republic when the ban is [actually] enforced. This happened as a result of launching the police patrol [service],” Pashinyan said.
13:49, 5 February 2024
YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 5, ARMENPRESS. Georgian intelligence services have thwarted what they described as an attempted smuggling of explosives from Ukraine to Russia through their territory.
According to the State Security Service of Georgia, the cargo of explosives was allegedly being shipped from Ukraine’s Odessa to Russia’s Voronezh for a terror plot. In a statement, the Georgian security service didn’t rule out that the organizers of the shipment also intended to carry out terror attacks in Georgia.
The suspects in the smuggling are reportedly citizens of Georgia, Ukraine and Armenia. According to the report, the smuggling was organized by “citizen of Ukraine, the candidate for deputy of the Kiev district of the local Rada of Odesa district in 2020 from the party "Servant of the People" Andrey Sharashidze, who is originally from the city of Batumi.”
The 14kg cargo sent from Ukraine reportedly reached Georgia on January 19 via Romania, Bulgaria and Turkey.
22:12, 2 February 2024
YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 2, ARMENPRESS. The US Embassy has eased travel restrictions for its employees in the territory of the Republic of Armenia, the Embassy said on social media.
“Notice to U.S. citizens: The U.S. Embassy loosens travel restrictions for its employees. This represents an easing of restrictions since the last notice had been issued,’’ reads the message.
The restrictions apply to Gegharkunik region east of Vardenis, Syunik region east of Goris, Syunik region south of Kapan. The travel through Yeraskh village in Ararat region is allowed, but stopping is not.
Yerevan obligated to arrest Vladimir Putin if he enters Armenia after move Moscow calls ‘unfriendly step’
Armenia has formally joined the international criminal court (ICC), officials said, a move which traditional ally Moscow has denounced as unfriendly.
The Hague-based court in March issued an arrest warrant for the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, over the war in Ukraine and the illegal deportation of children to Russia.
Yerevan is now obliged to arrest the Russian leader if he sets foot on its territory.
“ICC Rome statute officially entered into force for Armenia on 1 February,” the country’s official representative for international legal matters, Yeghishe Kirakosyan, told AFP.
The Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Armenia had taken a “wrong decision” when its parliament voted in October to ratify the ICC’s Rome statute, and the Russian foreign ministry has called the move an “unfriendly step”.
Armenia is home to a permanent Russian military base and is part of the Moscow-led military alliance the Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO), that consists of several ex-Soviet republics.
Western countries hailed the ratification, which marks the expansion of the court’s jurisdiction into what was long seen as Russia’s back yard.
“The world is getting smaller for the autocrat in the Kremlin,” the European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, said in reference to Putin after Armenia ratified the ICC statute in October.
Armenia’s prime minister, Nikol Pashinyan, has tried to reassure Russia that his country is only addressing what it says are war crimes committed by its neighbour, Azerbaijan, in their long-running conflict, and is not aiming at Moscow.
Kirakosyan said: “Joining the ICC gives Armenia serious tools to prevent war crimes and crimes against humanity on its territory.
“First of all, this concerns Azerbaijan,” he added. Yerevan has fought two wars with its arch-foe over the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region.
But Armenia’s move illustrated a growing divide between Moscow and Yerevan, which has grown angry with the Kremlin’s perceived inaction over Azerbaijan’s belligerence.
In September Azerbaijani forces swept through Karabakh – where Russian peacekeepers are deployed – and secured the surrender of Armenian separatist forces that had controlled the mountainous region for decades.
“Armenia hoped that by joining the ICC, by making such a sensitive step for Russia, it could receive security guarantees from the west,” independent analyst Vigen Hakobyan told AFP.
“But apparently it has strained its Russia ties without receiving real security guarantees from the west.”
Armenia signed the Rome statute in 1999, but did not ratify it, citing contradictions with the country’s constitution.
The constitutional court said in March those obstacles had been removed after Armenia’s adoption of a new constitution in 2015.
Last November, Yerevan formally deposited its instrument of ratification of the Rome statute.