Category: 2018

Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan on April 5 signed a decree on relieving Armen Sarkissian from the post of Armenia’s Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and to Ireland.

Armen Sarkissian was elected 4th President of Armenia by the Parliament on March 2. He will take office on April 9 at the Parliament’s special session which will be convened in the Karen Demirchyan Sports and Concert Complex.

During today’s Cabinet meeting, Prime Minister Karen Karapetyan announced that under the requirements of the Constitution the Government will soon resign.

“Thanks for the joint work, we will continue working with the same pace, don’t drop the pace”, the PM told his Cabinet.

The new constitution will come into force April 9 – the day when incumbent President Serzh Sargsyan’s term in office will end.

President-elect Armen Sarkissian (no relation to the incumbent) will be sworn into office in the Armenian parliament April 9. The government will resign on that day.

Henrikh Mkhitaryan, the captain of the Armenian national football team and midfielder of London’s Arsenal, says he wants to become one of the legendary players of the Gunners.

Mkhitaryan spoke about his transfer from Mancheser United and other issues in an exlusive interview to FourFourTwo magazine’s May 2018 issue. The Armenian playmaker arrived from Manchester United in January as part of a swap deal with Alexis Sanchez.

Eager to make an early impression at the Emirates Stadium, the 29-year-old assisted three goals on his home debut against Everton as Arsene Wenger’s men obliterated the Toffees 5-1, FourFourTwo magazine reported.

The Armenian international reveals that he didn’t need to think twice about relocating to north London, because he was keen to be part of an attack-minded Gunners team.

“When I heard I could swap Man United for Arsenal, I said, ‘Yes, I want to do that’, I didn’t think twice. It’s important for me to play in an offensive team.

“I couldn’t have imagined a better start. I’d missed playing offensively. I joined Arsenal because Wenger wanted me, not because he wanted to replace Sanchez. We are different players and characters, with different abilities and skills, so I’ll try my best to do everything for the club”, Mkhitaryan told FourFourTwo.

Mkhitaryan’s first Arsenal goal helped see off Milan in the last 16 and set up a quarter-final with CSKA Moscow, and the Armenian says he is focused on adding more trophies to the Gunners’ cabinet.

“I want to write my name into Arsenal’s history and have my name as a legend here,” says the midfielder. “I want to score goals, make assists and win trophies to make the fans happy.”

Armenia follows the process of the Russian-Turkish relations and draws conclusions, deputy foreign minister Shavarsh Kocharyan told reporters after today’s Cabinet meeting, commenting on the recent rapprochement of the Russian-Turkish relations, in particular, Putin’s visit to Turkey.

“Each state derives from its own interests, in this case the tendency is that the interests of Turkey and Russia coincide, and we need to take into account this and carefully follow it. At this stage there is a bigger field for coincidence of their interests”, the deputy FM said.

At the same time he urged not to go ahead in the conclusions, stating that this is a process where there are contradictions, moments when there is a rapprochement. “Of course we follow them and make conclusions”, the deputy FM noted.

President Serzh Sargsyan on April 5 signed a decree on relieving Gagik Gevorgyan from the post of adviser to the Armenian President.

According to the President’s another decrees, Matevos Aramyan (Priest Mesrop) and Felix Pirumyan have been relieved from the post of adviser to the President.

The Embassy of Germany has released a statement saying that VisaMetric, a visa service provider, cannot accept applications from April 3rd due to technical reasons. The visa procedure will be dealt by the visa department of the German Embassy itself.

“Agreements which have already been made with VisaMetric continue to be in force”, the statement said, adding that the embassy will soon enable an online application system.

Earlier on March 30, the personal data protection agency of the ministry of justice of Armenia demanded to suspend the visa application processing capacity of VisaMetric until the completion of the probe.

VisaMetric is a Russian-Turkish consortium with its parent company based in Turkey.

President of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan signed an order on April 5 on appointing Stepan Michaelyan to serve as judge of the Civil and Administrative Chamber of the Court of Cassation.

Michaelyan was also relieved from office as judge at the Civil Court of Appeals.

The Prime Minister of Armenia will have two official residences, minister of justice Davit Harutyunyan told reporters after the April 5 Cabinet meeting.

“The Prime Minister will also have a residence at the Governmental Seat because more efficient work can be done with Cabinet members here,” he said, adding that another residence is planned for the PM.

“The powers of the next Prime Minister are expanded to such an extent that a significant part of the president’s powers will be carried out by the Prime Minister and in terms of structure and infrastructure the [current] presidential residence is customized for the duly implementation of a number of powers”, he said.

Armenia will transition to a parliamentary administration system from April 9, in accordance to the Consitution. The next Prime Minister’s residence will be the incumbent president’s official seat – 26 Baghramyan in Yerevan. The next presidential residence will be 46 Mashtots.