Category: 2020

The American University of Armenia is pleased to announce the appointment of two new trustees of the AUA Corporation: Lena Sarkissian and Yervant Demirjian. Both appointees, who are also members of the 100 Pillars of AUA, bring a wealth of experience in the private and non-profit sector and will greatly contribute to advancing AUA’s mission.

Lena Sarkissian has over 20 years of experience as a Board of Director, in the non-profit sector. A resident of Toronto, Ontario, Sarkissian currently serves as a member of the Board of Directors for the Armenian General Benevolent Union and works in Asset Management for Byron Hill Holdings. She received her graduate degree in speech and language pathology and an undergraduate degree in linguistics and French from the University of California, Los Angeles.

“AUA has played a pivotal role in the higher education ecosystem of Armenia by introducing a new set of standards and approaches to education. The exponential complexity of the globalized world and pace of change demand that institutions continuously realign to meet the needs of the community they serve. A challenge for AUA is that it now has to prepare students for many of the jobs of the future that have not yet been created. Thus, the continuous reassessment of its pedagogy and infrastructure is necessary – all to further ignite the passion and creativity of its students and staff. Coincidentally also, with its focus on cultivating global networks, AUA will be able to disseminate the creative capacity of its community. It can thus aim to become a generator and a contributor of ideas and products on the global scene.”

Yervant Demirjian is a private real estate investor in Los Angeles, California, a current trustee and vice treasurer for AGBU, and a trustee of the AGBU Vatche and Tamar Manoukian High School in Los Angeles. Demirjian has 25 years of experience in banking. He has also served as a director of the AGBU Manoogian Demirjian School. Demirjian received his MBA and undergraduate degrees from Pepperdine University.

“I always believed that quality education would help us improve the destiny of our little yet noble community. Accepting the invitation to serve on the board of the AUA was part and parcel of my enthusiasm in giving our youth the tools to enhance their prospects in life.”

Founded in 1991, the American University of Armenia is a private, independent university located in Yerevan, Armenia, and affiliated with the University of California. AUA provides a global education in Armenia and the region, offering high-quality graduate and undergraduate studies, encouraging civic engagement, and promoting public service and democratic values. For more information about AUA and its donor opportunities, please visit the website.

Today, Acting Deputy Chief of Mission Lia Miller, alongside the Governor of the Province of Tavush, Hayk Chobanyan, and Country Director of Project Harmony International Armenia Office, Mariam Martirosyan, officially opened an American Library and Training Center – a new learning hub in Ijevan supported by the U.S. Embassy and housed at the Ijevan Branch of Yerevan State University.

The American Library and Training Center is the largest component of the Tavush Outreach Project, implemented by Project Harmony International using U.S. government funds. The purpose of the Tavush Outreach Project is to deliver concentrated U.S. government outreach by offering English language and other instruction to Tavush youth and young adults, by providing diverse capacity building programs, and offering resources to increase understanding of U.S. society.

The American Library and Training Center will offer diverse training programs for local community members to develop skills that are vital for practicing democratic values and active citizenship. The training programs will include, but are not limited to, English language skills, media literacy, project design and management, leadership skills, and communications skills.

The American Library and Training Center is equipped with relevant technical equipment and a diverse collection of American books and materials. The outreach program will also include film screenings, book clubs, and guest speakers.

$100 Million in U.S. Military Aid to Azerbaijan Adds Capacity for Renewed Aggression against Artsakh and Armenia

WASHINGTON—The Trump Administration’s $100 million security and military aid package to Baku largely funds joint U.S.-Azerbaijani Iran-facing initiatives – while enabling new offensive capabilities and freeing up other military resources for the Aliyev regime’s ongoing aggression against Artsakh and Armenia – according to a review, this week, of detailed budget breakdowns provided by the Congressional Research Service.

The largest share of U.S. security assistance to Baku is the Administration’s allocation of $101.5 million in FY18 and FY19 for “Section 333 Building Partner Capacity” assistance for “Maritime Security for the Caspian Sea and Southern Border Security programs.” This section, of the National Defense Authorization Act, was established in FY17 to build the capacity of foreign national security forces, including for “maritime and border security operations” and “military intelligence operations.” Between FY04 and FY09, Azerbaijan received approximately $64 million in “Caspian Sea Maritime Proliferation Prevention Program (Cooperative Threat Reduction),” and roughly $10 million in FY11 “Section 1206 Global Train and Equip” assistance.

“We are troubled that the Trump Administration’s $100 million security aid package to Baku adds substantial new equipment, tactical abilities, and offensive capacities to the Azerbaijani arsenal, while freeing up its state resources for renewed cross-border action against Artsakh and Armenia,” said Armenian National Committee of America Government Affairs Director Tereza Yerimyan. “American taxpayers shouldn’t be asked to provide a single dollar in military aid to an overtly and unapologetically aggressive Aliyev regime that – as recently as a week ago in Munich, Germany – renewed threats to attack Artsakh and publicly laid claim to Yerevan and all of Armenia as Azerbaijani territory. The Trump Administration should either stop sending military aid to Baku or start matching every dollar they send to Azerbaijan with another to Armenia.”

In testimony submitted to the House Appropriations Committee this week, the ANCA requested a provision in the foreign aid bill requiring that: “No funds appropriated or otherwise made available under this Act may be provided to the Government of Azerbaijan until the President determines, and so reports to the Congress, that the Government of Azerbaijan is taking demonstrable steps to cease all blockades and other offensive uses of force against Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh.”

This testimony, submitted by Government Affairs Director Tereza Yerimyan, supported this request by citing Azerbaijan’s obstruction of the Royce-Engel Peace Proposals, opposition to the U.S.-Artsakh Travel and Communication Resolution (H.Res.452), and continued cross-border attacks against Artsakh and Armenia.

Congress Has Maintained Armenia-Azerbaijan Aid Parity on FMF and IMET Military Assistance

Relatively smaller levels of Foreign Military Financing and International Military Education and Training – appropriated on the principle of parity with Armenia – have been provided to Azerbaijan since FY02 – the first year of the Section 907 presidential waiver. The Congress, in the wake of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, granted the White House the authority to waive the Section 907 restrictions, enacted in 1992 with the support of the ANCA, on U.S. aid to the Azerbaijan government, contingent upon the President determining that such aid “will not undermine or hamper ongoing efforts to negotiate a peaceful settlement between Armenia and Azerbaijan or be used for offensive purposes against Armenia.”

According to recent Congressional Budget Justifications, FMF assistance supports “Azerbaijan’s military professionalization and interoperability with NATO and coalition partners in multinational operations,” as well as “increased maritime domain awareness, with the goal of enhancing border security and protection of critical energy infrastructure.”

Additional U.S. security assistance has also been provided, at lower levels, for a range of other purposes, including nuclear and biological nonproliferation programs.

Congressional Alarm Bells on Increased Azerbaijan Military Aid Initially Raised in 2019

In September 2019, Congressional Armenian Caucus founding Co-Chair Frank Pallone (D-NJ), Co-Chair Jackie Speier (D-CA) and Vice-Chair Adam Schiff (D-CA) expressed concerns to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Secretary of Defense Mark Esper about the proposed dramatic increases in security assistance to Azerbaijan, noting that Section 907 of the Freedom Support Act, adopted in 1992, places restrictions on aid to Azerbaijan due to its ongoing blockade and aggression against Armenia and Artsakh.

“While the State Department has the authority to extend a waiver of Section 907, we do not believe the waiver the State Department noticed on April 18, 2019 is an appropriate use of this authority considering Azerbaijan’s continued efforts to destabilize the Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh and given the ruling regime of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev’s documented culture of corruption and oppressive tactics against dissenters,” stated Representatives Pallone, Speier, and Schiff in their September 27th letter.

In response to State and Defense Department assertions that $102 million in security aid to Azerbaijan “will neither undermine efforts to negotiate a peaceful settlement between Armenia and Azerbaijan, nor be used for offensive purposes against Armenia,” Representatives Pallone, Speier and Schiff were adamant:

“Without question, the increase of security assistance to Azerbaijan creates an imbalance in the region and ignores a 20-year precedent in U.S. foreign policy. We are concerned that rewarding Armenia’s autocratic neighbor with this windfall at such a time of historic change in Armenia sends negative signals about the importance we place on democratic values. Returning to parity in military assistance is the only way the U.S. will be able to retain its credibility as a regional power capable of bringing Azerbaijan and Armenia together.”

In their November 18th letter, the Congressional Armenian Caucus leaders requested that Armenia be provided with “training and equipment to build partner capacity that will help secure its borders and create military parity in funding with Azerbaijan. This funding would increase Armenia’s capacity for counterterrorism, counter-illicit drug trafficking, and weapons of mass destruction interdiction operations – especially on its southern border with Iran. We also ask for robust funding of confidence-building measures on each side of the border between Azerbaijan, Nagorno-Karabakh, and Armenia – including those that would implement the 2015 Royce-Engel Peace Proposal – to establish a clearer pathway to peace for all parties in this conflict.”

NEW YORK—Professor Houri Berberian of the University of California, Irvine, will give a book talk entitled “Roving Revolutionaries: Armenians and the Connected Revolutions in the Russian, Iranian, and Ottoman Worlds” at Columbia University. The talk will be held on Thursday, February 27 at 6:10 p.m. at the University’s Knox Hall, Conference Room 208, located at 606 West 122nd St., New York, NY 10027.

The program is co-sponsored by the Columbia University Armenian Center, Columbia University Department of Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African Studies, and the National Association for Armenian Studies and Research.

Houri Berberian is Professor of History, Meghrouni Family Presidential Chair in Armenian Studies, and Director of the Armenian Studies Program at UCI. Her talk will be based on her new book, “Roving Revolutionaries: Armenians and the Connected Revolutions in the Russian, Iranian, and Ottoman Worlds” (Univ. of Calif. Press, 2019). The talk explores three of the formative revolutions that shook the early twentieth-century world, occuring almost simultaneously in regions bordering each other.

Though the Russian, Iranian, and Young Turk Revolutions all exploded between 1904 and 1911, they have never been studied through their linkages until now. “Roving Revolutionaries” probes the interconnected aspects of these three revolutions through the involvement of the Armenian revolutionaries – minorities in all of these empires – whose movements and participation within and across frontiers tell us a great deal about the global transformations that were taking shape. Exploring the geographical and ideological boundary crossings that occurred, Berberian’s archivally grounded analysis of the circulation of revolutionaries, ideas, and print tells the story of peoples and ideologies in upheaval and collaborating with each other, and, in doing so, it illuminates our understanding of revolutions and movements.

This event is open to the public and copies of “Roving Revolutionaries” will be available for purchase. For more information, please contact Professor Khatchig Mouradian at [email protected].

Armenia’s High Commissioner for Diaspora Affairs Zareh Sinanyn on Tuesday welcomed the chairman of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation Bureau Hagop Der-Khachadourian.

During the meeting, the sides discussed the current course of Armenia-Diaspora relations, with Sinanyan briefing the ARF leader about the activities of his office, as well as future plans. Der-Khachadourian also outlined the party’s approach of Armenia-Diaspora relations, and detailed some of the ARF’s priorities in advancing those ties.

Sinanyan also discussed an upcoming Diaspora conference, scheduled for September and his efforts to work with various organizations to ensure optimum participation in the event.

The two also emphasized the importance of the involvement of the Diaspora in Armenia’s every-day affairs and the need to jump start repatriation of Diaspora Armenians to the homeland.