Category: 2022

Minister: 122 Karabakh health facilities under Azerbaijan’s control

Manouk Vasilian
PanArmenian
Armenia – June 6 2022
June 6, 2022 – 13:00 AMT

PanARMENIAN.Net – As many as 122 health facilities of Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh) have remained in territories under Azerbaijan’s control following the 44-day war in the fall of 2020, Karabakh’s top health official has told Armenpress.

Artsakh Minister of Health Mikael Hayriyan has revealed that 4 regional medical units (Hadrut, Shushi, Kashatagh and Karvachar), 1 district hospital, 9 rural medical outpatient clinics and 108 maternity wards are still under Azerbaijan’s control.

Almost all medical institutions throughout the country were damaged in the war, Hayriyan said, and the Ministry is working to ensure the employment of displaced medical workers in other institutions.

The health authorities are currently in the process of restoring hospitals, including the Center for Maternal and Child Health Protection, the regional medical centers of Martakert and Martuni, the Lady Cox Rehabilitation Centrer, and others.

The Second Karabakh war lasted 44 days and ended when Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, Russian and Azerbaijani Presidents Vladimir Putin and Ilham Aliyev signed a ceasefire statement on November 9, 2020. Under the deal, the Armenian side returned all the seven regions surrounding Nagorno-Karabakh, having lost a part of Karabakh itself in hostilities.

EU says no settlement possible without Karabakh Armenians’ opinion

Ani Kharatian
PanArmenian
Armenia – June 6 2022
June 6, 2022 – 18:24 AMT

PanARMENIAN.Net – EU Special Representative for the South Caucasus and the crisis in Georgia Toivo Klaar has said that it is impossible to reach a settlement without taking into account the opinion of the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh.

The three held their third meeting since December in Brussels on Sunday, May 22 and focused on the situation in the South Caucasus and the development of EU relations with both countries as well as the broader region.

Klaar made the remarks in an interview with the Armenian Service of RFE/RL on Monday, June 6, weeks after President of the European Council Charles Michel told Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan that it is necessary that the rights and security of the ethnic Armenian population in Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh) be addressed.

The EU envoy said the Armenians of Karabakh are a party to the conflict, that must be part of the solution, no matter what happens. According to him, the people of Karabakh have a fundamental interest in achieving a comprehensive settlement.

“I personally do not see how we can reach such a settlement without taking into account the opinion and point of view of those people,” he said.

 

Matena School’s new program to make municipal management in Armenia more effective

Karapet Navasardian
Public Radio of Armenia
Armenia – June 6 2022
June 6, 2022, 11:40

 

On June 4, professional development program for municipal authorities “Effectively Managing Communities in Armenia” by the Matena International School was launched in Dilijan. Around two dozen mayors, municipal executives and local councilors from 15 communities of Armenia participated in the program. The program, which aimed to significantly develop the professional and leadership skills of municipal leaders, was jointly developed by Matena and SKOLKOVO schools.

During the first module, the participants will be provided with comprehensive knowledge about modern municipal management, the role of a community leader, team management skills in complex situations, methods of strategic decision-making, key success factors, skills of building an effective team and managing it, peculiarities of external and internal communication and other important skills. 

The next two modules of the program will be held in July and August, respectively, in Yerevan and in Moscow (SKOLKOVO School of Management).

“The consolidation of communities has led to serious changes in terms of control and implementation of the community development programs. Thus, the goal of this program is to bring the best world experience to Armenia so that community leaders and the council members have the opportunity to gain new knowledge. The successfulness of a nation depends on the quality of its managers; and the development of communities is fundamental for the development of a country,” said Ruben Vardanyan, Co-Founder of Matena International School, Founding Partner of UWC Dilijan International School and the SKOLKOVO School of Management.

One of the exceptional components of the program is the co-financing of the best individual projects. Those community leaders, who come up with the best community development projects at the end of the program, will be co-financed by Matena for the implementation of their projects.

“It would be very hard to find an educational program of comparable level for community leaders in any management school in the world, moreover, a program that, in addition to transferring international best practices, is specifically designed and best considers the local governance peculiarities of Armenia. It is important that the participants of the program will not only learn, but will also act, because, at the end of the program, based on the knowledge and skills they have acquired, they will submit projects on effectively managing their communities, the best of which will be co-financed by Matena,” said the Co-Founder and CEO of Matena Ruben Hayrapetyan.

“The research on the competencies of public managers clearly demonstrated that there is a great demand for new knowledge on the development of team and territorial management skills. We see a high interest among the audience. We hope that the program in this format will help to solve the most acute problems and satisfy the demand of municipal authorities,” said Marina Veldanova, Professor of Business Practice, and Director of the Healthcare Development Centre of the SKOLKOVO School of Management.



Music: Armenian pianist wins First prize at international competition in Italy

Edgar Tavakalian
Public Radio of Armenia
Armenia – June 6 2022
June 6, 2022, 15:56

 

Laura Galstyan, a young pianist representing Armenia, was awarded the First Prize and a special scholarship at the 24th Pietro Argento International Music Competition held in Gioia del Colle, Italy on June 1-5, 2022.

The annual competition was founded in 1998 and is a member of Alink-Argerich Foundation. It is named after the famous Italian conductor Pietro Argento.

This year it was held in three categories: piano, vocal and chamber music. It featured bout 30 musicians from different countries of the world.

Laura Galstyan, 18, is currently studying at the Hochschule für Musik und Darstellende Kunst Mannheim (Germany) with Wolfram Schmitt-Leonardy. She is enhancing her professional skills with outstanding pianist Hayk Melikyan.

Device designed by Armenian students to be sent into space

Ani Tigranian
Public Radio of Armenia
Armenia – June 6 2022
June 6, 2022, 12:17

 1 minute read

The device developed by Ad Astra team of the Ayb school’s engineering lab will be sent into space. The launch is expected as early as this month. 

Three teams of teenagers aged 12-21 – Ad Astra, AYAS, GDL – had made it to the final of the competition. 

The Ad Astra team of Ayb school comprises 12th grade students Andre Vardanyan, Elina Melkonyan, Hayk Piliposyan and 11th grader Davit Vanyan, the mentors are Vazgen Gabrielyan and Ruben Kerobyan. 

The 197 gram device (payload) will be placed in a sub-orbital rocket and will be sent to the altitude of 125 km, i.e. it will cross the Kármán line, the boundary between Earth’s atmosphere and outer space,

The device will stay in space for 2-3 minutes, during this period it will collect data on the rocket’s flight path, temperature, pressure change, speed, acceleration, as well as the intensity of ultraviolet radiation and ozone concentration.

The sensors performing the last two measurements were designed and proposed by the AYAS team. After carrying out the planned measurements, the device will fall back together with the rocket.

43 new Covid cases recorded in Armenia in one week

Arbi Tashjian
Panorama
Armenia – June 6 2022

Armenia confirmed 43 new coronavirus infections over the past one week, bringing the national tally to 423,006 as of 11 a.m. Monday, June 6, according to data released by the Ministry of Health.

A total of 10,329 tests were conducted from May 30 to June 5.

15 more patients have recovered from the disease with the total number of recoveries now standing at 412,621.

No new Covid-19 death has been recorded in the country and the official death toll remains unchanged at 8,625. The figure does not include the deaths of 1,684 other people carrying the virus. According to the health authorities, they were caused by other diseases.

Armenia now has 76 active cases. As many as 3,109,931 tests have been performed in the country since the disease outbreak.

Davit Tonoyan’s lawyers to ask for public court hearing on Monday

Emil Lazarian
Panorama
Armenia – June 6 2022

Former Armenian Defense Minister Davit Tonoyan’s lawyers will request the court to make Monday’s hearing on his case open to the public, the legal team said in a statement. The hearing is scheduled for 3pm.

Tonoyan was arrested on 30 September 2021 on charges of “fraud and embezzlement of large sums of money” as part of a criminal probe into supplies of allegedly faulty ammunition to the Armenian army.

“The defense intends to share with the court documents proving that the charges are groundless. They do not contain confidential data and do not pose any threats to national security and public order,” the statement reads.

The lawyers claimed that holding the hearing in camera would lead to an “unjustified restriction on the open court principle and would violate the interests of justice.”

2,068 new trademarks registered in Armenia last year

Babken Chilingarian
Panorama
Armenia – June 6 2022

A total of 2,887 trademark registration applications (2,364 from national applicants) were submitted to Armenia’s Intellectual Property Agency in 2021, according to data released by the Statistical Committee.

A preliminary examination of 2,815 trademark applications was conducted. 42 trademark applications were retracted, while 240 others got rejected.

In total, 2,068 trademarks were approved (1,801 in the names of national applicants) by the agency.

33 applications for international registration of marks were filed from Armenia last year.

Analyst: Brussels has no mandate, but has a plan

Greg Madatian
ARMINFO
Armenia – June 6 2022
David Stepanyan

ArmInfo.Not having a mandate for a mediation mission to resolve the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan, the EU has a clear plan in this process. A similar  opinion was expressed to ArmInfo by Fyodor Lukyanov, research  director at the International Valdai discussion club, member of  presidium of Russian International Affairs Council (RIAC).

“All three meetings in Brussels are part of this plan, the purpose  of which is to carry out a mediation mission in essence with the  accompanying goal of protecting the interests of the EU and the  United States in this settlement. And the very fact that none of the  co-chair countries denies their role in the OSCE Minsk Group  demonstrates that all three countries understand the situation in  which only the Minsk Group has the only mandate to mediate between  Yerevan and Baku,” he said.

Based on the analysis of the statements made in Brussels, the analyst  singled out among them the intention to postpone the resolution of  the issue of the status of Artsakh for the future. According to him,  the EU is now exclusively interested in Armenia-Azerbaijan relations  in the regional context. And, in his opinion, the prospects for the  current process largely depend on how and when the war in Ukraine  ends and, of course, on what agreements were reached by Yerevan and  Baku earlier.  

In this light, Lukyanov considers the strengthening of the dialogue  between Armenia and Azerbaijan a possible task for the EU. First of  all, because it will allow Brussels not to constantly deal with the  conflict, but to work for its final settlement, of course, it would  be preferable without Moscow’s participation.  

“If Russia and the EU are not involved in all this, by and large, it  does not matter how the conflict will be resolved. The main thing is  that its parties come to an agreement in the form of a peace  agreement.  This is the goal of Brussels. But whether it will happen,  depends on the outcome of the Ukrainian developments and how all this  will end for the Russian Federation. So the stakes are quite high,  which, among other things, is evidenced by the readiness of the EU to  implement social and economic assistance programs in the region. Not  to mention the positions of the parties to the conflict for which it  is not the solution of the conflict that is paramount, but on what  specific conditions it will be resolved,” the analyst summed up.

Armenia`s security is Iran`s security – scholar

Ophelia Vardapetian
ARMINFO
Armenia – June 6 2022
David Stepanyan

ArmInfo.Tehran, is, no doubt, interested in a security platform with the participation of Armenia and Russia, Vardan Voskanyan, Head of the Chair of Iranian Studies,  Yerevan State University, said in an interview with ArmInfo. 

“It is not known if any specific steps are being made toward  establishing such trilateral cooperation. In any case, nothing like  that is on the open agenda. Interested in the South Caucasus, Tehran  is closely following all the regional processes for the primary  reason that they – and the Caucasus-related geopolitics – directly  concern Iran,” the scholar said.  

Iran is the only state considering Armenia’s territorial integrity to  be a redline for itself. And Tehran showed that not only by means of  political rhetoric, but also by specific steps, particular the recent  military exercise along the Iranian-Azerbaijani border. Iran will  never allow Turkish-Azerbaijani encroachments on the Armenian border. 

Mr Voskanyan does not rule out Armenian-Iranian consultations on the  “geopolitical impulses” in the region, particularly on the  Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict. He notes that such consultations are  belated, and the Yerevan-Tehran cooperation needs higher efficiency. 

“One more all-important issue on the Armenian-Iranian agenda is the  North-South highway construction.  Many people view the project only  in its economic aspect, whereas the North-South is a most important  component of the entire region’s security, to say nothing of its  geopolitical significance. Tehran is perfectly aware of that.  Evidence thereof is also Iran’s statements that the  Goradiz-Meghri-Julfa-Ordubad-Yeraskh railway can by no means be  considered the trunk line between Armenia and Iran. Rather, it is the  North- South highway,” Mr Voskanyan said. -t–