Category: News

 

 

 

The Armenian State Chamber Orchestra will perform the “Eternal Melodies” concert on April 2 with Italian saxophonist Federico Mondelci as soloist and Vahan Martirosyan as artistic director and conductor. The program includes works by Armenian composers – Komitas, Mansuryan, Harutyunyan, Babajanyan.

Federico Mondelci has performed as soloist with all the major orchestras in Italy, including the Orchestra Filarmonica della Scala at La Scala, Milan, conducted by Seiji Ozawa and the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra. During recent seasons, Mondelci has frequently performed in Russia and now enjoys a particularly close relationship with the Moscow Chamber Orchestra.

The current visit to Armenia is not the first one for Mondelci. The saxophonist says he’s always glad to return to Armenia and play with Armenian musicians.

“Armenian melodies always have spiritual roots,” Mondelci told Public Radio of Armenia. Speaking about the peculiarities of Armenian composers’ works, the musician said “they are melancholic, but very kind, something that gives freedom to the soul,” he said.

The Amazing Race, the CBS Emmy Award-winning reality/competition show, will be broadcasting from Armenia on Friday, April 1.

For the first time in The Amazing Race history, the teams travel to Yerevan, Armenia.

An Egyptian man accused of hijacking and forcing a plane to land in Cyprus on Tuesday using a fake suicide belt has appeared in court in Cyprus, the BBC reports.

The Larnaca court ordered an eight-day detention for Seif Eldin Mustafa.

Possible charges include air piracy, kidnapping and threatening behaviour.

He did not speak, but gave a victory sign as he was driven away by police. Cypriot authorities have described him as “psychologically unstable”, saying the incident was not terrorism-related.

EgyptAir flight MS181 was carrying 56 passengers from Alexandria to Cairo, along with six crew and a security official, when it was diverted to Cyprus.

During a stand-off lasting more than six hours, almost all passengers and crew were freed unharmed as authorities negotiated with Mr Mustafa.

 

 

 

The investigation has revealed the sources of financing and the suppliers of weapons to the armed gang neutralized in Yerevan’s Nork Marash district in November 2015, Mickael Hambartsumyan, First Deputy Chief of the Investigation Department of the National Security Service, told reporters today.

Members of the group received funding amounting to $65,000, Hambartsumyan said, but refrained from mentioning any names. He said the funder is from Armenia and is one of those 33 charged. The official added that those who supplied the gang with weapons are also in custody.

According to preliminary results, the group plotted simultaneous attacks on the National Assembly building, the Government, the Presidential Palace and the Constitutional Court. The group had gathered information about 147 statesmen and politicians, including lawmakers, the first and second Presidents of Armenia.

The investigative body also possesses the video and the letter that had to be released after the attack.

“The facts prove that the gang was planning a military coup, violence against state institutions,” Mickael Hambartsumyan said.

Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan visited the Moderna Therapeutics Biotechnology Company in Massachusetts. Established in 2011, the Company researches and develops protein therapies based on novel messenger RNA (mRNA) technology. American Armenian Noubar Afeyan is one of its co-founders.

Moderna Therapeutics employs more than 300 people and has research centers in Cambridge, Massachusetts and Sweden’s capital Stockholm.

The same day President Sargsyan visited the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and its media laboratory. Serzh Sargsyan met with the Institute’s Rafael Reif, founder of the media laboratory Nicholas Negroponte and Executive Director of the “Luys” Foundation Jacqueline Karaaslanian. President Sargsyan also participated in the meeting of American Armenian scholars and recipients of Luys scholarships.

President of the Republic of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan Speech at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Education and Human Capital: The path to sustainable development

Honorable President Reif;
Dear Faculty and Scientists;
Dear Fellows and Alumni of the Luys Foundation;
I am honored to be here at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology—one of the world’s top universities. I am grateful to you for hosting me and my colleagues today. With a wealth of teaching tradition, innovative ideas, and achievements, your Institute has made an essential contribution to the development of humanity.

In the 155 years of its existence, this Institute has not only withstood and adapted to, but also become a leader of constant progress and change. This is confirmed by your numerous inventions, achievements, and Nobel Prizes.

By the way, I am very glad that today the President of the Institute expressed the opinion that one of the graduates of the MIT will certainly win the Noble Prize. Mr. Noubar Afeyan was a witness there.

Importantly, your work turns into practical projects that benefit the entire world. I am glad that in recent years about two dozen Armenian students have become members of this Great Family.

Capacities and opportunities of your technological labs are remarkable. I just saw it myself; it was very impressive and educational for me. Of course, I hear about a lot of things; but to hear is one thing, to see is another. As a matter of fact, the methodology of the Institute’s Lego Educational Lab is replicated at the Tumo Center for Creative Technologies in Yerevan, which aims at bringing out the intellectual capacity of children and young people and enhancing their competitiveness.

Cooperation of the Armenian partners with the media labs at the MIT has enriched Armenia’s education with innovative ideas and programs. The Ayb School founded in Armenia is indeed a product of such cooperation. Our quest for the new contents of education and the creation of environments has been strongly influenced by such well-known scholars as Seymour Papert and Bill Mitchell. This year, we’ve launched two fablabs in Armenia, which provide ample opportunities for innovation and creativity to the Armenian young people interested in engineering and technologies. The “flipped classroom” program developed here at the MIT has been implemented very productively in Armenia, truly changing the perceptions of students and faculty about the modern education.

Dear Friends;

Daron Acemoğlu, a very bright representative of your Institute, recently developed a theory that became famous around the world. His major argument is that economic prosperity essentially depends on the institutional development or, to be more precise, on the inclusiveness of economic and political institutions. Poverty and other evils affecting society can be defeated through these very institutions.

We have acquired experience that proves the validity of these arguments. It is very hard to carry out a reform if public trust in fairness has been undermined, or if public institutions do not reflect the true aspirations of society. It is very difficult to strengthen institutions if people do not have faith in their effectiveness, in the rule of law, and equality of all before the law – with no exception.

But who can strengthen the institutions if not people themselves? Throughout my political career, I’ve never had any doubt that the citizens of Armenia are bright and extraordinary individuals. The time has come for this creative potential to bear fruits.

I dream of Armenia where strong and well-established individuals do not spare efforts for creating stable state and public institutions. It will come true only if they are convinced that these institutions belong to each and every one of them. It is not the first time I speak about it publicly. Moreover, we are working consistently toward the implementation of this vision in Armenia.

Recently, we’ve made major amendments to our Constitution. The next one and half to two years will be extremely important in this context, because our country is going through a systemic change.

I am confident that these efforts will be productive and visible for our people. We will achieve it through our political will, and with Armenian citizens who take initiative, aspire, and are dedicated to their homeland. We will achieve it through the will of every citizen of Armenia. We all have to bring our share to this initiative.

I hope that we will be able to prove the validity of Daron Acemoğlu’s theory. I also hope that he receives the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences and once again brings acclaim to your Institute.

Dear Scientists,

The Republic of Armenia has been independent for a quarter of a century, having traveled a complex and complicated path of development. Our state-building process has been accompanied by a disastrous earthquake, a war and a blockade imposed on us by our neighbors, and regional turmoil. They, together with scarce natural resources, have limited the development prospects of our country. But they have also provided an opportunity to build a state anchored in a democratic system and a knowledge-based economy.

The difficulties certainly pose obstacles, but they have not stalled our progress; they have not broken the Armenian people’s will to build the homeland of our dreams. Our neighbors have closed our borders, but they have not been able to curtail the advance of our intellect. Natural resources tend to expire, while human resources tend to generate.

I am glad that young people in my country are actively engaged in discussions on high-tech achievements, research and development, and are contributing to future progress. Our universities annually educate 2,000 IT and high-tech specialists.

It is through human capital that Armenia has earned its place on the IT map of the world. Solutions developed by the Armenian professionals are now widely used in various countries around the world.

Armenia has a number of competitive advantages in this field. We are fully aware that a strong educational foundation is the key to longevity of this success. The mission of our education system is to produce students and researches who keep up with the latest international achievements.

I am proud that our schoolchildren have recently achieved excellent results in the international subject Olympiads. Last year, Armenian schoolchildren earned 20 medals—5 silver and 15 bronze—in international Olympiads in mathematics, physics, astronomy, and biology. We had similar performance in the past: 19 medals in 2014, 15 medals in 2013, and 16 medals in 2012. These are significant numbers for a small country like Armenia. I am really proud in our schoolchildren: their achievements are greater by large than the awards earned by our immediate neighbors in the South Caucasus. In fact, these numbers are close to the number of medals won by countries that exceed Armenia ten-fold in terms of population.

The National Program for Educational Excellence is being implemented in partnership with the University of Cambridge and the Institute of Education at the University College London. The program aims at making advanced education accessible for all Armenian schoolchildren. The program will educate and train thousands of teachers. The program will be implemented under a new educational platform called Ararat Baccalaureate. It is an Armenian-language system that is based on the international criteria and best reflects top achievements of the global education and rich traditions of the Armenian schooling which is based on our national values. This year, the Armenian graduates will take for the first time the Ararat Baccalaureate’s international Armenian-language exam administered in Armenia.

To educate a competitive new generation, we have created the Luys Foundation that provides scholarships to Armenian young people admitted to the world’s leading universities. Of course, there was a concern that we might lose our human resources. However, as I was once told by the late Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew of Singapore that even if our compatriots do not return home after their studies, they are still our assets abroad, through whom the world recognizes our country; they contribute in various ways to the development of both the host country and their home country.

This is quite true in the case of Armenia. Achievements of our compatriots outside of Armenia are our achievements, as well. Their reputation is an essential factor in promoting Armenia’s international standing.

Experience has proved that the absolute majority of the Luys’s alumni returned home after completing their education and engaged themselves in Armenia’s development. It’s a fact.

Our young people currently studying in the top U.S. universities are present here today. I am glad to see all of you in high spirits and a determined look in your eyes. I wish success to all of you in your important work. As we were developing the idea to create the Luys Foundation and fund the education of our young people admitted to the world’s top universities, we had one goal in mind: to bring home all progressive and new that is constantly created around the world, studied and developed in the world’s leading scientific centers. “Home” includes each and every one of you—our extended family called Armenians and Armenia. I believe that every one of the Luys’s alumni, having received the best education in top universities, ought to do three things in his or her life: have a house in Armenia, work or be engaged in an Armenia-based initiative in his or her professional field, and be a lifelong “ambassador” of Armenia and the Armenian language everywhere he or she goes.

For quite some time, we have been implementing a program of targeted government assistance in Armenia called Affordable Houses for Young Families. Through affordable mortgage loans at below-market rates, we enable young families to purchase an apartment with all modern amenities. Please, keep in mind that the officials in charge of this program are waiting for you, and it is the first office you should visit in Yerevan once you finish your studies.

Dear Friends;

We are now working to forge mutually-reinforcing ties between universities, R&D, and labor market. I am grateful to the dozens of representatives of the impressive pool of Armenian American scientists who accepted my invitation to be present here today from all corners of the USA. I am confident that you have no regrets, and just like me, you take inspiration from the achievements of the Luys’s current scholarship-recipients and alumni. I am confident that this meeting will pave the way for lasting and practical ties. Many of you do not closely cooperate with the traditional Armenian organizations, parties, or at times even the community. I hope that contacts in this format can become regular and set the foundation for your mutually-beneficial everyday cooperation by creating an informal network of Armenian American scientists.

This meeting is also important in terms of forging close cooperation between Armenian and foreign universities.

We would also be delighted to host MIT faculty and students in Armenia. You could learn about our achievements firsthand, interact with our faculty and students, and visit Armenian IT companies and free economic zones.

Our dream is to promote technological higher education in Armenia in cooperation with the world’s top universities. In this context, your engagement and support would be very valuable. We have enabled the brightest of our youth to be competitive by studying at the world’s top universities. We would now like to create similar opportunities for all young people in Armenia.

We plan to host a World Forum of Information Technologies in Armenia in 2019. We would be glad if your Institute was represented at this large-scale event. Given your experience, knowledge, and achievements in this field, I am confident that your participation will greatly benefit the Forum.

In conclusion, I wish to recognize Doctor Noubar Afeyan who is present here today. Thank you for the financial support to today’s event and for brilliantly moderating this scholarly discussion. Thank you, Mr. Afeyan, also for your dedication to the Armenian Homeland and your hard work.

Thank you for this warm reception. I wish everyone present here new surges of your creative minds, scientific revolutionary ideas, and multiple discoveries.

 

 

 

As a country presiding over the OSCE, Germany expresses its support to the implementation of new mechanisms for the peaceful settlement of the Karabakh conflict, German Ambassador to Armenia Matthias Kisler told on the sidelines of a conference in Yerevan titled “German Presidency of the OSCE: Dialogue, trust and reinforcement of security in the OSCE area.”

The Ambassador stressed the importance of investigation of incidents at teh Armenian-Azerbaijani border and the line of contact, and attached special significance to the responsibility of the conflicting parties.

“The Karabakh settlement principles have been agreed and are on the table of the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs, but the political will of the parties is needed for their implementation,” Amb. Kisler said.

“We strongly support the three Co-Chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group. It’s up to them to make new proposals on the issue. Easing of tensions at the Armenian-Azerbaijani border and the line of contact is very important to us. That’s why we insist on the investigation of border incidents in order to find out who’s violating the ceasefire,” he added.

– Garo Paylan, an Armenian member of the Turkish Parliament from the People’s Democratic Party (HDP), has presented an inquiry to Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu regarding the cabinet decision to expropriate a number of areas and structures in Diyarbakir (Dikranagerd), among them the Surp Giragos Armenian Church.

In his inquiry, which he also posted on his Facebook page, Paylan asked Davutoglu about the reason of “immediate expropriation” of the total 6,300 areas, what legislations are to be made under the act, and how the rights of the citizens living in Sur will be protected.

In addition, the inquiry requests to clarify whether the expropriation decision affects the Christian, the Assyrian and Chaldean churches. At the same time it is requested to clarify by what standards and laws the “under risk” areas were selected.

While clashes and curfews continue in Diyarbakir, the cabinet took an urgent expropriation decision. St. Giragos Church, the largest Armenian church in Middle East, is among the places in Sur province of Diyarbakir that are expropriated by the decision of the cabinet. The church was restored and opened to worship in 2011. With the same decision, Assyrian, Chaldean and Protestant churches are also expropriated.

The co-chairperson of the HDP, Figen Yuksekdag, slammed the government decision saying “They want to destroy the living spaces and houses of the people who survived death and the massacres in those places, in Sur, in Silopi [in in the southeastern province of Sırnak] today,” reported the Hurriyed Daily News on Tuesday.

“Where is the law, right and justice in this?” asked Yuksekdag, who also remarked about the injustice of arresting more than 600 residents in the areas during Norooz festivities earlier this month.

Meanwhile, Adnan Ertem, General Director of the Directorate General of Foundations of Turkey, which oversees landmarks in Turkey told the Agos newspaper that the expropriation envisions the preservation of the historic structures around which numerous illegal buildings were constructed.

“This expropriation decision is not about historical structures or civil architecture. On the contrary, this decision is made for making the historical structures more visible by demolishing the unplanned structures around them. After ’80s, unplanned urbanization has been increasing in Sur. We want to eliminate that. This is an authorization which will be exercised only if there is a need to protect the historical structures. Whether a church or a mosque, it doesn’t matter, we want to preserve the historical structures,” rationalized Ertem. “Rest assured. We only want to preserve the historical structures.”

As a results of this vast expropriation order, hundreds of thousands of Sur citizens in Diyarbakir will be driven from their homes, creating a refugee crisis within Turkey’s borders.

Diana Markosyan, – This is a photo of Movses Haneshyan, seeing a picture of his former home for the first time in a century. He started to cry and then sing: “My home. My Armenia.” He touched the image as he sang, then kissed his hands, as if it might take him back.

Movses last saw his home in 1915, when he was five. When soldiers entered his village, he escaped with his father holding his hand. “Half the road was covered with dead people,” he told photographer Diana Markosyan. This marked the beginning of what Armenians refer to as the “great crime” – the genocide of the Armenian people in their homeland, now part of modern-day Turkey.

During the first world war, the Ottoman empire initiated a policy of deportations, mass murder and rape to destroy the Armenian presence within its borders. By the war’s end, more than one million people had been killed. To date, 29 countries have officially recognised the killings as genocide, but the Ottomans’ heirs in the Turkish government don’t fully acknowledge it.

In 2013, I travelled to Armenia to meet Movses and nine other survivors to ask them about those distant days. They were all frail and elderly. Three were willing to help me: Movses, Yepraksia Barseghyan-Gevorgyan and Mariam Sahakyan. We established the exact coordinates of the villages they’d left behind. I then set out to find them. Movses, who is 105, gave me a map, and I followed it as closely as I could, finding everything he had described: the sea, the tree with the fruit he remembered eating, the goats he shepherded, even the rubble of what was once his church.

Yepraksia, now 108, had escaped her village by crossing a river nearby. She watched as Armenians were killed and thrown into the water. It was “red, full of blood”, she told me. Mariam, 102, escaped to Syria with her mother and older brother, whom they dressed as a girl for safety. They hid in the grass when the soldiers came. They walked at night for three days and hid during the day. But once they got to Syria, she was separated from her family.

I took a picture of what remained in each village, and last year I brought each one back for the survivors. They grabbed at them, as if by holding them close they could be transported back there.

I am Armenian, but I was born in Moscow and raised in America. This is a part of my history, which I knew about but never fully embraced. My great-grandfather survived the genocide because his neighbours, who were Turkish, hid him. So this series was personal, a way of trying to understand that part of myself.

I had asked each of the survivors what I could do for them. Movses asked me to find his church, which was now a ruin, and leave his portrait there. Yepraksia asked me to find her lost brother, even though all she had of him was a drawing. “He liked to put me on his shoulders and play with me at the orphanage,” she said. “I don’t remember much else about him except he has blue eyes, like mine.”

Mariam asked me to go to her village and bring some soil. She wanted to be buried in it. When I did so, she opened the package and said: “You’ve brought the smell of my village to me.”

Mino Raiola’s visit to Juventus was to discuss Moise Kean’s contract and Borussia Dortmund’s Henrikh Mkhitaryan,  reports.

The agent appeared in Turin yesterday, leading to a flurry of speculation that he was there to talk about a number of his clients including Paul Pogba, Romelu Lukaku and Zlatan Ibrahimovic.

However, Gazzetta dello Sport today reports that the two players at the centre of the discussion were youngster Moises Kean and Dortmund playmaker Mkhitaryan.

The latter is a long-time target of the Bianconeri and the outlet believes Raiola told Juve sporting director Fabio Paratici that the Armenian is willing to move to Italy.

The Old Lady underlined their interest in the attacking midfielder but the problem remains Dortmund, who consider him indispensable.

The Armenian national team will hold two friendlies as part of a training campaign in the United States.

On May 28 Armenia will face Guatemala at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum and will play against El Salvador on June 1. The match will take place at the StubHub Center stadium in Los Angeles.