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international

Q: What are Armenia's main areas of "Having succeeded in
interest here in Geneva? The Foreign Minister of Armenia will
Geneva has a very vibrant international the political realm, speak on these issues, including on our
community. As a permanent bid for the membership, at the June
representative in Geneva, I cover the government session of the Human Rights Council,
the United Nations and the other where we also plan to open a photo
international organizations. This now wants to push exhibition of the Velvet Revolution and
includes, but is not limited to ICRC, to have a side event on the democratic
UNHCR, ITU, WHO, ILO many other transition of Armenia.
organizations with which Armenia forward the economic
has a decades long tradition of close And of course, when we talk about
cooperation. And I have another hat to development in Armenia's foreign policy priorities first
wear - soon I will be accredited also as a and foremost it is about the peaceful
bilateral Ambassador to Switzerland. a revolutionary resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh
As for Geneva then it includes also the conflict. Certainly, in Geneva we put
Human Rights Council, where Armenia man ner. more emphasis on the human rights
is trying to be elected for the next three and humanitarian aspects of the
years. So, one of my important tasks conflict, on respect of the fundamental
here is to promote Armenia's candidacy for the Council. The freedoms of the people of Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh)
elections will take place in New York in October. and full implementation of their inalienable right to self-
determination. The denial for respecting these rights of
As the Human Rights Council is based here in Geneva, the the people of Nagorno-Karabakh and the use of force and
team here also presents Armenia's approaches and vision in coercive measures against them created the conflict and
a clear and meaningful manner so that other countries will thus its settlement should take full account of the security of
know what we are going to do when we are elected. Nagorno-Karabakh and its status based on the legally binding
expression of free will of the people of Nagorno-Karabakh.
Last year, Armenia passed through fundamental changes
in terms of strengthening its democracy and promotion of Q: What about the economic situation since the revolution.
human rights. The protest movement of April/May led to what Has it improved?
became known as the "Armenian Velvet Revolution". It was You are asking a good question. As a rule, after a revolution
a peaceful and non-violent movement that involved tens of in any country, the economic situation may change to
thousands of people. It brought in a new government, which worse than before because of the change of government. In
came with a strong mandate from the people. I would also like Armenia, this was not the case. It shows that the institutions
to mention that at the forefront of this protest movement in are functioning well and that they can absorb this kind of
Armenia were youth and women, some of the latter with their shock - a revolution. The GDP growth of Armenia is one
baby strollers and children. Armenia was on the headlines of of the best in Europe. The World Competitive Index of the
the world major media outlets and The Economist magazine World Economic Forum, places Armenia in nineteenth place
named Armenia "a country of the year". Afterwards, we went out of 140 countries. There are also other figures showing that
through a period of snap parliamentary elections, which the economy is doing fine.
international observers followed closely. They concluded
that the elections respected all the international standards on I would also like to mention that the government has
fundamental freedoms and enjoyed broad public trust. The proclaimed that now the time has come for the revolution
ruling party won more than 70 % of the votes. also in our economy. Having succeeded in the political realm,
the government now wants to push forward the economic
Now, the Government is trying to do its utmost to fulfill development in a revolutionary manner.
the aspirations of the people of Armenia at building a more
democratic society with the promotion of human rights We have several fields of our economy that are very important.
based upon good governance and the rule of law in addition A lot of attention is paid to high tech and innovation, which
to fighting corruption and strengthening the country's is an area of the economy that is developing at a rate of 20 %
economic profile. annually, and which is responsible for 6 % of our GDP.
The innovation and creative education attach particular
So, I think that in this environment, it is a high time for attention of the Government efforts. We have a start-up
Armenia to become a member of the Human Rights Council, programme called TUMO, which is a place for creative
both to learn more from international experience in the field education for youth and children. It is a sort of after-school
of human rights and, if we can, in some way or another, to programme where kids can get acquainted with the novelties of
contribute from our experience to the international human the high-tech and robotics. It is a very innovative educational
rights agenda. I hope that our international partners will platform, which attracts the interest of other nations as well.
support us in this venture. Recently, the TUMO center was also set up in Paris, another

14 DIVA - INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMAT