MAY 3 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Armenian president Serzh Sargsyan officially appointed a new government which analysts said would be better placed to propel the country into the Russia-led Customs Union. The previous government resigned over its unpopular pension plans, a scheme the new government has watered down.
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(News report from Issue No. 183, published on May 7 2014)
APRIL 27 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Officials from Russia’s military arrived in Yerevan for talks with their Armenian counterparts, media reported. According to reports, the talks focused on strategy, military planning and the potential joint use of force. Armenia and Russia have been pulling increasingly close together.
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(News report from Issue No. 182, published on April 30 2014)
APRIL 25 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Armenia’s state statistics agency released figures which showed that economic activity in the first three months of the year dropped by 0.2%, media reported. The biggest fall was in industrial output. Armenia’s economy is struggling with the after effects of the global economic crisis.
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(News report from Issue No. 182, published on April 30 2014)
APRIL 29 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — It may not have been the full admission of guilt that many people in Armenia want, but Turkish PM Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s statement on the death of thousands of Armenians in 1915 broke new ground.
Turkey’s leaders have always denied accusations of genocide against Armenians living in the east of the country when the Ottoman Empire started to break up.
But on this occasion, Mr Erdogan’s comments were seen as unusually conciliatory.
“Having experienced events which had inhumane consequences, such as relocation, during the First World War, should not prevent Turks and Armenians from establishing compassion and mutually humane attitudes towards one another,” media quoted Mr Erdogan as saying.
His reference to relocation was to the forced deportation of millions of Armenians from their homeland around Van.
Although some pressure groups in Armenia dismissed Mr Erdogan’s statement as politicking others were more accepting. The importance for Armenia cannot be understated.
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(News report from Issue No. 182, published on April 30 2014)
APRIL 10 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Armenia signed a deal with Russia that will ease Armenian migrant workers’ permits in Russian cities, media reported. The deal is another sign of the economic benefits that Armenia is in line to receive after agreeing to join the Russia-led Customs Union. Remittances from Russia are an important part of Armenia’s economy.
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(News report from Issue No. 180, published on April 16 2014)
APRIL 13 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Armenian president Serzh Sargsyan named the speaker of the parliament, Hovik Abrahamyan, as the new PM.
Mr Abrahamyan’s brief is a tough one.
His predecessor quit abruptly at the start of the month the day after the Constitutional Court ruled that the government’s landmark pension reforms were illegal.
The reforms have been deeply unpopular, as are pension reforms throughout the world which try to make people work for longer and accept a smaller payout.
That mess, essential for sorting out Armenia’s damaged social security system, has to be sorted out.
There’s also the small matter of a vote of no confidence to deal with later this month. Armenia’s economy is stalling and its foreign policy at times feels adrift from its people — it has lurch towards Russia’s Customs Union at the expense of greater EU integration.
Mr Abrahamyan, a 56-year-old economist who has been speaker of parliament since 2008, is going to have to prove a tough operator in his new job.
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(News report from Issue No. 180, published on April 16 2014)
APRIL 10 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Armenian president Serzh Sargsyan said that he would not stand for a third consecutive term. His announcement comes just as his government are at a low ebb. Mr Sargsyan is facing low opinion poll ratings and had to appoint a new PM after his ally of six years. Tigran Sargsyan resigned this month.
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(News report from Issue No. 180, published on April 16 2014)
APRIL 10 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — A landmine killed three Azerbaijani soldiers on the border between Nagorno-Karabakh, a disputed region controlled by Armenia-backed separatists, and Azerbaijan, media reported. The deaths highlight the fragile cease-fire that covers Nagorno-Karabakh.
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(News report from Issue No. 180, published on April 16 2014)
YEREVAN/Armenia, APRIL 16 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — It was a mild Saturday evening in mid-March in a French café in central Yerevan. A group of young friends, well young-ish, had sat down to discuss the biggest news topic of the week — the revolution in Ukraine.
“We should take lessons from the young Ukrainians who are fighting for their independence, for democracy, for human rights,” said Ani Kirakosyan, a 30-year-old human rights defender.
Jazz music floated across the room.
This sort of political conversation in Armenia is important. Last year, at the same time as Ukraine’s former president Viktor Yanukovich chose to side with Russia over the European Union, Armenia’s leadership was doing the same. Since then Armenia, which hosts a large Russian military base, has supported Russia in the UN over its annexation of Crimea. Russia’s other supporters include North Korea and Syria.
“They (Ukrainians) have now chosen the EU,” Kirakosyan continued with a hint of anger in her tone. “At first we were also angry but we did not follow our dream. We stopped at some point.””
Lusine Baghdasaryan, a 32-year-old economist nodded. She said apathy was the problem. “I just don’t believe we can do it. It seems nothing now makes us angry,” she said.
But, said 28-year-old Syrian-Armenian Hayk Ghukasyan, can the US and the West be counted on to help out? “There are no guarantees. Just look at what the US did with Syria,” he said.
Ghukasyan fled from Syria’s civil war and is now struggling to find a job in Armenia.
“We are a small country with the tough and unresolved territorial problem of Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh),” he said. “If Azerbaijan smells fear they could resume war.”
People in Armenia are frustrated with their leaders but they also feel that they have few options. Geo-politically Armenia needs friends, and, for most, that means siding with Russia.
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(News report from Issue No. 180, published on April 16 2014)
APRIL 2 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Consumer prices in Armenia were 4.6% higher in March compared to the same period in 2013, media quoted the state’s statistics centre as saying. Food prices rose by 2.6%, tobacco and alcohol by 7.3% and non-food items by 3%.
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(News report from Issue No. 179, published on April 9 2014)