The 89th “Rose Roth” seminar of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly hosted in Yerevan ended on June 20. The seminar entitled “Security and stability in the South Caucasus. Promoting lasting peace in the region” covered 8 sessions. The seminar was attended by the delegations from member states of NATO Parliamentary Assembly and observers. The seminar was also attended by observers from Nagorno-Karabakh, while Azerbaijan and Turkey were missing.
In the interview with Aravot.am and News.am, NA MP Tevan Poghosyan said that at the seminar, the Armenian delegation reached its goals. “During the two years, visiting Azerbaijan and Georgia as an MP, it was clear that the NATO PA delegates have very large gap of information about Armenia. It should be mentioned that in this sense we have managed to achieve all the tasks that we had put before us: we created an opportunity not only for the public authorities to speak, but also for the expert community and the opposition views to hear, and along with it, the representatives of Nagorno-Karabakh to raise questions and receive answers. In that sense, I am confident that they will leave not only with Armenia in their mind, but also with a greater information base about our region, in a changed sense, because what they knew until now, it seems to me, is not what it is.”
He noted that the seminar was unprecedented by the number of the attendees. This many deputies from abroad had not gone to Georgia and Azerbaijan. About 60 delegates from abroad visited Yerevan to attend the seminar, and the total number of the attendees amounted to 160 people. “This seminar was unprecedented both geographically and by the number of the attendance. The tasks that we had put in front of us to speak on these issues, rather than only about Armenian and Armenia, but also to cover regional issues, the issue of the international challenges, we have achieved”. The deputy noted that when the seminar was held in Georgia, they were talking about the Georgian approaches and their conflicts, Baku was “in war”, while in Yerevan, the delegates were able to speak openly of the situation. “Here, no one was yelling and shaking a piece of paper, no one was promised to be killed tomorrow. They were able to openly ask questions and get answers. In that sense, we were able to solve the task put in front of us.”
Tevan Poghosyan added that during the days of the 89th “Rose Roth” seminar, the delegates visited Matenadaran, Tsitsernakaberd and Yerevan Brandy Factory. “During the visit to the Genocide Memorial, all of them considered their duty to leave signatures in the Memorial Book, because often when going to a place like this, they do not know that there is such a chance. When they went, they saw the exhibition and heard everything, you could read in their eyes that they indeed felt internal feelings and changes. We were able to present Armenia in that sense too.” The next “Rose Roth” seminar will be held in Yerevan, in 2020.
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Ami CHICHAKYAN
