On January 17, the RA Ministry of Diaspora hosted the presentation of ten books devoted to the Armenian Genocide and published under the sponsorship and by the order of the RA Ministry of Diaspora. The presentation was held on the sidelines of the weeklong program called “Hrant Dink: After 10 Years”.
Among the participants of the event were RA Minister of Diaspora Hranush Hakobyan, RA Deputy Minister of Justice Vigen Kocharyan, academician-secretary of the Armenian Studies and Social Sciences Section of the National Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Armenia (NAS RA) Yuri Suvaryan, as well as scholars and guests.
Greeting the gathered, the RA Minister of Diaspora mentioned the following: “We need to continue our efforts for recognition and condemnation of the Armenian Genocide and the elimination of the consequences. For years, the Ministry of Diaspora has been effectively collaborating with various centers for Armenian studies, and as a result, it has been conducting many studies.”
Touching upon the books published in 2016, Minister Hranush Hakobyan emphasized that the Ministry made the right selection of topics.
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In his speech, academician-secretary of the Armenian Studies and Social Sciences Section of the NAS RA Yuri Suvaryan expressed gratitude to the Ministry of Diaspora and Minister Hranush Hagopian for the effective cooperation established years ago. “I would like to stress the major role that the Ministry of Diaspora plays in the development of Armenology. Today, it is safe to talk about the so-called “political Armenology”. In 2016, more books devoted to the Armenian Genocide were published under the sponsorship and by the order of the Ministry, and our current objective is to develop mechanisms for restitution for the Armenian Genocide.”
RA Deputy Minister of Justice Viken Kocharian expressed gratitude to the Ministry of Diaspora for the cooperation and presented the English version of the book “The Armenian Genocide in International Legal Documents”. The book contains fundamental international legal documents about the Armenian Genocide that are related to the concept of “genocide”, the process of international recognition of the Armenian Genocide and the rulings of international tribunals in relation to the issue.
Director of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the NAS RA, academician of the NAS RA Ruben Safrastyan touched upon Anush Hovhannisian’s monograph “The Process of Deprivation of the Belongings of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire and in Kemalist Turkey”. Based on Turkish documents, the book examines several major issues related to the policy on forceful deprivation by the Ottoman Empire and Kemalist Turkey of the belongings of the Armenian people.
Expressing gratitude, the author, Anush Hovhannisian stated that the orders for such studies provide scholars with the best opportunity for research.
Director of the Institute of History of the NAS RA, academician of the NAS RA Ashot Melkonian presented Armen Marukyan’s book “Issue of Overcoming the Material Consequences of the Armenian Genocide” and Ruben Sahakian’s monograph entitled “The Military-Political and Administrative-Economic Situation of Western Armenia”.
Director of the “Center for Research on Western Armenian Issues” Scientific-Research Foundation Haikazun Alvrtsian talked about the book entitled “Hamshen and the Armenians of Hamshen: Current Issues”. The purpose of the book is to sum up and briefly present readers to the major episodes in the history of the Armenians of Hamshen, providing the opportunity to become familiar with the difficult and contradictory, but at the same time heroic and often tragic history of that sector of the Armenian nation.
Deputy Dean of the Faculty of Oriental Studies at Yerevan State University, Turkologist Ruben Melkonian presented the book “The Anti-Armenian Orientation of the Cooperation between the Republic of Turkey and the Turkish Diaspora” and the collection of materials of the conference on “Denial of the Armenian Genocide in the Context of the Neo-Ottoman Ideology”.
Director of the Abeghian Institute of Literature of the NAS RA Vardan Devrikian touched upon the subsequent “Literary Diaspora-2015” yearbook, which is dedicated to the Centennial of the Armenian Genocide.
In his book “The 50th Anniversary of the Armenian Genocide and the Second Republic”, for the first time ever, Avag Harutyunian presents and analyzes the historic and political events for commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide in the Second Republic of Armenia in 1965 through the wide and comprehensive use of archival sources, presses and literature.
Doctor of Political Science, Professor Levon Shirinian talked about the book entitled “The Geopolitical Context of the Armenian Genocide and the Evolution of the Armenian Question” (Levon Shirinian, Emil Ordukhanian, Haik Sukiasian).
Director of the National Archives of the Republic of Armenia Amatuni Virabian briefly expressed his opinion on the books.
French sociologist Lorens Riter presented her and her husband, Max Sivaslian’s book “Those Who Escaped the Sword: The Incognito and Islamized Armenians of Turkey”, which was published in Paris and translated into Turkish by the Hrant Dink Foundation.