Yearbook 1999
Armenia. Visit Countryaah official website to get information about the capital city of Armenia. The Armenian nation was shocked this fall by the assassination of Prime Minister Vazgen Sarkisian, Parliament Speaker Karen Demirtjian and six other leading politicians. On October 27, five armed men stormed into Parliament in the capital Yerevan and opened fire while the Prime Minister spoke. The assailants took the hostage, but gave up after President Robert Kotjarjan promised that their leaders would speak through television. He said at his appearance that he and the other assailants wanted to wake the nation and to make the residents react to the economic mismanagement in the country.
- Also see Abbreviationfinder.org to see the acronym of ARM which stands for Armenia and other definitions of this 3-letter abbreviation.
However, there were speculations that the attack was a reaction to the fact that Armenia seemed close to a compromise with neighboring Azerbaijan over the Armenian enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh in Azerbaijan. Armenia was said to be prepared to give up some land occupied in the war against Azerbaijan in the early 1990s if Armenians in the enclave could exchange security guarantees. At the end of the year, one of President Kotjarjan’s chief advisers was arrested on suspicion of involvement in the act.
The murdered Prime Minister’s brother Aram Sarkisian was appointed by the president in November as new head of government. Vazgen Sarkisian had held his post for almost five months after the parliamentary elections held in May. The election was won by the newly formed center-left alliance Mjasnutiun (Unity) with just over 41% of the vote. The alliance included the Armenian Republican Party, for which Sarkisian was leader, and the Armenian People’s Party. In second place came the Armenian Communist Party and then Nationalist Dashnak. According to international observers, there were irregularities in the elections.
In November, President Kotjarjan announced a new foreign policy line by proposing, together with Azerbaijan, a security pact in the southern Caucasus comprising Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Turkey, the Russian Federation and the United States. The pact would include involve withdrawal of all foreign troops, including the Russian, from the area. So far, Armenia has been an ally of the Russian Federation in the region, and over 4,000 Russian soldiers are in Armenia. The proposal also brought about a historical re-thinking by the pact linking Armenia with the traditional enemies Turkey and Azerbaijan. Due to the conflict around Nagorno-Karabakh, these two neighboring countries are carrying out a trade boycott against Armenia, which has had severe consequences for the Armenian economy.
LITERATURE
Within the Armenian Church, a flourishing religious literature developed in the native language, a literary tool that was previously non-existent. The first works were translations from Greek of sacred texts, but also of works of secular science, of Aristotle, Porphyry and several others. In the so-called golden period (407-450) a linguistic and stylistic perfection was reached which was no longer surpassed. An original production also began, in which Eznik of Kolb, reviser of the translation of the Bible and author of a treatise against the theories of pagan sects, excelled; historiography was important in the same period (especially Elisha Vardapet and Moses of Corene).
After a few relatively poor centuries, the 10th century. it marked a literary revival in connection with the flourishing of important monasteries. Very famous is that of Narek, to which is connected the great figure of Gregory, mystical theologian and poet; and alongside him his father Chosroe the Great, the abbot Ananias, Stephen Asolik, and other ecclesiastical and historical writers. The following two centuries continue to present a high intellectual level: in the century. 11th lived Gregorio Pahlavuni, a prolific polygraph and translator of Plato, and the chronicler Aristakes of Lastivert; in the 12th century. the katholikòs Narses Claiense, poet, theologian and musician, and Mechitar Gosh, compiler of the Armenian Corpus iuris stand out.
A period of decline for Armenian literature follows, up to the 18th century, whose second revival, with the contemporary rise of Armenological studies in Europe, is due to the abbot Mechitar of Sebaste (1676-1749), who transplanted to Venice (1717) on the island of San Lazzaro a still thriving hearth of studies and original literary production (alongside it is the Mechitarist seat of Vienna). Among the continuers of Mechitar (18th- 19th century) we remember M. Ciamcian, Armenia Bagratuni, L. Alishan. Outside the Mechitarist group, isolated aristocratic figures of poets and thinkers emerge, such as, for example, Armenia Ciobanian (1872-1955) and L. Chanth (1880-1951).
The early twentieth century marks a period of great splendor for Armenian literature, as evidenced by the poets D. Varužan, V. Terian, E. Č‛arenc ‛, H. T‛umanian, M. Mecarenc‛, the prose writers Intra Širvanzade (pseud. by Armenia Movsisian), G. Zohrap. After the First World War and the tragedy of the Armenian genocide, an Armenian Soviet literature and a literature of the communities of the diaspora developed which only after the collapse of the Soviet Union were gradually recomposed. Among the major poets who established themselves in the Armenia Soviet lyric poet Armenia Isahakian, revered as ‘The Master’, and P. Sevak (1924-1971), innovator of traditional themes and forms, deserve a mention. Among the Armenians of the diaspora, mainly active in Paris, Beirut, Tehran and Istanbul, the surrealist poet N. Sarafian stands out; the novelist Z. Vorbuni, the poet and prose writer Š. Šahnur.
