Student Operated Press, FL
March 24 2006
Republic of Armenia to Sign $235 Million Millennium Challenge Compact
by Judyth Piazza CEO (Editor)
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Chair of the Board of the
Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), will make remarks at the
signing of the Millennium Challenge Compact between the United States
and the Republic of Armenia, on Monday, March 27, 2006 at 4:00 p.m.,
in the Benjamin Franklin Room, at the Department of State.
MCC Chief Executive Officer Ambassador John Danilovich and Armenian
Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian will also make remarks. The $235.65
million Compact will be signed by Ambassador Danilovich and Armenia’s
Minister of Finance and Economy, Vardan Khachatryan.
Armenia’s Millennium Challenge Compact aims to reduce rural poverty
through a sustainable increase in the economic performance of the
agricultural sector. The Compact consists of two investments: a Rural
Road Rehabilitation Project and an Irrigated Agriculture Project. The
program will directly impact 75 percent of the rural population and
is expected to significantly increase the annual incomes of the rural
poor.
The Millennium Challenge Corporation, a U.S. government corporation
designed to work with some of the poorest countries in the world, is
based on the principle that aid is most effective when it reinforces
good governance, economic freedom, and investments in people that
promote economic growth and elimination of extreme poverty.
This event will be open to the press.
Pre-set time for cameras: 3:15 p.m. from the 23rd Street entrance.
Final access time for all press: 3:30 p.m. from the 23rd Street
entrance.
Media representatives may attend this briefing upon presentation of
one of the following: (1) a U.S. Government-issued identification
card (Department of State, White House, Congress, Department of
Defense, or Foreign Press Center), (2) a media-issued photo
identification card, or (3) a letter from their employer on
letterhead verifying their employment as a journalist, accompanied by
an official photo identification (driver’s license or passport).
Source: US State Dept.