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PRESS RELEASE
Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Armenia
Contact: Information Desk
Tel: (374-10) 52-35-31
Email: information@armeniaForeignMinistry.com
Web:

~LNew Answers to Old Questions: Armenians in the 21st century¹ is the
title of a forum which will take place on the second and third days
of the Third ArmeniaDiaspora Conference to be held, from September
18th -20th in Yerevan.

More than a dozen international experts and an equal number of
specialists from Armenia will participate in the first-of-its kind
forum.

Following the first day¹s session which will deal with general
Armenia-Diaspora and the new Rural Poverty Eradication Program,
the forum will focus on the old issues of identity, culture,
belonging, homeland-diaspora relations, but from the point of view
of a transnational people living in a globalized 21st century world.

The first panel of the forum, to be held on Tuesday, September 19,
is entitled Nation, State and Identity in the 21st Century, and will
explore new approaches to understanding the evolution of culture and
identity in relation to the diaspora, as well as Armenia. Khachig
Tololyan, editor of the Toronto, Canada-based Diaspora, A Journal
of Transnational Studies, and a professor of Comparative Literature
at Wesleyan University, will open the forum and moderate this first
session which will consider such questions as whether diasporan
political and institutional development can occur without a homeland,
whether the homeland can develop independently of the diaspora,
and whether the diaspora can develop outside of its traditional
structures and institutions. The role of language, literature, arts,
religion and history will also be discussed in relationship to how
they define citizenship and culture.

Participating in this panel are Chandrashekhar Bhat of the Center
for the Study of the Indian Diaspora in Hyderabad, India and Tsypylma
Darieva of Humboldt University in Berlin. Challenges of Identity will
be presented from two perspectives: Gagik Harutyunyan, President of
the Constitutional Court of Armenia, will present a view from Armenia,
and Khatchik Der Ghougassian, a political analyst from Argentina will
present a view from the Diaspora.

The second panel will address the mechanics of diaspora-homeland
relations.

Reciprocal perceptions of Armenians from Armenia and from the Diaspora,
as well as the need to make both socio-economic and political relations
a two-way street will be addressed by Harutyun Marutyan of Armenia¹s
National Academy of Science¹s Institute of Archeology and Ethnography
and Gloria Totoricaguena from the Center for Basque Studies at the
University of Nevada, Reno. In the same panel, Yevgeny Kuznetsov, an
economist with the World Bank in Washington, will speak on Diasporas
bringing know-how and networks to the homeland.

Razmik Panossian, Director of Policy, Programs and Planning of Rights
and Democracy, of Montreal, will be discussing whether mechanisms
and approaches be created in the future to direct cultural and social
developments toward ideal Homeland-Diaspora configuration.

Repatriation and territory of common identity will be the theme of
the third session of the forum covering topics such as emigration,
repatriation, the role of government in these areas, and whether
existing trends might be reversed.

Edward Melkonian, a Historian at the Slavonic University in Armenia,
will be moderating the session. Armenuhi Stepanyan, from the National
Institute of Sciences¹ Institute of Archeology and Ethnography, will
talk about Lessons of Post-War Repatriation in Armenia. This year,
2006, is the 60th anniversary of the year when the largest number
of Armenians repatriated to Soviet Armenia, in the Stalin years. A
look at current international migration will be presented by Sossi
Kasbarian of the School of Oriental and African Studies in London.

Gevorg Poghosian, Sociologist, will speak on the causes, consequences
and prospects for emigration from Armenia. Avetik Chalabian, a young
economist with the McKinsey Corporation, in Russia, will cover New
Migration, New Investments and New Diasporans.

In the same session, Judge Eduard Muratian of Armenia will speak
about the perspectives, prospects, promises and possibilities of
dual citizenship.

The final session of the forum will be held on Wednesday morning,
September 20, when four professionals from diverse backgrounds
will take a look at the Diaspora in 2020 and will explore possible
scenarios. This segment will look at what facts and analyses are
prerequisites to future programming and policies.

Moderator Noubar Afeyan of the US, one of the leaders of Armenia 2020,
will present four keynote speakers each of whom will present their view
of the Diaspora in 2020: Arman Jilavian, Editor-in-Chief of Nexion
Publications in Russia; Levon Abrahamian from the Armenian National
Academy of Sciences¹ Institute of Archeology and Ethnography; Bedros
Terzian of Petrostrategies in France, Lebanese-born, and a member
of the Board of Trustees of the Armenia Fund; and Tom Samuelian,
an American-Armenian who has been residing in Armenia for a decade
and heads the American University of Armenia Law Center.

Following each panel, a group of invited discussants representing
different communities, ages, and backgrounds, will comment on the
speakers¹ theses.

There will be simultaneous translation into four languages. Everyone
is welcome to participate. For more information and
last-minute registration, visit
< iaforeignministry.am> .

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From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress