MINISTRY OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS OF THE REPUBLIC OF ARMENIA
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PRESS AND INFORMATION DEPARTMENT
Telephone: +37410. 544041 ext. 202
Fax: +37410. 565601
Email: press@mfa.am

PRESS RELEASE

08-10-2007

Minister Oskanian Speaks About Rural Development at Armenia Fund Gala in NY

Armenia’s Minister of Foreign Affairs was the keynote speaker at the Armenia
Fund USA’s 15th anniversary Gala Dinner on Saturday, October 6, in New York
City, at the UN Headquarters.

The Minister, who is a member of the Armenia Fund Board of Trustees, and the
Board’s appointed liaison for the Armenia Fund Rural Development Program,
spoke about the economic challenges facing Armenia and the promise of a
program that focuses on the economic and infrastructure development of
Armenia’s rural communities.

The full text of the Minister’s remarks appears below.

Dear Friends,

I have come here to this building every year for the last 10 years to
address my colleagues from around the world as we explore ways for the
United Nations to achieve peace and prosperity for all our countires.

So, it is especially gratifying to be here this evening, in this same
building, to talk to my fellow Armenians, about the Armenia Fund and our
shared vision for peace and prosperity for our country, Armenia.

Last week, in my speech downstairs in the General Assembly hall, I said I
wanted to break the unspoken rule and although the representative of a small
country, I wanted to talk about what the big powers always talk about: the
global, complex challenges of the 21st century – disarmament, arms control,
climate change, tensions between powers, and even the price of oil – and how
the disorder in the world, the new fragmentation, and new dangers affect us,
the small countries, even more than they affect the great powers.

Here today, with you, I am going to break another unspoken rule, and do
outright fundraising for the Republic of Armenia.

I am not a fundraiser. I am the foreign minister of a country that has
managed to overcome obstacles, compete successfully and ensure our rightful
place in our region. We are respected in international organizations as a
capable partner. Today, we have the strong foundation required to build a
secure and prosperous country, of which all Armenians around the world will
be proud. We have an open economy and solid legislation. We have better
social and educational conditions than any of our neighbors. Don’t take my
word for it, it’s what the United Nations and the Heritage Foundation and
the World Bank say.

But my message to the Diaspora always, and to you today, is, don’t take this
for granted. Don’t take Armenia and Karabakh for granted, don’t take our
ability to survive and prosper for granted.

We have worked hard to keep the peace in Karabakh, we have worked hard to
come out ahead of our neighbors in almost every important economic index, we
have worked hard to relieve emigration and even achieve a modest level of
in-migration. We have worked hard to reach this day. We must work hard to
consolidate what we have and harder still to go forward.

But there are two problems. One is time, and the other is money.

First, the problem of time: If over these 16 years our neighbors were
searching for ways to uncover and utilize their potential, today they have
begun to reap the benefits of their resources. It will be harder now for us
to compete. We must strive to strengthen Armenia’s geostrategic and economic
security. We must work to assure comprehensive and even development for our
country. The urban areas are growing. The rural areas are not. Our growth is
based on such a low starting point that even with our great improvements,
more than one third of our population lives in poverty and half of Armenia’s
poor live in rural communities and have not benefited from Armenia’s overall
growth.

Don’t get me wrong. Armenia will grow and prosper. Don’t doubt that.
Governments come and go, but the people of Armenia, those who have withstood
difficulties that cannot be imagined, have and will survive and flourish. We
always have.

But do we do this in two generations, or three generations, or five
generations? Or do we capitalize on today’s fast growing economy?

Do we have the luxury of waiting generations for hope to reach our villages?
Or do we empower the villagers protecting our frontiers, make them feel
protected, give them a hand up, help them build homes, earn an income, and
live a life of dignity?

The answer is obvious. We don’t have time to waste, and to jumpstart rural
growth, we need to talk about money.

Look, I remember when Armenia’s national budget was $350 million a year. Ten
years later, it’s over a $2.5 billion. That’s amazing growth for us. But, by
international standards, it’s nothing. Even as we’ve done away with the
earthquake zone, rebuilt Yerevan, financed rebuilding in Karabakh, begun
paying our civil servants regularly, and invested heavily in our rural
areas, Armenia’s resources are not enough. That is why the Armenia Fund was
created – to build on the resources of Armenians everywhere to provide basic
infrastructure and development support that the Government can’t afford.

In the 21st century, Armenians are not orphans and survivors looking for
kindness and sympathy. Today, we are looking for philanthropy, not charity.
The Armenia Fund is more than charity, it is more than helping people, it is
building a country.
The Armenia Fund will utilize the generosity of the Diaspora to spur
strategic growth in Armenia, starting from the villages.

Those of you here remember that the Armenia Fund’s first years were focused
on securing emergency assistance and fuel.

By 1996, the Armenia Fund began to take on strategic projects – first, the
road that linked Karabakh to Armenia, then later, the road that linked
Karabakh’s different regions to each other directly, for the first time
without dependence on Azerbaijani roads. That was the second phase of the
Armenia Fund’s development.

Armenia Fund’s 15 years of accomplishments have been possible because the
Armenian people around the world have understood their responsibility to
support statebuilding in Armenia and Karabakh.

Today, Armenia Fund is entering its third phase – away from emergency
assistance, and toward complex, comprehensive development assistance. The
next 15 years of good work will be possible because the Armenian people
around the world will seize the opportunity to actually participate in
nationbuilding and statebuilding.

This is the year, this is the decade when we must demonstrate that people
are more valuable than oil. Oil in our region will peak in half a decade and
wane in two decades. But systematic economic growth and our people’s
commitment and strength will sustain us for far longer.

That is why the Armenia Fund has adopted the Rural Development Program for
Armenia and Karabakh. Our villages will have decent roads, drinking water,
irrigation water, gas and electricity, access to schools, to health centers,
to telephone service, television and the internet. So that they can afford
these services, we will work with the villagers to advance sustainable
economic development.

This is nationbuilding – one village at a time. Give tonight, give to the
telethon on November 22, give generously.

Give so that the villagers who wake up in the village of Azatamut and stare
across the trenches at soldiers pointing in their direction, know that their
back is covered.

Give so that the residents of Jrapi village are too busy to be intimidated
by the imposing Turkish flag laid out in stone on the hillside right across
their border.

Give so that grandfathers and grandsons are no longer alone in our villages,
and they can call their sons and fathers to come home.

Give, because your children’s and grandchildren’s identity is tied
inextricably to a democratic and prosperous Armenia.

Give, because the children of those who prospered and thrived in other
countries now want to come home.

Give, because for the first time in history, we have entered a new
millennium successful militarily, politically and economically, secure in
independent statehood.

Give, because Karabakh is ours and even as we work around the negotiating
table to formalize the historic, legal, moral fact that Karabakh is
Armenian, we must continuously demonstrate that Karabakh is a secure,
democratic political entity and that it is viable.

Give, because our resources are not under the earth, but around the earth.
You who inhabit lands beyond our borders are our limitless,
self-perpetuating, resource. You are Armenia. You must participate in its
creation, and do this wholeheartedly and completely — not with conditional
or partial use of your potential, but rallying all your resources, realizing
that you are doing so for your own survival as well as Armenia’s.