ARF BUREAU MEMBER MEETS WITH BIDEN

1_3/30/2009_1
Monday March 30, 2009

VINA DEL MAR, Chile (ARF Press Service)–Armenian Revolutionary
Federation Bureau member Mario Nalbandian Sunday met with
Vice-President Joe Biden during the sixth Conference of Progressive
Leaders, which was being held in South America for the first time.

Nalbandian, who is the ARF’s representative to the Socialist
International where he is a co-chair of the CIS, Caucasus and Black
Sea Committee, discussed pressing issues of concern to Armenia and
Armenians.

The Conference of Progressive Leaders was attended by British Prime
Minister Gordon Brown, Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg,
Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero and Presidents
Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva of Brazil, Cristina Fernandez of Argentina
and Tabare Vazquez of Uruguay.

Chile’s socialist President Michelle Bachelet hosted the summit, which
opened Friday with a seminar on "a progressive response to the global
crisis," organized by the Policy Network, an international think tank,
and Chile’s Instituto Igualdad (Equality Institute).

Other participants in the gathering were Organization of American
States (OAS) secretary general Jose Miguel Insulza, and the executive
secretary of the Economic Commission for Latin America (ECLAC),
Alicia Barcena.

The progressive leaders summits, the first of which took place in 1999
at the urging of then President Bill Clinton and then British Prime
Minister Tony Blair, bring together heads of state and government
and other high-ranking government and international officials with
ties to socialist, social democratic, labor and democratic parties
around the world.