Nouvelles d’Arménie Magazine: How did AGBU experience and perceive the Velvet Revolution?  
Berge Sétrakian: We followed the events with a lot of interest. It is indeed a popular movement unprecedented in the history of modern democracies. This change of popular upheaval also affects a lot of countries once referred to as the free world. 20 - 25 years after the fall of the Soviet Union, the people are asking questions and demanding accountability from their leaders. This ancient world has been confronted with a wave of popular discontent starting with the Brexit vote and continuing with the elections of Trump and Macron. It’s a form of questioning the traditional political establishment. This phenomenon has also left more or less of a stain on Italy, Austria, Hungary and elsewhere. These events are a result of the rejection of migration towards Western countries but more so, from the general social crisis, related to the increasing wealth gap between the richest and the poorest. This wealth gap is generating frustration and anger. Armenia has not escaped this phenomenon and the situation in the country had only been aggravated by corruption. It’s not like Armenia has a monopoly on this—this, alas, plagues the whole world. But the leaders could not cope with it. This was too much for the people and they said: enough!...

 

 

Armenian General Benevolent Union (AGBU) announced today a major push behind its AGBU Fund for Artsakh, a four-way strategy for sustainable socio-economic growth in Artsakh centered around programs in education, culture, humanitarian relief, and socio-economic development. AGBU President Berge Setrakian believes that a sustainable growth economy for Artsakh is as indispensable to its survival as negotiating a just peace and defending the right to self-determination, stating that, “Along with providing a better life for the people...

 

 

It all started when a couple of years ago #Bridge4CSOs pro-bono expert, professor Michael Aghajanian, came to Armenia and witnessed himself the great potential of our Armenian Civil Society Organizations. In 2017, the group of Interactive Qualifying Project (IQP) students, who had worked on improving Eye Care Delivery Through Data Sharing Technology with the Armenian Eye Care Project, won the President’s IQP Award. This year, Michael has once again created the opportunity, that allowed his Worcester Polytechnic Institute students in Massachusetts...

 

 

With the aim of empowering Armenian women, AGBU Armenia, together with Fruitful Armenia Charity Foundation, is taking its Women Entrepreneurs project to women in Artsakh. The entrepreneurship course developed together with the American University of Armenia’ Extension program looks to boost women’s entrepreneurial skills and teach them how to apply those in the world of business. 

The announcement is available in Armenian here.

 

The first audio-book was recorded in the noise of warring Aleppo. It was later when the project initiators from the remote shores of America heard the echos of horrible shootings in the lines of Raffi’s “Jallaledine”. The audiobook was narrated by Margarit Shamlyan directed by Berjouhy Avedian, and produced by Hagop Tovmassian who built the recording studio from the scratch with whatever materials available during the ruins of the war. “The sound of war in the background of the raw recordings was horrifying, however, for the recording...