The Armenian National Committee (ANC) of Eastern Massachusetts has announced the inaugural Michael Varantian Lecture Series, the Armenian Weekly reports.
The first lecture will be presented by Ambassador Zohrab Mnatsakanyan, the permanent representative of the Republic of Armenia to the United Nations on Jan 21, in the Armenian Museum of America, Watertown.
Named after Michael Varantian, one of the luminaries and intellectuals of the Armenian independence and renaissance movement of the late 19th century, the series will feature informative talks and panel discussions to help inform, discuss, and articulate current geopolitical events in Armenia and its neighboring region. In light of the ever-changing developments in the political landscape of the region, and cognizant of the upcoming 25th anniversary of the rebirth of the Republic of Armenia, better understanding of the dynamics of the dominant powers and shifting alignments of the interested parties will shed light onto and help formulate the participatory strategies of the Armenian nation, and its greatest resource, the Armenian Diaspora. By providing a platform of experts in the fields of political science, economics, and international law and diplomacy to share their knowledge and experience, the ANC strives to provide the community with a deeper understanding of current affairs and their overt and covert driving forces. It hopes that well-informed citizens will engage more effectively in the political discourse, and will affect positive change towards a better future for their adopted as well as ancestral homelands. This, it believes, is at the core of the democratic principles of the free society we live in, and which we collectively pledge to reinforce, nurture, and sustain in our 25-year-young republic.
Ambassador Mnatsakanyan will discuss the recent UN General Assembly resolution introduced by the Republic of Armenia to establish an International Day of Commemoration and Dignity of the Victims of the Crime of Genocide and of the Prevention of This Crime.
This resolution adds to Armenia’s continued efforts to promote consolidated international action against the crime of genocide. Introducing the draft resolution on behalf of 84 co-sponsors from all regional groups, Mnatsakanyan noted that “millions of human lives have been lost as a result of the most horrendous crime—the crime of genocide—that humankind has, to its shame, demonstrated the ability to commit. We believe the International Day will serve an important platform for prevention by way of commemoration.”
Dec 9 was the date when the UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide was adopted in 1948.
