Heydar Ali is the Caucasus Representative of the People’s Congress of Kurdistan (Kongra-Gel). This interview was conducted at the office of the Kurdistan Committee in Yerevan on 24 August 2004 and is part of a follow-up series of interviews to work on the division within the Yezidi minority in Armenia conducted during June 1998.
Amarik Sardarian is the Yezidi editor of the Kurdish newspaper, “Riya Taza”. “Riya Taza” is one of the oldest Kurdish newspapers in the world. This interview was conducted by Onnik James Krikorian in Yerevan, Armenia, on 12 June 1998.
Mahir Welat is the official representative of the National Liberation Front of Kurdistan (ERNK) and the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) to Moscow and the former Soviet Union. He is also a member of the ruling Central Committee of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK). The Turkish Government has to date made two assassination attempts on his life in Russia.
Aziz Tamoyan is the President of the National Union of Yezidi in Armenia. This interview was conducted by Onnik James Krikorian in Yerevan, Armenia, on 11 June 1998.
Vladimir Chadoyev is the Chairman of the Union of National Minorities in Armenia.
Dr. Karlene Chachani is a Yezidi living in Yerevan, Armenia. He is President of the Department of the Kurdish Writers of the Writers’ Union of Armenia, and Chief Editor of “Friendship” – an Armenian-Kurdish political Journal.
Professor Garnik Asatrian is the Head of the Faculty of Iranian Studies at Yerevan State University. Born in Tehran in 1953, he moved to Yerevan in 1968. He has been prolific in his research into Kurdish tribal and linguistic tradition, and instrumental in the establishment of contemporary Kurdish academic study.
For many, the news of the assault on a police station in Yerevan over the weekend brought back memories of the two-week siege of another station back in 2016. The reasons were similar too. Eight years ago, just a few months after the four-day war, rumours spread throughout Armenia that then President Serzh Sargsyan was under pressure to accept the so-called Lavrov Plan in which five out of seven regions then occupied by Armenian forces would be handed back to Azerbaijan as part of an anticipated peace deal.
This year, Azerbaijani-Georgian communities across Georgia came together to celebrate Novruz with a variety of events and festivities.
Almost six months after the mass exodus of the Karabakh Armenians, their plight in Armenia remains as uncertain as ever. On Wednesday, some will even protest in Yerevan’s Freedom Square. There had been no major humanitarian crisis, despite claims of mass starvation as they crossed into Armenia via the Lachin checkpoint in late September, but the situation for many remains one of desperation or despair. A recent report by the International Crisis Group (ICG) highlighted that clearly earlier this month.