On January 29, RA Deputy Foreign Minister Vahan Kostanyan participated and spoke at the press conference on the occasion of the registration of Komitas Vardapet’s collection of works in the International Memory of the World Register by the unanimous decision of the UNESCO Executive Board—Minister of Culture and Sports Zhanna Andreasyan, Director of Komitas Museum-Institute Nikolay Kostandyan, and others. RA Deputy Foreign Minister Vahan Kostanyan, in his speech in particular, noted.
“Let me once again congratulate you on the 9th anniversary of the significant jubilee of the museum institute. Let me also commend you on another important milestone of international recognition of Komitas’s heritage. As already mentioned, dear partners, in May 2023, UNESCO’s Executive Board made an important decision, approving the application submitted by Armenia and registering Komitas’ collection of works in the International Register of Memory of the World.
Also, in 2019, when the 150th anniversary of Komitas Vardapet was celebrated, this important jubilee was included in the UNESCO list of famous people’s jubilees. That significant jubilee was celebrated with great pomp.
Document samples of exceptional value are registered in the International Register of Memory of the World. The main objective of this program is to prevent the loss of valuable collections of archives and libraries worldwide and to promote their adequate protection and wide dissemination. The first survey of the Byurakan observatory, the collection of manuscripts of Matenadaran, and Aram Khachatryan’s works found their rightful place in the prestigious list.
Today, the registration of Komitas’ works in the International Register of Memory of the World is primarily the result of years of joint work, as already mentioned, between the museum institute, the Ministry of Education, Science, Culture, and Sports, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Taking advantage of this opportunity, let me also mention the work done by our partners and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the direction of UNESCO in 2023. On November 9, the Minister of Foreign Affairs participated in the 42nd session of the UNESCO General Conference, and the issue of sending a UNESCO fact-finding mission to Nagorno Karabakh was raised here. To address the educational needs of forcibly displaced children from Nagorno Karabakh, the UNESCO expert mission was in Armenia in October last year. UNESCO has approved an urgent mission plan to include refugee children in the education process and improve their morale and psychological condition.
As you know, the 100-year anniversaries of the births of Charles Aznavour and Sergey Parajanov were included in the 2024–2025 calendar of anniversaries of famous people and important events. The minister has already mentioned that the tradition of blacksmithing has been registered as UNESCO’s intangible heritage, and the process of granting enhanced protection status to Tatev and Tatev’s Great Desert Monastery and the Vorotan River Gorge, the monument group within the framework of the UNESCO Convention on the Protection of Cultural Assets in the Conditions of Armed Conflicts, has started. “.
The presentation of the “Working Songs” volume of the series of Armenian folk songs “One Thousand and One Songs” was also held within the framework of the event. At the end of the event, the participants also toured the Komitas Museum-Institute
