How One Peace Agreement Gave America a New Route Through Iran and Russia’s Backyard | Ambassador Narek Mkrtchyan

[RUSH TRANSCRIPT BELOW] Almost a year after the Washington Declaration, Armenia is trying to turn a hard-won peace with Azerbaijan into something lasting. In this conversation, Armenia’s ambassador to the United States, Narek Mkrtchyan, explains what the agreement means on the ground and why the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity could reshape the region and the country’s future.

“We sit in a very tough neighborhood. We sit in a very interesting geography. We are at the crossroads of Europe, Middle East, Central Asia, South Caucasus,” Mkrtchyan says.

Mkrtchyan describes how Armenia is trying to turn geography into strategy through the development of diplomacy, new trade routes, and international partnerships. He views this as more than a peace process—it’s a chance to redefine Armenia’s place in the region.

“In the center is the concept of crossroads of peace,” Mkrtchyan says.

Recently, Armenia also got approval for the biggest artificial intelligence factory in the region—a $4 billion project that officials say could help make the country a hub for computing power and advanced technology.

Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and the guest, and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.

RUSH TRANSCRIPT

Jan Jekielek:

Ambassador Narek Mkrtchyan, such a pleasure to have you on American Thought Leaders.

Ambassador Narek Mkrtchyan:

It’s my pleasure to be here.

Mr. Jekielek:

We’re nearing the anniversary, the one-year anniversary, of this Washington deal between Azerbaijan and Armenia, and I want to kind of dig into it. We remember something happened; we knew it felt historic, but the details are kind of murky at this point. We don’t remember, right? So I want to try to give people a sense of the geography and also a sense of the significance.

Ambassador Mkrtchyan:

Thank you for the question. You’re right. So we are approaching one anniversary of the historical peace deal, or we call it the Washington Declaration, when President Trump brokered peace between Armenia and Azerbaijan after three decades of conflict. So this peace deal became historical not only for Armenia and Azerbaijan but also for the entire region. It also created a lot of opportunities for international regional cooperation. 

And of course, based on mutual interests, it opened a new chapter of bilateral relations between the U.S. and Armenia. It changed the geoeconomics of the region, or at least it created new opportunities for the change of the geoeconomics. So the Washington Peace Declaration created another document or another platform for cooperation. The first and most important project is TRIPP [Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity], which is a 42-kilometer connectivity route.

Mr. Jekielek:

I’ll just read the whole name of it because it’s the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity. 

Ambassador Mkrtchyan:

Yes, TRIPP. Which is, again, not only about connectivity between Azerbaijan and Azerbaijan’s enclave, mainland, but it’s also about a new inter-regional supply chain, a new connectivity between Central Asia,South Caucasus, and Europe, Turkey as well. And Armenia and the U.S. created a TRIPP development company. This is, first of all, a bilateral project, so created by the governments of Armenia and the U.S. And the United States government shares ownership. 74 per cent of the shares belong to the U.S. government, and 26 per cent belong to the Armenian government. This is a very important project for peace between Armenia and Azerbaijan because this will provide a long-term opportunity for peace because this is one of the examples of how different projects can come together and bring dialogue. 

And in this context, I remember as a historian Immanuel Kant’s concept of perpetual peace: that peace is not something that starts like signing a document, etc. We need institutions, dialogue, and we need mutual interests, economic interests as well. After the Washington Declaration, Armenia and Azerbaijan started to trade. So we started to import some products from Azerbaijan. We started to bring different products from different countries using the Azerbaijani territory to Armenia. 

This is part of our diversification policy because we sit in a very tough neighborhood. We sit in a very interesting geography. You know, we are at the crossroads of Europe, the Middle East, Central Asia, the South Caucasus, and Europe—like the collective West, let’s say European civilization. This project can actually be very interesting, like a connectivity project, bringing all of these differences to Armenia, and from Armenia, going to other countries, other regions. 

But again, at the center is the concept of a crossroads of peace. Because we put forward the ideology of a crossroads of peace, we wanted to turn our small piece of land—our Republic of Armenia has always been in a crisis situation. You know, three decades is not a short period of time.

Mr. Jekielek:

Not at all.

Ambassador Mkrtchyan:

Now, we are turning this into an opportunity, like a crossroads of opportunity, a crossroads of peace, a crossroads of tech for the entire region. America has active participation. And we are very proud that we have the U.S. as an important player in our diversification policy in our country.

Mr. Jekielek:

Let me just lay out a little bit of the geography because it’s really fascinating. Of course, as I was preparing, I looked carefully at how you’re placed. As you said, it’s kind of a tough neighborhood, right? So you’ve got Iran to the south, right? And you’ve got two parts of, on either side of you, and this corridor. And then this southern sliver of Armenia touches Iran, of course, across the river. 

And then that’s the corridor. So you’re actually, that corridor also connects the two parts of Azerbaijan through Armenia. And then you have Russia over to the north. This is fascinating because this isn’t just geopolitical from the Azerbaijan-Armenia perspective; this is Iran, this is Russia. There are many dimensions to the U.S. having a controlling interest in this corridor.

Ambassador Mkrtchyan:

Yes, why is the role of President Trump and the U.S. government so important? And we appreciate their engagement, the President’s engagement, U.S. institutions’ engagement, because the Washington declaration respects three important principles. Like you mentioned, all of the neighbors.There were a lot of negotiations concerning this connectivity, this route. But the Washington Declaration fixed very important principles. This project trip will respect three important principles: the sovereignty of Armenia, territorial integrity, and jurisdiction. Everything concerning the trip, the management, the operation, the function, everything will be under the sovereign jurisdiction of Armenia’s institutions, like customs, border control, police, security, emergency. Everything will be managed by Armenian institutions. And this is something that we value and appreciate that the Washington Declaration respects and fixes. 

And at the center, we have, of course, our national interests. And we communicate it out with our neighbors, with Iran. So, you know, that we have cooperation with Russia. We are in the Eurasian Economic Union. We say that this is our sovereign decision. So we are going to diversify our supply chain, our energy, our foreign policy, our procurement, and our economic engagement. And you have to respect that.

Mr. Jekielek:

And there’s also the one NATO ally in the region, Turkey. And I’m curious what developments there have been since this normalization, this Washington declaration, in terms of Armenian relations with Turkey?

Ambassador Mkrtchyan:

You know that our borders between Armenia and Turkey are closed, and we do not have diplomatic relations. But again, within the context of the diversification, within the context of the Crossroads of Peace project, since the TRIPP project is an organic part of the Crossroads of Peace project, we need to create other organic connections. So we can’t have a closed border with Turkey and have a vision to create a crossroads of peace and to have an interconnected region. For that reason, again, our leadership made another important decision: to normalize relations with Turkey, to establish diplomatic relations, and to open the borders. It’s not an easy process. 

When you look back at history, there are a lot of complicated experiences that we have to take into consideration, but also look forward. And we decided to normalize these relations. From both sides, we now have special envoys. Serdar Kilic is the special envoy from the Turkish side. Our deputy speaker of parliament is a special envoy. And there is very active communication and dialogue between the leadership of Turkey and Armenia. President Erdogan and Prime Minister Pashinyan are always in touch discussing this issue. We really have a lot of optimistic developments and are looking forward to having the borders opened as soon as possible. We did all the infrastructural things from our side. 

Now, we are even ready to build or reconstruct the railway infrastructure from our side to have connections with the Turkish side and have access to the Mediterranean Sea, to have access to the European markets to create opportunities for Turkey to have access to Central Asia using all the infrastructures of Armenia, we say we are ready to open all the infrastructures—air, land, and digital infrastructure—for interconnectivity. And we are very optimistic that the Washington peace declaration will create important momentum. 

Recently, Armenia got approval for the biggest AI factory in the region. It’s a $40 billion project. 58,000 Blackwell GPUs from NVIDIA will be delivered to Armenia and will be computing data and converting electricity to intelligence, and then sent to the US. And the same company recently signed a $10 billion agreement with the Kazakhstan government. Again, this is an example of how this partnership can bring interregional cooperation. 

And to make this peace deal something resilient and to show our public and the region that peace is a precondition for prosperity, we signed a couple of other documents at the White House last year on AI, semiconductors, energy, and crossroads of peace. And now we already have a comprehensive strategic partnership, which again stemmed from the Washington Declaration. We signed a minerals agreement. We recently signed a joint statement on Pax Silica, that Armenia is becoming a trusted partner of the U.S. to work on energy, critical minerals, computing, and semiconductors to make the supply chains resilient for future AI systems.

Mr. Jekielek:

Okay, this is very interesting because my next question is going to be, you know, there are some people in America that believe that America is kind of overextended. Why is America all over the place, has interests everywhere? And this is a new interest, right? Somewhere far away from America. And why should America be there?

Ambassador Mkrtchyan:

First of all, America, in that sense, is already in Armenia; it’s been in Armenia for more than 20 years. So, when you look into the ecosystem of the Armenian tech industry, you can notice interesting names: Nvidia, Synopsys, National Instruments, Broadcom, Cisco, and GlobalFoundries. All of these big companies are in Armenia, some of them for more than 20 years. They are doing chip design; they are doing software development. So, because of Armenia’s highly educated workforce, highly developed AI and ICT [information and communications technology] ecosystem.

Mr. Jekielek:

And you mentioned this, and I was reading that it’s the number five user per capita of ChatGPT in the world. Yes, that’s something.

Ambassador Mkrtchyan:

Yes. Recently, I was in Silicon Valley and had meetings with the headquarters in San Francisco with the leadership of OpenAI. Recently, we signed an agreement with OpenAI. Starting from September, our public schools will be provided with OpenAI’s Edu platforms. So, we’re buying these platforms for our kids. 

Mr. Jekielek:

But not to just write their exams.

Ambassador Mkrtchyan:

Yes, it’s mentorship. It’s more mentorship. So, these tools will help them to learn more about their studies. It’s not about cheating.

Mr. Jekielek:

I was just reading. I’ve been reading a lot. I’ve been thinking about doing an episode on this because there’s a lot of cheating going on.

Ambassador Mkrtchyan:

I know, but there are filters, actually, in this. One of the main topics of discussion when I attended the OpenAI conference, all the American universities attended. And one of the important topics among the discussed topics was how to avoid cheating and how to really use AI or ChatGPT as an important tool for learning. And now they have filters, and we are very proud to be among the first nations to be a formal and official partner of OpenAI. If I’m not mistaken, Armenia and Singapore are the first two countries that joined and signed an agreement and will be official partners. And they already announced it; it’s public disinformation.

Mr. Jekielek:

Let’s talk a little bit about the Azerbaijan-Armenia relations. And of course, you mentioned there was this very, very massive toll from this war for many years. There’s this very contentious region, Nagorno-Karabakh, which basically Azerbaijan, is contained now. I know there are issues; Azerbaijan is interested in some constitutional changes and things like that. But just in general, right, since this peace declaration, what is the status of Azerbaijan and Armenia relations now, a year later?

Ambassador Mkrtchyan:

Actually, when we look back to the September Washington Declaration and what kind of achievements we have, I can say that we have really advanced a lot, and we have very positive and very optimistic developments on the ground. As I mentioned already, trade started. Five years ago—I’m not talking about 10, 20, 30 years—five years ago, this is something even difficult to imagine. Armenia would trade, would import oil, for example, from Azerbaijan, Russia, and then use the railways of Azerbaijan to bring it to Armenia. Or it could be very difficult to imagine that there could be reciprocal visits of civil society representatives, experts, both crossing the land and the air, and visiting Armenia, or Armenian experts, civil society representatives visiting Azerbaijan, or even some senior government representatives, even discussing the visit. 

Again, history teaches us how, for example, nations decide to rise or fall. It depends on what kind of decisions the leadership is taking. So we decided that peace is a foundation for us, and we have to put forward the agenda of peace. This is not only the wish of political leadership; this is a wish or strategy backed by the people. So, when we asked our people, do you want us to create a peace agenda? You have to give us a mandate. 

We went to a snap election in 2021. The people said, yes, we want peace. We’re tired of this war, and we want development. And for prosperity, we need peace. We already confirmed this argument after the Washington Declaration, having a couple of documents, and now we have a lot of development projects on the ground. It’s just a year after a devastating war. We went for a snap election. And when you look back to history, it would be very difficult to find a case when the same authority can be re-elected, the same government re-elected, after being defeated in a war. 

But the people believed in this agenda of peace, in this value of peace, and our mission. And again, the same government was re-elected. In June, we had another election. Again, people were elected. The number one slogan, let’s say, of the campaign was, take care of the peace, protect the peace, give us another chance to institutionalize the peace. Hey, you are talking about the constitutional change topic. 

Yes, this is something that we initiated. It’s when our prime minister put forward the ideology of real Armenia. You know, historically, Armenia, all nations in the world. You look, for example, you mentioned Poland. When you look at the current map of Poland, I don’t think that the current map of Poland would be the same as it was 200 years ago, 300 years ago.

Mr. Jekielek:

A lot of change over the years.

Ambassador Mkrtchyan:

I think all maps in the world have changed. And we say, no, we have to focus on, we should be free of illusions. Utopia is always good.

Mr. Jekielek:

But you have to be realistic.

Ambassador Mkrtchyan:

Yes. The Republic of Armenia, this is something internationally recognized, and we have to take care of this piece of land. That’s why we say in the constitution, which is sometimes the manifestation of the world order after the collapse of the Soviet Union, when nationalistic aspirations and national movements were the key. Of course, the Soviet Union collapsed because of different reasons, but the nationalistic, like the national segment, national component layer was one of the most influential and powerful layers. 

And in the constitution, there is a declaration of independence, the historical manifestation, which contradicts current trends and current philosophy and current foreign policy priorities of Armenia. And who says that constitutions are like sacred texts that cannot be changed? Constitutions, first of all, are about our vision. Our aspirations should be aligned with all of these components. That’s why we also started these internal negotiations, communications with the public. 

Again, the same government was elected because of the support of this vision from the public, from citizens of the Republic of Armenia. There is also a diaspora, and there are differences among the Armenian diaspora.But in order to understand these differences, we have to understand what kind of identity, concept of identity they have, because there is no monolithic diaspora. The diaspora are different, and the sources of diaspora formation are different.

Mr. Jekielek:

How close do you think you are to diplomatic relations with Azerbaijan?

Ambassador Mkrtchyan:

We have really very well-established diplomatic dialogue, let’s say. Relations are not established yet, but there is very strong communication right now. And this is important. I want to mention this one, to emphasize that we always keep engaging bilaterally. Our prime minister, President Aliyev. So, this is also thanks to their political maturity that they decided to speak with each other. 

Of course, both Armenia and Azerbaijan. Friendly nations that would be happy to intermediate, to provide a platform, etc. But our prime minister always said the best way of support is just you can provide a room, a platform, and we together can discuss the fate of our nations. And I’m happy that now there is really a nice development and a commitment from both sides that we have to build a peaceful region. 

Again, it’s not an easy process. It will take time. It will again, it requires dialogue. It requires mutual interest. We need to create a mutual interest, and it requires people-to-people contacts. You know, for more than 70 years, Armenians and Azeris lived together in the same system of the Soviet Union. Our elderly generation, I think it’s easier to engage with others, like easier than for the current generation. But there is nothing impossible. 

Look at European history, the 100 Years’ War, and the 30 Years’ War. So now they live peacefully, yeah? As friends, as brothers, they live together. But we need to fix the vision. We need to fix the foundation. For us, peace now is a foundation, and we will take care of the peace, and we will do everything to institutionalize that peace and to turn our region into a real crossroads of opportunities.

Mr. Jekielek:

So, really, I mean, in a way for you, the United States provides some added stability and also, you know, investment, I guess, is the combination of those things. Is that the core role in your mind?

Ambassador Mkrtchyan:

Yes. And the aims of the United States government are very honest. They really want, first of all, to support peace. This is one of the success stories brokered by the U.S. current administration and President Trump. So far, both Azerbaijan and Armenia are very careful and like to keep this peace because this is a value, both for Armenia and Azerbaijan. The most important value is people, and we have to provide opportunities for the development of the people, not to create another war condition. Small nations, we have to take care of our human capital. But having all of these American investments and projects, this will create a mutual and interconnected region. 

For example, we are speaking about AI, about technology. Numerous times, we announce this Nvidia project in Armenia, okay, this is in Armenia, this is for Armenia, this is for U.S. and Armenia corporations, companies. But who says that we can’t cooperate with Azerbaijan? Who says that Azerbaijan cannot be part of this infrastructure? They have energy. We have infrastructure, ecosystem, we have chips, we have specialists, we have computing opportunities. We can cooperate. 

So that’s why, again, I want to come back to the concept of perpetual peace, through the prism of Kantian philosophy. If we want to have the final peace, we have to go through different steps, create institutions, create mutual interest, and people-to-people contact. And then, yes, we need some, we can’t do it overnight, and we can’t do it alone. We need partners, supporters. And we are very happy that the US decided to partner in this way. 

I think this will be a long-term partnership. We have good relations with the European Union as well. So the European Union is very supportive.Russia, with Iran and the others, says, you know, this is our sovereign decision. These are bilateral projects, also bilateral, but it has the potential to be regional and interregional. And it’s not against a third country.

Mr. Jekielek:

So, what has been the reaction of these different countries? This is, and I mean, specifically, you know, the U.S. and Iran are in a war right now, right? And actually, Iran has been firing missiles into some of its, you know, basically countries that it never did. Before, let’s say, right? Is this in some way concerning to Armenia? Are you under threat in this way?

Ambassador Mkrtchyan:

There is no risk of a threat. And regarding the war between Iran and Russia, first of all, we pray that this war will end soon. So, as a representative of a nation which has been in a conflictual situation, I value the importance of peace. I really hope that very soon we can see a peace deal between Iran and the U.S. But so far, there is no negative influence, and we don’t see any kind of risk that this project between the US and Armenia will be in danger. And some political or geopolitical centers started to spread some pessimistic information. The United States of America will be changing in the region. 

But immediately after such an informational attack, let’s say, the State Department made a clear announcement that the TRIPP project, the strategic partnership with Armenia, is a priority for the U.S.and will be continuing. And you know, diplomacy is the art of the possible. And the key is communication. Of course, when we announced the TRIPP project, we got some concerns from our neighbors. But we communicated this is not against you, and we don’t want to do something against some countries. This is for our national interest. You have to respect our national interest. 

So we share borders with Iran, you know. We have an Armenian community in Iran, and we historically had good relations.And we always got respect from the West, and we always got respect from Iran when we were engaging with Western countries and with the U.S., with the European Union. So far, there is no real risk and there are no problems that can question the current projects that we have. But of course, we need a more stable, more peaceful region in order to make our vision of a crossroads of peace concept project possible.

Mr. Jekielek:

You know, there’s still this Russia-Ukraine war happening. How is Russia viewing all this?

Ambassador Mkrtchyan:

You know, we always put it clearly that we are not a partner of Russia in this war. So we never engaged in any kind of, we never took a side. And again, we hope as representatives of Armenia, who suffered a lot because of the wars, we really want peace in the region. Because, you know, the peace between Russia and Ukraine will bring a lot of benefits to Armenia as well. And human security is also very important because we have half-a-million Armenians living in Ukraine and we have up to two million Armenians living in Russia. So some of them are citizens of these respective countries, but we really hope that there will be peace. 

Armenia always showed its hospitality to host both Russian people and Ukrainians during the war, a lot of relocations, a lot of like tech companies, they, in order to save their companies, to save, you know, some of them dedicated half of their life to create a company. And because of the war, there was a risk that this company or that company could be destroyed, and they moved to Armenia. That brought benefit to the Armenian economy as well. And since our culture is very, like, open to receive others as well. So, we really treated them as brothers and helped them to create and create opportunities, incentivize their activity in Armenia. Again, we hope that this war will be ending soon.

Mr. Jekielek:

Fascinating. And another thing that makes Armenia different from many of its neighbors is that it’s a Christian country. Maybe you could just tell me about that dynamic in the region.

Ambassador Mkrtchyan:

Yes, Armenia is the first Christian nation in the world. Armenia adopted Christianity as a state religion in 301 AD. And since the fourth century, Christianity became an inseparable part of Armenia’s national narrative. Since the fourth century, every sphere of the public sphere, public life in Armenia, has been influenced by the concepts and ideologies of Christianity. And we are very proud of it. 

We still have more than 2,000 medieval and ancient monasteries, churches, cathedrals, and the oldest cathedral in the world is in Armenia, built in the 4th century. Yes, and this became the Armenian Apostolic Church, and Christianity always played an important role in preserving national identity and culture when we didn’t have statehood. When you look in the history of Armenia, you can find several centuries that we didn’t have statehood. We lost the statehood. 

And Christianity and the values of Christianity and the writing culture again developed through Christianity helped us to preserve our culture, our national identity, and more importantly, our language. We’re still using the language that the alphabet that we created in the 5th century. And when you visit Yerevan downtown, there is one of the biggest museums of ancient manuscripts, and there are also research centers. 

Recently, we signed an agreement with the Museum of the Bible to create a permanent exhibition of Armenian Christian heritage in D.C. and to show the world, especially the younger generation of the U.S., that they can visit Armenia. We will be showcasing some illustrated manuscripts, etc. But again, this is our wealth, and we are very proud for it to be a part of world heritage. And we have a lot of manuscripts about ancient Greco-Roman philosophy that have survived in Armenian. 

So, we, like Christianity, also contributed to world heritage. Thanks to that Christianity, we created this writing culture and translation of books from ancient authors into Armenian. Then it happened that all of these manuscripts and this knowledge survived in Armenian, and we are very proud to convey it to future generations.

Mr. Jekielek:

A little bit of Poland, who was in a similar situation, lacked sovereignty for a number of years, and it was the Christian faith that kind of maintained the structure, if you will, of the national identity, or at least helped considerably to do that.

Ambassador Mkrtchyan:

But when you look at the history, there is an interesting pattern. Christianity and the church always became stronger when the state was stronger, when the kings and kingdoms supported and kept the church strong and independent from other influences. There are a lot of interconnections like the institution of statehood played an important role in making the church and Christianity resilient. Again, the Christianity of Armenia was one of the state projects; it was brought to Armenia by the support of one of the kings. It was by the decree of the king to follow Christianity and to turn to Christianity and to provide all the opportunities for Christian intellectual activity.

Mr. Jekielek:

You know, the foundation, I think, the origin of Poland in 966, I’m just talking from a, you know, I guess a similar, a comparable example. It was basically the baptism of Poland that created the Polish nation. That’s the historic picture, right? The king took on the faith of his new wife. But how does that manifest today?

Ambassador Mkrtchyan:

The Armenian Apostolic Church and Christianity still play an important role. We consider this an important national institution. And the government of the Republic of Armenia, right now, is doing a lot of projects to support the Armenian Apostolic Church. And one of the examples I mentioned is that the government will be financing a project and a museum of the Bible to create this platform to show the Christian cultural heritage to the world. Of other big projects as well. 

So we value this, and we really consider this an important national institution, and we have to keep it safe, keep it safe from possible foreign interference; to not let foreign actors use the church, or even some of the church fathers, to not politicize these institutions, because we consider these institutions as real value. From the fourth century to the 21st century, it always accompanied the Armenian nation. 

When you look back at different periods of history, you can see different countries, different kingdoms, they tried to create gaps between the nation and the faith, Christianity, church, and the state. But, you know, I strongly believe that our society is quite mature and quite like they have wisdom to value this important institution and preserve this institution. The Armenian public, 99 per cent are Christians, first of all, but we also are very fond of intercultural activity. 

We have mosques in downtown Yerevan, we have a synagogue, we have ethnic minorities, we have religious minorities. Even by our law, all of the representatives of the religious and ethnic minorities, they have a seat in the parliament. But of course, we can’t deny the influence and the contribution of Christianity to the development of the Armenian nation. And sometimes they worked very closely with the state institutions.

Mr. Jekielek:

You mentioned earlier that you’re a historian. Of course, I know that, and that’s kind of an interesting background. Maybe just tell me a little bit about your background and road to becoming, I know you were the labor minister at one point, but your road to becoming the Armenian ambassador to the United States?

Ambassador Mkrtchyan:

Yes. I changed my professions many times, but I never changed my mission. So, when you look at my career, it seems that I always change professions. But I think this journey is about the same mission of serving the nation. So, yes, I began with a historian because I always believed that history is not a science about the past. This is science about the future. It is science about the patterns because societies always leave patterns which accompany us throughout the centuries. 

Then I became a history professor and I have been teaching at the American University of Armenia for about 10 years. And teaching history always kept you updated, kept your critical thinking updated, and always kept you engaging with the students and to remind them about their identity, about their belonging, about their role in future projects because history helps you to engage in the future. 

And when in 2018 a Velvet Revolution started in Armenia by the current government, so I was thinking should I still continue to study history or to be part of history making? Because history was unfolding in front of our eyes, it was about the new Armenia. And I decided to join this revolution. It’s a velvet, nonviolent, peaceful revolution. 

I joined this team and got elected as a member of parliament and began to support the institutions of, and the reshaping of Armenia, creating a new Armenia, new democratic reforms in Armenia. And we call this new Armenia because we really started a new process of transformation of different spheres. But we didn’t know that history was preparing a surprise for us. Just after two years, we went into a devastating war. But again, we decided that despite all of these consequences, we have to look forward. 

Then I was entrusted with responsibilities to be Minister of Social Affairs and Labor. And that ministry at that time was one of the main responsible agencies to reply to the challenges of war and to like the social costs and social costs, like refugees, people with disabilities. We have to, but you know, we were in a dilemma to only manage the crisis or to do reforms. But we decided to do both. So we successfully, adequately replied to the challenges and we helped people to overcome this crisis situation. But also, we fundamentally changed a couple of institutions of the social protection system in Armenia. 

When I engage in this process, it reminds me of an interesting English author, Arnold Toynbee, when he speaks about the advancement of civilization. There’s a civilization or system, it could be civilization, country, it develops not because of the absence of crises, but because you have a mature society or like leadership who decides to turn crises into opportunity. When you provide critical and like creative answers to the challenges and the crisis, you can turn this into opportunity. There was the disappointment and the social and psychological problems after war. There was negative energy after war. 

But we decided that we have to turn this negative energy and this crisis situation into opportunity. And for that mission, we need a concept of peace. That’s why just a year after all of these problematic processes, we went to the snap elections. And in Washington last year, we got this historical peace deal. And after that peace deal, I got appointed as an ambassador of Armenia to the U.S.

Mr. Jekielek:

Well, very good to have you here and representing this amazing history of this nation, the present and the future, right? Well, this has been an absolutely fascinating conversation. Perhaps a final thought as we finish up, Mr. Ambassador?

Ambassador Mkrtchyan:

So, again, thank you for this opportunity. And I’m proud that I now have a unique chance to serve my nation in this beautiful country, in this very historical period of time. Not only is it historical because of the peace deal that we are discussing, but also because of the new chapter of bilateral relations that we have. We never before had such a rich bilateral agenda with the U.S. Now my mission is to implement concrete projects. 

Our relations with the U.S. are not only value-based, because Armenia is a democracy and we are very proud of it, but also to create concrete projects which would bring mutual benefits to Armenia and the U.S. And again, these benefits, I think both the Armenian government and the U.S. government are ready to share with the regional players, with different regions in our part of the world.

Mr. Jekielek:

Well, Ambassador Narek Mkrtchyan, it’s such a pleasure to have had you on.

Ambassador Mkrtchyan:

Thank you so much. It’s my pleasure.

This interview was partially edited for clarity and brevity.