BERN (ArmRadio)—Active negotiations between Turkey and Armenia to normalize their strained relations are ongoing and the process cannot be stopped, Swiss Foreign Minister Micheline Calmy-Rey said Wednesday after a meeting in Bern with the Speaker of Armenia’s National Assembly.
“Switzerland is resolute in advancing the process,” Calmy-Rey said, noting that Armenia “cannot stop [the process] half-way.”
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Armenia’s government unveiled on Thursday the state budget for next year which calls for a nearly 7 percent increase in its expenditures. The draft, which will be sent to parliament on Friday, commits it to spending a total of 998.4 billion drams ($2.8 billion), up from 935.5 billion drams projected for this year.

Citing insufficient evidence, a Superior Court judge struck down a hate crime allegation Wednesday against a 23-year-old man accused of smashing a religious monument at St. Mary’s Armenian Apostolic Church.

The Turkish government allowed on Thursday the country’s’ leading ultranationalist party to hold a Muslim religious service in a medieval Armenian church, RFE/RL reported.

The dramatic dismissal of Yuri Luzhkov will not adversely affect the implementation of a massive redevelopment project in Yerevan that was supported by Moscow’s longtime mayor, a senior Armenian official said on Wednesday.

The Russian Ambassador to the United Nations Vitaly Churkin believes that the NATO-led coalition forces are not doing enough to effectively combat drug production in Afghanistan. As he addressed a meeting of the UN Security Council, Churkin urged NATO to respond to a proposal from the Collective Security Treaty Organization to join forces in addressing the drug threat coming from Afghanistan.

“The process of regime change must start in the provinces,” said Armenian Revolutionary Federation Supreme Council of Armenia chairman Armen Rustamian Wednesday at a rally, which local government authorities had not authorized.

The 19th anniversary of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic’s independence was marked at a special Capitol Hill program featuring Karabakh Parliament speaker Ashot Ghoulian, reported the Armenian National Committee of America.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) said on Wednesday it could provide Armenia with a fresh $56 million installment of a $395 million loan package approved by the IMF in June.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Wednesday complained about the continuing delays in the Nabucco project that is designed to carry Caspian natural gas to Europe.

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu said on Wednesday that Turkey was still keen on normalizing its relations with neighboring Armenia.

On September 15, the Hayastan All-Armenian Fund, jointly with the Indian Embassy in Armenia, unveiled a renovated school in the borderline Artsni village of Armenia’s Lori region.