ACTIVITIES

All the participants had the opportunity to apply for a project which would allow them to get closely acquainted with each other, share their own experience among each other, learn about the situation in the local communities, as well as present projects aimed at cooperative learning and strengthen the ties between the activists and independent artists functioning in the spheres of human rights and peace-building in Russian Federation, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Ukraine and Georgia.

German Foundation Culture Counts in cooperation with the Federal Foreign Office organized the first “Global Peacebuilder Summit” from September 4-9, 2016. 30 peace and human rights activists from around the world gathered in Berlin to discuss the role of civil society in peacebuilding processes. The objective of the “Global Peacebuilder Summit” was to strengthen these key actors in their commitment, to make their work better known to the broad public, and to facilitate the networking between them.

Over a period of six years, from 2010 to 2015 the RA and NK armed forces suffered a total of 206 fatal casualties, of which 48 were results of suicides and 43 results of murders. That number does not include the fatalities that were the result of ceasefire regime violations on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border and the line of contact. In percentage this numbers are equivalent to 23% and 21% of total non-combat casualties during the last 6 years.

67 fatalities out of 206 recorded in the RA and NK armed forces during the period 2010-2015 were fatal accidents. This number does not include the fatalities that were the result of ceasefire regime violations on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border and the line of contact.

In response to the announcement posted on the RA Ministry of Defense website inviting non-governmental organizations to send proposals for designing a draft action plan for the period of 2017-2019 stemming from the provisions of the strategy for the protection of Human Rights, Peace Dialogue NGO sent the following suggestions to the RA Ministry of Defense.

On August 11, 2016, in response to the Peace Dialogue’s letter, the Chief of Staff of the RA MoD, stated: “According to Article 9 and Article 12 of the RA law on State and Official Secrets, as well as the decision N 173 made on March 13, 1998 and decision number 665 made on October 29, 1998, the questions and legal acts, requested by the organization, contain state and official secrets.

The inaugural ARENA: Summer School for Peace and Art was held this year in Borjomi, Georgia. During the Summer School a group of 47 activists, independent artists and trainers from 9 different countries including the Russian Federation, Netherlands, Armenia, Lebanon, Azerbaijan, Italy, Ukraine, Georgia, and Germany worked in three groups: theatre, graphic design and video.
The Summer School was organized under the scope of the three-year project ARENA: Community Theatre and Public Art launched in 2015. ARENA aims to empower civil society representatives of former Soviet Union and Eastern partnership countries and the Russian Federation to work together to develop creative approaches, new methods and activities in the field of human rights and peace building.