GENERAL

GENERAL What is the UN asking of Turkey?

In a letter of inquiry to Turkey’s Ambassador, Sadık Arslan, three groups tied to the UN Human Rights Council posed critical questions concerning what Armenians experienced in 1915 and the years that followed. Edvin Minassian, who lives in the United States, wrote about the importance of the letter and how the Armenian community has responded to it.
GENERAL AI, big surveillance and robot ethics in healthcare

Artificial intelligence (AI)-powered robots are being introduced for automation in healthcare, and on the street as facial recognition software. However, AI robots can only be as smart and democratic as the data we feed into their algorithms and the persons who use them. AI can also amplify the historical and social injustices embedded in data. For AI and robot ethics, let’s not forget it is us – humans with all our prejudices – and not aliens from space, who are designing and deploying AI robots in healthcare and society.
GENERAL Yazidis Who Call Armenia Home

When I asked Jasem Mahmudyan whether he had been to Iraq to visit the Yazidi holly sites in Lalesh, he answered in negative. The tragic events in Sinjar had shaken the entire Yazidi community, and some families had found temporary refuge in Armenia, but they had eventually continued to European destinations. From the village of Alakyaz, Iraq seemed very far away indeed.
GENERAL Armenia: What Comes After a Revolution?

The Armenian government can learn from the lessons of Georgia and elsewhere. For three decades, neoliberal policies did not bring happiness. To imagine solving Armenia’s problems by attracting foreign investments will fail.
GENERAL Ara Jan, goodbye…

Ara, who for decades, watched the world through the veiwfinder and clicked for images thousands of times to imortalize humanity hus shut his eyes and covered the lens of his cameras for good. Ara Güler’s images will live on, he will live thorugh the people who’s lives he touched.
GENERAL Cambodia: Is Justice Possible After Genocide?

In Cambodia I often heard that the particularity of the Cambodian genocide is the fact that “they killed their own people”. They mean by it that Khmer Rouge killed their ethnic kin, other Khmer.