Only four of the Armenian ambassadors abroad are women

March 2 is marked as Day of Diplomacy in Armenia. The holiday is fixed by the law “On the Memorial Day of the Republic of Armenia” since 2012. The professional holiday is accepted to connect with the important event that best communicates its advice. So the day is symbolic. 1992 On March 2, the Armenian flag broke into the United Nations headquarters and Armenia again became part of a large family of sovereign states.

According to the MFA, the Republic of Armenia has about 60 diplomatic missions abroad (in 90 countries). Among ambassadors sent to different countries, women make up only 7%. Meanwhile, in the history of diplomacy, the Armenian woman, Diana Abgar, who was appointed Honorary Ambassador of the First Republic of Armenia in Japan in 1918, is mentioned as the first female ambassador to the world. Women ambassadors are currently appointed in Italy, Vietnam and Indonesia.

By the way, yesterday by the decrees of the President of the Republic of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan ambassadors have changed, as a result of which only four  of the five women appointed in that post have been left. One of the female ambassadors was dismissed from office and the other was moved to another country. It is about Dzyunik Aghajanyan and Anna Aghajanyan. The latter was relieved of the post of Armenian Ambassador to Indonesia and Malaysia. There are no news reports about her further appointment yet. She was sent to Indonesia in December 2013, the Armenian embassy there officially operates in January 2014.

In one of the interviews, Anna Aghajanyan made quite interesting remarks especially about the problems of a female diplomat, noting that they differ from women’s issues that are striving for promotion in any other area.

Dzyunik Aghajanyan, who previously served as RA Ambassador to the Kingdom of the Netherlands, will work in Jakarta instead of Anna Aghajanyan. She has served as Ambassador to the Netherlands for seven years. She was dismissed from the post of the Permanent Representative of the Republic of Armenia to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons. Garegin Melkonyan, who was the first deputy minister of economic development and investment, was appointed ambassador to the Kingdom of the Netherlands.

Thus, only four women are sent from Armenia to different countries as ambassadors:

Victoria Baghdasarian/ Italy

Dzyunik Aghajanyan/Indonesia

Raisa Vardanyan/Vietnam.

Estera  Mkrtumyan/ Argentina

Full text in Armenian