At 12:00 on April 23, 2012, the press conference of the directorate of the Armenian Genocide Museum and Institute will take place at Komitas hall of the institute. The main results and directions of AGMI’s activity during last year will be presented at the press conference. Geoffrey Robertson, whose report, entitled “Was there an Armenian Genocide?” and dedicated to the historical facts and political speculations referring to the Armenian Genocide, was published in 2010, will be present at the press conference, together with Jussi Biørn, the grandchild of Norwegian missionary Bodil Catharine Biørn, who will report on Bodil Biørn’s recently discovered handwritten memoirs describing the 1915 Mush massacres.
The main achievements of the Armenian Genocide Museum and Institute from 2006 to 2011 and overall strategy of the events which will be organized on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide will be presented during the press conference.
• In May AGMI is going to hold a memorial event dedicated to Clara Barton - the founder of the American Red Cross and the friend of Armenians. The official report of Clara Barton on the humanitarian assistance to the Armenians who suffered from the Hamidian massacres will be presented during the event. The Armenian translation and publication of the original report was supported by the US Embassy in Armenia.
• In September AGMI will organize an International Conference and a temporary exhibition dedicated to the 90th anniversary of “Smyrna disaster.”
• In 2012 AGMI will publish about 25 volumes covering unexplored episodes of the Armenian Genocide in Armenian, English, French and Russian.
• In 2012 the first two issues of the “International Journal of Armenian Genocide Studies” will be published in English. Through this academic journal AGMI will provide new insight and analysis on the subject of the Armenian Genocide.
• Within 2012-2013 AGMI will work on the preparation of the Encyclopedia of the Armenian Genocide, the Atlas of the Armenian Genocide and the volume of Illustrated history of the Armenian Genocide.
• During 2012 the AGMI will organize mobile exhibitions in Lebanon, Denmark, Sweden and in U.S.A.
• In 2012 the construction of the new building of the Armenian Genocide Museum and Institute and the renovation of its old building will start.
At the end of the conference, the journalists will be provided with the report on the Armenian Genocide Museum and Institute’s activity from 2006 to 2011: After the press conference, at 12:30, the temporary exhibition titled “The Book as a Witness of the Genocide” will be opened. The exhibition has been organized on the occasion of the 500th anniversary of the Armenian printing and the proclamation of Yerevan as 2012 World Book Capital City by UNESCO. The exhibition includes about 300 volumes of the first editions acquired with the support of Serzh Sargsyan, the President of the Republic of Armenia, Jevan Cheloyants (Moscow), Ralph Yirikian, VivaCell-MTS General Manager and Tigran Kalayjyan (Cyprus).
The books shown in the exhibition are grouped under different headings: traveling notes, text-books and publications referring to the social, cultural and business life of the Western Armenians. Separate tables present publications of the pro-Armenian movements that followed the Hamidian and Adana massacres, unique publications printed in Germany, U.S.A, Great Britain, Sweden, France, Russia and other countries, which represent undeniable evidence of the crimes committed by the Turkish political regimes against humanity and civilization.
Some of the books included in the exhibition can be found only in the collection of the AGMI.
By the decision of the scientific council of the AGMI Ralph Yirikian, Geoffrey Robertson and Jussi Biørn were awarded with Fridtjof Nansen gold medal, issued in the nomination of “Gratitude”, for the support to AGMI and their input in research on the topic of the Armenian Genocide.
