“168 Zham” carries an editorial devoted to Armenia’s Army Day, a public holiday marking the 24th anniversary of the official establishment of the Armenian armed forces. “Today is not only the army’s day,” writes the paper. “In a sense, Army Day can also be considered State Day because amid the nominal existence and effective inactivity of other state institutions the army has become one of the most important, if not the sole, functioning system in our state.” It says that various problems that continue to plague the Armenian army cannot negate this reality.
“Aravot” comments on the decision by the Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly (PACE) to reject one pro-Azerbaijani resolution on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and approve another. The paper sees mostly extreme and emotional reactions in Armenia to this development, saying that the Armenian government and its loyalists speak of a diplomatic victory for Yerevan, whereas their political opponents and other critics claim the opposite. It suggests that such diametrically opposite evaluations only serve propaganda purposes and “do not help us in any way to understand what we have done and to figure out in which direction we should now work.”
“An epidemic of swine flu is raging in the region,” writes “Chorrord Ishkhanutyun.” “Eighteen people have died from that disease in Armenia. Nevertheless, the Armenian authorities have stopped guaranteeing free-of-charge treatment of the disease [in hospitals.] The main problem is not that this is not quite ethical. If people have to pay for the treatment it means that the more disease spreads, the more revenues the healthcare system will get.”
(Anush Mkrtchian)