View source for Armenia

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{{Infobox Country
|Box title = Country summary
|Row 1 title = Capital
|Row 1 info = Yerevan
|Row 2 title = Borders
|Row 2 info = [[Azerbaijan]]-proper 566 km, Azerbaijan-Naxcivan exclave 221 km, [[Georgia]] 164 km, [[Iran]] 35 km, [[Turkey]] 268 km
|Row 3 title = Government type
|Row 3 info = republic
|Row 4 title = Population
|Row 4 info = 2,967,004 (July 2010 est.)<ref name="CIA_AM">CIA - The World Factbook. [https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/countrytemplate_am.html "Armenia"], from The World Factbook. Referenced 2010-09-30.</ref>
|Row 5 title = Population growth
|Row 5 info = -0.03% (2010 est.)<ref name="CIA_AM" />
|Row 6 title = Life expectancy
|Row 6 info = 72.68 years<ref name="CIA_AM" />
|Row 7 title = Unemployment
|Row 7 info = 7.1% (2007 est.)<ref name="CIA_AM" />
|Row 8 title = [[Wikipedia:Index of Economic Freedom|Index of Economic Freedom]]
|Row 8 info = 38<ref name="Heritage_AM">Heritage Foundation. [http://www.heritage.org/Index/Country/Armenia "Armenia"], Economic Freedom Score. A lower ranking is better; but please be careful when comparing between different countries or years. Referenced 2010-09-30.</ref>
|Row 9 title = [[Wikipedia:Corruption Perceptions Index|Corruption Perceptions Index]]
|Row 9 info = 120<ref name="Transparency_AM">Transparency International. [http://www.transparency.org/policy_research/surveys_indices/cpi/2009/cpi_2009_table "Armenia"], Corruption Perceptions Index 2009. A lower ranking is better; but please note that the numbers cannot be compared between countries or years due to different methodology. Referenced 2010-09-30.</ref>
|Row 10 title = [[Wikipedia:Doing Business Report|Doing Business ranking]]
|Row 10 info = 43<ref name="Business_AM">Doing Business. [http://www.doingbusiness.org/economyrankings/ "Armenia"], Doing Business 2010 (part of The World Bank Group). A lower ranking is better; but please be careful when comparing between different countries or years. Referenced 2010-09-30.</ref>
}}

'''Armenia''' (Armenian: Հայաստան Hayastan, Հայք Hayq), officially the Republic of Armenia, is a landlocked mountainous country in Eurasia between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, located in the Southern Caucasus. It shares borders with Turkey to the west, Georgia to the north, Azerbaijan to the east, and [[Iran]] and the [[Nakhichevan]] exclave of [[Azerbaijan]] to the south. A former republic of the Soviet Union, Armenia is a unitary, multiparty, democratic nation-state and one of the oldest and most historic civilizations in the world with a rich cultural heritage, as well as the first nation to adopt Christianity as its official religion. Although Armenia is constitutionally a secular state, the Christian faith plays a major role in both its history and the identification of the Armenian people.{{Fact}}

Armenia prides itself on being the first nation to formally adopt Christianity (early 4th century). Despite periods of autonomy, over the centuries Armenia came under the sway of various empires including the Roman, Byzantine, Arab, Persian, and Ottoman. During and after World War I in the Western Armenia, modern day eastern Turkey, fell subject to a policy of forced resettlement coupled with other harsh practices that resulted in an the genocide of 1.5 million Armenians. The Armenian Genocide, as noted by the scholar Ugur Ungor, the largest property transfer of the 20th century. The Eastern Armenia was ceded by the Ottomans to Russia in 1828; this portion declared its independence in 1918, but was conquered by the Soviet Red Army in 1920. Armenian leaders remain preoccupied by the long conflict with Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabakh, a primarily Armenian-populated region, assigned to Soviet Azerbaijan in the 1920s by Moscow. Armenia and Azerbaijan began fighting over the area in 1988; the struggle escalated after both countries attained independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. By May 1994, when a cease-fire took hold, ethnic Armenian forces held not only Nagorno-Karabakh but also a significant portion of Azerbaijan proper. The economies of both sides have been hurt by their inability to make substantial progress toward a peaceful resolution. Turkey closed the common border with Armenia in 1994 because of the Armenian separatists' control of Nagorno-Karabakh and surrounding areas, further hampering Armenian economic growth. However, in 2009 senior Armenian leaders began pursuing rapprochement with Turkey, which could result in the border reopening.<ref name="CIA_AM" />


==Economical characteristics==
* '''Currency''': Dram (ISO code: AMD)
* Central bank '''[[Wikipedia:Discount rate|discount rate]]''': 7.25% (2 December 2008)<ref name="CIA_AM" />
* Commercial banks '''lending rate''': 17.05% (31 December 2008)<ref name="CIA_AM" />
* '''Stock of money''' ([[Money supply#M1|M1]]): $1.359 billion (31 December 2008)<ref name="CIA_AM" />
* '''Quasi money''' (with M1 makes [[Money supply#M2|M2]]): $950.1 million (31 December 2008)<ref name="CIA_AM" />

===Notable events:===
* [[Banking crisis]]: August 1994-1996<ref name="Reinhart_crisis">Carmen M. Reinhart and Kenneth S. Rogoff. [http://press.princeton.edu/titles/8973.html "This Time is Different"], ''Princeton University Press'', ISBN 978-0-691-14216-6, p. 350. (The list does not claim to be complete.) Referenced 2011-07-19.</ref>

===Statistics===
{| border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="5" style="text-align:center"
| Statistic / Year
! 1999
! 2000
! 2001
! 2002
! 2003
! 2004
! 2005
! 2006
! 2007
! 2008
|-
! [[GDP]] (million USD)<ref name="WorldBank_GDP_AM">World Bank. [http://open.worldbank.org/countries/am/indicators%5BNY.GDP.MKTP.CD%5D?date=1999:2009 "Armenia: GDP"], from World Bank [http://data.worldbank.org/ Data]. Referenced 2010-09-30.</ref>
| 1 845
| 1 912
| 2 118
| 2 376
| 2 807
| 3 577
| 4 900
| 6 384
| 9 206
| 11 917
|-
! Govt. debt (% of GDP)<ref name="WorldBank_Debt_AM">World Bank. [http://open.worldbank.org/countries/am/indicators%5BGC.DOD.TOTL.GD.ZS%5D?date=1999:2009 "Armenia: government debt"], from World Bank [http://data.worldbank.org/ Data]. Referenced 2010-09-30.</ref>
| 
| 
| 
| 
| 
| 
| 
| 
| 
| 
|-
! Govt. revenue (% of GDP)<ref name="WorldBank_Revenue_AM">World Bank. [http://open.worldbank.org/countries/am/indicators%5BGC.REV.XGRT.GD.ZS%5D?date=1999:2009 "Armenia: government revenue"], from World Bank [http://data.worldbank.org/ Data]. Referenced 2010-09-30.</ref>
| 
| 
| 
| 
| 17.726
| 18.198
| 19.305
| 19.763
| 21.385
| 22.372
|-
! Govt. expenses (% of GDP)<ref name="WorldBank_Expenses_AM">World Bank. [http://open.worldbank.org/countries/am/indicators%5BGC.XPN.TOTL.GD.ZS%5D?date=1999:2009 "Armenia: government expenses"], from World Bank [http://data.worldbank.org/ Data]. Referenced 2010-09-30.</ref>
| 
| 
| 
| 
| 16.415
| 16.956
| 18.146
| 17.148
| 17.042
| 20.688
|-
! Debt to revenue (years)
| 
| 
| 
| 
| 
| 
| 
| 
| 
| 
|}


===Armenian Genocide===
{{Wikipedia text|Armenian Genocide|568268021}}
The '''Armenian Genocide'''<ref>The International Association of Genocide Scholars, Affirmation, Armenian Genocide, "That this assembly of the Association of Genocide Scholars in its conference held in Montreal, June 11–3, 1997, reaffirms that the mass murder of Armenians in Turkey in 1915 is a case of genocide which conforms to the statutes of the United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide. It further condemns the denial of the Armenian Genocide by the Turkish government and its official and unofficial agents and supporters".</ref> ({{lang-hy|Հայոց Ցեղասպանություն}} ''Hayots’ Ts’yeghaspanut’yun''), also known as the '''Armenian Massacres''' and by Armenians as the '''Great Crime''' ({{lang-hy|Մեծ Եղեռն}} ''Mets Yegherrn'')<ref>H. H. Chakmajian's ''A Comprehensive Dictionary English-Armenian'' (1920, Yeran Press, Boston) defines "Crime" as Եղեռն (Yeghern) on p. 350.</ref><ref>M. Kouyoumdjian's, ''A Comprehensive Dictionary Armenian-English'' (1970, Atlas Press, Beirut) defines Եղեռն (yeghern) as "crime"on p. 312</ref> was the [[Ottoman Empire|Ottoman]] government's systematic extermination of its minority [[Armenians|Armenian]] subjects from their historic homeland in the territory constituting the present-day [[Turkey|Republic of Turkey]]. It took place during and after [[World War I]] and was implemented in two phases: the wholesale killing of the able-bodied male population through massacre and forced labor, and the deportation of women, children, the elderly and infirm on [[death march]]es to the [[Syrian Desert]].<ref>''Armenia: The Survival of A Nation'' by Christopher J. Walker, Croom Helm (Publisher) London 1980, pp.&nbsp;200–203</ref><ref>The Treatment of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire, 1915–1916: Documents Presented to Viscount Grey of Falloden by Viscount Bryce, James Bryce and Arnold Toynbee, Uncensored Edition. Ara Sarafian (ed.) Princeton, New Jersey: Gomidas Institute, 2000. ISBN 0-9535191-5-5, pp.&nbsp;635–649</ref> The total number of people killed as a result has been estimated at between 1 and 1.5 million. Other [[indigenous peoples|indigenous]] and Christian ethnic groups such as the [[Assyrian Genocide|Assyrians]], the [[Greek Genocide|Greeks]] and other minority groups were similarly targeted for extermination by the Ottoman government, and their treatment is considered by many historians to be part of the same genocidal policy.<ref>{{Cite journal | publisher = International Association of Genocide Scholars | format = PDF | url = http://www.genocidescholars.org/images/Resolution_on_genocides_committed_by_the_Ottoman_Empire.pdf | title = Resolution on genocides committed by the Ottoman empire | postscript = <!-- Bot inserted parameter. Either remove it; or change its value to "." for the cite to end in a ".", as necessary. -->{{inconsistent citations}}}}</ref><ref>Gaunt, David. ''[http://books.google.se/books?id=4mug9LrpLKcC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Massacres,+Resistance,+Protectors&cd=1#v=onepage&q=&f=false Massacres, Resistance, Protectors: Muslim-Christian Relations in Eastern Anatolia during World War I]''. Piscataway, New Jersey: Gorgias Press, 2006.</ref><ref>{{Cite journal | doi = 10.1080/14623520801950820 | last1 = Schaller | first1 = Dominik J | last2 = Zimmerer | first2 = Jürgen | year = 2008 | title = Late Ottoman genocides: the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire and Young Turkish population and extermination policies&nbsp;– introduction | url = | journal = Journal of Genocide Research | volume = 10 | issue = 1| pages = 7–14 }}</ref>

It is acknowledged to have been one of the first modern [[genocide]]s,<ref name="24.04.1998">{{cite web|url=http://www.armenian-genocide.org/Affirmation.153/current_category.7/affirmation_detail.html |title=Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly Resolution |publisher=Armenian-genocide.org |date= |accessdate=25 March 2013}}</ref><ref name = "Ferguson">{{Cite book | authorlink = Niall Ferguson| last = Ferguson | first = Niall | title = The War of the World: Twentieth-Century Conflict and the Descent of the West | place = New York | publisher = Penguin Press | year = 2006 | isbn = 1-59420-100-5 | postscript = <!-- Bot inserted parameter. Either remove it; or change its value to "." for the cite to end in a ".", as necessary. -->{{inconsistent citations}}}}</ref>{{rp|p.177}}<ref name="IAGS">{{Cite journal | publisher = Genocide Watch | url = http://www.genocidewatch.org/images/Turkey-_13Jun05ErdoganletterAmericanHistoricalAssociation.pdf | format = PDF | title = A Letter from The International Association of Genocide Scholars | date = 13 June 2005 | postscript = <!-- Bot inserted parameter. Either remove it; or change its value to "." for the cite to end in a ".", as necessary. -->{{inconsistent citations}}}}</ref> as scholars point to the organized manner in which the killings were carried out to eliminate the Armenians,<ref>{{cite web |url = http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/R?r110:FLD001:S03144 |title = Senate Resolution 106&nbsp;— Calling on the President to ensure that the foreign policy of the United States reflects appropriate understanding and sensitivity concerning issues related to Human Rights, Ethnic Cleansing, and Genocide Documented in the United States Record relating to the Armenian Genocide |publisher = Library of Congress}}</ref> and it is the second most-studied case of genocide after the [[The Holocaust|Holocaust]].<ref name="nazi">Rummel, RJ "The Holocaust in Comparative and Historical Perspective". ''The Journal of Social Issues''. Volume 3, no. 2. 1 April 1998. Retrieved 30 April 2007.</ref> The word ''[[wikt:genocide|genocide]]'' was coined in order to describe these events.<ref>Coined by [[Raphael Lemkin]], 1943; {{Cite journal | last = Hyde | first = Jennifer | title= Polish Jew gave his life defining, fighting genocide |url = http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/europe/11/13/sbm.lemkin.profile/ |publisher=CNN |date= 2 December 2008 |accessdate=2 December 2008| archiveurl= http://web.archive.org/web/20081203090012/http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/europe/11/13/sbm.lemkin.profile/| archivedate= 3 December 2008 <!--DASHBot-->| deadurl= no}}</ref><ref>[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uCebMq-GmH4 Interview with R. Lemkin in the UN implying that the term "Genocide" was invented to describe the killing of a race or group, including Armenians, "because it happened so many times"].</ref>

The starting date of the genocide is conventionally held to be 24 April 1915, the day when Ottoman authorities arrested some [[Deportation of Armenian notables in 1915|250 Armenian intellectuals and community leaders]] in [[Istanbul|Constantinople]].<ref>''The Encyclopædia Britannica'', Vol. 7, Edited by Hugh Chisholm, (1911), 3; ''Constantinople, the capital of the Turkish Empire&nbsp;...''</ref><ref>[http://concise.britannica.com/ebc/article-9368294/Istanbul Britannica, Istanbul]: ''When the Republic of Turkey was founded in 1923, the capital was moved to Ankara, and Constantinople was officially renamed Istanbul in 1930.''</ref> Thereafter, the Ottoman military uprooted Armenians from their homes and forced them to march for hundreds of miles, depriving them of food and water, to the desert of what is now [[Syria]]. Massacres were indiscriminate of age or gender, with rape and other [[sexual abuse]] commonplace.<ref>Hans-Lukas Kieser, Dominik J. Schaller, ''Der Völkermord an den Armeniern und die Shoah: The Armenian genocide and the Shoah'', Chronos, 2002, ISBN 3-0340-0561-X, p. 114.</ref> The majority of [[Armenian diaspora]] communities were founded as a result of the Armenian genocide.

==References==
<small>Note: statistical data was rounded. Different sources may use different methodologies for their estimates. Debt to revenue is calculated by dividing the two variables from their original ('unrounded') values. It represents how long it would a government take to repay its entire debt if it used its whole revenue for this purpose.</small>
{{Reflist}}

==Links==
* [[Wikipedia:Armenia|Armenia]] on Wikipedia
* [http://www.cba.am Central bank] of Armenia
* [http://www.enterprisesurveys.org/documents/EnterpriseSurveys/Reports/Armenia-2009.pdf Country profile] (pdf) from the Enterprise Studies page (part of the The World Bank Group)
* [http://countrystudies.us/armenia/ Studies] from the Library of Congress (1986-1998)
* BBC [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/country_profiles/1108052.stm country profile]
[[Category:Countries]]