HUMAN GEOGRAPHY
According to localtimezone, Armenia appears densely populated with 99.95 residents / km²; about a third of the residents live in the capital and more than half are concentrated in the flat areas at the foot of Mount Ararat, within a radius of about 60 km from Erewan. Even if the urban concentration is quite high (about three fifths of the population) the urban network is rather weak; the main nuclei, after the capital, are Gyumri and Vanadzor. The ethnic composition of the country includes almost exclusively Armenians (98.1%) and minorities of Yazidis (1.2%), Russians (0.4%), Kurds (0.1%), Assyrians (0.1%) and others (0.1%).
HISTORY
As for more recent history, with the dissolution of the USSR, Armenia, which was one of the republics of the Union, acquired its full sovereignty. The elections of 1990, in fact, saw the affirmation, in the Supreme Soviet of Erewan, of the separatists of the Armenian National Movement, whose leaders Levon Ter-Petrosyan and Vazuen Manukyan were elected president and prime minister respectively in August. In 1991, independence was definitively sanctioned, in acceptance of the popular will expressed by a referendum, and Armenia became part of the CIS. The new state, however, inherited the unsolved problems within the Soviet power and in particular the conflict, albeit not officially declared, which saw it as opposed towith regard to the sovereignty of Nagorno-Karabah, the Armenian enclave in Azerbaijani territory that Stalin had wanted to include in Azerbaijan despite the prevalence of Armenian and Christian elements. The Nagorno-Karabah problem had already broken out in 1988, causing numerous and bloody clashes that the Red Army had not been able to control. With the new situation, the push of the Nagorno-Karabah separatists resumed, who managed to conquer a large part of the region, while the Armenians decided to occupy a strip of Azerbaijani territory to create a corridor between the country and the enclave.. The issue, however, also had internal political repercussions in Armenia because President Levon Ter-Petrosyan refused to recognize the autonomy and sovereignty of Nagorno-Karabah, supported instead by the Dashnak party, a minority in the country but a majority in the enclave.. The clash was resolved with a show of strength by the Pan-Armenian nationalist movement HHSh (the president’s party) which outlawed (December 1994) the opponents, paving the way for constitutional changes (strengthening presidential powers) and for the election of the new National Assembly in which the HHSh won 119 of the 190 seats (July 1995). The conflict with the Azeris, however, had new spikes over the course of the year despite the various agreed truces and the negotiating efforts of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).
The presidential elections held in September 1996 reconfirmed Ter-Petrosyan at the helm of the country. Meanwhile, the persistence of the long diplomatic crisis with Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabah reflected on internal politics, causing an institutional crisis: the controversies that arose following the signing of an agreement (October 1997) between the presidents of the two countries, which provided for the granting of autonomy to the region, provoking the resignation of Ter-Petrosyan (February 3, 1998), who was succeeded by Robert Kotcharian. The political elections of May 1999 decreed the overwhelming victory of the Unity Bloc (41.2%), led by former communist leader Karen Demirchyan, while the office of prime minister was assumed by Vazgen Sargsyan. In the’ October 2000, a commando of terrorists (later arrested) raided the Armenian Parliament, killing ten people, including Prime Minister Sargsyan and Parliament Speaker Demirchyan. V. Sarkisyan was succeeded by his brother Aram, who however, following a government reshuffle (May 2000), had to leave the post of prime minister to Andranik Markaryan. In 2001 Pope John Paul II visited Armenia, re-establishing relations with the Armenian Apostolic Church, interrupted after the Council of Chalcedon (451 AD). The 2003 elections reconfirmed the previous president and government.
In 2005, the government abolished the ban on dual nationality, thus making it possible to obtain an Armenian passport for millions of Armenians from the diaspora. In March 2007 Markaryan died and the government resigned. Elections were held in May, won by the Republican Party which occupied the majority of parliamentary seats. Serž Sargsyan was given the post of prime minister. Presidential elections were held in February 2008, won by the incumbent prime minister and in April Tigran Sargsyan was appointed prime minister. In July 2009, the presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan committed themselves to a peaceful resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh issue, meeting in Moscow with the mediation of the Russian president D. Medvedev. In October, a normalization agreement was signed with Turkey after nearly a century of hostility. In February 2013, President Sargsyan was reconfirmed with 58.6% of the votes. In 2015, a constitutional reform was approved which transferred most of the prerogatives of the President of the Republic to the premier. In the 2017 elections, the party of President Sargsyan won again, obtaining 49.2% of the votes. In March 2018, A. Sarhissian became president with the support of the Republican party, while the outgoing president Sargsyan assumed the office of premier, taking over from K. Karapetian. The appointment of prime minister to Sargsyan aroused considerable protests in the country, especially in consideration of the fact that the constitutional reform of three years earlier had considerably expanded its powers. Sargsyan thus decided to resign from the post of premier, held since May 2018 by the opposition leader N. Pashinyan. To speed up the democratization process of republican institutions, in October 2018 Pashinyan resigned and called early elections. The consultations, which took place in December 2018, saw the triumph of the outgoing premier with 70.4% of the votes, while the republican party, in power since 1999, did not exceed the threshold. in October 2018, Pashinyan resigned and called early elections. The consultations, which took place in December 2018, saw the triumph of the outgoing premier with 70.4% of the votes, while the republican party, in power since 1999, did not exceed the threshold. in October 2018, Pashinyan resigned and called early elections. The consultations, which took place in December 2018, saw the triumph of the outgoing premier with 70.4% of the votes, while the republican party, in power since 1999, did not exceed the threshold.
