Majority Vote in Favor of a Single Union of Armenia, Georgia, and Azerbaijan

Residents of the villages and cities of Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Armenia once again met in the Azeri-populated village of Tekali in Georgia, this time on March 8 to discuss the pros and cons of bringing the countries of the South Caucasus into a single union.

All the demonstrations and meetings of this year's Tekali process were dedicated to the memory of founder and director of the International Centre on Conflict and Negotiation (ICCN), scholar, and champion of human rights and freedoms and peace in the Caucasus Giorgi Khutsishvili. During the first civil hearing in Tekali, back in March 2011, Khutsishvili was the first speaker and debated the "for" position on the topic "Georgia as mediator in the process of resolving the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict: Pros and Cons."

At this Saturday's meeting on the topic of a "South Caucasus Union," arguing in favor were human rights activist, emergency room physician, coordinator of the Kazakh-Aghstafa branch of the Helsinki Citizens' Assembly of Azerbaijan Hamis Masimov and journalist, president of the Foreign Correspondents Association, correspondent of the newspaper Izvestia in Armenia Tigran Hovhannisyan, while arguing against was journalist, editor of the websites Media.ge and NPO.ge, board member of the Georgian Charter of Journalistic Ethics David Mchelidze. Moderating the debate was the president of the Caucasus Center of Peace-Making Initiatives, Georgi Vanyan. 

The reports discussed at the meeting are already published on SouthCaucasus.com [RU].

The civil hearing is implemented by the Caucasus Center of Peace-Making Initiatives within the framework of the Symbolic Court of Human Rights, with the support of the National Endowment for Democracy, the Tekali Association, and the Kazakh-Aghstafa branch of the Helsinki Citizens' Assembly of Azerbaijan.

Details in video below (in Russian only).