Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s official visit to Germany has kicked off in Cologne.

Pashinyan met with the KfW Ban Director for Eastern Europe, Olaf Zymelka and visited, the Cologne Technical University where a memorandum of cooperation was signed between the University and the National Polytechnic University of Armenia.

In his address Pashinyan said that the Armenian government views the IT sector as a pillar of economic development and a priority domain.

A senior U.S. Department of Defense official this week praised the Armenian Armed Forces’ contribution to peacekeeping missions and highlighted Armenia’s commitment to the Resolute Support mission in Afghanistan and recognizing Armenia as a top-five non-NATO contributor to NATO’s Kosovo force.

Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Laura K. Cooper attended the Armenian Embassy’s January 29th celebration of Armenian Army Day.

She also shared the Pentagon’s pride in Armenia’s 15-year “enduring” partnership with the Kansas National Guard and expressed her interest in visiting Armenia and exploring ways to deepen U.S.-Armenia defense ties.

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan ruled out the so-called “land for peace” formula, which calls for a compromised settlement of the Karabakh conflict. 

“I believe that the current Armenian government is pursuing a policy on the Karabakh issue that no government had done before. And attempts to search for any parallels or similarities with the policy that was pursued earlier are a complete mistake," Pashinyan told reporters.

Speaking about his phone conversation with National Security Adviser John Bolton, Pashinyan stressed that the Karabakh issue was not discussed during this conversation.

The Armenian Tamrazyan family will stay in the Netherlands after the coalition government agreed to grant residency rights for 630 refugee children.

In October 2018, the Tamrazyan family and their three children of 21, 19 and 15 were offered refuge by a church in The Hague for fear of deportation.  Ninety-six days of continuous sermons were held to protect the family from deportation.

Our position on the Karabakh remains unchanged, spokeswoman for Russian Foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova told reporters.

 “We welcome the recent political contacts between Yerevan and Baku at various levels. We heard the constructive assessments that the capital cities gave on this issue, and we believe that this is the right way to move forward,” Zakharova noted.

Armenia has purchased Su-30SM military jets from Russia, Sputnik Armenia reported quoting the Defense Ministry.

“The Republic of Armenia has signed a deal on the acquisition of Russian Su-30 SM jets,” the message says.

There is no information about the number of jets and the amount of the transaction.