Armenians all over the world have great potential, and a country with such a global resource as Armenia should not have the problems it currently has, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said at the first World Armenian Summit launched in Yerevan.

In his opinion, the first World Armenian Summit is meant to become a platform and a meeting place for people who want and are ready to make the state interests of the Republic of Armenia a pan-Armenian agenda, as well as to promote those interests and help the strategic development and institutional establishment of statehood.

"In the context of the Armenia-Diaspora dialogue, this meeting is indeed expected and appropriate. Especially in these days when it is obvious to everyone that Armenia-Diaspora relations are undergoing profound substantive, social-psychological and organizational changes. And this is regardless of our will. These changes are taking place not because anyone wants them to, but because global processes are leading to these kinds of changes.

These changes have nothing to do with the revolution that took place in Armenia in 2018 or the tragedy of the 44-day war in 2020. Both the revolution and the war were occasions for us to state the obvious. And what is obvious is that time inevitably affects the nature and content of the Armenian Diaspora.

What does it mean to be a member of the Armenian Diaspora in an era when one can spend 7 days a week on six different continents of the world? What does it mean to be a member of the Diaspora, when you can send and receive emails, photos and videos from anywhere in the world within seconds, have direct contact with anyone, 24 hours a day? What does community life mean in a situation when Armenian literature, Armenian press, books are available online anytime and anywhere and any Armenian can talk to any other Armenian anytime, generate, share, spread any idea under these conditions when Armenia is in the list of leading countries of the world in terms of Internet access and Internet freedom. These are questions, the answers to which are extremely important for all of us," the Prime Minister stressed.

The Prime Minister noted: the answers to these questions will change a lot in relations between Armenia and the Diaspora.

"We confidently believe that Armenians around the world have great potential, and a country with such a global resource as Armenia should not have the problems it has today. And if so, it means that we have been doing and are doing many things wrong, not only in Armenia, but also in Armenia-Diaspora relations," the Prime Minister believes.

The biggest mistake, according to the Prime Minister, is that the Armenia-Diaspora conversation usually begins, continues and ends with generally known or, as they say, nationally recognized truths.

"That's not a bad thing, of course. It's maybe even good, but it's not ideal in the sense that it doesn't broaden our view of ourselves and the world. This, in turn, does not allow us to perceive and register the changes in the world with the necessary speed. In other words, to seize the opportunities and manage the challenges.

The first World Armenian Summit is taking place at a time when many of our ideas and dreams about the world, the region and even ourselves are shaken and sometimes even collapsed.

Our proposal and idea is not to stay under that rubble but to try to find new opportunities, to try to make the Republic of Armenia a platform for the formation and development of new ideas, new dreams and new approaches which have an independent, sovereign, secure, free, developed and democratic Armenia at its core. Because any Armenian anywhere in the globalizing world can have anything: prosperity, job, money, family, and there is only one exception, and that exception is the Republic of Armenia, the pride and happiness of being a citizen of which the majority of those present in this hall have," the Prime Minister concluded.