Archbishop Aram Ateshyan, General Vicar of the Armenian Patriarch of Turkey Aram Atesyan will be welcomed by protests at Zvartnots airport.
The move comes after the Archbishop’s highly controversial message to the Turkish President Regep Tayyip Erdogan following the German Bundestag’s vote on the Armenian Genocide.
“At a time, when Bundestag MPs of Turkihs descent urge to ban Erdogna from Germant, we, as descent children of the Armenian nation, which respects the memory of the 1.5 million canonized victims of the Armenian Genocide, won’t allow Atesyan to enter Armenia,” reads a statement of a Facebook initiative, which calls itself “We won’t allow Aram Atesyan to enter Armenia.”
Historian Gevorg Yazichyan believes that the Armenian Foreign Ministry should have declared about the inexpediency of Atesyan’s visit. He’s disappointed by attempts of some clergymen to justify the Archbishop’s behavior.
“Anti-human, not anti-Armenian.” This is how MP Zaruhi Postanjyan assesses Aram Atesyan’s statement.
To some members of the Armenian society it’s unacceptable that Aram Atesyan remains a member of the Supreme Religious Council of the Armenian Apostolic Church and is coming to Armenia to participate in the meeting of the Council. According to Gevorg Yazichyan, the assertions that the Armenian Church has no right to defrock Archbishop Atesyan are groundless.
