Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan's father, Azat Sargsyan, died at the age of 84 in Stepanakert, on 16 December. 

 Below is an article by Thomas de Waal published on the Carnegie Moscow Center website. 

 The civil initiative "Against forceful pension payments" goes on informing the community about the obligatory accumulative pension system that will start functioning since 1 January 2014. 

The ruling regime has no way out from the created hard economic situation in Armenia, the head of the opposition Armenian National Congress parliamentary faction, Levon Zurabyan, told Arminfo correspondent. 

Ahmet Davutoglu has successfully performed his mission unlike Edward Nalbandyan, Turkologist Artak Shakaryan told journalists on Saturday, when asked to comment on the Turkish Foreign Minister's Thursday visit to Armenia.

 Davitoglu's three pillar policy is significant. It shows that Turkey is trying to break out of the straitjacket that it found itself in when it back-tracked over the 2009 protocols because of the sharp opposition of Azerbaijan to any deal with Armenia prior to a Karabakh settlement, says Dennis Sammut, Commonspace.eu political editor. 

 The ruling Republican Party of Armenia is likely to abandon ideology of Nzhde and come back to marxism-leninism, former premier of Armenia, a member of the parliament from the opposition Armenian National Congress faction, Grant Bagratyan, wrote at his page in Facebook. 

 A member of the Public Council Committee for Air Communication Izabella Muradyan ran away from journalists as soon as they began asking her questions in a press conference, Friday.  

 The deportation of Armenians in 1915 was inhumane, and Turkey has never supported the move, Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said yesterday as he made a landmark visit to Armenia, Hurriyet Daily News reported. Davutoglu was visiting the meeting of the BSEC Foreign Ministers in Yerevan. 

Foreign Minister of Armenia Edward Nalbandian met with his Turkish counterpart Ahmet Davutoglu and reaffirmed Armenia's compelling stand on normalizations of the bilateral relations without preconditions, the Foreign Ministry of Armenia told ArmInfo.

The reduction in air ticket prices in Armenia is directly connected with the launch of Air Armenia's flights and has nothing to do with the open skies policy declared by the Armenian authorities, Arsen Avetisyan, Head of Air Armenia, has told ArmInfo's correspondent when commenting on the recent statement of Arman Khachatryan, CEO of the National Competitiveness Foundation of Armenia.  
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The reduction in air ticket prices in Armenia is directly connected with the launch of Air Armenia's flights and has nothing to do with the open skies policy declared by the Armenian authorities, Arsen Avetisyan, Head of Air Armenia, has told ArmInfo's correspondent when commenting on the recent statement of Arman Khachatryan, CEO of the National Competitiveness Foundation of Armenia.  

 Armenia and India have signed a memorandum for cooperation in the IT sector. 

The Parliament of Armenia passed the second and final reading of amendments to the Law On Mandatory Accumulative Pension, Thursday. 

Joining the Customs Union will be the peculiarity of 2014 for Armenia, Prime Minister of Armenia, Tigran Sargsyan, said in the parliament today. 

 The statistics indices submitted by prime minister of Armenia are evidence of an extremely hard social and economic situation formed in Armenia. However, the premier did not say that such a situation was formed as the current government could not fulfill all its numerous obligations, a member of the parliament from the opposition Armenian National Congress faction, Nikol Pashinyan, said in the parliament today. 

 One of the Armenian Government's priorities for 2014 will be improvement of business environment, Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan said in the Parliament, Thursday.

He said that over the last years Armenia has made certain progress in improvement of the business environment. In this light, the prime minister recalled WB Doing Business report where the country took the 37th position out of 180 countries.  Nevertheless, the Government will take steps to noticieably improve the situation in the following three dimensions: tax and customs administration, judicial system and construction permits. This will boost investments in economy of Armenia, he said. 

 Ryanair, a major European low-cost air company, denies its interest in making flights to Armenia. When asked by ArmInfo's correspondent whether the company is negotiating on launching flights to Yerevan, Ryanair spokesperson Michelle Lowe says that Ryanair is not going to comment on rumors or speculations. 

Armenian Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandyan and Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu have finished their tete-a-tete meeting in Yerevan.

Armenian Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandyan and Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu have started their meeting in Yerevan.