YEREVAN, 30 MARCH, 2015. The Polish people share the greatest pain of the Armenian people and Poland will be presented by high-ranking delegation at the Tzizternakaberd Genocide Memorial, on April 24. The Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Poland to Armenia Jerzy Marek Novakovskin stated this in an interview to “Armenpress”. Ambassador Novakovski, who has been conducting diplomatic activity in Armenia for three months, reflected on the Armenian-Polish relations and confessed what he has discovered in Armenia.

- Mr. Ambassador, how do You feel in Armenia?

- I feel myself very well in Armenia. Armenia is an interesting country both in the political and tourism terms. I cannot imagine any other place that would be more interesting than Armenia.

- In that time, have You revealed something new?

- Every time I discover something new, because I still get used to this country. Of course, the sightseeing views are not new to me, because we knew about it. I have met many people; activists, who view the world not as a small country, but they are the citizens of the world. It is one of my discoveries. It is also interesting that in many cases the skin color of the Armenian people is more open than that of many Europeans.

- Let's talk about the Armenian-Polish relations. What are the priorities of Your activities in this context?

- I would like to make a distinction between Armenian-Polish and Armenia-Poland relations. Speaking about the inter-state relations, I would like to mention the activation of collaboration in the economic sphere. Day by day a lot of Polish companies are interested in investing in Armenia. I am glad to see that many Armenian companies show interest in investing in Poland. This is a partnership exchange. The second factor in the inter-state relations is the Poland’s help to make Armenia closer to the EU. Poland is from co-authors of the Eastern Partnership program and will try to bring Armenia to EU in the political term at the Riga summit.

The third element is the cultural cooperation. We implement exchange of the exhibitions and artists and this cooperation can be classified in the third type of the Armenian-Polish relations. It should be noted that the Armenian-Polish relations are very warm. The basis of that warmth is the Armenian Diaspora in Poland. We can meet Armenian doctors, entrepreneurs in Poland and there are many students in the Polish universities. The Polish people have positive attitude and perception towards the Armenians. Surely, they knew a lot about Armenia. I think that it is a great opportunity in the sense of the tourists’ exchange, in order to contribute to the growth of the number of the Polish tourists.

As we know, there are direct flights from Yerevan to Warsaw and from this week four flights will be per week, which will promote to the growth of the Polish tourists. I hope that many Armenians want to visit Poland, at least feel Poland’s cold air and sometimes to get rid of the Armenian heat.

- Mr. Ambassador, the year of 2015 is of a special importance for Armenia and we will commemorate the memory of the Armenian Genocide victims. Do you have any call on the Armenians?      

- I'm not the right person to come out with that call. The higher officials of Poland will issue their call on that issue and address the people. As per Poland's position, Poland has expressed it by the decision of Seimas ten years ago and we will hear the call of Poland’s senior officials, which is addressed to the Armenian people, to be closer with the solidarity and spiritually. Poland has tragic experience from the World War II. As a result of the Soviet and Hitler’s totalitarian regimes millions of Poles were killed and so we have a special attitude towards genocide. (FULL VERSION OF INTERVIEW IS AVAILABLE IN ARMENIAN)

Interview by Hasmik Harutyunyan