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Movses Gorgisyan statue unveiled in Yerevan –

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A park in Yerevan’s Shengavit administrative district was named after the 1990’s national hero Movses Gorgisyan after his bust was erected there in a solemn ceremony on Tuesday.

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The sculpture was unveiled by Yerevan Mayor Taron Margaryan and the hero’s wife, Ruzanna Grigoryan who described the monument as a symbol of independence and freedom.

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“This monument, which is being erected today, is one of the memorials dedicated to, and honoring Movses, but  its message now is more a call for soberness to make us all to once again value the independent Armenian statehood,” she told reporters attending the event. “I find this a historical and political heritage expressing respect for the 1988 national-liberation movement and struggle, self-determination and victory. I believe that every person has to approach this memorial with a beating of heart and realize – before laying a flower – that he has to bow to not only [the memory of] national hero Movses Gorgisyan but also to all the Armenians who struggled for the re-establishment independence and statehood.”

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The author of the bust is sculptor Hayk Tokmajyan.

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Movses Gorgisyan, an outstanding champion of independence of the late 1980’s and early 1990’s, was born in 1961 in Yerevan. In 1984, he graduated from the Armenian Teacher Training University’s Department of Culture, obtaining the qualification of a stage director and producer. From 1986 till 1987, Gorgisyan worked at the Drama Theatre of Goris town.

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In 1987, he joined the nationalistic movement, becoming a member of the National Self-Determination Union. He was the first person to hoist Armenia’s tricolor flag on Liberty Square on Armenia’s First Republic anniversary in 1988. One of the founders of the Independence Army, Gorgisyan is widely known for his speeches on the re-establishment of Armenia’s independent statehood. Since the start of the Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) liberation movement, he was an active advocate of Artsakh Armenians’ independence campaign. On January 18, 1990, border villages in Ararat region came under Azeri militants’ armed attack. A day later, the Armenian fighters eliminated one of the enemy’s detachments, seizing a large quantity of weapons. Together with his warriors, Gorgisyan attacked and silenced the enemy’s weapon emplacement on a hill, but he died a hero’s death in the battle.

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Gorgisyan is buried in Yerevan’s Tsitsernakaberd Park.

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