(closed project) Breaking stereotypes, linking and humanizing the lives of people considered being “enemies” – this is the main reason why a group of young women from Armenia and Turkey have united.

In the fourth year of the programme, aiming to strengthen ties between journalists from Turkey and Armenia and to establish direct means of exchanging news sources, journalists, columnists, and bloggers from Armenia visited Turkey and learned in-depth about various issues on Turkey’s agenda.

After signs of a breakthrough in 2008 diplomatic relations between Turkey and Armenia are in a bottleneck again. At the same time there is increasing interest in both societies in overcoming legacies of the past, exchanging experiences with neighbors and aiming towards an open border. Since its inauguration in October 2010, the Ani Dialogue — organized by the HBF South Caucasus, the HBF Turkey and the Caucasus Institute in Armenia — is dedicated to bottom-up reconciliation and normalization of mutual ties between Turkey and Armenia.

The first meeting of the Ani Dialogue has ended with great achievements in building relations and preparing the ground for future joint projects between the Turkish and Armenian civil society. A new bottom up process was inaugurated, which aims at contributing to a better understanding of both societies and, in a long term, to a relaxation in Armenian Turkish relations.

The Yerevan-based Analytical Centre on Globalization and Regional Cooperation (ACGRC) organized three one-day seminars in Vanadzor, Gyumri and Yeghegnadzor, with support from the South Caucasus Regional Office of the Heinrich Boell Foundation.