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On October 8 RA NA President Hovik Abrahamyan received the heads of the participant delegations of the ongoing Armenian-French Decentralized Cooperation Forum in Yerevan, led by the Chairman of the United Cities’ of France Charles Joselin.

Greeting the guests the NA President noted that he was also glad to see in the delegation the parliamentarians, who did a lot of work in the development of cooperation with Armenia both in local bodies and in the Parliamentary Friendship Groups. He emphasized the effective cooperation being implemented at the level of the local authorities: from the beginning of the 1990s the network of the sister cities, departments and regions of the two countries being extended with great power includes 30 partnership ties. Hovik Abrahamyan noted that the revelation of the solidarity of the cities of France would never be forgotten in the days following the 1988 destructive earthquake. The cities of France, which showed humanitarian support to Armenia, were among the first, expressing in that way the sympathy and friendly attitude of the French people towards Armenia. The NA President also highly assessed the cooperation programmes implemented in the partnership cities of Armenia and those being in the phase of implementation, which added the partnership at high state level between Armenia and France. To the NA President’s conviction, the friendship between the cities of Armenia and France and the decentralized cooperation day by day promoted the strengthening of Armenia-France relations, where the Armenian community of those same cities of France also had its significant role. Touching upon Armenian-French Decentralized Cooperation Forum Hovik Abrahamyan noted that it was the result of the long-lasting work of the two sides and emphasized the agenda themes of the Forum, which would be ruling spheres for further cooperation. He also highlighted the adoption of the Charter, which would be valuable achievement in this sphere for the development of the Armenian-French cooperation. He expressed his conviction that the establishment of the frequency of such forums was a necessary step, in which frameworks could be indicated the further directions of the development of the decentralized cooperation sphere and the mechanisms of their implementation.

The French NA deputy, the Deputy Mayor of Nice Rudy Sal in the name of the delegation thanked the NA President for the reception and noted that the forum was successfully held. He stressed that considerable progress was noticed, and there was big potential in deepening the cooperation between the two countries. He highly assessed the friendly relations existing between the two countries, documenting that the Day of Independence of Armenia was the only foreign holiday that was marked in the communities of France. In the French MP’s word, in the 21^st century the first law, which was adopted in the French Parliament, was the law on recognition of the Armenian Genocide.

During the meeting at the guests’ request Hovik Abrahamyan touched upon the issues concerning the activities of the parliament, the local self-government system, and the Armenian-Turkish relations.

After the meeting the French guests were in the reconstructed hall of the National Assembly.