The Armenian National Committee of Greece, the body representing 150,000 Greek citizens with origins from the friendly nation of Armenia accused the Greek Ministries of Foreign Affairs and Education of committing a grossly offensive act after an event titled “28 years of independence of Artsakh. The path to recognition” was banned from being hosted at the Panteion University in Athens.
According to sources privy to protothema.gr, the insult taken was quite serious, as Lernik Hovhannisyan, Minister of Culture, Youth Affairs and Tourism of the country was slated to speak.

The event had been agreed to take place a week ago at the Panteion University, with all the relevant media and press promotion, after the intervention by the Greek Foreign Affairs and Education Ministries, the University was forced to cancel the event. The same sources said this happened to uphold the serve relations with the pro-Turkish government of Azerbaijan.

In a statement, the Armenian National Committee of Greece said that “it unequivocally condemns any attempt to hinder free speech and any external involvement in academic events and expresses its deep dissatisfaction with any political agent attempting to prevent an event at a Greek university, serving foreign-imposed interests.”
The event was finally hosted at the Journalists’ Union of the Athens Daily Newspapers ESIEA building.

The Republic of Artsakh, also known by its official name between 1991 and 2017, the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic, is a de facto independent country in the South Caucasus that is internationally recognised as part of Azerbaijan.
The region is currently populated mostly by Armenians and the primary spoken language is Armenian.