Orit Noked, the Minister of Agriculture, is the first member of the Israeli government to visit Armenia since the establishment of official diplomatic relations between the two states in 1992. Despite the country’s close ties with Iran, Armenian officials have often visited Jerusalem. The biggest delegation arrived in Israel ion 2005. It consisted of 80 members including the then Defense Minister Serge Sarksyan , the head of the Armenian Central Bank Tigran Sarksyan and the head of the Armenian Church Catholicos Garegin II. In 1995 and 2000 Armenian Presidents Levon Ter-Petrosyan and Robert Kocharyan also visited Israel.
It’s no secret that Israeli high officials avoided visiting Armenia in order to protect their relations with Turkey and Azerbaijan. Noked’s visit to the South Caucasus vas a purely practical venture, but Armenia attributed a great deal of importance to the visit of this second-rank Minister. President Sarksyan even said that this visit is opening a whole new page in the history of the two states’ relations.
According to the Israeli media, Noked not only met with her colleagues in Yerevan, but also honored the monument of the ‘1915 genocide’ victims.
Noked’s Armenian counterpart, Sergo Karapetyan, said that they’ve reached an agreement on cooperation in the area of high-tech pedigree stock-breeding as well as in other areas of agriculture. Noked herself said that the two states agreed on creating a special working group for working out a plan of cooperation in the area of agriculture. She also invited her counterpart to visit the Agritech 2012 expo that is due to take place in Israel.
However, the visit didn’t go without a scandal: the tiny Jewish community of Armenia expressed its indignation with the fact that the high guest from Israel couldn’t find time to have a meeting with the community. The head of the Armenian Jewish community also said that the Israeli government ignores their community since 2010 for no apparent reasons, even though they’ve always tried to contribute to the development of the relations between the two countries.
After her visit to Armenia Noked traveled to Tbilisi and met with her Georgian counterpart. Ironically, this visit also coincided with a major deal between Georgia and Israeli Eden International Trading Group, which purchased 2,400 sheep from Georgia.
After Tbilisi Isreali Minister of Agriculture went to Baku, where she plans to meet not only with Azeri officials but also with representatives of local business community interested in cooperation with Israeli agricultural sector. She is also expected to visit the monument of the ‘Black January 1990’ victims.
