In the sphere of foreign policy of Armenia the year of 2009 was an ordinary year with mandatory and unexpected events, the most important of them being perhaps the signing of the Armenian-Turkish Protocols on normalizing relations and opening the Armenian-Turkish border. This issue by itself deserves a separate discussion, which we were actually engaged in for most of the year. But, understandably, foreign policy of the country is not limited to these protocols only.

The whole week, major political forces of Armenia have been summing up their activity in 2009. Another important event in the passing week was the statement of the PACE Monitoring Committee co-rapporteurs on the conclusions of the ad-hoc parliamentary commission studying the events of March 1, 2008. Among the significant events of the week was also the RA National Assembly Chairman's statement on the timing of ratification of the Armenian-Turkish Protocols by the Parliament.

Armenia is ready to resist the second wave of crisis, RA Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan stated, summing up 2009 results. As Tigrah Sargsyan noted: "The depth of the crisis can't be assessed or the time for the second wave forecasted. Still, we have to be ready to face it." According to him, Armenia is prepared for the year 2010. "With a balance of AMD 80 billion, stabilization fund of AMD 54 billion and EU financial assistance of USD 100 million we have enough resource to provide macroeconomic stability and face new challenges," he stressed.

A couple of years ago I had a chance of an interview with Robert Sahakyants and one could not assume at that time that he would leave the world so soon. We all knew he was ill, but no one suspected how serious the illness was. He was one of those without whom, in his opinion, everything would sink in sweet syrup. All that you'll read further are his direct words, as we thought no one could speak of Robert Sahakyants and the world surrounding him better than he himself. For some reason he always spoke Russian, although he knew his native language perfectly well. Call it freak of a genius if you like, but now that he is gone words, however beautiful they might be, are needless.

For the past month the focus of Internet-users and IT specialists around the world has been on three main events, namely the completion of the new operating system Windows 7 - the product of Microsoft Corporation, the release of the fast browser Chrome by Google and the work on our own operating system (OS).