Azad-Hye, Dubai 30 December 2005: The Newsletter of the Catholicosate of Cilicia reports that the archival storeroom in Antelias is going to be organized soon.
Two experts from Yerevan (Amadouni Virabian, Director of the Armenian Government's official archival department and Prof. Samuel Mouradian of Yerevan State University) visited Beirut last week to do necessary assessment for this project. They provided Catholicos Aram I with proposals for the classification process, due to start in April 2006, with the help of five experts from Armenia.
In 2004 a new archival storeroom has been built in Antelias financed by Gulbenkian Foundation in Portugal, using latest technology from Italy.
It is a known fact that the archives of the Catholicosate are very rich with material related to the history of the Armenian people and the region in the past centuries.
We believe that the archives storeroom in Aleppo, Syria also need close attention and care, especially with the help of modern technology. Leaving such treasures without appropriate handling could lead to the destruction of the material in hand.
What about the archives that concern Middle Eastern communities? There is abundant material in private collections, mostly in need for publication. We lack the effort of gathering this material and producing the history of particular communities, especially those of lesser numbers, such as the Armenians in Kuwait, UAE, Jordan, etc.
