Avetis Aharonian - Gharip

Aharonian was born in Igdirmava, a village of Igdir, in the Surmalu region, at the foot of Mount Ararat. He received his secondary education at the Gevorgian College (Seminary) of Ejmiatzin. He later attended the Sorbonne, in Paris, and the University of Lausanne, in Switzerland. He was a prolific writer and activist, and a member of the ARF Bureau.

Aharonian worked for Droshak and headed the editorial staff of the Mourch (Hammer) and Harach newspapers in Transcaucasia. He was also the principal of the Nersisian School in Tiflis, Georgia.

In 1909, toward the end of the Tsarist persecution of revolutionaries, he was imprisoned for two years by Russian authorities for being an ARF leader. He returned to Switzerland after his release from prison.

During the years of Armenian independence, Aharonian headed the delegation of the Armenian Republic to Constantinople, and also at the Peace Conference in Paris, where he signed the Treaty of Sevres on behalf of the Republic of Armenia.

His last words, translated below, were spoken in February 1948, in Marseille, France, at a Hamazkayin Cultural Association gathering of some two thousand people, at which he was the main speaker. He suffered a stroke on stage and died two months later, in Paris, at the age of 82.

In Armenian