UAF: Armenian Assembly dropped from membership roster

Assembly says priorities elsewhere

by Emil Sanamyan

Published: Monday March 08, 2010

A pallet of humanitarian aid being unloaded from the UAF cargo plane at Yerevan Airport. Courtesy UAF

Washington - "The Armenian Assembly had informed the United Armenian Fund that, due to financial difficulties, it is unable to pay its share of the UAF's annual operating budget," the UAF Board of Directors told The Armenian Reporter in a statement.

"The UAF Board of Directors decided that the Armenian Assembly's continued membership in the UAF would not be appropriate or fair to the six other member organizations who continue to pay their share of UAF's operational costs," the statement went on to say.

When asked to comment, the Assembly's executive director Bryan Ardouny said in an e-mail that AAA "had sent a letter to UAF, which essentially indicated that we continue to stand ready to assist UAF, but that we chose to prioritize our budget expenditures other than on UAF at this time."

The Assembly was one of UAF's founding members. The Fund was established by the Lincy Foundation as a pan-Armenian umbrella group for humanitarian relief efforts in the aftermath of the 1988 earthquake.

Its members include the Lincy Foundation, the Armenian General Benevolent Union (AGBU), Armenian Missionary Association of America (AMAA), Armenian Relief Society (ARS), Diocese of the Armenian Church of America, and Prelacy of the Armenian Apostolic Church of America.

Last year, UAF shipped $33 million worth of aid to Armenia, primarily medicines and medical supplies. Over 20 years of operation, UAF has shipped $572 million worth of relief aid to Armenia on board 153 airlifts and 1,726 sea containers, the Fund reported in a recent press release.