Irina Rodnina school in Yerevan renamed after her words about Khojaly

The Council of Elders of Yerevan has approved the renaming of the figure skating school named after the Russian figure skater Irina Rodnina into the Yerevan school of figure skating and hockey. The school was renamed because of the Rodnina's participation in the march in Baku dedicated to the events in Khojaly. Her participation in the event and her statements about the tragedy in Yerevan have been treated as anti-Armenian acts.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that on February 26, 2019, Azerbaijan commemorated the victims of the Khojaly tragedy. Irina Rodnina, Deputy Chairman of the State Duma Foreign Affairs Committee, took part in the march.

The draft resolution to rename the Irina Rodnina Sports School of Figure Skating was prepared by the "Luys" faction, Akop Karapetyan, the press secretary of the Yerevan Mayoralty, wrote in his page on the Facebook.

According to his story, on May 8, the Council of Elders renamed, by a majority vote, the Irina Rodnina Sports School of Figure Skating into the "Yerevan School of Figure Skating and Hockey".

The initiative to rename the sports school had to do with Rodnina's participation in the march in Baku on February 26, Ani Khachatryan, the secretary of the "Luys" bloc faction of the Yerevan Council of Elders, told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent.

"Firstly, it is an insult of the Armenian people. And secondly, being a deputy chair of the Armenian-Russian inter-parliamentary commission, Irina Rodnina should have refrained from participating in such an anti-Armenian event, moreover, to make statements," Ms Khachatryan has stated.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on May 9, 2019 at 05:29 am MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.