Serzh Sargsyan calls inadmissible existence of closed borders in 21st century

"Today we witness unspeakable cruelty taking place in the Middle East. The religious intolerance resulted in the irreversible aftermath. We have been most directly affected by the atrocities unfolding there, since they result in the destruction of the Armenian spiritual and cultural heritage artifacts, murder and expulsion of the numerous Armenians residing in Iraq and Syria, President of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan said addressing 70th Session of UNGA in New York. 
The president highlighted that the Armenian community of Syria, whose history is centuries-long, shares and experiences all hardships that the Syrian people are undergoing in these difficult times.  "We are trying to aid the refuges to the best of our abilities: until this day, Armenia received more than 16 thousand refugees from Syria. By this sheer figure, Armenia is one of the first among recipient European countries.
Armenians know well the fate of the refuges, of the exiled and expelled. The Armenian Genocide should have claimed many more lives, and the survivors should have gone through much more hardship unless a number of nations, our friends had given us their shoulder in those difficult times.  Today it is Germany, Sweden, and some other countries that deserve their due praise for humanism they displayed. They provided hundreds of thousands of refugees with safe haven, and thus reiterated that the assistance was necessary both from the legal and humanist perspectives," the president said.
The president recalled the Iran nuclear deal as a successful example of resolution of an international problem. " This year we all witnessed how the joint and adequate actions paved the way to smoothing out a difficult international issue. An historical agreement was made on the nuclear program of the Islamic Republic of Iran, an immediate neighbor of ours. That critical deal is undoubtedly going to contribute to the global settlement of the conflict situations and consolidation of the mutual trust, and it was made possible by the extended and consistent political and diplomatic efforts.
All these come to prove that when there is a political will to bridge disagreements and emphasize the spirit of cooperation, it is indeed possible to find solutions for the most complicated issues. From this podium I would like to once again stress the importance of taking diplomatic efforts, especially with the aim to eliminate the closed borders. Armenia has been subjected to the illegal blockade by its neighbors, and we deem unacceptable such an improvident policy that in the 21st century establishes artificial obstacles disrupting intercultural, human to human and trade contacts. In this context, we highly value the periodic review carried out under the framework of the UN Conferences on Landlocked Developing Countries. We stand ready to invest further efforts in this endeavor, also by hosting intermediate workshops on this topic in our country," the president said.