Armenian Revolutionary Federation
The Armenian Revolutionary Federation, also known as Dashnaktsutyun, is an Armenian nationalist and socialist political party founded in 1890 in Tiflis, Russian Empire by Christapor Mikaelian, Stepan Zorian, and Simon Zavarian. As of 2023, the party operates in Armenia, Lebanon, Iran and in countries where the Armenian diaspora is present. The party was also active in Artsakh until the Azerbaijani offensive in September 2023. Although it has long been the most influential political party in the Armenian diaspora, it has a comparatively smaller proportional presence in modern-day Armenia. As of October 2023, the party was represented in two national parliaments, with ten seats in the National Assembly of Armenia and three seats in the Parliament of Lebanon as part of the March 8 Alliance.
ARF Founders left to right: Stepan Zorian, Christapor Mikaelian, Simon Zavarian
Yeprem Khan was a revolutionary leader of Iran
Fedayi group fighting under the ARF banner. Text in Armenian reads Azatutyun kam Mah (Liberty or Death)
Armen Garo (Karekin Pastermadjian), an ARF member of Chamber of Deputies from Erzurum during the Second Constitutional Era.
Artsakh, officially the Republic of Artsakh or the Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh, was a breakaway state in the South Caucasus whose territory was internationally recognised as part of Azerbaijan. Between 1991 and 2023, Artsakh controlled parts of the former Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast of the Azerbaijani Soviet Socialist Republic, including its capital Stepanakert. It had been an enclave within Azerbaijan from the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war until the 2023 Azerbaijani offensive, when the Azerbaijani military took control over the remaining territory controlled by Artsakh. Its only overland access route to Armenia after the 2020 war was via the 5 km (3.1 mi) wide Lachin corridor, which was placed under the supervision of Russian peacekeeping forces.
The town of Chartar in 2010
General view of the capital Stepanakert in 2015
Artsakh Street in Watertown, Massachusetts in 2011
Wall with images of fallen Armenian soldiers during the Second Nagorno-Karabakh War