Political analyst Richard Giragosian, who headed the Regional Studies Center (RSC), died in Istanbul on September 19.
He had traveled to Istanbul to attend a business meeting, but his health had deteriorated over the past week and he had been hospitalized. Doctors had recorded a cerebral hemorrhage.
Giragosian's death is a sensitive blow not only to his family and colleagues, but also to the entire regional analytical field. He was one of the few experts whose work was read equally in Yerevan, Istanbul, and broader international circles, and it is precisely this circumstance that makes his absence all the more noticeable.
It is especially symbolic that it happened in Istanbul, a city where he worked for years toward building bridges. The questions whose answers he was seeking will now remain on his colleagues' shoulders.
At this point it is difficult to say how the center's work will be reorganized and who will continue the research he began. One thing is clear: analysts of such caliber are rare.
