STEPANAKERT—Armenia’s newly elected Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan on Wednesday paid his first working visit to the Republic of Artsakh, where he participated in the events dedicated to the Victory in the Great Patriotic War, the formation of the Artsakh Defense Army and the Liberation of Shushi.

Earlier Wednesday, Pashinyan and Artsakh President Bako Sahakian, accompanied by high-ranking officials from Armenia and Artsakh, marched from Renaissance Square in Stepanakert to the Stepanakert Memorial, where they laid flowers and wreaths at the memorial of freedom-fighters and soldiers killed during the Great Patriotic War and the liberation of Shushi.

The Prime Minister then visited the cemetery where freedom fighters killed in the Artsakh War are interred, laid flowers at their tombs and paid tribute to martyred freedom fighters. Later on, the high-ranking officials of the two republics laid flowers at the Shushi Tank Monument, Sparapet Vazgen Sargsyan’s and Nelson Stepanyan’s statues, honoring their memory.

Pashinyan and Sahakian then attended at the opening of the Armenian Dram Museum in Shushi, which was established with the technical and professional assistance of the Central Bank of Armenia. They visited the museum and got acquainted with the exhibits.

The museum features coins and notes from the ancient Armenian Tsopk Kingdom, Tigran the Great, Artavazd II, Artashes II, Cilician Armenia, Russian Empire and USSR, and all the editions of the Armenian Republic.

The museum has a special place dedicated to Artsakh, the coins minted in Tigranakert, silver coins minted in Shoushi in the 19th century, contemporary souvenir banknotes and coins, as well as commemorative coins issued by the Central Bank of Armenia.