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=Anna Astvatsaturian Turcotte=

Anna Astvatsaturian Turcotte (born Anna Astvatsaturova in 1978, Baku, Azerbaijan) is an Armenian writer and lecturer. After fleeing Baku due to the Pogrom of Armenians in Baku, she and her family spent three years in Armenia as refugees before coming to the United States in 1992. Her family was placed in Wahpeton, North Dakota where she became a U.S. Citizen in 1997.

Education
She studied at the University of North Dakota and received degrees in English & Literature and Philosophy & Religion, along with a minor in Russian Language & Literature. She received her Juris Doctor degree from the University of Maine School of Law in Portland, Maine in 2003. After graduating from law school she was one of the first American clerks at the International Criminal Court in The Hague, Netherlands.

Publication
In 2012 she published her first book, Nowhere, a Story of Exile, which was based on childhood diary entries she kept as her family faced the ethnic violence and cleansing in Baku that followed the beginning of the Nagorno-Karabakh War. She began translating the entries into English at the age of 14. The account further described her life in Armenia as a Baku refugee. Her book was the first English Language first-person account of the Anti-Armenianism in Azerbaijan and Baku pogrom of the Armenians.

Works
Astvatsaturian Turcotte has written and lectured extensively across the United States, including on Capital Hill, on issues of human rights, international law, as well as Anti-Armenianism. She was the driving force behind the State of Maine's 2013 resolution recognizing the independence of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic, the third state to do so after Rhode Island and Massachusetts. She has discussed Azerbaijani aggression and the independence of Nagorno-Karabakh with members of Congress. and the European Parliament. Astvatsaturian Turcotte is an advisory board member of the non-governmental organization Americans for Artsakh.

Awards
Astvatsaturian Turcotte was awarded the Mkhitar Gosh Medal of Honor from the President of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan and the Nagorno-Karabakh Gratitude Medal from Bako Sahakyan in 2013. In 2014, she was awarded Vahan Cardashian award by the Armenian National Committee of America - Western Region.

Media
Anna presented at TEDxGrandForks 2015, themed for exploring what it means to move beyond amazing ideas, launching them into action. She spoke about the birth of her life as a human rights activist after avoiding the ethnic cleansing of her childhood for 20 years.

Currently
On November 3rd, 2015 Anna Turcotte successfully won the election to Ward 3 of the Westbrook Maine City Council. She received 64% of the total vote, unseating incumbent Paul Emery and defeating another candidate in the race.