Askanaz Mravian

(also Askanaz Arutiunovich). Born Dec. 21, 1885 (Jan. 2, 1886), in Elizavetpol’, present-day Kirovabad; died Oct. 23, 1929, in Yerevan. Soviet governmental and party figure. Member of the Communist Party from 1905.

Mravian was of petit bourgeois background. He graduated from the pedagogical faculty of the St. Petersburg Psychoneurological Institute in 1915. He carried on party work in Yerevan, Tbilisi, Baku, and St. Petersburg and from 1915 to 1917 edited Paikar (Struggle), a newspaper influenced by the Bolsheviks. In 1917 he edited the newspaper Banvori kriv (The Worker’s Struggle) and was a member of the Tiflis and Caucasus regional committees of the RSDLP (Bolshevik). In 1918, Mravian became the secretary of the Caucasus regional committee and edited Kavkazskaia pravda (Pravda of the Caucasus). From 1920 to 1922 he was a member of the Revolutionary Committee of Armenia, then became the secretary of the Central Committee of the CP (Bolshevik) of Armenia and people’s commissar of foreign affairs of the Armenian SSR. In 1923 he became people’s commissar of education and deputy chairman of the Council of People’s Commissars of the Armenian SSR, at the same time editing the newspaper Sovetakan Aiastan (Soviet Armenia). Mravian was also a member of the Central Executive Committee of the USSR.