Armenian law requires virtually all men aged between 18 and 27 to serve in the armed forces for two years.
A Defense Ministry bill circulated on Wednesday would allow draftees to do only a four-and-a-half-month service in exchange for paying the state 24 million drams ($60,000).
An explanatory note attached to the bill says that proceeds from this scheme would be used for sharply increasing the wages of the Armenian army’s contract soldiers. This, it says, would also make volunteer military service more attractive to other citizens.
The bill needs to be discussed and approved by Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian’s government before it can be submitted to the parliament. Defense Minister Suren Papikian is a key political ally of Pashinian and leading member of his Civil Contract party.
Armen Khachatrian, a senior Civil Contract parliamentarian, on Thursday voiced support for the Defense Ministry proposal while saying that the authorities are open to considering other ideas.
“We would have more well-paid contract soldiers,” Khachatrian told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service. “Also, people would not have to find loopholes to be exempt from [two-year] military service.”
By contrast, representatives of Armenia’s main opposition forces rejected the proposed arrangement as unfair and dangerous for national security.
“With this draft law, the authorities want to ensure that in the Republic of Armenia two-year compulsory military service is performed only by those people who cannot afford paying tens of thousands of dollars for exemption,” said Gegham Manukian of the opposition Hayastan alliance. This could only deepen inequality in the country, he said.
Tigran Abrahamian, another opposition lawmaker, likewise warned of the emergence of a new social division. He also said that the authorities can find other sources of financing military pay increases.
“It’s not that there is no money in the country that can be used for raising contract soldiers’ wages,” said Abrahamian.
Most of the people randomly interviewed by RFE/RL’s Armenian Service in the streets of Yerevan also spoke out against the Defense Ministry initiative.
“That means turning a citizen’s duty into payment,” said one man. “This is the lowest level of morality.”
“A worker’s boy will have to serve while a rich kid will pay up and get exempted,” complained another. “Twenty-four million drams is pocket money for [the rich.]”
Pashinian pledged to gradually make the Armenian military fully “professional” during last year’s parliamentary election campaign. But he gave no time frames for such a transition.
Opposition forces blame Pashinian for Armenia’s defeat in the 2020 war with Azerbaijan. They also say that his administration is doing little to rebuild the armed forces.