Armenia’s Russian-owned national gas distribution company declined on Wednesday to specify the amount of additional Iranian gas that will be used by it during a month-long suspension of supplies from Russia.
A senior official in Nagorno-Karabakh on Tuesday warned Russia against selling more weapons to Azerbaijan, saying that they would increase the risk of renewed fighting between Karabakh Armenian and Azerbaijani forces.
Russian customs and security officials frequently collect illegal payments from Armenian businesses exporting goods to Russia, Armenian Economy Minister Artsvik Minasian claimed on Friday.
The sole functioning crossing on the Russian-Georgian border, which serves as Armenia’s main trade route to Russia, has mostly reopened to traffic two weeks after being blocked by a massive mudslide.
Armenia’s controversial Finance Minister Gagik Khachatrian, who has long been linked with lucrative businesses, on Wednesday refused to clarify whether he had helped his two sons buy a luxury villa in the United States.
The Russian Foreign Ministry on Monday appeared to have backtracked on its criticism of a recently erected statue in Yerevan of an Armenian nationalist statesman who fought against the Bolsheviks and later collaborated with Nazi Germany.
Russia insisted that it is not trying to sideline other international mediators in seeking a peaceful resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh as its Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov again visited Armenia on Monday.
Armenia’s government is scrambling to open alternative trade routes to Russia following last week’s massive mudslide in Georgia that blocked the sole functioning crossing on the Russian-Georgian border.
One year after sanctioning an increase in electricity prices and thereby triggering dramatic street protests in Yerevan, Armenian utility regulators decided on Friday lower the tariffs by at least 5 percent.
The Armenian government warned on Thursday that its landmark compromise deal with the opposition will fall through unless international donors finance the purchase of special equipment that would be used for preventing fraud in next year’s parliamentary elections.
France plans to enact a new law that will make it a crime to publicly deny the 1915 Armenian genocide in Ottoman Turkey, the French ambassador to Armenia, Jean-Francois Charpentier, said on Tuesday.
Germany will do more to facilitate dialogue between Armenia and Turkey after officially recognizing the Armenian massacres in the Ottoman Empire as genocide, a senior German diplomat said on Friday.
Acting on his pledges to de-monopolize lucrative business in Armenia, Prime Minister Hovik Abrahamian ordered on Thursday a set of government measures which he said will create “equal conditions” for all importers of fuel, medicines and basic foodstuffs.
Armenia’s total public debt has continued to grow this year and now stands at $5.25 billion, a figure equivalent to around half of the country’s Gross Domestic Product in 2015, government figures show.
Several bodyguards of Armenia’s controversial Transport Minister Gagik Beglarian have been arrested on charges of severely beating up other men, it was confirmed on Tuesday.
The Armenian government will decommission almost 800 cars used by its senior officials and other public sector employees as part of a major cost-cutting drive that was announced by Prime Minister Hovik Abrahamian last week.
The United States has described the latest meeting of Armenia’s and Azerbaijan’s presidents as “positive,” saying that they both seem ready to de-escalate the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and seek its peaceful resolution.
The European Union will provide 15 million euros ($17 million) in additional aid to Armenia if its government tackles widespread corruption in the country in earnest, a senior EU diplomat said on Friday.
Citing “new challenges” emanating from the unresolved Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, the Armenian government pledged on Thursday to streamline its expenditures, step up its declared fight against corruption and improve the domestic business environment.
Economic growth in Armenia is likely to slow to about 2 percent this year, a senior official from the International Monetary Fund said on Wednesday, echoing the World Bank’s most recent forecast.
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