What did Armenia do with $500 mln loan taken from Russia? (video)
What did you do with the $500 mln loan taken from Russia? Naira Zohrabyan, a lawmaker of the Prosperous Armenia Party (BHK), asked the question at the National Assembly today, adding that the loan has not been spent in fact. She said was convinced and could even produce evidence that the loan was given to several entrepreneurs and people standing close to the authorities. In reply, Deputy Minister of Finance Atom Janjughazyan said the loan was sent to the disaster zone to be given to people as private loans. “Most of the money was given to the Central Bank so that it can fund the economy.” In his turn, Nikol Pashinyan, a lawmaker of the Armenian National Congress (HAK), said in 2013 Armenia repaid $861 million of its entire external debt which made 33% of revenues recorded in 2013. “Next time Armenia will be able to settle a big debt in 2020 by repaying $1 milliard of the external debt. I wonder how expedient the timeframes are. Can’t we negotiate with the lenders over the deadline of repayments? Can’t these sharp fluctuations affect our economy?” “You are right and I understand your concerns. At the same time I want to assure you that we are able to settle our external debt,” said Artur Javadyan, Chairman of the Central Bank of Armenia (CBA). Atom Janjughazyan also responded to Pashinyan’s question, giving a long reply. Following Janjughazyan’s speech, the HAK lawmaker said he did not get a clear response anyway. Artur Javadyan hurried to help Janjughazyan saying, “We paid off the Russian loan on a yearly basis, otherwise we would be unable to do it in 2020. We were able to pay off the debt with another loan, through Eurobonds.”
