Author: Emil Lazarian

“I should like to see any power of the world destroy this race, this small tribe of unimportant people, whose wars have all been fought and lost, whose structures have crumbled, literature is unread, music is unheard, and prayers are no more answered. Go ahead, destroy Armenia . See if you can do it. Send them into the desert without bread or water. Burn their homes and churches. Then see if they will not laugh, sing and pray again. For when two of them meet anywhere in the world, see if they will not create a New Armenia.” - WS

The church theme was vetoed

Emil Lazarian

“Hraparak” daily writes.


The authorities recently conducted another internal survey and found out that the Armenian Apostolic Church, even after so many attacks and consistent discrediting, is the most trusted structure in Armenia. That is why the team was instructed not to talk much about the provisions against the Armenian Apostolic Church in the CP pre-election program, which are, in fact, anti-constitutional provisions. Let us remind you that the pre-election program of the CP party states that the actual head of the Church, that is, the Catholicos, should be changed.


“In order to solve the problem of having a valuable spiritual life, the renovation of the Armenian Apostolic Holy Church is a vital necessity. In recent decades, as a result of the activities of the actual leadership of the Armenian Apostolic Holy Church, the religious community has been alienated and continues to be alienated from the Armenian Apostolic Holy Church, which, among other things, is a problem of spiritual security, because it has created an opportunity for external forces to try to turn the Armenian Apostolic Holy Church into a stronghold of the hybrid struggle against the independence and sovereignty of the Republic of Armenia. The “Civil Contract” party supports the agenda of the improvement of the Armenian Apostolic Holy Church and adopts the following road map: a) Removal of the de facto head of the Armenian Apostolic Holy Church (retirement title), b) Election of the Catholicos vicar in the established order, c) Adoption of the Charter of the Armenian Apostolic Holy Church.

According to the charter, structures should be established to ensure the maintenance of fixed principles, financial transparency and the good behavior of clergymen. In the ruling team, it can be said, a veto was placed on the discussion of this issue, with the calculation that after the elections on June 7, when they win, they will announce that they have also received approval for the implementation of their anti-Church plan, so they will start a new and stronger attack against the Holy Father and the Church.

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Whoever voted for CP will vote for Aliyev and Erdogan. Tsarukyan

Emil Lazarian

This government cannot manage, and if the government cannot manage, then it must go. Gagik Tsarukyan, the leader of the “Prosperous Armenia” party, announced this during the pre-election campaign in the communities of Tavush region.


According to him, an entire nation should not suffer and be discredited because of the government. He pointed out all the problems that these authorities have brought upon RA. Foreign debt reaching 15 billion dollars, a difficult social situation, and with those 15 billion dollars, no serious economic program was implemented, no factory was built.


“I didn’t graduate from Harvard, but I graduated from the school of life. Nothing is impossible, everything is solvable, you just need the right specialists, party affiliation should not matter, but a person’s knowledge, work, and respect. Today they say: you elected Tsarukyan, you will vote for Lukashenko, and I say: whoever voted for CP, will vote for Aliyev and Erdogan,” stated Gagik Tsarukyan.


The PAP leader urged the participants of the meeting to definitely participate in the elections, voting according to their conscience.


Details in the video

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The Russian Federation has included Armenia as a country with a high risk of arrest of its citizens

Emil Lazarian

Russian citizens should consider the risk of detention by third countries and extradition to the United States when traveling abroad. Grigory Lukyantsev, Director of the Multilateral Human Rights Cooperation Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Russia, told RIA Novosti about this.


“Many states, not only in the EU but also more broadly, have certain obligations regarding extradition and extradition. All this should be taken into account when assessing the risks that people may face when traveling abroad,” Lukyantsev said.


The diplomat emphasized that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs does not decide where Russians can and cannot travel. It can only advise not to visit certain countries if the citizens think that they may have problems with the American or European authorities.


According to the information published by the Russian Foreign Ministry, countries with a high risk of arrest of Russian citizens at the request of the United States include most of Europe and Latin America, as well as Australia, Canada, Armenia, Israel, Maldives, South Korea, Singapore, Thailand, Fiji, Sri Lanka, Liberia and Morocco. However, the ministry notes that this list does not include all countries that have extradition treaties with the United States.

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Worrying situation. Before the elections, the social situation is tense

Emil Lazarian

May 14, 2026

In recent months, in order to woo the voters, the political authorities have been distributing widespread aid at the expense of the budget. But before the elections, the social situation in Armenia worsens. The growth of salaries has slowed down significantly, instead, inflation has intensified to a great extent.

The official statistics recorded that this year the growth of nominal average wages is far behind the rate of inflation.

The increase in salaries does not catch up with the price increases, which means that people have started to live worse than they did last year.

Until recently, Nikol Pashinyan considered one of the main achievements of his government and political power to be that wages are growing much faster than inflation. Based on that, he said that people live better now. This year, we see that inflation is growing at a much faster rate than wages. But Nikol Pashinyan does not say that people have started to live worse.

Read also

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In the first 3 months of the beginning of the year, according to official statistics, the average nominal salary in Armenia increased by only 2.9 percent.

We are talking about the increase of the average salary recorded during one year.

Admittedly, this is a rather modest increase, which indicates that the pace of wage growth has slowed down significantly. It happened in conditions of no less high economic growth. The growth of economic activity in the first quarter was 7.1 percent. Much higher than last year. But that growth has bypassed working citizens. The rate of growth of their wages has weakened.

In March, even nominal wages fell.

According to official data, the average salary in Armenia in March was lower than in March last year. A 1.2 percent decrease was recorded.

This is a very bad impulse. Especially, if we take into account that this decrease is not a seasonal decrease, from which we can be calm. If it continues, serious problems may arise, and not only from a social point of view.

A decrease in wages can have many other related negative consequences, and first of all, for the banking system. It is known that in recent years, many citizens have found themselves under loans, and many of them somehow manage to pay off the loans and solve their social problems on the other hand. The decrease in wages will increase the financial pressure on them. Many people may face the fact of insolvency, not being able to fulfill their obligations.

It doesn’t take much imagination to understand what will happen after that.

The decrease in wages is one of the biggest risks that have been placed under the country in the form of a bomb in recent years. Due to this, they can cause many problems in different fields.

It is noteworthy that the decrease in wages took place mainly in the economy.

The official statistics recorded that in March, compared to March of the previous year, the average salary in the economic sector was reduced by 4 percent. And it happened against the backdrop of inflation activation.

Average inflation in March was 4.5 percent. Compared to March of the previous year, consumer goods rose in price by 4.5 percent on average.

During that same period, the nominal or “dirty” salaries of almost 600,000 citizens employed in the economy decreased by an average of 4 percent. After taxation, the reduction will be greater.

Now let Nikol Pashinyan be kind enough to say whether these people lived better last year, or whether the social condition of these people has improved or worsened compared to last year.

Another thing in the case of the state. the social condition of those employed in the state system and especially high-ranking bureaucrats has improved. The rate of growth of their salaries has been much higher than the rate of inflation.

While the salaries of citizens working in the economy and creating good have decreased, the average salary in the state system has increased by 9.8 percent in March.

Do you know at what expense, the millions that are taken from the budget and from the taxes paid by taxpayers, are divided among themselves under the name of incentive money? At the expense of those millions, such salary increases were registered in the state system.

The salary of a working, productive, tax-paying citizen has decreased, and that of government officials, who are fed by the taxes paid by these people, has risen quite sharply. It increased because they decided to encourage themselves with millions.

The growth rate of the average salary in the state system was more than double the rate of inflation.

They started to live better in the state system, and those who fed that system started to live worse. And it didn’t happen only in March.

In the first three months of the beginning of the year, the average salary, including the state system, increased by only 2.9 percent, and inflation during that period was 4.2 percent compared to the previous year.

Inflation exceeded the growth rate of the average nominal salary by 1.3 percentage points.

Privately, in the first quarter, the average nominal salary increased by 1.7 percent, inflation was 4.2 percent. The average salary in the state increased by 6.9 percent, inflation was 4.2 percent.

In the state system, which survives at the expense of the private sector, life has improved, and private life has worsened. Privately, people work so that CP bureaucrats feel better and live better.

HAKOB KOCHARYAN




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RFE/RL – Another Ex-Karabakh Leader Protests From Azeri Jail

Emil Lazarian
  • Gayane Saribekian
May 14, 2026
Nagorno Karabakh – Davit Babayan, March 31, 2022.

Yet another former leader of Nagorno-Karabakh jailed in Azerbaijan has condemned his and the other Armenian prisoners’ trials and accused Azerbaijani authorities of continuing to violate their rights.

“This is not a trial but an ethno-political vendetta against the past and future of the Armenian people,” Davit Babayan said in an audio message communicated to his family in Armenia by phone and made public on Thursday.

“All humanitarian, legal and international norms and their own legislation are being grossly violated,” he charged. “I call on fellow patriotic Armenians to unite and defend our rights because we are going appeal to the international court.”

Eight former Karabakh Armenian leaders were captured right after the 2023 Azerbaijani offensive that restored Baku’s full control over Karabakh and forced the region’s Armenian population to flee to Armenia. They all denied a long list of war crimes charges levelled against them. An Azerbaijani military court sentenced five of them, including Babayan, to life imprisonment and gave the three others 20-year jail sentences in February this year at the end of two trials denounced by Amnesty International as a “travesty.”

Babayan said that his appeal against the verdict filed later in February “disappeared” and did not reach a higher Azerbaijani court. He suggested that the authorities in Baku are deliberately preventing him from appealing to an international tribunal, presumably the European Court of Human Rights.

Babayan, who had served as Karabakh’s foreign minister, is the third Karabakh Armenian prisoner to have made a statement from the Azerbaijani prison. Ruben Vardanyan, who is also a prominent Armenian businessman, has done so on a regular basis.

In his most recent statement issued last week, Vardanyan stepped up his accusations that Armenia’s government is indifferent to the fate of the prisoners. He also criticized Armenia’s human rights ombudswoman, Anahit Manasian, for essentially dismissing his earlier appeal to try to visit the prisoners together with their relatives.

Earlier in May, another former Karabakh leader held in Baku, Davit Ishkhanian, urged Armenians to stay “strong” while decrying “blatant violations” of human rights and international law which he said occurred during the trials.

Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian and other Armenian officials insist that Yerevan has been doing its best to try to secure the release of at least 19 Armenians remaining in Azerbaijani captivity. Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev again branded them as “war criminals” when he addressed on May 4 a European Political Community summit in Yerevan via video link. Pashinian did not respond to Aliyev, drawing strong criticism from the Armenian opposition.

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Another Armenian Arrested For Insulting Pashinian

Emil Lazarian
  • Naira Bulghadarian
May 14, 2026

Armenia – Artak Avetisian, a Yerevan resident arrested for insulting Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian.

Law-enforcement authorities pressed on Thursday criminal charges against a man arrested after using offensive language to attack Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian during Armenia’s ongoing parliamentary election campaign.

In a live Facebook broadcast, Artak Avetisian, a resident of Yerevan’s southern Shengavit district, lashed out at Pashinian as the latter campaigned there on Tuesday. Avetisian was arrested from his home shortly afterwards. His family circulated a video of police officers forcing the handcuffed businessman into their car.

Armenia’s Investigative Committee formally charged Avetisian with disseminating hate speech after its officers searched his house on Thursday afternoon. The law-enforcement agency also asked a court to remand him in pretrial detention.

Ruben Melikian, a prominent pro-opposition lawyer representing Avetisian, insisted that his client did not break any laws. Melikian denounced the criminal case as politically motivated, saying that the Armenian authorities are continuing to crack down on their vocal critics ahead of the June 7 elections.

One of those critics was arrested and charged with hooliganism in February two months after posting an offensive video about Pashinian on the TikTok platform. Another citizen, a 55-year-old woman from the northwestern town of Akhurian, was prosecuted around the same time for reportedly making a disparaging statement about the prime minister and his family in a private message sent online.

Armenian prosecutors have not denied reports that they are monitoring people posting angry comments about Pashinian on social media and have ordered criminal investigations into some of them.

No Pashinian supporters have been prosecuted for offending or voicing threats against opposition politicians. In late December, one government loyalist publicly called for the murder of Catholicos Garegin II, the supreme head of the Armenian Apostolic Church whom Pashinian has been trying to depose. The Investigative Committee did not charge or even interrogate him.

Pashinian himself publicly insulted the fugitive son of one of his main election challengers, Gagik Tsarukian, during his campaign visit to Shengavit.

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‘You visited the first Christian nation, yet ignored the Catholicos of All Arm

Emil Lazarian
Panorama, Armenia
May 14 2026

The prestigious French periodical Le Journal du Dimanche has published an open letter from the former Ambassador of Armenia to the Holy See, Mikayel Minasyan, addressed to French President Emmanuel Macron. Notably, the letter has also been officially delivered to the Élysée Palace.

Tert.am presents the Armenian translation of the message addressed to President Macron, in which Minasyan details the issues facing the Armenians of Artsakh, as well as the persecutions and repressions carried out against the Armenian Apostolic Church.

Addressing the President of France, Mikayel Minasyan wrote:

“Days ago, you were hosted in my homeland, Armenia, where you were welcomed with the warmth characteristic of the Armenian people. The friendship between France and Armenia has centuries of history and deep roots in shared values; however, allow me to state a simple truth: just as Armenia is not Nikol Pashinyan, France is not you.

Your visit was not a mission to support an allied people, but rather overt and harsh political propaganda in favor of Nikol Pashinyan, just one month before the elections. Your obsession with flattering the incumbent authorities was so overwhelming that you even resorted to falsehoods, claiming that no such visits to Armenia had occurred prior to 2018. Meanwhile, all three of your predecessors paid official visits to our country, earning the utmost respect of the people and an equally warm reception.

During this visit, you chose to see only the ‘Nikol-aligned’ side of Armenia. You avoided hearing the voices of those Armenians who do not forgive and do not forget how, on October 6, 2022, in Prague—under your direct auspices—Nikol Pashinyan recognized Artsakh as part of Azerbaijan. Many of the authors of that black page of history have already left the political stage, as you and your protégé will one day. However, what remains are the 120,000 Armenians of Artsakh and their descendants, who, as a result of your ‘peace agenda,’ suffered under blockade for eight months, faced starvation, and in September 2023, were forcibly displaced from their millennial homeland following ethnic cleansing and military aggression—all amid the silence and inaction of you, your protégé, and your colleagues.

Today, you make loud statements about Pashinyan’s ‘courage.’ If surrendering one’s own homeland and people to the enemy is courage to you, then to us, it is national treason. But you did not meet those Armenians.

You did not see the Artsakh Armenians being manhandled and subjected to brutal force on the streets of Yerevan because police cordons kept them far from your sight. You visited the Genocide Memorial, yet you never learned that the director of the Genocide Museum—a distinguished scholar—was recently dismissed by Nikol simply for daring to present a book about Artsakh to the Vice President of the United States.

You visited the first country to adopt Christianity, yet you ignored the Catholicos of All Armenians, who has long been subjected to open persecution for refusing to renounce Artsakh and for defending Armenian spiritual heritage. The persecution unleashed against the Armenian Apostolic Church is not limited to the campaign against the Supreme Patriarch. Today in Armenia, four bishops and high-ranking clergy of the Church remain in custody, held solely on fabricated and politically motivated charges. Furthermore, the movements of the Catholicos of All Armenians are effectively restricted within the country, and members of his family have become political hostages, ending up behind bars.

You visited Gyumri, but you were not told that the leader of that diocese, Archbishop Mikayel, spent about a year in prison for his commitment to free speech and the truth, and is currently under house arrest. During your visit, the faithful of Gyumri, who attempted to raise their voices to you, were barred by brutal police force from even approaching your motorcade.

Armenia today is submerged in total repression. The existence of political prisoners, the violent silencing of free speech, and the collapse of democratic institutions are documented even in the reports of reputable international organizations. Pashinyan does not shy away from persecuting prominent figures of the Diaspora—some of whom, incidentally, were part of your own delegation. You cannot be unaware of all this.

The Armenians you failed to meet are certain: history will yet deliver its harsh verdict on the ‘courage’ you so diligently praise.

They are also glad that, just as Armenia is not Nikol Pashinyan, France is not you.”

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Armenia as Something to Eat? PM Pashinyan Refuses to Cut Map-Like Cake

Emil Lazarian
PRAVDA, Russia
May 14 2026
 14.05.2026 16:10
World

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan refused to cut a cake shaped like the map of Armenia during a campaign trip to the community of Gyulagarak, drawing attention on social media and in local media coverage.

Residents prepared the cake to welcome the prime minister during his pre-election visit. The dessert featured the outline of Armenia colored in orange and blue, matching the colors used in the government’s election campaign branding.

Pashinyan Declines Symbolic Gesture

Video published by Radar Armenia showed Pashinyan thanking supporters but declining to cut the cake.

“No, no, thank you very much. I understand what you meant, of course, but we will not cut this cake. And I ask you very much — cakes, and generally anything edible, should not be made in the shape of Armenia,” Pashinyan said.

The moment quickly spread across Armenian social media platforms, where users debated the symbolism behind the prime minister’s reaction.

Campaign Focus on Armenia’s Recognized Borders

The incident comes as Armenia’s internationally recognized borders have become one of the central themes of Pashinyan’s political messaging ahead of upcoming elections.

Earlier, the Armenian leader described the 1988 movement seeking the unification of Nagorno-Karabakh with Armenia as a “fatal mistake,” signaling a major shift from previous nationalist narratives that dominated Armenian politics for decades.

Pashinyan has increasingly emphasized the importance of preserving Armenia’s sovereignty within its internationally recognized borders while pursuing normalization efforts with neighboring countries.

Position on Russia Sanctions

During separate remarks to journalists, Pashinyan also reiterated that Armenia does not plan to join sanctions against Russia.

“We have stated that we will not enter the sanctions regime, but we also will not take steps that would cause us to fall under sanctions ourselves,” he explained.

Armenia maintains close economic ties with Russia while simultaneously seeking deeper cooperation with Western countries and regional partners, forcing Yerevan to balance competing geopolitical pressures.

Analysts note that Armenia’s leadership continues to pursue a cautious foreign policy strategy aimed at avoiding direct confrontation with either Moscow or the West.

Author`s name Anton Kulikov

Editor Dmitry Sudakov

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Armenia’s parliamentary elections: Polarisation and hybrid threats

Emil Lazarian
Commonspace.eu
May 14 2026

This commentary was prepared by Dr Andrzej Klimczyk for the Armenian Election Monitor 2026. 

The upcoming parliamentary elections in Armenia will undoubtedly be crucial for the country’s future. We can already observe significant social polarisation, the use of hate speech, and brutal media attacks by competing electoral entities on each other. Unlike Georgia or Moldova, Armenia is operating under intense and immediate security pressure following the end of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. Border issues, normalisation of relations with Azerbaijan, and relations with Türkiye are not just foreign policy issues; they are existential political issues. This raises the stakes of the election and increases the likelihood of hardline rhetoric that could complicate post-election management.

Armenia continues to hold genuinely competitive, free elections. Compared to countries such as Russia, this remains an important strength. The main problem is not the lack of competition, but the quality of it.  Currently, politics is highly polarised and often based on support for or opposition to Nikol Pashinyan. This risks narrowing the political debate and turning elections into referendums on leadership rather than on future-oriented programmes.

There are real threats and risks of disinformation or hybrid interference in these elections.

Not only during the campaign, but also on election day and afterwards. The greatest threat is the constant flow of hate-driven narratives, which reinforce existing polarisation rather than creating a stable pre-election environment.

Disinformation can also target the diaspora. Armenia’s large diaspora is an asset, but it also allows narratives to spread outside the country and return through social media platforms.

Armenia is partly prepared to counter external disinformation. For sure, Armenia is better prepared than it was a decade ago, but its defences against hybrid interference are still not fully integrated.

There are many organisations, civil society groups, and independent media outlets actively engaged in fact-checking and monitoring, often with support from the European Union. This is an important strength.

In this context is worth noting that on April 21, the EU approved a new civilian mission in Armenia, EUPM (EU Partnership Mission to Armenia), aimed at combating hybrid threats (election interference, cyberattacks, illicit financing).

The mission was created at the request of the Armenian side ahead of the parliamentary elections scheduled for June 7. Yerevan asked Brussels to deploy a “rapid response team” to protect against external interference.

The European Council established the EUPM Armenia within the framework of the Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP), further contributing to efforts to strengthen Armenia’s democratic resilience and crisis management capacity. The mission will support Armenia in countering multifaceted threats, such as foreign information manipulation and interference (FIMI), cyberattacks, and illicit financial flows. EUPM Armenia will provide strategic advice and capacity-building to various ministries and government institutions in developing policies to counter the threats facing society and government, as well as support the development of a horizontal, whole-of-government approach.

Key objectives of the mission are,

  • Combating disinformation and cyberthreats
  • Preventing illicit financial flows in politics
  • Advising security agencies

EUPM should help Armenia to fill out institutional gaps, including the lack of a fully integrated, state-led strategy that combines cybersecurity, strategic communications, platform engagement, and crisis response. Faster and clearer communication from authorities is needed to prevent information vacuums. Coordination across social platforms and closer cooperation with major technology companies may also be necessary to detect coordinated behaviour at an early stage.

The greatest risk is not that the elections will be technically manipulated, but that the information environment becomes so polarised that the outcome is widely questioned.

Another problem is low public awareness, which causes weak or poorly documented claims to quickly gain popularity.

There is a need for faster official communication. Clear, timely updates from authorities are necessary to prevent an information vacuum.

  • In summary, elections will be competitive in a very polarized electoral environment. Compared to countries like Russia, Armenia continues to hold truly competitive elections. The bigger problem isn’t the lack of competition, but the quality of it. Politics is highly polarized, largely based on support for or opposition to Nikol Pashinyan. This polarization risks narrowing the political debate and turning elections into referendums on leadership rather than on forward-looking agendas. On April 23, the Central Election Commission registered 19 entities: 17 political parties and 2 electoral unions, as candidates to participate in the elections. At present, I do not observe a real contest over programmes, but rather a contest over names. Voters are being asked to choose between party leaders, not between program proposals.
  • A specific problem for the opposition is its difficulty uniting. In Armenia, opposition forces often coalesce around protest movements but struggle to maintain cohesive electoral coalitions. This situation favours the ruling party, despite persistently high levels of public dissatisfaction with Nikol Pashinyan’s rule.
  • There are real threats, not only during the election campaign, but also on election day and the day after. In my opinion, the greatest threat is the constant flow of “hate” narratives that reinforce existing polarization rather than creating a stable and peaceful pre-election atmosphere.
  • Armenia has made real strides in electoral administration since 2018—better transparency, more credible vote counting, fewer blatant abuses of administrative resources compared to earlier periods. But public trust in institutions remains uneven. Many voters still suspect elite bargaining or external influence behind political outcomes, even when procedures are sound.  Post-election stability: Even a technically well-run election could be followed by protests if the result is politically contested.

The main challenge isn’t whether votes are counted correctly; it’s whether the outcome is broadly accepted as legitimate in a society under significant internal and external strain.

Armenia is better prepared than it was a decade ago, but its defences against hybrid interference are not yet fully integrated. The greatest risk isn’t that the elections will be “hacked,” but that the information environment will become so controversial that the legal outcome will be widely questioned—a problem that is both political and technical.

Source: Dr Andrzej Klimczyk is a former Polish diplomat with over 25 years of experience in post-Soviet countries. Dr. Klimczyk is an expert in fields such as the promotion of democracy and human rights pertaining to electoral systems, as well as freedom of speech in mass media. Moreover, he has broad experience in the security and defense sector. Dr Klimczyk is a former Political Officer in the OSCE Mission to Moldova (2001-2008) and Political Officer in the NATO Liaison Office in Georgia ( 2010-2017). Additionally, he has served as a former journalist and press attaché in the Polish Embassy in Moscow (1996-2000). Dr Klimczyk has significant experience observing general, local, and municipal elections in Russia, Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova. He is the founder of the“Anush Klimczyk Foundation”.The foundation was established in March 2025 in Yerevan, Armenia. 


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Armenia allows construction of energy storage systems

Emil Lazarian
PV Magazine
May 14 2026

Amendments to Armenia’s Energy Law permits the development of energy storage systems for the first time, subject to licensing. Systems smaller than 1 MW, or those above 1 MW designed for self-consumption, are exempt from licensing.

May 14, 2026 Patrick Jowett

From ESS News

The Armenian government has passed legislation allowing the construction of energy storage systems.

The amendment to the country’s Energy Law, which has now passed a second and final reading in parliament, sets out the introduction of energy storage systems subject to licensing.

Speaking to Armenia’s national news agency Armenpress, the country’s Minister of Territorial Administration and Infrastructure, David Khudatyan, explained the license will allow, in accordance with market rules, the right to buy and sell electricity on the wholesale market and to provide storage services to market participants.

The new rules also stipulate that licensing will not be required for the development of energy storage systems when the system is up to 1 MW in capacity, or when the system is above 1 MW but is designed for self-consumption.

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