RoA Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan today visited the Nubarshen toxic chemical dump with the aim of devising ways to neutralize the dangers it presents to area residents and the environment. At the site are collected chlorine-based pesticides that were banned in the Soviet Union back in the 1970’s. The Nubarashen site was opened several years later. Earlier this March, an environmental alarm was raised at the site when heavy equipment was reported to have dug at the dump, exposing the buried chemicals underneath.

The site sits in an unstable zone where the ground is known to shift. In addition, heavy rains wash the chemicals to surrounding fields that residents use for grazing livestock and for crop growing. The Armenian government has already allocated 32 million AMD for site clean-up work. The risks posed by the site have been temporarily resolved and the dump is now monitored. PM Sargsyan listened to calls by several civic groups to have the site permanently neutralized; a costly expenditure. He stated that further study is needed and that a final resolution would be decided upon with the collaboration of international experts.