Lilit Tadevosyan

Talking today about a final 2016 budgetary bill, Armenian Prime Minister Hovik Abrahamyan took aim at critics accusing the government on increasing the national debt via foreign borrowing.

While confessing that Armenia’s economy faced a number of international economic challenges at the end of last year, Abrahamyan said that foreign loans weren’t designed to fill in gaps in the country’s budget but rather to spur reforms.

The prime minister argued that oftentimes the budget is discussed in a non-professional manner by some critics, adding that his government is constantly debating the foreign credit issue and that it doesn’t agree on a spur of the moment basis.

Abrahamyan then turned his attention to the oft heard criticism that the government isn’t adequately taking advantage of the Russian market and that exports haven’t been increasing.

“It mustn’t be forgotten that the private sector is the exporter, not the government. We only create advantageous conditions, the tools, for organizing exports. In the new world order, our producers do not have sufficient potential to do this,” Abrahamyan said.

Wrapping up, Abrahamyan stated called for the input of all healthy forces and rational proposals to resolve the economic issues facing Armenia.

“We have the political will to do this. I am certain that together we will see Armenia flourish,” the prime minister said.