SOCIETY

Residents of the village of Goght in the Kotayk province of Armenia have kept the road to their village closed for a few hours, thus expressing their protest and disagreement with the government program, under which the Gegardalich water reservoir near the village is to be given to several villages after reconstruction.

This week, Yerevan has been hosting five Nobel laureates in medical sciences delivering nine lectures on topics of biochemistry, physics and medicine, presenting their inventions, scientific achievements and unique success stories in the professional field to the Armenian audience.

The Armenian government on Thursday decided to delay for a year the introduction of a compulsory accumulative pension scheme for private sector employees.

The so-called Panama Papers revelations about world leaders’ connections to offshore businesses that have been the highlight of world media in recent days have not bypassed Armenia either, coinciding with anti-corruption sentiments in society amid an escalation of conflict with Azerbaijan.

Activists in Armenia staging protests in support of a Russian-Armenian businessman jailed in Moscow believe the conviction and imprisonment of the Karabakh native who has vastly contributed to his homeland’s rebuilding has political goals as they see Azerbaijan’s hand behind it.

The Monday resignation of Mihran Poghosyan, the head of the Justice Ministry’s powerful Service of Mandatory Execution of Judicial Acts (SMEJA), whose name is linked with a global offshore scandal, is considered by some as a victory for media or civil society, others, however, believe it is not enough in terms of restoring justice and legality.

The Armenian Police have disproved media reports claiming that a number of journalists covering last night’s protests in central Yerevan were detained or taken to police stations.

The recent arrest in Armenia of a website manager and her assistant on extortion charges has cast a shadow on the country’s media industry, creating a challenge for it find ways to combat this vicious phenomenon.

Last week two criminal cases in Armenia took a turn against Russia, and while there is no major interstate resonance in connection with these developments yet, analytical circles in both counties appear to be watching closely progress of Armenian claims.

At an anti-corruption forum in Armenia last week, head of the European Union (EU) Delegation to Armenia Piotr Switalski said that if there are no visible results of the fight against corruption in Armenia, the EU will not allocate the 15 million Euros (about $17 million) that it has promised to give for anti-corruption struggle.