SALE OF POWER PLANT’S UNIT TO STRENGTHEN ENERGY SECURITY – ARMENIAN PREMIER

Public Television of Armenia, Yerevan
10 Apr 06

[Presenter] New gas prices are coming into force from 10 April. The
population will pay 65 drams instead of 59 drams for 1 cu. m. of
gas, whereas commercial enterprises will pay 94.5 dollars for 10,000
cu.m. [as heard].

Prime Minister Andranik Markaryan again confirmed that the government
would do everything possible to keep gas and electricity tariffs
unchanged in the next three years. He also said that there had been
no agreement between Russia’s Gazprom company and Armenia on the
Iran-Armenia gas pipeline. Speaking about the sale of the fifth unit
of the Razdan thermal power plant, he said that it was not connected
with the gas price.

The prime minister described the deal as a successful transaction
which would strengthen Armenia’s energy security.

[Andranik Markaryan, captioned] This is a successful deal. We sold
the unit for 250m dollars on the condition that 140m dollars will be
invested into its reconstruction and upgrading in two years’ time.

This will strengthen our energy security. From this point of view,
I consider this is a right decision and the Armenian government has
got an opportunity to use this money to finance domestic gas consumers.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress