ACCORDING TO ALARM CALLS RECEIVED BY "ACHILLES", EXTRA MONEY EXTORTED AT TRANSPORT CHECKUP POINTS

Noyan Tapan

Au g 13, 2008

YEREVAN, AUGUST 13, NOYAN TAPAN. "Achilles" NGO for Protection of
Drivers’ Rights has received complaints by its hot line about illegal
actions committed at transport checkup points. The NGO chairman Edward
Hovhannisian said at the August 13 press conference that the drivers
mainly complain that the employees of checkup points extort extra
money from them.

In his words, in accordance with the new order of checkups, the
checkup points shall have modern equipment of 17 types to check about
60 parameters of vehicles. However, according to E. Hovhannisian,
in some cases drivers were given checkup tickets without their cars
having been examined.

Hrayr Hovhannisian, chief expert of the Technical and Road Unit of the
Trasport Inspection of the RA Ministry of Transport and Communication,
said that E. Hovhannisian’s statement is not true. In his words, today
it is impossible to undergo a checkup without a vehicle because the
checkup is made by a computer and all data on the technical state of
the given car is entered into the computer. Hrayr Hovhannsian added
that the intervention of an inspector in this process is actually
ruled out. He announced that there are currently 31 checkup stations
in Armenia, including 10 in Yerevan.

It was stated that the deadline for the checkup of vehicles is
December 31.