From 2018 to 2022, expenditure on the protection of high-ranking state officials in Armenia has increased by 70 percent. The secretary of the opposition "Armenia" Faction, Artsvik Minasyan, stated this at Monday’s parliamentary standing committees’ joint debates on Armenia’s draft state budget for 2022—and addressing National Security Service (NSS) deputy director Aram Hakobyan.

According to Minasyan, this spending is particularly on the protection of the prime minister, the National Assembly speaker, and several other top officials.

"Thus, in 2018-2019, the NSS provided protection of eleven objects. 2.5 billion drams were allocated for those purposes. At the same time, in 2020 the number of protected objects was reduced to ten, and in 2022 ten objects will still be subject to protection. At the same time, 3.9 billion drams will be allocated for their protection," Minasyan explained.

According to the deputy director of the NSS, however, these numbers are exaggerated.

"We have not had such increase. Yes, if necessary, additional funds were included; but they are not the main regular expenses, but episodic," Hakobyan assured.

This answer did not satisfy the opposition lawmaker. He made respective calculations during this very meeting and confirmed the veracity of his claims.

Nevertheless, the NSS deputy director did not change his stance in this regard.