Today when the implementation of the Foreign Ministry’s budget was being presented, Nikol Pashinyan, an Armenian National Congress (ANC) MP, inquired of Shavarsh Kocharyan, a Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, “The Minister of Foreign Affairs drives a car, which is the most expensive car of all cars driven by the Ministers of Foreign Affairs in the history of the third republic, he lives in luxury. Don’t you think that the minister should be a bit more restrained?” Shavarsh Kocharyan explained, “The car of the Minister of Foreign Affairs is a present. It was given from Germany; it is not a car bought for government money.”
In Nikol Pashinyan’s words, there are many persons in Germany – a gift of one part of them may be acceptable, a gift of the other part will mean something else. Shavarsh Kocharyan responded, “He is a German, we will answer afterwards, we don’t remember the name, nonetheless, those issues are the focus of the Foreign Minister’s attention.”
Later on, during a briefing with journalists, Nikol Pashinyan stated, “What have we found out? We have found out that Eduard Nalbandyan’s Mercedes-Benz S-Class, a car worth roughly €150-300 thousand, is a gift. We tried to inquire who had given that car as a present. Shavarsh Kocharyan didn’t know being a Deputy Foreign Minister; they said he was some German. So let us finish today’s work on this optimistic note. And since Mr. Kocharyan was late for his flight (he had said earlier that he was leaving for Yalta, H.J.) and since Mr. Nalbandyan is not in the Republic of Armenia because of very important issues, this is all we can assert given the results of today’s meeting.”
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In response to a question why people usually gave such expensive cars as a present , Mr. Pashinyan said that he couldn’t make a comment, “We assert facts. I think that Mr. Kocharyan should be aware of more issues. We thought that only governors were not aware of issues, but it turns out he isn’t either.” www.aravot.am asked Mr. Pashinyan to clarify whether he thought that one couldn’t give such a car as present for nothing, he replied, “I understand that you want to awake a journalist inside me, but I cannot comment.” www.aravot.am inquired of Alexander Arzumanyan, a former Minister of Foreign Affairs, what car he had driven at the time. He replied, “Volga GAZ-31, which had been used by Papazyan and Raffi Hovhannisyan before me.”
Hripsime JEBEJYAN
