At the yesterday’s Government session, RA Prime Minister Hovik Abrahamyan gave instructions to the State Committee for Economic Competition, Ministry of Economy and the Civil Aviation General Department closely to scrutinize the market of passenger air transportation. According to the Prime Minister, the international flights to Armenia should be made in more convenient hours, as the night flights are causing inconveniences to the tourists.
In an interview with Aravot.am, political analyst Gagik Hambaryan considered the Prime Minister’s assignments belated. According to him, it cannot give any benefit to Armenia’s tour business at this moment. “The tour season has begun long ago, I don’t know why the government of Armenia has now decided to react to this chaos, in the true sense of this word, that exists in the aviation market of Armenia. The Republic of Armenia that declared itself to be a tourist center has directly appeared in a ridiculous situation in the sense that as of today, perhaps the most expensive air transportation in the region is carried out only in Armenia. Recently, the air tickets have been sharply increased in Azerbaijan and the responsible person in this industry in Azerbaijan, Director of “Azal” motivated it by the fact that the expenditures of the Olympic Games in Baku caused “Azal” to bear great losses, and now they have to compensate it through the price rise. And the reason is that they have transported a large number of athletes and their coaches to Baku free.”
According to the political expert, the RA authorities do not see how many citizens leave Armenia for migrant work through the territory of Georgia. “As of today, we have the most luxurious airport in the region and the former CIS republics, but our government authorities and the International Airports of Armenia company, which is owned by Eduard Eurnekian, are doing everything for the citizen of Armenia to leave for Egypt, Antalya, Cyprus and European countries from Tbilisi: 300km from Yerevan and 200 km from Gyumri and arrange his flight from there to other countries. This is just ridiculous. For me, it is surprising that a few days ago, Minister of Economy Karen Chshmarityan made a statement that as of early April, the ticket prices in Armenia has been reduced by 15.9 percent. This does not only fail to meet the reality, but also a brazen lie. It is necessary to take out the pink-colored glasses to see what is actually going on. All the air tickets from Tbilisi to all directions, moreover by European directions are 100-200 euros cheaper than the flights from Yerevan in the same direction. In addition, the Georgian government authorities are doing everything for the newly built airport in Kutaisi, the second city of their republic, to make sufficiently develop.”
As said by Gagik Hambaryan, the air ticket from there to various European cities is 70-90 Euros, while from Armenia – 5-6 times more. Gagik Hambaryan is asking whether Hovik Abrahamyan did not know that the most expensive prices are set at the “Zvartnots” international airport for the daytime. Therefore, the airline organizing flights prefer arranging the flights at nights. “Hovik Abrahamyan should deal not only with this issue, but also with the issue of why the British Airways is leaving Armenia’s air market, or why the Polish “LOT” airline is leaving Armenia’s market, already officially reported by the United Arab Emirates ‘Etihad’ airline. So, we are the ones who create problems to these airlines, in other words, Eduardo Eurnekian and the government of Armenia. The two are just looting the airlines, and Eduardo Eurnekian violating all business rules is trying possibly to return all the money spent on “Zvartnots” airport than he could have done it in an airport built in European or Latin American countries.”
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According to Gagik Hambaryan, Serzh Sargsyan would do it right to invite an audit to determine why this number of airlines are leaving Armenia and move their business to Georgia and Azerbaijan. “His close friend Michael Bagdasarov, who had a monopoly position in Armenia’s aviation market and was the owner of “Armavia”, how it happened that an airline with the monopolistic position became insolvent. Such a thing can happen only in Armenia. A monopolistic position is granted to an airline and it becomes insolvent in the event when once it was setting the highest prices.”
The political analyst is also interested in what Gyumri has done wrong to Eduardo Eurnekian that he diligently is doing everything for the airport of Armenia’s second largest city “dies away.” “During leaving for overseas labor season, in early spring, “Armenia’s international airports” corporation is doing everything for the Gyumri-Moscow flight to close up. The closed so long that even the Javakh Armenians who used to come and take a flight from Gyumri airport to their migrant work, 70-80 percent of them keep their family by the migrant work, they no longer come to Gyumri. They tried to make them come to Yerevan, but, as Serzh Sargsyan said, the cucumber grew from the opposite side, and everyone went to take the flight from Tbilisi.”
According to Gagik Hambaryan, although we are thankful to Eduardo Eurnekian for building such a luxurious airports in the cities of out republic, but dead constructions are of not benefit to Armenia.
Our interlocutor is convinced that they plunder not only the tourist but their own people, and this is an anti-state activity. And if the government of Armenia and Eduardo Eurnekian continue in this way, according to Gagik Hambaryan, the most advanced means of transportation in the world – the aviation transport – will disappear in Armenia.
Nune AREVSHATYAN
