“Emigration is perhaps one of the main threats that negatively impacts our national security, especially in terms of the army,” Security Council Secretary Armen Grigoryan told reporters. He assured, “We are trying to understand ways that we can try to resolve this issue. The solution to this problem has many layers and cannot be solved with one action. Many discussions have been held with the Prime Minister and on other levels to determine how we can decrease the amount of emigration. There is another problem that goes hand in hand with that- the birth rate- and we wish to increase the national birth rate. We are developing policies to resolve the issue or to at least decrease emigration as much as possible.”
Grigoryan noted that there was positive data in terms of how many Armenians left the country at the end of 2018 and how many Armenians came, but it’s still too early to say whether or not there was immigration. Grigoryan said that it is necessary to conduct research and to find out whether those people were tourists or whether they came to stay. The Security Council Secretary said that the number of applicants for an Armenian passport has gotten larger, but this does not necessarily mean immigration. “We want to at least decrease the rate of emigration to zero, and then we will focus on positive movement.”
Nelly Babayan
