ArmInfo.Public administration expert Hovhannes Avetisyan has responded to Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan's statement in parliament that the increase in the country's public debt by $8 billion (over 3 trillion) is due to military spending, stating that lying has become the norm under the current government.
As evidence for his claims, he published a table compiled based on reports published by the Armenian Ministry of Finance alongside his Facebook post. Thus, according to this table, the government planned to purchase weapons worth over $3.9 billion (1.5 trillion drams) in its annual plan (i.e., less than the external public debt - ed.), but has actually purchased $200 million (77 billion drams) less than planned.
"Therefore, even if we take into account that weapons have always been purchased on credit, the total military expenditures from 2019 to the present amount to barely $3.5 billion (1.4 trillion drams)," Avetisyan noted, thereby demonstrating that the external debt could not have been formed through arms purchases.
