ArmInfo.After a meeting with environmentalists, activists and residents of the city of Jermuk, who oppose the exploitation of the Amulsar Gold Mine, Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan convene a closed meeting with MPs of the "My Step" faction. The meeting takes place in the office of the Civil Contract party.
As the MP of the My Step faction, chairman of the standing committee of the National Assembly of Armenia on economic issues Babken Tunyan stated in an interview with reporters, if there are no sufficient grounds for terminating the mine's activities, that are, "the reasons that will make it possible to win the possible arbitration process, then the mine definitely needs to be exploited. " "If we revoke Amulsar's license in these conditions, then we should withdraw the permission to operate all the mines of Armenia by the same logic. Are we ready for this?" Tunyan asked, once again emphasizing that this scenario with Lydian Armenia may become a very negative signal for any external investor.
It should be noted that the discussion with all interested parties on the issue of Amulsar and with the participation of representatives of the Investigative Committee recently ended at the Presidential residence on Baghramyan26.
At the moment, there have been no official comments regarding the outcome of the meeting. Only some activists and environmentalists, having left the presidential residence, said they were unhappy with the discussions and intend to continue their struggle, guided by the slogan: "Amulsar should remain a mountain, full stop." As one of the participants in the meeting said, Nikol Pashinyan did not want to hear their arguments, because " the only reference point for the prime minister at present is the opinion of the Investigative Committee".
To recall, on August 14, the Investigative Committee of Armenia submitted an expert opinion on the Amulsar project of the Lebanese consulting company Earthlink & Advanced Resources Development (ELARD). As the head of the Committee Hayk Grigoryan stated at a government meeting on August 15, 3 important conclusions can be made on the basis of the expert opinion. First of all, as Grigoryan noted, this refers to the fact that there is no direct connection between the underground waters located on the territory of the Amulsar project and the thermal hot springs of Jermuk. There is also no connection with the waters of the Sevan basin. "At the same time, during an earthquake, a certain concentration of acid drainage can penetrate into the basin of Lake Sevan through the reservoirs of Spandaryan and Ketchut. However, the combination of this concentration will be insignificant on the scale of Lake Sevan," the head of the investigating body said. The third important conclusion that can be drawn based on the expert's conclusion is that the possible impact of groundwater from the Amulsar field on the Arpa, Debet and Darb rivers can be mitigated if Lydian Armenia takes 16 environmental mitigation measures proposed by experts. As Grigoryan pointed out, representatives of Lydian Armenia have already expressed their readiness to implement 15 of the proposed 16 events: they are already carrying out 10 events, and they will be ready to conduct another 5 measures in the near future. The head of the Committee noted that at present there are grounds for terminating the criminal case instituted under Art. 282 of the Criminal Code of the Republic of Armenia (Concealment or willful misrepresentation of information on environmental pollution.