New laws to regulate private guard activities to be adopted 

ArmInfo. Security activities in Armenia will be subject to new legislative regulations. The RA National Assembly Committee on Defense and Security at its session on  March 20 issued a positive opinion on the amendments to the law "On  Private Security Activities" and a package of related laws submitted  by the RA government in the first reading.

Presenting the amendments, RA Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs  Armen Mkrtchyan noted that the package is aimed at bringing security  activities to uniform standards. In particular, video surveillance  services provided through the installation of technical equipment,  security using an alarm system, as well as rapid response services  are now added to the existing regulations. Another change concerns  the process of obtaining a license. The bill stipulates that at the  time of filing an application for a license, an organization must  have at least 10 qualified security guards, compared to one at  present. The package also includes a requirement for mandatory  insurance of the protected facility. To solve this problem,  organizations must insure property for an amount twice the amount of  income received at the end of the previous year, but not more than 10  million drams. In this case, we are talking about the possibility of  compensating the protected object for damage due to the  unsatisfactory work of security guards, which must be compensated by  the insurance company.

The package is planned to increase the amount of state duty for a  license for security activities from 300 times the base rate to 500  times. The number of cars of a person accompanied by bodyguards  should not exceed one vehicle, and the number of bodyguards should  not exceed three persons.

The liability for violations of the presented package is being  tightened, in connection with which the corresponding amendments have  been made to the Code of Administrative Offenses.

According to the justification of the draft law, the main purpose of  the package is to apply the relevant standards, especially  considering that from January 1, 2026, the police will stop guarding  buildings and structures of state bodies, and this function will be  transferred to private security organizations. As shown by the study  of available information, the number of business entities that  received a license in the Republic of Armenia in 2022 compared to  2017 increased by about 3.6 times - from 42 to 152. Currently, the  number of such organizations is 210. Given the social significance of  the sector, it is important that business entities receiving a  license have the appropriate potential and economic resources.  Otherwise, the risk increases that business entities, not having  sufficient resources to provide services of due quality, will begin  to fail to comply with a number of legislative requirements in order  to reduce the cost of services. This, in turn, may lead to a  violation of equal conditions of competition between business  entities operating in the security sector.