Thursday, 20 April 2017
Prime Minister: “Clean Armenia program to kick off right away”
A regular Cabinet meeting was held today, chaired by Prime Minister Karen Karapetyan. Before discussing the agenda, the Prime Minister gave a number of instructions.
With a view to properly organizing garbage collection and sanitation operations, the Head of Government noted as follows: “Our surveys carried out as part of the recommendation issued on February 16 concerning the Clean Armenia initiative have revealed that landfills alone extend on more than 430 hectares. We can witness lack of proper control in waste management, incomplete cleaning of cities and villages; garbage can be seen on roads and roadside areas, etc. The situation is catastrophic, and I think that all of you have noticed it. I should note that this is chiefly due to Marz governors’ and community leaders’ years-long poor performance, shortcomings and, in many cases, neglect of duty. They are responsible not only for proper organization of sanitation and garbage collection activities, but also for dealing with the piles of garbage, colleting the scattered garbage and shutting down the irregular landfills. Therefore, all these problems must be included in the regional and community development programs.”
Proceeding from the policy of making Armenia attractive and comfortable for everybody, given the inadmissibility of the situation, Karen Karapetyan announced that the Clean Homeland program should be launched right away. He gave the heads of executive agencies 2 months to work out a program of necessary measures to ensure systemic collection and sanitation in the territories under their jurisdiction. The Prime Minister ordered them to develop a strict monitoring toolkit.
Justice Minister Arpine Hovhannisyan was told to submit within two months a comprehensive package of legislative initiatives on legal responsibility for failures in garbage removal, as well as on application of stricter administrative sanctions and criminal responsibility, if necessary. The Premier stressed the need for extending the scope of enforcing entities.
The Prime Minister gave the Chief of Police a month’s time to prevent the shedding spam in unforeseen places in cooperation with the traffic police and patrol forces. The Minister of Territorial Administration and Development was instructed to discuss within a month’s time with Marz governors and community leaders the possibility of including in regional and community programs clearly defined measures for implementation and control of sanitation activities. It was also instructed to ensure the widest possible awareness of Clean Armenia program, in partnership with international and local organizations, as well as carry out overall coordination of the project.
The Prime Minister gave instructions regarding the monitoring and accountability in the field of road building, consolidated route network development and use of subsoil.
In order to enforce the requirements defined by the law On Amending the Law on Excise Duty, the meeting amended two previous government decisions. The law stipulates that from January 1, 2017, taxpayers can submit excise stamp purchase applications electronically.
The Government approved the procedure and a timetable for payment of tax authority-calculated amounts of royalties. The new regulation suggests that as agreed between the parties, the payment of additional royalties may be on a fixed or flexible basis.
The Government decided to abolish the requirement for foreigners to fill in an application form with a view to getting an entry visa. At the same time, the decision implies that foreigners will only have to lodge a written application instead of filling in an application form should they wish to renew or extend the entry visas issued in Armenia’s diplomatic missions and consular offices.
The Government decided to move the working day of May 8, 2017 over to the Saturday of May 20, 2017.
