Anti-Corruption Oct/26/2018: Manvel Grigoryan announces he'll donate $10.5mln properties to state; IRS investigation charges 2 officials and 17 businessmen for bribery; companies that defrauded Defense Ministry have repaid; Yerevan municipal workers under investigation; Gas price invstg. continues..
The Investigative Committee (not to be confused with SIS) has rejected Robert Kocharyan’s appeal to recognize him as a victim party in the audio leak case. The Committee does not find that the audio showed anything illegal being done against Kocharyan.
Parliamentary gas-price investigation committee held another session today. Chairman (BHK) Mikael Melkumyan says the contract signed by the previous administration with GazProm was "humiliating" (BHK voted against it in Parliament on 2013). It limits how much energy Armenia can create/receive from sources other than GazProm for 20 years, by requiring a certain profitability for the company after they invested $700mln to purchase Hrazdan hydro'c 5th bloc and built 170km of gas pipelines. The committee will encourage the government to negotiate with Russia around this issue.
... They also want to find out why the gas delivery error-allowance was increased, thus costing as much as AMD 20bln/year to the consumers. They'll discuss this with the Ministry of Energy in a few weeks.
... reducing the electricity price by AMD 5 will cost AMD 27bln on the Armenian electric grid, but only AMD 17bln if the savings were to come from GazProm.
... when the border gas price was reduced from $189 to $165, that difference was saving AMD 9.6bln annually, but all those savings went to GazProm Armenia. When the price went further down from $165 to $150, that drop allowed the Armenian consumers to pay AMD 9 less per cubic meter.
... Armenian Electric Grid profitability is 17%. It has 11% operational loss, which will be reduced to 6% within the next 10 years. It will also reduce the cost of producing electricity, which is currently AMD 20 for Yerevan TPP. This efficiency improvements will help when Armenia and Iran increase the electricity transfers in future. Armenia will give more electricity and take more gas in return.
The angry republican activist who masterminded 13 bomb-scares against prominent Democrats with non-functional but real pipe-bomb materials has been caught after leaving traces of DNA on the packages. His cell phone and social media tracking also helped the law enforcement to locate him. The man was already in the law enforcement radar due to lengthy record of violence, including bomb threats dating as early as 2002.
91- Theft ; 94- Domestic Violence; 02- Bomb threat; 04- Illegal ID ; 04- Controlled substance; 04- Evidence tampering; 09- Foreclosure; 09- operating w/out license; 13- Theft; 13- Battery; 14- Theft; 15- Probation violation.
While in custody, the suspect told the law enforcement the materials could not have exploded and his intention was not to physically harm the recipients. He is charged with 5 counts of mailing pipe bomb materials, threats, e.t.c. He could face 58 years in prison if convicted.
President Trump's critics have placed the blame on him for continuously criticizing the Democrats and their media allies with a harsh language. Trump supporters have blamed the Democrats for creating a dangerous environment by using violent rhetoric and calls for uncivility against republicans, citing the recent arson attacks against GOP offices, stabbing attempts and ricin-scare letters being sent to President Trump, family, and allies.
President Trump has condemned the bomb-scare saying "there is no place for it in our country."
This page was last edited on 24 December 2018, at 18:21.