(MENAFN- AzerNews) By Rashid Shirinov
When Karen Karapetyan became the prime minister of Armenia in 2016, people had a hope that the new official would be able to save the Armenian economy. However, with the passage of time, Armenians realized that he is not different from other authorities, who have not been capable of correcting the critical situation in the country.
Armenian media have recently calculated how much spending Karapetyan brought for Armeniaand it turned out that he is ‘the most expensive,' in a negative sense, head of the Armenian government so far.
This January, Armenia's state debt grew by $123.5 million to $6.898 billion, coming very close to the threshold of $7 billion. During ten years of President Serzh Sargsyan's office, Armenia's state debt has only increased from then two to almost seven billion dollars today. But the sharpest increase in the amount of Armenia's state debt happened during Karapetyan's premiership, Armenian media note.
The simple fact is thatduring his premiership in 2016 and 2017, Armenia accumulated additional $1.696 billion of debt and this figure continues to grow.
Thus, the debts of Armenians have increased and at the same time the level of their well-being has declined, as the World Bank's expert reports say. Armenia's gross domestic product (GDP) per capita was $4010 in 2008, but in 2016 it became only $3,614. Experts predict that having the current rates of economic growth, Armenia will not be able to reach the level of 2008 even in 2019.
This suggests that the Armenian authorities applied no efficiency when using the borrowed funds. In addition to inefficiency, there is the widespread corruption. International experts note that about $900 million get illegally taken out of Armenia every year.
In this connection, Armenia's external debt servicing seems virtually impossible. It is worth reminding that at the end of 2016, the first president of Armenia Levon Ter-Petrosyan predicted a probability of default in the country.
'While the governing regime is busy with theatrical ceremonies of reforming the governance and electoral process, which are clearly aimed at strengthening its own power rather than at the improvement of the state, our country is at the risk of a real economic disaster in the near future, hidden under a harmonious name 'default, Ter-Petrosyan said back then.
The Armenian authorities reacted with sarcasm and mockery to his warning and actively objected to the words of the first president, but time has passed and Ter-Petrosyan's gloomy forecast began to come true.
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