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At present, works are going on with the Eurasian Development Fund related to receiving budgetary support loan, which will be summed up in 2023 or in 2024 conditioned by the speed of the reform implementation. The RA Minister of Finance Vahe Hovhannisyan said about this, presenting the economic and political aspects of the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) during the debate of the report of the state budget 2022 execution. On June 5, the joint sitting of the Standing Committees on Regional and Eurasian Integration and on Financial-Credit and Budgetary Affairs was held.

Vahe Hovhannisyan presented the implemented works within the framework of the EEU. Speaking about the sphere of purchasing policy, he noted that the draft elaboration of the Agreement of the Mutual Recognition of the Banking Guarantees being used in the purchasing processes, improvement of conditions on the use of the national regime in the sector of purchases, as well as on the purchases established by the EEU Treaty. Regarding the macro-economic policy sphere, the Minister of Finance noted that the active participation and cooperation in a number of directions continued.

According to Vahe Hovhannisyan, in the sphere of tax policy at present the draft on Amending the Treaty for regulating the issues of levying indirect taxes on the goods being realized by the physical persons in the framework of the electronic trade is at the stage of debate within the framework of the EEU. In the draft as a main principle the principle of the country of the goods consuming of the VAT levying was fixed. Speaking about the sphere of customs policy, he noted that in the customs sphere the main works are done on modernizing of the EEU Customs Code and complying with the sub-legislative legal acts. After adopting the EEU Customs Code a relevant working group was set up for solving the legislative problems, and in 2021 the works on modernization of the legislative regulations began. On September 14, 2022 the RA law on Customs Regulation.

During the year 2022, many working discussions were held with the specialists of the working group of the united market formation for rendering services in the sphere of accounting and auditing activity.

In particular, as a result of working group discussions, the draft Agreement on Implementing the Auditing Activity in the Member States of the Eurasian Economic Union was agreed, which was signed by the heads of the EEU Member States on April 19, 2022 and now it is at the stage of the inner-state procedures for entering into force. The draft Agreement on Administrative Cooperation in the Audit Sphere in the EEU Member States, as well as the procedures aimed at the formation of the united market in the sphere of accounting and preparing financial reports in the EEU Member States.

Presenting the information on the customs duties entered to the state budget 2022, the Minister mentioned that the customs duties were 56bln 685mln AMD, which is less by 28bln AMD than in 2021, which is conditioned by the decrease of the volume of the general investments for 2022.

The RA Minister of Foreign Affairs Ararat Mirzoyan noted that during the year 2022, the RA Foreign Ministry continued the active engagement in the works of preparation of the agendas of the sitting being held at different levels within the framework of the EEU, drafting, reviewing and agreeing of the documents. In 2022, 2 sittings of the Supreme Eurasian Economic Council and four sittings of the Eurasian Inter-Governmental Council took place with the participation of the Deputy Prime Minister. At the end of the year, the sitting of the Eurasian Inter-Governmental Council was held in Yerevan. 11 international treaties were signed by the RA, and 15 – were ratified within the framework of the EEU.

Answering the MPs’ questions Ararat Mirzoyan presented clarifications on Armenia-Georgia relationship and demarcation of Armenia and Azerbaijan.

The deputy Mikayel Tumasyan noted that recently a decision was made on appointing military and trade attaches in some countries, welcomed and highlighted the such decision making. He inquired about the issue of such appointments in further programmes.

“In reality, at present the RA have military attaches in a number of countries and organizations. There was an experience of having trade attaches. On two cases the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is not the one appointing in that, though we are part of that process.” The RA Deputy Minister of Economy Narek Teryan informed that informed that in 2022, the trade turnover between Armenia and EEU countries was 5.2bln USD, which increased by 92.7% compared with 2021. In 2022, the export was 2.5bln USG, which increased by 2.8% compared with the previous year. The import was 2.7bln USD, which increased by 49% compared with the same period of the previous year. “The trade turnover increased with all EEU Member States. Her, we can say we pursue balanced policy,” the Deputy Minister said.

In 2022, the volume of the net flows of foreign investments in the real sector was 196bln AMD, 158bln AMD out of it from the EEU countries. During the same period the foreign direct investments was 181bln AMD, 108bln AMD – from the EEU countries.

The Deputy Minister also mentioned that now discussion go on with the EEU partners to have an Agreement on Free trade with Egypt, Iran and the United Arab Emirates (UAE).