The National Assembly adopted the Draft Law on Establishing the Foreign Intelligence Service in the First Reading

The law was adopted with 69 “for”, 28 “against” and 0 “abstention” votes.

During the presentation of the Draft, Armen Grigoryan, the Secretary of the Security Council, stated that the service will be a body subordinate to the Prime Minister.

“With the creation of the Foreign Intelligence Service, it is planned to form an intelligence community in Armenia, and the foreign intelligence service will play an important role in that community,” he said.

“Taking into account the fact that both the Ministry of Defense and the National Security Service have units performing similar functions, where the service is considered as military service, there is a political decision to create a new type of state service that will not be a military service. With this, it will be possible to fill the newly created body with public servants working in other departments, who will contribute to the establishment of the Foreign Intelligence Service with their experience, knowledge and professionalism”, the Secretary of the Council of Ministers said.

The Head of the Foreign Intelligence Service will become a member of the Security Council.