On 17 March, the first meeting of the Commandant’s Office was held under the chairmanship of the RA Commandant Tigran Avinyan.

Tigran Avinyan said:

“We have a number of important issues on the agenda, and in particular the first are purely procedural issues. I should ask that we have a slightly more flexible approach to all bureaucratic procedures. I see that there are some issues and even in emergency situations we have some formalization of decision-making delays. I should ask that our lawyers propose a slightly more specific and flexible system that we will move forward, because I have the impression that we have less flexibility in emergency situations than we had before. And I have to ask you to keep this issue in your focus.

I will definitely provide the floor to Mr. Torosyan to present the general situation of what we have.

In the future we will also discuss some other important issues related to restrictions on public events throughout the Republic of Armenia and how to exercise control over it. We talked to Mr. Sargsyan last night and we have some agreement on what to do. I think all restrictive measures should be followed by clear methodical guidelines so that each official performing their duties knows what to do and in what sequence and everything must be very clear.

We will discuss the issues of launching a unified hotline. Again, we have all the potential questions and answers that can be addressed to the hotline. And these questions need to be answered clearly.

We have financial issues to discuss, ways to communicate, and restrictions on the media as well.”

The Minister of Health then presented the situation in the republic with regard to the fight against the spread of coronavirus. In addition to the events organized by the Commandant’s Office, the participants emphasized the role of civic consciousness and alertness and additional security measures.

The session discussed the decision of the Commandant on the limitations of public events. The role of the Police in overseeing the ban on public events was highlighted. Appropriate methodological instructions were provided on control measures. The role of governors and the mayor of Yerevan in coordinating oversight activities with the involvement of different agencies in the regions and in the city of Yerevan was highlighted.

The participants discussed socio-economic measures needed to boost the economy and mitigate the impact of coronavirus on various social groups.

Issues related to communication and visa regimes with a number of countries were discussed as well.