Minister of Environmental Protection of Armenia, Vardan Ayvazyan, announced on Monday that Armenia foresees creating a joint venture with Russia in 2007 with the purpose of conducting geological studies and preparing a preliminary evaluation on the uranium mines of Armenia. The atomic energy agency of Russia has presented the joint venture plan of 2007. The archival data of the geological/investigative tasks on uranium in Armenia must be collected from the Russian geological foundation, an analysis must be made, the mountainous and geological conditions and substructures must be tested and evaluated, the preliminary data for elaboration of technical/economic calculations of the exploitation of useful uranium and other conserve mines must be prepared, and the program for the geological/investigative and experimental/technological tasks must be elaborated.
Let us recall that during Robert Kocharyan’s meeting with Vladimir Putin in Sochi in January, Kocharyan had announced that Russia has interests in Armenian mining industry, especially concerning uranium. Let us also recall that V. Ayvazyan has disagreements with the “Global Gold” company investigating the gold mines. Last year, this company announced that as a result of investigations, it turned out that there are sources of uranium in the Getik ore. Ayvazyan caused a scandal by announcing that that company does not have the right to investigate uranium. It is not excluded that the Ministry of Environmental Protection may deprive “Global Gold” of the right to investigate mines and grant that right to a newly created company.