– Mr. Sargsyan, recently there were some rumors spread in the newspapers that academician Anri Nersisyan was accusing you of taking over the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) and destroying it.
– Yes, I am familiar with those rumors. Some newspapers are not well-informed and are spreading false rumors. I have nothing to say to them…they are just doing what they are told to do…
– But the accusations were from the founder of the NAS library and academician A. Nersisyan. He is bringing up facts.
– I know that man very well and I know what he is capable of…
– Nersisyan is especially accusing you of stealing the money from the NAS budget, which was foreseen to spend for development projects, and using it for construction purposes.
– That man is so naïve that he doesn’t even understand how much money we are talking about. That money was provided by the government’s storage fund taking into consideration the catastrophic situation of the NAS buildings. The government has made a decision to especially restore the heating system of the Scientific Research Institute (SRI) of the NAS and provide gas. As a matter of fact, with the decision made by the government in 2004, the money received has been distributed to 10 SRI according to the list which has nothing to do with the money from the budget. All that has been checked up on last year by the Prosecutor’s Office, the Ministry of Education and Sciences and the House of Supervision of the National Assembly and neither of them have found anything wrong. As you entered the NAS building, did you smell the odor? It’s because the roofs of the building have not been remodeled since the day that it was constructed; the academies have not had heating systems. You can probably imagine that if there is no heating, then we can’t work. We restored heating in 18 institutes, better yet, we changed the entire heating system because they had not been changed for 50-60 years. I don’t care what people say-I have worked in many institutes and I know for a fact that it is impossible to work in the winters without heating. We were able to restore heating in 18 institutes and there are still others. Besides that, we have also remodeled the roofs due to the fact that they were in a terrible situation and as a result many buildings look horrible.
– Academician Nersisyan brought up the example of the Molecular Science and Biochemistry institutes, claiming that a lot of money has been spent on installing heating systems but those buildings are not heated because only a small part of the buildings is used. According to him, it is absurd to waste all that money to heat those buildings. So, was it really a waste of money?
– The abovementioned institute has also been checked by the supervising bodies, however, they have not mentioned anything about waste of money.
– You are also accused of wasting the money provided by the Armenian Union of Russia as well as the money from the Academy’s account.
– We haven’t gotten any money from the Armenian Union of Russia for over four years now. During the years when we used to get the money, we always presented a report on the expenditures, and the union checked up on it. The academy used it so much that the union stopped sending the money…As for the account, we only spend the percentage rates of the money which we divide among institute owners who are not academicians and they only get a 25,000 dram salary. It is not right that the owner has to get that much, and the other owners get 25000 drams more. If any accident happens, we get money from the account for that. For example, during the heavy snowfall, we spent some money to clean the snow off the roofs, otherwise we could have lost the building. We have buildings with collapsed roofs. If we take a look at the expenditures, it is clear that we have spent more money on remodeling the library building and the owner of that library is Nersisyan.
– The same Nersisyan is also talking about the violations made during the NAS presidential elections. He states that he wasn’t informed of the elections and thus, didn’t’ have the chance to put up his nomination or vote in favor of any other candidate.
– If it’s about the 2003 elections, I must tell you that there were 100 voters and out of the 100, 94 have secretly voted. In addition, voting is restricted at the academy; the electoral committee consists of scientists that let people in one by one and voters vote in secret booths. Nersisyan was unaware of the elections because he had been present during the first part of the meeting and then left. During the second half, the presidency decided to conduct presidential elections. It is always like that and that happened that day. You must know that if a president is elected at the academy, both the president of Armenia and leader of the government must agree. They were both informed and they had advised the presidency to make a decision. Only the academy’s presidency makes the decision; there is no alternative. Even if Nersisyan were to vote and the votes were to be 93 instead of 94, nothing would change. This was the first election in the history of the NAS where there were so many votes in favor. Before, only academicians participated in the elections. There were only 33 people and if we take a look at the results, we will see that out of the 33, 10 had voted against, but there has never been an election where 94 are for and 5 or 6 are against.
– During one of his speeches, academician Nersisyan has also accused the NAS presidency of privatizing some territories belonging to the academy just for the fun of it. He brought up the example of the scientific library of which he is the owner, claiming that in 1999, a 200 square meter territory belonging to the library was sold to someone without him knowing about it. What do you have to say about this?
– I know about that. First of all, that is a land territory and not a territory around the building. Secondly, that land has never belonged to the academy or the library. Recently, I found out that that area was a junkyard for residents living nearby and someone had made an agreement with the academy’s administration to keep the area clean. At the present, it is not privatized and is included in the NAS cadastre.
– Mr. Sargsyan, you are also accused of spending the money pertaining to the scientists on the “Medical Genetics Center” and the owner, according to rumors, is your daughter.
– The genetics institute was founded by Jrbashyan, who is a rich man living in France. Another wealthy man from America also gave some money with which we bought a building and gave it to the Genetics center for free. The center has been around for 8-10 years already. At the time, we signed a contract with the government according to which the government agreed to provide money for projects. The benefactors give ten times more than the government does. However, to this day, the name of that benefactor can’t be seen anywhere near that building. The only thing that will serve as a memory after he is dead is that he helped found the center. 21,000 children were registered at the center last year alone and if it hadn’t been for that center, a quarter of them would have died from the illness known as Armenian illness. I shouldn’t be talking about this because as soon as the benefactors hear this, they will forget about the contract and take back the money. As a result, the children will be the ones to suffer.
– According to A. Nersisyan, he has officially asked the NAS presidency to present a list of the “miscellaneous” expenses made, however, he has not received a reply.
– I have not heard that from him. Perhaps he has said that to the press. I for sure haven’t read that…