One of the biggest challenges or problems for Armenia is the bad situation with natural protection such as pollution of the Sevan lake and high level of water, annihilation of forests, rough violations of natural protection norms for mining purposes, etc. We can continue this list very long. Definitely the natural protection organizations are true to make a noise from time to time about the tragic situation of the natural protection. In a word, the situation with natural protection is so bad in Armenia that the officials of this sector should either feel shame to show up in the society or demonstrate that they really care about it and they want to resign as soon as possible. However, the minister of Natural Protection Aram Harutyunyan is totally a different thing and during the years he has proven that he deserves his nickname “cookie”. The latter organized a press conference and informed the journalist with a cynical happy face that he has succeeded in “snatching 10 million dollars grant from the Global Ecologic Foundation”. The head of this organization Mrs. Monique Barbut, who took part in the conference, could not hide her happiness either who praised the Armenian government, even A.Harutyunyan. She also said with a happy face that she had been treated very nicely in Sevan and the reservoir of Khosrov. Definitely they worked with the traditional and classic Armenian formula, which means that they sat near a good table with delicious fish and cut a deal how much she would get for giving the money that does not belong to her under the control of Mr. Harutyunyan, who is not controllable at all. If we are not mistaken, the PM has touched upon this topic and said they would not let anybody in the government to cut deals and get “commissions” back from the transactions they make. This is also a good example to show why international organizations agree to sponsor the sectors which they believe are not effective. Even more, for the purpose of struggling against things like this they also give grants to numerous environmental protection organizations in Armenia to make noise for environmental protection violations.
