A regular Cabinet meeting took place today, chaired by Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan.

The Government made additions and changes to one of the previously adopted decisions, by which it is planned to expand the range of beneficiaries of medical care with assisted reproductive technologies. As the Minister of Health Anahit Avanesyan noted, before that the range of beneficiaries of the program was not wide. preference was given to the families of fallen servicemen, citizens living in border settlements. "251 babies were born within the framework of the "Infertility Overcoming Program" launched in 2020. With this new program, it is proposed that the "Infertility Overcoming Program" should be open to all citizens of the Republic of Armenia, regardless of their place of residence, social status, marital status, and the Armenian citizens will be able to overcome infertility with state budget funding," said the Minister.

At today's Cabinet meeting, the results of the liberalization of the electricity market, which started in Armenia in 2018, were discussed. Chairman of the Public Services Regulatory Commission of Armenia, Garegin Baghramyan, presented the latest results. "Reforms of the electricity market started back in 2018. The most important and biggest reform was the issue of market liberalization. With the support of international consultants, we created an electronic platform for the sale of electricity in the wholesale market, which started in 2022, with the restriction of some market segments. Since it was a significant reform and required training of specialists, we can say that we completed the first stage of these reforms during this one year: from February 1, 2023, the market will be fully operational in its segments. Essentially, the concept is to replace monopoly with competition. First of all, the consumer will be given the opportunity to independently choose his supplier. That is, the consumer has the opportunity to choose a supplier who will supply him with electricity on a contractual basis. In the case of commercial consumers, it is even possible to act independently in the wholesale segment of the market and buy electricity directly from the producer. The other option is to remain a consumer of the Electric Networks of Armenia with regulated prices”.

In response, Nikol Pashinyan noted: "The important feature here is that the Public Services Regulatory Commission decided the electricity price supplied by the Electric Networks of Armenia, now any entity can go and make an agreement with the producer, and in terms of price, the Public Services Regulatory Commission does not have any role." An exchange of ideas regarding the issue took place. Summarizing, the Prime Minister noted. "I think that with the results of the discussion, you are convinced of what kind of important, deep institutional reform has taken place. And I consider it very important and I am convinced that this reform will greatly contribute to the realization of our target of at least 7 percent growth in 2023."

Before the approval of the Statute of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Government should decide on the issue of subordinate bodies. Accordingly, the Government adopted a decision proposing to transfer the Police, the Rescue Service and the Migration and Citizenship Service to the Ministry of Internal Affairs.

Referring to the decision, the Prime Minister said that the Minister of Internal Affairs and Deputy Ministers will be appointed next week. "The structure of the ministry has a very important feature. We have already applied that model in the Ministry of Defense. The essence is that the Police Chief and the Head of the Rescue Service will be deputy ministers of Internal Affairs at the same time. The Minister of Internal Affairs will also have two deputies. one of them will deal with the development of strategies for the Police and Internal Affairs, and the other will coordinate the activities of a civil sector," Nikol Pashinyan said.