Dear Vice Presidents of the National Assembly,
Dear Members of the National Assembly,
Dear Cabinet members,
Dear people,

We are discussing the 2025 State Budget Implementation Report and the first thing I want to say about the 2025 State Budget is that, in essence, we have crossed a turning point, because compared to 2017, I take the last year preceding the People’s, non-violent, Velvet Revolution, compared to that year, we have increased the tax revenues of the state budget by 135%, which means that we can already confidently assert that over the eight years following the revolution, the tax revenues of the state budget of the Republic of Armenia have doubled.

In fact, we could have said this formally in 2024, because the state budget revenues in 2024 had increased by 106% compared to 2017, but the percentage of formality would be slightly present in that statement, because when considering the budget's tax revenues, one must also take into account inflation, which itself ensures a certain increase in turnover. Subtracting the entire inflation index starting from 2017, we can say that 2025 is the year in which we have doubled the state budget's tax revenues compared to 2017 by all parameters.

This is truly a very important indicator, which is a numerical indicator, but there is a very significant content under this, and this content is, first of all, the growth of our economy, because as already mentioned, the gross domestic product has more than doubled, and this is also a very significant indicator, and shows the weight of our economy. But I consider it significant that in 2025 we recorded the foundations that allow us to say that we can transition to the new agenda that we have formulated, including during the 2026 parliamentary elections: an agenda for the formation of a new quality state, and of course, this opportunity is primarily related to several important events that took place in 2025.

I would like to remind you that it was in 2025 that the Republic of Armenia and the Republic of Azerbaijan announced the completion of negotiations on a draft agreement on the establishment of peace and interstate relations between the two countries, with the approval of the draft agreement. This was truly a milestone, and it was this event that made it possible to establish peace on August 8, 2025, in the capital of the United States, Washington, D.C., with the participation and initiative of President Trump.

We must finally record that 2025 is the year in which we fully recorded that we have peace, we have established peace, and in essence, we have an end to the conflict between the Republic of Armenia and the Republic of Azerbaijan. We must record that in 2026, that fact was legitimized and re-recorded by the election and voting of the people of the Republic of Armenia, because according to the results of the 2026 elections, the people of the Republic of Armenia stood up for peace, which means that we, in essence, considering 2025 as the best year of the revolutionary governance, can record that every year after this should be the best year of post-revolutionary governance, including, for example, in the logic of budget flows.

I have had the opportunity to say from this rostrum that the parameters of the 2026 state budget already give us optimism that we will significantly exceed our planned revenues in 2026, and this, of course, is primarily related to the economic indicators we recorded in 2025. In particular, yes, the decision to increase pensions was made in 2026, but I want to remind you, including in the logic of responding to political speculation, how and why the decision to increase pensions was made. You know that for 2025, both international and Armenian institutions and the state budget recorded a significantly lower economic growth indicator, 5.2% if I am not mistaken, and in fact, in February 2026, the Statistics Committee of Armenia published our economic growth indicators and it turned out that economic growth exceeded the forecasted indicator by about 2%.

Of course, here I am convinced and it is obvious that the political events that I spoke about a little while ago played a role in this, that is, the successful conclusion of the negotiations on the text of the peace agreement between Armenia and Azerbaijan in March 2025 and the subsequent establishment of peace in Washington brought a new economic stimulus and it is as a result of these decisions and changes that we actually had greater economic growth than predicted.

For us, it was also a political issue, and there is always that political issue, because, you see, we constantly talk about economic growth, we talk about gross domestic product and economic growth in general, because from 2018 to today our economy has grown by 53%, this is a huge number. Gross domestic product per capita has more than doubled. And the problem that usually exists in our reality is that people do not see the statistics spoken from this podium in their lives. This is where the rupture arises, and our greatest political task and commitment is that when we from this podium and the state institutions of Armenia announce economic growth and development, people must see these growths in their lives in concrete terms. This is why, having recorded that the economic growth in 2025 was about 2% higher than predicted, and also taking into account the pre-election promise we had made in 2021, I have decided that immediately there should be an increase in pensions in the Republic of Armenia. I want to say that this is an indicator and result of 2025, and for the first time in the Republic of Armenia we have a higher average pension than the minimum consumer basket.

I want to reiterate our commitment, because before the elections there were many rumors about our commitments that they would be canceled after the elections, and it is our commitment, and it is not an easy task to implement, because any action related to pensions implies very large budgetary expenses. The reason for this is that if we increase the pension by 1,000 drams, for one pensioner that 1,000 drams does not matter much, but for the state budget it is an expense of billions, because we are talking about 650,000 people.

That is already a huge amount and it is our commitment that starting in 2028 we will review and index the pension at least by the inflation rate, so that we never fall below this social benchmark again. But I also consider it important to note that it is with the results of 2025 that we managed to introduce the Health Insurance System from January 1, 2026, and this is also the result of the work we did and the decisions we made in 2025, because naturally all those decisions were made in 2025 and the 2025 budget year was very significant in this regard.

Although I have talked about this a lot during the pre-election period, but speaking about 2025 in that format, I cannot help but note that 2025 is the first calendar year when we have had neither casualties nor injuries as a result of the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict. One of the facts that has been said a lot, but is worth saying again, is that as a result of 2025, emigration from the Republic of Armenia has stopped and immigration has begun. 2025 is the first year, we do not count the year of the coronavirus, because that year, of course, gave certain statistical deviations, but 2025 is the first year in normal conditions when we, in fact, emigration of citizens of the Republic of Armenia has stopped and we have immigration, because the number of citizens who returned to Armenia in 2025 exceeds the number of citizens who left the Republic of Armenia by 8,860. Of course, this also makes 2025 very significant in the life of the Republic of Armenia, and I must state that 2025 is unequivocally a historic year, because the very facts that I mentioned makes 2025 memorable for the history of the Republic of Armenia. But it is very important to state that it is not an isolated event, but rather events that took place in 2025, decisions were made that will determine the future course of development of the Republic of Armenia. I would also like to emphasize that this is, first of all, related to the establishment of peace and related processes.

The year 2025, with the Washington Declaration, recorded the implementation of the TRIPP project, which will be of turning point not only for the Republic of Armenia, but also for the entire region. Let me record, especially today, that the process of the Republic of Armenia turning from a dead end of war or conflict into a crossroads of peace is taking place at a very visible pace. I should happily record the peace deal between the United States of America and the Islamic Republic of Iran, which makes the “Crossroads of Peace” project more than relevant. Of course, within the framework of the TRIPP project, I would like to remind you that one of the most important features of that project was that it opens not only communication routes from east to west, but also from north to south or vice versa. I must state that this process, the TRIPP project, will definitely and unequivocally open the communication routes between the Persian Gulf and the Black Sea, including, as we have already talked about many times, the communication routes between the Mediterranean Sea and the Caspian Sea, which will obviously make the Republic of Armenia a crossroads of peace and economy.

In this regard, I want to say that the decisions we made in 2025 are already yielding practical results in the Republic of Armenia. Do you remember those discussions in this hall, dear colleagues, when we were talking about the three memorandums of intent signed between the Republic of Armenia and the United States? There were very big discussions in this hall about those memorandums of intent, what obligations they impose on the sides, what it means, what impact it will have. I want us to record this pace of actions and developments again, because there is a high probability, and let me express my conviction, that the pace of our lives will change in general and the pace of our developments will change. On August 8, 2025, a memorandum of intent on cooperation in the field of artificial intelligence and technologies will be signed in Washington between President Trump and me, which is widely criticized by the opposition in the Republic of Armenia as a paper that does not mean anything and does not provide any advantages. And it's only been 10 months, and we have an artificial intelligence center and a supercomputer at Yerevan State University. We have an artificial intelligence factory in the Gagarin settlement. And it is already scheduled, in June, maybe in July, we will also have a second artificial intelligence factory in Hrazdan, which has an investment potential of 5 billion dollars. Here comes the question that I have been talking about, because with this our problems are not decreasing, but rather our problems are increasing, because artificial intelligence factories increase the consumption of electrical energy, one might say, even with geometric progression. In a situation where just a year, a year and a half ago we could consider that we have a very significant surplus of electricity, which we need to find a place to consume, today we no longer have it. Today we must already think about what new capacities we will generate in order to realize the 5 billion dollar investment potential, which we have with the Firebird program alone. Of course, we are taking very concrete actions in this direction and we have good news in that regard. Just these days, the Minister of Foreign Affairs is on a visit to the European Union, discussions have taken place in the format of foreign ministers, and the European Union has reaffirmed its commitment to providing accelerated support for the development of storage plants in Armenia. This means that we are moving with great strides, we will move towards greater energy independence and more reliable security, because it is already a well-known fact that, in particular, in the field of solar energy, we have, in fact, unlimited potential, and we just have to realize this potential. And these opportunities for realization are materializing today, and we will follow this path. Today, we have already adopted a Government program, by which we accelerate and stimulate the investment in storage plants in the private sector, as well as in the production sector, and we must move forward with this logic.

Dear colleagues, of course, we are now summing up the work of the current eighth convocation of the National Assembly, and I would also like to take this opportunity to thank the deputies of the eighth convocation of the National Assembly for their joint work during this period, because we have indeed passed a very difficult path, but the key word is “passed”, because we have passed that path and I hope that with the data I have presented I was able to convey the feeling that, having passed that path, we have reached a completely different place.

Of course, the challenges are also in place and tangible, and I must record that first of all, we have twice managed to ensure the expression of the will of the citizens of the Republic of Armenia in extremely difficult conditions. I would like to remind you of the environment in which we held the parliamentary elections in 2021, and according to the results of those elections, the citizens of the Republic of Armenia had the opportunity to freely express their will. In the 2026 parliamentary elections, the citizens of the Republic of Armenia also had the opportunity to freely express their will. But in the conditions and environment known to you, we have faced completely new challenges, and responding to these challenges, forming appropriate mechanisms to respond should be the most important part of our upcoming political agenda. In particular, today we must create guarantees that political forces that distribute electoral bribes and act according to that logic will not have any chance to have any political influence in the Republic of Armenia. I want to state that, yes, we must clearly state that, in essence, the parliamentary opposition that is being formed in the National Assembly of the ninth convocation is a political unit formed as a result of completely illegal activities, or it cannot even be called a political unit, and it is the legitimate right of the Republic of Armenia to deprive those processes and those circles of the opportunity for further political activity. For this, the Republic of Armenia must take measures, and we have also undertaken and re-undertaken that obligation during the pre-election campaign for the 2026 parliamentary elections. Of course, the citizens of the Republic of Armenia also had the right to say, to ask why these problems have not been resolved to this day, and we tried to explain, and the reality is that in an environment of lack of peace, the resolution of such issues becomes significantly more difficult, because you know, it must be said very clearly and directly, and in the previous period, following the 2021 elections and the period following the 2020 elections, the over-concentration of the Government of the Republic of Armenia and the parliamentary majority was the peace agenda. And all possible forces and energy were focused on solving that problem. And this also had a very significant reason: the Government's 2021-2026 Activity Program, approved in this hall on August 24, 2021, begins with the statement that opening an era of peaceful development for the Republic of Armenia and the region is the greatest commitment undertaken by the parliamentary majority and the Government before the people. And the greatest efforts and the greatest energy have been directed at fulfilling that obligation, although the good news is that, and this is indeed a very memorable fact, during this period, as I had the opportunity to mention, the Republic of Armenia has not only continued its normal development, but also the economic growth in the Republic of Armenia has, in fact, been higher than both the world average and the average of the Eurasian Economic Union in the previous period. But I must also say frankly, perhaps I have not had the opportunity to say with such emphasis that, including the processes of uprooting the criminal-oligarchic system established in Armenia, obviously - now I can talk about it, because it has already been expressed, it is already open, it is already obvious, I am no longer telling a secret, I am simply formulating what is before everyone's eyes - the processes of uprooting the criminal-oligarchic regime of the Republic of Armenia have been and would have been accompanied by external influences, for objective and subjective reasons. And they could also pose certain threats to the security of the Republic of Armenia. There have been, yes, situations, I do not want to hide this anymore, when we have reached a point when we have understood that the further continuation of the influence can bring about such counter-effects that can even have existential consequences for the Republic of Armenia in the form of heightened security threats. And this is something that I am obliged to say and record when summing up the work of the National Assembly of the eighth convocation. Today, including due to the circumstances I mentioned, those risks have been overcome, therefore, I want to say again, in the previous period there was not a minute, not a second, when we compromised with the criminal-oligarchic system. We have simply realized that there are situations when we need double, triple caution, even slowness, so as not to provoke external influences that will bring such effects to Armenia as we had, for example, in August-September 2022. Now I am responsibly saying that all these risks have been overcome and all these risks are managed and these risks, in fact, no longer exist, and therefore, nothing prevents the Government of the Republic of Armenia, the people and the political majority from focusing on the process of eradicating the criminal oligarchy in the Republic of Armenia, including the forces distributing electoral bribes. I can say that this process has already begun and this process cannot be stopped in any way, this process will go to the end. I am sure that in the coming years, when talking about the state budget implementation report, I will have the opportunity to present a more and more detailed report on this topic to the National Assembly.

But, nevertheless, I cannot but emphasize that despite all these challenges, from 2018 to 2026 we have returned about $8 billion in shadow or stolen or looted or illegally alienated funds to the Republic of Armenia, and this process continues today. In fact, the return of funds from looted property in the Republic of Armenia has become an integral part of the daily news feed. We see this on a daily, weekly, monthly basis, and of course, there is no doubt that this pace will gradually increase and accelerate.

Dear colleagues, also taking into account that in fact, this is my last speech to the National Assembly of the eighth convocation in the format of the state budget implementation report, because I will not make such a speech in the budget format again, I would like to thank the National Assembly of the eighth convocation for the joint work during this period and the results we have jointly achieved.

Thank you.