YEREVAN. – Depreciation of the Armenian dram (AMD) will not prevent the payment of external debt of Armenia, Deputy Finance Minister Pavel Safaryan said.

According to the legislation, in budget revenue and expenditures the foreign currency is converted to drams at the rate specified in the budget.

“The 2015 draft budget will be submitted to the parliament in early December, thus in the budget the rate will be specified as of November 1 [AMD 411.2/$1 – ed.],” he said.

The US dollar rate was AMD 435/$1 on Monday, going up immediately by 16 drams. This is an unprecedented leap since the fall of dram in March 2009. The differences between the current rate and the budgeted rate is almost 5.5 percent.