YEREVAN. - President of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan today received Cyril Muller, the newly-appointed World Bank Vice President for Europe and Central Asia. Newly-appointed World Bank Regional Director for the South Caucasus Mercy Tembon was also present at the meeting. The President congratulated them on assuming those responsible offices and wished them good luck in their work.

Sargsyan highly appreciated the long-term cooperation of Armenia with the World Bank, attaching importance to the Bank’s role in the country’s social economic development. He also stressed that from the very beginning Armenia considered  the World Bank not only as an authority funding the investment programs, but also a partner supporting economic reforms and development of human capacities. 

Sargsyan expressed hope that this partnership will remain and strengthen, the cooperation will intensify, and the program directions will be qualitatively renewed. The President assured that the Armenian government will confidently continue implementing the reforms aimed at improving the economic climate in Armenia.

For his part, Vice President Cyril Muller said that together with his and regional director’s appointment, a high benchmark for work has been set, and they will do their best to realize those ambitions. According to him, during the previous years the World Bank had already planned a number of projects, whose implementation in Armenia will cost roughly $700 million USD. The implementation of those projects will have a great significance for the development of Armenia, Muller said.

At the meeting, the interlocutors discussed the implementation process of current program of WB partnership strategy, touched on the priority directions of Armenia’s economic policy, and issues on ensuring the basis for midterm sustainable economic growth. He also attached importance to the role of WB in fostering private investments under the state-private sector model.