YEREVAN. – According to official statistics, the national debt of Armenia is 5 billion and 594 million US dollars, as of September 30, reported Haykakan Zhamanak newspaper.

“Our debt increased by 110 million dollars in one month alone, and by 517 million dollars—since the beginning of the year.

“In recent times, a noteworthy change is recorded in the ‘anatomy’ of the debt [of Armenia]. The government has put the stress on the accumulation of the internal debt, and not the external.

“The government sold bonds in [Armenian] drams equivalent to about 1 billion dollars, and it shall buy them back at high interest [rates]. But if the dram devalues, it will appear that these bonds will be bought back cheaper than the sales price was.

“And it turns out that the government is interested to devalue the dram at some point, owing to which it will not spend money on servicing the internal debt,” wrote Haykakan Zhamanak.