YEREVAN. - The Government of Armenia is denying that the cooking oil, which will be distributed to the needy families as a New Year Gift, is expired, Yerkir daily writes.

“In our interview, [Ministry of Emergency Situations] MES Public Relations Department Chief Nikolay Grigoryan noted that the oil, which is received from Russia as a humanitarian assistance, expires in September 2012. In response to our question as to why the humanitarian assistance was not distributed to the people from the very beginning, Grigoryan said: ‘It is the domestic affair of each country as to how to manage the assistance. If there are problems, issues to be resolved, it could be sold, too. Now it was deemed inexpedient to sell, and the Government manifested goodwill and distributed [it] to the people,’” Yerkir writes.