YEREVAN. – If I’m not mistaken, we previously had embassies that virtually didn’t have state funding. Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan stated this at Thursday’s Cabinet meeting of the Government of Armenia.

And Foreign Minister Zohrab Mnatsakanyan confirmed that fact.

“It’s a quite bizarre situation because there is an impression that sometimes there were situations when there were ‘personal’ embassies where even the property and everything belongs to a specific person, but they act on behalf of the state,” Pashinyan stressed. “This is a bizarre situation, no matter who the ambassador is. Numerous questions arise, and finding the answers to those questions is on the agenda for today’s Armenia.”

The government on Thursday decided to allocate 347.5 million drams (around US$714,000) from the government’s reserve fund to the Foreign Ministry for 2019, to ensure the activities of Armenia’s diplomatic service agencies that are accredited in foreign countries.

Previously, some persons who were not from the Armenian MFA system were appointed heads of several Armenian diplomatic missions abroad. And some of them—and by their own suggestion—had declined from their respective salaries, benefits for family members, apartment rental, medical insurance, and some other representative expenses.

Now, however, it has been decided that these expenses shall be made by the Armenian state.