At Thursday's Cabinet session, the government of Armenia decided to invest about 4.733 billion drams to pay for the shares of the newly established national airline in the authorized capital of the Armenian National Interests Fund (ANIF) CJSC, and increasing—in accordance with the respective law of the country—the authorized capital of this company by issuing additional ordinary shares and distributing them in favor of Armenia.

Accordingly, it was noted an agreement was signed on July 14 between ANIF and the company belonging to Air Arabia, by which the parties undertook to establish a national airline in Armenia.

This new airline will be operated by Air Arabia.

Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan stated that back in 2018 they attached importance to the goal of creating and developing national airlines in Armenia, and in that sense, the country’s government should have a certain role.

"In this case, the Armenian government, in agreement with Air Arabia (a subsidiary company), is doing the following action: each is investing $10 million. We invite Air Arabia, which has experience in creating and developing airlines, to jointly establish with us and operate an airline which will be called Arna,” the premier added, in particular.

Pashinyan stressed, however, that this new airline will not have any privileges and will operate on an equal footing.

According to him, everything should be done in order for this airline to operate regular flights as of Spring 2022.