Armenian News - NEWS.am presents a daily digest of top news as of 06.04.2020:

·       Only 11 COVID-19 new cases have been reported in Armenia per day, PM Nikol Pashinyan noted on his Facebook.

However, the PM noted the new death: A 68-year-old compatriot died of double pneumonia, presumably the result of COVID-19; but this person also had diabetes.

According to the National Center for Disease Control and Prevention, the total of 833 COVID-19 cases are confirmed as of Monday morning.

The number of patients who have recovered has increased by five and reached 62, whereas eight others have died.

As health minister Arsen Torosyan noted, most patients in Armenia are not even running a fever, but there are 146 patients with pneumonia. According to him, 35 patients are in critical condition.

·       Karabakh army soldier Arayik Shakhpazyan, 20, has sustained a gunshot wound at a Defense Army military unit, and from a shot fired by Azerbaijan.

The soldier was transferred to Yerevan.

According to Armenian defense ministry spokesperson Shushan Stepanyan, the soldier's condition is assessed as stable.

An investigation is underway to find out the details of the incident.

·       Fitch Ratings has revised the Outlook on Armenia's Long-Term Issuer Default Ratings (IDR) to Negative from Stable and affirmed the IDRs at ‘BB-‘.

“The coronavirus shock negatively affects the Armenian economy,” the press release noted. “Fitch projects that GDP growth partially recovers in 2021, to 5.5%.”

"General government debt is projected to rise from 53.6% at end-2019 to 59.2% of GDP in 2020 before falling back to 56.0% in 2021,” the statement said adding that “Fitch assumes that Armenia will continue to experience broad social and political stability and that there will be no prolonged escalation in the conflict with Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabakh to a level that would affect economic and financial stability.”

·       Armenian 3rd President Serzh Sargsyan has been invited to hearings to be held by the special parliamentary committee set up for inquiry into the circumstances of the military operations that took place in April 2016, and the hearings will be held on either the 13th or 16th of April. Sargsyan can choose the date, said a representative of the Office of the 3rd President of Armenia Mary Harutyunyan.

The letter was sent by the chairman of the committee Andranik Kocharyan.

·       A young woman was injured in a landmine explosion Sunday in Paruyr Sevak village of Armenia’s Ararat Province, the head of the community, Eduard Stepanyan, told Armenian News-NEWS.am.

“She had gone to collect beets with her mother-in-law; there were 3 other women with them,” he noted. "The woman was taken to Astghik hospital [in Yerevan]; most likely, her leg will be amputated."