Armenian News - NEWS.am presents the daily digest of Armenia-related top news as of 02.12.21:

•             An exchange of fire took place about an hour ago in the area of Karmir Shuka village of the Martuni region of Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh).

The exchange of fire was started by the Azerbaijani side, to which the Armenian side responded.

The shots were fired with various firearms.

Taghavard village mayor Oleg Harutyunyan told NEWS.am that no shots were fired in the direction of Karmir Shuka and Taghavard villages.

•             After the meeting in Moscow on Wednesday, the working group headed by the deputy prime ministers of Armenia, Russia, and Azerbaijan Mher Grigoryan, Alexei Overchuk, and Shahin Mustafayev will continue—in the coming days—working on the opening of regional communications, said Ani Babayan, assistant to deputy PM Grigoryan of Armenia.

"The [next] session of the trilateral working group will take place in the coming days. It will be possible to talk about the results only after the end of the session," she added.

•             The Armenian electricity tariffs may increase as of February.

If there is an increase in electricity tariffs in Armenia, it will be as of February, Garegin Baghramyan, Chairman of the Public Services Regulatory Commission of Armenia, told Hraparak daily.

"It will be as of February 1, 2022—if there is one," he said.

"Natural gas is interconnected with these agreements—depending on what agreements will be made regarding the 5th power unit of Hrazdan. They are interconnected. I assume that there are also certain other factors besides Hrazdan-5. But the lion's share will be conditioned by the 5th power," he added.

•             US Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu Wednesday in Riga, Latvia, on the margins of the NATO Foreign Ministerial. This is noted in a press release attributable to US State Department spokesperson Ned Price.

“Secretary Blinken and Foreign Minister Cavusoglu discussed the crisis in Ethiopia and joint efforts aimed at maintaining stability in the Black Sea region.

“They also discussed Russia’s aggression against Ukraine and the situation in Armenia and Azerbaijan as well as Afghanistan,” the press release also reads, in particular.

•             As of Thursday morning, 558 new cases of the coronavirus were confirmed in Armenia, and the total number of these cases has reached 339,578 in the country.

Also, 21 more deaths from COVID-19 were registered, making the respective total 7,631 cases.