Armenia coronavirus response task force considers heightened lockdown measures

YEREVAN, MARCH 25, ARMENPRESS. Deputy Prime Minister Tigran Avinyan, who serves as the Superintendent in charge of the coronavirus response task force of Armenia amid the state of emergency, has chaired a meeting of theteam on March 25.

“As you are all aware, new nationwide restrictions have been imposed on various business activities, as well as the movement of people. According to these restrictions, people leaving their homes must have a document of permitted movement, which can be handwritten, mentioning information on the point of exit, destination, time of exit and return. And people must have passport or ID cards with them, because from today all people in Armenia are considered self-quarantined, with the exception of the cases prescribed by the same decision. That is, those who are going to work – if their type of work is not banned, if they are going to the store, to the pharmacy, or to someone who needs care. It is highly important for this information to be filled in the document and for people to possess ID cards or passports, because otherwise the violation of the self-quarantine regime is already penalized under the Administrative Code.

As you know, the law has been adopted by second reading on Monday. I am calling on our citizens to unconditionally adhere to these restrictions, to treat this situation seriously and give us time to have the chance to modernize our toolbox to make the fight against the coronavirus more effective. Perhaps this is all I wanted to say, dear colleagues. Today, perhaps certain additional restrictions until March 31 will also be discussed. The restriction that more than two people cannot travel in a passenger vehicle is already in force, and I have to ask the traffic police to strictly monitor this decision.

We must try to minimize people’s movement as much as possible until March 31 and continue effectively preventing, detecting the chains and through these chains be able to maintain the trace of the virus in our spotlight in order to be able to effectively fight against its further transmission,” the Deputy PM said.

Edited and translated by Stepan Kocharyan