A Municipal Leader’s View of Meghri

Domestic Politics

Meghri was turned from a simple town into an enlarged municipality in 2016, due to a change in Armenia’s governmental system, increasing the territory under the control of the municipality. After the 2018 “Velvet Revolution” that brought Nikol Pashinyan and the Civil Contract Party to power, the first election bringing officials who were not connected with the former Armenian regimes took place in Meghri in 2021.

In fact, none of the political parties fielding slates in Meghri’s 2021 election were affiliated with the parties of the prior three Armenian presidents. Four parties, Civil Contract, Liberal, Republic and Country of Living, competed. Andreasyan said that he presented himself as the candidate of the Liberal Party for municipal head but was never a member of the party. He said that in fact, he never had been a member of any political party but was always an independent.

Andreasyan explained that as no party received 51 percent of the votes, an alliance was formed between the Liberal Party, which was led nationally by Samvel Babayan, and the Republic Party, led nationally by Aram Sargsyan, to obtain a ruling majority. They decided that Bagrat Zakaryan of the latter party would serve for the first 2 ½ years of the five-year term as municipal head, with Andreasyan as first deputy, and then they would swap positions for the next 2 ½ years.

Andreasyan began his period as municipal head in May 2024. It takes time to make plans and obtain funding for projects, he said, and he must again face elections in the fall of 2026. This time, however, he will be a candidate of the Civil Contract Party. Sometime in the spring of 2025, Andreasyan said he joined this party, declaring: “That happened knowingly: looking at their work, the movement of the government, their growth of the economy, and taking all this into consideration, I understood that we are going forward. I did this voluntarily. No one guided me.”

Municipal Budget and Projects

The municipality has around 69 staff members in different departments or divisions, including social, construction, accounting, legal and planning, and each one has 6-7 people, Andreasyan said. Not all are based in Meghri due to space limitations. For example, Andreasyan said that an official dealing with education and school issues has his office in Agarak.

The municipal budget was 1 billion 200 million drams (approximately $3,147,600) while Zakaryan was in charge. The state gave four or five hundred million drams and the rest came from municipal taxes and duties. Few renovations or repairs could be carried out because of budgetary restrictions, Andreasyan said. When Andreasyan took over, the budget increased by another 1 billion 280 million, more than doubling, to 2,480,000,000 drams.

Where did the additional money come from? Andreasyan answered that in part it was from the Agarak Copper-Molybdenum Combine. Aram Sargsyan’s Republic Party was pro-European and critical of Russia. The owners of the mining company are Russian and no investments were made by it during Zakaryan’s time in office by it nor by the Zangezur Copper-Molybednum Combine. Andreasyan said that after he was elected and became municipal head in 2024, he went to them and they contributed about 150 million drams (roughly $395,893) to the budget.

In addition, there were lands not given out to rent to the Agarak Combine in prior years. Local mayors would allow these lands to be used officially for free but in exchange they sold products like gas to them privately to make personal profit, Andreasyan said. Now Andreasyan formally rented these properties for 160 million drams annually, which of course increases the municipal budget, while Kajaran municipality also gives Meghri 150 million drams rent.

The central government also increased its contribution to Meghri to 700 or 800 million drams, Andreasyan said.

He spelled out several of the major projects which this 2025 budget will allow him to tackle. Roofs and elevators on some large apartment buildings in Meghri will be repaired for 234,158,000 Armenian drams ($617,955), towards which the municipality contributes 70,000,000 and the central government 140,000,000. The apartments are owned as private property and their owners take care of their internal spaces. They pay taxes which may be used towards repairs of the building but the responsibility of building maintenance still falls on the municipality (unlike the case of individual self-standing private homes). Andreasyan said that roughly speaking, the municipality pays 30 percent, the central government 60 percent, and individual taxpayer owners pay 10 percent towards such renovations.

The streets in Agarak used to be very dusty and made of dirt. Street repairs there, especially asphalting, will cost 563,000,000 drams ($1,485,919). This work was to begin at the end of last October and included changing the drainage or sewage pipes.

The mines in the region cause damage to the environment. Consequently, those who work there donate money to the municipality in part as a remedy. They donated around 100 million dram and the municipality sent 118,850,000 ($313,776) to the Meghri Regional Medical Center to buy new medical equipment, including laparoscopic equipment costing 18,840,000 drams (the price was set through an auction competition). Previously people had to go to Kapan, Goris or even Yerevan for laparoscopic procedures.

The hospital itself does not belong to the municipality but to the Health Ministry, but as it helps the municipal population the local government wants to help it as much as possible, Andreasyan said.

Fourthly, Karchevan village of the municipality suffers water shortages from July to September when river water dries up. The municipality allocated 22,000,000 drams ($58,064) for its water issues. A deep well will be prepared to provide inhabitants with water.

Another project is spending 100,000,000 drams ($263,928) to fix up the area behind the large statue of Paramaz (Madteos Sarkisian), an Armenian revolutionary and leader of the Social Democrat Hunchakian Party born in Meghri in 1863 and hanged by the Ottomans in 1915. The statue was erected in 2001 but the area behind it is rocky and in poor shape.

Andreasyan said part will be turned into a playground for children with a small swimming pool and slide. The great heat in the summer makes having swimming pools important for children’s health (the municipality also maintains public pools in Meghri and Agarak). The rest of the area will be a garden.

TRIPP and Trade

Andreasyan seemed very optimistic last October about TRIPP. He observed that President Donald Trump declared that great investments will be made there. Andreasyan said that the route would be profitable for Armenia as well as the US and there would be great growth in the Armenian economy. The Azeris would transport oil through Armenia since that is the shortest distance to Turkey, and they would pay a fee to use Armenian roads, as would the Turks, so the state budget of Armenia would increase.

A second bridge is going to be built over the Arax River, he said, and while there are daily 350-400 vehicles going over the current bridge with Iran, it would increase to 1,800-2,000 daily. One reason is that the Chinese right now use a route via Iran, then Azerbaijan to China, but TRIPP provides a way to shorten this. Instead, the Chinese will transport goods from Dubai to Iran and then through the Meghri route to the Black Sea (to Georgia and then via ship).

The $145 million the US is transferring is only for renovating the existing old railway line, which China will be able to use. If a totally new line would be built, Andreasyan estimated the cost would be several billion dollars.

Andreasyan said that based on the speech of the Armenian prime minister at the UN, the Armenians will check incoming Azerbaijani vehicles, while Azerbaijanis will check Armenian vehicles. He said, “There can be no objections, when a powerful state like America says it will be like this…we are very happy.”

American supervision of the route, Andreasyan said, is desirable in his opinion, adding, “Why is it desirable? Because the two states have fought one other for over 30 years. There can’t be custom houses and conflicts not occur. This is impossible. Time must pass. It [relations] must be refined. People must progress and understand in a European way that law has force and law must operate. You have no rights outside of the law.”

He noted that around 10 European countries were also making major investments in Syunik province as donations, not loans in the fields of agriculture, including irrigation, business, and solar energy. He said that in general, while people were afraid and did not make investments, after the August peace agreement between Azerbaijan and Armenia, people have more hope.

Personal Background

The 60-year-old Andreasyan was born in Karchevan village of the Meghri municipality and graduated middle school there before moving to Agarak. He served in the Soviet army from 1985 to 1987. After he returned, he worked a year as a locksmith before the Karabakh movement began in 1988.

He became a fighter and formed a group with Ghevond Hovhannisyan as commander. They participated in the 1990-91 battles, including the defense of Meghri, towards Nakhichevan, and Kapan, until the peace arrangement. In 1993 and 1994 he was in the Armenian army and had the rank of senior lieutenant. After that, he became the president of the Meghri Regional Division of the Defenders of the Land [Yerkrapah] Volunteer Union, a paramilitary group of veterans ready to defend the borders in case of new wars.

In 1998, he put forth his candidacy for mayor of Meghri and won third place out of seven candidates. He decided then to get higher education, so he went to Yerevan’s Agricultural Academy. After graduation, he became the director of the Armenian-Iranian Market from 2000 to 2006. Trading with Iranians took place in a no customs zone until the Armenian state shut it down in 2006.

After this, Andreasyan went back to Yerevan and established two businesses. He exported nonferrous metals and iron scraps to India, Iran, Pakistan and other countries until 2012. In 2013 he imported goods from Ukraine.

When the 2020 Artsakh war began, Andreasyan enrolled as a volunteer but could not go because he got severely sick from Covid. Instead, he helped financially as much as he could, he said, and when the revolutionary movement of Nikol Pashinyan began in 2018, he was supportive though he did not join any political party.

Andreasyan said that he would not move to Yerevan again because he loved Meghri, and was looking forward to the 2026 elections for municipal head. He said, “I have a saying: I am happy that I am Armenian. I am doubly happy that I am a Syunik native, and triply happy that I am a Meghri native [Meghretsi].”