Epress.am News from Armenia
Residents of the village of Goght in Armenia's Kotayk province have been blocking the main highway leading to the capital, Yerevan, since early morning, demanding a stop to the construction of a gravity irrigation system in the Geghardalich reservoir. The World Bank-backed project envisages the use of Geghardalich water for the irrigation of a number of communities in Kotayk, including Voghjaberd, Dzoraghbyur, and Jrvezh. Protesters from Goght, however, insist that the reservoir water can barely meet their own irrigation requirements.
Speaking to Epress.am, protester Vahram Sedrakyan said that on May 21 the protesters had participated in the protest staged by hundreds of residents of Garni village against yet another World Bank-financed irrigation project under which the water from Azat river would be diverted to a number of Ararat province villages for irrigation purposes. On that day, Armenian Prime Minister Hovik Abrahamyan finally went to see the protesters himself and announced that the project would be halted and the construction machinery would be withdrawn from the Azat river gorge. The head of the Government also promised that he'd continue discussions about the Geghardalich project with the residents of Goght.
According to Sedrakyan, however, any debates have yet to be called, while the construction of the gravity system in the reservoir was in full swing, despite authorities' promises of termination until further discussion. Several of the villagers, along with village head Artavazd Hakobyan, have even visited the Kotayk regional administration and reached a verbal agreement with Kotayk governor Karapet Guloyan on a new project for Geghardalich.
Today, however, protesters told Epress.am that they no longer believed in “verbal agreements.” They claimed that they would continue to protest until construction in Geghardalich was stopped.