Gyumri Municipality Denies Russian Defense Ministry Statement: The Military Base Did Not Participate in Snow Removal Works

On December 15, the press service of Russia’s Ministry of Defense stated that “The soldiers of the Russian military base have helped local population in Armenia to cope with the snow”.

The press release published by the Russian Ministry of Defense with the aforementioned headline said that a group of 50 Russian soldiers has been formed for that purpose and they have been provided 10 trucks and other equipment.

According to the press release, that group is supposed to help the population in case of emergency situations caused by weather conditions. However, according to the headline, that help has already been provided. Moreover, the publication is accompanied by the photo of the truck which seems to be providing the help.

We contacted Gyumri Municipality in an effort to verify that information. However, the mayor’s spokesperson Sona Arakelyan informed us that the municipality has not received any help from the Russian military base.

In particular, the spokesperson said, “We have not received snow removal equipment or any other help from the Russian military base”.

Arakelyan also noted that the municipality has necessary amount of equipment with which they are carrying out snow removal works.

“It is a long time snow removal works have been completed and the streets of Gyumri are ideally cleaned up from snow”, the spokesperson claimed.

We will not go into details of the latest claim by Arakelyan. However, it is worth noting that she in fact officially denied the participation of the Russian military base in snow removal works of Gyumri city.

It is also worth noting that such “manipulations” are typical of almost all Russian official news websites. But in this case, we deal with the press service of Russia’s Ministry of Defense.