Deputy Minister of Labor and Social Affairs Davit Khachatryan and Minister's press secretary Zaruhi Manucharyan presented from the Government's "Humanitarian Center" details on the planned state assistance program for housing affordability for persons forcibly displaced from Nagorno-Karabakh.
According to Davit Khachatryan, the state support program for housing affordability for persons forcibly displaced from Nagorno- Karabakh will be mainly in three directions. Accordingly, assistance will be provided to build a house, to purchase a residential house or an apartment, and persons who for objective reasons cannot use the above two types of assistance will be given the opportunity to live in social housing, that is, they will be provided with housing. There will be a certain list of settlements, including rural ones. A mandatory condition for participating in the program is having the citizenship of the Republic of Armenia. Regarding property ownership rights, the deputy minister noted that after 10 years of residence, the ownership rights will be transferred to them. There is a condition here that persons of working age must repay a certain amount to the state, after which, if within 10 years the amount is fully repaid according to the condition of the program, then ownership will pass to them. Exceptions are minor children, as well as pensioners and socially vulnerable groups.
According to Davit Khachatryan, the program will be implemented in phases and may last up to 5 years. In the first phase, priority will be given to families with three or more minor children, in the second and subsequent phases, according to the number of children.
The deputy minister also referred to the current program of state support for housing security in border villages, within the framework of which the state provides 16 million AMD and repays the interest on the amount. Davit Khachatryan emphasized that in case of using this program, persons forcibly displaced from Nagorno-Karabakh cannot use the above-mentioned program, which is currently under development.
Zaruhi Manucharyan referred to the decisions taken yesterday at the Cabinet meeting. Accordingly, the range of beneficiaries of one-time assistance of AMD 100,000 has been expanded, and now those who accompanied the medical patients transferred to the Republic of Armenia after the blockade of the Lachin Corridor who submitted their applications before January 31, 2024 and whose data are on the lists provided by the Ministry of Health can benefit from the program.
As for the 40,000 + 10,000 AMD support program for utility costs and temporary housing rents, according to the decision, before this change, people who owned real estate in Armenia received only 10,000 AMD of the program for utility costs. With the new change, those persons who own only one real estate for living under the right of shared or common joint ownership, the corresponding area of which is less than 20 square meters, they will also be able to get the 40,000 AMD of support provided for the apartment rent. Zaruhi Manucharyan also reminded that the persons who applied late due to some circumstances will be able to receive the fees for the previous months as well, if they were absent from the Republic of Armenia for less than 10 days in the previous months. The application submission period has been extended from March 15 to March 31.
Changes were also made to the 50 + 50 thousand AMD social support program. According to the amendments, the program can also be used by those persons who were absent from Armenia for less than 30 days in November. Children whose parents have more than 2 million AMD in their accounts can also benefit from the support. Those whose applications were rejected because of being registered in the state population register in Armenia before September 19, 2023 will also become beneficiaries. The mentioned changes will be effective for the period starting from November, 2023.
