“Armenia is the 4th country in the world in terms of accepting refugees”

Over the past 4 years, 20 000 thousand people have arrived from Syria to Armenia, but only 16 000 of them stayed. This was announced by the Minister of Diaspora Hranush Hakobyan during the discussion of the draft law on RA “On state budget of 2016” answering the question of Heghine Bishryan –Head of the “Country of Law” faction – who wondered how many people stay here and how many of them get disappointed and leave Armenia.

Hranush Hakobyan also pointed out why they leave Armenia. “At the beginning of the Syrian conflict many Armenians believed that they would return. They spend two years in Armenian but the last two years made them realize that they should integrate and settle problems in Armenia”, – she said adding that in fact there are also differences in cultural approaches and it takes a long time to adjust to all these things.

However, in terms of accepting refugees Armenia is the 4^th country in the world. “As a result of escalation of the conflict in Syria many Syrian-Armenians settled in Germany, Sweden, and Canada. Approximately 12 000 Syrian-Armenians settled in Lebanon and about 5-6 thousand Syrian-Armenian families live in Jordan. However, in terms of accepting refugees we are the 4^th in the world and are quite ahead by all comparisons”, – she said.

Full text in Armenian