Liquified petroleum gas (LPG) prices have surged to 50% as Armenian lorries carrying LPG continue to be obstructed from entering into Georgia from Russia. While Georgia denies that the lorries were being obstructed, lorry drivers claim that they are being pressed to pay bribes of up to $1,500 in order to be allowed entry.
Throughout the week, prices of LPG at Armenian pumps reached ֏180 ($0.47) per litre, a dramatic increase from the previous rate of ֏120 ($0.31) per litre.
Armenian Economy Minister Gevorg Papoyan commented on reports of bribes at the Georgian border on Tuesday, saying he would forward any comments he had received on the matter to Armenia’s Anti-Corruption Committee.
‘This is important, because if there is indeed bribery, this must also be revealed and informed to Georgian colleagues’, Papoyan wrote.
Papoyan had been updating his followers on Facebook on the situation on the Georgian border since it first began.
One Facebook user commented on Papoyan’s status asking him to comment on how lorry drivers were being asked to pay bribes of $1,200.
RFE/RL has cited an anonymous source as saying that the Georgian side is allegedly charging $1,500 per lorry ‘to permit entry into Armenia’, otherwise the drivers are forced to wait in long queues in the summer heat. The news outlet wrote that LPG importers would pass the bribes to an ‘intermediary’ in Armenia who would ‘get in touch and allow the lorries to move’.
RFE/RL’s source has also claimed that vehicles from other countries do not encounter the same difficulties entering Georgia.
Importers previously said they were unaware of what was causing the problem, and that they had only previously faced similar issues on the border due to weather conditions or other ‘objective’ factors.
The Armenian authorities have not provided any statement clarifying why the lorries were being barred entry to Georgia.
In a post on Friday, Papoyan announced that on Thursday, 77 lorries carrying LPG entered Armenia, with 331 lorries crossing the border in the past week.
‘I think it’s time for the Competition Protection Commission to deal with the issue of price changes in the liquefied gas market’, Papoyan concluded.
‘A complete lie’
Following the coverage of the obstruction of LPG supply for over a week and subsequent price increase in Armenia, Georgian authorities dismissed reports of Armenian lorries being stuck on the border with Russia as ‘another misinformative statement made by some media and representatives of opposition parties in Georgia’
In its post on Wednesday, the Georgian Revenue Service of the Ministry of Finance also denied ‘blocking’ Armenian cargo, including gas products.
‘This is a complete lie, serves to mislead society, discredit institutions, and politicise the issue’, the statement read.
Instead, they suggested that ‘under the increased volume of cargo traffic, all customs procedures for vehicles involved in international shipments are carried out in special/active mode, in order to smoothly conduct them’.
Footage shared online of the border showed the long queues of lorries believed to be carrying LPG at the Upper Lars checkpoint. Some showed drivers were seen hosing down tankers with water jets in order to cool them down as temperatures spike, with drivers warning that the temperatures could cause leakage or explosions.
Addressing the videos, the Georgian authorities claimed that they did not reflect ‘the real situation’ at the Upper Lars checkpoint, ‘where for a short period of time there was a minor delay with the lorries, which was completely eliminated’.
Georgia’s obstruction of Armenia’s gas supply emerged shortly after the two countries entered a dispute which saw Georgia bar lorries carrying Armenian brandy from crossing into Russia through its borders.
Since late April, Armenian cargo had been subjected to inspections in Georgia, effectively halting the transit of Armenian brandy. As of early July, reports suggested that issues surrounding the brandy lorries had yet to be resolved, despite meetings between the two sides.
Arshaluys Barseghyan
