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Armenia asks Russia $100 mln loan to revive diamond industry

23 January 2010 23:52 (UTC +04:00)

Baku. Ziya Agazade â€“ APA. Armenia asked Russia to provide it with a $100 million loan to develop the Transcaucasia state’s diamond industry, which was the country’s major economic locomotive in early 2000th, but has plunged in recent years, a Russian Finance Ministry spokesman said on Saturda, APA reports quoting â€œRia Novostiâ€.

"The request has been received, we are considering it," Konstantin Vyshkovsky, who heads the ministry’s state loan department, said, adding the decision would be taken "within a reasonable time."

The Armenian Finance Minister Tigran Davtyan, who visited the Russian capital, Moscow, on January 20, announced earlier on Saturday the republic’s intention to spend some $100 million of loan funds to buy Russian rough diamonds. Other $20 million of loan are expected to be spent on the development of cooperation between Armenian diamond producers and Russia’s largest diamond miner Alrosa.

Alrosa, which accounts for 97% of Russian and 25% of global diamond output, said in December it sold diamonds worth $2.19 billion in 2009, including $2.13 billion worth of rough diamonds and $60 million worth of cut diamonds.