Deputy Police Chief Explains Why the Validity Period of Old Sample Passports is Being Shortened

Deputy Police Chief Ara Fidanyan discussed today, October 21, during a session of the National Assembly's permanent committee on state legal issues, the draft submitted by the Police proposing to reduce the validity period of passports. Fidanyan stated that the goal of shortening the validity of old passports is to transition to the biometric passport system.

“The only goal is this: today we are taking active steps towards the establishment of a new biometric passport system. I am confident that by the end of 2022 we will have completely transitioned to biometric passports and the implementation of the biometric passport system. With this step, we are trying to minimize the number of people who will be without biometric passports. If we give the old passports another 10 years of validity next year, we will have no way to replace those passports with biometric ones later. Consequently, we will have citizens using old sample passports at least until 2032,” he remarked.

It is worth noting that the police have submitted a new draft for public discussion, which proposes an amendment to the Government's decision. Currently, according to the Government's decision No. 821 dated December 25, 1998, the passport of a citizen of the Republic of Armenia is issued with a validity period of 10 years, except for individuals under 16 years of age and conscripts.

The draft decision proposes to set the validity period of the passport of a citizen of the Republic of Armenia to 2 years. If the draft is adopted, there will be no need to make changes regarding the revenues, expenditures, and deficit of the state budget of the Republic of Armenia.

Another draft also proposes to set a maximum extension period of 2 years for the validity of the passport of a citizen of the Republic of Armenia in foreign states.