Since yesterday, a number of obvious and, in all likelihood, directed false statements by some media outlets and Facebook users have been widely spread on the Internet aimed at overshadowing the reputation of the RA Ministry of Defence. Without going into details about the goals of the launched dirty information campaign and choice of the tools being used and leaving it for the law enforcement agencies to deal, we consider it necessary to respond to a number of provisions presented in those publications.

1. It is alleged that the RA Ministry of Defence sold weapons and ammunition to Turkey through a private company, from where it fell into the hands of the pro-Turkish terrorists in Syria.

This is an obvious and impudent lie. The Ministry of Defence of the Republic of Armenia has never sold any kind of weapons or ammunition to the Republic of Turkey through any channel. The main part of the documents mentioned in the publication is interpreted in a distorted way and the circulating misinformation is built on that distortion.

2. It is presented that for unknown reasons the Ministry of Defence of the Republic of Armenia lent  $3.5 million  to a private company, the head of which has friendly relations with Minister of Defence David Tonoyan.

This is an obvious and impudent lie. The Ministry of Defence gave that loan to the company in order to ensure the continuity of arms supplies from a third country to Armenia. Moreover, at the time of providing the loan, the company had already supplied a part of the ordered armament, the value of which was higher than the given loan. And the total value of the deal was much more than the mentioned loan amount.

By the way, having in mind the actual leak of the official documents of the state department, it becomes very remarkable that the mentioned documents were confiscated by another state structure in 2018 for study.

3. It is stated that at the beginning of the war, some individuals offered the Ministry of Defence to buy bulletproof vests from the Russian Federation for $ 300, but the Ministry of Defence rejected that offer and then, through another private company, purchased the same bulletproof vests for more than $ 1,000.

This is an obvious and impudent lie. The Ministry of Defence of the Republic of Armenia, in accordance with the relevant agreements signed between the Republic of Armenia and the Russian Federation, acquires Russian-made weapons, ammunition and armaments at preferential prices set by the Russian Federation for the Republic of Armenia. Therefore, even theoretically, it is impossible for any person or organization to offer Russian-made weapons, ammunition or armaments to the RA Ministry of Defence, the cost of which will be lower than the one offered by the state.

In this particular case, the mentioned bulletproof vests, as well as the corresponding bulletproof helmets were acquired in very limited quantities, through the same state structures of the Russian Federation, exclusively for the special units, in order to fulfill complex combat tasks. They differ significantly from the combined arms bulletproof vests and bulletproof helmets, both in terms of quality and price. Moreover, prior to the acquisition, their quality features were checked by the professional commission of the RA Ministry of Defence, which, as a result of the detailed examinations, gave a positive assessment (the protocol of the commission is available), after which the transaction was carried out.

The Ministry of Defence of the Republic of Armenia strongly condemns the spread of this and other similar false statements and information manipulations with obvious direction and considers it a criminal activity aimed at undermining the security of the country and demands from the media outlets to spread denials. The Ministry of Defence expects operative response from the relevant law enforcement agencies to identify the perpetrators of the document leaks, organizers and distributors of information campaigns, find out their goals and initiate appropriate legal proceedings.