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A group of residents of the village of Mravyan (Yeghipatrush) in Aparan community of Armenia's Aragatsotn Province were in protest over poor road conditions in the community on Monday. They unveiled a plan to block the highway leading to the village to make the authorities deal with the issue.

“This road was renovated in 2016; they laid down asphalt on the ground and left. Now nothing has been left of it,” one of the villagers complained.

He claimed they had submitted several appeals to the local authorities, including the governor, but their demand had been neglected.

“We have blocked the road once, now we are going to do it for the second time. We are not criminals, but the whole staff of the [police] department have been told to come here,” he added.

According to the protesters, the deadline of the road renovation expires this year, while 1 km of the road  remains in poor condition.

“Our demand is for this section of the road to be improved. Let them come here and see themselves and join us to finish the work,” the protester said.

According to another villager, in 2016 the 9-km highway was set to be completely renovated, with 780 million drams envisaged for the project, but the whole money was seized.

He stated even 30% of the sum was not allocated for the road renovation. “We are not begging help from the government, we are just asking for the culprits to be caught,” the villager said.

Aparan head Karen Yeghiazaryan promised the residents that equipment will be brought on August 10 and the road will be renovated.

The villagers agreed to end the protest, but on the condition that if the renovation work fails to start within the mentioned timeframes, the community head must join them and block the road, which Yeghiazaryan agreed to.