Khudatyan insisted that this is not a consequence of Russia’s threats to hike the price of its natural gas supplied to Armenia. “The existing capacity of our gas pipeline [leading to Iran] is greater than the [volume of] gas currently flowing through it.” Armenia imported less than 500 million cubic meters of Iranian gas last year in addition to around 2 billion cubic meters of Russian gas supplied via Georgia. According to Ara Marjanyan, an Armenian energy expert, the Iranian gas is currently twice as expensive for Armenia as the Russian gas. The Russian gas price for Armenia has long been set well below international market levels.