Geghashen Villagers Fight Sand Mine They Say Will Bury Village in Dust
YEREVAN, Armenia - Residents of Geghashen, a village of some 4,000 people in Armenia's Kotayk province, are pushing back against a government-backed sand extraction operation they say will destroy grazing land and bury their homes in a permanent cloud of dust. They face a formidable array of official opposition: the ministry that issued the permit stands behind it, a second ministry has cleared the project on health grounds, and the government's enforcement service is now pressing local authorities to allow work to begin immediately.
Armenia's Ministry of Territorial Administration and Infrastructure awarded Anthracite LLC a twenty-year permit to extract sand at the site in 2022. The country's Ministry of the Environment has also backed the project, asserting that any potential health risks fall within permissible norms. As a condition of operation, Anthracite LLC is required to allocate AMD 300,000 annually for environmental monitoring.
The government's Compulsory Enforcement Service has since instructed the Abovyan Community Council - Geghashen falls within the administrative boundaries of the Abovyan Municipality - to immediately allow exploitation of the mine to proceed.
Villagers say they were shut out of the process that produced those approvals. Three public hearings were held on the sand mine, with official minutes recording support for the project at each session. Residents who spoke to Hetq said they were never informed the hearings were taking place.
A fourth public hearing, convened in February 2022 after Geghashen's administrative incorporation into the wider Abovyan community, produced a different result. Scores more residents attended, and those present voiced their opposition to the planned mine.
Residents later formalized that opposition in writing. On May 10, 2023, an application was submitted to the Abovyan community administration on behalf of 355 Geghashen residents stating their objection to operating the mine in an area adjacent to residential zones. When the matter reached a council committee, three of its five members sided against the project.
The dispute has stirred raw anger in the village. "I'll drive those trucks myself. I'll put that dust on his head. Will he come and live here?" said Manukyan, one resident who spoke with Hetq, voicing the frustration of villagers who see the mine as both a health threat and an assault on the agricultural life of the settlement.
For Geghashen, the consequences are tangible. Fields adjacent to the planned extraction site serve as grazing land for livestock, and their degradation would directly damage the livelihoods of farming families in the village. Persistent questions about air quality and the health of residents living close to the operation have not been resolved to the community's satisfaction, even as the Ministry of the Environment maintains that risk levels remain within permissible bounds.
The dispute also exposes a procedural fault line. Residents allege that the three hearings which generated official approval were held without their knowledge, meaning the community had no effective opportunity to object before a twenty-year commitment was made on its behalf. The official record and the testimony of Geghashen residents offer irreconcilable accounts of how that consultation was conducted.
With the Compulsory Enforcement Service pushing the Abovyan Community Council to act and Anthracite LLC holding a permit valid through 2042, the 355 residents who signed the petition and the committee members who voted against the project represent the most concrete resistance the village has available
