Armenia will not put its clocks forward to summer
26.01.2012,
21:06
The Armenian government plans to abandon shifting to daylight saving time, economy minister Tigran Davtyan said today. To date, the difference with Greenwich time zone is + 4 hours, 3 hours with other European countries, 9 hours with the East Coast in the USA and 12 hours with the West Coast.
YEREVAN, January 26. /ARKA/. The Armenian government plans to abandon shifting to daylight saving time, economy minister Tigran Davtyan said today. To date, the difference with Greenwich time zone is + 4 hours, 3 hours with other European countries, 9 hours with the East Coast in the USA and 12 hours with the West Coast.
Speaking to journalists after a Cabinet session the minister said the government approved a parliamentary initiative asking to drop transition to daylight saving time. As a result, throughout the year the country will be in one and the same time zone - GMT +4.
“We will wake up an hour later in the morning,’ the minister said.
He said geographically Armenia is in time zone GMT +3, but today the country is not in its real-time zone. The shift was made in the 30's of the past century, when hour hands on all locks in the former USSR were moved one hour forward with Armenia appearing in GMT +4 time zone. When the daylight saving time was introduced, for seven months a year the country was in the time zone GMT +5. According to the minister, the next step will be the transition to GMT +3 time zone that may take a couple of years.
Davtyan said Armenia’s major regional partners - Russia and Georgia, as well as almost all other CIS countries have stoped shifting to daylight saving time.
"Essentially, throughout the year we will be in the same time zone as Moscow and Tbilisi and during the summer we will be one hour closer to Europe," he said. -0-
