PRESERVATION OF CULTURAL VALUES IN ARMENIA ASSESSED 'GOOD'

''The state of preservation of mobile cultural monuments in Armenia is rather good,'' cultural values preservation agency deputy head, Armenak Ghazaryan, told a news conference today. In his words, those monuments are preserved by respective structures that have special monitoring procedures. ''The threats are only caused by nature,'' Ghazaryan added. In his words, these structures try to solve other problems today. ''Time affects everything, including cultural items. Cultural values are best preserved in archives rather than exhibition halls since the temperature is always the same in the archives,'' he said. Ghazaryan mentioned that in time cultural items undergo deformation but they are not completely destroyed.

''Our agency deals with legal improvements of the preservation of monuments. We try to correct mistakes. We engage is protection functions that are aimed at state structures and the preservation of items that are of private property,'' agency deputy head said. Today the main problem of the agency is to find experts as well as a physical and chemical laboratory.

''We conduct the studies visually and it is rather difficult,'' he said.

Currently Armenia has 28-29.000 static and 6 million mobile cultural values. There are 67 state archives in the republic.