The Central Asian country makes efforts to improve its investment climate after more than two decades of economic isolation that kept foreign private businesses at a distance. President Shavkat Mirziyoyev made the attraction of foreign investors one of the top priorities of his ambitious reform agenda.

The ministry said that oil production in November was below the country's quota under OPEC+ commitments at 647,000 bpd.

Armenia's economy has expanded by 2.7 percent in the third quarter of this year, backed by a rise in prices for commodities on world markets, growth in agriculture and robust tax collections figures.

The company suffered losses of 3 billion hryvnias in the third quarter after a profit of 306.7 million hryvnias in the first half of the year due to the seasonal increase in the generation of renewable energy sources.

The sentences were the latest in a long line of heavy punishments meted out to opponents of Lukashenko, who was re-elected to a sixth term in 2020.