Is GHB legal in Armenia?

Legal status

Controlled in Armenia, and the list it sits in can now be named. The հավելված to Government Decision N 1129-Ն of 21 August 2003 prints «Գամմա-հիդրօքսիկարագաթթու» in Ցուցակ N 3, the list of substances over whose circulation certain control conditions are established, which is the mildest of the three substance lists rather than the prohibited one. The lists are alphabetical and carry no serial numbers, so the position is given the only way the annex allows: the line stands between Բուտոբարբիտալ and Գլուտեթիմիդ. The applied cell matched the line correctly but attached a Chemical Abstracts number to it, and the annex prints none, so the identification rests on the Armenian name and its position rather than on a registry number. The applied cell also called its own search record incomplete because the logged terms were Latin and the line is Armenian, and that gap is closed here: the line was reached by searching the Armenian forms listed in the source line. Neighbouring lines in the same Ցուցակ N 3 print «Եթեր բժշկական» and ether for anaesthesia, which shows this list does reach medical gases and agents, and that matters for how the lactone question should be put. Read on 21 September 2026.

Consequences if caught

Capital exposure: none. Armenia has no death penalty and no life sentence for a drug offence. The entry relied on for GHB is «Գամմա-հիդրօքսիկարագաթթու». The ceiling is 12 years. Criminal Code article 393(3) provides a term of six to twelve years, and articles 393 and 396 carry the principal offences. That 12 year ceiling is the lowest of any country authored in this session, and it is the figure the article itself prints rather than a reading of a range. The quantity instrument prints this row as «2 to 10 g»; «>10 to 50 g»; «>50 to 250 g; especially large >250 g». A printed annex figure in Armenia is a small amount, not a threshold for the offence. The statutory multipliers at article 393(4) to (6) turn it into the significant, large and especially large bands.

If prescribed or medical

Armenia states no lawful personal use allowance for a scheduled substance, and Article 393(4) to (6) measures its significant, large and especially large bands from the minimum small amount figure the Government sets, which is a criminal threshold and never a traveller quota. A scheduled medicine must in addition satisfy the law on medicines, «Դեղերի մասին» Հայաստանի Հանրապետության օրենք, together with the prescription, packaging, import and customs rules that law carries. The placement is «Գամմա-հիդրօքսիկարագաթթու» in Ցուցակ N 3, and the heading of that list matters to a patient: it is the list of substances subject to defined control conditions rather than prohibition, and it carries medical ether alongside, so a medicinal route is not excluded by the list heading itself. The enquiry should still ask whether the acid line is read as reaching its lactone, because the lactone row of this same table is open on precisely that question and no lactone line was found in the annex.

Documentation

Carry the prescription and the original dispensing packaging for any medicine containing gamma hydroxybutyric acid, with a doctor's letter naming the patient, the active ingredient, the dose and the treatment period, and put the question to the Armenian Ministry of Health or the nearest Armenian embassy in writing before travelling rather than at the border. Name the acid in Armenian as the annex names it, «Գամմա-հիդրօքսիկարագաթթու», and say that it stands in Ցուցակ N 3 between Բուտոբարբիտալ and Գլուտեթիմիդ, because the annex prints no Chemical Abstracts numbers and no serial numbers and that is the only way to point at the line. Name the acid precisely, because its lactone is separate and unresolved. Read on 21 September 2026.

Drug laws and enforcement change and vary within a country. This is not legal advice. Always confirm with Armenia’s embassy or official drug authority before traveling; penalties can be severe, including imprisonment.