YEREVAN, October 12. /ARKA/. Artsakhbank will return gold items pledged by Nagorno-Karabakh residents to get  secured loans before they had to flee to Armenia, the bank said today.

It said the gold will be  returned and the borrowers will be exempted from their  credit obligations. The bank had already returned more than 400 clients the pledged gold items before they fled to Armenia. Some 500 more borrowers who could not get the pledge in Nagorno-Karabakh can apply to the bank's branch in Yerevan. -0-