Although the Armenian parliament has ended discussions on the amendments of the electoral code of Armenia (EC) and has already voted for it, however it doesn’t really seem that this was a discussion. Even the speaker of the National Assembly was of that opinion and said that the deputies talked more about other issues rather than the EC and wasted their time.
During the discussions of the Electoral Code (EC) amendment the head of ULP, Gourgen Arsenyan said that they shouldn’t feel like “elephants”, referring to the joke made by Republican Ashot Ashotyan about an elephant that paints a picture, the other animals make changes and then all the animals say that the final picture isn’t as good as the original one. Mr. Arsenyan said that that elephant didn’t fit in with the nature of Armenia. However, he did say that the level of effectiveness of the electoral code amendments will be seen only after the upcoming parliamentary elections. The National Unity faction is not going to take part in the discussions of the EC since it is against it; the code doesn’t include the version of a fully majority basis election system. The ARF advocates the mentioned amendment draft. As for the Rule of Law, after Heghine Bisharyan’s speech, it is very difficult to assume what the RL’s role is on the code. Mrs. Bisharyan says that no one believes that there will be fair elections and added that there should be “limits for violations too”. Before the voting, there was a thought that “Justice” was going to vote against the EC amendment draft. The secretary of the “Justice”, Grigor Harutyunyan said that the fact that there is no trust is conditioned by the fact that violators have not been punished and asked the deputies that had committed violations to apologize to the voters. “You should apologize to voters and tell them that you are not going to do that any more. People will think that you are serious politicians and will start believing in the elections”, said Mr. Harutyunyan. Concerning this, NA speaker Tigran Torosyan said, “You can apologize to people too. You should apologize to the people for calling back your representatives from the electoral commissions”. NA vice speaker Vahan Hovhannisyan said that it was evident that the deputies elected on a majority basis have always been for the authorities. Hovhannisyan said that it was understandable since those that were elected on majority basis were not teachers or doctors trusted by citizens, but businessmen who don’t depend on the executive branch of government.
Anyway, the next issue, the draft on alienating property for the needs of the state, was discussed the next day. The same draft has been rejected twice and is being brought to the parliament for the third time without any significant changes. The government has taken a provision out of the draft, according to which the citizens that have been given reimbursement cannot bring a court case to argument the decisions made before. The head of the constant commission on state and legal issues, Rafik Petrosyan, said that instead of that the government had included another “complicated” provision, which means almost the same as the previous one. R. Petrosyan said that they couldn’t cheat him.
There was a Q&A session in the parliament, during which Armen Ashotyan asked a question regarding the foreign affairs minister, who said that Victor Dallakyan was right to say that the mapping of the Armenian-Georgian border was based on the map of 1939, since that’s the only map that’s integral. Mr. Dallakyan says that as a result of that, Armenia will lose 300 km territory. The foreign affairs minister said that the issue concerned the state and the parliament could discuss it in the future and it can reject or adopt it. During the Q&A session, the minister of energy, Armen Movsisyan said that the Iran-Armenia pipeline would be ready ahead of time and will start functioning by the end of this year. RA prime minister answered to journalists’ questions and didn’t refute the rumors that Armenia is currently negotiating with Russia on the Iran-Armenia pipeline issue. “We don’t speak about selling it generally. Armenia may simply invest in the founding capital or we may do that investment jointly since it will be illogical to keep two gas distribution networks in Armenia”, said the prime minister and added, “We have separate network or pipeline, in addition, we also deal with the “ARG” company. We will make certain negotiations only when the time comes to do that and we have gas in the pipeline”. The prime minister says that Iran is informed about all the details concerning the pipeline since, as he said, “Iran is our main ally”. As for citizens, they will be informed about the details only “when the time comes”. Head of the Armenian-Russian inter-governmental commission, defense minister Serge Sargsyan assured that our country had not given the pipeline to anyone. “I assure that we haven’t given the pipeline to anyone. There is no document to show that. I promise to ask the head of the ARG again to give detailed information about that in the future”, told Serge Sargsyan to journalists. Concerning the accusation of the RL that the defense minister and the prime minister are doing black PR against heir party and preventing them to speak in the media, the defense minister said, “Both the RL members and the other deputies are not prosecutors to accuse the prime minister and me of anything. I can say only one thing; it is just amazing and ridiculous for me. I have more important things to do than going to Gyumri or Vanadzor cities and telling anyone not to allow them speak in Media. There are more important things to do in this country”. During the session, the defense minister spoke about the hymn as well and said that he would like to hear the Armenian hymn with music by Aram Khachatryan and lyrics by Armenian poet Charents. As for the prime minister, he said, “I wish it were acceptable by everyone”. The prime minister said that the music by Aram Khachatryan was good, however there were no words and he associated that music with the old words.