Yesterday, the Government rejected “Republic” party’s request for holding the conference of the Armenian National Congress in the session hall of the Government (situated on Melik Adamyan street) on the 21st, 22nd or the 23rd of December. Earlier, the Government had rejected the appeal for providing the session hall to the Armenian National Congress on the 19th of December. Last Friday morning, David Sargsyan, Head of the Government staff, had a telephone conversation with Avetis Avagyan, manager of L. Ter-Petrosyan’s office, and informed him that he couldn’t provide the session hall of the Government on the date specified in the request. The government should have done it in an official letter form. Levon Zurabyan, a leading member of the ANC, condemned this as a “blatant violation of law” and demanded that the government give an official written response to the alliance. “The government’s behavior is a simple mockery,” he said. “For us phone calls don’t matter. There was an official application and the government was obliged to officially respond in writing.” As he said earlier the ANC would hold its Congress in Georgia in the event of refusal. The Armenian National Congress continues its discussions over the option of conducting the conference in Georgia. It turns out that the government was aware of the threat that the opposition would hold its session in Georgia. Perhaps they understand the large-scale noise that the ANC session will cause internationally if it is held in Georgia. Armenia, which reputation is already marred, may even become more humiliated. After that the government will be totally mistaken to claim that the “anti-national” opposition is deliberately marring the reputation of the country because in this case they prohibited the conduct of the session of Armenia.
