Month: October 2006

QUEUE IN THE CONSTITUTIONAL COURT

A1+
[04:11 pm] 06 October, 2006

After the Constitutional reforms when the citizens were given the right
to turn to the Constitutional Court a number of applications have been
registered. Today more than 300 citizens have turned to the Court.

11 cases have been accepted, and two of the individual applications
have already been considered.

"There are no problems in connection with individual applications as
the procedure is clearly defined", President of the Constitutional
Court Gagik Haroutyunyan informed the journalists today. "The only
problem is that too many people apply to the Court".

After the Constitutional amendments the deputies can turn to
the Constitutional Court collecting the signatures of 1/5 of the
Parliamentarians, instead of 1/3, as before. The Ombudsman too has
the right to turn to the Constitutional Court.

CONSTITUTIONAL COURT WILL GUARANTEE DEMOCRATIC ELECTIONS

A1+
[04:42 pm] 06 October, 2006

AS IN 2003?

Representatives of the Constitutional Courts of 11 countries, the CE,
the OSCE, and the European Court of Human Rights, as well as a number
of other structures have gathered in Yerevan in order to discuss how
the Constitutional Courts can guarantee democratic elections.

The representatives of Bulgaria, Romania, France, Germany, Belarus,
Lithuania, Cyprus and other countries will try to represent the
experience of their countries. But the Constitutional Court of Armenia
is also experienced. After the 2003 Presidential elections the RA CC
decided that the voters can organize a Referendum of Confidence. In
spite of the efforts of the opposition, the authorities did not
organize it. "A1+" tried to find out if this affected the reputation
of the CC.

Head of the OSCE Yerevan office, Ambassador Vladimir Pryakhin said,
"The question is a difficult one. I wouldn’t like to say that the
situation affected the reputation of the CC. But I can recall that
the decision of the Court referred to the course of the elections
in general. As for the Referendum of Confidence, it was the 16th
provision of the decision which was a piece of advice in itself. I
don’t think it was violated and I don’t think it has affected the
CC in any way. I think it was a sincere decision which displayed the
high competence of the CC".

Representatives of the opposition and parliamentary powers were
also invited to today’s discussion. Former Speaker of the NA Khosrov
Haroutyunyan said, "We must support the Constitutional Court and not be
angry with them. We can only criticize if needed. The Constitutional
Court and the constitutional justice are things which we need greatly
today".

ADDITIONAL AUTHORITIES IN ORDER TO COMBAT MONOPOLY

A1+
[04:59 pm] 06 October, 2006

In answer to the question of "A1+" about the raise of the costs of
imported goods in the context of fall of the US dollar in exchange,
RA Prime Minister Andranik Margaryan noted that they have turned to
the Committee Protecting Economic Competition and are waiting for their
decision after which the Government will take corresponding steps. We
turned to the Committee in order to get details about the case.

It turned out that at present the Committee is working on the
legislative amendments.

"Part of the pack of amendments refers to the necessity of giving
the Committee additional authorities in order to combat the raise of
costs. The pack of the legislative initiative will be represented
to the Government", said press secretary of the Committee Armineh
Udumyan. According to her, the present Law does not give the Committee
enough authorities in order to realize control.

Nevertheless, she noted that within the framework of its present
authorities the Committee is investigating the issue of those companies
which have monopoly in the field of the goods of mass consumption.

By the way, this year the monopolies have made reports for the
first time; according to the corresponding amendment of the law,
the monopolies are to made reports twice a year on the basis of which
the experts of the Committee assess the activity of the company and
the possible cases of abuse. The Committee made a promise to make
the results public.

ARTHUR BAGHDASARYAN DEPRIVED OF AIR

A1+
[12:53 pm] 06 October, 2006

TV Company "Mig" in Vanadzor has been ordered not to broadcast the
interview with Arthur Baghdasaryan, the press service of Orinats
Yerkir Party informed.

According to the statement made by the party, two days ago the TV
Company conducted an interview with Arthur Baghdasaryan informing that
it will be broadcast on Saturday. Nevertheless, yesterday the head
of the TV Company said that they have been prohibited to broadcast
the interview.

"Moreover, according to our information the interview has been watched
according to the rules of the 1937 censorship, and the TV Company has
factually been oppressed. Alongside with this, the governing parties
have flooded the television with political commercials. "Orinats
Yerkir" condemns the obstacles artificially created on their path
and the oppressions of freedom of speech", the statement says.

A1+

STRASBOURG DIARY
[12:47 pm] 06 October, 2006

REJECTED LAW WILL BE ADOPTED

NA Speaker Tigran Torosyan who is also the head of the Armenian
delegation to the PACE met Per Sogren, the head of the Ago group. The
representatives of the Venice Commission also participated in the
meeting. Mr. Torosyan represented the course of honoring commitments
since the last visit of the reporters. The members of the Ago group
were especially interested in the ten laws they had passed on to
the Parliament.

Mr. Torosyan mentioned that six of them have been adopted, and one of
them has been discussed and rejected due to its numerous shortcomings,
but the Parliament will adopt it till the end of the year.

The amendments to the Electoral Code were also
represented. Mr. Torosyan briefed the members of the Ago group on
the main approaches of the draft. The representatives of the Venice
Commission were content with several solutions in the draft Electoral
Code.

Head of the Ago group Per Sogren voiced hope that the developments
will contribute to the organization of 2007 Parliamentary elections
in compliance with the internationally accepted standards.

THE VISIT WILL PROBABLY BE POSTPONED

During the meeting of Tigran Torosyan, President of the ad-hoc
committee on Karabakh affairs adjunct to the CE Lord Russell Johnston
and head of the Azeri delegation to the PACE Samad Seidov, Mr. Johnston
mentioned that the period of time meant for the visit of the members
of the committee to the region is not very favorable. He said it
would be better to postpone the visit till the next year.

Before that, during the January sitting, discussions will be held in
Strasbourg in which the members of the Armenian and Azeri delegations
will participate.

Armenian Genocide Issue Disturbs Dutch MPs

PanARMENIAN.Net
06.10.2006 14:57 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Labour Party (PvdA) of the Netherlands is not yet
free of the Armenian Genocide question. Various media again cast
doubts on the position of prominent MP Nebahat Albayrak yesterday.
Meanwhile, PvdA Senator Erik Jurgens has proposed dropping the ban on
Holocaust denial. The PvdA broke with candidate MP Erdinc Sacan last
week. He is not running in the 22 November general elections because
he refuses to recognize the Genocide perpetrated by Turkey on the
Armenians. Albayrak, the highest-placed candidate on the PvdA list
after front-runner Wouter Bos, is however still refusing to provide
clarification of her position. According to Elsevier magazine, Albayrak
has been unavailable for comment since last week, when she "reduced
the debate" to a question of definition in an interview with Trouw
newspaper. Albayrak said it is not possible to take a clear position
because the historical sources are "polluted." According to Elsevier,
there are virtually no independent academics that doubt that the term
‘genocide’ is appropriate. "In the Netherlands, a report appeared as
early as 1918 by a committee of very eminent politicians which spoke
unequivocally of the ‘systematic slaughter’ of 800,000 Armenians
in Turkey."

Professor Ton Zwaan of the University of Amsterdam, specialist in
genocide studies, said yesterday in Trouw that "Albayrak, unhampered
by any knowledge, has made a series of dubious statements which are
closely related to negationism and denial politics. The question is
how she and her party think they will get away with this," Abovyan
Cultural Center reports from Brussels.

HUMAN-RIGHTS-96 CALLS ORINATS YERKIR’S INITIATIVE ON ELECTIONS "BALLOON"

Panorama.am

Human Rights 96 said in a statement that the imitative of Orinats
Yerkir (OY) which the party calls "For legal elections," is a
balloon. The statement says that a month ago OY held its first and
last (as becomes clear) discussion-event. "Next balloon exploded
in the Armenian political field," the statement says. Not only OY
did not initiate any other events, but also did not respond to any
suggestions or criticism, it continues. /Panorama.am/

SAHAKIAN SAYS HE OBLIGES HHK DECISION

Panorama.am
14:46 05/10/06

"I have always been disciplined in my actions and, naturally, because
of that discipline I oblige the decision of the Armenian Republican
Party (HHK)," Arman Sahakyan, HHK board member and former vice mayor,
explains his refusal to nominate himself for the community head
elections at Ajapniak.

In his words, he had taken a right decision. However, he said he would
propose his candidacy if the present community head Artsrun Khachatryan
also ran for election. "Running for community head has never been
an end in itself for me. I was trying to fight not against a person
but the situation created in Ajapniak community for years. He said
Ajapniak "is not a community of 21st century" whereas his dream is to
live in "a normal, civilized, clean, beautiful community." Sahakyan
expressed his readiness to render further support to the community
of Ajapniak. /Panorama.am/

DEPUTY CURSES CORRUPT AUTHORITIES

Panorama.am
15:20 05/10/06

Convention on Corruption raised a clamor in the parliament giving
chance to the opposition to criticize corrupt authorities. The
convention is signed in New York on October 31, 2003. Independent
deputy Tatul Manaseryan has been trying since yesterday to clarify
why Armenia does not call World Bank (WB) to responsibility for its
report which says that corruption is growing in Armenia especially
in customs. "We must be persistent and punish the corrupt officials
or else we must call for responsibility those institutes that make
discrediting statements," Manaseryan said. The deputy informed his
colleagues that WB has assigned its units to name officials who are
involved in bribery or give bribes. Manaseryan hoped that Armenian
officials will also be named.

The convention proposes publicity and transparency in the fight
against corruption. It also obliged those countries that ratify it
to set up expert groups that will fight against corruption.

United Working Party (UWP) will vote for the convention because the
party leaders say it is compatible with the party directives. UWP
leader, Gurgen Arsenyan, even cursed those officials who are engaged in
corruption wishing them not to enjoy the property they have collected
through bribery.

Justice block secretary, Grigor Harutunyan, believes that the
convention is under discussion at the parliament now only because of
elections. Vahan Hovhannisyan, vice speaker, tried to take the blame
from the executive saying it was the obligation of the parliament
to ratify it. "If we were not ready for that, let’s confess it,"
also saying many other countries have not ratified it yet. Justice
Minister David Harutunyan also said ratification is a long process.

If the parliament ratifies the convention and after 30 days it
comes into effect, several legislative amendments are expected. Time
will show how the government will launch the actual fight against
corruption. /Panorama.am/

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

MARXISTS SAY CANDIDATES SHOULD PASS AN EXAM

Panorama.am
17:36 05/10/06

Davit Hakobyan, chairman of Marxist Party, said "it is a national
tragedy" that we formulate our Election Code on the advice of Venice
Committee, quoting a national proverb which says that a person should
not be guided by what his neighbor says. The chairman suggested
to set the election deposit in the amount of 10% of income. The
Marxists also says that those who will not go to elections should
be called for responsibility. He believes that this step may
reduce election fraud. Hakobyan favors 40 majoritarian and 90
proportional rate. Moreover, he suggests that the candidates pass
special examination from world history, evolution of state and law,
world public science and rhetoric. He suggests to register only those
candidates who will get "pass." /Panorama.am/