`We have sufficient political will to hold free elections, and we have
very serious intention to do that’, Armenian President stated
January 18, 2008
Yerevan /Mediamax/. Armenian President Robert Kocharian stated in
Yerevan today that the state bodies do everything possible to hold free
and fair elections.
Mediamax reports that, talking to the journalists today after the
meeting in Yerevan City Administration, the President stated that all
the structures work according to the schedule, established in
accordance with the electoral legislation.
`We have sufficient political will to hold free and fair elections. We
have already demonstrated that will during the parliamentary elections
of May 12 of 2007 and we have very serious intention to do that’, the
Armenian President stated.
Robert Kocharian expects that `the members of electoral commission will
stand above their party interests that will perceive themselves as
members of a state structure and work in the corresponding manner’.
The President refuted the accusations of certain oppositional forces
concerning planned large-scale falsifications, in particular,
concerning the intention of the authorities to organize a printing of
false passports. According to him, `these people show themselves
astonishingly uninformed, and I see here the problem of absence or a
deficit of shame’.
Commenting on the statements of the opposition, concerning the fact
that this year the Armenian government should allocate 178mln drams for
printing passports, Robert Kocharian stated that `not a single dram’
will be spent from the given sum in the course of the nearest few
months.
The President specified that the given sum is provided for the
implementation of a new passport system in Armenia with bio-chips in
the passports ` for the simplification of visa relations with the
European countries.