CEC REPORTS 52.85% OF VOTERS CAST THEIR BALLOTS
Panorama.am
12:00 01/06/2009
The President of the Central Electoral Committee Garegin Azaryan
published details over the number of votes cast at Yerevan City
Council Elections.
According to him 52.85% of voters cast their ballots in Yerevan 439
polling stations. 407 745 people participated in the elections. 12
voters recovered their voting right not finding their names in the
electoral lists.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
GAGIK BEGLARYAN – YEREVAN’S NEXT MAYOR
200 9/06/01 | 09:31
Important Society
According to preliminary results issued by the Central Electoral
Committee this morning the vote in yesterday’s municipal elections
breaks down as follows:
Republican Party of Armenia – 47.39%
Prosperous Party of Armenia – 22.71%
HAK (Armenian National Congress) – 17.41
This signifies that Gagik Beglaryan will become the uncontested new
mayor of Yerevan.
The other parties in the race failed to meet the minimum vote count
of 7%.
Orinats Party (Rule of Law) – 5.22% ARF – 4.65% People’s Party –
2.14% Socialist-Workers Party – .49%
NO RESULT IN CHAKHALYAN’S SECOND APPEALS HEARING
-3/
2009/06/01 | 13:41
Diaspora Politics
On May 29, the second appeals hearing took place in the Tbilisi Civil
Court to overturn the decision of the Georgian Ministry of Justice
and to allow the registration of Patrick Arabyan, a member of the
Paris Advocates Collective, to represent Javakhk-Armenian activist
Vahagn Chakhalyan.
The second hearing also resulted in no decision. The justice ministry
presented its documentation regarding the case and the court then
issued a recess until June 15 to study the material.
Mr. Chakhalyan is presently be represented by Nino Andriashvili,
head of the Georgian Human Rights Center, NGO.
ARF CANDIDATE CLAIMS "NO COMMENT"
Astghik Khachatryan
yun-4/
2009/06/01 | 15:13
Important Society
With a mere 4.65% share of yesterday’s election vote, the ARF failed
to hit the 7% threshold for city council representation.
When we tried to get ARF candidate Artzvik Minasyan to comment
on yesterday’s vote results he responded with "no comment". He
said that the ARF’s Supreme Council would issue a statement today
TIGRAN KARAPETYAN – HAK SHOULDN’T TAKE SEATS IN CITY COUNCIL
Astghik Khachatryan
-7/
2009/06/01 | 15:31
Important Society
Tigran Karapetyan, leader of the People’s Party, stated to "Hetq"
that the results of yesterday’s municipal elections do not reflect
reality. His party only received 2.14% of the vote according to
official results.
"I’m not talking about my party’s votes. I’m referring to the elections
process. The voting must be voluntary but they are directed with
bribes and fraud," he stated.
He claimed that all were responsible for the situation, but most
especially the regime. "They literally brought the votes to the
polling stations. The regime isn’t worthy of those votes."
Mr. Karapetyan also criticized the statement of the head of the
Council of Europe’s Congress of Local and Regional Authorities that
declared the vote to be in line with European standards. He said
that the international monitors probably visited only a few polling
stations were the vote proceeded normally. "They should have gone to
the Zatikyan School, to P.S. #39, to see what was going on."
Mr. Karapetyan said that he would call a press conference tomorrow
to protest the election and that the People’s Party would chart its
future course of action in an upcoming congress. He said that the
party did not intend to contest the election results in court since
it would be a waste of time.
He added that if he represented the HAK (Armenian National Congress)
he would not take seats won in the Yerevan City Council and that he
expected HAK to so the same.
AUCTIONS GONE AWRY: PUBLIC DISCLOSURE IS SADLY LACKING AND NO ONE IS HELD ACCOUNTABLE
Lousine Toplaghaltsyan
2 009/06/01 | 19:12
Feature Stories Marzes
One month ago, in the pages of the newspaper "Hayastani Hanrapetutyun",
we came across an advert announcing that an auction of farm equipment,
tools, and cars belonging to the community of Tretuk, Gegharkunik Marz,
was to take place on May 19. The announcement included the deadline
for applications and details regarding contacting the community
municipality and a cell phone number. The announcement was signed by
the community mayor.
Even thought the time of the auction wasn’t specified in the
announcement we arrived in Tretuk at 11:00 am on May 19. There were no
notices about the auction at the municipal office. The law stipulates,
however, that the auction organizers must post public information
about the event at least one day before at the site where it is to
take place.
When we asked when the auction was to start Silva Abrahamyan, the
deputy community leader of Tretuk, told us the sale would start at
noon. She said that they had received two bid applications from local
residents. One was from her son, Mikhayil Abrahamyan and the other from
Karo Asatryan. She said that the farm equipment to be auctioned off was
quite old. In the case of one of the tractors, she said that they had
been using it for the past twenty years and had repeatedly petitioned
the community leader to hand over the property rights to them.
She phoned the community head to get more specific information and
to also ask if he was to show up at work or not. Fifteen minutes
later, however, she told us not to wait for the village mayor. He
had supposedly phoned and said that the auction would be postponed
till May 21 since there were no registered bidders.
The mayor describes his deputy’s statements as "gossip"
We decided to wait and get an explanation directly from him. One
hour later, Suren Yeghiazaryan, the community mayor arrived and
told us that today’s auction was being cancelled since there were no
registered bidders.
When we told him that his deputy had given us different information
Mr. Yeghiazaryan shrugged it off as mere village gossip. He said
that Silva Abrahamyan’s son was in Russia and couldn’t possibly
participate in the auction. We asked if it was fair and proper of
him to label his deputy’s information as mere "gossip" and proposed
that Mrs. Abrahamyan be present at our conversation. Mr. Yeghiazaryan
declined, saying that he saw no need for such a meeting.
It is stipulated in the RoA "Bargains Law" that a public notice must
be posted regarding all auctions. The law specifies that eleven pieces
of information must be included in said notice. Most, if not all,
were absent in the notice compiled by the Tretuk municipality. The
following points were missing in the Tretuk notice
1) Time of the auction 2) Title of the auction organizer 3) Address
of the auction organizer 4) Auction rules and procedure 5) Auction
conditions; including lot titles and descriptions. If the lot to be
bided on is an object, its physical condition (wear and tear) and
manufacture date. The starting bid price and other essential details.
Mr. Yeghiazaryan agreed that the auction notice was flawed. He told us
that there were four lots up for auction – two tractors with a start
bid of 419,000 and 312,000 drams, a 219,000 dram dump-truck, and a
22,000 dram trailer. All weren’t included in the notice since they
were quite old, remnants of the collective farm era. Mr. Yeghiazaryan
described them as nothing more than junk metal.
The issue of auctioning off the community’s remaining farm equipment
was taken up at the March 26 session of the community council. The
session is duly registered in the council logs. Mr. Yeghiazaryan told
us that a public advisory meeting was held on May 5 and that local
residents were informed about the upcoming auction. A five-member
auction committee was set up as well. To bolster his argument
that the auction was well advertised, Mr. Yeghiazaryan said the
community receives eleven copies of the "Hayastani Hanrapetutyun"
newspaper. The municipality has a subscription to three copies and the
mayor personally gets one of them. As to where potential bidders must
get information about the lots for sale and auction fees, the answer
is the same; from the community mayor. Potential bidders were forced
to either make their way to the village of Tretuk or Metz Masrik,
where Mayor Suren Yeghiazaryan resides, or to call him at the cell
phone number provided in the notice.
When a public notice offers little or no information
It is no wonder then that all roads leading to auction information
starts and ends with Mayor Yeghiazarayan, who, by the way, is also the
president of the auction committee. However, the committee president
wasn’t able to provide potential bidders with a specific entrance fee,
since he thought that the fee should be 10% of the valuation of each
lot up for bid. The RoA "Bargains Law" states that the entrance fee
must not exceed the starting bid on the most expensive lot up for
bid by 5%. The mayor couldn’t even say what the minimum incremental
bids were to be, arguing that this detail would be decided during
the auction.
We requested to see a copy of the auction regulations but the mayor
said it was locked away in somebody’s fire-proof safe and that
the owner was away on business. When we asked if we could see the
community’s budget, the mayor claimed that it too was locked away in
the same safe.
Mr. Yeghiazaryan told us that the auction committee was to meet
at 3:00 pm that same day to officially register the fact that the
auction had been called off. However, according to Article 15 of the
RoA "Bargains Law", this procedure should take place the following day.
Most probably, this isn’t the first or last auction to be
cancelled. The question remains, what good is publicizing an auction
if it offers little or no information to prospective bidders? Then
too, who is to be held accountable for the fact that the public
notice posted by the Tretuk municipality regarding the auction was
so flawed? Whose duty is it to see that the auction laws are observed
if there aren’t citizens who come forward as prospective bidders and
demand a full accounting as prescribed by the law?
If there are bidders then, by extension, there is no one to complain
about the auction process. In the end, things will remain as they
are. The mayor will reprimand his deputy for carelessly divulging
"internal information" and come the next auction that same deputy
will be less than forthcoming with the facts.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
115 PEOPLE INFECTED SWINE FLU IN ARGENTINA
Panorama.am
13:47 01/06/2009
More 15 cases of H1N1 virus recorded in Argentina making the total
number of infection in the country 115.
According to Russian media a young man died in one of the regions in
Argentina and currently the Health Ministry tries to find out whether
the patient died because of the infection.
Argentinean official source says that the majority of people infected
in the country are children; hence some schools currently are closed
down to overcome tragic cases.
FRANCE, UAE LAUNCHED DESERT LOUVRE PROJECT
/PanARMENIAN.Net/
01.06.2009 21:07 GMT+04:00
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ France and the United Arab Emirates formally launched
the Desert Louvre project yesterday, bringing the iconic cultural name
and its tourist pulling power one step closer to the oil-rich Gulf.
Visiting French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Abu Dhabi Crown Prince
Sheikh Mohammad bin Zayed al-Nahayan attended a ceremony in a luxury
UAE hotel to mark the start of construction of the museum, expected
to be completed by 2013.
They also inaugurated an exhibition on Talking Art: Louvre Abu Dhabi,
at which works of art from the Louvre and other French museums will
be on display until July 2. Also on show are some of the new museum’s
first acquisitions.
Under a 30-year agreement, Abu Dhabi will pay 400 million euros
(A$711 million dollars) for the Louvre brand name and for hundreds
of artworks loaned from the Paris museum for periods of between six
months and two years.
The new museum on Saadiyat (Happiness) island off Abu Dhabi, the UAE
capital, has been designed by French architect Jean Nouvel.
It will be housed in a 24,000-square-metre building topped by a dome
inspired by traditional Arab architecture.
"The Abu Dhabi Louvre project is unique and will remain so. It is
not an attempt to duplicate the Louvre," Henri Loyrette, president
of the Paris Louvre, said at Tuesday’s ceremony.
Abu Dhabi’s will be "a new museum, the bearer of two cultures and
two traditions," he added.
The Louvre Abu Dhabi is one of five museums to be built on Saadiyat
island, a vast complex of luxury hotels, golf courses, marinas and
private villas set for completion in 2018.
The complex is part of Abu Dhabi’s plans to secure a larger slice of
the Gulf’s booming tourist industry.
However the development has come under fire from Human Rights Watch,
which in a report focused on Saadiyat this month accused the Abu
Dhabi authorities and global institutions of failing to tackle abuse
of foreign laborers.
"It’s very important to be vigilant about security conditions, comfort
and respect for the workforce," Nouvel told reporters on Tuesday.
"The problem today is that architects are no longer the complete
masters of a project the way they were 50 years ago … but we
are still very vigilant. On each site we ask to see workers’
accommodation."
Abu Dhabi’s Tourism Development and Investment Company, the government
arm charged with developing Saadiyat, rejected claims of abuse on
the island, AFP reported.
ARMENIAN CHESS PLAYERS WIN LEBANON JUNIOR CHAMPIONSHIP
/PanARMENIAN.Net/
01.06.2009 21:08 GMT+04:00
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Armenian chess players Razmik Hognanyan, Zhirayr
Hognanyan, Kristel Hovsepyan and Meghri Kirakosyan won Lebanon 2009
junior championship.
Grak Glpozyan and Narek Najaryan came second; Karen Khaloyan and Karo
Havludjyan came third.
ANC DOES NOT INTEND PLUNGE INTO ADVENTURE
/PanARMENIAN.Net/
01.06.2009 22:27 GMT+04:00
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ "If international observers and European
organizations give true estimation of presidential elections of
2008, then today we would not have such a "decayed" elections,"
Levon Ter-Petrosyan, leader of the Armenian National Congress, said
at today’s meeting near Matenadaran.
He also stressed, that such a small amount of representatives from
European organizations to observe elections held in Yerevan rather
seems to be a mockery, since even 100 observers would not be enough
to prevent falsifications.
According to Levon Ter-Petrosyan, ANC will not plunge the people
into adventure, and first of all ANC will bring into play all
formal mechanisms for admission of the Yerevan Council elections
illegitimate. For this purpose ANC will appeal against the outcomes
of the elections at all degrees of jurisdiction and to European bodies.