YEREVAN, November 28. /ARKA/. The election headquarters of the Republican Party of Armenia (HHK) lashed out at acting Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan on Tuesday describing in a statement a string of statements he made over the last two days as ‘the most vivid manifestation of hatred that crosses all permissible limits of political struggle, as well as violates a number of human and moral principles.’
"This sort of behavior is unprecedented in our political culture, especially coming from a high-ranking official – the prime minister, who is responsible for the security and prosperity of all of us," the statement said.
Recalling that HHK already had a reason to talk about the abuse of power and use of administrative resource by Pashinyan, the statement notes that another obvious example of that is that the head of the government, while officially on vacation, voiced threats against the elected officials, and in fact gave police orders mandatory for execution.
“We are drawing the attention of the Central Election Commission, the Ombudsman and international observation missions to the speeches, behavior and rhetoric of the acting Prime Minister,” the statement said.
Acting Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan resigned October 16 to clear way for the dissolution of the parliament and holding early parliamentary elections. Under the Armenian Constitution, early elections are held if lawmakers fail twice within 14 days to appoint a prime minister.
Pashinyan was elected as PM by the country's National Assembly after former president turned-prime minister Serzh Sargsyan resigned on April 23 under immense public pressure provided by weeks of nationwide protest against Sargsyan and his Republican Party.
Nine political parties and 2 blocs will be contesting the polls. They are My Step bloc, the Prosperous Armenia Party, the National Progress Party, the Christian-National Revival, the Sasna Tsrer All-Armenian Party, the Orinats Yerkir Party, the We bloc, the ARF Dashnaktsutyun Party, the Bright Armenia bloc, the Republican Party of Armenia, the Social Democratic Party and the Decision of Citizen party. -0-