Wednesday, February 03, 2021
Armenian Opposition Alliance To Resume Anti-Government Protests
February 03, 2021
• Gayane Saribekian
Armenia -- Opposition supporters demonstrate outside the main government
building in Yerevan to demand Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian's resignation,
December 12, 2020.
Leaders of a coalition of more than a dozen Armenian opposition parties said on
Wednesday that it will resume soon street protests aimed at forcing Prime
Minister Nikol Pashinian to resign.
“There will be civil disobedience actions -- marches, demonstrations, rallies --
so that we oust this government of evil under popular pressure,” said Ishkhan
Saghatelian, the coordinator of the Homeland Salvation Movement. He did not go
into details.
The alliance blames Pashinian for Armenia’s defeat in the recent war with
Azerbaijan and wants him to hand over power to an interim government headed by
one of its leaders, Vazgen Manukian. The prime minister has rejected the
opposition demands and has offered to hold fresh parliamentary elections instead.
The opposition forces failed to attract large crowds for their street protests
staged in Yerevan in November and December. Saghatelian said last week that they
are now discussing ways of reinvigorating their campaign.
The top leaders of the alliance met late on Tuesday as part of those
discussions. They included Saghatelian, Manukian, former Presidents Serzh
Sarkisian and Robert Kocharian, Prosperous Armenia Party (BHK) leader Gagik
Tsarukian and former National Security Service Director Artur Vanetsian.
“The movement will continue protest actions at top gear and use its entire
toolkit for fighting against the authorities,” Vanetsian told reporters. He said
that the anti-government protests were suspended because of a cold weather,
rather than differences among the alliance leaders.
Saghatelian acknowledged that they are divided over their participation in snap
elections that would be held by the current government. But he downplayed those
differences, saying that the opposition forces remain united in their attitude
towards Pashinian’s administration.
Kocharian said last week that he and his political allies will participate in
the elections if they are organized by the current government. The BHK and
Vanetsian’s Fatherland are also against boycotting such polls. The boycott is
favored by Sarkisian’s Republican Party.
Armenia ‘Ready’ To Buy Russia’s COVID-19 Vaccine
February 03, 2021
RUSSIA -- A woman receives an injection with Sputnik V vaccine against the
coronavirus disease (COVID-19) at a hospital in the village of Donskoye in
Stavropol Region, January 27, 2021
The Armenian government would like to buy Russia’s Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine
and is negotiating with Moscow for that purpose, Health Minister Anahit
Avanesian said on Wednesday.
“Close cooperation and periodical exchange of experience with the Russian side
is very important for us, and our specialists are now holding active
negotiations over the acquisition of the Sputnik V vaccine,” she told Sergei
Kopyrkin, the Russian ambassador to Armenia, at a meeting in Yerevan.
A statement by the Armenian Ministry of Health quoted Avanesian as saying that
her government is ready to buy Sputnik V in addition to another vaccine which is
due to be supplied to Armenia by the COVAX Facility global partnership supported
by the World Health Organization. No other details were reported.
The Russian Ministry of Health donated more a dozen doses of Sputnik V to
Armenia in November. Then Health Minister Arsen Torosian and other senior
officials were among Armenian volunteers who received the vaccine shots at the
time.
The deputy director of the Armenian National Center for Disease Control and
Prevention, Gayane Sahakian, said late last month that COVAX will soon deliver
the first batch of the relatively cheap vaccine developed by the British company
AstraZeneca and Oxford University
Sahakian said the Armenian health authorities plan to start vaccinating an
estimated 3 percent of the country’s population against COVID-19 by the
beginning of March. The “first phase” of the vaccination will cover medical
workers, care home personnel, people aged 65 and older as well as younger people
suffering from chronic diseases, added the official.
The authorities have so far announced no plans to vaccinate the majority of
Armenians.
Armenia has been hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic, with more than 167,000
cases and at least 3,096 fatalities officially confirmed in the country of about
3 million to date. The real number of cases is believed to be much higher.
Ministry of Health data shows that COVID-19 infections have fallen significantly
in the last three months even though the authorities have largely stopped
enforcing their safety and hygiene rules. The ministry reported on Wednesday
that 190 people tested positive for the disease in the past 24 hours, down from
more than 2,000 cases a day routinely registered in late October and early
November.
Armenian Parliament Approves Government Plans For New Judges
February 03, 2021
• Artak Khulian
• Gayane Saribekian
Armenia -- A session of the National Assembly, February 3, 2021
Opposition leaders accused the Armenian parliament of undermining judicial
independence on Wednesday as it approved a government proposal to hire new
judges who will deal only with corruption cases or pre-trial arrests of criminal
suspects.
A relevant bill drafted by the Ministry of Justice calls for the selection of up
to 21 such judges for Armenian courts of first instance. Three other new judges
specializing in arrests or corruption-related offenses would be appointed to the
Court of Appeals.
Government officials have said that the new judges would reduce the workload of
courts increasingly overwhelmed by pending criminal and civil cases. According
to Justice Minister Rustam Badasian, they should also hand down “more objective”
rulings on arrest warrants demanded by investigators.
In recent months Armenian judges have refused to allow law-enforcement bodies to
arrest dozens of opposition leaders and members as well as other anti-government
activists. Virtually all of those individuals are prosecuted in connection with
angry protests sparked by the Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian’s handling of the
autumn war in Nagorno-Karabakh.
Pashinian charged in December that Armenia’s judicial system has become part of
a “pseudo-elite” which is trying to topple him after the disastrous war.
Armenia -- A courtroom in Yerevan.
The National Assembly passed the government bill in the first reading by 83
votes to 17 with one abstention. Both opposition parties represented in the
parliament rejected the bill, saying that the authorities should address instead
the far more pressing security challenges facing Armenia and Karabakh.
“These issues are not addressed because the authorities have what they see as a
much more important agenda: how to increase the number of judges approving
arrest warrants,” said Naira Zohrabian of the opposition Prosperous Armenia
Party (BHK).
Lilit Makunts, the parliamentary leader of Pashinian’s My Step bloc, rejected
the criticism. “I want to remind that the government takes on a weekly basis new
measures to overcome consequences of the war,” she said. “We do not contribute
to a better [security] environment by delivering fiery speeches here and trying
to spread alarm among our citizens.”
Armenia - Riot police detain opposition activists outside the parliament
building in Yerevan, February 3, 2021.
Several other opposition groups denounced the government bill in stronger terms
and rallied hundreds of supporters outside the parliament compound in Yerevan in
a bid to scuttle its passage. Their senior members claimed that Pashinian’s
administration wants to install loyal judges who would duly allow the pre-trial
arrests of their political opponents.
The protesters scuffled with riot police after blocking a major street adjacent
to the compound. Several opposition activists were detained on the spot.
The crowd then marched to the main government building surrounded by several
rows of riot police.
Food Prices Soar In Armenia
February 03, 2021
• Sargis Harutyunyan
Armenia -- A man looks at meat products at a food store in Yerevan.
Food prices in Armenia rose by an average of 6.4 percent year on year in
January, according to government data.
A monthly report released by the Armenian government’s Statistical Committee
shows particularly drastic increases in the prices of imported key foodstuffs
such as cooking oil and sugar. They were up by more than 40 percent from January
2020.
The prices of bread, dairy products and eggs rose by about 8 percent, said the
Statistical Committee. It also reported a roughly 10 percent surge in the cost
of fruits and vegetables mostly grown in Armenia.
Meat and products made from it were the only foodstuffs that have essentially
not become more expensive since January 2020, the official statistics show.
Consequently, consumer price inflation in the country reached 4.5 percent last
month, according to the committee report, surpassing a full-year target of 4
percent set by the government for 2021. It already rose significantly in
December.
In a bid to curb the higher-than-projected inflation, the Central Bank of
Armenia has twice raised its key interest rate since December 15.
The surge in food prices was caused in part by a major depreciation of the
Armenian dram. The national currency has lost more than 7 percent of its nominal
value against the U.S. dollar in the past year.
The surge also appears to reflect a global trend. In a recent report, the UN’s
Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) said that world food prices rose in
November to the highest level in six years. It described the coronavirus
pandemic as “an important driver of the levels of global food insecurity.”
The pandemic was the main factor behind an estimated 8 percent contraction of
Armenia’s GDP in 2020.
Reprinted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL
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