US HELSINKI COMMISSION CO-CHAIR CONCERNED OVER ANTI-SEMITISM IN ARMENIA
Azeri Press Agency
April 21 2008
Azerbaijan
Washington. Husniyya Hasanova-APA. At the hearings on the post-election
situation in Armenia co-chair of the US Helsinki Commission Benjamin
Cardin said he was astonished by the post-election blackmail campaign
in Armenia, APA’s US bureau reports.
Making a speech on the theme "Armenia after the election" Benjamin
Cardin noted that in the "documentary film" demonstrated on
pro-government H2 TV channel on February 14 former president Levon
Ter-Petrosyan, whose wife was Jew, was accused of being Zionist spy,
the protesters were discredited in participating in Jew-Israel coup
d’eta against Armenia.
"I would have never thought about the existence of this kind of
anti-Semitism in Armenia," he said.
Arman Grigorian, spokesman for Armenian presidential candidate
and leader of the opposition movement Levon Ter-Petrosyan noted
large-scale intimidation of voters and opposition’s representatives,
violations of vote counting procedures and ballot stuffing had been
recorded. According to him, in seventeen constituencies, which is
more than 15 percent, counting was assessed to be bad or very bad.
"Even if this number has a 5 percent sampling error, and only 10
percent of the precincts in the country as a whole have had a similar
quality of vote counting, it is hard to be confident in the central
electoral commission’s announcement of a first-round victory for
Serzh Sargsyan. The numbers actually become more suspect, the more of
that report we read. We learn that 95 precincts had a voter turnout
exceeding 90 percent. But 44 out of these 95 had a voter turnout
exceeding 95 percent, and higher turnouts were perfectly correlated
with higher numbers for Serzh Sargsyan. In one precinct 100.36 percent
of the eligible voters turned out to vote." he said.
According to the official data of the government, 3,228,300 people have
Armenian citizenship, while the World Factbook prepared by the Central
Intelligence Agency for 2006 shows that the 2,976,372 people have
Armenian citizenship. 750,000 of them live in Russia and Europe. It
means that as at February 19, 2008 2,226,372-2,478,300citizens lived in
Armenia. According to the official figures, by February 19, 2008 there
were 600,300 citizens under 15 in Armenia. There are approximately
745,300 citizens under 18 in the republic at present.
These facts show that as at February 19, 2008 1,481,072-1,733,000
people had the right to vote. According to the Armenian Central
Election Commission, 1,671,027 citizens voted. Basing on the figures
in the World Factbook prepared by the Central Intelligence Agency
1,89,955 electorate voted in the republic. Basing on the statistics
of the Armenian government, it turns out that 96.4% of the electorate
participated in the elections."
Grigorian said 44 families controlled 55% of the GDP.
The spokesman says that the regime declared the end of the state of
emergency on March 20th, but the streets are still full of riot police,
and people are being arrested for not more than taking a stroll down
Northern Avenue.
"The regime claims to seek dialogue, but it has arrested over 145
people, most of them on trumped-up charges. It claims to have lifted
the restrictions on free speech, but it orders the tax police to check
the books of oppositional newspapers. any further dialogue will be
doomed, if the regime refuses to allow an international investigation
into the events of March 1st and if it refuses to repeal the newly
adopted constitutional amendment to the law on conducting meetings,
assembles, rallies and demonstrations". The regime will have to grant
a broadcasting license to the independent A1+ channel. A. Grigorian
called the United States and West to unequivocally side with freedom
against tyranny. "Freedom and Tyranny are precisely the two sides in
Armenia’s struggle".
The U.S. Helsinki Commission held hearings on post-election situation
in Armenia on April 17.