A LAW GENERATING MONOPOLY

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[07:33 pm] 08 June, 2006

On June 8 at the House of Journalist in Yerevan a press-conference
was held, where the representatives of journalistic associations spoke
about the draft amendments to the RA Laws “On Postal Communication”,
“On Licensing” and “On State Duty”, proposed by the RA National
Assembly deputies of the United Labor Party Gurgen Arsenian and
Grigor Ghonjeyan.

According to the draft amendments developed by them, the provisions
on licensing of organizations who implement subscription for print
periodicals and their delivery should be removed from the respective
laws.

In April this year similar amendments to the Law “On Postal
Communication” were proposed by Yerevan Press Club.

The drafts of the ULP faction meet the requirements of the journalistic
community and the press disseminating agencies. However, as it was
stated at the press-conference, the stance of the Government does cause
concern. The Government agrees that the subscription service does not
have to be licensed, yet maintains that the subscription delivery
is actually the same as the letter delivery, and its licensing is
necessary as conditioned by the interests of the consumers.

In the opinion of journalistic associations, the functioning of
the Law “On Postal Communication” as the Government sees it will
mean a shutdown for many private companies engaged in newspaper and
magazine delivery by subscription: their small profits will not afford
the payment of 5 million AMD for the license (over $ 11,500). The
monopolist position, with all the resulting negative consequences, will
be taken by the national communication operator “Haypost” (“Armpost”).

Putting an equality sign between the deliveries of open print
periodicals with letter delivery is completely illogical: the
letters contain confidential information and hence the activity of
the organizations that deliver them to the addressees must be under
certain control of the state.

Meanwhile, on June 7 the RA State Commission for the Protection of
Economic Competition admitted that “Armpost” has already taken a
dominating position on the market in several services, including
interstate post, telegraph and urgent messaging service.

On June 9 the proposed amendments to the RA Law “On Postal
Communication”, “On Licensing” and “On State Duty” will be considered
by the RA NA Standing Committee on the Issues of Finance, Loan,
Budget and Economy.

The material was provided by the YPC.