RIA Novosti, Russia
May 13 2007

Update: Five parties elected to Armenia parliament -election
commission
16:52 | 13/ 05/ 2007

YEREVAN, May 13 (RIA Novosti) – Five parties have been elected to
Armenia’s parliament, with the pro-presidential parties leading the
polls, the ex-Soviet nation’s election commission said Sunday.

The processing of 99.99% of ballot papers showed that the Republican
Party led by Prime Minister Serzh Sarkisyan received 457,032 votes
(33.8%), the pro-presidential Prosperous Armenia and Dashnatsutyun
gained 204,043 (15.1%) and 177,192 (13.1%) votes, respectively, while
the opposition parties Orinats Yerkir and Heritage won 95,256 (7%)
and 80,890 (6%) votes, accordingly, the election commission said.

More than 2 million Armenians voted May 12 in Armenia’s fourth
elections since the South Caucasus country gained independence in
1991, with twenty-two parties and one election bloc running for 131
seats in the parliament.

However, opposition parties said the vote was falsified and affected
the election results. Particularly, Orinats Yerkir said it intends to
challenge the vote results in a court of law.

"There were large-scale violations in the process of voting and
during the vote count. The intimidation of electors, the use of
bribes and non-existent ballot papers, numerous breaches in the vote
count and the distortion of real voting results give ground to
question the legitimacy of elections," the party said in a statement.

Observers earlier said they had not registered any serious violations
during the parliamentary elections.