DAVID HARUTYUNYAN: PACE REPORT WAS

armradio.am
17.04.2008 18:07

During its plenary session the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of
Europe (PACE) adopted a report on "The state of democratic institutions
in Armenia" with 93 pro, 8 con votes and 8 abstentions.

The report co-authored by members of the PACE Monitoring Committee John
Prescott and Georges Colombier, urges Armenia to undertake reforms of
the political system and of the electoral process, hold an independent,
transparent and trustworthy investigation into cases of the events of
March 1, urgently change the recent amendments to the Law Conducting
Meetings, Rallies, Marches and Demonstrations.

Head of the Armenian delegation to PACE David Harutyunyan characterized
the report as "harsh but balanced." "It was balanced in the regard that
it reflects the views of our partners, the honest opinion about the
events in Armenia, as will as their views on the state of democratic
institutions. The document should become a serious practical program
for Armenia, and if we compare it with the memorandum of the political
coalition, we shall see that there are many similarities. Many issues
prioritized by the document are included in the memorandum of the
political coalition," David Harutyunyan noted.

However, according to the Head of the Armenian delegation, the problem
is that all this should not remain on paper only, but become a serious
program of actions. Armenia should make serious steps, since during
its session in June PACE will give an assessment to the process of
implementation of these steps.

David Harutyunyan informed that the Armenian delegation has submitted
36 proposals. In his words, these did not pursue the aim to soften or
conceal the realities or evaluations, "We proposed to eliminate the
provisions which are disputable or do not correspond to reality. Most
of the suggestions were accepted," he noted.

As for the active participation of the Azerbaijani delegation in
the discussions, David Harutyunyan noted that the Azeri side uses
every opportunity, trying to strike a blow to Armenia. "It means that
Armenia should not create such opportunities, and second, we must not
be afraid of those attacks: we are discussing an issue, which is fist
of all necessary to us, and not the Council of Europe. Therefore, not
concerned about possible attacks, we did not even make a step to soften
the objective assessments," the Head of the Armenian delegation said.