THE COMMITTEE TO TAKE DECISIONS BY CONSENSUS
Gevorg Harutyunyan

Hayots Ashkhar Daily
Published on July 02, 2008
Armenia

NA temporary committee investigating March 1-2 developments and the
reasons convened its fifth session yesterday.

Yesterday’s session was special by the fact that for the first time
Leader of the United Labor Party Arsen Gurgenyan and Human Rights
Defender Armen Harutyunyan participated in it with the right to a
consultative vote.

The Head of the Committee Samvel Nikoyan said they have made a
new proposal to Levon Ter-Petrosyan to send his representative to
participate in the works of the committee, but there has been no
response.

Letters have been sent to Prosecutor General Aghvan Hovsepyan and
Chief of the police Alik Sargsyan to regularly send information to
the committee regarding March 1-2 developments. Human Rights Defender
Armen Harutyunyan considered it necessary to clarify the priorities
and the sequence of the committee’s activity. He said the decisions
in the committee should be taken by consensus. The participation
of the press in the works of the committee became a matter of
discussion. Leader of the "United Labor Party" Gurgen Arsenyan said
that he wouldn’t like to become a subject of speculations by means
of the press. "Isn’t it evident that there are certain interested
parties in this process. There are things that I would like to touch
upon, but not publicly. We are going to investigate the events due to
which 10 people died. We must be extremely attentive and responsible,
not to play with the reputation of the committee."

At the end of the session Samvel Nikoyan answered the questions of
the journalists.

"Mr. Nikoyan what did you manage to do during today’s session? Is
the activity of the committee efficient?"

"The most important thing is that we came to an agreement to take the
decisions by consensus. Every Friday each member of the committee
must represent the list of the high-ranking official or the state
body whom the committee must appeal. Thus we will come to a decision
regarding the agenda of the next session.

I attach great importance to the fact that the leader of the United
Labor Party and the Human Rights Defender expressed readiness to
participate in the works of the committee. We would be very glad if in
future the social and law organizations and why not extra-parliamentary
parties also join us.

We can’t wait for their expert support forever. Most probably very
soon we will invite experts."

"Is it acceptable that the leader of "Nor Jamanakner" party is planning
to participate in the works of the committee from September?"

"Aram Sargsyan attached great importance to the works of the committee
and wished success. It would be better if they also had their role
in that success. It would also be better if they participated in the
works of the committee from today and not from September, because we
need a complete and perfect activity."

"Can the committee discuss issues, which don’t need to be published?"

"By now we have invited all the representatives of press to be
present in our sessions, to estimate whether or not the party can
work efficiently and impartially.

But many members of the committee feel constrained from the presence
of the representatives of press. That is why many issues are not
discussed, because they don’t want to discuss them publicly. There
are issues that in case of publication can be falsified and commented
in quite a different way.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress