HOVHANNES HOVHANNISYAN: PACE SHOULD HAVE APPLIED SANCTIONS
Lena Badeyan
"Radiolur"
29.01.2009 15:50
President of the Liberal Party of Armenia Hovhannes Hovhannisyan,
who has been head of the Armenian delegation to PACE before, told a
press conference today that the Parliamentary Assembly should have
suspended Armenia’s voting right. He backs this opinion with several
factors. Why no sanction was applied this time? Hovhannes Hovhannisyan
analyzed and came to the conclusion that the situation at PACE and
the Karabakh negotiations are closely linked.
Won’t any sanctions be applied even if nothing changes in Armenia by
April? Hovhannes Hovhannistyan said "no." "When the co-rapporteurs last
visited the region, it was very clear that Serzh Sargsyan would not
agree to meet Ilham Aliyev if Armenia were deprived of the right to
vote. Therefore, there is breach of parity here. When we were joining
the Council of Europe in 2001, the whole organization was insisting on
one thing: Armenia could not join the Council of Europe alone. Armenia
and Azerbaijan had to join simultaneously. They started maintaining
parity because the two countries had a conflict. Serzh Sargsyan
would not meet Ilham Aliyev in case the parity was breached. Thus,
it was neither the victory of democracy, nor reforms," leader of the
Liberal Party of Armenia said.