ARMENIA ACCUSES AZERBAIJAN OF VOTING MANIPULATION
esctoday.com
May 19 2009
Armenian broadcaster APT accusses the broadcaster of the neighbouring
country Azerbaijan to have manipulated the voting during the final
of the 2009 Eurovision Song Contest by obscuring the screen when the
Armenian televoting number was shown. Political relations between
the two countries have been tense for more than 20 years.
APT launched an official complaint to the EBU claiming a severe
violation of the Eurovision Song Contest rules. Like in 2008,
Azerbaijan gave no points to Armenia. However, even if Azerbaijan
had given 12 points to Armenia, the country would have still finished
in tenth place behind Bosnia & Herzegovina. Armenia gave one single
point to the representatives from Azerbaijan, AySel & Arash, who
finished third.
The EBU has stated that they cannot comment on the story yet as
they have no proof of the accusations so far. However, they are
investigating and will report about the outcome in the next two days.
Armenia took part in the Eurovision Song Contest for the fourth time
in 2008 and achieved its fourth top ten placing in a row, although
the tenth place for Inga & Anush with Nor par is still the lowest
result to date.