18:35,

YEREVAN, JUNE 22, ARMENPRESS. During the session of the Armenian parliamentary standing committee on State and Legal Affairs, the lawmakers made changes to the Constitutional amendments bill which proposes to replace the Constitutional Court President and CC judges who have served no less than 12 years in their position.

The bill has been drafted by the ruling My Step faction MPs.

My Step faction MP Suren Grigoryan presented the proposal for change. “I propose to make a change in the bill according to which the nominations for vacant positions of CC member will be made after the vacant position is available not within one month, but within a two-month term”, he said.

Some technical changes were also made by the lawmakers.

The committee approved the bill.

According to the bill, the powers of Constitutional Court members or judges will be suspended if they had been in office for not less than 12 years before the entering into force the 7th chapter of the Constitution. In case a Court member of judge has not been in office for 12 years before the entering into force of the 7th Chapter of the Constitution, he or she will remain in office until the 12 year-term is completed.

If the bill is approved, the tenures of Constitutional Court Judges Alvina Gyulumyan, Feliks Tokhyan and Hrant Nazaryan will be suspended, while the present President of the Court Hrayr Tovmasyan will become Constitutional Court member.

Earlier it had been planned to hold a Constitutional referendum scheduled on April 5, which suggested to suspend the tenure of Constitutional Court President Hrayr Tovmasyan and 6 members of the Court. The referendum did not take place due to the state of emergency declared as a result of the coronavirus.

Reporting by Norayr Shoghikyan; Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan