Armenian parliament endorses constitution amendments to fit EU
By Tigran Liloyan
ITAR-TASS News Agency
September 1, 2005 Thursday
YEREVAN, September 1 — Armenian parliament has endorsed a bill on
a range of changes in the national Constitution that will be put up
for final endorsement at a national referendum.
As many as 98 MPs out of the total 131 voted in favor of the document
Thursday.
Senior MPs say the new amendments fit the requirements Armenia
undersigned while joining the Council of Europe.
One of the changes long awaited by numerous communities of Armenians
living abroad is a provision on dual citizenship, which the effective
Constitution, adopted in 1995 ruled out so far.
The number of Armenians living outside their historic homeland exceeds
five million people. It is roughly a million and a half bigger than
the population of this country proper.
Rough a half of the worldwide Armenian community – about 2.5 million
people – live in Russia.
In the meantime, the proposals to introduce dual citizenship have had
quite a number of opponents here. People in Armenia are apprehensive
of how the worldwide community members will use the right to vote,
which they get automatically along with citizenship.
The opponents believe their impact on election results may be overly
powerful.