A voter casting ballot in 9/11 polling station came back a few minutes after leaving the site demanding clarification on the stamp that vanished from his passport.
Chairperson of the local electoral committee Marianush Harutyunyan told journalists that they reported to Central Electoral Committee (CEC) on this and were allowed to stamp passports with regular ink.
Earlier, CEC chairman Tirgan Mukuchyan commented on this issue saying some polling stations did not follow the rules of using the stamp properly.
“The stamp should be shaken before putting the mark. The whole mechanism of using the stamp has been clarified now, and we have reports saying everything is ok now,” Mukuchyan said.
A few minutes after the voting started, voters and observers alarmed that the stamp put in a voter’s passport vanished in 17 minutes, leaving a thin line instead. Meanwhile, the stamp ink was supposed to disappear in 12 hours only.
Chairman of 4/07 polling station’s electoral committee Valery Kosyan said that also got similar reports and made a test to check whether this is true or not. They stamped a passport and waited for the ink to vanish; this did not happen, the ink held for at least one hour.
Parliamentary elections feature 8 political parties, Republican Party of Armenia (RPA), Prosperous Armenia, ARF Dashnaktsutyun (ARFD), Orinats Yerkir, Heritage, Democratic Party of Armenia (DPA), Communist Party of Armenia and United Armenians party, as well as one election bloc represented by opposition Armenian National Congress (ANC).
To enter the parliament, Armenian National Congress (ANC) must overcome 7% threshold as a bloc, unlike the parties, which need 5% threshold level.
647 international and over 31 thous. local observers will monitor the parliamentary elections in Armenia. OSCE/ODIHR (258 observers), OSCE Parliamentary Assembly (69), PACE (37), CIS Interparliamentary Assembly (22), as well as International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES) and SILBA international organization have deployed observer missions in Armenia.
The preliminary results will be published no later than 24 hours after the voting, with final results to be released on the seventh day starting the voting day.
