June 25, 2003 - 20:16 AMT
SUGGESTION ON NON-RECOGNITION OF ARMENIAN DELEGATION AUTHORITIES IN PACE AROUSED EUROPEAN PARLIAMENTARIANS' SURPRISE
The members of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe expressed their disagreement with CE observing mission reporter Bernard Schreiner's suggestion on non-recognition of the Armenian delegation authorities in the PACE because of the violations taken place in the course of the parliamentary elections in Armenia. Reporter of the PACE monitoring group Irzhi Yaskernya and member of the mentioned-above group Jozef Yuvio emphasized in their yesterday's speeches that the present suggestion did not correspond to the logic of the observing mission activities. As head of the Armenian delegation in PACE Armen Rustamian told in his interview to the Armenian Public Television, the present suggestion even aroused confusion among some delegates of the session. Particularly, French deputy Roslan, who refused to participate in the discussion of this issue, did not hide his surprise. In connection with the insertion of such an item in the report a number of other European parliamentarians expressed their dissatisfaction in the course of conversations held with the Armenian delegation members. A. Rustamian emphasized that the above-mentioned 53-th item of the report not being the result of the inner-parliamentary discussions on Armenia cannot be considered as a suggestion on Armenia. According to the CE regulations, reports of such character are only taken into account but are not considered to be a resolution regarding this or that state, he added.