Voting on State of Emergency bill delayedMarch 20, 2012 - 14:29 AMT PanARMENIAN.Net - Speaker of the National Assembly of Armenia Samvel Nikoyan did not offer the bill on Legal Regime of the State of Emergency for voting on March 20. The voting was first postponed for 20 minutes upon request of the parliamentary group of the Republican Party of Armenia, then the ruling party doubted they can “pass” the bill, taking into account lack of the required number of MPs (74 MPs out of total 131 attended the session, with quorum making 66). The speaker told the parliament that the voting can be organized at a more “appropriate moment”. This statement caused indignation among the parliamentary opposition which demanded that the bill is called back. “The current situation demonstrates that RPA members understand this bill is unacceptable. If all of you know this, why do you want to have this bill passed by all means? The majority of the society disagrees with it, so just call it back,” Vahan Hovhannisyan, head of the parliamentary group of ARF Dashnaktsutyun said with regard to this. The National Assembly of Armenia passed on March 1 the bill “On legal regime of the state of emergency” with 67 votes for and 1 against; opposition MPs boycotted the bill and did not vote at all. The new draft law “On legal regime of the state of emergency” was adopted in the National Assembly of Armenia on February 9, 2012 in the first reading. Then Prime Minister of Armenia Tigran Sargsyan called the bill back for amendment. The revised bill was submitted to the parliament again. Opposition believes this bill is unconstitutional since it gives the President personal authorities to declare a state of emergency (the president consults the prime minister and the speaker of the parliament but takes the decision independently), as well as envisages involvement of army to eliminate the threat that resulted in a state of emergency. Top stories The Cabinet of Ministers decided on Thursday, November 9 to allocated AMD 120 million to arrange the gathering. Michael Roth believes sanctions must be put on the table after Baku‘s ethnic cleansing in Nagorno-Karabakh. The Yerevan City Council has elected Tigran Avniyan from the ruling Civil Contract as the mayor of the Armenian capital. The Armenian Parliament on Tuesday, October 3 voted to ratify the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. Partner news | The Power of One Dram to benefit Road of Life charity The companies inform that the May beneficiary of The Power of One Dram is the “Road of Life” charitable organization. Ucom General Director gives lecture at French University in Armenia The General Director of Ucom Ralph Yirikian delivered a lecture at the French University of Armenia. Kazakhstan welcomes Yerevan, Baku’s agreement to meet in Almaty Kassym-Jomart Tokayev has welcomed the agreement of Baku and Yerevan to hold negotiations in Almaty. Aliyev says no need for mediators in Armenia-Azerbaijan process Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev believes that Baku and Yerevan do not mediators in the process of normalizing relations. |