Armenian opposition to give up all posts in parliament

The Armenian opposition will give up all administrative positions it holds in the National Assembly, Ishkhan Saghatelyan, a member of the Hayastan alliance, said in an interview with Radio Azatutyun.

YEREVAN, July 1. /ARKA/. The Armenian opposition will give up all administrative positions it holds in the National Assembly, Ishkhan Saghatelyan, a member of the Hayastan alliance, said in an interview with Radio Azatutyun.

Earlier on Friday, Saghatelyan was dismissed as vice speaker of the National Assembly, while Vahe Hakobyan from the same alliance was dismissed as chairman of the National Assembly's standing committee on economic issues.

The formal reason behind their dismissal is the absence from more than half of the sittings of the National Assembly.

"We, naturally, will not nominate new candidates, moreover, we will give up other administrative positions held by the parliamentary opposition - the posts of chairpersons and deputy chairpersons of committees, which are assigned to the opposition by law," Saghatelyan said.

Armen Gevorgyan, another MP from the Hayastan has resigned earlier today as chairman of the National Assembly's standing committee on regional and Eurasian integration.

Parliament speaker Alain Simonyan said the previous day that if the opposition put forward new candidates for the vacant seats, they could be elected.

Ishkhan Saghatelyan told Radio Azatutyun: "We considered this (holding positions in parliament) to be such a secondary issue that we have not had it discussed until now. But naturally, we will not nominate candidates, especially that our colleagues will probably give up other administrative positions held by the opposition."

Hayastan and the other opposition alliance Pativ Unem have been boycotting parliament sessions since May 3 when they started a campaign of disobedience in a bid to make Pashinyan resign, whom they accuse of preparing to place Nagorno-Karabakh under the control of Azerbaijan.-0-