20-minute break demanded at special session of parliament

The Armenian parliament is holding a special session today to discuss legislative initiatives submitted by the government.

The parliamentary speaker Galust Sahakyan said that the legislative activities of the National Assembly receded into the background as the NA sittings were extremely politicized so deputies should discuss the legislative issues requiring immediate solution.

The secretary of the ARFD faction Aghvan Vardanyan said, when speaking about the order of discussing the draft decisions submitted by the government, that there are laws to be discussed within 15 days, regardless of whether the session is regular or special.

“If the law shall be debated within 15 days, this requirement should be fulfilled. You submitted a draft that drew a wide public response, but these drafts were not even presented to 131 deputies,” Vardanyan noted.

Deputy of Armenian National Congress (HAK) faction Gagik Jangiryan said for his part that the faction does not object to the special session of the parliament, but “the issues included in the agenda were not discussed by the standing committees” and deputies are not familiar with the legislative acts.

“The drafts come to the plenary session of the NA without being discussed by experts. So it turns out that for the government, the parliament has become a place where laws are blindly punched,” Jangiryan said.

According to HAK deputy Aram Manukyan, a law should be read before its adoption, while the parliamentary majority did not familiarize themselves with the submitted draft.

“We speak about efficiency of laws, but none of the deputies read that draft. You could have sent it to us beforehand. Now we cannot say anything, and an inefficient law may be passed,” Manukyan said.

“I respect your proposals, but we do not propose that you should not read the law,” NA speaker Galust Sahakyan said.

HAK faction head Levon Zurabyan proposed announcing a 20-minute break so that the parliamentary factions could discuss this issue with the speaker of the NA.