Erevan, 5th June 2009: On 31st May in Erevan, Armenia have been hold the elections of the Erevan City Council
and the next major of Erevan. The official vote results announced by the Central Election
Commission on Monday 1st June showed the ruling Republican Party with nearly 48 percent
of the vote as the winners. Another governing coalition member party, Prosperous Armenia,
finished with 22.7 percent. The Oppositional Armenian National Congress - a coalition of
different oppositional movements under the leadership of former president Levon Ter
Petrosjan - getting 17.4 percent of the votes.
Oppostition parties and independent observers from mass media and non governmental
movements widely criticised the elections as clearly falsificated. "Yesterday's poll was a
real shock for us. The whole process was accompanied by infringements of different scale;
there was great crowding and stuffing at polling stations." declared Amalia Kostanyan,
head of the Armenian Transparency International Organisation. Together with the Helsinki
Citizens Assembly of Vanadzor (HCAV), representatives of the Transparency International
witnesses ballot stuffing, bribery, violence against observers and journalist and numerous
infringements.
This assessment of Armenian civil society stands in clear contradiction of the findings of the
Council of Europe."Yerevan municipal elections were largely conducted in compliance with
European standards," says the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities of the Council
of Europe. The observation mission expressed its satisfaction with the electoral processes
on a press conference held in Erevan on June 1st but their words aroused doubt among
the reporters and contributed to deepen dissatisfaction with the findings of international
election observers in Armenian society.
The Armenian National Congres declared on monday evening not to pick up their mandates
as they would not accept the election results.

For more information please see:
http://www.a1plus.am/en
http://www.coe.int/t/congress/files/themes/observation/20090531-yerevan/default_en.asp
http://www.armenianow.com/?action=viewArticle&AID=3784&CID=3631&IID=1237&lng=eng
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FwrHkAfpL5U&feature=channel