Your trusted source

“The 2 April parliamentary elections in Armenia were well administered,” Ignacio Sanchez Amor, Special Co-ordinator and leader of the short-term OSCE observer mission told reporters at a press conference on Monday.

“Fundamental freedoms were generally respected. Election day was generally calm and peaceful, but observers noted tension and the intimidation of voters in some polling stations visited. This was generally as a result of large numbers of party proxies present around polling stations throughout the day,” he said.

However, in the speaker’s words, there had been credible information of vote-buying, of pressure on public servants and representatives of the media that contributed to an overall lack of public confidence in the electoral process.

To remind, Parliamentary elections were held on April 2 in Armenia with 60,86% voter turnout, according to initial data, released by the Central Electoral Committee (CEC). Five political parties and four election blocs took part in the election to get seats in the country’s legislative body on proportional voting system.

According to the CEC-released preliminary results, four political forces enter the parliament with the ruling Republican party leading with 49.12% of the votes.
More than 28,000 representatives of 49 non-governmental organizations along with international observers from the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), the CIS Inter-Parliamentary Assembly, the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR), the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly and the European Parliament monitored the elections.