Robert Kocharyan warns of ‘unpredictable consequences’ if Armenian authorities try to rig snap elections
Armenia’s second President Robert Kocharyan, the leader of the Armenia bloc, warned of “unpredictable consequences” if the current authorities attempt to rig the snap parliamentary elections slated for June 20.
“If the authorities try to use administrative resources and rig the elections in different ways, there will be post-election processes that could have unpredictable consequences,” he told a news conference on Tuesday.
According to him, the current authorities do not have sufficient resources to take such an “impudent act”.
At the same time, Kocharyan assured he will become one of the forces generating the post-election processes in such a scenario.
Referring to the polls, according to which caretaker Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan enjoys a high rating, there are people willing to vote for his Civil Contract party, and answering the question about what the Armenia alliance is counting on, Robert Kocharyan noted: "As far as I know, all these polls are conducted by telephone ... phone polls are common all over the world, but, as a rule, their results are reliable in countries where there is no such internal polarization.”
He stated a large number of people are reluctant to express their opinion, thinking they may come under pressure.
“We are not saying that the interim [prime minister] has no rating, but we are convinced that holding 25-30% of parliament seats, it is impossible to be re-elected to the post of prime minister and form a government if there are no other forces ready to cooperate with you. So far, there is not a single political force running in the elections that is ready to cooperate with traitors and has the potential to make it to parliament.
“The situation is quite clear. Even if this 30% cannot be reduced to 15-20%, this political force will not be able to form a government and establish control over the executive branch,” Kocharyan said.
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