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The Standing Committee on Defense and Security of the Armenian parliament on Tuesday refused to appoint lawmaker Artur Ghazinyan from the opposition Armenia faction as its deputy chairman for the eighth time. The ruling Civil Contract faction MPs of the committee again voted against his candidacy.

Prior to the vote, Ghazinyan stated the authorities cannot force the opposition to field a new candidate for the post.

"To make my speech more substantial and to quickly get to the issues on the agenda, reiterating that I was asked more than 60 questions at previous meetings and there were over 30 speeches and remarks, I refuse to answer the questions and my final speech and propose to immediately start the voting," he said.

In his turn, Chairman Andranik Kocharyan insisted that the question and answer session and speeches continue according to the rules of procedure. After the discussion the Civil Contract MPs voted against Artur Ghazinyan.