‘Parliament is de facto dissolved’ – Pashinyan

The parliament is de facto dissolved, it remains to be dissolved de jure, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said today speaking to reporters.

“We don’t need a button-pressing parliament. By the way, we used to place the Electoral Code in the defendant seat for electoral problems, but the Yerevan City Council elections showed a different picture. You followed, you saw that the Electoral Code had no fault. In the past the electoral process resembled more of a chain of terrorism actions, than elections,” he said. The PM stressed that the “barricade” situation is impacting also the economy and that the task is to overcome this so the country enters normal development phase.

Reporters also inquired on the theoretic scenario of parliamentary forces quickly nominating a candidate for prime minister, which will result in Pashinyan losing control of law enforcement. But Pashinyan said this scenario is from the fantasy genre.

“The people and us won’t allow anyone something like that,” he said, adding that the people will liquidate anyone who has decided to cause trouble and disturb the people. “An MP must represent the people,” he said. “They claim they have supporters and are planning to rally. Go ahead, please, let them. The right to rally is guaranteed in Armenia. I say again, I will seriously discuss the possibility of having a speech in this rally,” he said.