Putin confirms his inviting Sargsyan to Russia

YEREVAN, March 10. /ARKA/. Russian President Vladimir Putin confirmed Monday his invitation sent to Armenian president elect Serge Sargsyan. Kremlin press office reports.

RIA Novosti says referring to the press office report that Putin congratulated Sargsyan on his election again confirmed his invitation in Monday’s phone talk with the latter.

On Saturday, Armenian Constitutional Court declined presidential candidates Levon Ter-Petrosyan’s and Tigran Karapetyan’s suits against the central election commission.

The court left the commission’s recognition of Serge Sargsyan as president elect unchanged.

According to the commission-announced final results of the 2008 presidential election, Serge Sargsyan won presidency by scoring 52.82% of votes.

The commission says Ter-Petrosyan got 21.5% and Karapetyan 0.6%.
Both candidates insist that the election was rigged and demand the court to void the results.

On February 20, Armenian opposition headed by former president Levon Ter-Petrosyan launched protests in Yerevan’s Libery Square disputing the results of the recent presidential election and insisting that the election was fraudulent.

The police attacked protesters Saturday night. Protests continued in the square near France’s embassy and city hall.

The police department says that the crowd started destroying nearby shops and other buildings. According to the police’s report, eight people were killed and 131 injured in the clash and 36 cars burnt.
President Kocharyan imposed state of emergency on March 1. M.V.-0--