Tovmasyan: Kocharyan's case occasion for making constitutional court predictable
03.10.2019,
11:40
Hrayr Tovmasyan, head of the Constitutional Court of Armenia, thinks that the Kocharyan case is just an occasion for making the Constitutional Court predictable. He said Wednesday in an interview with ArmNews that the existence of such a predictable Constitutional Court will be "the end of the state".
YEREVAN, October 3. /ARKA/. Hrayr Tovmasyan, head of the Constitutional Court of Armenia, thinks that the Kocharyan case is just an occasion for making the Constitutional Court predictable. He said Wednesday in an interview with ArmNews that the existence of such a predictable Constitutional Court will be "the end of the state".
Tovmasyan said he would like to hear a clear evidence of his wrongdoing. Responding to My Step faction, which calls into question his impartiality because of his biography and his political background, he said that there is no any restriction in the law for any person engaged in politics in the future to become a member of the Constitutional Court.
His kinship with Aram Orbelyan, one of the lawyers of Robert Kocharyan, a former Armenian president, Tovmasyan considers as absurd. "Yes, Kocharyan's lawyer Aram Orbelyan is my godson, but neither he nor anybody else can force me to make any decision I don't want to make," Tovmasyan said in his interview. He said he had never been in close relations with Robert Kochgaryan and even hadn't been in one room with him.
The procedure of stripping Hrayr Tovmasyan from his membership at the Constitutional Court is among issues on the National Assembly's four-day session agenda. On September 16, My Step faction at the National Assembly decided to start appropriate process to strip Hrayr Tovmasyan of his membership at the Constitutional Court.
The lawmakers point out some circumstances that prompted them to come up with this initiative, particularly Hrayr Tovmasyan's close ties with the Republican Party of Armenia. Tovmasyan has long been a member of the party and has worked at some key positions since 2010.
Robert Kocharyan, a former Armenian president, is charged with toppling constitutional order (bloody events of March 1, 2008) and taking a big bribe. He is now in detention pending trial. -0---
Tovmasyan said he would like to hear a clear evidence of his wrongdoing. Responding to My Step faction, which calls into question his impartiality because of his biography and his political background, he said that there is no any restriction in the law for any person engaged in politics in the future to become a member of the Constitutional Court.
His kinship with Aram Orbelyan, one of the lawyers of Robert Kocharyan, a former Armenian president, Tovmasyan considers as absurd. "Yes, Kocharyan's lawyer Aram Orbelyan is my godson, but neither he nor anybody else can force me to make any decision I don't want to make," Tovmasyan said in his interview. He said he had never been in close relations with Robert Kochgaryan and even hadn't been in one room with him.
The procedure of stripping Hrayr Tovmasyan from his membership at the Constitutional Court is among issues on the National Assembly's four-day session agenda. On September 16, My Step faction at the National Assembly decided to start appropriate process to strip Hrayr Tovmasyan of his membership at the Constitutional Court.
The lawmakers point out some circumstances that prompted them to come up with this initiative, particularly Hrayr Tovmasyan's close ties with the Republican Party of Armenia. Tovmasyan has long been a member of the party and has worked at some key positions since 2010.
The second circumstance that has prompted My Step faction MPs to come up with this initiative is Tovmasyan's kinship with one of the lawyers of Robert Kocharyan, a former Armenian president, who is now being prosecuted for toppling constitutional order in the country in 2008.
The third cause is that Tovmasyan has already expressed his biased stance on the March 1, 2008 bloody events and the processes that followed them.
There is also the fourth cause - this is a procedural fault related to Hrayr Tovmasyan.
Robert Kocharyan, a former Armenian president, is charged with toppling constitutional order (bloody events of March 1, 2008) and taking a big bribe. He is now in detention pending trial. -0---
