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e-Governance

Interviews, Briefings

Sunday, 13 May 2007

BLOOMBERG

Armenia's Ruling Coalition Heads for Election Victory
Armenia's ruling coalition headed for victory in parliamentary elections deemed ``largely'' fair by international monitors. The opposition said the poll was flawed.
The Republican Party of Prime Minister Serzh Sargsyan won about a third of the votes counted by 3 p.m. local time, twice as many as its nearest rival, the electoral commission said on its Web site. The coalition's share was more than 60 percent, with more than 98 percent of ballots counted. The official result won't be announced for a few days.
The vote was ``an improvement on previous elections and were conducted largely in accordance with the standards for international elections,'' Tone Tingsgard, who coordinated the monitoring for the Vienna-based Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, told a news conference in Yerevan today. The OSCE had 400 people monitoring the voting.
All Armenian elections since 1995 had been declared flawed by international observers. The landlocked state of 3.2 million people, bordering Iran and Turkey and about the size of Maryland, is the third-largest recipient of direct U.S. aid per person. It was warned it may lose aid if this poll was also defective.
``I wouldn't consider it a legitimate election,'' Tigran Mkrtchian of the opposition Country of Law Party said in Yerevan today. ``We are very disappointed.''
The coalition's Prosperous Armenia party's share of the votes counted was about 15 percent, and its partner Armenian Revolutionary Front about 13 percent, figures from the electoral commission showed. Turnout was 59.4 percent, or about 1.3 million of an electorate of about 2.3 million.
Election Laws
Foreign Minister Vardan Oskanian had said before the vote that ``we can't afford another election that doesn't meet international standards.'' The OSCE's Tingsgard said Armenian officials ``did their utmost'' to adhere to election laws.
Leo Platvoet, head of the delegation from the 47-member Council of Europe, said that while there were some ``irregularities,'' ``progress'' was made.
Armenia's government has an estimated budget of $1.6 billion this year, with revenue of $1.3 billion, according to the CIA World Factbook. U.S. aid has fallen to about $55 million a year, from $75 million previously, putting it behind Israel and Egypt. The country got about $254 million in overseas development aid in 2004 and also relies on remittances from expatriates.
The U.S. and Armenia signed a new agreement last year which may generate an aid package worth $235 million, to reduce rural poverty. Agriculture accounts for almost half of all jobs in the country and only about a sixth of gross domestic product.
Predecessor Dies
The opposition staged several rallies before the vote and had threatened more demonstrations if they deemed the ballot flawed. About 3,000 people had gathered in the rain at a large square beside Yerevan's Opera House today by 5:45 p.m.
Sargsyan became prime minister when his predecessor, Andranik Margarian, died in office in March. The former defense minister has said he may stand for the presidency next year, when incumbent Robert Kocharian stands down.
Armenia is in a sixth consecutive year of economic growth of more than 10 percent per year, Foreign Minister Oskanian said. The number of people living in poverty has fallen from 56 percent to 27 percent in the last 2 1/2 years, Sargsyan said.
The U.S. also has interests in neighboring Georgia and Azerbaijan. A crude-oil pipeline runs from the Azeri capital Baku across Georgia to the Turkish Black Sea port of Ceyhan.
Armenia has no diplomatic relations with Azerbaijan or Turkey. It fought a war with Az'rbaijan over the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh. The region has a majority ethnic-Armenian population and unilaterally declared independence in 1991. It is shown on maps distributed by the United Nations as being part of Azerbaijan and is completely surrounded by that country. Both Sargsyan and Kocharian come from Nagorno-Karabakh.
Sargsyan has said he wants to resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh dispute and establish diplomatic relations with Turkey ``without any preconditions.''

By Sebastian Alison and Troy Etulain