YEREVAN. – Armenian Constitutional Court (CC) President Gagik Harutyunyan maneuvered around responding to the remark that there is not enough political will in the country to implement the legislative provisions.

During the two-day discussion—which kicked off Thursday—of the project toward the concept for constitutional reforms in Armenia, non-pro-government Prosperous Armenia Party National Assembly (NA) Faction Secretary Naira Zohrabyan stated that numerous constitutional provisions in Armenia are declarative in nature due to a lack of political will.
Furthermore, as per Zohrabyan, the existing Constitution enables to build a democratic state.

In response, Harutyunyan stated that this is just a view and he does not wish to respond to it. At the same time, however, he noted that the two concepts cannot be linked to one another and the possibility of an arbitrary interpretation cannot be rule out.

Opposition Freedom Party Chairman, ex-presidential candidate, former PM, and Armenian National Congress NA Faction MP Hrant Bagratyan, for his part, noted that the document that was signed recently in the Kazakh capital city Astana, and with respect to the establishment of the Eurasian Union, is basically a presidents’ union. In this connection, Bagratyan expressed concern that this can reflect on the prospects for the revision of the matter of Armenia’s transition to a parliamentary system of governance. 

In response, Gagik Harutyunyan said that participation in such a union cannot obstruct a change in the system of governance. As case in point, he recalled that numerous countries with no presidential system of governance take part in major unions.