YEREVAN. – The staff of the National Assembly (NA) of Armenia continues to look into the absences of all MPs.

The head of the NA Information and Public Relations Department, Arsen Babayan, told the aforesaid to Armenian News-NEWS.am.

“I think the inquiry will be completed this week,” he added.

To note, the NA speaker is empowered to decide whether or not an MPs’ absences from the parliamentary sessions are excusable. If the head of the parliament decides that the reasons for a given MP’s absences are inexcusable, he petitions to the Central Electoral Commission of Armenia, and with a request to strip the parliamentary mandate of the given deputy.    

As reported earlier, speaking at Thursday’s meeting of the ruling Republican Party of Armenia (RPA) Board, President Serzh Sargsyan, who is also chairman of the RPA Board, had stated that PAP Chairman, MP and oligarch Gagik Tsarukyan had become a vice for the country as a political player. He also relieved the PAP leader from his status as a National Security Council (NSC) member, and promised that a process will begin in connection with Tsarukyan’s frequent absence from the parliament sessions noting that the PAP leader had attended solely four of the 145 NA sessions in 2013 and 2014.

And Zhoghovurd daily had reported that Gagik Tsarukyan has the most number of absences from the previous fall session of the Armenian parliament.