YEREVAN. - Ombudsman of Armenia constantly risks to appear between the authorities’ pressure and opposition’s blackmail. 

Head of the “Prosperous Armenia” Party (PAP) Naira Zohrabyan stated the aforesaid in the National Assembly at the debate on the candidacy of the current Deputy Justice Minister Arman Tatoyan for the post of the ombudsman.

Without calling into question the professional qualities and intentions of Tatoyan and his predecessors, life itself proves that the institute of the human rights defender doesn’t play its proper role, she added.

According to Zohrabyan, after the resignation of Karen Andreasyan, the post of the Ombudsman has been vacant for over a month, and no one even remembers that the country needs an Ombudsman. And all this, in her words, is due to the fact that the political culture is so distorted that the Ombudsman is considered ether one’s own or alien.

When he supports the activity of a certain institution in his report, the opposition labels him a footman. Conversely, the representatives of the authorities jump to announce him as an unsuccessful worker.

“I want you to succeed in your job. Then I will be the first to stand up and welcome you. But I can’t vote for you, since I have no guarantees that the situation described by me will change. And the deputies of our faction will vote freely, each according to their own conviction,” Zohrabyan said.