YEREVAN. – The Central Electoral Commission (CEC) finds that the requirements of the petitions are subject to dismissal. CEC Chairman Tigran Mukuchyan said this during the Constitutional Court examination Sunday of the petitions challenging the results of the snap parliamentary elections that were conducted in Armenia on June 20.
"First of all, in order to declare the election results invalid, it is necessary to find out whether there were any violations of the requirements of the Electoral Code as a result of the organization and conduct of the elections, as well as the summing up of the voting results.
Second, those registered irregularities should call into question the registered results of voting.
Third, the nature of the irregularities must be such that, when summing up the election results or discussing the complaint, it is no longer possible to clearly determine the exact outcome of the expression of the will of the participants in the voting.
In order to declare the election results invalid, it is necessary that the consequences of the irregularities be irreversible, the opportunity to clearly find out the exact expression of the will of the voting participants must be lost.
Therefore, declaring the election results invalid is a rather serious political and legal weapon, which should be used only in exclusive cases," Mukuchyan said.
According to the CEC chairman, when declaring the election results invalid, the citizens' right to participate in the elections should be given priority.
"The expression of the will of the voting participants materializes especially in the election results. That’s why the presumption of the validity of the registered results is underscored in the creation of guarantees to protect the election results. If in practice this principle is not observed by the election commissions, then inevitably mechanisms are formed that allow falsifying the election results, contrary to the expression of the will of the voting participants," Mukuchyan added.
As reported earlier, four political forces have petitioned to the Constitutional Court and disputed the aforesaid election results. The Constitutional Court decided to combine the petitions of the opposition "Armenia" and "I Have Honor" blocs, as well as of the opposition the Zartonk (Awakening) and Hayots Hayrenik (Armenian Homeland) parties to challenge the election results, as all these petitions refer to the same issue.
It is already the third day that the Constitutional Court is considering these petitions.