There really is a need for dialogue between Armenia’s authorities and the opposition, the Armenian National Movement’s board chairman Aram Manukyan stated during a press conference on Thursday. “If the discourse is successful, that will be good. At the same time, however, we have large masses who do not want for it to work out. We have said, through all written and official avenues, that we demand early elections. But we have not yet received their [the authorities] response,” Manukyan stated.      

The opposition member also reminded that the Armenian National Council (ANC) had given the authorities until the end of September to formally say either “yes” or “no” to holding early elections. “If there is a will to start something, they can say ‘we are ready to discuss your agenda and continue the dialogue,’ or ‘we do not accept your proposals and declare that there is no need to conduct early elections in Armenia.’ And there is the third alternative: Since we have agreed that the time for a ‘yes’ or a ‘no’ is until the end of September, we will regard as a ‘no,’ the ‘no’ which they do not say until September 30,” Aram Manukyan argued.         

The opposition member also underscored that the authorities are mistaken if they think they have trapped the opposition with such development regarding discourse, adding that the time for change in power and conduct of early elections had come long ago, and that is the people’s wish.    The opposition had suspended talks with the authorities, stating that it would resume the dialogue only in the case when ANC activist Tigran Arakelyan is set free. And in response to ANC’s 85-page document substantiating the holding of early elections, the authorities had presented a 130-page document rationalizing the inopportuneness of such elections.