Past daily of the Republic of Armenia (RA) writes as follows, in particular: The day’s authorities of Armenia are using every opportunity to apply them as a bludgeon against the opposition. One of them concerns the ill-fated Article 236 Section 2, Clause 2 of the RA Criminal Code, which prescribes criminal liability for materially incentivizing to participate in a rally or to refuse to participate in a gathering.

Let us remind that back in 2024, 1/5 of the NA [i.e. the National Assembly] MPs had applied to the Constitutional Court [(CC)] to have that clause recognized as unconstitutional. The CC had accepted the claim for proceedings, but later suspended the case and applied to the Venice Commission for an advisory opinion.

A year later, the Commission’s opinion was received, namely: the norm prescribing criminal liability for materially incentivizing participation in a gathering (or refusal to participate in a gathering) contradicts the principle of legal certainty, as well as the EU guideline on the freedom of assembly. Logically, after that the CC should have resumed consideration of the matter, but it is not doing so.

According to the information we have, realizing that any decision other than recognizing [it] unconstitutional is impossible to adopt, [Prime Minister] Nikol Pashinyan himself appealed to the CC president so that the consideration of the matter be delayed at least until the upcoming [parliamentary] elections [scheduled for next June]. This will enable the authorities to apply that controversial norm as a bludgeon against the opposition, as has been done until now.

Let us remind that under that article “cases” have been fabricated against numerous opposition figures, including Avetik Chalabyan, coordinator of the national civic union HayaKve, Gerasim Vardanyan, a member of the [Armenian Revolutionary Federation] ARF [Dashnaktsutyun Party of] Armenia SB [i.e. Supreme Body], and others.