On March 27, the deputies of the National Assembly of Armenia in a secret ballot granted the petition of Prosecutor General Anna Vardapetyan on giving consent to initiate criminal prosecution against MPs Hovik Aghazaryan and Taron Margaryan.

67 MPs voted unanimously in favor of depriving Taron Margaryan of parliamentary immunity, while 65 MPs voted in favor of Hovik Aghazaryan. Only 2 were against.

As it has been reported, at the end of October last year at the sitting of the National Assembly, a conflict took place between the then-deputy from the ruling Civil Contract party Hovik Aghazaryan and the head of the Armenian Investigation Committee Argishti Kyaramyan, which almost turned into a fight. Shortly thereafter, Kyaramyan, as well as several other high-ranking officials, resigned. The ruling party MP Narek Zeynalyan, who was involved in the incident, also resigned.
Aghazaryan refused to resign his mandate. After leaving the "Civil Contract," he became an independent deputy. Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan “asked” him to resign his mandate, accusing him of disclosing data related to state security and counterintelligence. A refusal followed.

Hovik Aghazaryan is suspected of patronizing and promoting the interests of two entrepreneurs. The latter wanted to export 150-200 cattle to the UAE. According to the case materials, the MP allegedly demanded 200-300 thousand dollars from the businessmen, promising them to organize the above-mentioned export.

In the second case, according to the investigation, Aghazaryan demanded a bribe of $23,000 and 300,000 drams from citizen Aram Mkrtchyan in order to organize the demolition of the emergency building of elementary school N136 in the Ajapnyak administrative district of Yerevan and transfer the territory for the construction of a residential building. Aghazaryan himself denies all the accusations made by the Prosecutor General's Office.

The parliamentarians will also have to discuss the issue of giving consent to initiating criminal prosecution against Taron Margaryan, MP from the opposition Armenia bloc, ex-mayor of Yerevan.

As for Taron Margaryan, the Prosecutor General's Office presented the parliamentarians with charges under different articles, which relate to money laundering, abuse of power and appropriation of land plots in different years.

Law enforcers accuse Margaryan of alienating land plots adjacent to schools and kindergartens and using them for “non-educational purposes.”

Also earlier, the Anti-Corruption Court accepted the suit of the Prosecutor General's Office for seizure of the MP's property. The matter concerns six houses in Yerevan, one building of public importance, a summer house in the resort town of Jermuk, and two vehicles.