President of the Public Council of Armenia Vazgen Manukyan says the introduction of vetting in Armenia is unfounded. He expressed his opinion to journalists and stressed that this is his personal opinion.

According to him, even though the fact that there is corruption in Armenia is undisputed and the results of global studies serve as evidence of this, Armenia has more favorable positions compared to other post-Soviet republics.

“Vetting and transitional justice are provisional measures, but the public gets the impression that this is like a panacea,” Vazgen Manukyan noted and reminded that there had been attempts to fight against corruption in ancient Babylon and Rome.

“The fight against corruption needs to be led through laws, and there have to be amendments to the Constitution, if necessary,” Vazgen Manukyan said. He reminded that the Venice Commission has considered the introduction of vetting in Albania dangerous and considers it justified only in the case of a transition from fascism, totalitarianism and dictatorship to democracy. “Armenia is not that kind of a country. Armenia has all the democratic institutions there are. To introduce vetting and transitional justice, we have to convince the whole world that Armenia used to be a totalitarian state, but do we need to do that?” Manukyan said.