The CC issued Friday a decision recognizing unconstitutional, hence non valid the Article 300.1 of the Armenian Criminal Code under which ex-president Robert Kocharyan and other former top Armenian officials are charged over the overthrow of the constitutional order.

President of the Constitutional Court Arman Dilanyan announced the decision, said the decision is final and enters into force from the moment of promulgation and added that Judge Khundkaryan of the Constitutional Court has a special opinion on the reasoning part under the case.

On July 18, 2019, the Constitutional Court rendered a decision to suspend the proceedings of the cases to determine constitutionality of Article 300.1 of the Criminal Code based on the applications filed by the Yerevan court of general jurisdiction and second President of Armenia Robert Kocharyan and addressed the European Court of Human Rights and the Venice Commission for opinions.

The ECHR and the Venice Commission gave their opinions in the summer of 2020. According to the Venice Commission, in international practice, there is no common approach to the formulation of crimes against the constitutional order (in some states, references concern the Constitution in its entirety, while other states directly make a reference to the need to maintain the constitutional order without establishing it).