Epress.am News from Armenia
Armenian National Congress (HAK) coordinator Levon Zurabyan considers Yerevan City Hall’s decisions to deny the opposition group’s applications to hold a rally in Freedom (or Liberty) Square to be completely illegal.
Speaking to journalists today, Zurabyan said this time they want to place city hall in a miserable state and show them just how deplorable their actions are.
“According to law, they have to respond within 10 days, [to say] what day we can have a rally in Freedom Square. Let them say, so we’ll know what to do. Let them say, is it forbidden from now to hold rallies there?” asked the opposition bloc representative, adding that regardless of the city’s decision, HAK “recapture the cradle of liberty in Liberty Square.”
On this occasion, the opposition group issued a statement in which it says it will put forth an application to city hall which will note that, after the re-opening of Freedom Square, more than 30 claims have been submitted to the city to hold a HAK rally there — all of which were denied.
“In accordance with the [Republic of Armenia] Law on Holding Meetings, Rallies, Marches and Demonstrations, Liberty Square is not listed among those properties where mass public events are prohibited (Article 9). According to the requirements of the same law, city hall, in receiving such a claim, ‘is obligated to propose to the organizer other days and times for holding the mass public event’ for the location specified in the notice (Article 13.4), which, violating the law’s requirement, it has never done.
Accordingly, we suggest to keep us informed of which days in the near future holding a mass public event in Liberty Square will not pose a problem,” reads the HAK statement.