{"id":257804,"date":"2014-09-24T11:57:32","date_gmt":"2014-09-24T07:57:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.epress.am\/?p=257804"},"modified":"2014-09-24T11:57:32","modified_gmt":"2014-09-24T07:57:32","slug":"ngo-vs-ministry-of-economy-demanding-documents-for-customs-union-accession","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/2014\/09\/24\/ngo-vs-ministry-of-economy-demanding-documents-for-customs-union-accession.html","title":{"rendered":"NGO vs. Ministry of Economy: Demanding Documents for Customs Union Accession"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"margin-top: 0.19in; margin-bottom: 0.19in; line-height: 115%\">\n\t<font color=\"#233760\" style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 100%;\"><span style=\"background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;\">Yesterday, the Armenian Administrative Court heard the complaint of the &ldquo;Union of Informed Citizens&rdquo; NGO against the Ministry of Economy, which refused to provide information demanded by the NGO. The NGO demanded the publication of the 900 product names <\/span><\/font><font color=\"#233760\" style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 100%;\"><span style=\"background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;\">for exemption <\/span><\/font><font color=\"#233760\" style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 100%;\"><span style=\"background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;\">that were negotiated<\/span><\/font><font color=\"#233760\" style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 100%;\"><span style=\"background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;\"> <\/span><\/font><font color=\"#233760\" style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 100%;\"><span style=\"background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;\">between Armenia and Russian for entrance into the Russian-led Customs Union. The Ministry refused to provide the information, saying that it was a secret.<\/span><\/font>\n<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: 100%\">\n\t<span style=\"color: rgb(35, 55, 96); font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 100%;\">During yesterday&rsquo;s court session, the Ministry of Economy representative, Ruzanna Azroyan, tried to prove that the Minister had the right to consider certain types of information either a state or administrative secret. The NGO representative Daniel Ioannisyan (pictured) said, that they recognize that such a right exists, however they don&rsquo;t believe that the Minister has classified those 900 products, because only while it is classified would it not be subject to publication.<\/span>\n<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: 100%\">\n\t<span style=\"color: rgb(35, 55, 96); line-height: 100%; font-size: 13px;\">&ldquo;<\/span><font face=\"Times New Roman, serif\" style=\"color: rgb(35, 55, 96); line-height: 100%; font-size: 13px;\"><font style=\"font-size: 12pt\">The Ministry representative said, that the list of products has been classified in both state and administrative secrets. In reality, they are totally different things, one document can not be both a state and administrative secret,&rdquo; Ioanissyan told Epress.am after the court session.<\/font><\/font>\n<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: 100%\">\n\t<font color=\"#233760\" style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 100%;\"><span style=\"background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;\">According to Ioannisyan, the document has a note saying &ldquo;<\/span><\/font><font color=\"#233760\" style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 100%;\"><span style=\"background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;\">F<\/span><\/font><font color=\"#233760\" style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 100%;\"><span style=\"background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;\">or administrative use&rdquo;, however, according to Armenian law, that does not mean the information is secret. With such notes information was considered secret by the USSR, <\/span><\/font><font color=\"#233760\" style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 100%;\"><span style=\"background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;\">from 1996 in<\/span><\/font><font color=\"#233760\" style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 100%;\"><span style=\"background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;\"> Russia, but not by Armenia.<\/span><\/font>\n<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: 100%\">\n\t<span style=\"color: rgb(35, 55, 96); font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 100%;\">Ioannisyan told that&nbsp;Ministry staff was making contradicting statements; before Minister Karen Chshmarityan told the media that the negotiations had finished, Deputy Minister and Azroyan were saying that negotiations were continuing.<\/span>\n<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: 100%\">\n\t<span style=\"color: rgb(35, 55, 96); font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 100%;\">Recall, that the NGO&rsquo;s court case has also filed suit against the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which has kept secret information about Armenia&rsquo;s membership treaty with the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU).<\/span>\n<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-bottom: 0.14in; line-height: 115%\">\n\t<font face=\"Times New Roman, serif\"><font style=\"font-size: 12pt\"><font color=\"#233760\"><i><span style=\"background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;\">Photograph from Ioannisyan&rsquo;s Facebook page<\/span><\/i><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/p>\n<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on the_content --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on the_content -->","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>During yesterday\u2019s court session, the Ministry of Economy representative, Ruzanna Azroyan, tried to prove that the Minister had the right to consider certain types of information either&#8230; <!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":257790,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tstyn_error":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[50053,57675,57674],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/257804"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=257804"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/257804\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/257790"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=257804"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=257804"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=257804"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}