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Ruling Republicans Not To Form Election Blocs


By Ruzanna Khachatrian

Prime Minister Andranik Markarian’s Republican Party (HHK) will not join forces with any other political group to contest next year’s parliamentary elections, one of its leaders said on Tuesday.

Galust Sahakian told reporters that the Republicans, whose Miasnutyun alliance with the People’s Party (HZhK) collapsed last year, will not form any election blocs. He said that they could only “cooperate” with some parties ahead of the polls.

Miasnutyun, co-founded by former prime minister Vazgen Sarkisian and parliament speaker Karen Demirchian, swept to a landslide victory in the previous elections held in May 1999. The assassination of the two charismatic leaders in the October 1999 attack on the parliament eventually led to the bloc’s break-up. The HZhK, which holds President Robert Kocharian responsible for the killings, is now in opposition to the authorities.

The HHK is the dominant political force represented in the current government and controls the largest faction in the Armenian parliament. Sahakian, who is the leader of that faction, said the Republicans continue to support Kocharian but have yet to decide whether they will support him in the next presidential elections, also due next year.

He also voiced skepticism at the possibility of the HHK cooperating with the pro-Kocharian Armenian Revolutionary Federation (Dashnaktsutyun), arguing that Markarian’s party is “against any kind of revolution.” Dashnaktsutyun controls two ministerial posts in Markarian’s cabinet.
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