Pashinyan: Opposition's refusal of mandates will allow forming a legitimate parliament

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan again made sharp statements against the opposition, saying that his political opponents' refusal of parliamentary mandates would lead "to the formation of a parliament with 100 percent legitimacy."

The head of government said this at a briefing after a cabinet meeting, commenting on discussions around the possible refusal of opposition forces to participate in the work of the newly elected National Assembly.

"If the opposition refuses to receive mandates, we will have a parliament with 100 percent legitimacy. Otherwise, we will be forced to see bags of money on the parliament rostrum that represent no other political value," Pashinyan stated.

He claims that the only political force "that received exclusively organic votes from voters" is the ruling Civil Contract party. The other political forces, according to the prime minister, "cleared the electoral threshold into parliament thanks to voter bribery."

Pashinyan also reacted sharply to media reports that the authorities had offered a political deal to Gagik Tsarukyan, leader of the Prosperous Armenia party.

"If we had offered a deal to Gagik Tsarukyan, he would have accepted it on his knees. In Armenia, no one offered him any deals, so like an orphan he wandered around the world in search of agreements. He found something somewhere, and then it turned out that he had simply been recruited, and he did not even know it himself," the prime minister said.

He also rejected the very possibility of such negotiations with the leader of Prosperous Armenia.

Source: Sputnik Armenia