Pre-Election Killing
As Yerevan goes to the polls for its local elections today, A1 Plus reports that the Mayor of Nor Hajn, Armen Kelishyan, yesterday shot dead the head of the town’s electricity network, Ashot Mkhitaryan.
To remind, the election of the Mayor in Nor Hajn will be held in two weeks. The incumbent Mayor put in his nomination. Ashot Mkhitaryan supported his rival.
According to the A1 Plus site, the weapon used to kill Mkhitaryan was presented to Kelishyan by the Armenian Prime Minister, Andranik Margaryan. No other details are known so far.
I’m not sure where exactly Nor Hajn is, especially as you can sometimes find two villages or towns in Armenia with the same name, but a quick search on the Internet suggests that diamonds are a major industry there.
This is relevant because elections in Armenia are not so much about political power but rather who controls economic interests and businesses. This is also the situation in Yerevan as well as outside of the capital city.
The Armenian Revolutionary Federation - Dashnaktsutyun (ARF-D), a member of the three party coalition government in Armenia, even warned that the local elections could end in bloodshed in February.
