With parliamentary elections scheduled for early 2007 at the latest, 2006 is going to prove to be a very interesting year as political parties prepare for what is going to be a very dirty campaign. As if that wasn’t enough to get political pulses racing, the year has already started with scandal. RFE/RL reports that the Culture Minister Hovik Hoveyan has resigned after reportedly pistol-whipping electricity workers.

Hoveyan revealed the news to RFE/RL following a humiliating interrogation by the Armenian police and an internal investigation conducted by the governing Orinats Yerkir Party, of which he is a member.

“Unwilling to give rise to unnecessary attacks on my party and government partners and considering the fact that attempts to exploit the issue have already been made, I announce my resignation,” he said after an emergency meeting of the party’s leadership.

Hoveyan has been dogged by scandal since his controversial appointment in April 2004 after his predecessor was also forced to resign. Although many might sympathise with anyone who strikes back at Armenia’s notoriously inefficient and rude utility services, Hoveyan is another matter entirely.

He complained, for example, last March that too many Armenians are now practicing folk dances because of socioeconomic hardship. In an August 2004 interview with RFE/RL, he singled out the ability to organize funeral services as one of the key traits which young Armenians should develop to meet the challenges of adult life. And a few weeks later he opined that most of the statues placed in downtown Yerevan in the 1960s and 1970s are already too old and should be replaced because they haunt city residents at night and “interfere with their dreams.”

Meanwhile, after a deeply flawed referendum to amend the Constitution, the Human Rights Ombudsperson Larisa Alaverdyan is appealing to the Constitutional Court now that she is unable to perform her duties. Under the old constitution, the Ombudsperson was appointed by the President, but now the postion is decided by Parliament.

Unfortunately, it is uncertain when Alaverdyan’s replacement will be chosen, leaving Armenians effectively unprotected at a time when human rights are being violated as never before.

In a December 26 open letter to parliament speaker Artur Baghdasarian, Alaverdian argued that she should therefore be allowed to continue to perform her duties in the interim. Baghdasarian and other parliament leaders effectively rejected the demand, however.

Kocharian, meanwhile, set up on Wednesday an ad hoc commission that will manage the Ombudsperson’s Office until the election of its new head. The commission comprising the chief of the Constitutional Court and Justice Ministry staffs and the deputy head of the presidential administration took over the office affairs the next day despite strong objections from Alaverdian.

Funny. The Council of Europe and the United States wanted a new constitution adopted in order to speed up the process of democratization, but it looks as though the government has understood that it can be used in the short term to frustrate development and to silence critical voices.

Alaverdian also said her resignation will not prevent her from issuing an annual report on the ombudsman’s activities. Her previous report made public last spring contained a damning indictment of the Armenian authorities’ human rights record and their 2004 crackdown on the opposition in particular.

The report further strained her relationship with Kocharian and his government. Shortly after its publication officers of Armenia’s National Security Services raided the ombudsperson’s offices in Yerevan and temporarily confiscated its computers, ostensibly as part of a criminal investigation into a bribery case involving one of Alaverdian’s employees. The human rights defender condemned the raid as politically motivated.

Last September Alaverdian released another report that dealt with the forced evictions of hundreds of Yerevan residents whose old houses are being demolished as part of a controversial redevelopment going on in the city center. She believes that the process is unconstitutional because it is regulated by government directives, rather than the constitution and laws adopted by parliament.

Coincidently, I ran into one of Alaverdyan’s daughters last night and passed on both my congratulations and commiserations. Because I can understand how much pressure has been put on Alaverdyan’s family as a result of her position and battle with the government, I congratulated Arus on getting her mother back. However, I offered my condolences because Armenia has now lost a damn fine ombusperson.

In related news, the European Court of Human Rights is about to rule on the detention of an opposition activist in the wake of the 2003 presidential elections that international observers considered as failing to meet democratic standards.

Armen Mkrtchian is one of several hundred people who were fined or briefly imprisoned in the wake of Armenia’s disputed presidential elections of February-March 2003. He and five other oppositionists want the Strasbourg-based court to declare the punishment illegal and even force the Armenian government to compensate them.

Alvina Gyulumian, the Armenian member of the court, told RFE/RL that Mkrtchian’s appeal has been accepted. “The European Court of Human Rights has agreed to adjudicate on this case and I hope a verdict will be handed down in the course of this year,” she said in Yerevan.

The court will also soon be rule on the closure of A1 Plus in 2002. Many believe that the independent TV company critical of the government was forced off the air on the orders of the President and the National Security Council. Since then, the television media is totally controlled by those closest to the authorities. Because most Armenians rely on TV news for their information, this represents a serious obstacle for democratization in Armenia.

Still, while most Armenians now consider that democracy and the rule of law are well and truly dead, the outgoing British Ambassador to Armenia thinks otherwise. While the British Embassy did issue a statement on behalf of the EU criticizing the 27 November referendum, it would appear that adopting new laws regardless of whether they function, as well as progress in negotiations over Karabakh, are more important for my government.

Armenia has made progress in recent years in bringing its political and economic systems into conformity with European standards, Britain’s outgoing ambassador in Yerevan, Thorda Abbott-Watt, said on Thursday.

“I along with other European community member states have very much welcomed Armenia’s moving more closely towards Europe and European standards,” she told a news conference held on the final day of her three-year tenure in the country.

[…]

The British diplomat also echoed international optimism regarding a peaceful resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. “I think I share your foreign minister’s view that we have a window of opportunity on Nagorno-Karabakh,” she said. “The parties can reach even an interim solution that might soon allow the opening of borders. I think that that is something deeply to be welcomed because I believe that Armenia will never achieve her potential with closed borders.”

Interesting to note that when it comes to democracy, Abbott-Watt is less outspoken than she is on other issues.

Abbott-Watt’s time in Armenia was marred in March 2004 by a diplomatic scandal sparked by her public comments on the 1915-1918 killings of over one million Armenians in Ottoman Turkey. Citing the official position of the British government, the envoy stated that the massacres did not constitute a genocide. The Armenian Foreign Ministry protested the remarks in a diplomatic note sent to London.