Should a commission be established over the case of wiretapping? Marukyan’s opinion has changed

The National Assembly, formed after the parliamentary elections, has has started its work. It is the fourth day that the 7th convocation National Assembly is holding sessions to form committees, to elect presidents, and to settle other issues.

Today, on January 17, during the session, Edmond Marukyan, the leader of the “Bright Armenia” party, touched upon the case of the wiretapping of the conversation between the National Security Service director and chief of the Special Investigation Service, noting that they should address this issue again and, if necessary, invite the heads of these power structures to the parliament. During the break, during the question and answer with journalists, Marukyan presented his vision of this issue in more detail, noting that a NA Investigative Committee must be set up to examine the case of the wiretapping of the conversation between NSS and SIS Heads.

“We need to bring these issues to the point of discussion within the framework of parliamentary oversight and  fix these issues, so that after raising this issue in the ECHR, the representative of Armenia can say that there was such a case, but following it, our country has launched a criminal case, punished the perpetrators, and an investigative committee has been established in the National Assembly, which has examined the case and the perpetrators were held responsible.”, – Marukyan noted.

Alen Simonyan, a member of the “My Step” alliance, made a speech on this topic from the NA podium opposing Marukyan and reminded that when the Republican Party brought the bill to the parliament to form an investigative commission, he and Marukyan were on the list of opponents of the bill.

To understand what viewpoint Marukyan held on this topic, it is worth looking back several months.

During the 4th session of the National Assembly of the 6th convocation the case of the wiretapping of the conversation between NSS and SIS Heads was brought to the discussion by the Republican Party. At the September 13 sitting, Gevorg Kostanyan presented the issue of forming an investigative commission. At that time, Edmon Marukyan, a member of the “Elk” bloc, was still against this project, noting that it contradicts the “NA Rules of Procedure” of the RA Constitutional Law, as the Investigative Committee cannot be established when a preliminary investigation is underway on the given case. Marukyan also noted that the commission to be formed would be in danger of becoming an inactive committee, because the issues that should be discussed would be related to the preliminary investigation and the invited people would not have the right to come to the commission and give testimony.

The bill was adopted by 47 votes for and 18 votes against. Edmon Marukyan was also among the opponents of the bill.

Today, however, Marukyan has a different viewpoint.

Let us note, that the case of the wiretapping of the conversation between NSS and SIS Heads is still under examination.

Karine Kirakosyan