ArmInfo. Hrant Bagratyan, candidate from the Free Democrats bloc, comes out for legalization of prostitution in Armenia.
At today's press conference in Yerevan, Bagratyan stressed the need to regulate the activities at the night clubs and strip clubs, because such facilities located in the center of the city disturb the residents of Yerevan. He thinks the licensing of such facilities and their location in a special district of the city will have only a positive effect on their activities. As regards prostitution, Bagratyan said: "We should either follow North Korea's example and kill the prostitutes directly in the streets or we should legalize and license the persons who provide such services," he stresses, adding that in such matter the Armenian society should be more progressive and take into account the global trends, especially as taxation of such services will have a positive effect on the state budget.
For his part, First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Armenia Tatshat Sargsyan said that when the Communist Party was ruling in Armenia, there was no prostitution in the country, because the society condemned such things. Sargsyan also strongly criticized Bagratyan, who yields to the western trends and does not realize the damage prostitution and the strip clubs can inflict to the country. "Bagratyan is misleading the society. I do not understand why needs this. He is already 50-60 years old," Sargsyan said, noting that the Communist Party's foreign and domestic policies will be fighting all negative phenomena and will eradicate both prostitution and the sects.