Tuesday, April 22 2014

 Armenia's economy is still below the pre-crisis level in comparable figures and in terms of US dollars, amid threefold growth of the state debt and significant growth of poverty. Such results are not a matter of boasting, indeed, second president of Armenia Robert Kocharyan said in an interview with 2rd.am, when commenting on Serzh Sargsyan's positive assessment of the 12th prime minister Tigran Sargsyan's performance.   

"I have no idea what and how Serzh Sargsyan assessed in the activity of the ex-prime minister, but, it appears that the assessment has nothing to do with the prime minister's performance," he said. As for the new Prime Minister Hovik Abrahamyan, Robert Kocharyan said he was a good minister of territorial administration-vice premier in the period of his presidency. "It remains to be seen if he will be a good prime minister. He has got no good heritage. I honestly wish him success," the second president said.

Many experts and politicians interpreted Serzh Sargsyan's latest statement at the RPA Council meeting, wherein the president said that some former high-ranking officials seek their success in failures of the incumbent authorities, as a hint at Kocharyan. In response, Robert Kocharyan said: "I am not going to enter into controversy, as it was his subjective views. Furthermore, assessment of my activity on the highest state positions in Armenia and NKR in no way depends on the efficiency of the current authorities. Regretfully, the president did not perceive the difference between sincere concern over country's fate and exulting over poor performance of the authorities."

Commenting on the views that the real goal of the constitutional reform initiated by President Serzh Sargsyan was to ban a person from occupying the top leadership position trice - something that many experts perceived as a measure of caution against Robert Kocharyan - the second president said: "There was no need to initiate constitutional reform. They could just remove the word 'consecutive' from Article 50 (Article 50 of the Constitution of Armenia says: The same person may not be elected for the post of the President of the Republic for more than two consecutive terms. - editor's note)."