ArmInfo.The package of laws on early retirement of judges of the Constitutional Court is an opportunity to leave with dignity, and this decision can in no way be qualified as humiliating. Minister of Justice Rustam Badasyan, who introduced amendments to the constitutional law "On the Constitutional Court' at meetings of the standing parliamentary commission on state and legal issues, announced this in a conversation with reporters on December 2.
According to the minister, the current legislation "On the Constitutional Court" already stipulates such a regulation, according to which they can retire ahead of schedule before reaching the age limit for judges of the Constitutional Court.
"Within the framework of the project, in the Judicial Code, we have introduced new mechanisms for initiating disciplinary proceedings, a mechanism for checking property status, which will be taken by the commission for the prevention of corruption," Badasyan said, adding that these mechanisms will affect not only the judges of the Constitutional Court, but the entire judicial system as a whole.
<As part of our law enforcement strategy, we also have certain procedures that will be reflected in the legislation, so we will have the opportunity to check the trustworthiness of senior officials>, the minister said. He added that in relation to other judges, the same approach to sending to an early retirement pension cannot be applied taking into account their number.
Thus, according to him, if judges of the Constitutional Court of Armenia retire before January 31, 2020, then their pension will be commensurate with their current salary, taking into account the allowances, which in total exceeds the sum of 600 million drams for all members of the Constitutional Court. Upon early retirement, each of the judges of the Constitutional Court will receive more than 1 million drams per month.
It should be noted that the parliamentary opposition represented by the Enlightened Armenia and Prosperous Armenia parties opposed this legislative package, however, the bill received a positive conclusion from the permanent parliamentary commission.