ArmInfo. The Armenian government made another attempt to resolve the situation around the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Armenia. On December 2, the Commission on State and Legal Issues of the National Assembly of the Republic of Armenia discussed the amendments to the law "On the Constitutional Court", according to which, if the judges of the Constitutional Court retire early, they will retain the amount of pensions.
According to RA Minister of Justice Rustam Badasyan, it is proposed to introduce into the document a provision according to which, upon early retirement of the judges of the Constitutional Court to retire until January 31, 2020, they will retain all benefits. In particular, the size of their pension will be proportional to the current salary, taking into account the allowances, which in aggregate exceeds the amount of several hundred million drams. "We set the task with different mechanisms to check the reliability of the judges. The introduction of the mechanism of early retirement is the next step in this direction," Badasyan explained.
The parliamentary opposition in the person of the "Bright Armenia" and "Prosperous Armenia" parties opposed this legislative package. In particular, MP from the "Prosperous Armenia" party Gevorg Petrosyan asked what decision was made by the Constitutional Court, which the government does not like. According to him, the proposed bill is directed exclusively against the current chairman of the Constitutional Court, Hrayr Tovmasyan. "Let's be honest and call a spade a spade. The current government simply wants to get rid of the current composition of the Constitutional Court and appoint people it pleases," the MP said.
In turn, head of the "Bright Armenia" party and the faction of the same name Edmon Marukyan, together with his party member Taron Simonyan, supported the position of Gevorg Petrosyan.
To recall, in early October, the parliament invited the judges of the Constitutional Court to impeach president of the Constitutional Court Hrayr Tovmasyan. The termination of his powers was initiated by the ruling "My Step" faction. The faction believes that Tovmasyan and two other judges did not have the right to participate in the consideration of the lawsuit against former President Robert Kocharyan because of their possible bias to the case. The decision on the removal of a judge is the responsibility of the Constitutional Court, but he did not support the impeachment procedure initiated by the authorities of the chairman of the Constitutional Court.