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Armenian President Wins Re-Election; Rivals Allege Election Fraud

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  • Armenian President Wins Re-Election; Rivals Allege Election Fraud

    ARMENIAN PRESIDENT WINS RE-ELECTION; RIVALS ALLEGE ELECTION FRAUD

    International Business Times
    Feb 19 2013

    BY Amrutha Gayathri | February 19 2013 5:35 AM

    Armenian President Serge Sarkisian won a re-election Tuesday avoiding
    a runoff in a national poll that international observers said was not
    "genuinely competitive."

    Sarkisian received nearly 59 percent of the vote, enough to avoid a
    runoff, Tigran Mukuchian, chairman of the country's Central Election
    Commission, said Tuesday, the Associated Press reported.

    His closest rival, U.S.-born Raffi Hovannisian, who served previously
    as foreign minister, took nearly 37 percent.

    After polls closed Monday, police said they received 70 reports of
    voting violations, including bribery at polling stations, and that
    they had opened two criminal investigations, Reuters reported.

    Just over 60 percent of Armenia's 2.5 million eligible voters cast
    votes in Monday's election, the AP reported citing the election
    commission.

    Though votes from all polling stations have been counted, the winner
    is not expected to be declared until next Monday.

    Representatives of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Organization
    for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), Europe's main election
    monitoring body, said Monday's election was peaceful.

    "However, the limited field of candidates meant that the election
    was not genuinely competitive," they said in a written statement,
    as reported by Reuters. "The candidates who did run were able to
    campaign in a free atmosphere and to present their views to voters,
    but the campaign overall failed to engage the public's interest."

    Several of Sarkisian's key rivals pulled out of the contest fearing
    that the process would be skewed in the president's favor.

    One of the candidates - Paruyr Hayrikyan, head of the National
    Self-Determination Union - was shot Jan. 31 outside his home near
    Armenian capital Yerevan in a suspected assassination attempt.

    Another candidate, Andrias Ghukasyan, has been on hunger strike
    since the start of the election campaign calling on the authorities
    to invalidate the president's candidacy and urging international
    observers to boycott the election.

    Another contender Arman Melikyan had earlier said he would neither
    recognize the election results nor vote Monday because he believed
    the poll would be rigged in favor of the president.

    In the 2008 presidential election, then Prime Minister Serge Sarkisian
    was declared winner in the first round with 52.9 percent of the vote.

    But thousands of opposition supporters staged protests against the
    poll, which they said was rigged. OSCE said the vote met international
    standards for most part.

    http://www.ibtimes.com/armenian-president-wins-re-election-rivals-allege-election-fraud-1092442

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