Prime Minister Karen Karapetyan received representatives of the students who had been protesting against the proposed bill “On Military Service and Servicemen’s Status” outside the House of Government. Armenian Defense Minister Vigen Sargsyan and Minister of Education and Science Levon Mkrtchyan also attended the meeting.
“We wanted to hold today’s meeting, considering that every one of you has a sense of duty and responsibility before the country. I am confident that while making queries, we all understand the liabilities and commitments we have as a citizen, as well as the challenges we are facing. If you have a concern that with these legislative amendments we can do something wrong, you will have to take account of the experience of other countries similar to us; namely whether the arguments you are putting forth are acceptable in those countries, whether science and research suffer from such legislative arrangements or whether our citizens are insufficiently prepared. We are all convinced and realize that we will not have a good future if we happen to be unwise. In this sense, we should be well balanced in our actions and calculate every step that can be harmful,’ Karen Karapetyan pointed out at the beginning of the meeting.
Then the students presented their concerns and views, which were given detailed clarifications. It was noted that the main concerns raised by the students can not be streamlined by law; instead they are supposed to be addressed by means of sub-legislative acts.
The Prime Minister and the Defense Minister underscored that about seven dozen government decisions will have to be passed, and the representatives of the initiative group were prompted to join the task force in charge of the drafting of the aforementioned decisions in order to submit their suggestions and approaches. The students declined the proposal.
The full video footage of the meeting is available for downloading at ftp://ftp.gov.am/ online plarform