The stage of collecting petitions for the “Hayakve” legislative initiative was completed yesterday in Gyumri. No incidents were reported during the month, but some unusual stories existed.
Vardan Srtashyan, the Head of the “National Value” club and y the Head of the Shirak region of “Hayakve,” told Aravot.am that a group of school teachers came to the building of the Gyumri Municipality and joined the initiative, which, let’s remind, is a criminal punishment for those persons who will recognize Artsakh as part of another state on behalf of the Republic of Armenia, as well as refuse the international recognition of the Armenian Genocide on behalf of the Republic of Armenia. The educators enthusiastically came and joined the signature gathering, but after a short time, they returned their signatures. Moreover, according to Vardan Srtashyan, they filmed the process of withdrawing their signature, which gave the organizers a reason to assume that all this was done under the threat of their dismissal.
There was pressure on educators, probably to fire them, to intimidate people. By the way, they demanded to picture the moment of removing the signature. Perhaps it confirmed that they came, regretted, and deleted their signatures for some. There were provocative cases when they entered and tried to escalate the situation, but our group did not give in to the provocations. That’s all that was registered in the Shirak region; compared to the other areas, there were even attacks in other regions. It didn’t go badly in the Shirak region,” said Vardan Srtashyan. He also mentioned that there were civil servants who, ignoring all pressure, came and joined the signature gathering. “There were government officials who came openly and signed on the dictates of their conscience. There have been many such cases worthy of respect. I would not like to draw attention to those people to avoid harming them unnecessarily․ I want to add that people in those same authorities understand that this situation is catastrophic and something has to be done. At the cost of risking their work and career, they also came and signed,” said our interlocutor.
Nune AREVSHATYAN
