Free Democrats, a political party set up last year by several former members of Armenia’s main opposition group, is likely to contest the upcoming parliamentary elections in a bloc with another major opposition party, Heritage.

A key National Assembly committee has appointed for February 15 full chamber hearings on opposition-proposed amendments to the electoral law that seek to scrap single-seat ballots some three months before the parliamentary polls.

The presence of political will, changes in the legislation and public involvement are the three elements for a successful struggle against corruption, said representatives of several Armenian opposition political parties during a discussion in Yerevan on Tuesday.

The two dozen or so political parties and organizations currently forming Armenia’s main opposition alliance have decided to stay together also in contesting the upcoming parliamentary elections.

The parliamentary faction of coalition partner Prosperous Armenia Party (PAP) has joined the initiative of opposition Armenian Revolutionary Federation (ARF, Dashnaktsutyun) and Heritage factions to hold parliamentary hearings on proportional and majoritarian systems of parliamentary representation.

The official campaign of the mayoral elections in Hrazdan, Kotayk province, scheduled for February 12, launched on Wednesday. Residents of Hrazdan will have to choose between the candidates of the ruling Republican Party (RPA) and the opposition Armenian National Congress (ANC).

Residents whose apartments face a yard on Central Yerevan’s Nalbandyan Street are at odds with a construction company that entered their yard and tried to remove trees on an “elite” construction site.

A senior representative of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (AFR, Dashnaktsutyun) believes that the adoption of the law criminalizing the public denial of the Armenian Genocide by the Senate of France is a great political achievement for all Armenians of the world and a victory of justice for France.

A court case concerning the death of army lieutenant Artak Nazaryan, who died under mysterious circumstance while on post in Tavush province in 2010, has been moved from Yerevan to Ijevan. Judge Samvel Mardanyan cited concerns over public order and the availability of a witness pool as reasons for the move.

Twenty two years have passed since the Baku pogroms and the perpetrators are still unpunished. No legal proceeding ever took place calling to account all those political forces and individuals guilty of mass murder. Violently displaced Armenian refugees never received any compensation for the moral and/or material damage they’d suffered.