YEREVAN, APRIL 16, ARMENPRESS. Members of Parliament from the ruling alliance and the opposition clashed during today’s debates in parliament after the majority rejected to include the opposition’s bills in the agenda.

MP from the ruling My Step faction Hamazasp Danielyan said the opposition is introducing bills with controversial content and chooses sabotage as its practice. But opposition MP Naira Zohrabyan from Prosperous Armenia Party was quick to react and called on Danielyan to be restrained.

MP Edmon Marukyan, the leader of the other opposition party Lusavor Hayastan (Luminous Armenia) also reacted to Danielyan.

The parliament eventually did not include the bills of the two opposition parties that were earlier rejected by respective committees.

MPs engaged in heated debates mostly around Prosperous Armenia’s bill that suggested that servicemen should be sent to active duty on combat shifts after 12 months of service and training.

“You mention populism whenever you don’t wanna adopt a bill”, Prosperous Armenia MP Gevorg Petrosyan said. “The committee is a political body, but it is very bad that committee’s include people who often don’t understand the essence of the issue, who vote against and the bill enters the plenary sitting’s agenda in another perception,” he said.

My Step’s Hamazasp Danielyan said it is already becoming a tradition when opposition factions are bringing bills with controversial content, to say the least. “And the word populism is indeed worthy. It’s become a tradition to speak on behalf of the people. Let’s stop the practice as to who is closer to the people. We are hearing speeches about reasoning from Gevorg Petrosyan…They’ve chosen a strategy of sabotage, pleasant to the ears of various layers of the society, perhaps for bringing useful decision, and they themselves do not realize how it will be implemented,” he said.

Naira Zohrabyan from Prosperous Armenia responded: “I think you should have elemental decency to not raise such issue. Hamazasp Danielyan, be a bit restrained. Perhaps your small political biography doesn’t allow you to appreciate what Prosperous Armenia Party has done,” she said.

Edmon Marukyan from Luminous Armenia also slammed Danielyan’s remarks on sabotage. “Can you bring at least one example when the government has wanted to do something good and we have sabotaged? The revolution happened, it is over, you are the political majority, do your job, who is sabotaging you? We stand with you and the prime minister for every good thing done”, he said.

Edited and translated by Stepan Kocharyan