YEREVAN, OCTOBER 3, ARMENPRESS. Chairman of the Alliance party, Member of Parliament Tigran Urikhanyan has presented clarification on his voting for the amendment of the Rules of Procedure Law.

Urikhanyan claims that he hasn’t approved voting in favor of the bill in the format which it was put up for voting.

Few other lawmakers who are away had also submitted their votes for the bill beforehand, as required by law.

He is currently in Russia, and as required by law he had left a written document regarding his vote for the bill. He posted a photo of the bill, claiming it has been altered afterwards. “Either the parliament will give an explanation or I will be first to resign upon returning, starting from that moment to demand the dissolution of parliament, for which I have always been in favor,” Urikhanyan said.

Yesterday, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan called on his supporters to rally outside the parliament building after Republicans convened an extraordinary session to adopt a bill on amending the rules of procedure of the parliament. The Tsarukyan and ARF factions supported the bill.

PM Nikol Pashinyan fired ministers from his Cabinet representing the Tsarukyan and ARF factions.

The controversial bill is an amendment to the Rules of Procedure law of the parliament, whereby in the event of a parliament session being unable to be held because of lack of quorum, or if lawmakers are anyhow prevented from participating, it will be considered interrupted rather than failed, with a possibility of resuming at a later date. The aim of the bill is apparently a limitation of possible circumstances of dissolution of parliament.

Thousands rallied outside the parliament building, where MPs were literally besieged.

The PM entered the building to hold negotiations. After more than an hour of talks, he exited the building and said “Today we showed that early elections are a pan-Armenian demand and the political forces that will oppose this political demand declare war against their own people. My impression is that our colleagues from the HHK, ARF and Tsarukyan factions realized this message.”

The Prime Minister also said he will resign in order for snap elections to take place as soon as possible.

Edited and translated by Stepan Kocharyan