No new violations

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"The violations registered at the polling stations until now are classic violations. There were rumors that there would be new violations during these elections, yet we haven't seen such yet," "Civil Society Institute" representative, "hotline" coordinator Artak Kirakosyan told "A1+".

As of 2 p.m., the "Hotline" had already received nearly 40 alarms from observers, proxies and voters. In addition, 20 rapid reaction automobiles were touring the polling stations without waiting for a specific alarm.

Touring the polling stations of the Avan district, we found out that the main electoral violations were connected with placement of voting booths. For instance, the voting booths at the 1/1 polling station of the district were clung to the wall and were facing the commission, making the voter look towards the commission. President of the polling station commission Vardan Muradyan assured us that voters had a hard time moving around at the station due to the small size of the station. That is why they had fixed a chain at a 1.5-2 meter distance.

This is not a violation of the law. All commission members gave their consent and it was the report was drawn up," assured the commission president referring to the RA "Electoral Code".

It seemed that the area at the 1/2 polling station was rather large, but the voting booths were installed in the opposite direction again. President of this staton's commission Hranush Khachatryan assured us that they installed the booths like that because the tables had to be at a distance of 1 meter.

We were caught by surprise at the 1/19 polling station. True, the voting booths were installed by law, but they were near the door and in front of the windows. President of the commission Tamara Vahanyan assured us that it has been like that during all elections and there have never been any problems. According to him, they hadn't received any warnings from the Central Electoral Commission. We talked about ANC proxy Andranik Petrosyan, but he also didn't see any violation of the law.

The situation was more ridiculous at the 1/3 polling station. A young man came out of the "Z" taxi with a list in his hand and tried to enter the polling station. We asked him what the lists were and he said that they were the lists of residents living on the 4th cul-de-sac in Avan district, so that "the people at the polling station could participate in the vote."

"We haven't brought the list to the polling station. We are simply checking to see that everybody comes to vote," said the young man.

Let us mention that as of 4 p.m, nearly 900 people had cast their votes at this polling station and at 1 p.m., Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan came to the 10/21 polling station at the Levon Shant school to cast his vote.

Journalist for "168 Hours" Armine Avetyan and "Transparency International" representative Sona Ayvazyan were beaten up.