Amnesty without remembering “March 1”?
Amnesty was on top of the agenda during the Public Council's session today as 36 representatives discussed the letter to be sent to the president.
Chairman of the Public Council Vazgen Manukyan informed that the issue of amnesty has been discussed in all council committees and 80% of participants are in favor of piousness and tolerance in society.
"Amnesty is a lesson for the government, the opposition and the society. Setting aside the categories, we must understand that raising the issue of amnesty may have a political subtext and that the society is not going to approve it immediately. But one thing is clear: the society demands amnesty," said Vazgen Manukyan and gave the floor to Head of the State/Legal Issues Committee Grigor Badiryan.
The latter presented the text of the letter composed during the discussions. The letter states the issue of granting amnesty to those deprived of liberty based on the case of March 1. This gave rise to contradicting discussions and actor Sos Sargsyan proposed to take that point out of the letter.
"They are usual criminals. Why are we separating them?" asked Sargsyan. Many council members agreed with him, while others agreed to leave it with another formulation.
"What if we don't write anything at all? Perhaps they will understand it and won't include them. After all, amnesty is directly linked to "March 1" and the inclusion of March 1 will contribute to establishing of tolerance in society," said Khosrov Harutyunyan.
"Every attempt to circumvent "March 1" will be useless. If we really want to be a Public Council, we must get engaged," said Arshak Sadoyan.
The council's agenda also included the issues of nominating new members, confirming committee structures and discussion of appeals. There are currently 1,590 citizens representing 960 organizations in the council.
