Armenian pro-Western platform to launch signature campaign for EU membership referendum

Signatures will be collected in Armenia demanding a referendum on EU membership.

The Platform of Democratic Forces, formed from pro-Western parties in Armenia, intends to collect signatures in August demanding that the issue of EU membership be put to a referendum.

“As previously reported, this platform approached the National Assembly with a proposal to hold a referendum, but Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan refused to support his satellites in the form of pro-Western political forces and stated during the ‘Armenian Forum for Democracy’ held on July 1 that Armenia will not hold a referendum on membership in the EU, since he, as the leader of the country, already knows the opinion of the people,” Caliber.Az reports, citing Armenian media.

In fact, having received a refusal from Pashinyan, the pro-Western forces decided to collect dividends among the population against the high anti-Russian background that exists in Armenia. They intend to start collecting signatures, collect 50 thousand signatures and present this as a public demand to parliament, so that the National Assembly adopts a draft referendum on Armenia's membership in the EU.

The head of the European Party of Armenia, part of the Platform of Democratic Forces, Tigran Khzmalyan said that they intend to begin collecting signatures in mid-August, and since the process will take 45-60 days, it is planned to be completed at the end of September.

The collected 50,000 signatures will be presented to the National Assembly as a draft demand for holding a referendum on EU membership following the example of the Ayakwe initiative project, which was failed in parliament last year through the efforts of the ruling Civil Contract party,” the publication notes.