The two opposition parties that gained enough votes in the Armenian parliamentary election to enter parliament, have stated that they will challenge the results of the election in court. On Sunday (27 June), a spokesperson from the ‘Armenia’ alliance, which came second with 21.9% of the vote, stated that the bloc would apply to the country’s constitutional court to have the election invalidated. This announcement was followed on Monday (28 June) by a spokesperson from the Homeland party – part of the ‘I Have Honor’ alliance, which garnered 5.22% of the vote – stating the same intention.
On 27 June, the Armenian Central Electoral Commission (CEC) published an official summary of the elections, revealing that the ‘Civil Contract’ party will get 71 seats; the ‘Armenia’ alliance, 29 seats; and the ‘I Have Honor’ alliance, 7 seats in the new National Assembly. Responding to previous applications for the vote to be invalidated by the two successful alliances and the Zartonk National Christian Party, Tigran Mukuchyan, chairman of the CEC, said that there is no substantive list of violations to invalidate the election results. In Armenian law, if the opposition parties want to submit any further application to the Constitutional Court, they must do so within five days of the election summary.
The conduct of the elections was given an overall positive review by international election observers from the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR), the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly (OSCE PA), and the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE). Eoghan Murphy, Head of the ODIHR election observation mission, said the mission had observed that “candidates could campaign freely throughout the election process, fundamental rights and freedoms were generally respected, and voters were provided with a broad range of options leading to a competitive election”.
On Monday (28 June) the president of the United States, Joe Biden, congratulated the people of Armenia and Nikol Pashinyan, the Armenian prime minister and leader of the Civil Contract party, on theit successful elections:
Congratulations to the people of Armenia and Prime Minister @NikolPashinyan on successful parliamentary elections. Our partnership with Armenia is one of shared values and cooperation on democratic reform and conflict resolution—we are committed to strengthening that partnership.
— President Biden (@POTUS) June 28, 2021