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Ararat Davtyan

Constitutional Court Decision Ignored

This meant that each person had the right to choose whether or not they wanted to have a social security card and nobody had the right to force anyone to present the card in any given situation.

In November, 2006, ArmBusinessBank demanded that Laura Barseghyan, a resident of Yerevan, present her social security card in order to open a bank account. She wrote a letter to Ara Kirakosyan, the president of the bank, saying that the Constitutional Court decision meant that the lack of a social security card was no reason for the bank to deny her its services.

Kirakosyan replied, saying, “The Constitutional Court decision does not apply to opening bank accounts. It is therefore necessary to have a card to be able to open a bank account.”

This reply from the bank was based on a memorandum dated November 3, 2006 to Tigran Sargsyan, President of the Central Bank of Armenia, from the Minister for Labor and Social Affairs Aghvan Vardanyan. The minister had written, “A social security card is required for the opening of a bank account.” Therefore, Varujan Melikyan, the head of the legal department in the Central Bank, circulated a letter to all the banks in Armenia requiring them to ask for a social security card from customers when opening new accounts.

“These memos had very crude and potentially dangerous errors. Both the minister and the staff at the Central Bank have interpreted the Constitutional Court’s decision, which they are not authorized to do, and moreover, they have distorted it,” said Barseghyan.

Let us note that the Constitutional Court, in its January bulletin The State of Implementation of 2006 Decisions by the Constitutional Court , declared the following –“The Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs of the Republic of Armenia is not authorized to interpret or clarify any decisions of the Constitutional Court. The Ministry has only to implement those decisions… In the case of this ‘interpretation’, the essence of the issue has not been presented. The Constitutional Court has decided that the disputed parts of Article 11 of the Law [this is the part of the law regarding social security cards which makes having a card mandatory for citizens] is anti-constitutional… Those citizens who opt out of having a social security card because of personal beliefs should be given a constitutionally valid alternative option which would involve all the seervices used by citizens with social security cards. The executive should not place any unconstitutional limitations before them.”

Laura Barseghyan has appealed to Prosecutor General Aghvan Hovsepyan and asked a criminal case to be filed against Minister for Labor and Social Affairs Aghvan Vardanyan, Central Bank President Tigran Sargsyan and ArmBusinessBank President Ara Kirakosyan.

Zelim Tadevosyan, head of the Department for the Protection of State Interests, replied with the suggestion that Barseghyan should “go to court to protect her rights, because this is a civil case and is not within the jurisdiction of the Prosecutor General’s Office.”

This was said despite the fact that Barseghyan clearly noted in her appeal that the people mentioned above had not implemented a Constitutional Court decision, which was a criminal offense according to Article 353 of the Criminal Code.

Laura Barseghyan appealed to Aghvan Hosvepyan again and demanded that the Prosecutor General carry out his responsibility and make a decision either to file a criminal case or to reject the request.

The Office of the Prosecutor General repeated the same reply it had given earlier.

This was followed by an open letter in the press, addressed to Aghvan Hovsepyan, bearing the title “A Crime Has Been Committed”. Letters were also written to Aghvan Hovsepyan about this case from non-government organisations such as Christians Against the Enumeration of People and Transparency International Armenia. But the reply from the Prosecutor General’s office has stated the same – “This is a civil case”.

“A Constitutional Court decision has been ignored, but no criminal case filed. Many people have given up their social security cards sincer that decision was made. But they keep coming up against us demanding our cards in many different institutions. Some had to be held accountable for this, but who? Who will free us from this situation?” asked Barseghyan.

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