As protesters gathered outside the convening session of the National Assembly today, Armen Hovhannisyan, a member of the "We are Against Foreign Language Schools" initiative, reminded everyone that today was St. Mesrop Mashtots and Sahak Barthev Day.  On this day dedicated to the founder of the Armenian alphabet and his pupil, the National Assembly was set to vote on a draft law on language, which would allow foreign language schools to be opened in Armenia. As Members of Parliament arrived, they were greeted by protesters with calls of "Shame", "Education in Armenian", "No Compromises on Armenian", "No to Colonization" and so on. Before entering the session, independent Member of Parliament Viktor Dallakyan assured the protesters that he would be voting against the draft.  When asked whether he would vote against even after changes were made to the law, Dallakyan said, "This is a matter of principle.  The Constitution says that the national language of Armenia is Armenian, which suggests that school education in Armenia must be in Armenian." At 12 noon, a quick round of voting was organized and the draft law was passed with 71 votes in favor, 13 against and 1 abstaining. Some Members of Parliament, such as Vardan Khachatryan and the Heritage Party's Stepan Safaryan, were not present during the voting and arrived later.  When asked how one could miss this session, Khachatryan said, "One can miss the session if one is convinced that his vote does not matter.  My vote would not have changed the result." Armen Hovhannisyan of the "We are Against Foreign Language Schools" initiative said that only 66 votes were needed to pass the draft law and if anyone had not voted, they would not have stopped the motion from gaining those 66 votes.  In a reference to suggestions that Members of Parliament had deliberately missed the session to avoid voting, Hovhannisyan said, "I do not want to sound conspiratorial to that extent."  He added that the members of the initiative had been prepared for all possibilities, including that which would see the draft passed after the first reading.  The group was preparing to analyze the situation and make a formal announcement. "We will get the names of those 71 Members of Parliament and other documents, analyze them and publish all the information.  We will also publish all our personal conversations with them and all other relevant information available to us.  This is a civil struggle in the name of our honor and we will not agree to any concessions," said Armen Hovhannisyan, "Time will pass before this draft becomes law and is implemented. That time is to our benefit – we will be better organized, powerful, relentless and we will struggle fiercely.  We will unite all the forces in society – irrespective of political convictions – against these changes.  Education for Armenians in Armenia must be solely in Armenian."