In a March 16 letter to Thorbjorn Jagland, Secretary General of the Council of Europe, Levon Ter-Petrosyan thanked the CoE for keeping the political situation in Armenia in its focus and for remaining true to the PACE principles regarding the sham presidential elections of 2008. In his letter, Ter-Petrosyan reminded Mr. Jagland that HAK (Armenian National Congress) had forwarded its own timetable for reforms to PACE and urged the CoE Secretary General to use his office and personal leverage to see that the "HAK" proposals are included in the Pace Monitoring Committee’s March 17 agenda. Former President Ter-Petrosyan underlined that a political crisis has existed in Armenia ever since the "Ill-fated" elections of February 19, 20008, and that implementation of the HAK proposals was a matter of vital urgency. Mr. Ter-Petrosyan also pointed out that this evaluation of Armenia’s internal political situation was also shared by the U.S. State Department in its recently released human rights report that is critical of restrictions placed on the rights to speech and assembly in Armenia, especially during the past two years.