Levon Ter-Petrosyan makes two proposals to Prime Minister

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Armenia’s first President Levon Ter-Petrosyan has made two proposals, which he says should be included in the program submitted by the newly-formed government on October 19. He said the most urgent task of the government led by Prime Minister Karen Karapetyan should be the fight against corruption, as ‘corruption is the root of all evils in Armenia,’ iLur.am reports. "All evils in Armenia – the grave social situation, poverty and mass emigration, illegitimate elections, lack of justice, violations of human rights and democracy are because of corruption, because of widespread and insatiable looting of the national wealth by public officials. Therefore, the most urgent task of the government should be employment of efficient mechanisms to fight corruption, which implies

1. elimination of extra-budgetary accounts and funds of ministries and other state agencies, as well as local government bodies
2. immediate ratification of Article 20 of the UN Convention against Corruption (UNCAC) which deals with criminalization of illicit enrichment of public officials

If these two provisions are not included in the government program, it will become meaningless to hope for the improvement and development of Armenia’s economy, and the new government will have the same fate as the previous one. Although these proposals are not new and have been spokes about many times, they have remained ‘a voice crying in the wilderness.’ Unless corruption is eradicated in Armenia, no prime minister will be able to achieve success and he will simply become the next ‘goat of atonement’ in a short period of time. Because of the greediness of the authorities and corruption, we may lose not only our independence but also Karabakh and Armenia. The new government is to understand this very fact and demonstrate courage and determination to overcome that disaster otherwise all its promises about systemic reforms will remain empty talks," Levon Ter-Petrosyan said.