Smoke, mirrors, and the joker in the pack: on transitioning to democracy and the rule of law in post-Soviet Armenia.

Other reform initiatives included various Memoranda of Understanding between the Armenian government (acting through the ACEC) and various international organizations. The memoranda provided for training of the electoral commission members, voters, domestic election observers, judges, and others who play a crucial role in the conduct of elections in Armenia. (177)

E. Post-reform 2003 Election Violations

Most of these efforts were undertaken prior to the 2003 elections or were conducted in anticipation of those elections. However, they did not lead to improvements in the conduct of Armenian elections.

Despite several far-ranging initiatives, the text of the OSCE/ODIHR's Report on the 1996 Armenian presidential election, which described the shortcomings perceived by OSCE/ODIHR's election observer mission and outlined recommendations made by the mission to alleviate those problems, might have been lifted wholesale and reinserted into the OSCE/ODIHR's 2003 presidential elections report with little substantive change in details. (178) Such has been the de facto effect of ameliorative initiatives undertaken to enhance the Armenian electoral system.

1. Voter Lists

The problems observed included incomplete or inaccurate voter lists, ballot stuffing, carousel voting, tabulation violations, and intimidation. (179)

2. Intimidation and Violence

While the voting itself was relatively calm, violence hovered like a miasma and included attacks on journalists and candidates' staff. (180)

Further, in the interval between the first and second rounds of the presidential elections, popular protests by thousands of citizens, led by the opposition candidates, who alleged massive fraud during the elections, (181) were countered by the arrests at night at the homes of opposition election staffers. (182) The accused were tried and convicted in closed trials (183) and "coincidentally" received sentences ensuring they would be unavailable to participate in the second round of campaigning. (184)

3. Media

Prior to elections, the media was intimidated. Two neutral television stations lost their broadcast licenses through curious machinations of the government agency in charge of auctioning licenses. (185) The stations that did remain on the air, including the national public television, were unabashedly pro-incumbent. (186)

4. State Resources

During the campaign, governmental resources were coopted to the use of the incumbent, in clear violation of Armenia's own election laws. (187)

F. Role of the International Community

Despite substantial contributions to the Armenian economy and continued engagement with the government and other institutions of public life, the events of the elections demonstrate the impotence of the international community in the face of Armenia's illusory democratic and rule of law reform. The impotence is manifested in the exhortations and recommendations made by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (the Assembly or PACE). (188) In successive opinions targeted at Armenia's repeated use of administrative detentions to quell political dissent, both during electoral campaigns and in other circumstances, the Assembly has condemned the use of the detention mechanism. (189) For example, in response to events that took place in Armenia in the period between the two rounds of the 2003 presidential elections, the Assembly declared in Resolution 1361:

14. The Assembly is shocked by the scandalous use that continues to be made of the arbitrary procedures concerning administrative detention provided for in the Administrative Code, which is totally incompatible with its strongly-worded statement in Resolution 1304 of September 2002 that the Armenian authorities should no longer make use of these procedures. It firmly condemns the arrest and conviction of over 270 people--members of the opposition parties, sympathizers and office-holders--between the two rounds of the presidential election and at the end of the second round. It expects the Armenian authorities to discuss by February 2004 the issue of administrative detention provided for in the Administrative Code in co-operation with Council of Europe experts and to send the draft amendments for the Council of Europe's expertise by April 2004. (190)

However, despite stern wording, these exhortations had little effect. They were followed by these statements in Resolution 1374 of PACE:

5. With regard to the conduct of the authorities, the Parliamentary Assembly recalls that its actions are contrary to the spirit and to the letter of the recommendations formulated in its Resolution 1361 (2004) on the honoring of obligations and commitments by Armenia, adopted in January 2004. It is particularly concerned with the fact that:

i. arrests, including those carried out on the basis of the Administrative Code, ignored the demand to immediately end the practice of administrative detention and to change the Administrative Code used as a legal basis for this practice;

ii. the authorities refused to authorize opposition rallies for reasons not permitted under the European Convention on Human Rights. Moreover, the new draft law on the procedure for conducting gatherings, meetings, rallies and demonstrations, currently undergoing parliamentary procedure, was evaluated as excessively restrictive by experts of the Venice Commission; (191)

iii. persons detained during the recent events were reportedly subjected to brutality and ill-treatment by police and security forces while in custody, in spite of the Assembly's demands that resolute and more active steps be taken to remedy misconduct by law enforcement officials;

iv. freedom of expression continues to be seriously curtailed and several acts of violence against journalists, which took place during the recent events, were carried out, or were allowed to happen, by the police and security forces. (192) Clearly demonstrating the impotence of the international community, the repeated condemnations from the Assembly, beginning in September 2002, spurred no ameliorative action addressing the targeted electoral campaign violations, that is, abuse of the administrative detention mechanism--on the part of the Armenian authorities whether before, during, or after the 2003 elections. (193)

G. Implications of the 2003 Election Violations for Democracy in Armenia

A review of the OSCE/ODIHR Election Observation Mission 2003 Reports raises a strong suspicion that the election violations and discrepancies from international electoral norms are no accident, but instead are successful tactics employed in previous Armenian election cycles. Indeed, two months after the presidential elections, when the stakes for the incumbent administration were considerably lower, (194) the parliamentary elections witnessed a substantial improvement in execution. (195)

However, observers can take no comfort in the improvements. The positive changes that took place between the 2003 presidential and parliamentary elections mirror the improvements effected between the presidential and parliamentary elections of 1998 and 1999. (196) The conduct of the elections and the improvement from the presidential to parliamentary round, instead of providing evidence of amelioration, may merely indicate the cynicism of the power structure. Further, the recurring pattern indicates that, rather than lacking the resources and know-how to conduct elections that meet international election norms, there may be inadequate institutional incentive or will to attain those standards--or, worse, an intentional manipulation of the electoral machinery. (197)

In the eyes of Western officials, and some Armenians, the fact the protests following the 2003 presidential elections were not met with violence and instead were allowed to proceed over a period of several weeks, may appear to be an indication that rule of law reform has penetrated into the political life of the country. (198) However, the targeted secret arrests, trials, and convictions of opposition supporters belie this view. Rather, the apparent democratic development of tolerance for open protest can be viewed as smokescreens and mirrors used by the power elite to weave the illusion of reform. The dramatic improvements from the presidential to parliamentary elections starkly demonstrate the presidential-round violations were deliberate--with illegal methodologies systematically deployed when the stakes of power retention were higher.

IV. ELECTORAL NARRATIVES

The first person (199) and other narratives about the 2003 Armenian presidential elections are included here to give color to the popular Armenian perception of the 2003 presidential elections, as well as the experiences of a foreign observer. Employment of the narrative devices here encapsulates and gives flesh to otherwise potentially sterile discussions of violations of electoral procedures.

"People who have grown up and lived in Europe cannot understand our mentality. They have their rules and views on democracy, and we have ours." (200)

A. Voting Armenian Style