News - Armenia PM Nikol Pashinyan attending Yerevan mayor-elect Tigran Avinyan’s swearing-in ceremony

The swearing-in ceremony of the Yerevan mayor-elect Tigran Avinyan is taking place at the special session of the newly elected Council of Elders of the Yerevan Municipality. Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, National Assembly speaker Alen Simonyan, Deputy Prime Minister Mher Grigoryan, Security Council Secretary Armen Grigoryan, as well as ministers, MPs from the ruling Civil Contract Party, and representatives of international organizations are attending the event. Avinyan is greeting the guests on a red carpet at the entrance of the city hall building and inviting them inside. Earlier, Armenian News-NEWS.am reported that according to the results of the Yerevan Council of Elders elections held on September 17, the seats at the newly elected council were distributed as follows: Civil Contract Party - 24 seats National Progress Party - 14 seats Mother Armenia bloc of parties - 12 seats Republic Party - 8 seats Public Voice Party - 7 seats Tigran Avinyan was nominated as the only candidate for Mayor of Yerevan at Tuesday’s first meeting of the new Council of Elders and was elected with 32 votes in favor and 5 against. Subsequently, the Civil Contract and Republic Factions of the city council signed a memorandum of cooperation, which means that they will administer over the Armenian capital city together. The Mother Armenia bloc, led by opposition ex-MP Andranik Tevanyan, and National Progress Party, led by former mayor Hayk Marutyan, had announced that they will not participate in the first session of the new Council of Elders so that there will be no quorum, and therefore the Council of Elders is dissolved and new elections are held. But the Public Voice Party, led by well-known blogger Vardan Ghukasyan, participated in the session, as a result of which there was quorum, and the session was held. However, it should be noted that the Civil Contract-Republic duo does not have a majority in the Council of Elders. Only 32 of the 65-member Council of Elders' seats belong to these two political forces, whereas the remaining 33—to the opposition.