Yerevan, February 18. ArmInfo.
The 6th presidential election in the history of independent post-Soviet Armenia kicked off on February 18 at 8:00am local time. The Head of the Armenian CEC Tigran Mukuchyan said a total of 41 district election commissions and 1988 territorial election commissions are operating in the country, with 7 commissions being set up at penitentiaries. These 7 commissions will open later in line with the special regime at the given penitentiaries.
The first voters were at the polling stations starting at 8:00am. Only 126 of 15904 members of commissions are absent, which does not affect the work of the commissions,
In line with the legislation of Armenia, voting is possible only in the territory of the country, the only exception is the members of diplomatic missions abroad and their families, who will vote online, a total of 243 people.
A total of 2 505,000 people have been included in the electoral registers.
The presidential candidates are as follows: incumbent president Serzh Sargsyan from the Republican Party and former prime minister Hrant Bagratyan from the Liberty Party. All the remaining are self- nominated candidates: Leader of the Union for National Self-Determination Party Paruyr Hayrikyan, Leader of Heritage Party Raffi Hovannisian, Advisor for Political Issues of the Refugees and the International Law Civil Society Network, ex-foreign minister of NKR Arman Melikyan, political expert Andrias Ghukasyan, and specialist Vardan Sedrakyan.
