Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan attended the event dedicated to the 27th anniversary of the founding of the Constitutional Court.
According to the RA Government’s information service, also participating were President of the Republic Vahagn Khachaturyan, President of the National Assembly Alen Simonyan, President of the Constitutional Court Arman Dilanyan, President of the Supreme Judicial Council Karen Andreasyan, RA Prosecutor General Anna Vardapetyan, and a number of representatives of the National Assembly, the Government and the judicial system.
In his speech, Prime Minister Pashinyan thanked the President of the Constitutional Court for organising today’s event and for the invitation to participate in it.
«Today is a very important day, and I want to thank the President of the Constitutional Court for initiating this meeting today so that this conversation can take place. Because we have had many occasions to say that our response to the well-known challenges that concern and worry us all must be asymmetric. The asymmetric nature of that response must be expressed first of all in the establishment and development of our state institutions. Because, by and large, all the problems we have today can be divided into two parts: problems that have prevented state institutions from being established, and problems that have arisen because institutions were not established. And, in essence, all our agenda items fall within these two boundaries. In this regard, the role of constitutional justice is very difficult to overestimate.
Constitutional justice is important not only for overcoming situations, not only for showing a way out of deadlock situations that have arisen and paving the way out, but it is also very important that constitutional justice shape a mindset that is institutional and state-oriented by nature. I consider this to be one of the most important functions of constitutional justice, and in general of the judicial system and all institutions, because ultimately, not having an independent state, we have had a certain mindset.
From the moment we gained independence and statehood, the most important function of all our institutions, in addition to solving everyday operational issues, must be to ensure the transformation of that mindset.
In that transformation, of course, the role of constitutional justice is extremely important, and I also hope that today’s meeting, discussion and context have precisely this significance, which must be expressed not only in our actions but also in our language and thinking.
Recently, during a discussion concerning the state and its mindset, even at the level of conversations, debates and discussions, we had occasion to confront the fact that to this day the relationship between the concepts of nation and people remains unresolved in our reality, whereas I believe our Constitution has given that logic very clearly, because the people are the state-creating unit, the state-creating institution; the characteristics of the nation are somewhat different and may very directly not be connected with the state and state institutions. After all, let us note that it is about the body that adopted the Constitution of the Republic of Armenia. By ‘constituent’ is meant the people, and this is exactly what is expressed in the preamble of our Constitution.
Constitutional justice must also be accessible, yes, not only as a matter of practical application but also as material for research, as material for reading. When from time to time a summary of the work is made, it is extremely important that the work done is made accessible both in the online domain and published in printed form. Of course, I am also convinced that in the future students and researchers will find very interesting information in those studies, which is a very important link in the chain of forming the state mindset I spoke of».
The Prime Minister emphasised the meaning and importance of the day, because, in his words, the Constitutional Court is one of the most important state institutions administering constitutional justice in our country. «The importance of the Constitutional Court is visible, and we are consistently making decisions, conducting and developing joint policies aimed at equipping the judicial system in general and the Constitutional Court in particular with the necessary conditions for the implementation of its institutional functions. If there were occasion to list what has been done recently, we would have quite a long list.
Honourable President of the Constitutional Court,
Honourable judges of the Constitutional Court,
Allow me once again to thank you for organising today’s event and for the invitation to participate in it. I wish success to us all on the path of strengthening and enhancing the institutional capacities of our state and of increasingly reinforcing, day by day, the organic bond between our state institutions and the founder of the state — the people. Because I believe it is this bond, this communication, that must give confidence to us all and inspire confidence in the people that, by creating the state — the Republic of Armenia — it has created an instrument through which it will be able to ensure its own security, well-being, justice, equality of all before the law and the Constitution and, by and large, the rule of law. I believe our gathering today is about the fact that we all reaffirm and express our devotion and commitment to this path», the Prime Minister noted.
