The Freedom of Information Center applied to the court with the request of the obligation to provide information. The responding party is the “Civil Contract” ruling party.

On August 23, 2023, the FOICA sent an information request to the “Civil Contract” political party, asking for information on the list of donors who raised money during the party’s fund-raising evening held before the Yerevan Council of Elders elections, as well as those who donated to the party during the same fund-raising evening and ” Information on the refund of donations exceeding the limit set by Article 24, Part 2 of the Constitutional Law on Parties.

The party did not respond to the first request submitted by FOICA, it also left unanswered the second request for information addressed on September 11, 2023, as a result, FOICA’s right to receive information was violated.

To remind: The “Civil Contract” party receives funding from the state budget by Article 26 of the Constitutional Law “On Parties”. By Article 4 of the Constitutional Law “On Parties”, the party is obliged to ensure the principles of transparency, publicity, and accountability of its activities.

The request of the “infocom.am” news site became the reason for the request of the FOICA. On August 9, 2023, Infocom’s journalist sent a request for information to the “Civil Contract” party, asking for information on the list of donors who raised money during the party’s fund-raising evening held before the Yerevan Council of Elders elections, as well as those who donated to the party during the same fundraising evening. and information on the refund of donations exceeding the limit set by Article 24, Part 2 of the “Constitutional Law on Parties”.

On August 15, 2023, the Infocom journalist received an interim answer about the extension of the deadline for responding to the request. The party noted that their staff is burdened with the organizational problems of the Yerevan Council of Elders and the upcoming elections and that they will try to answer the journalist’s question as soon as possible.

In an additional letter, citing the provisions of the Law on Public Affairs, the Infocom journalist noted that being burdened with the organizational problems of the upcoming elections of the Yerevan Council of Elders is not an objective basis for delaying the response and asked to be informed about the reasons for delaying the response and the deadline for providing information, as required by law.

The journalist, not receiving any other official response from the party, including the requested information, applied to the Freedom of Information Center, asking for assistance in obtaining information.

The court case was assigned to Yerevan Civil Court Judge Kima Arzumanyan. You can find the FOICA’s lawsuit here in Armenian.