YEREVAN. – Numerous employees of Armenia’s bookmakers, and who are staging a protest outside the National Assembly (NA) building since Wednesday morning, have reopened the Marshal Baghramyan Avenue and the Derenik Demirtchyan Street in capital city Yerevan.
But they continue their picket on the sidewalks running along Marshal Baghramyan Avenue.
In the demonstrators’ words, their demand was a meeting with the NA headship.
Babken Tunyan, Chairman of the NA Standing Committee on Economic Affairs, has received a five-member group from these protesters.
“We will wait for the answer by our group that is meeting with Tunyan,” a protester said. “If the answer doesn’t satisfy [us], we will close off Baghramyan Avenue again.”
Many workers of Armenia’s bookmakers are picketing outside the parliament building, and against the bill on limiting the activities of the country’s bookmaker offices. This bill has been approved by the aforesaid NA committee and sent for debate at the parliament floor.
This proposed law aims to toughen the terms for conducting betting in Armenia, and it has been developed along the lines of fight against gambling in the country.
The bill proposes to remove all bookmaking offices from Yerevan.
If the draft law is passed, it will come into force in November 2020.