Azernews.Az

Armenian presidential candidate Levon Ter-Petrosian predicts bitter ramifications for his country in case another key runner-up in the February 19 election, Prime Minister Serzh Sarkisian, wins.
"If he becomes president, Armenia's political and economic blockade will exacerbate and the threat of a war with Azerbaijan will rise," he said in his first pre-election nationwide address.
Ter-Petrosian, a staunch critic of the incumbent authorities, pledged that just the opposite will happen if he wins at the polls.
"Elimination of the gang-like regime, restoration of the constitutional system, protection of freedoms, free competition, a constructive foreign policy and other issues will find their solution," he vowed.
Ter-Petrosian also promised to raise wages three times, pensions and allowances four times and to ensure the repayment of bank deposits that citizens lost after the Soviet collapse in 1991.
The presidential hopeful called on the electorate to cast votes "for their future" on the election day. He warned that if Premier Sarkisian is elected, the arbitrariness committed during President Robert Kocharian's tenure would become a common practice. "Stealing the people blind, accumulation of the country's wealth in the hands of a group of individuals and the division of society into classes will persist in that case. The rich will get richer, while the poor will get poorer. The current monopolies will wipe out small and medium enterprise and cases of arbitrariness by law enforcement, taxation and customs bodies will continue," Ter-Petrosian said.
He said the migration process gaining ground in Armenia would cause a demographic catastrophe, while assassinations and gasoline and gas machinations would remain undisclosed.
A total of nine candidates are running for the upcoming election in the South Caucasus republic.