He made public facts of violations during the pre-election campaign in Armenia.

Activities

In the spring of 2017, on the eve of parliamentary elections in Armenia, Daniel organized a telephone polling of more than 100 school and kindergarten directors on behalf of the Republican Party of Armenia (RPA). He recorded all the conversations and posted them on the Internet (copies of the records are available at the "Caucasian Knot").

In one of the records, the headmaster of a school in Gyumri talks about a list of 1700 voters who were "agitated, and some even intimidated" by her. Another school principal from the city of Vagarshapat said that he had split his list of 442 persons and passed them to electoral offices of two candidates from the RPA.

"With the exception of 19 headmasters, who, in all probability, guessed that not Republicans were talking to them, and refused to talk, all the rest confirmed that they had compiled for the RPA lists with personal data of voters," Ionesyan told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent.

The Armenian General Prosecutor's Office (GPO) has admitted that after the publication of audio records of conversations with 114 school principals, who had compiled lists of voters for the ruling party, no criminal case was initiated, although in one of them elements of a criminal offense were noted, while the remaining 113 audio records contain elements of an administrative offense.

The Central Election Commission (CEC) of Armenia saw no violations in the audio records, sufficient for the withdrawal of the RPA from the elections. And on April 11, 2017, 30 school principals filed libel lawsuits against Ionesyan and the non-governmental organization (NGO) "Union of Informed Citizens". However, on July 17 of the same year, the lawsuits were recalled.

On June 19, 2018, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan signed a decree on the formation of a commission for reforming the country's electoral legislation. The commission is headed by Ararat Mirzoyan, First Deputy Prime Minister, and Daniel Ionesyan was appointed to be its secretary.

Biography

Daniel Ionesyan was born on November 27, 1987; he studied physics at the Yerevan State University.

In 2010-2011, he worked in the National Assembly of Armenia as an MP's assistant. During this period, he drafted packages of legislative amendments to the system of law enforcement bodies.

Since 2011, Daniel Ionesyan has worked in various local mass media as an analyst of the work of law enforcement bodies.

In 2013, he founded the NGO "Union of Informed Citizens", an organization with the activities aimed at raising the public awareness on important issues.