* Opposition capitalising on anger over economy
* Signs both sides trying to avoid confrontation
By Hasmik Mkrtchyan
YEREVAN, April 28 (Reuters) - Around 5,000 Armenians rallied
against the government on Thursday, the latest in a series of
opposition protests beginning to wring concessions from
President Serzh Sarksyan.
Spurred in part by Arab uprisings in the Middle East and
North Africa, the opposition in the ex-Soviet republic is trying
to capitalise on popular anger over the state of the economy
ahead of the next parliamentary election due in 2012.
The government is grappling with high inflation and rising
poverty after a deep economic downturn in 2009, while Sarksyan's
rule continues to be haunted by the deadly clashes that met his
election in early 2008.
Thursday's rally marked the first time in three years that
authorities had granted permission for protesters to gather on
Yerevan's central Freedom Square, where the opposition rallied
against Sarksyan's election in 2008 before violent clashes in
which eight protesters and two police officers died.
It also followed an order from Sarksyan last week for
investigators to intensify a probe into the violence, a key
opposition demand alongside early elections. Dozens of activists
jailed over the violence have since been released.
"If the door to dialogue is not yet open, it is half open,"
opposition Armenian National Congress party leader and former
Armenian president Levon Ter-Petrosyan told the rally.
Some analysts say an unofficial dialogue between
Ter-Petrosyan and Sarksyan on reforms may already be under way.
The government's concessions suggest an effort "to finally
move beyond the unresolved post-election crisis and to seek to
overcome the burden of public mistrust", said Richard
Giragosian, director of the Regional Studies Centre in Yerevan.
But he cautioned that the country faced huge economic
challenges despite a return to modest growth last year.
"Mounting disparities in wealth and income have exacerbated
structural shortcomings in the Armenian economy, which pose much
greater threats to the state itself," he told Reuters, citing
poor tax collection, entrenched corruption and budgetary
pressure on social spending.
The landlocked country of 3.2 million people is a close ally
of Russia, squeezed between Iran and Turkey.
Armenia's leaders say they want to build a European-style
democracy and have won Western praise for allowing contested
elections. But opponents say that in reality the country is run
by a clique who refuse to give their rivals access to political
power or economic influence.
(Additional reporting and writing by Matt Robinson in Tbilisi)
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