Andranik Margaryan, 55; prime minister of Armenia since 2000
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Armenian Prime Minister Andranik Margaryan, 55, died of a heart attack at his home in Yerevan on Sunday, depriving the former Soviet state of a senior unifying figure ahead of parliamentary elections.
Margaryan served as prime minister for nearly seven years and sought to reduce tensions between the government and the opposition, which accuses President Robert Kocharyan of attempting to rig the May 12 vote.
“The prime minister of Armenia today died from a heart attack,” said a statement released by Kocharyan’s news service.
Born in Yerevan in 1951, Margaryan studied computer engineering. A dissident when Armenia was part of the former Soviet Union, he was arrested in 1974 for his political beliefs and sentenced to two years imprisonment.
Margaryan, who was also chairman of one of Armenia’s leading parties, the Republican Party, came to power in 2000 after Kocharyan sacked Aram Sargsyan, the brother of Vazgen Sargsyan, a prime minister slain in parliament by gunmen on Oct. 27, 1999.
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