The New Nation - Internet Edition

AP, Yerevan

Armenian police on Saturday dispersed a protest by a few hundred opposition supporters who had been camping out in the capital for more than a week. The opposition has protested the results of the Feb. 19 presidential election and tried to force a new vote. The police moved in before 7 a.m. and began forcing protesters onto buses. A few clashes broke out on the central Yerevan square. Officials said Prime Minister Serge Sarkisian - the favored successor of outgoing President Robert Kocharian - won the vote outright. But supporters of opposition candidate Levon Ter-Petrosian have rejected the results, alleging fraud. Daily protests on a large square in central Yerevan have drawn tens of thousands of people. Several hundred have remained overnight, warming themselves over campfires and sleeping in tents. The standoff has raised concerns of instability in the poor Caucasus nation at the junction of the energy-rich Caspian Sea region and southern Europe, with Russia and Iran nearby.