Police today prevented some twenty merchants from displaying their wares along a sidewalk adjacent to Yerevan’s Vernisaj market.

The merchants, in a sign of protest, closed a section of Khandjyan Street. Police quickly dispersed them.

Many of the merchants, who mostly sell dinnerware and silverware, have been plying their goods at the market for some twenty years.

The merchants sent a letter to Yerevan Mayor Taron Margaryan, requesting that they be permitted to set up shop, at the same spot, on the weekend. Otherwise, they want a spot in the market itself.

The merchants say they’ve been periodically prevented from selling at the site ever since the Vernisaj market was renovated a year ago. This time, they say, the ban seems permanent.

While they’ve been told to wait for spots in the market proper to free up, the merchants, whose sole source of revenue stems from what they sell there, argue they can’t wait that long.