After Judge Mesrop Makyan handed down his ruling, supporters of the ten defendants blocked the street outside the courtroom, calling for the release of all political prisoners.
Law enforcement accuse Chukaszyan of organizing events planned for April 24, 2015, the day Armenians were to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide.
Investigators in Armenia started looking into the case in early 2016, after having received a report from the European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF) about some accounting irregularities connected to a €120,000 grant made to the Martuni Student Council NGO.
Ruben Hayrapetyan, President of the Football Federation of Armenia, tried to drive his car through the closed section of Babajanyan Street at least two times.
She said it was no longer possible to teach her pupils about the meaning of Mikayel Nalbandyan’s famous poem “Freedom”.
Lawyer Nikolay Baghdasaryan told Hetq that this was to protest the fact that Republican Party of Armenia MPs did not hear the people's voice and voted against Nikol Pashinyan.
Police state that Avinyan has been arrested on suspicion of Article 225, Point 2, of the Criminal Code – using violence during mass disorder, damaging or destroying property, resisting representatives of the government, using explosives, and setting fires.
Rustam Badasyan, Pashinyan’s attorney, told Hetq that he had telephoned the Sevan Police, only to be told that they had been holding Pashinyan but he had been transferred elsewhere.
In an apparent response to the thousands now gathered in Yerevan’s Republic Square, the government has deployed police units and armored vehicle to Baghramyan Avenue, where the National Assembly and Presidential Palace are located.
Ayroum residents tell Hetq that they staged a similar protest yesterday as well.
Yerevan police today detained and later arrested Armen Grigoryan, a political analyst and civic activist, on charges that he violated various administrative codes related to the organization of public rallies and marches.
The police weren’t able to provide data on the number of people detained outside Yerevan.
Three large freight trucks are blocking Yerevan’s Halabyan-Kievan intersection, stopping all traffic, and causing tie-ups at the access to Haghtanak Bridge.
Police have detained some fifteen people who had just started an anti-Serzh Sargsyan protest march from Ashtarak to Yerevan.
Shortly prior, the court satisfied the suit of Special Investigative Service investigator on the arrest of Tigran Mazmanyan, a civil activist. Thus, Mazmanyan was sentenced to a two-month imprisonment.
Of the 123 people detained by police in Yerevan today as of 6pm, 85 have been released, after receiving summonses, and the other 38 face various criminal charges.
In Armenia, these "detentions" are legally described as “administrative arrests”, when various municipal codes are violated. In most cases, police can only hold people for no more than three hours. Those not released by this deadline are then detained for further questioning and possibly face criminal charges.
At a rally yesterday evening in Republic Square, Yelk Alliance MP Nikol Pashinyan called on citizens to paralyze the workings of the government.
Those detained are being kept at various police stations in Yerevan.
Momik Vardanyan told Hetq that Grigoryan is recuperating from foot surgery at Yerevan’s Armenia Medical Center.
Pashinyan, apparently not concerned with tipping off law enforcement to the movement’s plans for tomorrow, told a crowd of several hundred people attending a rally this evening in France Square to wake-up early on Monday and launch various acts of civil disobedience at 8:15 a.m.
The two detained individuals, Babgen Grigoryan and Varsenik Ouzounyan, were taken to the Kentron Police Station, this according to Civil Contract Vice-President Souren Papikyan.
Mesrop Papikyan and Norayr Hayrpetyan were detained and taken to the Arabkir police station after being spotted writing the name of the movement on a Yerevan street.
Siroush Aghvanyan, Vardanyan’s other lawyer, told reporters that her client’s health started to deteriorate last summer and that he constantly has high fevers.
Today’s trial session in the August 1, 2017 murder case of four people at a funeral home in the Aragatzotn village of Shamiram had to be postponed due to the absence of defense attorney Kromvel Grigoryan.
Armenia’s Court of Appeals today sustained a lower court’s verdict sentencing former Artsakh Defense Minister Samvel Babayan to six years behind bars for money laundering and attempting to smuggle a portable surface-to-air missile into Armenia.
Supporters of Sasna Dzrer group members now on trial in Yerevan held up signs reading “You’re the Turk; You Sellout”, referring to State Prosecutor Petros Petrosyan.
Exchanges of “You’re a Turk”, “No, you’re a Turk” were heard in the courtroom when tensions rose between the state prosecutor and the defendants.
Security was tight today at the trial of Telman Kalashyan, accused of gunning four to death and injuring seven others at a funeral home in Aragatzotn village of Shamiram on August 1, 2017.
A man found dead in a street in the Yerevan district of Avan on February 4 has been identified as Norayr Melkonyan, a 63-year-old Russian citizen who had earlier been charged with stealing a 1,050- dram bottle of vodka from a Yerevan grocery store (Krpak).
The appeal case of former Artsakh Defense Minister Samvel Babayan, sentenced by a Yerevan court on November 28, 2017 to six years imprisonment for money laundering and attempting to smuggle a portable surface-to-air missile into Armenia, continued today at Yerevan’s Kentron and Nork Marash Administrative Court.
In 2016, orphanage director Hasmik Mkrtchyan was charged with embezzling AMD 46 million from the institution. (The amount stolen translates to around US$ 93,000 at today's exchange rate).
Kherounts, who was facing a number of charges, is said to have died from cardio-vascular failure.
Harutyun Saribegyan, one of the nine individuals, including a former Armenian deputy defense minister arrested in 2015 on charges of illegal arms possession and planning to overthrow the government in Armenia and now on trial in a Yerevan court, has stopped his water strike but is still on hunger strike according to his lawyer.
Smbat Barseghyan, a defendant in one the three Sasna Dzrer trials now underway in a Yerevan, today declared in court that it was due to the “chaotic situation in Armenia” that he and others are facing charges of seizing a Yerevan police station in July 2016.
The trial of nine individuals, including a former Armenian deputy defense minister, arrested in 2015 on charges of illegal arms possession and planning to overthrow the government in Armenia, was postponed for two weeks.
Alexandre Varbedian, banned from entering Armenia since 2002, has taken his case to the courts in Armenia, seeking to get his name removed from a list of “undesirable foreigners” compiled by the country’s National Security Service (NSS).
On November 28, a Yerevan court sentenced former Artsakh Defense Minister Samvel Babayan to six years imprisonment for money laundering and attempting to smuggle a portable surface-to-air missile into Armenia.
Inessa Petrosyan, Manukyan’s defense attorney, told reporters that the court alleges that her client failed to heed the instructions of the judge at the July 26 trial session and slandered his good name.
According to the indictment, the weapon was supposed to have been transported to Artsakh. The prosecutor fails to cite any reasons for Artsakh as the destination.
Taking exception with being called the “accused”, Sasna Dzrer defendant Arayik Khandoyan shouted out in a Yerevan court today that he should be referred to by name.
Khachatur Gishchyan, now being tried as a defendant in the Sasna Dzrer case, feel today in court after losing consciousness and was rushed to hospital.
Former Artsakh Minister of Defense Samvel Babayan, now on trial in a Yerevan court for money laundering and attempting to smuggle a missile launcher into Armenia, never showed up in court today due to a sore throat.
Due to changes made in court cases of Sasna Dzrer defendants accused on seizing a Yerevan police building and taking hostages in July 2016., there will now be three separate trials.
When the attorneys arrived this morning at Yerevan’s Avan and Nor Nork Administrative Court, some were banned from entering after refusing to be searched.
Relatives and supporters of Garo Yegnukian Չnow on trial for complicity in the seizure of a Yerevan police building in July 2016 by the armed Sasna Dzrer groupՃ detained earlier today at Republic Square in Yerevan for attempting to display photos of and distribute leaflets about political prisoners in Armenia to those attending the 6th Pan-Armenian Armenia-Diaspora Conference now taking place in Yerevan, have been released.
Minutes ago, police detained the wife and children of Garo Yegnukian (now on trial for complicity in the seizure of a Yerevan police building in July 2016 by the armed Sasna Dzrer group) at Republic Square in Yerevan on suspicion that were about to place a bomb at the site.
They told reporters that even though the government had decreased the fee from 10,800 AMD to 5,400 two days ago, the decision hadn’t been implemented and that they have been banned from transferring wood from the forest.
Today’s trial session of the Sasna Dzrer defendants was postponed since most of the attorneys staged a boycott to protest what they claim are arbitrary personal and property searches by court bailiffs before they’re allowed to enter the courtroom.