Former director of the National Security Service of Armenia Artur Vanetsyan’s representatives have issued a statement which reads as follows:

“As “Dareskizb” LLC reported (Armenian Times, armtimes.com), we had demanded refuting the false and defamatory information regarding Artur Vanetsyan in the article entitled “I have or don’t have honor” and published in the January 12 edition of the newspaper on its website. We had promulgated the application and the content of the refutation, and the public had the opportunity to know which specific statements are defamatory statements and which statements need to be refuted in full.

However, today, the specified company sent a letter that was probably addressed to us and stated that “the application for refutation and the text of refutation attached to the application” are not a subject for consideration.

However, in the same letter, by turning the application and the text of the refutation into a subject for consideration, the author states the following:

1. Vanetsyan’s representatives, in accordance with the power of attorney granted by them, have “the right to submit a claim for refutation< but don’t have “the competence to submit a text for refutation with the same content”.

2. The text of and application for the refutation doesn’t state that “which statements in the published article were defamatory for Artur Vanetsyan and violated his rights”.

In accordance with the powers of attorney granted to us, we are authorized to “present a demand for dissemination of refutation of the published material, including the text of refutation” and “make statements, present and receive documents, applications, complaints, reports and other materials and sign all necessary documents”.

We believe this letter is fully adequate to the content of the article published on January 12, 2020, additional interpretation of the article is a waste of time, and the time needs to be used to prepare the civil claim effectively and submit it to the court as soon as possible.

Representatives of Artur Vanetsyan

Lusine Sahakyan

Aramazd Kiviryan”