The attorneys of the Khachatryans have issued a statement sounding the alarm about the ongoing and overtly unlawful acts of the National Security Service of Armenia. The statement reads as follows:

“The attorneys of the Khachatryans are sounding the alarm about several unlawful acts that have been committed in the period between April 30 and May 17. In this period, several dozens of unlawful searches have been conducted in the homes and structures of co-founder of Galaxy Group, chairman of the board of directors of Ucom Gurgen Khachatryan, his family and relatives, as well as persons related to them, and this has sparked several questions with respect to the lawfulness of the motions for searches and the actions of the National Security Service.

It should also be stated that a specific judge had partially upheld nearly ten motions for searches, permitting a search to find Gurgen Khachatryan, but instead of appealing the court decision to the appeal court as prescribed by law, criminal prosecution bodies submitted the motion to the court in minutes, and the case was inscribed to a ‘desired’ judge, who immediately upheld the motion and satisfied the desire of the National Security Service. This means that under this criminal case, even courts can’t serve as a reliable mechanism to restrain the unlawful actions of the body implementing criminal proceedings. “This is the second search in the homes of the family members of Gurgen Khachatryan over the past week. Employees of the special significance subdivisions of the National Security Service of Armenia have already been engaged in the searches and have started seizing objects, including pictures posted on the walls of the homes, but the courts hadn’t given permission for seizure,” the attorney stated.