YEREVAN. – The legal defense of Dr. Armen Charchyan—Izmirlian Medical Center director and an MP candidate from "Armenia" bloc, led by second President Robert Kocharyan—who is accused in the criminal case under investigation by the Special Investigation Service (SIS), on Monday submitted a petition to the SIS investigator to select “personal guarantee” as a precautionary measure against the accused, who is remanded in custody. Armenian News-NEWS.am was informed about this by the SIS.

The respective SIS statement added that considering the fact that Charchyan was remanded in custody by the decision of the Yerevan court and taking into account that according to the Criminal Procedure Code, the pretrial detention measure set by the court can be commuted and revoked by the court, whereas in the pretrial proceedings—also by the prosecutor, the abovementioned petition was sent by the SIS investigator to the prosecutor for consideration.

"Taking into account the abovementioned, we consider it at least strange the fact that the mentioned petition was submitted to the investigator of the RA [(Republic of Armenia)] Special Investigation Service. It would be desirable for the lawyers who have assumed the defense of the accused to master the basic norms of criminal procedure, according to which the power to commute detention as a measure of restraint does not belong to the investigative body," the SIS statement also reads.