YEREVAN.-  A Yerevan court of general jurisdiction is currently examining former President Robert Kocharyan’s motion on granting him bail.

2nd President of Armenia Robert Kocharyan, who ruled the country from 1998 to 2008, spent two weeks in jail in summer 2018, but was eventually freed. But on December 7, a higher court overruled the release and ordered him to be remanded into custody pending trial again.

Robert Kocharyan’s attorneys have asked the Court of Cassation to determine the amount of the bail to be set.

With its ruling on December 7, the Criminal Court of Appeal upheld the first instance court’s July 27 decision on remanding Robert Kocharyan in custody. On the same day—December 7, Kocharyan handed himself over to a Yerevan penitentiary where he was arrested.   

Armenia’s second President Robert Kocharyan—along with several other former officials—has been charged within the framework of the criminal case into the tragic events that transpired in capital city Yerevan on March 1 and 2, 2008—and under Article 300.1 Paragraph 1 of the Criminal Code; that is, breaching Armenia’s constitutional order, in conspiracy with others.

On March 1 and 2, 2008 the then authorities of Armenia used force against the opposition members who were rallying in downtown Yerevan, and against the results of the presidential election on February 19, 2008. Eight demonstrators as well as two servicemen of the internal troops were killed in the clashes. But no one had been brought to account for these deaths, to this day.