Armenia is actively moving towards dictatorship. This is what secretary of the Prosperous Armenia faction of the National Assembly of Armenia Arman Abovyan said in the yard of the court examining the petition to arrest leader of Prosperous Armenia Party Gagik Tsarukyan. When asked if all courts in Armenia perform the orders of the authorities, Abovyan said as deputy of the National Assembly, he hopes this is partially untrue.

“If the court renders a decision to arrest Tsarukyan, this will be within the logic of the current policy and total repression,” he said, adding that dictators never say they want to silence, repress or send opposition members to jail, but they do away with opposition figures with beautiful slogans.

At this moment of the conversation, police apprehended a group of citizens in the courtyard.

Arman Abvoyan went on to claim that Armenia is actively moving towards a dictatorial regime.

“The authorities are already trying to silence and intimidate people by cheating and lying to people and making up phony cases, but they can’t silence and intimidate the leader of the largest opposition party. We’re analyzing the process and calculating our future actions, but we can already see that the situation is escalating and will reach a point where people won’t be able to express their opinions. We hoped we were living in a legal state, but we were wrong,” Abovyan said.