The group of demonstrators from Vagharshapat (Etchmiadzin), Armenia, on Saturday reopened the road leading to Zvartnots International Airport of capital city of Yerevan, and which they had closed off earlier in the day, and with the demand that fellow city resident, retired General Manvel Grigoryan, be immediately arrested again.

But they announced that their next respective protest will be staged on January 14, outside the Criminal Court of Appeal where the court will consider the attorney general’s petition that Grigoryan be remanded in custody yet again.

The Vagharshapat Police chief as well as Hayk Sargsyan, an MP from the majority “My Step” Faction of the new elected National Assembly, were negotiating with the protesters for hours so that they reopen the road.

On December 21, 2018 the Yerevan Court of General Jurisdiction released Manvel Grigoryan from custody on an AMD 25mn (approx. US$51,600) bail. The Prosecutor General’s Office, however, has appealed this decision to the Criminal Court of Appeal.

Grigoryan was remanded in custody on June 19, and by the decision of the Yerevan Court of General Jurisdiction.

He is charged with unlawfully acquiring and possessing weapons and ammunition, as well as committing large-scale embezzlement. In particular, it is about the appropriation of the aid that was sent during the days of the four-day war in Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh), in April 2016.