YEREVAN. – Attorney Hayk Alumyan, a member of the legal defense team of Armenia’s second President Robert Kocharyan, has submitted a crime report to the Prosecutor General. Alumyan informed this at a press conference on Monday.
As per Alumyan, the grounds for this report are former Military Prosecutor Gagik Jhangiryan’s recent interview, in which he spoke about the most recent developments regarding the criminal case into the events that occurred in capital city Yerevan, in March 2008.
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.
In Alumyan’s words, in his interview, Jhangiryan noted several things, each of which is grounds for opening a criminal case.
“Jhangiryan invokes circumstances that attest to the pressure on the courts,” the attorney explained, in particular. “In response to the query about the [general jurisdiction court] decision to suspend the case on Kocharyan and the others and to petition to the Constitutional Court, Jhangiryan said that the Constitutional Court enables [the lower courts] so that they correct their own mistakes. (...). If that’s the case, it means we are dealing with previously-planned judicial acts.”
The attorney added that the idea that the Constitutional Court (CC) will not consider this petition means that Jhangiryan already knows beforehand as to what will happen.
As reported earlier, the Prosecutor General’s Office has appealed the Yerevan general jurisdiction court decision to release Robert Kocharyan from custody, and the same court’s decision to suspend the proceedings of this criminal case and to forward it to the CC. The legal representatives of the successors of the aforesaid victims also have filed appeals.
Second President Robert Kocharyan is charged with overthrowing the constitutional order in Armenia in connection with the tragic events that occurred in Yerevan in March 2008, and taking a particularly large bribe.
On May 18, a Yerevan court of general jurisdiction decided to release Kocharyan from custody, and based on the personal pledge by Artsakh Republic (Nagorno-Karabakh Republic) incumbent President Bako Sahakyan and second President Arkadi Ghukasyan.
And on May 20, the same court suspended the criminal case against second President Robert Kocharyan, former Defense Minister Seyran Ohanyan, former Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces and former CSTO Secretary General Yuri Khachaturov, and former Deputy Prime Minister and ex-Secretary of the National Security Council Armen Gevorgyan, and petitioned to the CC to determine the constitutionality of some Criminal Code articles and sections that are applied regarding this criminal case with respect to overthrowing the constitutional order in Armenia, and in connection with the abovementioned events in March 2008.
And the CC last week extended for one month the deadline for examining this Yerevan general jurisdiction court petition on the criminal case involving ex-President Robert Kocharyan, and the other former senior officials.
