Co-founder of One Armenia Party Artur Ghazinyan today told reporters that the government had failed in the fight against the coronavirus and that he had submitted a maximally substantiated report on a crime with concrete facts on June 12.

“Our political party has presented data that have been concealed from the public and distorted by entities obliged to present information that poses a risk to the lives and health of people, and this has led to deaths or severe consequences. This report has nothing to do with the 600 recorded deaths, the criminal negligence and the potential corruption risks of the pandemic,” Ghazinyan said, adding that he will bring a couple of facts to substantiate that a crime has been committed in Armenia.

“The Special Investigation Service rejected the report on the crime and refused to institute a criminal case. The preliminary investigation body approved the fact that it is the duty of entities in charge of implementing Armenia’s healthcare policy to provide information about people and lives in the healthcare sector. The policy is developed by the government, and the authorized body is the Ministry of Health. Consequently, it is the duty of Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan, Minister of Health Arsen Torosyan and other officials of the Ministry of Health to provide the information.

The investigator has only accepted as a basis the viewpoint of the deputy health minister, but the investigator had to implement complex measures and listen to Nikol Pashinyan, Arsen Torosyan, the director of Nork Infection Clinical Hospital and other entities thathave provided information about the risks of the coronavirus in this period.”

Ghazinyan stated that, in essence, the Special Investigation Service approves the fact that the government hasn’t taken preventative measures and has acted according to the situation, meaning the government didn’t take measures to prevent penetration of the virus into and its spread across Armenia.

Ghazinyan also emphasized that the investigator had stated that the WHO declared the coronavirus a pandemic on March 13, but it was declared a pandemic on March 11. “Our political party thought perhaps this was due to the fact that Nikol Pashinyan had been holding meetings until March 12 in Armenia’s Syunik Province which were terminated on March 13. Perhaps the investigator decided to solve the problem of those two days under a political instruction, but we found a government decision that also states March 13. I don’t believe that government officials didn’t know that the WHO had declared the coronavirus as a pandemic on March 11. The decision is signed by Nikol Pashinyan. We strongly believe that official fraud has been committed.

Today I will submit a report on a crime based on official fraud to the Special Investigation Service. I would like to repeat that a crime has been committed in Armenia and that its scale is unprecedented, that is, over 600 people have died. Armenia’s economy is on the brink of collapse, thousands of companies have shut down, tens of thousands of people are unemployed, and the healthcare system is in the worst situation. There have to be people held liable for this, and we believe Nikol Pashinyan and Arsen Torosyan are those people,” he said.