A criminal case regarding the police officers who beat children’s parents in front of their eyes has been launched. This is what Deputy Chief of Police of Armenia Ara Fidanyan said during today’s discussion on the bill on making amendments and supplements to the Law on Citizenship of the Republic of Armenia in parliament today.

According to Fidanyan, the police wouldn’t have used force, if the citizen had fulfilled the lawful demands of the law-enforcement authorities. “The extent to which the proportionality of the police measures was is a different story. An official investigation has been designated and a criminal case has been launched,” he said.

On October 14, in the Malatia-Sebastia district of Yerevan, police demanded that resident of Yerevan Vazgen Rafayelyan leave the premises of an illegally constructed building. Rafayelyan was selling auto parts and repairing cars. When he refused to fulfill the police officers’ demands, the police coercively sat him in a car and took him to the local police station. The man was hospitalized after the incident.