Armenian Ombudsman to strengthen litigation control

With account of numerous complaints of the witnesses who figure in the former "Case of Seven" on application of torture and violence to them with the aim "to obtain evidences wanted by the investigation," Armen Arutyunyan, Ombudsman in Armenia, has made a decision to add personnel to his office with the aim to monitor the trials.

The Ombudsman has stated that he repeatedly draw attention of the authorities and broad public "to repressive essence of law enforcement bodies, on continuation of vicious practice of knocking-out false evidences." According to his story, in spite of the fact that all the checks conducted by official bodies failed to confirm any of the witnesses' complaints, nevertheless, the amount of complaints and the content of them, and also the latest witnesses' statements, evidence the methods of work of law enforcement bodies.

Armen Arutyunyan has expressed his concern of the cases of pressure on witnesses and of a great number of unsolved crimes, including those committed against journalists.

Let us note here that on May 7 at the trial of Deputy of the National Assembly Sasun Mikaelyan one of the basic witnesses - Yakov Melkonyan - refused from his evidences that he had given to investigation. According to his story, Razdan policemen forced him to evidence against Mikaelyan by means of torture.