Supporters of the Armenian National Congress in Yerevan deprecate the verdict to four oppositional activists

On November, 13, about 50 members of Armenian National Congress (ANC) in Yerevan gathered in front of the building of the court to express protest against the sentence to four activists of ANC convicted for hooliganism, the “Caucasian Knot” correspondent reports.

On July, 20, the court of general jurisdiction of Yerevan communities of Center-Nork-Marash sentenced the activists of ANC to different term of custody: Tigran Arakelyan to six years, Artak Karapetyan to three years, David Kiramijyan and Sarkis Gevorkyan to two years. All of them were accused according to clauses “resistance to an authority by means of using violence or threats of violence” and “hooliganism. The Appellate Court brought a standing judgment on the verdict of the primary jurisdiction court.

Lawyer Stephen Voskanyan declared that he had not expected any other judgment. “We provided all the proofs of the defendants’ innocence but the court was not inclined to a fair decision”, the lawyer says.

Voskanyan added that “even if the defendants are guilty of anything that does not mean admissibility of unlawful actions”. “Penalty to violators of the law should be lawful but not one more illegal action”, he emphasized.

Activist of ANC Tigran Barsegyan considered it his duty to come and support his comrades. “The case is not limited to the four guys, tomorrow any of us can find himself in the same position”, the activist said.

Participant of the action Armenak Dovlatyan is sure that the courts in Armenia are not independent. “We have to go through all the instances in order to be able to appeal to the European Court after that”, he remarked.

Melissa Brown, representative of the movement “Political prisoners’ wives”, considers the arrest of the four ANC activists nothing else but a political prosecution. “By way of example of these four oppositionists the authorities want to put the rest to silence for the same may happen to any of them”, she says.

Kornelij, author of the “Armenian chronicles” blog on the “Caucasian Knot”, also wrote about the action of ANC activists in Yerevan on November, 13. “An assault at a policeman is a very bad action. I can believe that the scuffle was designed deliberately. But 6 years of custody for that!..”, the blogger expresses his surprise adding that ”penalty to some murderers is even less”.