SENTENCE ON CASE AGAINST ZHIRAYR SEFILIAN TO BE MADE PUBLIC ON AUGUST 6

Noyan Tapan
Aug 1, 2007

YEREVAN, AUGUST 1, NOYAN TAPAN. At the August 31 court sitting on
the case of the coordinator of "Defence of Liberated Territories"
social civil initiative Zhirayr Sefilian, the defence lawyers Vahe
Grigorian, Ara Zakarian and Mushegh Shushanian filed a petition to
the court to bring in a verdict of "not guilty".

According to V. Grigorian, at the meeting of the Union of Armenian
Volunteers on December 2, 2006, the accused just exercised his right
to express an opinion which is stipulated by the Constitution and the
European Convention of Human Rights. M. Shushanian, defence lawyer
of the member of the "Homeland and Honor" party’s political board
Vardan Malkhasian, pointed out that although some content-related
distortions were found as a result of examining the recorded speech of
V. Malkhasian, they were not corrected in the speech of the prosecutor
Artur Mkrtchian. According to the defence lawyer, the speech of his
client contained some subjective opinions about the situation in the
country but not calls to overthrow the state power by violence.

In his statement Z. Sefilian said that there is no corpus delicti
in the case: this is a "trumped-up case", which was opened as
a result of a political order and aims to teach a lesson to the
public. V. Malkhasian also stressed the absence of his guilt and corpus
delicti, saying: "My thoughts were about those who ruin our country,
criminal dregs of society."

The former freedom fighter Vahan Aroyan in his turn said that the
weapons found at his home have no relation to Z. Sefilian. "I’d
never use the gun taken from Azeris against my own people," the
accused stated.

The court went to the consultation room. The sentence will be made
public on August 6.