PARLIAMENTARY COMMITTEE ON INQUIRY INTO EVENTS OF MARCH 1-2 FINDS IT EXPEDIENT TO BE PRESENT AT INVESTIGATION ACTIONS
Noyan Tapan
Au g 5, 2008
YEREVAN, AUGUST 5, NOYAN TAPAN. On August 5 Samvel Nikoyan, chairman
of the Parliamentary Ad Hoc Committee on Inquiry into the Events of
March 1-2, secretary of Repulican Party of Armenia (RPA) faction,
met with the RA Prosecutor General Aghvan Hovsepian. Announcing this
at the regular sitting of the Committee, S. Nikoyan noted that it
would be necessary, important and more efficient if the members of
the Committee were present at the investigation actions on the case
in order to form a comprehensive notion about the criminal case. The
chairman of the Committee mentioned that henceforth it should be
one of the directions of their work. S. Nikoyan also informed the
Prosecutor General about the Committee’s concern about NA deputy
Miasnik Malkhasian’s health condition and asked to undertake necessary
measures to settle the problem.
It was stated at the sitting of the Committee that two meetings
took place with two arrested people in penitentiaries: with
former RA Foreign Affairs Minister Alexander Arzoumanian and Armen
Sirounian. Arzoumanian expressed no complaint connected with the
conditions and his health, and his main complaint concerned "quite
a long and passive process", so he wishes that the preliminary
investigation would be completed soon and the case would be sent
to court. The former Foreign Affairs Minister thinks that he is
wrongfully accused and he consequently finds that he does not need
an amnesty but only an acquittal. A. Arzoumanian insisted that he
and the Armenian National Movement board chairman Ararat Zourabian
did not take part in the actions of early March 1, and they were at
the French embassy in Yerevan at 10pm, while his speeches were very
careful and moderate ones which can in no way be used against him.
Armen Sirounian is charged by the first part of 38-308 of the
Criminal Code: acting as an accomplice to the abuse of official
position. According to the accusation, during the period of rallies,
there was an information leakage from the National Security Service
which was passed to the leaders of rallies. Sirounian expressed no
complaint concerning the investigation actions and the conditions
but he mentioned that his feet ached. A. Sirounian does not accept
the accusation, and inspector of the NSS investigation group Mikael
Hambardzoumian, together with the members of the Committee have
presented the evidence which, according to him, formed the basis of
an accusation against Sirounian and keeping him under arrest. The
investigation body finds that at the moment it is not expedient to
change Sirounian’s precautionary measure.