GEORGIA: ESPIONAGE ARRESTS OF ETHNIC ARMENIANS STOKE SUSPICION OF RUSSIA
Molly Corso and Gayane Abrahamyan
EurasiaNet
Feb 12 2009
NY
Georgia’s arrest of two ethnic Armenians on espionage charges is
threatening to increase tensions in the country’s predominately ethnic
Armenian region of Samtskhe-Javakheti. Although aspects of the case
remain unclear — including an alleged confession — the arrests have
triggered public outrage in neighboring Armenia. Meanwhile in Georgia,
many suspect that Russia is somehow involved.
On January 22, police arrested Grigol Minasian, the 29-year-old
director of a youth center in the town of Akhaltsikhe, and Sarkis
Hakopjanian, the head of a local charity organization, on charges
of espionage and of creating an "illegally armed group." The pair’s
lawyer, Nino Andriashvili, told EurasiaNet that the two men pled
guilty to "part" of the charges during their January 24 arraignment.
"In part, they admitted that they are spies, but they did not admit
that they were preparing to form a [militia group]," Andriashvili
said, adding that the two men told her they were under "pressure"
when they made their admissions of guilt.
A senior official from the Ministry of Internal Affairs,
however, denies that either man has confessed to espionage. "No
[confessions]. Nothing has happened yet," said administration head
Shota Khizanishvili,
The ministry has not named the country in whose favor the pair was
allegedly spying. Local conjecture supposes that it is Russia, but
no evidence has been presented to substantiate that claim.
According to Andriashvili, the government’s case against Minasian and
Hakopjanian focuses on a questionnaire the two men were allegedly paid
to fill out by a Belarus-based non-governmental organization. Little
is known about the organization, called the Association for Legal
Assistance to the Population (ALAP). Its website is not functioning
and there is no listing for an office in Georgia.
An online directory of Belarusian civil rights organizations identifies
ALAP as active in human rights issues, and the recipient of a
1999 award from the New York-based International League for Human
Rights. The American organization did not respond to EurasiaNet’s
requests for comment. The ALAP, which at the time was headed by Oleg
Volchek, a former state prosecutor-turned-reformer, opened a human
rights protection center in 2001 in Minsk. In its 2004 report on
human rights conditions in Belarus, the US State Department noted that
Volchek suffered a severe beating in September of 2003 at the hands
of an unidentified assailant. The attack came just a few weeks after
a Belarussian court "shut down" the association. The circumstances
surrounding the association’s subsequent revival remain murky.
The Georgian Interior Ministry’s Khizanishvili would not comment
on claims that the government’s investigation focuses on the ALAP,
adding that he did not know anything about the group.
The ALAP questionnaire zeroed in on natural gas supply questions —
an increasingly sensitive topic in the South Caucasus — and general
questions about Georgia that could be answered "from newspapers,"
or from other publicly available information, lawyer Andriashvili said.
Andriashvili said that the government is using a videotape that shows
an inebriated Minasian and Hakopjanian discussing the formation of
a militia group with an unidentified man from the ALAP. The video,
the government contends, substantiates its claim that the two men
were attempting to sow unrest in Samtskhe-Javakheti.
Andriashvili stressed that while the two men admit to being on the
tape, they claim that they were "just playing." The two, however,
had misgivings about the ALAP, she claimed, and suspected that it
had some kind of connection to Russia’s Federal Security Service.
In Akhaltsikhe, people close to Minasian, who was prominent in the
town’s ethnic Armenian community, describe themselves as flabbergasted
by his arrest and the charges. By contrast, the arrest of the
lesser-known Hakopjanian sparked few comments.
"We are in a vacuum here. We don’t know anything," said Veronika
Hambarian, an Armenian-language teacher at Minasian’s youth center.
Hambarian recounted that police took the hard drive from the center’s
computer and all Armenian language material, including her language
lessons and fairy tales. They did not take Russian or Georgian language
books and materials, she said.
Parliamentarian Tamaz Petriashvili, who represents Akhaltsikhe in
Georgia’s National Assembly, as well as an acquaintance of Minasian,
described the arrests as a "surprise."
As did some ethnic Armenians in Akhaltsikhe, Petriashvili suspected
that "some people" — a veiled reference to Russia — want to
create conflict in Samtskhe-Javakheti. Certain groups in the region
"are financed as if from Yerevan, but that is not from Yerevan,"
he said. "We all know that very well."
Within Armenia, the arrests have set off a wave of public
criticism. Rather than espionage, many people see the case as an
example of an alleged Georgian campaign to push ethnic Armenians out
of Samtskhe-Javakheti, a region that many Armenians see as historically
part of Armenia.
"We Armenians have always tried to have good relations with Georgia,
but the only thing working in Georgia today is anti-Russian sentiment,
and Armenians, Russia’s partners in that context, are seen as
Georgians’ enemies," commented Yerevan-based political analyst Levon
Shirinian. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive].
A representative of the Armenian Foreign Ministry said that
the government in Yerevan was monitoring the situation concerning
Minasian and Hakopjanian’s arrest. "We watch the developments and are
in a continuous daily contact on various levels" with the Georgian
government, commented spokesperson Tigran Balaian.
Some politicians and interest groups, however, charge that the Armenian
government has responded passively to the two men’s arrest. The
Armenian Revolutionary Federation Party (ARF), a member of Armenia’s
governing parliamentary coalition, insists that the region deserves
to have some form of autonomy. The ARF regularly raises the issue
of ethnic Armenian rights in Georgia during parliamentary debate
in Yerevan.
"The Georgians simply need to understand that if Javakhk [the Armenian
name for Samtskshe-Javakheti] or any other Armenian-populated region
loses its Armenian population, it does not mean it will be inhabited
by Georgians," commented ARF parliamentarian Vahan Hovhannisian, a
former presidential candidate and deputy chairman of parliament. "Any
vacuum in the Caucasus is immediately filled with Turks."
The issue of education is frequently raised as well in conjunction with
coverage of the Minasian-Hakopjanian arrests. Many ethnic Armenians in
the region have limited knowledge of Georgian and, hence, are unable
to study in Georgian universities.
Name differences divide the two countries as well on the
Minasian-Hakopjanian case. While the Georgian government states
Minasian’s first name as "Grigol," Armenian media use the Armenian
version of the name, "Grigor."
But while Samtskhe-Javakheti is known for its strong Armenian ties,
such cultural influences appear slight in Akhaltsikhe, where store
signboards are all in Georgian. Georgian town residents interviewed
had little or no knowledge of the arrests.
According to Eduard Ayvazian, a computer instructor at Minasian’s
center, prior to the arrests, no real tension existed between the
town’s Georgian and Armenian communities.
"There is discrimination here, but not strong discrimination,"
Ayvazian said. "The authorities are afraid that a conflict can start
here. But I believe they are moving in the wrong direction with these
types of arrests."
As a result of the arrests, many ethnic Armenians in Akhaltsikhe
now "are actually thinking about how to leave here," Ayvazian
continued. "We are all afraid. No one needs problems."
Editor’s Note: Molly Corso is a freelance reporter based in
Tbilisi. Gayane Abrahamyan is a reporter for the ArmeniaNow.com weekly
in Yerevan.