ARMENIA: WPFC condemns seven-year prison sentence against leading journalist

IFEX – News from the international freedom of expression community
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ALERT – ARMENIA

20 January 2010

WPFC condemns seven-year prison sentence against leading journalist

SOURCE: World Press Freedom Committee

(WPFC/IFEX) – Washington, USA, Jan. 19, 2010 – The World Press Freedom
Committee – an organization representing 45 press freedom groups from
throughout the world – condemns the seven-year prison sentence handed
down today against Armenian journalist Nikol Pashinyan,
editor-in-chief of the country’s leading newspaper, Haykakan Zhamanak
(Armenian Times), who was arrested on July 1 after he voluntarily came
out of hiding.

Mr. Pashinyan was accused of serious crimes, including inciting mass
disorder and assaulting a public official. But the truth is he was
just exercising his right to free expression during a peaceful
political rally on March 1 and 2, 2008, which ended up being brutally
repressed by riot police. The bloody incident left ten people dead.

A 2008 US State Department report on human rights concluded that,
"some of the deaths may have occurred from purposeful arbitrary
killing, misuse of crowd control equipment (. . .) or some combination
of these factors." The report goes on to conclude that no
investigations were conducted into the behavior of the security forces
during the incident.

Mr. Pashinyan, whose writings had been very critical of the
government, went into hiding after that fateful day and continued
writing for his newspaper. After the Armenian Parliament passed a
resolution of amnesty for all those implicated in the March 1
incident, he decided to come out of hiding only to be immediately
arrested and taken to a former KGB prison.

The arrest, trial, conviction and sentencing of Mr. Pashinyan defy the
amnesty resolution and a resolution by the Parliamentary Assembly of
the Council of Europe (PACE), which reminded the Armenian authorities
that "the amnesty will also apply to those persons charged in relation
to the events of 1 and 2 March 2008." The PACE resolution also urged
the Armenian authorities to allow those charged in relation with that
incident to remain free during the duration of their legal
proceedings.

Arresting a journalist because of reasons directly or indirectly
related to his professional activity is a serious attack not only on
his fundamental human rights, including press freedom, but also on his
audience, who are deprived of important information about issues of
public interest. By sentencing him to seven years in prison, his
audience is also held hostage to an arbitrary decision that violates
fundamental democratic principles.

The harassment and illegal detention of members of the media represent
grave violations of fundamental human rights, postulates enshrined not
only in the Armenian Constitution but also in international covenants,
such as the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

The conviction and imprisonment of Mr. Pashinyan constitute an attack
on his fundamental human rights and, should he decide to appeal his
sentence, the court that rules on the appeal should declare his
sentence null and void.

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For more information:

World Press Freedom Committee
United States
Tel: +1 202 296 5101