MAN CONVICTED OF ATTEMPT TO KILL BUSH TO APPEAL SENTENCE – LAWYER

Interfax
Feb 11 2010
Russia

A man serving a life sentence in Georgia since 2006 after being
convicted of an attempt to assassinate Georgian President Mikheil
Saakashvili and former U.S. president George W. Bush and of murdering
a policeman plans to appeal his sentence, a lawyer said on Thursday.

Arutyunian, who is an ethnic Armenian, threw a hand grenade wrapped
in a handkerchief toward the podium where Bush was speaking during a
rally that brought together more than 10,000 people on Liberty Square
in Tbilisi, Georgia’s capital, on May 10, 2005. Saakashvili and others
were seated behind the American leader. The grenade never detonated.

Arutyunian escaped but was arrested two months later and killed one
of the policemen arresting him.

He was convicted in January 2006.

His lawyer Gela Nikolaishvili told Interfax on Thursday that Arutyunian
had applied to the European Court of Human Rights to enable him to
appeal his sentence with a Georgian court.

"The essence of Arutyunian’s request is that he wishes to appeal for
a revision of the case but under Georgian law, he had the right to do
so within six months of his sentence being passed. This was not done
for several reasons. These included Arutyunian’s then health condition
and the fact that he had no independent lawyer," Nikolaishvili said.

The lawyer said that Arutyunian is currently in a normal health
condition. "While in prison, he has converted to Islam, grown a beard
and learned the Arabic language," Nikolaishvili said.