The health condition of Nerses Poghosyan, who was on hunger strike for 18 days for the case of Jirayr Sefilyan, Shushi’s special battalion commander, and others, is getting worse day by day. “He is quite weak; he refuses to receive any medical help,” Arayik Papikyan, Nerses Poghosyan’s defender, told A1+.

He alarmed that Nerses’ legs are already swelled. “As a rule, keeping a hunger strike for a considerable period of time brings to kidney, pressure problems, headaches, dizziness; now it is getting worse.”

Arayik Papikyan hoped  that Nerses Poghosyan would change his decision and stop the hunger strike as he had been very weak during the previous trial. The reason for Nerses Poghosyan’s hunger strike was Judge Tatevik Grigoryan’s rejection of the mediation on a prosecutor’s self-withdrawal, as well as a measure of restraint, detention. “We all know that in the RA, particularly in this case, no matter if the demand is legal, justified or not, if it is an arbitrariness, regardless to its content and form, it will never be done,” said Arayik Papikyan.

Nerses Poghosyan is accused of obtaining, selling, storing, transporting or carrying weapons, ammunition, explosives or explosive devices by an organized group. If the charge is confirmed, Nerses Poghosyan is threatened with three to eight years’ imprisonment.