Monday,
Kocharian Goes On Trial (UPDATED)
• Naira Bulghadarian
• Gayane Saribekian
Armenia -- Former President Robert Kocharian attends the first court hearing in
his trial in Yerevan, .
A court in Yerevan held on Monday the first, preliminary hearing in the trial
of Armenia’s former President Robert Kocharian and three other former senior
officials prosecuted in connection with the 2008 post-election violence in
Yerevan.
The hearing focused on defense lawyers’ demands for another judge to preside
over the high-profile trial. The ex-president was therefore the only defendant
present in the courtroom.
The other defendants are the former presidential chief of staff Armen Gevorgian
and retired army Generals Seyran Ohanian and Yuri Khachaturov. Unlike
Kocharian, they are not held in detention.
Kocharian looked relaxed and smiled when he spoke with his lawyers during a
break in the court session. At one point he also waved to two dozen supporters
who filled the courtroom and chanted “President!”
They afterwards bitterly argued with a man apparently critical of Kocharian who
tried to enter the courtroom. Police officers intervened to stop the
altercation from degenerating into violence.
Earlier in the day, Kocharian supporters were angered outside the courtroom by
Vardgez Gaspari, a prominent activist who held up a poster saying “Robik
murderer.” One of them ripped up the posted while another hit Gaspari with a
bottle.
Police officers removed participants of the incident from the building moments
later. Gaspari accused them of inactivity.
Kocharian, Gevorgian, Ohanian and Khachaturov stand accused of “overthrowing
the constitutional order” in the wake of a disputed presidential election held
in February 2008. Investigators say they illegally used Armenian army units
against supporters of the main opposition presidential candidate, Levon
Ter-Petrosian, who protested against alleged electoral fraud.
All four men deny the charges. Kocharian says that they are part of a political
“vendetta” waged by Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian.
Kocharian’s younger son Levon echoed that claim when he spoke to RFE/RL’s
Armenian service in the courtroom. “I believe that the accusations are personal
revenge,” he said. “There are many facts which prove what my father says, what
our lawyers say and what we agree with.”
Pashinian was one of the main opposition speakers during the 2008 protests. He
subsequently spent about two years in prison for organizing what the former
Armenian authorities characterized as “mass disturbances.” Pashinian has denied
interfering in the investigation, which took a new turn after last year’s
“velvet revolution” in the country.
Eight protesters and two police servicemen were killed as security forces
quelled the post-election protests on March 1-2, 2008. Kocharian ordered army
units into central Yerevan during the violence.
Khachaturov served as deputy defense minister while Ohanian was the chief of
the Armenian army’s General Staff at the time. Ohanian has repeatedly denied
the army’s involvement in the post-election political processes.
Earlier this year, Kocharian was also charged with receiving a $3 million bribe
from an Armenian businesswoman, Silva Hambardzumian. Prosecutors say that
Hambardzumian also paid a separate $1 million kickback to Gevorgian. The latter
became Armenia’s deputy prime minister after Kocharian handed over power to
Serzh Sarkisian in April 2008.
Both Kocharian and Gevorgian deny the corruption accusations as well.
The ex-president’s lawyers also demanded on Monday that the presiding judge,
Davit Grigorian, recuse himself from the high-profile case. They said he cannot
be trusted because earlier this year he declined to rule on their petition to
free Kocharian from pre-trial custody. They also claimed that Grigorian has not
had enough time to thoroughly examine materials of the criminal case.
The prosecution led by Armenia’s Prosecutor-General Artur Davtian as well as a
lawyer representing the families of people killed in March 2008 objected to the
demand. Grigorian will announce on Tuesday whether he will continue to preside
over the trial.
Incidentally, the Supreme Judicial Council, a body overseeing the Armenian
judiciary, censured Grigorian on Monday for having another judge decide whether
Kocharian should remain behind bars. The council last week took similar
disciplinary action against two other judges for the same reason.
Minister Cautious About Corruption In Healthcare
մայիսի 13, 2019
• Susan Badalian
Armenia -- Health Minister Arsen Torosian speaks at a news conference held at
the UN office in Yerevan, May 6, 2019.
Կիսվել
Կարդալ մեկնաբանությունները
Տպել
Armenia’s public healthcare sector may still be plagued by corruption despite
the government’s anti-graft efforts, Health Minister Arsen Torosian admitted on
Monday.
“If we talk about illegal revenues collected in medical institutions and
consider that corruption, then it does exist,” he told reporters. “I personally
don’t consider that corruption. I consider that illegal revenue … which a
doctor seeks from a patient, a patient’s relative and so on.”
“If we go a bit further up, if we talk about corruption in the government
apparatus, I can say that we are doing everything do put an end to that,” said
Torosian.
As recently as in late March, one of Torosian’s deputies, Arsen Davtian, was
arrested while allegedly receiving a hefty bribe from a hospital director in
return for ensuring greater government funding for the latter’s medical
institution. Davtian was sacked shortly afterwards.
Torosian has repeatedly pledged to eliminate widespread corruption in the
healthcare system since he was appointed health minister one year ago.
He insisted on Monday he will alert law-enforcement authorities about any
instance of corruption known to him. The minister argued that it was he who
effectively engineered the arrest in February of two senior government
officials accused of attempting to personally benefit from government-funded
supplies of medical equipment to three hospitals.
The officials held senior positions in the State Oversight Service (SOS), a
government agency tasked with combatting financial irregularities in the public
sector. The SOS chief, Davit Sanasarian, was also indicted but not arrested
last month. Sanasarian strongly denies the corruption charges.
Turning to the chronic problem informal payments collected in Armenian
hospitals, Torosian said the best way to end them is to raise the salaries of
doctors and other medical personnel. “No doctor enjoys getting 5,000 drams
($10) and putting it into their pockets,” he said. “They want to legally get
that 5,000, 10,000 or 50,000 drams as part of their monthly salary, and our
task here is to shift everything on to a legal plane.”
Jailed General Insists On Innocence
• Marine Khachatrian
Armenia -- Retired General Manvel Grigorian appears before a court in Yerevan,
.
Retired General Manvel Grigorian and his wife pleaded not guilty to a string of
criminal charges brought against them at the start of their trial in Yerevan on
Monday.
“I don’t consider myself guilty,” Grigorian said nearly one year after being
arrested following searches conducted at his properties in and around the town
of Echmiadzin.
Investigators found there many weapons, ammunition, medication and field
rations for soldiers provided by the Armenian Defense Ministry. They also
discovered canned food and several vehicles donated by Armenians at one of
Grigorian’s mansions. An official video of the searches conducted by the
National Security Service (NSS) caused shock and indignation in the country.
Grigorian was also charged with tax evasion and extortion in February. His
wife, Nazik Amirian, was indicted on some of these charges but not arrested.
Armenia - A screenshot of official video of security officers finding larges
stockpiles of food in a villa belonging to retired General Manvel Grigorian, 17
June 2018.
Amirian insisted on Monday that the high-profile case is “fabricated.” She also
protested her and her husband’s innocence at the first, preliminary court
hearing in the trial held in Grigorian’s absence on May 2.
That hearing focused on defense lawyers’ fresh demands for Grigorian’s release
from detention on health grounds. The court rejected them, backing prosecutors’
assertions that the ailing ex-general is receiving adequate treatment in a
civilian clinic in Yerevan when he has been kept since February.
Grigorian, who served as deputy defense minister from 2000-2008, told the court
that he has suffered from many serious diseases and undergone several surgeries
in the last two decades. “There is hardly a doctor in Armenia who hasn’t
treated me,” he said.
Grigorian felt unwell during Monday’s court session which was repeatedly
interrupted because of that. The 62-year-old required medical aid from doctors
present in the courtroom.
Pashinian Allies Slam Karabakh Security Chief
• Ruzanna Stepanian
Armenia -- Retired General Vitaly Balasanian attends an official ceremony at
the Yerlablur military cemetery in Yerevan, January 28, 2017.
Two Armenian pro-government lawmakers on Monday hit out at a senior
Nagorno-Karabakh official who has traded insults with Prime Minister Nikol
Pashinian’s press secretary.
Vitaly Balasanian, a retired army general who serves as secretary of Karabakh’s
Security Council, began the war of words last week when he criticized Armenian
authorities for not heeding the current and former Karabakh leaders’ calls for
the release of Armenia’s imprisoned former President Robert Kocharian. He made
the comments in Stepanakert during official celebrations of Karabakh’s main
public holiday attended by Pashinian.
Responding to them, Pashinian’s press secretary, Vladimir Karapetian, said that
Balasanian should have exercised “necessary restraint.”
“Vladimir Karapetian is too little a person … to make such statements,”
Balasanian shot back in an ensuing newspaper interview. “Let the Vladimir
Karapetians mind their business.”
Karapetian responded by likening Balasanian to two senior members of the former
ruling Republican Party of Armenia (HHK) loathed by many allies and supporters
of Pashinian.
Two of those allies added their voice to the criticism of the Karabakh
official. “The statement by that official not only endangered our national
security system but also offended our public self-esteem,” said Andranik
Kocharian, the chairman of the Armenian parliament committee on defense and
security. “He must not do such things.”
Ruben Rubinian, who heads the parliament’s foreign relations committee,
described Balasanian’s statements as “unfortunate.” “Unfortunate for Mr.
Balasanian,” he added at a joint news conference with Kocharian.
Balasanian was a prominent field commander during the 1991-1994 war with
Azerbaijan. He is now seen as one of the potential main candidates in a
presidential election which is due to be held in Karabakh next year.
Nagorno-Karabakh -- Prime Minister Nikol Pashinin and Karabakh President Bako
Sahakian lead a festive demosntration in Stepanakert, May 9, 2019.
Pashinian raised more questions about his relationship with the Karabakh
leadership on his return from Stepanakert. “If some people try to turn Artsakh
(Karabakh) into a hotbed of counterrevolution, the people of Artsakh will turn
it into a hotbed of revolution,” he wrote on Facebook late on May 9. He did not
elaborate.
It is not clear whether Pashinian warned Balasanian or HHK leader and former
President Serzh Sarkisian. The latter was also in Karabakh last week, attending
events together with Karabakh’s ethnic Armenian leadership.
While in Stepanakert Sarkisian was interviewed by Karabakh state television. He
spoke only about the 1991-1994 war, avoiding any comments on political
developments in Karabakh or Armenia.
Pashinian publicly lambasted Karabakh leaders in November during Armenia’s
parliamentary election campaign. One of his close associates, Sasun Mikaelian,
declared at a campaign rally that last spring’s protest movement that brought
Pashinian to power was more important than the Armenian victory in the war.
Mikaelian’s remark was condemned by Armenian opposition politicians as well as
senior officials in Stepanakert, including a spokesman for General Levon
Mnatsakanian, the then commander of Karabakh’s Armenian-backed army.
Pashinian accused the Karabakh leadership of misinterpreting Mikaelian’s
statement and “meddling” in the Armenian parliamentary race. Mnatsakanian was
sacked in December.
Reprinted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL
Copyright (c) 2019 Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty, Inc.
1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.
www.rferl.org