Karen Bekaryan, Ara Saghatelyan and Mher Avagyan are detained. This is what co-founder of Legal Way NGO Ruben Melikyan told reporters in front of the building of the National Security Service (NSS) of Armenia a little while ago.
“I just talked to Ara Saghatelyan’s attorney, who told me that investigative actions are underway. Ara Saghatelyan and Karen Bekaryan are detained under three articles, and Mher Avagyan is detained under one article,” Melikyan said, adding that the detainees’ attorneys have declared that they will file appeals against the lawfulness of the detention after the investigative actions.
“This is simply embarrassing, it is political persecution,” Melikyan concluded.
Earlier, masked officers of the NSS apprehended co-founder of Quartet Media, political analyst Karen Bekaryan in his house and took him to the NSS. The officers also conducted searches in the office of former chief of staff of the National Assembly Ara Saghatelyan and two other offices near that one, after which Saghatelyan was apprehended and taken to the NSS.
Attorney Mikayel Shkhimyan reported on his Facebook page that, in his presence, the officers of the NSS threw his client Mher Avagyan to the ground in the obscenest way and videotaped him.
Azerologist Anzhela Elibegova and constitutional expert Gohar Meloyan were also apprehended and taken to the NSS. They were released a little while ago.