Wednesday,
Armenia’s Former Top Judge Wounded In Gun Attack
• Narine Ghalechian
Armenia - Arman Mkrtumian, chairman of the Court of Cassation, at a news
conference in Yerevan, 3 April 2009.
Arman Mkrtumian, the former powerful head of Armenia’s highest criminal court,
was shot and lightly wounded late on Tuesday in a reported armed attack on his
house carried out by gunmen.
Police said Mkrtumian’s 30-year-old son fired a gas pistol at the three masked
attackers armed with assault rifles when they burst into the villa located in
Dzoraghbyur, a village just outside Yerevan. One of the gunmen was wounded and
caught by the Mkrtumians while the two others fled the scene, firing random
gunshots in the process, according to a police statement.
The police also released a short video showing the alleged attacker who was
identified as Hovannes Ryzhenko, a 45-year-old resident of Gyumri. The man had
blood on his face and a bandage wrapped around his head.
“The neutralized person was detained,” Sona Truzian, a spokeswoman for
Armenia’s Investigative Committee, told RFE/RL’s Armenian service on Wednesday.
She said law-enforcement authorities are taking “all necessary measures” to
track down the other attackers.
The authorities did not immediately suggest any motives behind the gun attack.
The Investigative Committee opened a criminal inquiry under an article of the
Armenian Criminal Code dealing with “banditry.”
Mkrtumian received medical treatment at Yerevan’s Erebuni hospital shortly
after incident. A hospital official said he refused hospitalization despite
sustaining a gunshot wound. The retired judge made no public statements on the
attack.
Mkrtumian, 57, headed Armenia’s Court of Cassation for ten years. He resigned
in early June more than one month after mass protests brought down the
country’s previous government headed by Serzh Sarkisian.
Throughout his tenure Mkrtumian was accused by lawyers of severely limiting the
independence of lower courts. In June 2013, for example, about 200 lawyers went
on a two-day strike to protest against what they called arbitrary decisions
routinely made by the Court of Cassation.
Yerevan Hopes For Lower Russian Gas Price
• Tatev Danielian
Armenia - Gazprom Chairman Alexei Miller speaks at a ceremony in Yerevan,
16Apr2015.
The Armenian government will ask Russia’s Gazprom giant to cut the price of its
natural gas supplied to Armenia during upcoming negotiations, Energy Minister
Artur Grigorian said on Wednesday.
Armenia currently pays $150 per thousand cubic meters of Russian gas imported
via Georgia. By comparison, the Russian gas price for Europe stands at around
$230 per thousand cubic meters.
The Armenian side and Gazprom were expected to review the tariff late last
year. But visiting Yerevan in October 2017, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry
Medvedev said the “special price” will remain unchanged until the end of 2018.
Alexei Miller, the Gazprom chairman, accompanied Medvedev on the trip.
Grigorian said that Armenian officials and Gazprom executives will start
negotiations on a new gas deal in November. “We will do everything to get a gas
price that’s lower than the existing one,” he told a news conference.
The minister did not specify the extent of the price reduction that will be
sought by Yerevan.
Armenia’s Gazprom-owned gas distribution network cut its retail fees for
households and corporate consumers in November 2016, more than two months after
Karen Karapetian was appointed as the country’s prime minister. Karapetian
managed the network from 2001-2010 and held senior executive positions in
Gazprom subsidiaries in Russia from 2011-2016.
He was replaced as prime minister by Serzh Sarkisian in April this year just a
few weeks before mass protests brought down Armenia’s former government. The
protest leader, Nikol Pashinian, took over as prime minister in early May.
So far the Russian government and Gazprom have given no indications that they
are ready sell gas to Armenia at a deeper discount. Some analysts have
suggested that with Karapetian no longer in government the Russians could
actually raise the existing price.
Gazprom accounts for over 80 percent of Armenia’s annual gas imports. The South
Caucasus country also buys gas from neighboring Iran. Officials in Yerevan have
for years insisted that Russian gas is cheaper than Iranian gas.
Grigorian revealed that Yerevan is now discussing with Tehran the possibility
of a lower Iranian gas price for Armenia. “I think that very soon we will have
the final gas price declared by the Iranian side, which will certainly be
compared with the price of Russian gas,” he said.
Press Review
“Robert Kocharian says that he is returning to active politics in order to
defend his honor and dignity,” “Zhamanak” writes in a commentary on the former
Armenian president’s interview with a Russian TV channel aired on Tuesday. The
paper says Kocharian essentially blamed Serzh Sarkisian for the recent
revolution in Armenia, saying that his successor should not have tried to cling
to power.
“Hayots Ashkhar” says Kocharian’s political comeback has been one of the most
important political developments of this summer. “This is only the beginning,”
the paper says in reference of the former president’s recent moves and
statements.
“Zhoghovurd” notes the readiness of Sarkisian’s Republican Party of Armenia
(HHK) to cooperate with Kocharian. The paper finds it natural, saying that
Kocharian’s and Sarkisian’s interests “again converge now.” “They are now
united by the criminal investigation into the March 1 [2008 violence,]” it
says. “Driven by their self-defense instincts, they now have to join forces and
fight together.” The paper says that the HHK and its spokesman Eduard
Sharmazanov in particular criticized Kocharian in the not so distant past.
“During Serzh Sarkisian’s presidency Kocharian voiced criticism of the
authorities from time to time and Sharmazanov was the first to counter it,
often using crude language.”
“Even under the former authorities there were people who warned that enslaving
the judicial system is a dangerous path that lays the foundation of a vicious
tradition of courts serving some people today and others tomorrow,”
editorializes “Hraparak.” The paper says Kocharian and Sarkisian are now paying
the consequences of their tight grip on the judiciary. “[Kocharian] hopes now
that the judicial system is not that devastated and crushed and will dare to go
against the will of the new authorities and rule in his favor,” it says.
(Tigran Avetisian)
Reprinted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL
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