UN Observer
March 2 2007
Armenia: Man Dies After Self-Immolation in Republic Square
2007-03-02 | While photographing and interviewing participants at a
rally held outside the Presidential Palace by citizens evicted from
their homes to make way for new construction in central Yerevan,
shocking news started to circulate that a man had set himself on fire
in Yerevan’s Republic Square.
An hour later that news was confirmed with RFE/RL’s Emil Danielyan
informing CRD/TI Armenia that the man was not expected to survive.
Although there was speculation that the man had also been evicted
from his home, this theory has now been ruled out.
RFE/RL’s Irina Hovannisyan now reports that the man has since died
from burns that covered 80 percent of his body at a Yerevan hospital.
The full post is at:
fter-self-immolation
Please also see:
Protest Outside Presidential Palace
Although the Constitutional Court ruled last April that the eviction
of tenants from their homes in central Yerevan to make way for
arguably the largest land grab in Yerevan’s history was
unconstitutional, nothing much has changed. Indeed, while ruling in
their favor, the Constitutional Court was careful enough to word
their decision so vaguely enough as to allow for further evictions
and to prevent the true worth of the land their homes once stood on
from being paid out.
The full post is at:
tside-presidential-palace
Parliamentary Election Monitor
Following on from various private television stations denying that
high costs for political advertising were introduced to prevent
opposition parties from taking out slots in the broadcast media,
RFE/RL reports that the Chairperson of the managing board of Armenian
Public Television and Radio, Alexsan Harutyunyan, has defended his
station’s policy on pricing. He also took the opportunity to promise
that his journalists will remain impartial during the election.
The full post is at:
ary-election-monitor-7