"Hraparak" newspaper wrote:
Ombudsman Anahit Manasyan announced yesterday that he reaffirms his position that any case of depriving a person of his liberty must meet the established standards of legality, and any concern related to the matter must be properly discussed.
We are talking about the arrest of 9 participants of the Sacred Struggle, but Anahit Manasyan, as usual, reacts late to the events, and his reactions have the effect of "mustard after dinner is useless" for citizens. As a rule, the Ombudsman does not visit them personally and remembers that he has something to do when the train has already left.
This time he decided to respond to the situation when 9 arrested persons were released from custody.
Although Anahit Manasyan's office assures that they started the study on the same day, 2024. on October 31, when media published information that 9 people were arrested on suspicion of illegal possession of firearms.
"On the instruction of the human rights defender, an investigation procedure was immediately started in the staff.
On the same day, necessary clarifications were requested from the General Prosecutor's Office of the Republic of Armenia regarding the legal justification of the arrest of the mentioned persons and a number of issues related to the initiated criminal proceedings.
Today, on November 1, the Defender's staff received information that all 9 arrested persons were released.
The study initiated by the human rights defender's staff is continuing," the HRD office reported yesterday, and a citizen unfamiliar with Anahit Manasyan's activities may think that they were so afraid of his questions that the arrested were released immediately.
"One day, 24 hours, people stay illegally in the prison, illegally deprived of their freedom, why doesn't the HRD come once and find out what happened?"
Today he spread a formal message that he allegedly addressed the prosecutor and so on, but people gathered in front of his office, he did not go down to see what we want, he sent his press officer.
We demanded that one of us and a journalist go upstairs, they said no, a journalist should not come, they are afraid of a journalist or maybe they have an allergy," says Mkrtich Davtyan, a lawyer representing the interests of 4 of the arrested.
The protestors waited for about an hour before delivering their speech to the HRD, and then the HRD to them. "They have a wide discussion, they get advice from the prime minister, but we don't understand from the superiors," says the lawyer and suggests that the HRD should be renamed VIP, meaning the defender of the prime minister's rights.
"There is no other way out. You were chosen as a counterweight to the authorities to prevent him from doing illegal activities. We suggested Mkrtich Davtyan to remember a case when MP Manasyan went to some poor, protesting citizen whose rights were violated. "Oh, you are saying such an insulting thing.
How can he, sitting on top, go down? He is sitting close to God on the second or third floor, why should he come down to a citizen? You are insulting him," the defender taunted.
The HRD says that it continues to investigate the case, what result do you expect? "But what does he study?" Instead of coming, enter the prison cell, tell me who you are, why they brought you, take the arrest warrant, make a photocopy, take it to study.
One does not ask: what are you studying if you are not aware of the incident? There was one of the patrolmen, he was probably a shepherd before, because they say shepherds became patrolmen, he wrote in the report that a person got out of the car in a drunken state.
But it has no protocol. The next person says that he got down, he had something like a gun in his hand, he put it in his pocket. And after that, they conducted a search, made a record, in which they found "Samsung", money and a lighter.
Such police officers should either be sent to a psychiatric hospital or to a narcologist, who sees everything as a weapon. And they put this protocol as the basis of the arrest decision, and the investigator does not say where is the weapon, but where is he who drank, where is the protocol?
He should have refused, said: be rad, go. But the investigator, in turn, puts the same false facts as the basis of the decision, and also makes the arrest decision himself," says Mkrtich Davtyan.
All 9 arrested, Aghvan Arshakyan, Hayk Nikoghosyan, Vigen Azatyan, Ara Mkrtchyan, Nikolay Kocharyan, Mushegh Navasardyan, Hovhannes Avetisyan, Mikayel Ohanyan, Artem Kharatyan, are active participants in the actions of the "Holy Struggle" movement. They have not been charged. All were arrested in different places, in the same way.
They were not even with each other. They had no connection with each other. There was an order, they carried out the order. "They probably saw what cars they came to events in, they stopped the cars on suspicion of having weapons, they searched them, which they had no right to do, they saw that there were no weapons, then they searched them, they said: come to the department tomorrow, or we will take them away.
The people, knowing that they did not do anything, went to the department, where they made a decision to arrest them," says Mkrtich Davtyan.
He filed a report against the police and the investigator. "The arrest was based on obviously false facts, on the basis of which he was deprived of his freedom and also subjected to criminal prosecution."
The lawyer is convinced that depriving people of their freedom illegally is intentional, they are carrying out actions by abusing their official position, and the goal is to intimidate, disgust, so that no one will hold a rally, protest, go out on the streets, and smoothly turn Armenia into a Turkish vilayet.
Almost the same things were found on all the arrested persons during a personal search: a phone, coins, money, one had a pen, the other had a gas gun, for which the person had a permit and showed a certificate.
But the policeman told him that it doesn't matter whether you have a permit or not, you go and that's it. A public criminal proceeding has been initiated under the article of carrying illegal weapons. No weapons were found, but the proceedings were initiated and are not terminated.
