Defense Lawyers to Appeal Conviction of Armenian Oppositionists

Lawyers representing “Founding Parliament” civil initiative appealed on Tuesday, April 14, the court's decision to imprison opposition movement member Varuzhan Avetisyan. Today, April 15, the lawyers plan to appeal the criminal conviction of the other four arrested members of “Founding Parliament," Jirayr Sefilian, Garegin Chugaszyan, Pavel Manukyan, and Gevorg Safaryan. 

Recall, the oppositionists were detained on April 7, and charged with organization of mass disorder (RA Criminal Code Article 225 Section 1) on April 9. They were sentenced to a two-month imprisonment.

The decision to appeal has been made with the permission of the arrested leaders of the opposition movement, lawyer Hayk Grigoryan said in an interview with Epress.am. 

Note that “Founding Parliament” leaders have always spoken against cooperation with law enforcement authorities, stating that they only served the interests of the ruling regime. The initiative did not even turn to the police after the incident on the Nagorno-Karabakh border. 

“This is not a political issue anymore as they are now imprisoned. We do not know how long the violations of the law by the authorities are going to last, so we find it necessary to have all those violations on paper to be able to file an appeal to the European Court of Human Rights in the future,” said Grigoryan.

Pavel Manukuyan has ended his 6-day-long hunger strike at his friends' insistence, the lawyer also informed Epress.am. 

Recall, three of the arrested oppositionists, Sefilian, Avetisyanm and Manukyan, were transferred to Vardashen penitentiary, while Chugaszyan and Safaryan –  to Nubarashen penitentiary.