Month: July 2022

War changes people, their lives and dreams. Sargis Harutyunyan, a soldier from Artsakh, lost his friends and both legs during the 44-day war in 2020, but when he was in hospital he made up his mind never to fall into despair, fight on and move forward.

Sargis was born in the village of Aknaberd in Artsakh’s Shahumyan region, which is about 70 km away from Karvachar. After graduating from school, he entered the Stepanakert Vocational School. After two years of study, Sargis was drafted into the army.

He had already been serving for 1.5 years when the war broke out. He served in Martakert and was on combat duty at the military position which Hero of Artsakh Robert Abajyan defended. On September 27, he was on duty when an alarm was sounded. Sarkis and his fellow soldiers thought it was just another alarm, but shortly afterwards the Azerbaijani military started shelling their military unit.

At first the troops were moved to shelters, two or three hours later they left them and headed to the combat positions. Sargis was at the Martakert positions until 22 October, then his unit was moved to Martuni, and later to Chartar, remaining there until the end of the war.

On October 28, Sargis fought his last battle. “We suffered a lot of casualties, but we refused to leave our post until the end,” he says.

After suffering an injury, he was taken to the Martuni hospital, but on the way the ambulance overturned and he was taken to the hospital by a second car with great difficulty. The young man remembers that day in visceral detail as he was conscious. He lost it only when the hospital doctors said he had been saved. He opened his eyes already in the Stepanakert hospital and two days later he was transported to Yerevan. He stayed in Heratsi Hospital Complex until November 21, where he underwent three surgeries.

Sargis tries not to recall the hellish days of war, the pain stifles him when he recalls his dead friends… He tries to look forward and fight on.

Getting acquainted with Lieutenant-Colonel Sargis Stepanyan, head of the Federation of Disabled Athletes of Armenia and multiple European and world champion in armwrestling, was fateful for the Artsakh man. Thanks to his support, Sargis not only overcame his mental health problems, but also after getting prosthetic legs he started going to the gym founded by Sargis Stepanyan, fully recovered and then began to participate in competitions.

“The very first meeting with Sargis Stepanyan changed a lot in my life. Thanks to him I changed my outlook on life. After the prosthetics I started to recover and try my hand at armwrestling. Not only me, but also many of my friends followed his example. I do not know what would have happened if I had not met him, whether I would have been able to overcome my mental issues so quickly. I had never taken up sports before the war, but now I can’t imagine my life without it,” Sargis Harutyunyan tells Panorama.am.

He took part in armwrestling championships organized by the Federation of Disabled Athletes of Armenia, earning the champion’s title. Then he competed at the world and European championships.

Sargis Harutyunyan won gold at the 24th European & Para Armwrestling Championships in Bucharest in May, defeating his Turkish rival.

The next competition is scheduled to be held in September in Turkey. “We should definitely win. I defeated the Turk, we have to make sure we win in Turkey as well,” Sargis says.

The Artsakh athlete is now thinking about achieving greater success in the sport. He does not exclude that he will work as a coach in the future, saying he sees his future in Artsakh.

Sargis got married a few months ago. His spouse, Tatev, is also from Artsakh. Together they try to support each other and overcome difficulties they face. According to him, during the war he lost his fellow soldiers, friends of childhood and youth. His wife’s brother was also among the war victims. Sargis and Tatev dream of living and raising their children in Artsakh. Sargis’ parents are building a house for their son in Aknaberd.

“I only feel good in Artsakh and I must go back. My children must live in Artsakh. The presence of the enemy there is a matter of time. The enemy has no place in our land, now it is in Artsakh, but it won’t stay there in the future,” Sargis adds.

Two years ago, on July 20, Hayk Karapetyan was appointed CEO of HayPost in order to carry out the digital transformation of the company. Huge changes were made at HayPost under Hayk Karapetyan’s leadership both towards digital transformation and in the courses of human resources, tariffs, commercial, customer service, mail exchange organization and international areas, the postal operator said on Monday.

HayPost ecosystem was built under the five-year development strategy of HayPost adopted in 2020, affiliated companies were established, and many new products and services were launched: iNovation, HayPost Retail, HayPost Med, Ber-Ber, Armoteca, etc.

This stage of transformation successfully ends with the launch of the juridically certified mail. The cooperation between Hayk Karapetyan and HayPost finishes from 25 July.

The trial in the case of opposition activist Avetik Chalabyan, a member of the Unification Movement, is to start soon, his defense team told a news conference in Yerevan on Monday, presenting the illegalities recorded during the preliminary investigation of the case.

Avetik Chalabyan has been illegally held in pre-trial custody for two and a half months now in a fabricated criminal case, and the defense team is preparing to mediate open court hearings, through which they will have the opportunity to present the absurdity of the case. The defense team is preparing to challenge the constitutionality of the article submitted to the charge.

“First, despite the fact that the new criminal code entered into force on July 1, 2022, on the same day we submitted a corresponding motion to the pre-trial body to qualify the possible act under the relevant article of the new criminal code, but the said motion was actually left without examination, because that no response has been received so far. Then the court included obviously false information in its decision and extended Avetik Chalabyan’s detention period on the basis of said false information. Incidentally, the investigator did not carry out a procedural action to introduce the case materials. The temptation was so great to keep Chalabyan in detention that they went the way of a rough law violation, if you like, a criminal violation,” Varazdat Harutyunyan, Chalabyan’s attorney, said, pointing to the numerous violations committed during the preliminary probe.

“It’s been 2.5 months that I have been held hostage by the authoritarian regime ruling the country. If at the beginning of all these processes there was a tinny suspicion on the essence of the case, now the facts make it obvious that this is an organized reprisal that is happening to me and already to my family. However, my case is just one link in the long chain of repressions that have been taking place against patriotic and decent citizens, starting from the ordinary soldier to the former president of the country, during the last four years, but especially after the war ingloriously lost by the regime. All this is taking place under the silent gaze of many Western institutions, which seem to have forgotten their fundamental commitments regarding the establishment of democracy and the rule of law, and based only on their well-known geopolitical considerations, look with indulgence at the celebration of illegalities unfolding in our country,” Chalabyan’s wife, Anahit Adamyan, read out his message from Armavir Penitentiary.

“The arrest of Avetik Chalabyan should sound as an alarm for our society, which is still in a deep slumber, and until now has not noticed this injustice or paid due attention to it. Imprisoning a well-respected public figure without any reason, prolonging his imprisonment at any cost, and persecuting his family member is nothing but a sign of confirmation of the dictatorship of one person. In relation to this particular case, the circumstance of usurpation of the power was demonstrated. the instruction to the National Assembly to recriminalize the act blamed on Avetik and the instructions to the courts to arrest Avetik in the absence of a basis for it. Toleration of this injustice will affect all of us,” said a member of the Unification Movement, candidate of historical sciences and associate professor, Menua Soghomonyan.

The trial in Chalabyan’s case begins on July 26 and the defense group calls the attention of mass media and human rights organizations to present the many illegalities and absurdities of the case to the public through participation in open hearings.