I left the prison 2 months ago, it’s a shameful situation… Grigor Minasyan also says

Human rights defender Karapet Poghosyan, who was deprived of his freedom twice because of his political views, says that in normal countries there are generally no political prisoners, they do not condemn anyone for their political views, they do not deprive them of their freedom.

The human rights defender, who spent his imprisonment in two different penitentiary institutions, states that the situation in the penitentiaries is terrible today.

“I’m telling you with my own example, I left the prison 2 months ago, it’s a completely hopeless situation in terms of health issues. If in the past there was at least a hospital for convicts and the convicts had the opportunity to go there, now they have just opened medical wards.

Let me give my example again, I have several chronic diseases, hypertension – high blood pressure, which was fixed every day in the detention center, I also have diabetes. For exactly 20 days, I was not allowed to take the pills for blood pressure and sugar that I was taking before I was arrested and I am still taking now. Having high blood pressure, only 50 days later, the cardiologist examined me and performed an EKG, electrocardiogram, as a result of complaints.

In other words, I was deprived of medical examination for 50 days, even though I had a high blood pressure of 200 every day. They just gave me an injection, which could regulate the high blood pressure for an hour and that’s it.” of 168.am Karapet Poghosyan mentioned in the conversation with, talking about the cases of deaths registered in the prisons and the prevailing situation, adding that he presents these facts so that everyone knows that there is a bad and discriminatory attitude towards detainees, first of all, discriminatory attitude towards political prisoners.

According to his description, in Armenia, nothing and no one is in its place, because the situation in the penitentiary institutions and in the field of justice is disgraceful.

“In Nubarashen prison, where Arsen Gevorgyan died, unfortunately, the conditions are unbearable, they don’t meet any standards at all. I saw it with my own eyes when I was there in 2024, I know very well what is happening there and the bad conditions. For example, in the “Armavir” penitentiary, the detainee used to go for a walk during the day, which is important for the convicts, but in “Nubarashen” even this walk was a very big problem. We were walking on the highest floor of the building, under the windows. “Imagine, a person with heart problems, who necessarily has to take a walk every day, had a heart attack after standing under those glasses for 5 minutes,” our interlocutor added.

As for Justice Minister Srbuhi Galyan’s statement that the penitentiaries received this condition from the previous authorities, the human rights defender noted that 8 years was enough time to do everything.

“Former minister Grigor Minasyan also said that we will build a new prison. Did he build it or did they just waste the money brought from the Europeans?”

The main responsible for all this is the country’s political leadership, the Minister of Justice, the Minister of Health also has an explanation to give,” emphasized Karapet Poghosyan.

It should be noted that yesterday in the parliament, the chairman of the NA Standing Committee for the Protection of Human Rights, Lilit Galstyan, said that the number of deaths in prisons has doubled, only in 2025, 24 deaths and 8 suicides were recorded.