Thursday,
Ex-General’s Wife Arrested
Armenia - Nazik Amirian, the wife of retired General Manvel Grigorian, at a
news conference in Yerevan, 18 July 2014.
The wife of Manvel Grigorian, a retired army general prosecuted on corruption
charges, was detained late on Wednesday two days after an Armenian
law-enforcement body issued an arrest warrant for her.
The Special Investigative Service (SIS) said Nazik Amirian is suspected of
helping her husband acquire “large quantities” of weapons and ammunition and
keep them at his villas located in and around the town of Echmiadzin.
Grigorian was arrested when security forces raided those properties on June 16.
They found many weapons, ammunition, medication and field rations for soldiers
provided by the Armenian Defense Ministry. They also discovered canned food and
several vehicles donated by Armenians at one of Grigorian’s mansions.
The Armenian parliament last week allowed investigators to prosecute and keep
Grigorian in pre-trial detention on charges of illegal arms possession and
embezzlement. Grigorian, who has been a parliament deputy since 2012, denies
the accusations.
The SIS, which is conducting the high-profile inquiry, decided on Monday to
also arrest Amirian. Explaining the decision, it said that two days after the
ex-general’s arrest police impounded two trucks laden with canned meat also
meant for Armenian military personnel.
According to an SIS statement, the truck drivers told police officials that
Amirian instructed them on June 16 to urgently transport the food from the
Yerevan headquarters of the Yerkrapah Union of Karabakh war veterans to other
locations. General Grigorian has headed Yerkrapah for nearly two decades.
The law-enforcement body made no mention of the confiscated food rations when
it announced Amirian’s arrest. It said she turned herself in to the
“investigating body.”
Earlier on Wednesday, the Armenpress news agency quoted a spokesman for the
Armenian police service as saying that they are still taking “measures” to
track down and detain Grigorian’s wife.
Amirian is the stepmother of Karen Grigorian, who resigned as mayor of
Echmiadzin the day after his father’s arrest. He was charged last Friday with
helping the ex-general misappropriate three vans that were donated to the
military by an Armenian Diaspora organization in Russia in 2016.
The SIS did not arrest Grigorian Jr. and instead had him sign a pledge not to
leave the country until the inquiry is over.
Pashinian Vows To Move Out Of Former Presidential Palace
• Karlen Aslanian
Armenia -- The presidential palace in Yerevan, 31Dec2017.
Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian said on Thursday that he and his staff will no
longer be based in in a building in Yerevan that used to house Armenia’s former
presidential administrations.
In line with a controversial law enacted early this year, the presidential
palace remained the seat of former President Serzh Sarkisian after he was
elected prime minister on April 17 a week after serving out his final
presidential term.
The end of Sarkisian’s decade-long presidency was followed by the country’s
switch to a parliamentary system of government. The new president of the
republic, Armen Sarkissian, has largely ceremonial powers.
The law in question also gave the prime minister offices in another building
where the previous, far less powerful premiers were based. The building located
in Yerevan’s central Republic Square also serves as the venue for weekly
cabinet meetings.
Pashinian has used both buildings since becoming prime minister on May 8 after
a protest movement led by him forced Sarkisian to resign. He had criticized his
predecessor’s decision to convert the presidential palace into the prime
minister’s main office.
“There are criticisms that we are forgetting what we criticized before coming
to power,” Pashinian told members of his cabinet. “This is not the case. Over
time we will fix what we criticized.”
“Over time we will return that building to the presidential staff,” he said
without setting any time frames.
Such a move requires corresponding amendments to the law.
Sarkisian’s Former Security Chief Charged, Remanded In Custody
• Naira Bulghadarian
Armenia - President Serzh Sarkisian (L) and his chief bodyguard Vachagan
Ghazarian, 11 July 2015.
A high-ranking officer who has long led former President Serzh Sarkisian’s
security detail was remanded in custody on Thursday three days after being
arrested on corruption charges.
A court in Yerevan allowed Armenia’s Special Investigative Service (SIS) to
keep Vachagan Ghazarian in detention pending investigation stemming from more
than $2 million worth of cash confiscated from him.
The SIS on Wednesday formally charged him will illegally enriching himself and
failing to disclose the bulk of his massive assets to a state anti-corruption
body.
Ghazarian was detained on Monday five days after police raided his apartment in
Yerevan and found $1.1 million and 230,000 euros ($267,000) in cash there.
The National Security Service (NSS), which made the arrest, said Ghazarian
carried $120,000 and 436 million drams ($900,000) in a bag when he was caught
outside a commercial bank in Yerevan. It said Ghazarian claimed that he was
going to give the money to its “real owner” but refused to identify that person.
According to an NSS statement, Ghazarian was also planning to withdraw 1.5
billion drams ($3.1 million) kept by him and his wife at another Armenian bank.
He claimed that he “forgot” to add these sums to his official income
declarations, added the statement.
Such declarations are mandatory for Armenia’s high-ranking state officials and
their close relatives. Ghazarian, who has the rank of NSS general, was among
them until Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian dismissed him last month as first
deputy head of a security agency providing bodyguards to the country’s leaders.
Detailing the accusations levelled against Ghazarian, the SIS argued that the
cash seized from him “substantially exceeds his legal revenues.” It portrayed
this as clear proof that he “illegally enriched himself.”
It is not clear whether or not Ghazarian will plead guilty to the accusations
carrying between two and six years in prison. His lawyers made no statements
and did not even publicize their names as of Thursday afternoon.
Ghazarian is the first person in Armenia prosecuted on such charges. He worked
as Sarkisian’s chief bodyguard for more than two decades. The ex-president has
not yet commented on the corruption case against one of his most trusted
individuals.
Armenia’s new government has been instrumental in a series of high-profile
corruption inquiries launched against former officials. Prime Minister Nikol
Pashinian has repeatedly pledged to “root out” endemic corruption in the
country since he swept to power about two months ago.
EU Envoy Hails Armenian Anti-Corruption Drive
• Harry Tamrazian
Armenia - Piotr Switalski, head of the EU Delegation in Armenia, speaks at an
event in Yerevan, 24 January 2018.
A senior European Union diplomat on Thursday praised the new Armenian
government’s efforts to combat corruption and said the EU is ready to assist
Yerevan in that campaign.
Piotr Switalski, the head of the EU Delegation in Armenia, also said that the
success of the unprecedented anti-corruption campaign launched by Prime
Minister Nikol Pashinian’s government would make the country more attractive to
foreign investors and donors. “I think that fighting corruption builds a good
image for the country,” he told RFE/RL’s Armenian service (Azatutyun.am).
“We are seeing material proof that the new government is determined to
eradicate corruption and all its manifestations,” Switalski said when asked to
comment on high-profile corruption inquiries launched by the authorities. “What
is equally important is that the new government wants to do it in the framework
of the rule of law, on the basis of legislation and full transparency of the
activities of law-enforcement agencies.”
Switalski also saw mounting “popular intolerance towards corruption.” “I’m so
glad that Armenians now have the courage to talk about it and to show their
opposition towards all manifestations of corruption,” he said. “Well done,
Armenians!”
The EU’s foreign policy chief, Federica Mogherini, similarly hailed last week
“concrete action” taken by the Armenian authorities against various corrupt
practices. Speaking after talks with Armenian Foreign Minister Zohrab
Mnatsakanian, Mogherini also voiced “full support” for their broader reform
agenda.
Switalski said that a team of anti-corruption experts from EU member states
will visit Yerevan in September to advise Armenian officials involved in the
anti-graft drive.
“We are also ready to provide other assistance,” the diplomat went on. “It is
not a big secret that at the recent meeting of the [EU-Armenia] subcommittee on
justice and freedom the Armenian side requested us to provide technical
expertise concerning the recovery of assets accumulated through illegal or
criminal activities.”
“As you know, Europe has quite rich experience in that and we are ready to
share with Armenia this technical experience,” he stressed.
Armenian PM Meets Relatives Of Slain Policemen
Armenia - Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian meets with relatives of police
officers killed in a 2016 standoff with opposition gunmen, .
Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian met on Thursday with close relatives of the
three Armenian police officers who were killed in the July 2016 standoff with
an armed opposition group that seized a police base in Yerevan.
Pashinian discussed what his press office described as their “concerns” raised
with him as two more members of the group were set free pending the outcome of
their ongoing trials.
A total of 13 jailed gunmen have been released on bail to date. They do not
include the leaders of the group calling itself Sasna Tsrer and its two members
accused of killing Police Colonel Artur Vanoyan and Warrant Officers Gagik
Mkrtchian and Yuri Tepanosian. Both men deny the murder charges.
Immediately after seizing the police facility in Yerevan’s Erebuni district,
the three dozen gunmen demanded that then President Serzh Sarkisian free
Zhirayr Sefilian, the jailed leader of their Founding Parliament movement, and
step down. The gunmen, who took police officers and medical personnel hostage,
laid down their weapons after the two-week standoff with security forces.
Armenia - Flowers are laid at a memorial in Yerevan to police officers killed
during a July 2016 standoff with opposition gunmen, 17Jul2017.
Armenian courts holding the three separate trials began freeing the militants
on June 6 the day after Sasna Tsrer issued a statement in which they voiced
support for Pashinian’s government and renounced violent methods of political
struggle.
In late May, the armed group’s top leader, Varuzhan Avetisian, and Sefilian
denounced Pashinian for his reluctance to tell courts to free all radical
oppositionists. They warned that their continued imprisonment could have
“severe consequences” for Armenia. The premier rejected “the threats of
violence.”
Pashinian has publicly listed Sefilian, but not the jailed gunmen, among the
individuals who he believes were imprisoned for political reasons. Shortly
after being elected prime minister on May 8, he said the Erebuni attack case is
“a bit different” because of the three casualties. He said it should be
resolved as a result of public “discussions” that must involve relatives of the
slain policemen.
Armenia - Relatives of police officers killed in a standoff with opposition
gunmen attend a remembrance ceremony in Yerevan, 28Sep2016.
Some of those relatives decried the release of Sasna Tsrer members before the
meeting with Pashinian. The courts have freed them in return for bail and other
guarantees provided by Armenian parliamentarians. Some of those lawmakers are
affiliated with Pashinian’s Yelk alliance.
“I totally share you grief,” Pashinian said at the meeting. “I believe that it
is everyone’s grief because I have always been of the opinion that there must
be no manifestations of violence in solving internal Armenian issues. I am very
happy that the revolution which we carried out took place without any violence,
without a single drop of blood.”
The premier went on to stress that he will avoid “any interference” in the work
of the courts dealing with the Erebuni case. “It is important for me to hear
your views and positions which cannot become court verdicts because I don’t
hand down verdicts and would not want to find myself in such a position.”
“To those bodies that are subordinate to the prime minister I will give
instructions so that they deal with some issues raised by you,” he added.
Pashinian’s press service did not specify what those issues are.
Press Review
“Armenia at last has a government which is waging a fight against corruption,”
writes “Haykakan Zhamanak.” “This is beyond any doubt. It’s just that this
struggle has not yet reached the ‘big sharks,’ which is natural because
Armenia’s law-enforcement system is not prepared for a large-scale and
systematic fight against corruption. Such a task has not been set for this
system for many years.” The paper says the government should therefore act
quickly to take preventive measures against corruption.
“Zhoghovurd” says Armenia is still not doing enough to address problems that
have long prompted criticism from the Council of Europe and its Parliamentary
Assembly (PACE) in particular. The paper says members of the Armenian
delegation at the PACE were busy instead attacking Azerbaijan and its backers
at this week’s session of the Strasbourg-based assembly.
“Aravot” says that the risk of another war with Azerbaijan will not disappear
anytime soon. “The extent of that risk does not depend on whether Armenia is
governed by an authoritarian or democratic regime or how legitimate it is,”
says the paper. In theory, it says, if the recent “velvet revolution” leads to
more democracy and stronger rule of law in Armenia “our country will also get
stronger in the military sense and the danger will decrease.” “But it must be
noted that … in this regard the situation is pretty much the same as it was two
months ago,” it adds.
(Tigran Avetisian)
Reprinted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL
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