Category: 2022

ArmInfo. The Prosecutor General’s Office sent to the Investigative Committee a recording of the conversation between current head of the Supreme Judicial Council  (SJC) Gagik Jhangiryan, SJC member Stepan Mikayelyan and former  Chairman of the SJC Ruben Vardazaryan, which the latter made public  during a press conference on June 20. Gor Abrahamyan, adviser to the  Prosecutor General of Armenia, announced this on his Facebook page.  He noted that the audio materials were sent to the Investigative  Committee for a complete, objective and comprehensive verification.

It should be noted that during a press conference today, Ruben  Vardazaryan, whose powers as chairman of the Supreme Judicial Council  were suspended, presented a scandalous record in which Gagik  Jhangiryan demanded that the current head of the Supreme Judicial  Council leave his post.

“I was going to publish an audio recording, but I was deprived of  this opportunity,” Ruben Vardazaryan said. According to him, it  becomes clear from this record why a political decision was made that  he should not serve as chairman of the Supreme Judicial Council.

It should be noted that after the publicity of the recording, which  was made in February 2021, the Supreme Judicial Council stated that  it would not comment on it, emphasizing that the recording was made  without the knowledge of the head of the Supreme Court of Justice.

The “Armenia” bloc also published a statement in connection with the  incident, which says that the recording contains a comparison of the  obvious elements of a crime, illegal interference in the composition  of the Constitutional Court, facts of interference in criminal cases  and threats in case of failure to comply with specific requirements.

“These circumstances should be the subject of an investigation by  those law enforcement agencies who, in fact, according to the  published recording, may be given instructions on mandatory execution  by the well- known member of the Supreme Judicial Council Gagik  Jhangiryan. The recording also contains promises to interfere in  political activities, and its consequences are actually recorded by  the international community allegedly fair and transparent  parliamentary elections,” the statement said.

Gagik Jhangiryan was appointed to the post of chairman of the head of  the SJC  at a closed meeting on April 15, 2021, while Vardazaryan did  not officially resign.  

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ArmInfo. With the support of the West and Iran, Armenia managed to make adjustments to the “corridor” logic promoted by Azerbaijan since the signing of the tripartite  statement of November 9, 2020. A similar opinion was expressed to  ArmInfo by head of chairman of the “Free Citizen” Civic Initiatives  Support Centre, political analyst Hovsep Khurshudyan.

“Initially, I was convinced that Russia, let’s say, was not at all  against this logic, in fact promising Aliyev a green corridor through  the territory of Armenia. However, it is already clear that the  “simplified regime” of land communication between Azerbaijan and  Nakhichevan, the already agreed railway communications between  Armenia and Azerbaijan, the finalization of other issues of this  case, without any doubt, provides for the recognition of Armenian  sovereignty. And there are no other interpretations here and cannot  be,” he stressed.

In the analyst’s opinion, the change of approaches from corridor to  sovereign ones indicates that the Russian Federation is far from  succeeding in everything that it initially plans to implement in the  South Caucasus. The reason for this is the interests, respectively,  the position of the EU and Iran. Meanwhile, from the very beginning,  it was in Moscow’s interests to provide Azerbaijan with a corridor  through Armenia, which would be under its full border control. In  accordance with the same statement of November 9th.

According to his estimates, initially the Armenian customs control on  the territory of the “corridor” was not envisaged at all. And  Azerbaijani vehicles were supposed to move through the territory of  Armenia exclusively accompanied by Russian border guards. However,  everything changed with unequivocal statements by the US, the EU and  the Russian Federation itself, according to which the deblockade of  communications would take place, taking into account the sovereignty  of the participating states.  “It is clear that Azerbaijan and the  Russian Federation do not like all this. But these are the new  geopolitical realities. Since the fall of 2020, much has changed.  Including in our region.  And the undisguised interest of the West  and Iran in the Syunik region of Armenia is evidenced by the at least  regular visits of EU ambassadors and US ambassadors there. Moreover,  Iran opens a consulate in Meghri. So the situation has already  changed and continues to change further,” the analyst concluded. 

ArmInfo. In a normal country, after such a press conference Ruben Vardazaryan would already be looking at the sky through prison bars. A similar opinion was expressed to  ArmInfo by head of the Armenian Institute of International Relations  and Security Stepan Safaryan.

Yesterday, the Chairman of the Supreme Judicial Council Ruben  Vardazaryan (powers suspended), as evidence of the political  motivation of the criminal case initiated against him, presented a  recording of his conversation with acting Chairman of the Supreme  Council Gagik Jhangiryan. During which Jhangiryan persuades his  interlocutor to leave the post under the guarantee of the absence of  criminal prosecution in the future. According to adviser to the  Prosecutor General of Armenia, Gor Abrahamyan, the recording was sent  to the Investigative Committee “for a complete, objective and  multilateral verification.”

“Vardazaryan’s testimony against himself is extremely surprising. I  can’t say to what extent with this recording he harmed Jhangiryan,  but I can say that he definitely drowned himself. One thing is clear,  the Supreme Judicial Council must be dissolved with such leadership  and such judges, completely, and as soon as possible. With such a  composition of the Supreme Court of Justice, it simply has no right  to exist. The street lexicon, the swear words of these people are a  real disaster for the judicial system. Not to mention their actions  themselves,” he believes.

Safaryan noted that according to the same recording, it is only  Jhangiryan who prevents the initiation of all three criminal cases  instead of only one criminal case against Vardazaryan. Accordingly,  in his opinion with such radical steps, Vardazaryan is trying to drag  all the other people associated with his dark deeds to the bottom.  According to Safaryan, there are a lot of cases, which are on  Vardazaryan’s conscience. Several of which he is preparing to publish  personally.

“One way or another, we learned a lot from the recording: About the  Supreme Judicial Council, about the Armenian judicial system as a  whole, about Jhangiryan, about Vardazaryan himself, about the judge  of the Court of Cassation Stepan Mikayelyan, about how Jangiryan  “suspended” the criminal cases, about how Jhangiryan organized the  army service of Artur Vanetsyan. And I can only guess how many  criminal and civil cases and lawsuits were ” suspended ” in this way  by these “most worthy representatives” of our “fairest” judicial  system in the world,” Safaryan summed up.   -sh-  

ArmInfo.Acting head of the Supreme Judicial Council (SJC) Gagik Jhangiryan cannot participate in the consideration of disciplinary proceedings against Ruben  Vardazaryan, including in terms of making a decision. Lawyer Aram  Vardevanyan, a MP from the “Armenia” opposition faction, stated this  referring to the scandalous recording of the conversation between  Jhangiryan and the dismissed head of the Supreme Judicial Council  Ruben Vardazaryan, which was released yesterday.

According to him, from a legal point of view, there are several  indisputable starting points for the situation around the  SJC-Jhangiryan.

Vardevanyan added that having a number of subjective observations,  however, he will confine himself to presenting objective ones.

“Firstly, a criminal case should be initiated against Gagik  Jhangiryan.  Secondly, Gagik Jhangiryan cannot participate in the  consideration of disciplinary proceedings against Ruben Vardazaryan,  including in terms of making a decision. Given the first  circumstance, Jhangiryan’s powers must inevitably be suspended, it  will apply to all proceedings.  And thirdly, irreparable damage has  been done to the reputation of the judiciary, especially the SJC, and  the legitimacy of the 2021 elections,” Vardevanyan concluded.  It  should be noted that on June 20, the temporarily dismissed Chairman  of the Supreme Judicial Council Ruben Vardazaryan presented a  scandalous recording of a conversation with Acting Chairman of the  Supreme Judicial Council Gagik Jhangiryan and a member of the Supreme  Judicial Council Stepan Mikayelyan, which took place on February 20,  2021. In this conversation, Jhangiryan persuades Vardazaryan to leave  his post, while asking him to do it “for good, quietly and  peacefully.” He advises to think about the future of children, family  and assures that if he leaves, then all criminal cases initiated  against him will be terminated. “I guarantee you this as long as I’m  alive,” according to the recording Jhangiryan said.  

After the recording was published, the Prosecutor General’s Office  announced that the recording of the conversation between Gagik  Jhangiryan, member of the SJC Stepan Mikayelyan, and Ruben  Vardazaryan, had been sent to the Investigative Committee for study.  

And the Supreme Judicial Council (SJC) reported that the decision on  the case against Vardazaryan would be made public on June 23.  It  should be reminded that Gagik Jhangiryan was appointed Acting  Chairman of the Supreme Judicial Council (SJC) at a closed meeting on  April 15, 2021. Prior to this, Vardazaryan’s powers were suspended,  however, he never officially resigned.

ArmInfo. The Government of the Russian Federation has decided to establish an additional checkpoint for vehicles a few kilometers from the Upper Lars checkpoint, the  press service of the State Revenue Committee (SRC) of the Republic of  Armenia reports.

“The State Revenue Committee and the Ministry of Territorial  Administration and Infrastructure jointly inform that, in accordance  with the agreement reached by the Republic of Armenia as a result of  working negotiations with the Russian Federation, on June 20, the  Government of the Russian Federation decided to allocate additional  territory 3-4 km away from the Upper Lars international automobile  checkpoint pass of the North Ossetian Customs of the North Caucasus  Customs Administration, where it will also be possible to carry out  procedures related to customs control of about 250 vehicles”, the  State Revenue Committee said in a statement.

It is noted that this adjustment will have a positive impact in terms  of increasing the capacity of the checkpoint, reducing vehicle  congestion and proper management of existing queues.