June 14 was marked in the Armenian calendar as the Day of Remembrance of the Repressed. In a conversation with Aravot, Vardan Harutyunyan, who was repressed during the Soviet years, noted that the persecutions for political purposes in our country started from the Soviet years and continue to the present. In different regions they had development peaks, and in different regions they decreased. For example, in 2004 and 2008, and before and after March 1, according to our interlocutor, quite a lot of people were convicted for political reasons.
In response to the question about if we have people convicted for political reasons now- at least, the oppositionists claim that there are, for example, Avetik Chalabyan, Armen Grigoryan, Igor Khachaturov, Hayk Sargsyan and others- and lawyers warn that people continue the vicious practice of convictions based on the testimony of one police officer, Vardan Harutyunyan answered, “In this case, as far as I know- I, of course, do not know the whole material- but the police who testified were at the scene, or were involved in the incident, the scuffle. In one case, maybe, the police were pulled, in another case, maybe, the police were pulled.
And in the cases I mentioned, the police who testified were not at the scene at all, they just went to court on their instructions and testified. In this respect, these cases are a little different. As for whether they are political persecutions or not, it should be not in the preliminary investigation stage, but in the court, in the trial stage. Human rights activists and human rights organizations, local and international, give those assessments, as they did in the case of 2004, in the case of 2008, and it is a process that must take place. I do not rule out the possibility that, yes, some people are persecuted for political reasons, but I do not fully understand the material for a number of reasons. One of them is that I have not been in the country during the recent developments.”
Judging by the pace of judicial reforms, what results will we have in the near future, as when they came to power in 2018, this government spoke about rapid and systemic changes, but the pace of reforms seemed to slow down, and our interlocutor answered, “I do not see a slow pace, I see a pause. There are promises and talk about it, but I do not see tangible steps, at least today. There are rumors about it again today, but I have already started not to take those rumors seriously, not to believe them. Years have passed, and if there was a goal, a trend, I think we should have seen significant changes. I’m sorry it does not exist. At least I had high expectations that did not come true.” The reason, Vardan Harutyunyan considers, is the lack of political will and program. According to him, the Civil Contract did not have a plan to make changes since coming to power. Or, they do not know what to do, which he also does not consider an excuse.
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Nelly GRIGORYAN
