THEY DEMAND JUDGE’S RESIGNATION

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“Let’s honour the victims of March 1 with a minute of silence,” Judge Mnatsakan Martirosyan said at the beginning of today’s trail of the case against seven opposition activists. Though the judge’s offer was unanimously accepted, indignant shouts were heard throughout the courtroom, “You killed them in order to honour later!’

The opposition leaders tried to calm them down.

At the beginning of the trial Judge Martirosyan presented the sides their rights and the indictment. Shortly afterwards Stepan Voskanyan, the advocate of Abovian’s former Mayor Grigor Voskerchyan, petitioned the judge to tender a rejection. Voskanyan grounded his petition for the3 fact that “Martirosyan has announced numerous indictments on March 1 and suspended pre-trial restraints.”

Shant Harutyunyan was very active at today’s trial. He filed a petition to hear his case separately as he had fought against the Russian Federation. He noted that on March 1 desperate people had begged asylum from the Russian Embassy. Meanwhile, a man was shot dead in front of the embassy. According to Shant Harutyunyan the shot might have been fired by the embassy employees. Therefore, Shant Harutyunyan urged to invite the embassy representatives to the trial.

Shant Harutyunyan and Mnatsakan Martirosyan soon started a heated argument. Ex Foreign Minister Alexandre Arzumanyan called the judge to order and said, “If you say in the name of Armenia, do not forget that we were the founders of the Republic of Armenia!” He reminded that as a foreign minister he had signed a number of agreements, and Judge Mnatsakan Martirosyan is bound to commit them and dismiss the case.

Prosecutor Koryun Piloyan found the petition ungrounded. The court has retired to consider the petition.