Another political prisoner to be freed in Armenia
The Parole Board of the Sevan Penitentiary Institution today made a decision on releasing Armenian National Congress (HAK) activist Aram Bareghamyan on parole.
Arsen Babayan, a spokesman for the Department of Penitentiaries at the Ministry of Justice, confirmed the news, the case will be discussed by an independent parole board and forwarded to court for a final conclusion.
Aram Bareghamyan was arrested on March 9, 2008 on violence charges. The arrest followed the post-election clashes between the opposition and the police on March 1, 2008. In the morning of March 1, Bareghamyan was brutally beaten in the crackdown in Liberty Square. He was arrested a week later.
Bareghamyan was charged under Article 316 of the Armenian Criminal Code (violence against a representative of the authorities) and Article 112 (infliction of willful heavy damage to health).
He was sentenced to six years in prison.
Aram was the head of Levon Ter-Petrosyan's presidential campaign headquarters in the city of Hrazdan, and an electoral proxy for Ter-Petrosyan during the 2008 presidential elections.
