“Hraparak” journalist as eyewitness
Journalist Lusine Petrosyan will appear as an eyewitness during the next trial for "Hraparak" daily newspaper's lawsuit against Robert Kocharyan.
It was Petrosyan's article entitled "They are eliminating Kocharyan, explaining to Tsarukyan" that became the reason for Robert Kocharyan to demand denial of information that hurt his honor and dignity, as well as compensation worth 6 million drams, including 3 million for slander and offense, and another 3 million for court expenditures.
Today Judge of the Kentron and Nork-Marash districts' first instance court of general jurisdiction Edik Avetisyan partially upheld the sides' petition to invite the journalist as an eyewitness to the 4th trial and denied the petition to hear "Hraparak" editor Armine Ohanyan and Robert Kocharyan as eyewitnesses.
The defendant's lawyer, member of the Chamber of Lawyers Ara Zohrabyan mentioned that there were serious grounds for denying the case because the lawsuit was presented 9 days after one month prescribed by the law.
The defendant was unclear as to which words and expressions were qualified as slander and offense.
The plaintiff mentioned several publications in which, according to the plaintiff, there are such expressions.
After the judge proposed to specify the number of articles on the topic, the plaintiff's lawyer Sargis Grigoryan said that he would leave it up to the court to examine that.
In the end, the judge postponed the trial for a "reasonable period" without mentioning any date with the hope of hearing the eyewitness during the next trial.
