Peace Dialogue NGO changed the basis for the lawsuits filed to the Administrative Court against the Minister of Defence and the Ministry of Defence.

The RA Administrative Court is proceeding with two administrative lawsuits filed by Peace Dialogue. The first case would require the Ministry of Defence to provide official information regarding the fatalities in the RA Armed Forces from 2007-2009 including the full names of the deceased soldiers, the location of the incident, the date, unit number, unit commander’s full name and title, the cause of death and all other unrestricted information. The other case would require the Ministry of Defence to provide similar information for the period 1994-2014 and in addition calls for administrative penalties against Minister Seyran Ohanyan of the Ministry of Defence for ignoring the organization’s inquiry.

So far there has been one preliminary hearing on each of the cases.  During the preliminary hearing the representative of the defendant presented a document stating that the Ministry of Defence authorised him to be present at court, however in this case the defendant is not the Ministry of Defence but the Minister of Defence himself, Seyran Ohanyan.In these conditions the Court did not recognise the credentials of this person and on those grounds the trial was adjourned until July 30,2015.

During the preliminary hearing of the other case on July 9, 2015 the representative of the Ministry of Defence did not show up at all.

Aside from the fact that the representatives of the Ministry of Defence showed up without proper documentation or did not show up at all, there has been no response or any verbal or written objections submitted by the defendant. Whereas, according to Article 86 of the RA Administrative Court, the defendant is obliged to present a response to the lawsuit within a two-week period starting from the day they received the decision that the case is proceeding.

In regards to both cases, Peace Dialogue NGO’s representative, attorney Arthur Soukiasyan motioned to change the basis of the lawsuits. The essence of the changes is that the Ministry of Defence has already provided the organization with similar information before (for the period from 2010 to 2011). Therefore, based on the principle of prohibition of the arbitrariness provided by the Article 7 of the Law on Fundamentals of Administrative Actions and Administrative proceedings, the Ministry of Defence is obliged to display equal approach towards similar factual circumstances and provide the requested information.

In July of 2015 Peace Dialogue launched its one-year project called Awareness Raising Mechanism for the Effective Protection of Human Rights in the Armenian Armed Forces. The project is aimed at raising awareness among local and international communities about the human rights situation in the Republic of Armenia (RA) Armed Forces and mobilizing them to increase public demand for transparency, accountability, and greater respect for human rights in the military.

In the framework of the project, Peace Dialogue will present and promote the website www.safesoldiers.am to citizens living in different regions of Armenia (Lori, Tavush, Vayots Dzor, Ararat, and Syunik regions) in order to raise public awareness of problems in the military. Visitors to the website will be able to anonymously contribute to the database by posting information or uploading photos or other materials about non-combat fatality cases, which happened in the Army. In addition, the project team will urge visitors to report about any other human rights violations in the army that have not been recorded on the website. The website focuses on the period after Armenia and Azerbaijan reached a ceasefire in 1994. Such materials will be carefully reviewed and verified before being posted.

Hundreds of military non-combat deaths have gone without proper and unbiased investigation. In many cases the cause of death has been misrepresented by the military services. Family members, noticing inconsistencies in reports and seeking answers have been generally ignored. Eventually, these non-combat deaths are successfully covered up and forgotten. The purpose of www.safesoldiers.am is to give families knowledge and support in finding answers. The staff of Peace Dialogue believes that quick updates on crimes and human rights violations that take place in any of the military units and are posted by actual witnesses will serve as an alarm to authorities so that appropriate and effective actions can be taken urgently.Furthermore, the website will serve as a source of information for officials and local and international experts in raising awareness and developing solutions for preventing additional human rights violations in the RA military forces.

In addition, the project team will monitor all media, reports of local and international NGOs regarding the non-combat fatalities in the army and will publish the records and reports in the www.safesoldiesr.am database after the relevant review and clarification of the details.

For the additional questions, you can contact as at [email protected] or [email protected].

The project is supported by The Democracy Commission Small Grants program of the Embassy of the United State of America in Armenia.

The opinions, findings and conclusions or recommendations expressed herein are those of the Author’s and do not necessarily reflect those of the Department of State.

The results of the observations carried out by Peace Dialogue NGO regarding the fatalities in the RA and NK armed forces for the first semester of 2015.

The observations revealed 35 death cases in the RA and NK armed forces: 11 death cases occurred in the territory of Armenia while the other 24 cases occurred in the territory of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Based on the data revealed, 22 soldiers died as a result of ceasefire regime violations (7 cases in the RA territory, 15 cases in the NK territory):

1. Karen Grigoryan
2. Vardan Mkrtchyan

Karen Grigoryan and Vardan Mkrtchyan died as a result of the same incident on the night of January 2-3 in the territory of Nagorno Karabakh.

3. Arman Haroutyunyan(January 17^th , RA)
4. Suren Pilosyan(January 20^th, NK)
5. Nahapet Asatryan(January 21^st, NK
6. Arman Udumyan(January 21^st, RA)
7. Karen Galstyan
8. Artak Sargsyan

Karen Galstyan and Artak Sargsyan died as a result of the same incident on January 23 in the territory of Armenia

9. Shakespeare Hakobyan(February 5, NK)
10. Artak Aghekyan
11. Hayk Baroyan

Artak Aghekyan and Hayk Baroyan died as a result of the same incident on February 28^th in the territory of NK

12. Arsen Karapetyan(March 2, NK)
13. Hakob Khachatryan
14. Eduard Hayrapetyan
15. Arshak Haroutyunyan
16. Samvel Hakobyan

Hakob Khachatryan, Eduard Hayrapetyan and Arshak Haroutyunyan died as a result of the same incident on March 19th in the territory of NK, while Samvel Hakobyan died on March 26th in the hospital as a result of the wounds he received during the same incident.

17. Unknown (January 6, NK)
18. Unknown (January 6, NK)

Times.am and Tert.am reported that 2 contractual soldiers died during the incident that occurred on the night of January 5-6 near the border of NK. However, there is no official report about this. NK Defense Army refused to provide any information to Peace Dialogue NGO.

19. Hovsep Andreasyan(March 29^th, NK)
20. Levon Mirzoyan(April 7^th , NK)
21. Hayk Keshishoghlyan(April 7^th , RA)
22. Arman Yepremyan(June 26^th , RA)

4 soldiers committed suicide

1. Samvel Mirzoyan(March 6^th , RA)
2. Haroutyun Hambaryan(May 8^th, NK)

A criminal case was initiated in regards to Horoutyun Hambaryan’s murder case. The preliminary investigation revealed that serviceman of the same military unit D. Haroutyunyan violated the rules of statute, tried to underline his dominance by insulted H.Hambaryan and using force against him. Based on the facts revealed, D. Haroutyunyan was charged under Article 359, Part 1 and Article 360, part 1 of the RA Criminal Code.

3. Edgar Melkonyan(June 11, NK)
4. Mavrik Melikyan(June 30, RA)

4 murder cases were reported

1. Haykaz Barseghyan(January 29^th, RA)

A criminal case has been initiated in regards to Haykaz Barseghyan’s murder case. Officer of the RA MoD Vazgen Sargsyan military institute, Captain Artyom Avetisyan was arrested in regards to the case. The criminal case was initiated under Article 375, Part 1 of the RA Criminal Code: “Abuse of power, transgression of authority or administrative dereliction, if these acts were committed for mercenary or group-interest motives, by a commander or official, and if these inflicted essential damage.”

4 servicemen of the same military unit Vache Sahakyan, Movses Azaryan, Gnel Tevosyan and Norik Sahakyan were charged under Article 104, Part 2, point 7 and 10 of the RA Criminal Code (murder by a group of people out of hooliganism)

2. Tigran Simonyan(February 10, NK)

Within the framework of the criminal case with regards to the death of Tigran Simonyan, soldier of the same unit, senior lieutenant Taron Gedeonyan was arrested. He is suspected of breach of combat duty regulations as a result of negligence or bad faith and causing grave consequences.

3. Armen Osipyan(February 14, NK)
4. Albert Safaryan (February 27, NK)

The preliminary hypothesis of Albert Safaryan’s suicide was refuted

This information was provided by the deceased soldier’s father Emil Safaryan in an interview to NEWS.am.

“The investigator of the case told me that the suicide hypothesis was refuted and that it was in fact a murder, however he did not tell further details. In a few days I will meet the investigator to get acquainted with the materials of the case,” said Mr. Safaryan and mentioned that the preliminary investigation of the case is underway.

One soldier died in unknown circumstances.

1. Hayk Margaryan(March 22, NK)

Three soldiers died as a result of accidents

1. Arthur Vardevanyan(January 17, NK)
2. Arthur Arakelyan(April 9^th , NK)
3. Artyom Tovmasyan (April 17^th , RA )

One soldier died as a result of health issues

1. Khder Saroyan(May 29, RA )

You can download the infographic here infographic eng

A second witness has renounced his testimony given during the preliminary investigation of the tragic death of Manuchar Manucharyan. After stating this, the witness left the court room as a sign of protest.

We have already noted in one of the previous articles (See: Key witness testifies that his testimony was coerced in the wrongful death of Manuchar Manucharyan) that during this same trial where the court is investigating the non-combat death of M. Manucharyan a fellow serviceman Arthur Abrahamyan insisted that his testimony was coerced.

The witness, Mr. Arman Sahakyan had mentioned in his previous testimonies that he was not in the military unit during the days before the incident, however he said that his co-serviceman Libik Mekrtchyan informed him that allegedly defendant Babken Gaboyan bullied, cursed and humiliated deceased soldier Manucharyan a few days before the incident.

The witness also added that he is not an eye-witness of the events and that he only testified on second hand knowledge of what Mr. Libik Mekrtchyan’s told him. It is noteworthy that his testimonies are a word-by-word repetition of Libik Mekrthcyan’s testimonies, even in terms of references and quotes.

The concern that the witness was put under pressure was confirmed at Court when he said that “all the testimony I have given during the preliminary investigation are false and are what the investigators dictated to me to write.” According to the witness, he was questioned in the military unit, the Military Police and the RA MoD Criminal Investigation Service office respectively. Moreover, he was questioned by 5-6 persons in the Military Police. The witness insisted that there was no pressure or threatening against him. However, he mentioned that while testifying in the military unit four hours after the incident he was very depressed emotionally because he had just returned from a leave he took because his grandfather and grandmother died. Because he was depressed and weak-willed he was unable to oppose the investigator’s request and wrote whatever the he told him to write.

During the interrogation of Mr. Sahakayan, the representative of the victim’s family R.Martirosyan drew attention to the fact that the witness was very anxious and could not give complete answers to the questions.

See more articles on this topic:

• Key witness testifies that his testimony was coerced in the wrongful death of Manuchar Manucharyan. 16 June, 2015;
• “Serious questions arise during trial on the unexplained death of Manuchar Manucharyan“. Posted 27 April, 2015;
• An Appeal has been filed against the inaction of the Yerevan Garrison Military Prosecutor’s Office to reopen the death of conscript soldier Manuchar Manucharyan. Posted 02 April, 2015

During the hearing on June 2, 2015 concerning the potential wrongful death of Manuchar Manucharyan, Mr. Arthur Abrahamyan was again called to testify. He had testified before that he was on duty the day of the incident. However, in this appearance, the witness renounced most of his previous testimony given during the preliminary investigation explaining that he had given those testimonies under pressure and threatening.

During the hearing the witness testified that that his testimony was coerced with unacceptable methods of investigation: he was intimidated, threatened with a stick, and beaten. Moreover, it was threatened that his parents would be summoned to testify. Through this and other actions he was forced to give false testimonies and describe events which in fact he had not witnessed and said unequivocally that his testimony regarding the murder was a lie from the beginning to the end and that it has nothing to do with reality.

The witness announced that in fact he did not know Manuchar Manucharyan, which he said he did in his previous testimony. He had testified that he saw Manuchar a few times in the morning of the day the incident happened. He previously testified that he had first seen Manucharyan talking to captain Muradyan, and that later he saw Manuchar together with Babken Gaboyan entering a room in the unit for household duties and then the latrine, after which Manucharyan came out with his head lowered and depressed.

Using this and other testimony, the preliminary investigative body sought to justify the hypothesis that M. Manucharyan committed suicide and that he was driven to commit suicide. Mr. A. Abrahamyan does not know the names and the surnames of those who threatened him and forced to give false testimonies, however at court he announced that they were wearing uniforms and that he was questioned in the “investigative department”. He also added that he can recognize these people if he sees them again.
Mr. A. Abrahamyan, the witness, also informed the court that he was testified more than six times, however he also said that he does not remember exactly how many times it was. The testimonies were extorted from the witness by two or three persons, who, as expected, did not explain to the witness his rights. The facts are that his first testimony is dated sixteen days after the incident. The investigator V. Haroutyunyan violated a number of provisions of the law in his report as he did not mention the exact location of the crime scene; he mentioned only city Yerevan and it is also improper that he questioned the witness late in the evening, from 9:45-11:40 p.m.

It is important to note, that Mr. A. Abrahamyan’s false testimony serves as a basis not only for the indictment but also for the posthumous forensic psychological examination. Moreover, based on this so-called “evidence” forensic psychologist Elda Grin concluded that the actions of the two defendants Gaboyan and Stepanyan could cause M. Manucharyan to commit suicide.

See more articles on this topic:

• “Serious questions arise during trial on the unexplained death of Manuchar Manucharyan“. Posted 27 April, 2015
• An Appeal has been filed against the inaction of the Yerevan Garrison Military Prosecutor’s Office to reopen the death of conscript soldier Manuchar Manucharyan. Posted 02 April, 2015