Kocharyan calls his prosecution «legal hooliganism»

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YEREVAN, 11 October. /ARKA/. Former Armenian President Robert Kocharyan has called his ongoing prosecution a «legal hooliganism» as the Armenian Anti-Corruption Court launched hearings today into the 2008 March 1 case./pp

The case dates back to late February and early March 2008 following the disputed presidential election, when then prime minister Serzh Sargsyan was declared the winner, angering the opposition, led by the first Armenian president Levon Ter-Petrosyan and setting off 10 days of nonstop protests that led to a crackdown on March 1, in which 10 people were killed and more than 200 injured./pp

According to Kocharyan, what is happening around him more resembles a genre of absurdity. ‘This has absolutely nothing to do with jurisprudence and justice. This case was kept in the Court of Cassation for 3 years. They (the authorities) then managed to change the composition of the Constitutional Court, after which it took a very strange decision,’ Kocharyan told journalists. Kocharyan noted that there is no concrete accusation against him./pp ‘I believe that this case was submitted to the Anti-corruption Court in order to find a solution. However, there is no legal solution here... In general, what is happening now is legal hooliganism,’ he said.nbsp;/pp

Kocharyan also stated that he and his team had every right to pursue politics while the country was in danger.br Kocharyan recalled that after the end of his presidential term in 2008 he retired from political activities, but since 2018 politics itself has taken over./pp ‘I served as President and Prime Minister. It is not a sweet treat, I must say, as it seems to those who cherish it. I didn’t want to go back into politics, but the threats that the country faced forced me to do so, he said./pp

Earlier two first instance courts had discontinued criminal proceedings against Kocharyan. But later the Court of Cassation referred the case to the Anti-Corruption Court for reconsideration on the grounds that the provisions of the Criminal Code had been misinterpreted, and that, in view of the large number of victims, those responsible should be punished./pp

The General Prosecutor’s Office reported that in the actions of the second president and other defendantsnbsp; of March 1 case there are signs of another crime./pp

It noted that the Anti-Corruption Chamber of the Court of Cassation on September 12 overturned the decision of a general court to terminate the criminal case against Robert Qocharyan, former deputy prime minister Armen Gevorkyan, former defense minister Seyran Ohanyan, former Chief of the General Staff Yuri Khachaturov./pp

Thenbsp;defendants in March 1 casenbsp;were accused of overthrowing the constitutional order during the mass protests on March 1, 2008. -0-/p brp/p