New, important details about March 1 case

Director of the Special Investigative Service Sasun Khachatryan has disclosed new details over the ongoing March 1 investigation. Speaking to reporters today at a press conference which was initially about the wiretapping of a phone conversation between him and National Security Service director Arthur Vanetsyan, he first of all said that they have discovered the top secret 0038 order, which hasn’t been included in the criminal case for more than 10 years.

“When the top secret order was discovered it became clear that the army has participated in these events. Moreover, the army has taken part since February 23 [2008], and by the secret order a terming was made what after assessing the election results as fair and free certain individuals and organizations do not accept it and are causing unrest. Please take into account that the order was issued on February 23rd, meaning one day before the central electoral commission published the election results. Meaning, one day ahead Robert Kocharyan and Michael Harutyunyan were aware that the central electoral commission was to declare Serzh Sargsyan as the winning candidate, and that international structures were to assess this election as free and fair. And in this case an order is signed to bring the army to a barracks state and to prevent the peaceful demonstrations,” Khachatryan said.

He said that when the investigation revealed that under the 0038 order mobile and stationed groups were formed, Robert Kocharyan’s lawyers made statements claiming that these groups were formed in order not to allow Gagik Melkonyan and Manvel Grigoryan to involve the army in certain processes.

“They were making such arguments which to say the least aren’t serious. After this they said that the army didn’t participate in the March 1 events, and that it was brought to a barracks state. Our investigation has already revealaed that not only has the army taken part in the March 1 events, it has opened gunfire, the army has shot at the direction of people’s apartments. We have specific evidence that servicemen of the armed forces of Armenia have opened automatic gunfire in the direction of the buildings in Leo Street [Yerevan], after a burning bottle has been thrown from someplace in the balconies. Meaning, the army has taken part in those operations with its entire volume,’ Khachatryan said.