Samvel Alexanyan summoned to court
Republican lawmaker Samvel Alexanyan is to appear in the Court of Kentron and Nork-Marash administrative districts on September 12. Today Judge Karine Petrosyan refused to accept Alexanyan’s application in which he denied his connection with the controversial Pak Shuka (Covered Market). The judge also decided to summon the affluent businessman to court. This came after Karo Yeghnukian, a member of the civil initiative calling itself “Let’s Liberate the Monument from the Oligarch,” sent letters to the prosecutor general and the chief of Armenian police, asking them to prosecute the person(s) who attached a placard with his photo to the facade of the market. Yeghnukian said that the placard was placed with the aim of ‘inciting hatred, discrimination and violence’ against him. The placard with a photo of Karo Yeghnukian has been on the market’s façade for several days. The placard says: “Mason”, “No to Hired Oppositionists”, “No to Grant-Eaters”, “No to Foreign Spies” etc. The placard appeared on the façade of the market after the activist expressed his support for the campaign ‘Let’s Liberate the Monument from the Oligarch.’ Yeghnukian claims that the placard could not have appeared on the building without Alexanyan’s knowledge and demands that Alexanyan apologize to him for insulting his dignity and business reputation. The agricultural market known as Pak Shuka reopened in the Armenian capital in November 2013 after nearly two years of controversial renovation that activists say has distorted its original architectural form. The major part of the building has been turned into a huge supermarket, stirring up protests against the construction.
