We do not grow weary and are used to struggling - says President of A1+ Company
The Prosecutor General’s Office has overturned the decision of the Special Investigative Service (SIS) to dismiss the case filed for obstructing the professional activities of Marine Khachatryan, a journalist working for A1+ Company. The Prosecutor General’s Office remitted the case to the SIS for further review and instructed to recognize Marine Khachatryan as an aggrieved party. “This is really encouraging that the Prosecutor General’s Office made a decision on the case that was delayed artificially and entered into a ridiculous situation,” says Mesrop Movsesyan, President of A1+ Company. Ashot Melikyan, Chairman of the Committee of Committee for Protection of Freedom of Speech, says the case is to be investigated from the very beginning and this would be the third probe into the same case. In the previous two times, Khachatryan was summoned to the SIS for questioning as a witness. “It is evident that the SIS does not want to conduct an impartial investigation. When an investigator refuses to admit that a journalist has been attacked and hit, he does not have the right to work in the system,” says Mr Melikyan. Mesrop Movsesyan adds that by instituting criminal cases and then dismissing them, they [SIS] are testing the patience of the journalistic community. “I want to warn them that they we shall not of their actions. We got used to struggling and waiting for years,” he said. On September 9, after members of the Hakaharvats (Counterblow) street art group hung a banner reading “Hello Rob” (Rob referring to Armenia’s second President Robert Kocharyan) on the National Assembly’s main gate, the chief of the NA security Karen Hayrapetyan came out and tore down the banner. Then he hit A1+’s journalist Marine Khachatryan, who was covering the incident, on the arm, causing her to drop her recording device – iPad – to the ground. Hayrapetyan later said that Khachatryan wasn’t wearing her press badge and he assumed she was a member of the Counterblow group. “All these processes occurring around us are very ridiculous. They resemble a show with trained monkeys where everyone knows their roles and have been automatically performing these roles for many years,” said Mr Movsesyan.
