After Exhausting Domestic Courts in Arsen Babayan's Case, We Will Appeal to the ECHR: Defense Attorney

Arsen Babayan has no expectations regarding the process of being released on the personal guarantees of Avetik Ishkhanian and Artak Beglaryan, considering the illegal acts he has been charged with and deprived of his freedom.

This was stated by Lusine Sahakyan, the defense attorney of Arsen Babayan and a former deputy head of the National Assembly staff, in a conversation with Tert.am, referring to a written appeal directed to the prosecuting authorities by human rights defender and the president of the 'Helsinki Committee of Armenia', Avetik Ishkhanian, and the Human Rights Defender of Artsakh, Artak Beglaryan, who have expressed their willingness to guarantee Babayan's proper behavior during the criminal proceedings.

"We, the defenders, also cannot state what expectations we can have. If the law enforcement bodies were guided by the established legal norms, Arsen Babayan would neither have been charged nor deprived of his liberty. Currently, if they are guided by the law, they should at least immediately release Babayan and cease the criminal prosecution," Sahakyan stated.

She emphasized that under the current circumstances, they have no such expectations. "For this reason, we will present all possible motions and complaints to exhaust domestic courts," the attorney added, noting that after exhausting domestic avenues, they will appeal to the European Court of Human Rights.

It should be noted that Arsen Babayan was arrested on October 21 on suspicion of committing official forgery. Subsequently, the court made a decision to detain him.

According to the Special Investigation Service, during the pre-trial investigation of the criminal case initiated under Article 300, Part 1 of the Criminal Code regarding the usurpation of power, factual data have been obtained indicating that officials committed official forgeries, both personally and through non-official employees, in the process of the former President of the Constitutional Court, Gagik Harutyunyan, relinquishing his powers, based on group interests.

Considering that a new criminal offense has been revealed, the Special Investigation Service has initiated a new criminal case under Article 314, Part 1 of the Criminal Code regarding official forgery, which has been combined with the criminal case concerning the usurpation of power. This case was initiated based on the report of MP Arman Babajanyan.