How Phone Recordings of Clergymen Are Obtained and Published

According to the newspaper "Patsy", phone conversation recordings of clergymen were leaked yesterday. In some ways, this was anticipated. The conversations that were 'released' yesterday were about intra-church relations. Many expressed the opinion that the authorities are attempting to create 'grounds' for the arrest of the Supreme Patriarch of All Armenians through such 'leaks'. There were also opinions suggesting that they might not go that far. However, with this government, anything can be expected, any negative manifestation.

Yet, there is another side to the issue, namely, the publication of the actual phone conversations. If we assume that these recordings were not fabricated and actually took place, then it is a violation of the confidentiality of phone conversations, which in itself is a crime, as the Mother See pointed out in its statement yesterday.

Incidentally, this is not the first instance of conversations being made public. It may create a preliminary impression that the recording was made by one of the interlocutors and is now being publicized. But considering that we are not talking about just one conversation, and there is another interlocutor involved, it should be assumed that we are dealing with wiretapped phone conversations and their processed publication.

This means that the law enforcement system has intercepted conversations and is publishing and distributing them through the press, effectively using them as a politically and propagandistically 'convenient tool' for senior officials. In any case, this raises serious legal issues. One is the legality of such widespread wiretapping. Another issue is the distribution of these recordings by the media.

It is noteworthy that shortly after the release of the recordings, the 'law enforcement bodies', represented by the Prosecutor General's Office, responded with the following statement: 'The recording circulating on the internet will be subject to examination within the framework of the investigation.' Considering that recent similar 'investigations' have manifested in the form of baseless charges leading to the detention of high-ranking clergy of the Armenian Apostolic Church, it is hard to expect any peaceful resolution (the newspaper was going to print when it became known that a criminal case had been initiated).

However, one question remains the same: will the issue of the acquisition and publication of these recordings become a subject of 'investigation'?...