Yesterday the Armenian police have formally charged a pro-opposition businessman, owner of Sil Concern and director of the board of ArmEconomBank with “imprisoning a person” in what the latter claims to be a case of persecution over his political views. Charges were filed against Saribek Sukiasyan under Article 133 of the RA Criminal Code (involvement in a group conspiracy to take the life of another from mercenary motives) which envisages prison sentence up to 3-5 years. Let us remember that Saribek Sukiasyan, the younger brother of pro-opposition businessman and former MP Khachatur Sukiasyan, was detained for 72 hours last Friday on suspicion of illegally possessing a gun and threatening to kill Audit Ltd. Director Gor Davtyan. They were released after they signed a paper on not leaving the country during the investigation. The businessman was brought up charges based on Article 136 (threat of murder) of the Criminal Code. "They simply want to snatch our business from our hands and smear our good name. The political motives are evident. I want to inform everyone that they cannot break our will by chasing the Sukiasyans family and filing unfounded charges against us. I hope it doesn’t reach the point when we are forced to disclose the names of all those in the group of bandits. We only follow a business perspective in all we do," said Saribek Sukiasyan.
