On December 10, which was the international day of human rights protection, the Armenian National Congress held a small demonstration, which was followed by March.
Last year the ANC held such march too. This one was different than the march of last year and the participants were demanding from the authorities the immediate release of the political prisoners and stop human rights violations in Armenia.
“Today’s demonstration is dedicated to the protection of the Armenian citizens’ human rights. Serzh Sargsyan’s decision and the demand of the international community are the results of the struggle of our people. We will continue struggling as far as there are political prisoners, killed people and as far as the culprits of those killings are free,” said the ANM board chairman Aram Manukyan.
Former military prosecutor Gagik Jhangiryan said in his speech that the freedom of their friends who are political prisoners are in the hands of people and they are the ones who will solve that problem. “These guys have silently born all the troubles while being in jail but they have still remained strong,” he said.
A lot of people from the opposition were there to take part in the demonstration, but the ANC leader Levon Ter-Petrosyan, PPA leader Stepan Demirchyan and Republic party leader Aram Sargsyan were not there. Aram Sargsyan is in the US.
The leader of Democratic Fatherland party Petros Makeyan blamed also the international organizations in addition to the authorities for the situation in Armenia. He believes these institutions externally accept the human rights protection as a higher value but not pay a due attention to the post-Soviet states. “They accept the fact that we are not mature enough to have democracy. They have their interests and due to their interests they are ignoring the situation in this country. The only way out of this situation is to get rid of the cleptocratic authorities in a fast and non-standard manner. We should give an opportunity to the society to elect their authority to serve their needs but not like the incumbent authorities, who make people serve for their own needs. Not only the cleptocratic power is guilty in this situation, but the society is guilty too because they have tolerated this situation for ten years,” said P.Makeyan.
A.Manukyan also said that the ANM board had applied to the EU institutions and the US government not to issue entry visas to those people who have given fake testimonies on the event of March 1, made fake decisions, carried out fake prosecutor’s functions, and those who have committed violence and supported to the process of keeping political prisoners in the country. We have clarified the list of such people. Vardan Harutyunyan’s “Right Freedom Center” has joined the ANM’s initiative as well. During the demonstration ANC representative Davit Harutyunyan made a speech too and he said that it was the beginning of another phase for releasing political prisoners. “The day when all our political prisoners will be here is close. The cleptocracy is cracking. It is their business, and our goal is to make the whole team leave the power and not to exploit the society anymore. These people are solving only the problem of keeping their power and becoming richer. I am announcing with the same sense of responsibility that they will have to leave too,” announced Davit Shahnazaryan.
“No one gives rights for free; rights are deserved. Nobody gives freedom, freedom is achieved,” said ANC coordinator Levon Zurabyan.
He says that after the political prisoners are released they will struggle for media and TV in order to enable the society elect their authority.
The director of Mkhitar Heratsi collage Ashot Bleyan was participating in the demonstration too. He says that it is shame for Armenia to have political prisoners. He believes the third republic of Armenia has not been formed because of the fact that we have failed to do our fourth responsibility. “The citizens are obligated the responsibility to respect the law, protect the country and pay the taxes. But there is another responsibility, the fourth responsibility, which I believe is very important too, and it is the responsibility for fighting for your rights and the rights of others. Because if you don’t struggle for your rights and the rights of others, you cannot have the republic you are tending to have. If there is no civic control, there is no civic power and there is no civic society,” said Bleyan.
The opposition marched through the Mashtots-Amiryan-Nalbandyan-Tumanyan streets and ended the march in the North Avenue. There were no incidents during the march.