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VIDEO: Two Women Threaten to Set Themselves on Fire in Yerevan’s Liberty Square

Yerevan resident Gohar Shiflikyan is prepared to set herself on fire in Liberty Square. She announced a hunger strike today and sat in the square holding a bottle full of gasoline and a poster that read the hunger strike was being staged against RA General Prosecutor Aghvan Hovsepyan.

“If anyone prohibits me from staging a hunger strike, I’ll self-immolate,” she announced.

Shiflikyan described how she purchased an apartment and all the documents were lawfully completed only to find out later that the same apartment was purchased by an additional five people and now the notary office is demanding the apartment be split into 5 parts.

“Aghvan Hovsepyan seized my apartment 17 years ago, then I took money out on loan and bought this apartment, and now 5 notaries are cheating, they’re splitting it in 5 parts, you split into 5 parts,” she shouted, while a young man snatched the bottle full of gasoline from her hands.

“I am stating, tomorrow I will come with the gasoline [already] poured on me, it’s okay,” she said, not really explaining who was responsible and for what reason her apartment was “stolen” from her.

Standing with Shiflikyan was her daughter-in-law, who spoke with Epress.am:

“In 2007, we went to buy an apartment, we went to the notary office, in three minutes all the documents were arranged, then they asked me, did you give the money, I said no, they said, well, what are you waiting for, give it, and I gave the $35,000 for that one-room apartment. Then I go to get the certificate of ownership, they tell me that same apartment has been sold to five people. The issue is that in our documents there are such omissions, in the documents given by the Shengavit cadastre, that the notary should’ve noticed and not ratified the document. The apartment is in the Malatia-Sebastia district. It is thanks to Aghvan Hovsepyan that we’re left without a home.”

The Epress.am correspondent on the scene was able to clarify neither the details of the story nor the connection with RA General Prosecutor Aghvan Hovsepyan, since the women weren’t speaking clearly.

Then, people in civilian clothes (who had received order from police officers in uniform) approached Shiflikyan, first, attempting to convince her to come with them, then, more forcibly, taking her by the arms and placing her in a police vehicle that was already standing by.

“I’m not like her, I have strength in me, tomorrow I too will start a hunger strike,” shouted Shiflikyan’s daughter-in-law, who was likewise picked up by police and whisked away in a police vehicle.