Epress.am News from Armenia
Armenia’s Human Rights Defender Armen Harutyunyan sent a letter to Hayk Harutyunyan, head of the Criminal-Executive Department, a separate subdivision at the RA Ministry of Justice, in the matter of imprisoned journalist, Haykakan Jamanak (“Armenian Times”) chief editor Nikol Pashinyan.
The Ombudsman’s letter reads as follows:
“It has been reported by mass media that on Nov. 14 of this year, with the purpose of ensuring Nikol Pashinyan’s safety, he was moved to an isolation cell, without restricting the rights of prisoners. Related to this, N. Pashinyan and his attorney V. Grigoryan disseminated a statement that moving N. Pashinyan was done without his consent and he has appealed to the penal institution’s administration neither in writing nor verbally regarding this issue.
“During a phone conversation regarding this matter with the RA Human Rights Defender’s staff employee, head of the RA Justice Ministry Kosh penitentiary L. Baghdasaryan said they had ‘operative’ information that there might be a threat to N. Pashinyan, which was conveyed to N. Pashinyan, and the latter verbally requested to be moved to the isolation cell.
“Please provide explanations to this conflicting information, as well as the legal validity for moving N. Pashinyan to an isolation cell on Nov. 14.”