Epress.am News from Armenia
Tigran Khachatryan died on Mar. 1, 2008, in Yerevan, Armenia. His mother, Alla Hovhannisyan, told Epress.am a little about her son’s life.
“Tigran Khachatryan was bron on Jan. 30, 1985, in Yerevan. He studied at no. 114 secondary school, then he was accepted into the correspondence program at the Department of Transportation and Transportation Management at the [Armenian] Agricultural Academy. He continued his education after serving in the Armenian army. He founded his own business; he was operating the Crystal taxi service.
“He was very honest, friendly, patriotic. He was very stubborn by nature and was afraid of nothing. Until the 2008 elections, Tigran was a fan of [Rule of Law party leader] Artur Baghdasaryan and he was very excited after participating in his two pre-election [campaign] meetings. But it pains me that Artur Baghdasaryan hasn’t been held accountable for his lies. That day, when my son found out that Artur Baghdasaryan is operating a rigged election and saw how he was drinking champagne with Serzh Sargsyan, he got very angry and disappointed. However, he participated a few times also in the Liberty Square rallies. On Mar. 1, when Tigran found out they dispersed the demonstration in Liberty Square, he became indignant and said that he’s going to a rally. We become concerned that they had broken up the people and our son wanted to go there. His father said, don’t go, it’s dangerous, you’ll go and something will happen to you, he didn’t listen and went. Before going, he said, “If I don’t go, another won’t go, who will go?” Tigran went to a rally on the evening of Mar. 1, at 6:30 pm. I came home at 9:30 pm and saw he wasn’t home, I called but he wasn’t answering his phone, During that time I kept calling him. That night, at around 2 am, his father went to the area near Myasnikyan statue looking for him, but he didn’t find him and on his way home, he stopped by the morgue and there he found out that his son was also one of the victims of that day.”
Today is the third anniversary of Mar. 1, 2008, when mass protests against alleged electoral fraud, organized by supporters of unsuccessful presidential candidate, first president of the Republic of Armenia Levon Ter-Petrossian, followed the presidential election of Feb. 19, 2008, in Armenia. On Mar. 1, 2008, national police and military forces, called in to disperse the crowds, used “excessive force and violence” which left 10 people dead and many more wounded.