Epress.am News from Armenia
Sarkis Hatspanian, an opposition activist and veteran of the Nagorno-Karabakh War, was released from Vardashen penitentiary this morning.
Greeting Hatspanian outside the prison were former MP, recently released oppositionist Sasun Mikaelyan, Conservative Party of Armenia leader Mikayel Hayrapetyan and Hatspanian’s family and friends.
Hatspanian, a French citizen of Armenian descent, was arrested on Nov. 7, 2008, on charges of false denunciation and sentenced to 3.5 years in prison. The opposition considers his arrest to be politically motivated and thus refers to him as a political prisoner.
Epress.am was informed by RA Minister of Justice press secretary Karine Kalantaryan that Hatspanian was released not because of the general amnesty declared by the president late May, but because of an earlier amnesty (in 2009) which saw his sentence reduced. Thus, Hatspanian was released today because he served his reduced sentence in full.
As previously reported, head of the Committee for the Protection of Political Prisoners and Persecuted People Vardan Harutyunyan had said that Hatspanian would be released in the coming days, but “not because of the authorities’ will, but because they have both fully served the sentence handed to them by the unjust Armenian courts.”
“I particularly isolate the case of Sarkis Hatspanian because both this amnesty and the one announced in 2009 applied to him, but the authorities refused to release him, displaying individual treatment and an arbitrary approach towards him,” he had said.
Photo: RFE/RL’s Armenian service
Updated 12:16 pm: added “by RA Minister of Justice press secretary Karine Kalantaryan”. Also, the length of Hatspanian’s sentence was confirmed as being 3.5 years.