Epress.am News from Armenia
The Armenian Investigation Committee has instituted a criminal case in behalf of a violation against a journalist’s work. The complaint was presented by local daily “Haykakan Zhamanak” journalist Taguhi Hovhannisyan in regards to an incident on October 3.
The journalist had told her editor that on the day of the incident in the Armenian National Academic Theatre of Opera and Ballet building, where the “Armenia-Diaspora” conference was taking place, the director of the Kazakhstan-Armenian community’s Nairi Association, Artyusha Karapetyan snatched her audio recorder. Then Karapetyan asked his escorts to grab and take away the journalist’s telephone. One of the escorts, whose badge wrote “Abrahamyan A”, snatched her phone and deleted a video recording and returned the phone back to her.
According to the Investigation Committee report, the Kentron (Downtown) investigation department instituted a criminal case based on the RA criminal code article 164, first part (hindrance to the legal professional activities of a journalist, or forcing the journalist to disseminate information or not to disseminate information).
If the investigation finds Karapetyan guilty, then he would be receiving minimal punishment of the sum of 200 to 400 minimum salaries. Artyusha Karapetyan has received significant protest from his community for election fraud, for closing the church as retaliation to protests, and restricting Armenian Genocide commemorations.