Epress.am News from Armenia
Smbat Barseghyan, one of the gunmen who seized a Yerevan police station in July, has been charged today with the murder of officer Yura Tepanosyan who was fatally shot on July 30 while sitting in a car parked some 400 meters from the besieged building, Hayk Alumyan, a lawyer for Barseghyan, told Epress.am on Tuesday, adding that his client denies the charge of murder.
The gunman, along with the nearly three dozen other members of the anti-government armed group, had, until now, been facing charges of illegally acquiring weapons, seizing state buildings, vehicles and/or communications facilities, and taking hostages.
Immediately after the officer’s deaths, Armenia’s police released a statement to accuse the gunmen of firing the fatal shot. However, one of the group’s leaders, Varuzhan Avetisyan, countered the accusation, insisting that the spot where the officer’s car was parked was out of the group’s sight. Avetisyan further suggested that Tepanosyan “must have been killed by one of the random sniper shots police were firing” around the besieged station.
The “Daredevils of Sasun” armed group seized the police compound in Yerevan’s Erebuni district to demand the resignation of Armenian president Serzh Sarksyan and the release of jailed opposition politician and leader of anti-government Founding Parliament movement Jirayr Sefilyan. The group remained holed up in the compound for two weeks, before finally laying down their weapons on July 31.