Epress.am News from Armenia
Samvel Babayan, former commander of the Nagorno-Karabakh army, and two other persons were arrested on Wednesday on suspicion of trying to smuggle weapons into Armenia, according to a statement by Armenia’s National Security Service.
The arrest came just hours after the NSS reported that border guards had prevented an attempt of smuggling parts for a Russian-made Igla shoulder-fired surface-to-air missile across the Georgia-Armenia border.
The latest statement did not identify the two other suspects; it added, however, that the two had been commissioned to acquire and transfer the Igla parts to Armenia by Babayan.
Incidentally, in its Wednesday issue, the local Zhamanak newspaper had “predicted” Babayan’s arrest, writing that Armenia’s security forces were suspecting the former military commander of planning a “Sasna Tsrer-2” operation.
Samvel Babayan has been a strong supporter of the opposition ORO bloc co-headed by former Defense Minister Seyran Ohanyan, former foreign minister Vardan Oskanyan, and past presidential candidate Raffi Hovannisyan in the Armenian parliamentary elections scheduled for April 2.
Speaking to reporters following Babayan’s arrest, Ohanyan said Babayan “is our ideological brother.” He also suggested that the arrest “could be related to the operations carried out against ORO” in the pre-election period.