{"id":281713,"date":"2017-08-02T15:40:24","date_gmt":"2017-08-02T11:40:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/epress.am\/?p=281713"},"modified":"2017-08-02T15:40:37","modified_gmt":"2017-08-02T11:40:37","slug":"gaspari-hold-lie-in-to-support-hunger-striking-oppositionist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/2017\/08\/02\/gaspari-hold-lie-in-to-support-hunger-striking-oppositionist.html","title":{"rendered":"Gaspari Holds Lie-In to Support Hunger-Striking Oppositionist"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/epress.am\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/vardgesgaspari.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-281710\" src=\"http:\/\/epress.am\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/vardgesgaspari.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"400\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u201cI chose to hold this protest between 12:30 and 14:30 because that\u2019s when the staff of the Ombudsman\u2019s office leave for a lunch break. I want them to clearly see how well-off they are compared to an ordinary citizen,\u201d Yerevan-based civil rights activist Vardges Gaspari told reporters during his lie-in protest outside the Ombudsman\u2019s office on Wednesday.<\/p>\n<p>The reason for holding the protest action, Gaspari added, derives from Sasna Tsrer armed group member Vardan Geravetyan\u2019s <a href=\"http:\/\/epress.am\/en\/2017\/07\/24\/sasna-tsrer-member-goes-on-hunger-strike-demands-protection-from-hate-propaganda.html\"><strong><span style=\"color: #003366;\">ongoing hunger strike<\/span><\/strong><\/a> in prison as well as from his wish to express his protest against the prison management regime in Armenia.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cPrisons are controlled not by managements but by \u2018area watchers\u2019 and that\u2019s why there are always illicit rules and regulations there, such as 50 000 &#8211; 80 000 dram payments to the obtshak, drug trafficking, etc,\u201d Gaspari stated. He added that he expects the Ombdsman\u2019s staff to speak about what is actually going on in Armenian penal institutions, even if only at the minimum level: \u201cOmbudsman\u2019s reports always gloss over these issues; the staff work like chinovniks.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><iframe width=\"425\" height=\"344\" src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/EulfbDzaZhA?wmode=transparent\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen> <\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Speaking to reporters, Ombudsman staffer Hrachya Palyan announced that the staff are aware of the issues raised by Gaspari and are trying to resolve them to the best of their power. He added that today several staffers visited the Nubarashen prison in Yerevan to meet with hunger-striking Geravetyan. \u201cIt\u2019s only Gaspari\u2019s subjective opinion that we are not properly addressing these issues. I just want to note that to start a procedure over some kind of issue there first of all have to be facts which should be reviewed through specific legal regulations. Only then can it be assessed whether these allegations correspond to the reality or not,\u201d Palyan said.<\/p>\n<p>An Epress.am reporter reminded the Ombudsman staffer about Gaspari\u2019s allegation, according to which his cellmate Mkhitar Sargsyan <a href=\"http:\/\/epress.am\/en\/2016\/03\/22\/gaspari-alleges-one-of-his-prison-torturers-was-murdered.html\"><strong><span style=\"color: #003366;\">was killed<\/span><\/strong><\/a> in prison on March 1, 2016, for not torturing Gaspari \u201cassiduously enough.\u201d Palyan replied that he did not remember about his incident, but if Gaspari has actually presented such a claim, he said, then \u201cwe are obligated to look into it.\u201d<\/p>\n<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on the_content --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on the_content -->","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Speaking to reporters, Ombudsman staffer Hrachya Palyan announced that the staff are aware of the issues raised by Gaspari and are trying to&#8230;<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":281709,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tstyn_error":""},"categories":[65966],"tags":[15584,37616,16528],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/281713"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=281713"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/281713\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/281709"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=281713"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=281713"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=281713"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}