Epress.am News from Armenia
Artur Sargsyan, a Yerevan man who was yet again arrested on Friday on suspicion of assisting the opposition gunmen who kept a Yerevan police station under a two-week siege last summer, has gone on a hunger strike today, refusing to accept the food that his family members brought him to the Convicts’ Hospital, one of his relatives told Epress.am, wishing to remain unnamed.
Meanwhile, the Armenian Women’s Front civil initiative (AWF) held a demonstration outside the Special Investigation Service building in support of Sargsyan. Speaking to Epress.am, AWF member Syuzan Simonyan said the demonstrators had taken with them a bag full of bread to the protest action, which they later handed over to passers by as a symbol of solidarity with Sargsyan’s actions last summer.
On July 26, Artur Sargsyan drove through the police cordon around the seized police station to deliver food to the members of the Sasna Tsrer armed group. He was subsequently arrested and charged with assisting the gunmen in hostage-taking and illegal firearms and ammunition transportation. Sargsyan was released on December 31, 2016, after numerous reports and appeals from his lawyers that he was not getting adequate medical treatment in prison.