European Court of Human Rights to Examine Pashinyan’s Appeals Earlier than Expected

The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has given priority to the three appeals filed by local daily Haykakan Jamanak (“Armenian Times”) chief editor, imprisoned journalist Nikol Pashinyan and will consider them out of the priority order. This decision was made by the president of the ECHR’s third section, J. Casadevall, on Wednesday.

Pashinyan’s attorney Vahe Grigoryan, speaking to Haykakan Jamanak, said that according to the Convention on Human Rights, ECHR examines cases in the order in which they are filed, but presidents of the Court’s five sections have the right to examine appeals out of this priority order. According to the attorney, the section presidents make use of this right in exceptional cases and this means that the ECHR has decided to accelerate examination of this case.

Pashinyan’s three lawsuits, in particular, refer to incidents where the the right to personal freedom, the right to freedom of peaceful assembly, and the right to a fair trial have been violated.

On Jan. 19, an Armenian court found Nikol Pashinyan guilty in organizing “mass disturbances” on Mar. 1, 2008, following disputed presidential elections in Yerevan, and sentenced him to seven years’ imprisonment. An appeals court upheld the decision but halved his sentence. In November 2010 Pashinyan claimed two masked men attacked and beat him in Kosh prison; the government denied the allegation. Both he and Ter-Petrossian’s Armenian National Congress consider the case politically motivated.