Nikol Pashinyan wants to use ECHR verdicts in fight against political opponents: attorney

Member of defense team of Armenia’s second president Robert Kocharyan Hayk Alumyan claims that Nikol Pashinyan gives instructions to the Armenian representative in the European Court of Human Rights.

“Nikol Pashinyan says we want the cases in ECHR pass in a way that when the verdicts come we will say that human rights were violated during presidencies of Serzh Sargsyan and Robert Kocharyan. This means an attempt to use European court’s verdicts in fight against political opponents,” he said.

He reminded that the Armenian government has representative in ECHR as well as Justice Ministry has department which must object the complaints of the applicants at ECHR on behalf of the government.

“The Prime Minister instructs these people to act in a way for them to be able to show the former authorities as violators of law. This is a very dangerous tendency and it is being noticed regarding March 1 case as well,” Alumyan said.

The attorney said that soon many cases will be examined at the European court relating to March 1 events and if the government fails to present all the possible counter-arguments ECHR will register that on March 1 people’s rights were violated.

Alumyan noted that the authorities are already trying to use Mushegh Saghatelyan’s case against Kocharyan.