ARMENIAN NEWS: BREAKING NEWS 12.09.2018

Azerbaijan has fired shots at Baghanis border village in Tavush Province, on Tuesday and early hours of Wednesday, spokesperson for the Armenian Defense Ministry Artsrun Hovhannisyan said.

In his words, the shots were fired in the direction of the Armenian combat positions and the village, but the Armenian side has silenced this shooting.

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan instructed the National Security Service (NSS), the police, to identify those standing behind the wiretapping of the phone conversation between the head of Armenia’s National Security Service and the chief of Armenia’s Special Investigation Service.

“From now on, I am instructing the police to carry out the raids, to disarm the bodyguards of high ranking officials and oligarchs,” he said, adding that this has to be done in two hours.

The matter of Armenia will be discussed at a special meeting of the Monitoring Committee of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), member of the Armenian delegation to PACE Arpine Hovhannisyan said.

“The current domestic political situation and the recent developments (…) in the RA [Republic of Armenia] were discussed yesterday [Tuesday], at the session of the PACE Committee on Political Affairs and Democracy,” she wrote, in particular. “I have submitted [respective] facts, videos, disseminations (…).

“As a result of discussion of the matter, the Committee made a decision to send a letter (…) to the [PACE] Monitoring Committee, proposing to conduct monitoring in connection with ensuring the rule of law, ensuring the independence of the legislative and judicial authorities, as well as the political persecutions in Armenia.”

Artak Davtyan, Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Armenia, has dismissed Special Investigation Service Head Sasun Khachatryan’s announcement with respect to the army’s involvement in the events that occurred in capital city Yerevan in March 2008.

“If they fired shots, some individual servicemen [did that],” said Davtyan, who at the time was serving as chief of the operative department of the armed forces. “We can’t speak about the whole army. There was no such order.”

At the same time, Davtyan assured that the investigators probably have more information than he does, after the ten years since these events in Yerevan.

Armenia’s Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan will visit New York at the end of September, and he will attend an address at the opening of the session of the General Assembly of the United Nations.

Spokesperson for Armenian Foreign Ministry Tigran Balayan added that several bilateral talks are also scheduled within the framework of Pashinyan’s trip to New York, but these meetings will be announced at a later date.