President Serzh Sarkisian pardoned at the weekend 16 more individuals
arrested and convicted in connection with last year’s post-election violence in
Yerevan, but the Armenian opposition insisted that only two of them are its
supporters.



The presidential press service said all of these individuals had appealed to
Sarkisian for an amnesty. It said the presidential decree signed on Saturday
also took into account their lack of prior criminal records as well as health
conditions and family circumstances.



The main opposition Armenian National Congress (HAK) was quick to brush aside
the move as a ploy designed to mislead the international community. “The decree
is a collection of lies,” the HAK charged in a statement on Sunday, saying that
only two of the pardoned men, Vartan Gasparian and Tigran Hakobian, had been on
the opposition list of some 60 “political prisoners.”



The HAK said the 14 other individuals have no links to the opposition and that
all but one of them had been arrested for looting shops during the March 1
clashes between security forces and opposition protesters demanding a re-run of
the February 2008 presidential election. At least six of them received suspended
prison sentences, added the statement.



Sarkisian’s office did not list theft or looting among the accusations that were
leveled against the 16 persons. It mentioned instead illegal arms possession,
resistance to the police and participation in “mass disturbances.”



The amnesties came just three days before a session of the Council of Europe’s
Parliamentary Assembly (PACE) that will decide whether to suspend the voting
rights of its Armenian members. PACE officials have accused the Sarkisian
administration of failing to fully comply with the Strasbourg-based assembly’s
resolutions that demanded the release of opposition supporters arrested on
“artificial or politically motivated charges.”



The HAK statement said the presidential decree is aimed at “influencing” PACE
members. “The resolutions demand the release of political prisoners, whereas the
authorities release criminal elements,” Armen Khachatrian, an HAK
representative, told RFE/RL.



Despite the PACE threats of sanctions, Sarkisian has refused to call a general
amnesty for all oppositionists remaining in prison. The Armenian president so
far been willing to pardon only those detainees that have confessed to
controversial accusations leveled against them.