According to the assessment of non-governmental organizations the number of accidents at peaceful time in Armenian army has decreased in 2011. If last year "Helsinki Citizens' Assembly Vanadzor Office" NGO estimated 44 accidents, this year that number has decreased to 38, but this cannot be considered a progress.

According to the data reported by the RA Ministry of Defense 47 accidents were recorded in 2005, 33 in 2006, 41 in 2007, 69 in 2008, 42 in 2009 and 54 accidents in 2010.

"Last year the number 54 was reported according to official data and as we have not been reported about the other ten victims, it is not excluded that the number will actually be greater this year" says the Coordinator of "Helsinki Citizens' Assembly Vanadzor Office" NGO Arthur Sakunts. He thinks the progress is that this year the society raises the question more actively and the number of discussions has increased but there is a lot to do in this sphere.

 "The Minister of Defense announced that this year the number of accidents caused by violation of regulation relationships has increased which is concerning" Sakunts agrees with the Minister. He says a case of murder with a fire-arm will soon be introduced caused by non organization of a proper service, which has not been spoken about at all.

According to the data reported by Sakunts this year 11 people died because of the infringements of ceasefire regime, 3 people died because of breaking the security rules, 8 people committed suicide, 6 people because of breach of the rules of regulation relationships, 6 people because of accidents and 2 people died because of having health problems. There was one case of deliberate murder and nothing is known about the other case.

This year the death cases were qualified as suicide and the arrests were mainly on the basis of abuse of the official position. The cases of injuries and mental disorders of servicemen were also recorded. The serviceman Hovhannes Vardanyan was taken to psychiatric hospital in September; the serviceman Zhora Mkrtchyan got an acute psychosis in October, in December the serviceman Narek Avetisyan lost the sight of his right eye because of the slaps in his face.

Seda Safaryan who is one of the attorneys engaged in the cases of murders made in the army has already brought a case against three investigators- Gnel Manukyan, Artak Apresyan and Artak Tamrazyan, the investigators of the cases of Tigran Ohanjanyan and Valeri Muradyan. She wants to show that the same will happen to other investigators if they try to implement a non- effective and non- comprehensive investigation.

"There is a tendency of revealing the military crimes this year. The state bodies pay attention to this from the point of revealing the issue, but they do not punish. So I am afraid of the errors of the preliminary investigation bodies and the approaches of judicial bodies, as because of their actions a wrong inspection of the site of the incident and wrong expert examinations are implemented, such kind of evidence is written, which is later denied", says the attorney.

Journalist and human rights activist Zhanna Alexanyan, who covers the cases that happen in the army from the civil perspective, is the only one, who considers this year positive. However she notices no difference from the point of view of revealing the cases.

"This is the atmosphere of not being punished, and it gives birth to new crimes. There is a widespread problem these years that the cases are brought on the article of suicide, although they say that they can be re-qualified, actually that never happens. And these are cases with obvious facts of murder", worries Zhanna. She calls the state bodies to stop accusing the parents that their children committed suicide because they had brought them up badly, because that happens as a result of not having a state regulated army.

The civil society representatives, especially the "The Army in reality" group, with the participation of the mothers of the soldiers, who died in the army carried out protest actions in front of the Government building every Thursday and organized discussions.

In September ten NGOs made a statement calling the RA Commander-in-Chief to immediately take steps in order to eliminate especially the non-regulatory relations and the unhealthy atmosphere in the army. In a month from the statement the NGOs did not notice any significant change so they disseminated the second statement "We consider that RA Commander-in-Chief Serzh Sargsyan does not perceive the important issue of changing the situation of army and does not feel his immediate responsibility for that. Thus it is useless to expect any radical reforms from him, so we demand his urgent resignation from the office he holds."

Karine Ionesyan
Source-www.hra.am