Armenian Government paying lip service to PACE recommendations

Almost one month after the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) demanded that the authorities restore the basic human rights of Armenia’s citizens immediately,

• 28 requests to hold public gatherings have been rejected by the authorities;
• Between May 2 and May 9, and following the Second Congress of the Popular Movement in Yerevan, over 100 innocent citizens were detained or arrested without warrants;
• In the morning of May 14 alone, more than 30 people were taken to police stations in Yerevan;
• Scores of individuals have gone on hunger strikes across the country, 17 of them on May 17;
• The detention period of political prisoners have been unlawfully extended;
• Under threat and intimidation, citizens are forced to provide false testimony on other citizens or prisoners and are held in police stations for hours and days until they do so.
• According to the president of the Helsinki Assembly in Yerevan some prisoners were brutalized and others denied their rights to an attorney.