Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said he considers the controversy surrounding footage showing former State Revenue Committee chairman Gagik Khachatryan being transported on a stretcher disgraceful, rather than the footage itself. He made the remarks after an Armenian government meeting, responding to reporters’ questions.
“The malingerer was taken exactly where he should have been taken. On the contrary, I think that after seeing this scene, all corrupt figures, both current and former, will understand that no one should get away,” Pashinyan said, according to Sputnik Armenia.
Pashinyan urged people to view the footage circulated online not as a disgrace but as a source of hope that justice would one day prevail in Armenia. He thanked all representatives of the law enforcement system.
“I believe our law enforcement system would have had no reason to act if the justification for that action had not been more than obvious to it. I want to thank all employees of our law enforcement system, starting with those who were holding that stretcher,” he said.
According to Pashinyan, all those people had a chance to come forward and say: “We stole several billion from the state and want to return it.”
“Yes, they must be stripped of their assets in the literal sense of the word,” Pashinyan concluded.
He also addressed the charges against Khachatryan and the property that prosecutors are seeking to have returned to the state.
“The listed assets provide full legitimacy for urgently sending a person with such employment earnings to Palma de Mallorca for recuperative rest; otherwise, it would mean that Armenia is a sadistic state and is torturing that person. My personal opinion, however, as someone who has been there, is that in this case Yerevan Penitentiary is not a bad substitute for the resorts of Palma de Mallorca,” Pashinyan added.
The Anti-Corruption Court granted an investigator’s motion to place Gagik Khachatryan in detention for two months. A video circulated online shows National Security Service officers lifting him from a bed and transferring him onto a stretcher. He was on a stretcher during the court hearing.
At the initiative of the Human Rights Defender, a procedure to examine the video concerning Gagik Khachatryan was launched immediately after it circulated online. Relevant explanations were requested from the competent authorities to fully clarify the main circumstances surrounding the matter.
