March 6, 2006

“Presidential” Campaign against Raffi Hovannisian and Heritage Party Continues: Break-in at Main Office

Yerevan—On March 4, 2006, an anonymous telephone caller informed Heritage Party officials that “agents from the KGB are breaking the entrance door” of Heritage’s headquarters located at 7 Vazgen Sargsian Street in the center of the capital. Responding to the call, party representatives arrived at the scene and witnessed the process of replacement of the entrance door’s already-smashed lock. This was carried out by chief engineer Levon Zohrabian of the Hakob Paronian Musical Comedy State Theater and two members from the theater’s auxiliary staff. In the meantime, the entire process was being supervised by two unknown men who were sitting in a nearby car. When approached the latter introduced themselves to Heritage Party members as friends of Karapet Shahbazian, the director of the theater, asserting that they were “helping their friend as a favor and seeing to it that the latter’s orders are carried out.”

Several days earlier, on February 25, a letter addressed to Chairman Raffi K. Hovannisian of the Heritage Party was received from Shahbazian, who demanded that tenant Hovannisian “vacate the premises and relinquish it in one week’s time.” According to the letter, pursuant to the Armenian government’s August 11, 2005 Decision No. 1569-A “On Transferring Property to the Department on State Property Management of the Government of the Republic of Armenia,” the real estate belonging to the theater was transferred to the jurisdiction of the aforementioned Department.

Taking into account that the government-run Department of State Property Management was now presented as the party to the lease signed with the Hakob Paronian Musical Comedy State Theater, Raffi Hovannisian, immediately after having received the letter, had a telephone conversation on the issue with Minister Manuk Topuzian, chief of the governmental staff. Topuzian recommended sending a formal letter to Prime Minister Andranik Margarian, which was done without delay.

In response to a subsequent telephone call made by the theater’s director on March 3, Heritage Party representatives informed him that since in conformity with his own letter the proprietor of the premises was now the Armenian government, the parties to the contract ought to wait for the Prime Minister’s formal response. Karapet Shahbazian agreed to wait.

Nonetheless, as an apparent result of official pressure, an unlawful act was intentionally committed by the theater’s technical personnel the next day and without prior notice to the tenant. The theater’s staff members told Heritage Party and media representatives who had arrived on the scene that they were just carrying out orders, and an explanation for this blatant violation of civil rights could only be given by the two individuals viewing the operation from the vehicle. But as soon as members of the press began arriving, the “friendly overseers” departed.

Heritage Party representatives then made a telephonic appeal to theater director Karapet Shahbazian, explaining to him the illegality of his deeds and asking that he give an explanation. He refused.

Raffi K. Hovannisian has leased the space located at 7 Vazgen Sargsian Street for nearly 12 years and has always fulfilled, conscientiously and in timely fashion, all the obligations set forth by the lease signed with the theater. The encroachment upon the Heritage Party’s headquarters was executed the day after Raffi Hovannisian had left for Europe. The first Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Armenia is representing Armenian perspectives in a number of prestigious forums and international meetings devoted to regional security and cooperation which are being held these days in Great Britain and other European countries.

This outrageous operation against the Heritage Party and its leader is one further link in the chain of a new campaign of threats, intimidation, and introductory terror carried out by the incumbent presidency and its security apparatus. Notably, this campaign has followed on the heels of Raffi Hovannisian’s recent public activity, citizens’ initiatives and freely expressed opinions, and has been launched through the use of large-scale technologies of slander by the state-supervised propaganda machine and its stooges against the long-standing institutions of high repute headed by Raffi and Armenouhi Hovannisian.

In this latest chapter, the “party of power” aims to paralyze Heritage’s activities in advance of parliamentary elections and other developments of interest. It is not to be ruled out that the acting authority, based on its own fear and lack of public legitimacy, will continue its policies of persecution with imaginary, trumped-up charges to be made against the party and its members.