23:31, 22 July 2017

"Sasna Tsrer" members go on hunger strike in jail

They demand to recognize all the persons arrested within the "Sasna Tsrer" case political prisoners and place them into separate cells in the Nubarashen Prison.

The statement on the start of the hunger strikes was circulated today by David Gyurjyan, the advocate of the activist Vardan Geravetyan.

On July 17, 2016, an armed detachment "Sasna Tsrer" (Daredevils of Sasun) from among supporters of the "Constituent Parliament", captured the building of the police regiment of the patrol-and-post service (PPS) in Yerevan. The charges in the case on the capture of the building of the patrol-and-post (PPS) regiment were filed against 47 persons.

The hunger-strikers motivate their demand to place them into separate cells by the fact that the prison bosses set up other inmates against "Sasna Tsrer" members, by spreading information that, allegedly, they would not be amnestied because of them.

The number of hunger-strikers is not specified.

"We treat the violence used at the trial against 'Sasna Tsrer' members, which the entire society had witnessed, as terrorism not against the 'Sasna Tsrer', but against the entire Armenian people," the "News.am" quotes the hunger-strikers' statement.

They put forward no claims about ensuring fair justice, finding it "senseless"; however, they demand an objective inquiry into the death of Arthur Sargsyan, who had been delivering foodstuffs to the members of the "Sasna Tsrer" detachment, which had captured the building of the police patrol-and-post service (PPS) regiment in Yerevan.

Full text of the article is available on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’.