Armenia’s ex-president Robert Kocharyan, charged with “overthrowing the constitutional order” with the aid of tipping the 2008 presidential election in favour of his ally Serzh Sarkisian, attends a hearing at a courtroom in Yerevan on May 13, 2019. (Photo by Vahram BAGHDASARYAN / PHOTOLURE / AFP)
Armenia’s jailed former president went on trial Monday over what prosecutors describe as a coup that led to bloody protests but he insists is a politically prompted case.
Robert Kocharyan led the ex-Soviet country for a decade up to 2008 when his hand-picked ally Serzh Sarkisian was once elected.
He stands accused of tipping these presidential polls in Sarkisian’s favour and faces fees of “overthrowing the constitutional order”.
Dozens of Kocharyan’s supporters rallied Monday backyard the Yerevan metropolis court, holding placards that study “Kocharyan is a political prisoner” and “Political vendetta.”
Hearings began at one thousand GMT in a tiny court docket packed with journalists.
Dressed in a grey business suit, Kocharyan looked unperturbed and smiled at supporters in the target market who shouted “Freedom”.
The 64-year-old informed AFP the case used to be introduced against him due to the fact of new leadership that pushed out his successor in a famous uprising ultimate year.
“What is taking place to me is nothing much less than lawlessness,” he instructed AFP from prison in written remarks sent with the aid of representatives.
“The modern-day Armenian political authorities have declared me guilty, and the judicial gadget now serves this political master.”
The former head of state faces up to 15 years behind bars if convicted.
After the 2008 election, tensions erupted into violent clashes between insurrection police and supporters of the defeated opposition candidate, who denounced the vote as fraudulent.
Eight protesters and two officers have been killed.
Sarkisian led the South Caucasus country till April final 12 months when he was pressured to resign because of mass protests towards his rule, spearheaded via current Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan.
In 2009, Pashinyan was arrested for organising the 2008 post-electoral protests and sentenced to seven years in prison, however was once released on a 2011 amnesty.
Kocharyan was arrested in July remaining year, then briefly launched but re-arrested again in December and has due to the fact then remained in pre-trial detention.
“I was a non-partisan president who acted except favour or prejudice,” Kocharyan advised AFP.
Defence attorney Hayk Alumyan instructed AFP that “the immediately goal… is to reap his launch from pre-trial detention”.
“The whole process may additionally take a number of years,” he added.
Kocharyan claimed that Armenia’s modern-day authorities “are now not mainly enthusiastic to discover out” who bears accountability for the deaths because of “fear of revealing extraordinarily undesirable facts for the present day government.”
“They have focused as an alternative all their efforts on the fabrication of politically prompted fees against me.”
He said Pashinyan “has a direct motivation to rewrite history in order to whitewash himself and shift duty for the activities of 2008 to others.”
Pashinyan launched a sweeping anti-corruption crackdown on former elites when he got here to strength ultimate May.
Critics accuse pro-Russian Kocharyan of gathering an huge fortune thru corruption, an allegation he denies.
In February, prosecutors charged Kocharyan’s son with tax evasion and money laundering the use of organizations owned by using the Kocharyan family.
Kocharyan’s presidency saw one of the bloodiest occasions in Armenia’s post-Soviet political records — a terrorist attack on the Armenian parliament in 1999.
Opposition parties have accused Kocharyan of organising the attack in which 5 gunmen killed his political foes which include top minister Vazgen Sargsyan and parliament speaker Karen Demirchyan.
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