Armine Sahakyan: Decision to try murder case in Russian court is Kremlin’s latest outrage against Armenians
▻http://www.kyivpost.com/opinion/op-ed/armine-sahakyan-decision-to-try-murder-case-in-russian-court-is-kremlins-l
Russian authorities have decreed that a soldier arrested in the murders of all seven members of an Armenian family will be tried in a Russian military court, not in an Armenian court.
The dictate is a slap in the face to the Armenian people.
Thousands of us had demonstrated after the murders in mid-January to demand that 19-year-old Valeri Permyakov be tried in Armenia. Russian officials rubbed salt in the wound by declaring that the offense Permyakov is accused of is a “military crime.”
It is nothing of the sort, many Armenians contend.
The murders were committed off Russia’s military base at #Gyumri, where Permyakov was stationed, and had nothing to do with any military matter. Russia’s defiance of Armenian popular will in refusing to hand Permyakov over for trial in Armenia has prompted many of us to contend that our government’s kowtowing to this powerful neighbor has gone too far.
One thing the skeptics have asked is why the government handed Permyakov over to Russia in the first place. Armenian border guards arrested him the day after the murders as he was trying to slip across the border into Turkey.
Rather than surrender the soldier to Armenian police, the border guards gave him to Russian authorities. He is now in confinement on the base at Gyumri, where Russian authorities said he will be tried.