GOAM RATCHETS UP THE PRESSURE UNDER STATE OF

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 04 YEREVAN 000227 SIPDIS SIPDIS DEPARTMENT FOR EUR/CARC, NSC FOR MARIA GERMANO E.O. 12958: DECL: 03/13/2018 TAGS: PGOV PREL PHUM ASEC KDEM AM SUBJECT: GOAM RATCHETS UP THE PRESSURE UNDER STATE OF EMERGENCY REF: A) YEREVAN 200 B) YEREVAN 199 YEREVAN 00000227 001.2 OF 004 Classified By: CDA JOSEPH PENNINGTON, REASONS 1.4 (B/D) -------------- SUMMARY -------------- ¶1. (C) Despite recent conciliatory public statements from President-elect Sargsian, the authorities appear to be ratcheting up their pressure on opposition supporters with one week left to the state of emergency. Foreign election observers who stayed to observe Constitutional Court proceedings reported harassment that prompted some to leave the country prematurely. The NSS continues to search homes and offices of opposition party members, and has arrested key LTP lieutenants. Meanwhile, Sargsian has issued conflicting statements about the potential arrest of Levon Ter-Petrossian, and has previewed the imminent sacking of an Armenian General with suspected LTP leanings. The Embassy has received a spate of requests for political asylum as citizens come out of the woodwork with allegations of intimidation and harassment. END SUMMARY. -------------- TARGETING ELECTION OBSERVERS -------------- ¶2. (C) In recent days the GOAM has undertaken a campaign of harassment and intimidation against members of the OSCE/ODIHR election observation mission (EOM). We learned from the British Embassy that Paul O'Grady, a British citizen and the EOM's Deputy Head of Mission, got so spooked by fear of retaliation in the wake of the latest ODIHR interim report (despite the GOAM's public claims that ODIHR had endorsed the election's fairness) that he requested the Embassy's assistance to ferret him secretly out of Armenia a day earlier than scheduled, which they did, taking him to Georgia in an embassy car. O'Grady told the Embassy he had done election observation for over a decade, including in such difficult places as Angola, and stated that he had never felt the kind of pressure he perceived here. (NOTE: Post heard from one member of the ODIHR mission that a senior GOAM official had told him that the latest interim report "had better be more positive" than the initial one. END NOTE.) The Head of Mission, retired German Ambassador Geert Ahrens, was more sanguine, but nonetheless accepted the German Ambassador's offer to drive him to the airport for his departure -- the German flag waving from the fender -- as a show of solidarity and to head off any difficulties. Neither man had diplomatic status. ¶3. (C) Authorities have continued their efforts to summon ODIHR staff to testify in criminal cases being developed against persons alleged to have been involved in electoral violations, a violation of ODIHR's customary neutrality. Ahrens was served a summons by the Gyumri prosecutor, which he then deposited at the Presidency, with Senior Adviser Vigen Sargsian, saying that the Presidency should resolve it. Gyumri prosecutors and police have continued in their efforts to demand documents from Karen Gayner, the Canadian ODIHR legal analyst who remained behind after most of the core team left in order to monitor the Constitutional Court proceedings. She refused either to supply any documents, or to heed a Gyumri policeman's insistence that she sign a document. She also stated there have been indications that police may summon ODIHR-contracted Armenian interpreters for questioning or to testify in court proceedings. She made arrangements with the permanent OSCE Office in Yerevan to help run interference if these people are summoned by police. -------------- THOSE RUMOR-MONGERING CAB DRIVERS! -------------- ¶4. (SBU) In a new step in its effort to control the flow of information, an Embassy FSN reported a recent conversation with a taxi driver who mentioned that his dispatch office had been recently visited by Armenia's National Security Service (NSS) and issued a warning to cease backseat gossip with passengers. This is consistent with a March 12 public comment by President Kocharian about "rumors" making the rounds in society, and his plans to lighten media restrictions to help staunch their spread. -------------- YEREVAN 00000227 002.2 OF 004 DETENTION OF WITNESSES... -------------- ¶5. (C) Post has learned of numerous instances in which persons with relatively minor involvement with the opposition have been detained at least briefly by the NSS, usually in an effort to obtain information about the whereabouts of other opposition figures. Last week a college acquaintance frantically called a POL-ECON FSN to report that unidentified individuals were trying to break down her door. An assistant to fugitive MP Khachatur Sukiasian who had his parliamentary immunity stripped on March 4, she was eventually detained by NSS officers as police arrived at the scene. (NOTE: The Embassy alerted the police to the break-in as it was taking place. END NOTE.) She and her companion inside the home were taken to an undisclosed location for several hours of questioning before being released. -------------- ...AND POSSIBLE INTIMIDATION -------------- ¶6. (C) Meanwhile, those who saw things they should not have during the March 1 crackdown may be under pressure to recant their accounts. At the National Assembly session on March 4, Heritage Party MP Stepan Safarian said he saw a police car run over two opposition demonstrators. Several days later, the Azg (Nation) newspaper reported that Safarian had recanted, and told prosecutors that he had only heard about this from another witness and had not seen it himself. However, this week Safarian directly told us that he had in fact witnessed the incident and had never told the police otherwise. -------------- ASYLUM REQUESTS -------------- ¶7. (C) Following the March 1 crackdown, post has received about a dozen requests for political asylum, most from persons who say they or their families are being harassed and intimidated by the GOAM due to their opposition political activity or participation in the post-election demonstrations. One of the requests came from the 93-year-old mother of Karabakh War Veteran Leader and MP Myasnik Malkhasyan, who was arrested and had his parliamentary immunity stripped on March 4. Another war veteran leader from eastern Armenia also requested political asylum by email, saying he was in hiding from the authorities who were persecuting him for his support of LTP. In addition, two persons appeared unannounced at the consular section to make asylum requests. Post has directed most of these persons to UNHCR. Post has also received about a dozen requests for information about immigration to the U.S. While none of these explicitly mentioned the post-March 1 events, in the previous nine months post has received perhaps two or three such requests, an indicator that the recent uptick is likely due to the current turmoil. -------------- THE DRAGNET ON OPPOSITION CONTINUES... -------------- ¶8. (C) The GOAM has continued its dragnet to arrest LTP supporters, netting the third of four opposition MPs who were stripped of their parliamentary immunity on March 4. Two of the MPs, Hakob Hakopian and Myasnik Malkhasian, were arrested and brought to the National Assembly when the body voted to rescind their immunity. The third, Sasun Mikaelyan, was apprehended on the evening of March 12, and charged under Articles 225 and 300 (organization of massive disorders and "usurpation of power"). Since the February 19 presidential election, 97 LTP supporters have reportedly been arrested, and LTP's camp calls them all political prisoners. On March 10, former Armenian Foreign Minister Aleksander Arzumanian and Ararat Zurabian, the former chairman of LTP's now-defunct Armenian Pan-National Movement, were also arrested and charged under the same articles. -------------- - WITH A LITTLE HELP FROM THEIR GEORGIAN FRIENDS -------------- - ¶9. (C) LTP confidant David Shahnazarian told CDA on March 13 that two other "low-level" LTP supporters arrested in the past few days had been captured in Georgia, apparently with the cooperation of Georgian law enforcement authorities and YEREVAN 00000227 003.2 OF 004 in the absence of any formal extradition procedure. He further claimed that Georgian police have been posting photos of two other Armenian fugitives -- pro-LTP oligarch Khachatur Sukiasian and Haykakan Zhamanak (Armenian Times) editor Nicol Pashinian -- and are actively trying to locate them. -------------- THE FATE OF THE MUTINOUS GENERAL -------------- ¶10. (C) During the post-election demonstrations, LTP claimed to have the support of Deputy Defense Minister General Manvel Grigorian. Grigorian, a Karabakhi, never made any public show of support for LTP, but made his loyalties known more discreetly. However, we have heard that Grigoryan lobbied Defense Minister Harutiunian not to allow the use of the armed forces in quelling any opposition demonstrations. In its nightly bulletin on March 13, Armenian Public Television -- the official mouthpiece of the government -- referenced PM Sargsian's regrets that Grigoryan "made an attempt not to obey the orders of the chief commander," and that the circumstances of the case should be studied. Grigoryan has not yet resigned or been fired, but Sargsian's first public comments suggest this may be just a matter of time. -------------- NO RALLIES WITHOUT A PERMIT... -------------- ¶11. (C) The State of Emergency bars political rallies, and LTP has pledged not to organize any rally until the ban is lifted, and even then pledges to hold only legally sanctioned rallies. While announcing March 12 that various elements of the state of emergency (SOE) had been lifted, and that he had no plans to extend the SOE, President Kocharian nonetheless warned the opposition against new protest rallies in Yerevan. Kocharian told state-run television, "Imagine if we give permission to hold rallies, and the people who participated in the unrest and clashes with the police and the representatives of law-enforcement bodies gather at one square, I cannot imagine what the 'communication' will be..." -------------- ...AND DON'T EVEN THINK OF APPLYING FOR ONE -------------- ¶12. (C) Earlier this week, Artak Zeinalyan (a member of the Republic Party, and one of LTP's legal counsels before the Constitutional Court) submitted an application for LTP to hold a rally at Freedom Square on March 21, the day after the SOE is set to end. The city denied the permit, and not long after, Zeinalyan received an anonymous call warning him to stay home (and presumably not file any more applications) if he wanted to keep himself and his family safe. (NOTE: Zeinalyan happens to be disabled. END NOTE.) Zeinalyan's wife received a similar call a short time later. On March 14, another LTP supporter, Lyudmila Sargsian, President of the Social Democratic Hnchak Party, had her apartment searched and was summoned to the police. The previous day she had filed applications to the city for rallies on March 22, 23 and 24. -------------- LTP WILL NOT BE ARRESTED...OR WILL HE? -------------- ¶13. (C) GOAM officials have spoken inconsistently but loudly about the possible fate of LTP. Speaking to students at the Armenian State University of Economics on March 11, Sargsian denied rumors that the GOAM had plans for LTP's imminent arrest. These followed remarks by Armenia's Prosecutor General (PG) and Justice Minister, respectively, who had previewed the arrest. PG Aghvan Hovsepian had previously stated publicly that he possessed enough information to prosecute LTP, asserting that opposition protest had been "managed from one center," in apparent reference to LTP's role in the March 1 violence. Justice Minister Gevorg Danielian told an AFP reporter March 10 essentially the same thing, and added LTP "has crossed from the political sphere to the criminal sphere." But PM Sargsian muddied the waters in his address to students, declaring "Levon Ter-Petrossian's fate will be primarily decided by the people, not now," and then in the same breath said, "Talk of Levon Ter-Petrossian being arrested today or tomorrow is not true. Neither are the claims that nobody will dare arrest him." -------------- YEREVAN 00000227 004.2 OF 004 MOVING THE GOAL POSTS IN MID-GAME? -------------- ¶14. (C) On March 14, the GOAM submitted to parliament legislative amendments to the law on "Providing Security To People Subject to Special State Protection" that apparently would force security personnel to cease their duties in the event of criminal activity by the person they protect. As its title implies, this law pertains to persons who enjoy special state protection, including former presidents, state officials, public, political and religious figures. The draft legislation appears squarely directed at LTP. During one of the rallies at Freedom Square, LTP had told the crowd that police had moved to disarm his bodyguards without any explanation. His bodyguards refused, citing a law that entitled the ex-President to have armed protection. Justice Minister Gevorg Danielian confirmed to an Armenian wire service on March 14 that the draft law is directly related to the post-election events in Yerevan. -------------- COMMENT -------------- ¶15. (C) The authorities' aggressive pursuit of LTP supporters during the SOE seriously undercuts the PM's public rhetoric about reconciliation. As events testify, harassment and intimidation of opposition figures and their supporters continues unabated, and appears to be even intensifying as the SOE draws to its presumed end. While we continue to encourage confidence-building measures both in public and private, we have now begun to privately question the authorities on the apparent disconnect between their words and deeds. END COMMENT. PENNINGTON