A well-known civic activist accused Armenian law-enforcement authorities of attempting to fabricate criminal charges against him after spending about an hour in police custody on Wednesday.
Argishti Kivirian, an outspoken critic of President Serzh Sarkisian’s administration, was detained by police officers on a street in Yerevan after refusing to allow them to search his pockets on the grounds that he may be carrying a knife. He did not resist the arrest.
“I just demanded that they don’t get too close to me,” Kivirian told reporters after his release. “I also held on to my pockets.”
The 44-year-old activist agreed to empty his pockets at a police station in the city center in the presence of his lawyers.
In a statement on the incident, the Armenian police acknowledged that that he was not found to possess any sharp objects. The statement described the police actions as an “honest mistake.”
Kivirian insisted, however, that the police planned to prosecute him on trumped-up charges in retaliation against his anti-government activities and statements. “They clearly did not manage to plant something in my pockets and they were very upset with that,” he claimed.
Kivirian, who currently manages a Yerevan law firm, has long actively participated in anti-government demonstrations organized by Armenian opposition and civic groups. He has been briefly detained and even sued by the police on a number of occasions.
Kivirian took legal action against the chief of the national police, Vladimir Gasparian, and one his deputies more than a year ago. A Yerevan court is still holding hearings on the case.
In 2009, Kivirian was beaten up and severely injured by two men outside his home. The activist, who ran two online news publications at the time, subsequently accused the ethnic Armenian police chief of the Akhalkalaki district in neighboring Georgia of masterminding the attack.
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