Eyewitnesses said that Mher Sahakian of the main opposition Hayastan alliance punched Vladimir Vartanian, the chairman of the parliament committee on legal affairs, during a session of the panel held behind the closed doors. They said the violence followed a shouting match between Vartanian and Sahakian and other opposition lawmakers.
Vartanian, who represents the ruling Civil Contract party, suffered an injury to his left eyebrow and was treated in hospital following the incident.
Meanwhile, other senior pro-government lawmakers called the police. Parliament speaker Alen Simonian could be seen giving instructions to police officers and security guards in the parliament lobby before they dragged away Sahakian to a police station in Yerevan.
Armenia’s Investigative Committee said later in the day that Sahakian was placed under arrest on suspicion of “hooliganism.” The law-enforcement agency did not clarify whether it will bring relevant charges against him.
Armenian law gives it three days to decide whether to indict the 35-year-old oppositionist and ask the National Assembly to lift his immunity from prosecution.
“We know very well what influence Civil Contract has on the law-enforcement system and don’t exclude that they will also raise the issue of his arrest and prosecution,” Sahakian’s lawyer, Ruben Melikian, told reporters.
Melikian insisted that his client acted in self-defense, a claim echoed by Artsvik Minasian, another opposition parliamentarian who also attended the committee meeting. Minasian said that during the meeting Vartanian shouted at opposition members of the committee before standing up and walking menacingly towards Sahakian.
In a statement, Hayastan’s parliamentary group likewise blamed the incident on Vartanian’s “provocative and unbalanced behavior.”
Vartanian said, however, that the assault was unprovoked. He claimed that Sahakian and other opposition deputies ignored his “legitimate demands” to stick to the meeting’s agenda.
Sahakian’s swift arrest sharply contrasted with law-enforcement authorities’ response to violent incidents involving lawmakers affiliated with the ruling party.
One of those pro-government lawmakers, Vahagn Aleksanian, approached and kicked Hayastan’s Vahe Hakobian as the latter gave a speech on the parliament floor in August 2021. Hakobian and five other opposition deputies were hit by a larger number of Civil Contract lawmakers in an ensuing melee that was not swiftly stopped by scores of security personnel present in the chamber. The authorities did not try to prosecute anyone in connection with that incident witnessed by Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian.
