Security forces fired an unprecedented number of such explosive devices on June 12 as they clashed outside the Armenian parliament with protesters demanding Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian’s resignation. The use of force was strongly condemned by not only the Armenian opposition but also civil society groups.
Research conducted by one of those Western-funded groups, the Union of Informed Citizens (UIC), backed opposition claims that the police used Russian-made Zarya-3 grenades that were not authorized by the Armenian Health Ministry at that point. Health Minister Anahit Avanesian formally added Zarya-3 to the ministry’s list of crowd control equipment only on June 26, two weeks after the crackdown.
In written answers to relevant questions sent by RFE/RL’s Armenian Service one month ago, the Interior Ministry declined late on Monday to clarify whether the riot police fired Zarya-3 or other, less powerful grenades used against protesters in the past. It referred all inquiries to another law-enforcement agency which claims to be investigating the legality of the police actions on June 12.
The agency, the Investigative Committee, said, for its part, on Tuesday that it cannot provide such information because the probe is still not over. It confirmed that no police officers have been indicted so far.
ARMENIA - Demonstrators scuffle with law enforcement officers during a protest against Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian in Yerevan, June 12, 2024.
Zaruhi Hovannisian, a human rights activist, criticized the authorities’ stance, saying that it highlights a “lack of the Pashinian government’s accountability to the public.” She suggested that the government made a “political decision” to allow the police to use Zarya-3 against demonstrators.
According to Russia’s leading state arms exporter, Zarya-3 is “designed to temporarily suppress mental stability of armed criminals with acoustic and light effects.” Valeri Osipian, a former chief of the Armenian police who had long been involved in crowd control, said last week that security forces had previously used Zarya-3 only for “disarming criminals and gangs.”
Earlier in June, Levon Yeranosian, a former commander of Armenian interior troops, was sentenced to four years in prison for what a Yerevan court deemed an unauthorized and dangerous use of less powerful Zarya-2 stun grenades against Pashinian-led protesters in 2018. Yeranosian avoided imprisonment thanks to a general amnesty declared in 2019. He too has insisted that Zarya-3 was never used against protesters before Pashinian came to power.
According to the Health Ministry, at least 57 of the people hospitalized after the June 12 clashes had shrapnel wounds which experts say could have been caused by Zarya-3 but not Zarya-2. One of the injured protesters had three of his fingers amputated as a result.