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Heritage: Open Letter To The Armenian Public

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  • Heritage: Open Letter To The Armenian Public

    PRESS RELEASE
    The Heritage Party
    Yerevan, Armenia
    Tel.: (+374 - 10) 27.00.03, 27.16.00 (temporary)
    Fax: (+374 - 10) 52.48.46 (temporary)
    Email: [email protected]; [email protected]
    Website: www.heritage.am

    October 30, 2006

    HERITAGE: OPEN LETTER TO THE ARMENIAN PUBLIC

    Yerevan--The forcible March closure of the Heritage Party's headquarters,
    the subsequent surreptitious and illegal break-in at the already-sealed
    office, the criminal theft of information from its main computer, and the
    campaign of political pressure and persecution unleashed against members,
    supporters, and local chapters of a duly-registered political organization
    compelled Raffi Hovannisian and the leadership of Heritage to seek justice
    amid the tribunes of the legal system.

    In spite of incontrovertible evidence attesting to the commission of
    criminal acts, the multiple levels of the judicial branch have repeatedly
    rendered capricious rejections of the legal claim to reopen the offices.

    This series of unfounded judgments supports the conviction that we have
    come
    up against different links in a single chain of criminal conduct that is
    guided by the highest echelon of executive authority.

    As for the scandalous reproduction of the "Watergate" precedent--the
    unlawful break-in to party headquarters and the presidential theft of
    information therefrom--the Armenian police department and then Yerevan's
    prosecutor have refused our legitimate demand to file criminal charges,
    evidently in an ill-disguised attempt to cover up the crimes in question.

    Accordingly, as a measure of final recourse, we have petitioned--and expect
    a just determination from--the Republic's prosecutor general to institute
    criminal proceedings and commence a full investigation by November 10, the
    deadline set by law.

    All this is taking place against the backdrop of the administration's
    recently repeated "oaths" to guarantee the absolute fairness of the
    parliamentary elections scheduled for Spring 2007.

    Without further interpreting Heritage's recent "experiences," we submit that
    the party enters the pre-election season--which de facto has already been
    launched and is overflowing upon the country's television screens--(a)
    locked out of its central offices, (b) with its database broken into and
    compromised, (c) being systematically and unlawfully deprived by relevant
    state bodies of the right to rent meeting space and thus to exercise the
    freedoms of speech and association, and (d) on a presidentially-conceived
    "black list" wholly forbidding access for Heritage, its founder and
    officials to the electronic media, which all are under strict supervision
    and vertical control.

    We appeal to the Armenian public with these key queries for the national
    agenda:

    - Can this constant course of illegalities and blatant violations of
    civil rights assume, under any circumstance, the mantle of
    fundamental legitimacy for the upcoming elections?

    - Is it possible that the failure to launch court proceedings--or
    their dismissal once instituted--against individuals, both officials
    and others, who have committed or commissioned crimes will serve
    to rein in the perpetrators of thousands of instances of electoral
    fraud?

    - Does Armenia's leadership have, in the first place, the moral right
    and legal standing to speak in the name of democracy and justice?

    - In the sum total of the foregoing, isn't the prospect of the
    parliamentary elections already prejudiced, and its fairness breached
    in advance?

    We demand answers, expect justice, and will continue our nation's quest for
    liberty and the rule of law, the triumph of equal rights for all, and the
    achievement of an Armenia for and of the people.
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