Campaigning for the June 7 parliamentary elections, Pashinian repeatedly vowed to “bring to their knees” and “take out” Kocharian and the leaders of the two other main opposition contenders. He also said that they will go to jail if he wins reelection. One of them, Gagik Tsarukian, was demonstratively arrested on Monday.
Kocharian brought up those statements during the latest session of his trial, triggering tense exchanges with the presiding judge, Sargis Petrosian.
“This is a political order,” said the 71-year-old ex-president. “While such orders were previously sent by text messages, they are now being issued publicly.”
“Those statements do not and cannot have any impact on my administration of justice in any way,” countered Petrosian. He said Kocharian must either trust him or demand that another judge take over the trial.
Kocharian’s lawyers already demanded in November 2024 that Petrosian recuse himself from the case because of his past links to the ruling Civil Contract party. The 36-year-old judge rejected the demand. He downplayed the fact that he was affiliated with Civil Contract before taking the bench in June 2024.
Kocharian, his former chief of staff Armen Gevorgian and two retired army generals are prosecuted again in connection with a 2008 post-election violence in Yerevan. They were cleared of “overthrow of the constitutional order” by another judge in April 2021 after Armenia’s Constitutional Court ruled that the accusation, rejected by them as politically motivated, is unconstitutional.
Prosecutors appealed against the acquittal, saying that they must be allowed to bring a different accusation also related to the events of March 2008, which left eight protesters and two police personnel dead. The Court of Cassation gave the green light for the new trial in September 2024.