Avetik Chalabian leads the Hayakve opposition movement that endorsed billionaire Samvel Karapetian’s Strong Armenia alliance ahead of the disputed elections. He was taken into custody and indicted on June 24 in what Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian’s critics see as a post-election government crackdown on the Armenian opposition.
Armenia’s Investigative Committee claimed that Chalabian traveled to a foreign country, presumably Russia, in May and persuaded government officials there to help Strong Armenia garner more votes in the elections. The committee said the officials pledged to have wealthy businesspeople order their Armenian employees travel to Armenia to vote for the ruling Civil Contract party’s main election challenger. It charged Chalabian with attempting to obstruct Armenians’ “exercise of electoral rights.”
Chalabian again strongly denied the accusation as he went on trial in a Yerevan court of first instance. He described the criminal case as a “distortion of reality” aimed at “disrupting our political activities.”
Meanwhile, prosecutors petitioned the presiding judge to extend his detention. The judge, Davit Balayan, rejected the demand and ordered Chalabian’s immediate release.
The case is based on a purported audio of Chalabian’s secretly recorded conversation with two other persons during which they discussed in Russian the participation of Armenian citizens living in Russia in the June 7 elections. It was posted on a pro-government social media account on the eve of the vote.
Chalabian insisted the next day that the recording was doctored to discredit him. He said his only contact with Russian officials was an “ordinary” meeting in January with diplomats from Russia’s embassy in Yerevan.
Hundreds of opposition members and supporters were arrested during the election campaign and even on election day on mostly vote-buying charges denied by Strong Armenia and other opposition groups. The crackdown continued after the polls marred by opposition allegations of serious fraud.