On June 20, the website of “Henaran” Press Club, Henaran.am, posted the statement of Yerevan Council of Elders member, Ashot Papayan, regarding the impeding of professional activities of Hakob Karapetian, correspondent of iLur.am. As we have reported, the incident with iLur.am correspondent occurred on April 23 in Yerevan, at the campaign event of the Republican Party of Armenia. The journalist was shooting on a video camera the event organizers distributing balloons to the children, when some people approached him and tried to find out who he was and what he was doing there. Then, one of the event organizers, Ashot Papayan, hit the journalist swearing at him. They took away the video camera from Hakob Karapetian, and returned it not long after, but with deleted files. The Police Major, who was present at the site of incident and did not intervene, was later imposed to disciplinary sanctions along with other representatives of law enforcement bodies. In connection with the attack against Hakob Karapetian, criminal proceedings were instituted upon Part 1 of Article 164 of RA Criminal Code, "Obstruction of legitimate professional activities of journalist " (see details in YPC Weekly Newsletter, April 19-25, 2013 and April 26 – May 2, 2013).
In his statement, Ashot Papayan, re-elected on May 6, 2013 to the Yerevan Council of Elders by the list of Republic Party of Armenia, expressed regret about the “unpleasant incident” and apologized to the journalist.
In his turn, in an interview to A1plus.am Hakob Karapetian appreciated the apologies of Ashot Papayan and the punishment imposed on the police officers for their inaction, at the same time stressing that he will be completely satisfied only when there are no such attacks against journalists at all.
