On August 6 the RA Court of Cassation left in force the ruling of the preceding court on the legitimacy of actions of the investigating body that did not institute criminal proceedings against the correspondent of “Hayots Ashkhar” daily Kima Eghiazarian on the complaint of the Chairman of Helsinki Association of Armenia Mikael Danielian. As it has been reported, the reason for the appeal was the article by Kima Eghiazarian titled “Mika’s Hullabaloo for the Council of Europe” ("Hayots Ashkhar”, April 24, 2004) where, in the opinion of the human rights activist, an “ungrounded conclusion” is made that Mikael Danielian is “the spy of the Council of Europe in Armenia” (see YPC Weekly Newsletter, April 30 — May 6, 2004).
However, the RA Court of Appeals, that considered the complaint of Mikael Danielian on July 8, and the investigative body that was to decide the institution of criminal proceedings, took into account the explanation of the author of the newspaper piece, who, referring to an Armenian language dictionary, pointed out that the word she used has other meanings but for a “spy”.
