YEREVAN, DECEMBER 2, ARMENPRESS: Samvel Uzunian, a judge that has been presiding since 2001 February over a court case trying a group of defendants, accused of attacking the Armenian parliament in 1999 October 27 and killing eight top government officials, upheld today state prosecutors’ demands to sentence six of them to life imprisonment and one to 14 years in jail.
Publicizing the lower court’s final verdict Uzunian said the group’s ringleader Nairi Hunanian, his brother Karen, Edik Grigorian, Derenik Bejanian, Vram Galstian and Ashot Knyazian were sentenced to life imprisonment and Hamlet Stepanian to 14 years in jail. The first five were accused of direct perpetration of the crime and the latter two of assisting them. The verdict also ruled that a total of 9.8 million Drams, the cost of damages sustained to parliament building in the armed attack, must be confiscated from them.
In their concluding remarks on October 24 , the prosecution had said that the accusations of terrorism, high treason and murder were fully proven.
The trial started on February 15, 2001 and since then 297 court session were held, 123 witnesses were questioned. The lower court’s decision can be appealed against in the Court of Review within 15 days after the issuance of the verdict.
Transport and communications Minister Andranik Manukian, who was severely wounded in the seizure of parliament, expressed his dissatisfaction over the ruling, saying that the attackers should have been sentenced to execution.
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