Anti-corruption panel ‘part of Armenian authorities’ populist program’ - advocate

The Armenian authorities’ move to launch an anti-corruption panel totally falls within the logic of their populist campgin aimed at manipulating the society, a Yerevan-based public attorney said yesterday, criticizing the idea as an attempt to present courts as "incompetent bodies" lacking the necessary expertise to handle crimes of corruption.

“The courts, by and large, proved in the past three years that they have the necessary capacity to investigate cases. Hence these actions are aimed at creating subservient courts appointed by themselves in order to push ahead with orders,” Mihran Poghosyan told Tert.am.

As for the plans to dissolve the Special Investigative Service (SIS) to create an anti-corruption commission, the lawyer described the idea as a "step backward", noting that the Prosecutor General’s Office had a similar independent investigatve body until 2005 to separate the oversight and investigative functions.

Asked whether the already existing court rulings may be subject to a further probe, Poghosyan said he doesn’t expect that level of illegitimacies by the current government. But he admitted that government change processes affected the final outcome in several cases, necessitating the launch of a new proceeding despite the availability of a final decision (by an investigator).

Addressing the possible problems in case of the Investigative Committee’s disssolution, Poghosyan highlighted the expected difficulties "linked to both technical maintenance and human resources". “Problems may arise in the proceedings of agencies facing a process of dissolution - in connection with the already existing cases - as the state will have to cover the costs at its own expense to resolve the problems. This is being done for populist purposes, with the authorities trying to ‘position themselves’ to use the law enforcement sector as a kind of club against former officials or those people who, in a way, changed their position during their tenure,” he added.

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