Violent opposition protests in Armenia leave eight people dead and scores wounded as President Robert Kocharian declares a 20-day state of emergency. The protesters, supporters of opposition leader Levon Ter Petrosian, accuse the government of manipulating the votes in favor of Serge Sarkisian.
President Robert Kocharian declared the state of emergency Saturday night following a day of clashes between police and demonstrators protesting alleged fraud in the Feb. 19 presidential election. Police fired in the air and let off tear gas to break up a gathering of some 15,000 opposition demonstrators, in some of the worst political violence to hit post-Soviet Armenia.
Police spokesman Sayat Shirinian said yesterday that eight people were killed and 33 officers wounded. He did not say if the dead were police or protesters. After the president’s announcement, a few thousand people remained in the streets, some holding peaceful vigils…
Opponents allege the election was fundamentally unfair, saying the government exerted pressure on people to vote for Sarkisian and pressured news media into skewing coverage to favor him.
I’m sure it’s Turkey’s fault. In one way or another.
Comments
1
jack
March 3, 2008 @ 7:58 pm CET
you are such a nasty turkish propagandist. that i would even lower my self to stuip and idiotic jibberish. i would only suggest to you to get a F***ing turkish make mirror. and look into your uglyless. because averbody else SEES in clearly. you piece of tukisk scum.
2
Michael van der Galien
March 3, 2008 @ 8:09 pm CET
Lets leave that one comment up. Thanks for making something very clear to all our readers Jack.
3
Nihat
March 3, 2008 @ 8:12 pm CET
What do independent observers say about the elections?
4
sevak
March 3, 2008 @ 8:28 pm CET
if only the author of this blog could understand his statements without his overwhelming positive bias of turkey…Did you ever stop and think about the other side?? There has to be a reason that many Armenians don’t like Turks…maybe it would help to notice that many other countries, Greece being one and other European nations don’t like turkey…Or maybe the fact that how all of a sudden millions of Christian people vanished from your country in the beginning of the last century.
5
Michael van der Galien
March 3, 2008 @ 9:00 pm CET
Sevak: my country?
Anyway, actually I know a lot about this subject and I also know why Armenians dislike Turks. I’ve written extensively on this subject. In short: the Armenians adopted an extreme form of Christianity mixed with a nationalist ideology, which led them to believe that they were superior to the Muslim Turks. This, in turn, led them to massacre tends of thousands of innocent Muslim Turks, and when WWI broke out they thought that they could establish an independent Armenia (from coast to coast and that nonsense) by attacking the Turks from behind / from within, which would then cause them to lose the war against the Russians, French, and British. Sadly for the Dasnaks that plan didn’t work out so well.
Sadly for you, however, this article isn’t about the so-called genocide, it’s about Armenia itself. Lets stick to the topic. All other off-topic comments will be deleted. Armenia, it’s about Armenia.
6
A. A. B.
March 3, 2008 @ 9:27 pm CET
Armenia is not a working democracy. Turkey also is a country where not everything is perfect. But I don’t think this is a criterion to judge what happened in 1915.
7
jack
March 4, 2008 @ 1:52 am CET
haha turkish ashole!!!!!
"They are not perfect like Turkish society and 1915 is huge lie??????"
YOUR KIND IS C-O-N-D-E-M-N-E-D TO LIVE THE LIFE OF ANIMALS YOU’VE ALWAYS BEEN. AND YOU WANT TO JOIN EUROPE?? WHY DON’T YOU GET TOGETHER AND JOIN CHENGIZ AND ADOLF’S UNION??
YOU WOULD FEEL RIGHT AT HOME.
March 3, 2008
PoliGazette
