Samvel Karapetyan subjected to severe political persecution and unlawfully detained for about 6 months – lawyer

Arrests in Armenia are not a preventive measure; they are not aimed at mitigating risks of improper behavior, but represent exclusively a repressive, authoritarian tool, lawyer Aram Vardevanyan said on Facebook.

“Human Rights Day and the real state of human rights in Armenia. Although the new Criminal Procedure Code introduces a wide range of new preventive measures, in practice only arrests are applied in all cases that outrage public opinion.

These public data clearly show that arrests in Armenia are not a preventive measure, arrests are not aimed at mitigating risks of improper behavior but represent exclusively a repressive, authoritarian tool.

National philanthropist Samvel Karapetyan has been unlawfully arrested since June 18, 2025. Judge Zh. Meliksetyan of the Anti-Corruption Court of Appeal is considering the complaints we submitted, and today is the deadline for submitting written positions, while on December 11 the court must issue its ruling. During this period, a number of additional written explanations and positions were submitted to the Court, rejecting the legal basis for continued detention in any form.

From a legal standpoint, it is an indisputable fact that Samvel Karapetyan is subjected to the severe political persecution, has been unlawfully detained for about six months, and throughout this entire period has been deprived even of the minimum guarantees of a fair trial.

In fact, the unlawful grounds for the detention are reflected in posts made by the head of the executive branch on Facebook on June 17, 2025.

Freedom to all political prisoners!” the lawyer said.