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Reporters Without Borders (RSF) condemns yesterday’s search by police of the headquarters of the Yerevan-based Armenian news website Yerevan.Today, stating It violated the confidentiality of journalists’ sources.

In a statement released on Tuesday, RSF says the police removed some of Yerevan.Today’s computer equipment during the search, which lasted seven hours and temporarily stopped the site from operating. They also searched the home of its editor, Sevak Hakobyan.

The authorities insisted that the searches had “nothing to do with the journalistic activities” of Yerevan.Today and were carried out as part of an investigation into the origin of a secretly-recorded phone conversation between two top security officials, which the Armenian media published last week.

“The search of Yerevan.Today’s premises and the seizure of its equipment constitute grave violations of the principle of the protection of journalists’ sources, which is guaranteed by Armenian legislation and the European Court of Human Rights,” said Johann Bihr, the head of RSF’s Eastern Europe and Central Asia desk. “We regret that the police did not seek a less intrusive and more proportionate way to achieve their legitimate goal.”

Armenian law enforcers raided the headquarters of Yerevan.Today on 17 September as part of the criminal case into the wiretapping of the telephone conversation between National Security Service Director Artur Vanetsyan and Special Investigative Service Head Sasun Khachatryan. In the recording, the two high-level officials informally discuss the ongoing criminal investigation into the March 2008 post-election crackdown in Yerevan.

The recording was widely reported in the Armenian media on 11 September after being posted on YouTube. The authorities claim that Yerevan.Today briefly posted it online two days earlier and then deleted it. Yerevan.Today insists that this claim stems from an erroneous technical evaluation. Computer security experts say the website can be right.