Your trusted source

The Armenian authorities took no action to curb the spread of the novel coronavirus in the country, Artur Ghazinyan, the leader of the opposition One Armenia party, told a news conference on Friday, presenting the grounds for the rejection of his legal claim calling for criminal proceedings into government’s coronavirus mishandling by the Special Investigative Service.

The conclusion of an investigator presented on behalf of the Republic of Armenia states that the actions of state officials were connected with the pace of the Covid-19 spread and concrete measures were taken in line with the situation.

Ghazinyan stressed that his claim offered concrete factual information on the authorities’ efforts to hide or distort information on the infection posing a serious threat to people’s life and health, whereas it was for the government, in the person of the prime minister and health minister, to publicise such data.

Noting that the law enforcement agency has turned down his lawsuit and refused to open a criminal case, Artur Ghazinyan said that the investigator only reached a deputy health minister for an explanation on the matter, while he should have taken an explanation from the premier, health minister and director of Nork Infectious Clinical Hospital. who provided updated data on Covid-19.

According to the politician, the investigator did not take or compare the data on coronavirus provided by the WHO from February 6 to March 16 with the information provided by Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Minister of Health Arsen Torosyan to reveal the distortions that occurred during this period.

"For that purpose the investigator should have considered Arsen Torosyan's statements that “it is just a type of seasonal flu", “it is not dangerous", “the death rate of the virus is equal to that of seasonal flu” to compare them with the WHO's advisory statements,” Ghazinyan stressed, adding the statements came against the backdrop of 3.5-4% coronavirus fatality rate against 0.5-1% death rate for influenza.

Also, the politician said he had made a “sensational revelation” from the investigator’s response, reading out load a part of it: “Arthur Ghazinyan made judgments about the Covid-19 infection based on the current situation, when more than 5 months have passed since the disease outbreak in the Republic of Armenia."

In Ghazinyan’s words, the response testifies to that fact that the first coronavirus case was reported in Armenia in late January or early February, as repeatedly claimed by the Nork Infectious Clinical Hospital head at briefings but refuted by Pashinyan as an error,

Arthur Ghazinyan concluded that the Special Investigative Service and the hospital director were more open with Armenian citizens than the prime minister and the health minister.