Artsakh Human Rights Defender responds to police chief`s verbal  attack against journalist 

ArmInfo.Artsakh Human Rights Defender Gegham Stepanyan responded to the attacks by the head of the 

Tavush regional police department, Colonel Arthur Mkrtchyan, against the Artsakh journalist.

Mkrtchyan, during protests in the village of Kirants, the territory 

of which the authorities are unilaterally handing over to Azerbaijan 

in violation of RA legislation, in response to the remark of an 

Artsakh journalist that the same thing would happen to the residents 

of this community as what happened to 120 thousand Armenians of 

Artsakh, suddenly asked him The question is where is he from? Having 

received a response from Artsakh, Mkrtchyan stated cynically: "Why 

didn't you stay there? Why did you leave Artsakh?"

Reacting to these attacks by Mkrtchyan, the Human Rights Commissioner 

of Artsakh drew attention to the fact that the question "Why did you 

leave Artsakh?", which the head of the Tavush police asked 

photojournalist David Ghagramanyan, is not an ordinary question that 

is asked during a constructive dialogue.

"This is a question that is asked in a situation where they 

deliberately try to insult a citizen of Artsakh who is already 

suffering from the pain of losing his homeland, when they try to say 

that Armenia is not your homeland and you have no right to speak. 

They do this deliberately, with the aim of causing pain .

Moreover, this policeman is not the only one who asked a similar 

question during this time. I am sure that those who ask this question 

know the answer very well, and there is no need to once again explain 

to them the consequences of the people of Artsakh being under the 

control of Azerbaijan.

And if a person decides to ask such a question, having seen the daily 

pain of thousands of his fellow countrymen, then no advice or 

recommendations will save him from this disgusting abyss of stupidity 

and immorality," Stepanyan concluded.