Armenian Prosecutor General's office: "Azerbaijan attempts to order the murder of Armenian political scientist Levon Melik-Shahnazaryan"

"The investigation found out that in early April of 2008 Aghababyan along with his friend Kondzhoryan met with some Akhan, Azerbaijani native, in the Marneuli region of Georgia.

During the meeting, Akhan offered these two Armenians to kill Levon Melik-Shahnazaryan for $10,000 for his critical speeches on the internal and external policy of Azerbaijan and the leadership of this country in press and on websites", says the statement.

The Armenian prosecutor general's office states that Aghababyan and Kondzhoryan agreed to the proposal and "received a whole of $500 from him for realization of their criminal intentions".

As is reported in mid April of 2008 they managed to learn the cell phone number of Melik-Shahnazaryan, the place where he works and the fact that he also teaches at the Anania Shiarkatsi university. The killers also learned where the political scientist lives.

"After holding all preliminary works, they took a gun with six cartridges from a man Karen by name promising to return it. Kondzhoryan was holding the gun", said the press service.

Reports say that on April 23 of 2008 Aghababyan and Kondzhoryan headed for the Ptgni village of Kotay. There, Aghababyan undertook the control over the area and Kondzhoryan, taking the gun and crossing the fence, came up to the window of the living-room and from a distance of three meters he fired at Melik-Shahnazaryan, standing by the window. But the fire hit the metallic treillage and changed its direction.

Thus, the criminals were not lucky in killing the political scientist. "Yet from April 29 until May 7, they periodically called to Melik-Shahnazaryan, threatening to kill his family members and demanding from him not to make announcements and publications and to spread information about his death via the mass media", said the press service.

As is reported, Melik-Shahnazaryan recorded these calls on his mobile phone and they were further transferred to the lazer disk. This disk was taken off him on May 9.

According to the Armenian general prosecutor's office, "while decoding the tape, it was revealed that Aghababyan and Kondzhoryan intended to kill Melik-Shahnazaryan in order to stop his activity as a public figure".

On the basis of these evidences, Aghababyan is charged under articles 34-305 (attempted murder of the state, political or public figure, committed in order to stop his activity) and paragraph 2 of article 235 (illegal purchase, sale, storing, transportation and holding of a gun, committed by a group of persons  by preliminary agreement). Kondzhoryan is being searched.

On October 3 of 2008, the criminal case was sent to the Northern criminal court for consideration in details.

The criminal case on Kondzoryan's, Akhan and Karen will be considered separately. Operative search measures are underway.

/Novosti-Armenia/