Susanna Petrosyan, Yerevan. Exclusively to VK
More than 500 lawyers representing the Lawyers Chamber of Armenia carried out a day-long strike on June 11 as a protest against lawlessness in the judicial system, first of all against unacceptable methods of work in the Court of Cassation. In late May the group of lawyers decided to establish a commission which should investigate the most outrageous violations in the judicial system and present proposals on settlement of the issues at the Court of Cassation. But later, lawyers decided to use radical measures against judicial outrage. The aim of the strike is to draw the attention of the juridical power to these problems.
The participants of the strike explained that none of the measures taken earlier – claims to various departments, publications in the mass media, and so on – helped, as they were ignored.
The lawyers stated that the strike was caused by amendments made in 2007 to the Judicial Code, which defined new criteria for considering cassation claims. According to the lawyers, the Court of Cassation interprets unclear criteria as it wishes and doesn’t explain refusals to consider: “Such activity of the Court of Cassation leads to juridical uncertainty. Even if there is no corruption at the stage of cassation claims consideration, the double standards used by the Court of Cassation, at least, do not dispel doubts that corruption lies at the basis of these principles. That is why the crisis of the judicial system is deepening,” the lawyers’ statement says.
One of the participants of the protest, Gevork Gezalyan, says that if the Court of Cassation doesn’t reconsider its policy, doesn’t stop using double standards and carrying out personally-focused legal proceedings, a full-scale defense couldn’t be provided.
Unfortunately, the view that courts are corrupt and take bribes from defendants for delivering the verdicts they need is widespread in Armenia. “If society knows that judges, prosecutors, and inspectors do not take money, bribery will become extinct,” the chairman of the Lawyers Chamber, Ruben Saakyan, says. He believes that many shortcomings of the judicial system could be fixed by decisions of the Court of Cassation.
The lawyers think that it is the Court of Cassation that is responsible for the vicious methods of work of investigation offices and prosecutors, for the unacceptable situation in the Court of Appeal, and for constant violations at all proceeding levels.
“The protest was directed not only against the Court of Cassation, but also against other constituents of the justice system. But why do we address our requirements to the Court of Cassation? Because we know that if the judicial system takes the right position, neither the police nor prosecution will commit lawlessness,” a member of the initiative group, Lusine Saakyan, confidently claims.
In response to the lawyers’ protest, an aide to the Court of Cassation's chairman, Sergey Marabyan, stated that the action against the Court of Cassation is politically colored: “From a professional point of view, the statements presented are beyond the legal sphere and have a political character. The lawyers’ actions were similar to an unreasonable smear of the authorities.” Marabyan explains that lawyers cannot strike against the courts, because the courts are not the employers of the lawyers.
Of course, a one-day strike of lawyers couldn’t raise a great wave of protest. The management of the Court of Cassation and judges didn’t response to the protest and didn’t show readiness to cooperate with the lawyers. However, the action has no analogues in Armenia and is important for judicial reforms. Perhaps similar protests will appear in the future.
