Armenian opposition MP broke his hand in parliament brawl, lawyer says

Opposition Hayastan bloc MP Mher Sahakyan suffered a broken arm after brawling with his pro-government colleague Vladimir Vardanyan in the parliament on Friday, his lawyer Ruben Melikyan said on Saturday.

Sahakyan was detained for allegedly assaulting Vardanyan, who represents the ruling Civil Contract party, at a closed meeting of the parliament committee on legal affairs on Friday morning.

“Mher Sahakyan has been diagnosed with a fracture of his right hand by an X-ray,” the lawyer wrote on Facebook on Saturday, stressing it totally rejects the preliminary version of the investigating body that he hit the pro-government MP with an object.

Melikyan stated earlier that his client acted in self-defense. In a statement, the Hayastan faction also blamed the incident on Vardanyan’s “provocative and unbalanced behavior”.