Court orders two-month detention for Armenian archbishop

A Yerevan court has ordered a two-month remand for Archbishop Arshak Khachatryan, Chancellor of the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin. The court granted the prosecution’s request and placed him in custody on Friday, his lawyer, Arsen Babayan, reported.

The presiding judge, Masis Melkonyan, offered no public explanation for the decision. According to Babayan, the defense has yet to receive the formal ruling and intends to appeal it.

The senior cleric is accused of having one of his aides plant drugs in the backpack of a protester who demanded Catholicos Karekin II’s resignation in 2018.  

Investigators say the case is prosecuted under Article 393(2) of the Armenian Criminal Code, which pertains to unlawful distribution of narcotics by a group in a public place.

The lawyer dismissed the charge as absurd, calling the archbishop's prosecution politically motivated.