We have bred rats and now we should get rid of them - opinion (video)
Heads of creative unions in Armenia call on the authorities and the members of the Sasna Dzrer armed groups to do everything to prevent bloodshed. Today, they spoke about the consequences of the group’s actions, clashes between riot police and citizens and discussed possible ways out of the situation. Karen Aghamyan, President of the Artists’ Union of Armenia, wonders why the police should decide to use violence against citizens last night. At the same time he cannot understand how people could throw stones at the police. “It provokes passions. Obviously, some forces wanted this to happen,” he said. Mkrtich Minasyan, President of the Union of Architects, says the authorities should learn lessons from the past to exclude similar occurrences. “Things cannot continue this way. A fair solution should be found for the guys who are there [in the police building]. There should be no more bloodshed but something must be changed after it. Last year people went to the street to protest against a planned rise in electricity tariffs. Problems are not solved in the country, our state agencies do not do their job, authorities do not talk to people, and all this creates an atmosphere. How can they treat people in such a cynical way? This disrespectful behaviour accumulates hatred inside people and causes a great wave of discontent. Now these guys have shouldered the responsibility because they know the smell of blood,” Mr Minasyan said. President of the Union of Composers Aram Satyan agrees that the authorities should have drawn corresponding conclusions long ago. Anyway, he does not think that Sasna Dzrer took the right step in order to solve the problems in the country. President of Journalists' Union Astghik Gevorgyan the guys who seized the police coupund in Erebuni district are ‘glorious freedom fighters,’ but today they are in a state of euphoria. “I urge them to sober up and understand what they are doing and why they are labeled ‘hostage takers. They are all our brothers in both camps,’ she said. Ruben Gevorgyants, President of the Union of Cinematographers, says the mechanisms to prevent future bloodshed are in the hands of relevant agencies. He says the standoff could have been resolved if the authorities had met the first demand of the gunmen and released their leader Jirayr Sefilyan. “Likewise, Nairi Hunanyan said [during the 1999 parliamentary carnage] that they had stormed the parliament building to restore justice and neglected rights of people. But what was the outcome? Murder! After the inclident the country appeared in a different place where we did not want it to appear. These methods do not produce the desired results,” he said. Speaking about the anti-government gunmen, Ruben Gevorgyants, said, “They are honest guys. I am sure that they did not kill the police officer deliberately. The guys had to go to this step, because it is impossible to tolerate the existence of so many rats in the country. we can no longer go in the same way that we have done in the past 25 years. We have been breading rats for 25 years, it is time to get rid of them.”
